I love Saturday night because I love Sunday morning. Sunday morning Jim doesn’t have to rush out of bed before 6 a.m., take a shower and catch a train. I hate Sunday night because it means Monday morning starts another six days of Jim being gone for six entire days except for our fifteen minutes – “hi honey I’m home” at 9:30 p.m. talks. I use to be so angry about this. I use be so angry that I could never reach him – meetings, no reception at the data center that he works at on Saturdays or he is just too busy. My perspective has changed a bit now….I know that he will come home eventually.
My heart couldn’t bear the thought of him not coming home, of never hearing his voice again, of Andrew not telling him “I love you daddy. I miss you daddy.” My eyes well up now. My heart aches now thinking of Jennifer and the ache she must feel. I don’t “know” her. I haven’t been fortunate enough to give her the eight second hug but my heart still aches. I have worried about her and worried for her all week. I have prayed for her and I pray that I never have to experience her pain.
My sister-in-law went through this unbearable pain last year. Many women have gone through this pain…many men have too. We humans are strong. I feel Jennifer is strong.
I made an ugly pie. Even though I had an easy week compared to Jennifer’s. I had a busy week. Last week of Anchor camp, preparing Jim’s resume and some expense reports for him, collecting information about bed and breakfasts, collecting monies for the Anchor staff, making brownies for the camp, writing letters for the camp staff and volunteers, taking our elderly friend to the doctor, to the store, driving Andrew because the bus scares him, making soup for a friend who had surgery, making our dinners, feeding and bathing Andrew….it was busier than usual. But I made an ugly pie on Thursday night. I was too embarrassed to take a photo of it.
Tonight I made a trifle out of it – some brownies, some chocolate pudding, some pie – some whipped cream. I had taken a picture of Andrew eating a piece of the pie on Friday – it is posted above. Again, he thought it was beautiful. Last night, Jim had a small piece of the pie – he thought it was good.
Tonight, sometime, Jim will come home. He will eat dinner and have some trifle and watch his Giants pre-season game that I will tape for him and I will tell him I love him. He will come home and for that I am grateful.
Mmmmmm… Trifle. I love that Andrew liked it even if you thought it was ugly. It reminds me of my Mamaw who would tell us a long list of things that were wrong with her fried apple pies (which were always incredible) before we even had the chance to try them. Sometimes you see flaws and everyone else sees yummy love.
By food blogger’s standards it was ugly…it looked halfway decent – I had made a graham cracker crust instead of a chocolate cookie crust – and after I baked it – it crumbled apart – you can’t cook/bake, be on the phone and answering e-mails about last day of camp at the same time! I’ve been reading about Mamaw’s fried pies – have you mastered them yet?
Not quite. But I’m fine with my version of them!
Some things in life cannot be fixed. For everything else, there’s trifle – the great fixer of broken desserts! I like it better than pie anyway.
My husband works pretty close to home and often comes home for lunch. I used to find that annoying at times, when I was busy, because it made me feel like I had to drop what I was doing and make lunch for him. From now on I will try to never feel anything but lucky.