Come What May

This post kind or wanders around a bit, but I think that's probably what you've come to expect anyway.

Melissa and I watched The Time Travelers Wife the other day (could one of you English people please tell me when I'm supposed to underline and when I'm supposed to use Italics for titles?).  If you haven't seen it and you are planning to you may want to skip the next few sentences.  As many of you know Melissa does not like shows where children or husbands die.  It gets her to thinking about the fragility of life and she usually ends up getting mascara on her pillow and that leads to a load of laundry which leads to a mountain of folding clothes which leads to numerous piles of folded clothes on the floor until they get put away in their spots.  It's just not good. 

Seriously though, after watching this particular movie we got to talking about the future (we all know how I like to do that).  Some time ago I happened to be teasing my dad, as I am apt to do, about how good his life is now that he's looking to retirement and all his kids are married and not causing him any worries.  To my great surprise he responded by saying that this stage of fatherhood is harder and more stressful than any he has yet experienced.  I don't quite understand that and I don't remember the conversation going much further.  Something to bring up next time I'm in Cedar I guess. 

Back to our current conversation.  Melissa got to thinking about when our kids get older and move away from home to start their own families.  That's hard for me to grasp.  At the moment we have 4 of a hopeful 6 children who are the center of our lives.  We plan everything around them and are ecstatic to do so.  I kiss the kids at bedtime and again before leaving for work in the morning when possible (heaven knows I've missed enough of those moments over the past 6 years).  I spend my days off convincing the kids to work in the yard with me.  I love the relationship I have with my kids and I hope it becomes the relationship I have with my parents.  There are not a whole lot of relationships that come close to that between a parent and a child, but over the past few weeks I've seen one that does.

It's no secret that Melissa wants twins.  She always says it is so she only has to be pregnant once more, but that's just a cover.  She really wants twins.  I have been somewhat reluctant in this desire and have voiced quite a few times that if we do have twins I want no part of twin girls.  The drama is just too much.  Do you know what it is like to be the husband to half of a set of twins, and the first one at that?  To be the one who supplants a twin sister as number 1?  Let me tell you, it's like a bed of roses, thorns and all!  Over the past 10 years I have seen Melissa and her sister laugh and cry and fight and makeup in a way that surpasses most other relationships I have seen.  It has been different and neat, but this past week has put a new light on that.  The emotion and excitement I have seen in Melissa over the past few days is something I have come to know with our wedding and the birth of each of our 4 chidren.  That's it.  Five times I have seen her this way. 

I'm not going to be surprised if our next child is alone in the womb when we get the ultrasound, but I think I understand a little better why Melissa will be a little sad, and for the first time, I might be too.