He's Everywhere

I started writing this post a few weeks ago, but with everything else that's gone on I'm only getting around to posting it now.

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We took a huge parenting step the other weekend - our first multi-night trip without The Boy. Four whole nights without him. We were apprehensive, but excited at the opportunity for a little break.

But despite the freedom of doing what we wanted, when we wanted, where we wanted.

Despite being able to slip of the room while P was showering to buy a bag of microwave popcorn and a porno magazine, and not worry about bringing The Boy with me; although he does have impeccable taste in microwave popcorn.

Despite being able to lie in bed, balance a bowl of popcorn on my stomach, watch wrestling on TV and utter the phrase "Bring on the pain" without The Boy taking it literally and bringing his heel down on my Adam's Apple.

Despite P and I being able to stay out late, tilt a few beverages, and stumble back to the hotel at a 45 degree angle.

Despite all that freedom, we thought about The Boy constantly.

• A kid learning to ski on the Bunny hill, "Oh that will be him one day."


• A baby being pulled through the village on a sled, "The Boy would love that."


• A little girl two tables over who has obviously crapped her pants, "Awwww."


• A burl formed on the side of a tree, "That looks like the time he came into our room and hid my watch but we were late so we grabbed everything in a hurry and got in the car and drove off only to discover I wasn't wearing the right pants so we turned around and drove home and I got changed which made us really late and by the time we got there our friends had left so we went and had ice cream."

Everything reminded us of him.

Before The Boy, P and I would take off at a moment's notice. Fill the cat food bowl, clean the litter box and away we go. Now of course it's not that simple, and when we do finally get a break, he's there at every turn.

And forget about any topic/movie/newspaper story/TV show that deals with child abuse/abduction/injury/death. Before being a parent, I found those sort of stories tragic, but thanks to mass media I was pretty desensitized to it. Now I can't even be in the same room if the subject comes up; it cuts too close to the bone for me.

The curse of being a parent I guess; you can get away, but you never really "get away".