Call your Mom (and your Dad)

I think it will be heavy for a while here on the site. Just returning from a perfectly lovely visit with my parents. An ache is creeping into my arms and back from a night of bowling, golfing, baseball, and tennis in the Wii (note to self. join gym. being sore after playing fake sports is unacceptable). All three of us bowled and my dad trash talked the entire 3 games. He told stories about his mom and stories about my mom, including a new one about how she flipped him by his neck when they were newly married. My dad said he couldn't swallow for three days. She says he was exaggerating and embellishing the story but does admit that she flipped him. I always, always knew she was a ninja.

We laughed a lot, my dad crashed one of his expensive hobby helicopters, he sometimes fell moody as he remembered that his mother was gone. I think of the ache I feel when even considering how I would feel if they were gone and I'm glad I don't have to know that pain just yet. Seeing my parents together, talking about their history, I think of all the things we (okay I) think I want in a partner and how many things I've determined I won't put up with. I don't think either of my parents would consider the other an ideal mate if they were picking one out of a catalogue. But they are committed to one another and love one another. As a reminder of mortality and my mother's always tenuous health loomed in my mind during this weekend, I felt a sense of urgency to make something that really mattered out of my life. Something everyone could enjoy. Something that makes us all immortal. Babies. I also thought about the man I hoped for and the rough list that normally tumbles around in my head and expanded it to allow for someone who doesn't think Frisky Dingo is funny, prefers the American version of The Office, and is not really into animals. I'm not even sure I would say hello to a guy like that normally but off the top of my head, I can't think of a single intersection of hobbies and interests between my mom and dad and they have made it work for almost 35 years.

I don't know...the 30's are treacherous waters. There is a feeling as I peruse the Facebook pages of my peers that my life is on pause. Even many of my unmarried peers have children and while I know that is probably not the way they would have preferred to have children, their lives are different than they were in high school. My life is still the same. Dating life is a famine, I'm accomplished in some sense professionally, and I still spend a lot of my spare time reading or writing and fending off the advances of completely inappropriate men. Tempting as it is to give the next homeless guy asking for the digits my number to see where it goes, I think I'll just get myself back into the mix. I do hope he's out there and not too far away from entering my life. We could use some company (and someone else to walk the dog).