Facebook Archive - May 2018

May 1 - Ian has been growing his hair out since August 2016. It was down to the bottom of his shoulder blades (when wet) and THICK! I couldn’t get it in a pony tail holder. Women would have killed for his hair. But he’s an 8-year-old boy and it was hard for us to maintain. We went to see James last week to change it in some way. I asked him what his priorities were for his hair. My issues were the tangles were hard to remove and it was hot for him. He agreed. Ian told James what he wanted very specifically and James delivered. He has a 5” strip of hair down the middle (he’s calling it a bro-hawk) and the rest was a #3 guard. We also cut about 4” off the bottom. Ian loves it. I love it. He flips his hair around like a super model. I French braided the middle strip the other night and he looked like a tiny little Saxon warrior. My kid is pretty great. ❤️

May 1 - This giant kid needs to hurry up and get his own bike so he doesn’t add weight to mine. That said, I adore that we have Bluetooth comms and can talk the entire ride. Best purchase ever, other than the bike itself. Gotta finish our free ice cream cause we can’t take it with us.

May 5 - Just a little trim before breakfast. Bro-hawk is now man bun

May 5 - My first large group ride! It was so great. Thirty or so bikes out to Surry and back. Ian was a champion passenger and we both leveled up in motorcycle.May 8 - I poured a full glass of lemonade and set it on the side table next to the couch. Ian plopped down in my seat and took a large swing of my lemonade. He then reached past the remaining 12oz of lemonade and attempted to drag a blanket *over the glass*. I dove and made some panicked “aaAAaa” noise, which doesn’t actually stop an 8-year-old in his tracks but makes him pull harder. Four towels later, we’re back on the couch. And I expressly said, “Don’t. Touch. My drink.”

May 9 - Ian at the farmers market: “I’m a cake sniffing orphan in the orphan shack!” In related news, we had a pound of strawberries for dinner.

Facebook Archive - March 2018

March 14 - Ian: “I have a hard time keeping track of who you’re dating and who you’re just hanging out with.”
Me: “You’re not the only one, dude.”

March 17 - (at Oceanfront for Shamrock 8K) Ian: “Next time can we bring bikes?” 

March 17 - Ian: “But you haven’t given up on love, have you? Oh I guess that’s impossible since you’ll always love me.”

March 25 - I forced my child to use the “push to talk” feature in his online game so the whole party doesn’t have to listen to him narrate the scenario. You’re welcome, fellow gamers.

March 28 - 

I showed Ian the video that Rich made for him back in 2012. He didn't like it very much. He said it didn't look like Daddy. 

My mom will get teary-eyed and say that I kept Rich alive long enough for Ian to know him. That if he had died in 2012, Ian would have never known him. 

But it does make me a little sad that the person Ian remembers is not the man I fell in love with. I have said that my husband went away in the summer of 2014 after his second failed surgery. And that's right about when Ian started having his own memories of him. 

My son and I love and miss two totally different people. 

I showed Ian one of the videos Rich made just before accepting hospice. It was about his time in the Army. Ian liked that video much better. It looked like his dad (sunken cheeks, bushy grey beard, PICC line in his arm). And he liked the specifics of the story versus the generic "I love you" that Rich sent out to his three-year-old son. 

I guess my elephant analogy (the blind men arguing that it's a rope, a pipe, a fan, or a tree) from his eulogy is accurate after all. Rich is all of those things.

Facebook Archive - February 2018

February 14 - “I made a mistake on Gia’s card. It says ‘Never have I hurt you.’ And that’s not true because I have hurt her feelings sometimes.”

(shared with permission)

Also, Ian received a valentine from his best (male) friend Jemari. It said that “Ian is a good friend and he is smot (sic) and God blessed Ian to past (sic) a grade.”

February 23 - Ian, watching Blazing Saddles: “Why are they so mean to the black people?”
Me: “Because it’s 1871.”
Ian: “But slavery was over by then.”
Me: “Child. We’ve talked about this. Labor prisons? Unfair housing practices? The New Jim Crow?” 
Ian: “Oh, right! Man, people can be so stupid.”
Me: “Preach.”