Meandering Through Melancholy

I was out on the porch alone late in the evening, enjoying a cigar and a beer (and oh how I enjoy that combo), reflecting on life. Cigars enjoyed alone tend to cause reflection.

It was chilly, but I figured it was one of the few remaining evenings when I could truly enjoy a cigar without enduring the cold winter weather that is soon to be here...you take the opportunity when it arises! I sat there, enjoying the moment, content and at ease when I caught sight of the Army flag we now fly with our American flag when it hit me, again. Patrick is in the Army. It is not talk or conjecture, it isn't temporary, he's not on vacation or spring break or anything like that. It is real, it is here and now. This is the umpteenth time I've had this revelation since Patrick left for BCT, but tonight, that black and yellow Army flag, snapping in the breeze really drove the point home! He's an adult.

After all these years, I'm still stunned from time to time with the concept that I am a Dad, that I have children. Even now I occasionally look at my daughter Kelly and get this odd feeling, this weird sense of "She's my Daughter? My child? How did that happen?"

And there I sat, sipping my beer, smoking my cigar, the father of a child who has pledged his life to his Nation, to his Mom, to me, to his sister, to all of us. Trying to assimilate it, trying to grasp this new reality...

The sense of awe and confusion left almost as quickly as it came. I'm getting somewhat more used to the idea that he's an adult, that he's on his own in a great big world, a not too safe world, that his job entails going in harms way, that he won't be home for the weekend like his buddies from high school. I'm hoping and praying that we did a good job preparing him for this world, that he endures, that he overcomes and that he prospers. Prospers in the way that matters the most, that he is happy and content in his soul.

The breeze picked up a bit, the cold was starting to find its' way through my sweatshirt and down my collar. I finished my cigar and thought of other things...a nephew in Iraq, work tomorrow, the fact I was getting cold, the Detroit Tigers World Series bid. Ordinary thoughts, easy thoughts. Thoughts that wandered out of melancholy and back into the safe, comfortable mundane.