That River in Egypt Boils Over

Damn my husband. Damn him. Damn him. Damn him!

Okay, don't actually damn him. I love him. I love him so much that he has the power to set off my emotional trip wire.

And he did it, but good, today.

I've been down for a few days. Maybe even a few weeks. And I haven't even been trying to hide it. Which is something new for me.

I've been telling the people who love me, "I'm down." Sometimes I can honestly add, "I don't know why." But when I do know why, I've been trying to be honest about it with some seriously mixed results.

I've been worried and stressed. Mostly about money. Often about the kids' stuff. And sometimes by people and things that let me down. (Why does someone volunteer to be a room mother/board member/hostess if she doesn't actually want to do anything? And why do I always pick up the slack? And do I have some magnetic field surrounding me that causes every computer I touch to have cardiac arrest?)

I've been blaming my hormones for my vacillations between anger and despair, but that can only account for so much.

Hovering just below the surface is that thing that I'm not thinking about. That news that I've been expecting yet still shocks me.

My father is sick. And getting sicker.

And in all of my quiet moments I keep thinking about that day when I get the phone call that he is gone and I have to tell my children that their grandfather is dead.

My daughter still talks about her damn dead goldfish.

It's going to be devastating.

So as my husband and I were sharing a nice lunch of leftover pasta, he had to drop a casual bomb on me.

"I hate to say this but I think once your father starts to go, he's going to go quick."

And I started to cry and I haven't stopped yet.

I love that man but he's made this weepy mess. And he's going to have to deal with it.