Calfgrit6 has always been an early riser. When he was a toddler he’d wake up at 5 a.m., and I’d put him in his stroller for a walk around the block before the sun came up. In the past couple of years, he’d wake up pretty regularly at 6 a.m.

We tried changing his bed time to later, but that made him wake up earlier. His normal bed time has been 7:30, and he’d wake up at 6:00. If we put him to bed at 8:00, he’d wake up at 5:30. Put him to bed at 9:00 and he wakes up at 4:30. Yes, that’s how it worked. The later he went to sleep, the earlier he’d wake up. It makes no logical sense, but that’s how it happened. Sadly, putting him down earlier than 7:30 also made him wake up earlier. We’ve talked with other parents and with his doctor, and we’ve learned this is not uncommon.

So we came to accept and work with his 6:00 a.m. waking time. In the past months, he’s matured enough that he can play in his room quietly in the morning. He’d wake up, put on his clothes, and come to our room to let us know he was awake. We’d tell him he could just play quietly in his room, and he cheerily do so. We’d get another half-hour of rest before he needed breakfast. (Calfgrit9 can easily sleep til 7:00, and later.)

This morning, Calfgrit6 woke up at 5:30, but he was not willing to play quietly in his room; he said he was hungry. We explained to him that we (Mom and Dad) don’t start our day before 6:00, and it was not time for breakfast, yet.

We’ve been through all this before — it’s not “morning” until 6:00, and we don’t fix breakfast before then. We had to set this rule a long time ago to stop him from thinking he could start our day as soon as he first opened his eyes. In the past, he has actually used the “I’m hungry; I need breakfast” call to make us start our day at 4:00 a.m. Once he learned that he couldn’t get us up and started before 6:00, (after we fell for the “I’m hungry” at 4 and 5 a.m. a couple times), he let himself go back to sleep if he woke up real early.

Setting the acceptable get-up time has taken a long while. We had to go through several frustrating early morning arguments, but that’s just how life goes with children. Set the acceptable rules, and then stick to them while the child tests, tests, and tests them to see that you really mean it. But once the child understands the rule is firm, he falls in line.

So, like I said, Calfgrit6 has been doing very well with the 6:00 day start time, for several months. He doesn’t bother getting up before 6:00, and even then he plays quietly in his room till 6:30 to 7:00 each morning. Our mornings have been relatively pleasant for a good while.

But then, this morning. He started saying he was hungry before 6:00. He started fake crying, in a loud, totally melodramatic way. His intention was to not let us ignore him until “morning.” He also knows that he can play us by threatening to wake up Calfgrit9 early — he doesn’t make a direct threat, but he knows we want CG9 to get enough sleep before school.

We have to stick to our rule, though, or else we’ll have to go through this routine every morning instead of just every once in a while when he wants to test our resolve.

Bullgrit

I’m back home, now. I’m back to my wife and boys, (who came home on Monday, after the funeral), and back to my job, and back to my regular life. There was a lot of legal and official stuff to do in my hometown regarding “estate” issues, but we’ve gotten things straightened out.

There were people to meet, documents to sign, decisions to be made, and grief to be dealt with. There were old pictures to gather up and go through, sentimental items to find and hold, and previously unknown stories and anecdotes to be heard.

During the visitation and funeral, I met more people than I normally meet in a year in my regular routine. My dad made friends easily, and he kept them forever. My brother and I figure between our step-dad’s funeral three years ago, and our dad’s funeral this week, we’ve now met every person in our hometown.

During these several days, I ate more food each day than I would normally eat in two days in my regular routine. Most all of the food was home-cooked and downright damn good. In the South, we feed and eat during grieving.

But then, after revisiting and honoring a life passed, we have our own present and future lives to get back to and on with. Events have made me reminiscence on old times, reweigh old experiences, and revisit old feelings. I have some old and new stories to tell, and I’ll relate them here sometime.

Bullgrit

My dad finally passed on today. I hope Heaven appreciates him as much as we on Earth have.

Bullgrit

My dad is still hanging onto life. He’s a tough nut to crack.

It may have sounded weird for me to say, “He is at his end, definitely,” in the previous post, but that “definitely” is something that’s new for us as his family. Since I never posted anything about his stint in the hospital this past summer, (because he didn’t want me to at the time), most of you aren’t privy to how on and off his imminent death was.

Over his 60 days in the hospital — at Duke — he was on the verge of death three times. We had “the Talk” with the doctors multiple times about how long and hard to try to save his life. I’ll tell you, that Talk is some seriously emotional shit. It’s not everyone who gets to or has to go through that discussion, and it can be pretty damn nerve-wracking to go through it three times in 2 months.

That up and down roller-coaster ride, “he’s dying,” “he’s getting better,” “he’s dying,” “he’s getting better,” “he’s dying,” “he’s getting better,” will wear the hell out of your nerves.

And here’s something I didn’t know: a living will — that legal paper that states the patient’s desires for how long and hard to fight for their life — ain’t binding, apparently. The individual who has personal authority over the patient can override anything on that paper. When we had the Talks, we stuck with what my dad had written in his will, but we had the ability to ignore it if we had wanted to.

So, anyway, about that “definitely” word.

When my dad was initially diagnosed with cancer, back in 1998, death was a potential outcome. But it wasn’t imminent, and it seemed to be stopped by the surgery, then. Even when he was given the 6-18 months to live back in 2009, he lived well right past 6 months and into 12 months. Real, actual, death just didn’t seem to really, actually, be coming for him.

Then we went through the summer of near death experiences, and he came out the other end of the few months actually seeming to be doing well. Looking at my dad, you don’t see a “tough guy.” He’s not a lumberjack kind of man. He’s just a normal man to the eye, but damn he’s resilient.

So, this idea that “my dad is dying” started to have a kind of “yeah, right” feel to it. He got and overcame cancers like my kids get and overcome colds. How can you take his mortality seriously when he’s shrugged off the Grim Reaper’s touch 3, 4, 5 times.

But this time, they’re telling us this is really it. There’s no more odds to beat, no more hanging in there to do, no more pulling through possible. But, they said, “he may last up to a week,” and be surely be darn, he’s going to last out that whole week. A man that can hang in there and pull back from the edge of death as many times as he has over the past years doesn’t just give up when someone says he can’t pull back this time.

It’s a happy and sad thing that he’s holding onto life this strongly.

Bullgrit