"Am I Dreaming?"

Dinners aren’t so good on those nights like last night when either my son or daughter has a baseball or softball game. It makes for a very short night and grabbing something on the “fly” is usually the order of the day. I can’t and won’t eat at a fast food restaurant although I am sure my children would have a different opinion! I don’t like when my son and daughter eat fast food so we are always seeking “healthy” alternatives. Last week was “Chipotle” the McDonald’s of Mexican food which in my mind is a step above the “normal” fast food restaurants. I can find a vegetarian/healthy item on the menu mostly by creating my own burrito. The problem becomes my children who really only eat rice in these types of places but it is very inexpensive purchasing the rice burrito for only 65 cents!!

Anyhow last night we opted for Chinese food which isn’t fast food but relatively fast at that time of the evening. The issue is the cost but the servings size were enough that we would have dinner for two nights covering my daughter’s game tonight. The children like Chinese food but their idea of Chinese food is plain lo mein which is just the soft noodles nothing else. Yes, these children didn’t stand a chance with my DNA as I was just like this when I was their age so the apple doesn’t stray far from the tree!!!

The dinner was fast and the next thing I realized it was time to put the children to bed. These days do fly by so fast and I would swear there has been an “accelerate” button pushed on February 27th of this year!! The homework was done, dinner was eaten and everyone was safely tucked away in bed. My wife and I weren’t far behind our children as my wife worked very hard organizing the house for our first guest’s arrival today.

We collapsed into bed but we were both awake very early in the morning. My wife has a tendency of letting things creep into her subconscious and this is what happened early today. She was thinking about what she needed to finish up which essentially woke her up very early this morning. I was awake because I had sensed that my wife was awake and we had a little conversation in the wee hours of the morning. My wife has such a good soul and this is where my son’s gets his wonderful attitude from. My wife is so consciousness in whatever she does; whether it is at work or at home she means well all the time. I love her so much and I didn’t mind being awake at the wee hours of the morning. It sure beats waking up in the wee hours of the morning hearing 35 grow men snoring!!!

I took off from working out this morning to do some work before departing for the airport. This was cut short because our guest’s flight was set to arrive some 45 minutes early. This is almost unprecedented because we were hoping the flight wouldn’t be too late and her it was coming in early. My wife would join me for the drive to the airport and the timing of it all couldn’t have been any better. Our guest who is my mother was just getting her luggage off the carousel when my wife went into the terminal. I didn’t have to circle the airport because I played dumb with the traffic officer who told me to proceed. Fortunately the traffic light turned red and out came my wife and my mother.

It is always wonderful to see my mother and I was so happy to be able to pick her up from the airport. The previous two times she came to California I was a bit “preoccupied” to pick her up from the airport since I was not allowed to venture into the free society during those times. I was happy to see “Mom” and mom looks very good. Not only were we picking up my mother but we were meeting a dear friend for lunch a few minutes later. It was a “reunion” of sorts because my mother hadn’t seen this dear friend in awhile and since we were in the area it all made sense.

The lunch was lovely once we settled on an “appropriate” restaurant. We sat outside in the warm area and enjoyed wonderful conversations for the lengthy lunch. The lunch may have been lengthy by normal lunch standards but I think the four of us could have stayed at the table for a very long time. The conversations flowed freely and it really is amazing how life does work out for the better. This was a dear friend I didn’t know existed a short time ago and it is all because of my previous misdeeds I have met this person and now consider this person a very dear friend. I do believe it all goes back to the “Law of Attraction” where like attracts like; my dear friend and I are very much alike and it was like finding the proverbial “needle in a haystack”.

We had to end lunch since we needed to get back home as the children were coming home from school. The children didn’t know Grandma was coming for a visit so it would be a surprise. We tried to come up with different ways to surprise the children and we settled on just walking in the house to surprise them but my son was peering out his window and spotted Grandma saying, “Am I dreaming?” over and over again. Fortunately my daughter didn’t hear her brother so Grandma was able to surprise her.

They both had huge smiles on their faces and were very happy to see Grandma. I had to stop and think how everything is going so well and in my two years away my children were able to get to know their Grandmas, Aunts, Uncles and cousins. It truly was a very different greeting from over two years ago where my children weren’t as close as they are now with their Grandma. There is certainly a connection there that wasn’t there a few years ago and another benefit of what could have been a terrible situation.