My son is home!

This morning my husband Art returned to Kentucky from Duxbury, MA. Our son, A.G., drove him to Providence for his early morning flight. Art came in to see our son, who is home on leave from Sudan where he works for a non-profit agency. He's based out of Khartoum where he works on micro-economic projects inside the camps for IDPs...internally displaced people. In my terminology, refugees. But as my son tells me, you can't be a refugee when you're in your own country...thus, IDPs. He also now travels to Dafur to supervise the extension of his agency's services there since the President of Sudan kicked out 13 agencies after the warrant for his arrest for crimes against humanity was issued by the International Court. Need I say more? Heavy stuff.

The last 5 days have been wonderful ones for me. First my husband got here for a little R&R. It took the arrival of our son to pull him away from his travels and work load. Art, my husband, works in international sales and spends far too many hours in the office or out of the country as far as I'm concerned. But after nearly 35 years of this I should have learned to keep my mouth shut! I still complain and fight for every moment I get!

He arrived the night before our son flew in from Sudan for his home leave. It also coincided with our 37th wedding anniversary. So what a wonderful gift! The only part missing was our daughter Jen who had to return, last week, to Chicago with her husband to finish her 3rd year of law school at Northwestern.

When our son, A.G., got off the bus from Logan Airport, I watched my husband run to him and hug him. He wouldn't let go and A.G. looked at me, over his Dad's shoulder, as if to say, "What's up with this?" My husband, Art, was overwhelmed with emotion. I know it well. The joy of seeing your child, the relief to know he is safe, and the realization that he is a man putting himself in harm's way for others. I deal with this each and every day as I start my day in prayer for my children and their spouses. This is not to say my husband doesn't. He does. His day starts and ends in prayer. But usually it's me that faces the kids on the front line. He's trapped in his job. Or he allows himself to be trapped in his job. That's another topic all together!

Our son's wife, Patty, has started a new job in D.C. She too is working to support non-profits. She works for a company that distributes and coordinates funds for non-profits, as best I can gather, and she too will be traveling to far off places. So A.G. will leave this week to join his wife and bring their dog to her. For awhile they will live apart while he finishes his job and she starts her new one.

During the few days my husband was here, we got to spend time with our son and absorb all that he has become. His love for his family is as strong as ever, his sense of humor as sharp. There is a new depth to him. He is seeing human nature in a way I never have. He is seeing what the worst in us can do. He watches what the best in us can salvage. He is incensed by the subterfuge our country is engaging in with the political parties playing their games with people's lives and welfare. He is more and more disenchanted with the "American Way." What he sees is a nation afraid to move forward. Afraid that becoming diverse weakens us. What his life experience teaches him, is that people, no matter their color, want the best for their children. Carrying that goal in their hearts, they will rise above genocide, political suppression, gender bias, religious fanaticism. And yet here, the greatest and freest land on earth, we are arguing about granting health care for the poor! For him it's an oxymoron. You are the richest land on earth yet you won't share it with your own.

His reflections clear the air for me. It makes it much more simple. You either take care of your citizens or you don't. If that's black and white, so be it.

So many thoughts and feelings rushed through me this weekend. And as a background for our family gathering to celebrate AG and each other, we watched the senior Senator from Massachusetts, Ted Kennedy, pass away and be buried. Family. First and foremost. Taking care of each other and called to public service. To share the gifts, talents and treasure with those less fortunate.

So much to share and to reflect upon. For now, I take joy in the sound of my son upstairs packing to join his wife in DC. And to know that my son is home and safe. For that I thank God.

Ah...parents!

Tonight I spoke with my dear friend Roni who is with her parents in Akron. Her Dad at 87 is in intensive care battling pneumonia, Legionnaires. Her Mom is presenting with symptoms of early stages of Alzheimers. Back home in Bowling Green, sits her husband and son minding her mother-in-law, 95, who has come to live with them for 3 months after suffering a fall in her home in Florida and several weeks of hospitalization. Her husband and his brother are splitting the care of their Mom right now...three months with one and then three months with the other.

So think about this. Roni at 65 and Chuck at 64 have 3 out of 4 parents still alive! And while living their own lives, Chuck still working et al, and being on call for their 3 children and 5 grandchildren they are now caring for 3 aging parents.

It boggles the mind, doesn't it? But that's the reality of the so called baby boomers today. We are caring for our kids' kids and their great-grandparents. Talk about the rubber band generation!!

So how do you deal with the emotions that roil inside of you when you are faced with this incredible task? Who do you cut off first? That sounds cruel but let's face it....something has to give. Do you focus on your parents who raised you, supported you, helped you with your own kids? Or do you look to the future and decide that you have to focus on your grandkids and be there for your own kids?

I don't have any good answers. Both of my parents are gone. My Dad to cancer just months after placing my Mom in a nursing home with Alzheimers. Mom spent 9 years on that ward. I watched her slip away from me and all my siblings. I'm not sure where she went for the years it took her body to finally acquiesce to letting this life go. But I stood vigil while it happened.

What's easier on a child, adult though they may be? To have a parent be "with you" until old age finally eases them into the next life, or to have them leave before their time in your eyes?

All I know is that I am witnessing my friend be swamped with decision-making and feeling overwhelmed by 3 aging parents depending on her.

Is it possible that one can live too long? I think so. What happens to families that have postponed dealing with those God-awful decisions that have to be made about final instructions, plans of what to do if Mom/Dad lives so long they can't take care of themselves? It can rip families apart. We've all seen it.

So tonight I speak with my Mom and Dad, wherever their spirits are, and I tell them how I love them. How I hope that if they had lived longer I would have cared for them in the right manner. That my brothers, sister, and I would have made the right decisions. And I admit to them my relief, that they are at peace and I never had to deal with what my wonderful friend Roni is facing.

Ah, parents. Mine, yours, ours. We came from parents, we are parents, and our children become parents. Do we parent ourselves as well as our kids? Do they parent us? Or is it that it's one continous cycle, where we are children, adults, parents, and children again? All I know is that whatever stage we are, we need to love and be loved.