Dear Claire,
Baby Claire, you’re four months now and you’re cute as hell. You’re jumping around in your jolly-jumper laughing your guts off is enough for me to think to myself that I’m the luckiest guy on the planet. The sound of your freaking out in impatience with not being able to get the toy in your mouth in a nano second reminds me that you are indeed my daughter, wanting a desperate fix on the pronto. - I dig that! So, it’s good to know that we feel lucky about having you, your mother (YM) and I, but the question is will you over time feel the same way about us? So, let me speak about that ...
One, I met YM at a party, a backyard BBQ. I was going to meet another girl, something Uncle Duane set up for me. Actually, it was something your uncle Duane wanted no part of, but his then girlfriend was into setting things up when I said to them both one night, “help me out, set me up with someone here. I’m like wasting away alone in my one-bedroom working on websites by myself.” They said they had just the girl for me and I was to meet her at this party. Well, prior to leaving for the party our toilet over-flowed (I shared an apartment with Uncle giant shit Jordan). So, I almost didn’t make it, I had my sleeves rolled up with a plunger fighting as best I could until the property manager got our page and headed over to fix it. (yes Claire, you dad is from the new era of manhood that has cell phones and digital address books on the ready to make on a call in the last minute for other men to come along and fix a problem that at one time would be your authority.)
Anyway, the point here is I almost didn’t make it out. Was it a sign? The toilet backing up, gurgling grunge up onto the floor, ruining my planned on outfit, almost making it impossible for me to make it out? Were the Gods trying to speak to me then? Was this message for your mother but got mixed through the rich tapestry of city plumbing it is was my toilet that got the message and not hers? Anyway, a quick change into something else and I biked over to the party, there to meet this other lady. Thing is, as soon as I arrived at the date set-up party, as the throng of party goers separated, there was your mother sitting there talking to friends (I later learned the subject was “in what movie did you first se a 20 pound bush?) and I was sold, no need to meet this other person. Immediately it was all about hooking up with YM. You’ll be happy to know Claire that YM was a total flirt and really came onto me in some pretty fast ways, but saved the consummation of our relationship to the third date a week later.
Anyway, we got hooked up pretty quick. We were moving in together after two weeks. We were engaged in a month or two. We were married a little after a year of meeting each other. Did we rush things outta love at first sight or terror from being alone in the big city? I don’t know. What I do know is that on our wedding weekend up at a cottage your father almost died, or at the very least had his right leg amputated. This is the luck I’m talking about.
We arrive at the wedding grounds, a giant cottage area north of the city. The panel van arrives with all the tables and supplies to set this sucker up. I jump into the van to unload this sucker, I’m already bouncing off walls with excitement. I grab a table, not noticing that this sets off a pile of tables upon my right ankle and I got sandals on. Well, the edge of the table leg catches my ankle and cuts the core, blood spurts out, hurts like hell, I grovel on the ground for a while. A friend dumps some antiseptic on it and a band-aid and I’m walking with a limp. Later that day everyone’s going swimming and as you know by now, I love water, so I jump right on into the lake. Next morning, the morning of our wedding day, my foot is starting to feel weird. By wedding time it’s kind of swollen. By end of wedding night it’s like really huge and hard to put weight on. By next morning the thing is giant and starting to discolor.
So, the day after the wedding, in the afternoon, at the insistence of everyone there, YM and I head to the local hospital. I walk through the doors with a smile on my face thinking they’ll send us home saying not to worry about a thing, it’s all good. But, immediately upon seeing me I’m rushed into an emergency room, thrown on a bed, and they go to work, dropping an IV into my wrist to give me penicillin directly. Apparently, if I had waited any longer to get in there blood poisoning would have set in I’d loose a leg or worse had that tainted blood make its way to my heart and died instantly. So, I left there loaded with drugs and had to return for 4 more days of similar treatment. The cut was deep, the water was still and full of bacteria, and I almost died ... If I never met YM ...?
What were the God’s saying? I asked a Guatemalan Elder, Roderico, who happened to be at our wedding, friend of Grandpa Tony’s. He tells me that the Gods are telling me to slow down, and start thinking first before acting. The next day he wants to give us a traditional Mayan wedding ceremony, involving candles, fire pit, and eggs - Roderico can place the eggs we hold into the fire and the way they crack can tell him certain things from the spirit world that we should know about. So, as YM and I are standing there, we place our eggs into the fire, right before they are about to pop and Roderico can get a read on them, offer some life-long marriage advice from our spirit ancestors, a friend of YM’s passes out (I think her name was Janet). So, Roderico misses the egg break and rushes to attend to the passed-out-Janet. Were the God’s speaking to us yet again and if so what were they saying and are we forever doomed for not hearing it?
Finally, I want to mention a couple moments of romance with YM and I - or at least failed attempts. In one, we’re eating strawberries. One hangs from my lips, and YM moves if for the sexy kiss and removal of strawberry from my mouth into hers. She makes the move, nice kiss, bites down on the strawberry, and rips her head away pulling the strawberry in a fiery sexy twist. Problem is, she also bit down on my lower lip and tore that all to hell, blood spurting everywhere. Very romantic as I rushed to washroom and she rushed to get me some ice. Then, just the other day, over baby you, YM and I lying in bed looking at and admiring our little wonderful girl, and YM says to me, “come over to me and give me a snuggle hug.” I shift over to hug her in bed and BAM she clocks me in the side of the head with an elbow as she also made a move to hug me that I wasn’t expecting. I go down like a sack of potatoes in front of you, baby Claire, and you have that worried look on your face looking back at me.
So, from that look, this blog to you, we feel lucky to have you. We hope over the years that you feel the same way. Though there is evidence to suggest that maybe YM and I aren’t a storybook love affair, but we do seem to keep loving each other at the end of the day, we do feel lucky for each other through all the ice, bandages, and medication. And most certainly with you.
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