Time Marches On

It’s Sunday night. Spring break has started for the kids, except for Nicholas, who had his a couple of weeks ago. Jill is in Boone with the trio visiting her dad, and we’re all heading to Los Angeles next week before Ben starts training for the “Billy Elliot” tour. I stayed behind to work, given that it’s budget time at my office and I have to save the few days of vacation that I have left between now and the end of the fiscal year.

In our household, that means there’s not much to report. And that’s not a bad thing, I guess, even if it is the calm before the storm. If anything, it's a welcome change from the past several months.

That said, the last week of March is tough for me, one that I find myself dreading annually and one that I'm glad to see pass. The reason: What used to be a week of celebrations has taken a 180-degree turn in a few short years.

It starts with Jill’s birthday, not itself a bad thing. Two days later is my mom and dad’s anniversary and the anniversary of Bill’s death, then two days after that is Fran’s birthday. It’s hard to believe Bill has been gone eight years, and that it has been five years since the long summer that saw our family lose my dad and Fran.

Time marches on — in so many ways. And so quickly, too. Soon, we'll be so busy that there won't be much time to reflect, or so we think. Memories have a way of popping up and surprising you...

Maybe I'll even write a few of them down.