This Post is NOT for the Feint-Hearted

This is a Monday post. Think of the worst Monday you've ever had and then put it on steroids. That is today. Last night my biggest worry was how to access Season 3 of Downton Abbey. Today that is nothing. I'll get right to it. Laura and Kyle couldn't get the baby to my house before work because Kyle left their apartment with the baby before Laura realized she didn't have her car keys. Kyle had to go back which cost him the time he needed to get the baby to my house. I had to go get him and got stuck in ridiculous traffic. I literally crawled to their office. Someone's Bmer had broken down at one of the busiest intersections in the city. When I got there, the office was in turmoil. Someone had decided to shuffle everyone's workspace. Laura no longer has a private office. She is in a larger space she shares with another worker. It is also the place where all the files are kept, and people are constantly going in there to access them. The married couple who used to work in that room with another guy have been moved out and separated. That's too bad because they really worked well together. The supervisor who is in charge of the apartment building where Laura and Kyle live had fired off a barrage of emails trying to get Kyle fired because Kyle is asking for improvements at the building. Kyle was volunteering to quit when I came in. Laura was stressed out. She and I left through the back door. The baby screamed all the way home. He would only stop if I held his binky in his mouth while I drove. I chose screaming bloody murder over risking an accident. When I got home my foreign exchange student was still there. She had skipped her classes that started at 9:00 a.m. She was sitting at the table, exactly where she was when I left to get the baby. Her head was down. She was crying. Her girlfriend had broken up with her. Dad was wheezing and gasping for breath. I have never heard him like that. His chest was heaving. He could barely talk. It broke my heart. I put my arm around him and sat with him while Carmi pulled her car up next to the house. We helped him into the wheelchair and then took him out to the car. I had spoken to two of his doctors and they both agreed that it was time to go to the ER again. The sweet side of my dad is something I have always been able to access. We have had a closeness over the years most of my friends have envied. So many of them had huge distances between themselves and their fathers. I was able to talk about almost anything with my dad. Except sex. I didn't talk about sex with my dad; that was just too creepy for me. But we could talk for hours. I accepted his relationships; he accepted mine. We could discuss politics, race, religion, work, secrets, indiscretions, money and whatnot. I spared him most details about Bill's gambling and how Laura had tortured me during her 'difficult' years, and there were things he spared me. The last few years have been hard on us. I saw the side of him that had always bothered other people but not me. I wasn't able to slough it off like I used to. I saw how his criticisms cut others to the quick, and I was unable to sway him to channel Grandma instead of Grandpa. Those were the grim realities that tarnished us but, through it all, I worked hard to remember that as we age, we lose our social filters, and move into an insidious, slow-evolving form of dementia. And sadly, because I have the baby today and Laura and Kyle's lives may be changing as well, I can't go to the hospital with Carmi. The blessing now is that KJ feel into a long, peaceful, much-needed nap without any resistance, and I am able to write this.