I am not a fan of transitions.
I shouldn’t complain about my 2 weeks vacation but the
planning, the paperwork on both ends and the onslaught of “goodbyes” take a
toll on me emotionally. Yesterday I
wrapped up everything at my family practice.
Today, I had the hard job of saying goodbye to my 4 patients at
hospice. When you leave your palliative
end of life patients for 2 weeks the goodbye has a special poignancy to
it. I managed the first 3 tears free but
broke down with the last one. I wished,
in that moment with them, that I wasn’t leaving for 2 weeks. The brother graciously offered up the fact
that “You wouldn’t be able to do what you do if you didn’t take a break now and
then”. I nodded in agreement, but the
unspoken hung heavily in the air. For
this man, and this family, my vacation came at the wrong time. After months of developing a deeply
meaningful and trusting relationship, I was leaving at a crucial time. As I’ve explained to my quizzical husband on
many occasions, “It’s like teaching grade 8 all year but not showing up for
Grade 8 Graduation.”
And so I left hospice today with a heavy heart and did what
always makes me feel better - - I went to find my family.
I had heard the plan at breakfast that morning – they were
off to the lake to paint the tree house that they were building together this
summer. What better way to kick of a
2-week vacation than a good bike ride out to the lake to surprise them?
Keen as they had been this morning it was evident that the
day was not going as planned. The tree
house was full of half painted fence rails with open paint tins and brushes
scattered across the floor. Rob was
down by the water working on a zipline and the kids were up at the house
alone. Apparently none of them were ACTUALLY all that
keen on painting after all. Without officially announcing my arrival, I peeled
off my sweaty bike gear and set to work.
Painting the rungs of the tree
house, up in a tree and all by myself was meditative and quiet and just
what I needed. Off in the distance I
could hear the familiar tussles of sibling disagreements with the occasional
harsh word and yell from Toby from up at the house, but I kept painting,
knowing that soon enough I would be a welcomed part of whatever disagreement
they were having.
After a brief time the shouts and noises grew closer and
soon my hideaway was discovered,
“Hi, Mom” they said, excited to see me, “Whatcha doing…??”
I handed them each a paintbrush and told them to join
me. We could paint together.
It was a combination of a Tom Sawyer and a Von Trapp
moment. Neither of them dared refuse as
they were relishing the opportunity to hang out with me but I don’t think
either of them REALLY wanted to be painting.
So I tried to engage them in conversation.
“So…. what were you guys doing up at the house?” I asked
innocently, pretending I hadn’t heard the screaming and yelling
“Oh,” said Toby earnestly, “We were busy building a FORT
together!”
“Ah…” I said, “I see.”
“Why?” he asked,
“What did you THINK we were doing?”
“Oh, nothing” I said, painting away, “I just thought I heard
some fighting that’s all”
“Oh…right…” Toby said.
“Well….there WAS this ONE moment…when we were building the fort and I
couldn’t get one of the pillows to stand up straight and I kept trying and
trying and it kept falling over and I was VERY FRUSTRATED and Mia just BURST
OUT LAUGHING at me and that made me REALLY ANGRY”
I was about to sympathize with him when a paint covered Mia piped
up from the other side of the tree house,
“Oh, Toby…” she said, “I wasn’t LAUGHING at you I was just
LAUGHING at something FUNNY that came into my head a that moment.”
RIIIIIIIIIIGHT.
I didn't buy it for a second. But our Toby is equal parts trusting and
naïve,
“Really?” he asked Mia with complete honesty, “What was is
that was so funny?’
BUSTED.
Mia didn’t skip a beat.
She dipped her paint brush in and turned her back to us to paint a rung
of the railing and launched into a slow but confident tale,
“Well….you see….FIRST I was thinking about going down a
WATERSLIDE….” She hesitated for a bit as she painted, “And THEN I got to
thinking that maybe at the END of the water slide I would do a fancy DIVE off
of it….but I didn’t. Instead I imagined
that I had done a GIANT BELLY FLOP. And
that made m LAUGH out LOUD.”
“Oh,” Said Toby a bit surprised, “Yes that DOES sound
funny.”
“Yes,” Mia replied smugly, “You see Toby it was just REALLY
bad timing."
Ahhh…the dichotomous bookends of my life…If today had been a Sesame Street Episode it would have been brought to you by the phrase “BAD TIMING”.
And just like that….I was on summer vacation.
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| The Unpainted treehouse |
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| Always worth the uphill bike... |
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