Muddling Through

An Edited Blog Post on Getting Real

Just musing, which is fair enough, eh? About self, what God has put in my path, not obstacles but what God has laid before me, set in my way. Some are museable during examen but private, too personal to blog so not going there --

-- but going here. There were three of us growing up. The two younger seemed pretty much a set. Oldest, I was alone, where alone is not necessarily lonely. From early memory I wanted a baby to baby. When mama’s sister married and began having baby girls, one of them often was left at our house for weeks on end, and I learned to dote. When Linda and I married, Malinda came along and I discovered what doting really is. With Joe, I found out that baby boys are just as -- dote-able as baby girls. In our mid-thirties, unexpected came Tass and I found out what it is like to bond and love a child so dotingly that you can’t bear to let her out of your sight and the worrying is constant. Once, a quarter century ago as Linda planned a trip to Birmingham to look after her mother for three weeks, Tass protested, “Mom! You can’t leave me alone with Dad for three weeks. Dad won’t let me do anything.” Doubtless it was smothering for Tass until Kristen came along. Now Kristen is the age Tass was when Kris was born, 20. At some point Papa has to let go, and the point has arrived. But there is no replacement, what to do?

Seeing 78 just around the bend, one needs to get real. There will not be another child of my very own. Holy Nativity was filled with children yesterday, not just little boys and girls running up for Children's Time, but babies. Not one of them mine. And Ryan wasn't there, and Christian wasn't there, and Joey, Lia and Bennett weren't there. To bond with someone else’s child is futile anyway, it’s happened to me twice, and I know personally. So what to do, where to go?

An unsettling is militating for change, pressingly, almost distressingly so.

This summer I’ll explore. Explore self, maybe even discover, we’ll see. A directed silent Ignatian retreat in June, another in July, a third in August. Maybe God has someone or something to put in my way again. If so, I may go there. If not, just keep on muddling through.

T+