Can't stop coughing, can't sleep, so I move to the recliner, hoping to let Nick rest and that maybe, if I'm more upright, the constant tickle will subside.
I hear Elias climbing down from his bed. His door opens, he lets out a little cry and then closes it again. Uh oh, I think, he either had a bad dream or is also sick.
Elias almost fell asleep at the table the night before, yawning and rubbing his eyes without eating a single bite of chicken or rice.
He stumbles out of his room and walks right past me in the dark. When I call his name, he stops in the kitchen, trying to make sense of his Mom's voice coming from the playroom he just walked through on his way to our bedroom.
"Elias," I say again, "I'm on the recliner."
He climbs up with me and snuggles in as only a wiggly bony nine-year-old boy can. "Try to keep your body still," I say, as I try to protect my chest from his elbows. He feels warm.
I don't know how long we are like this, minutes or hours, time is a bit of a trickster in a sleepless night.
But I know at 5:30 a.m. he throws-up on both of us.
Happy Saturday.
Oh yeah, and Nick took Olive to the doctor yesterday for her cough and fever, only to learn our three-year-old has low-grade pneumonia and an ear infection.
I don't remember any of us being sick all summer long, when our days were spent camping, fishing, and working in the garden.
Makes me think we should always be on vacation. Forget this whole school and work thing.
So if you have any creative ideas on how we could pay our bills without working, at least not in the traditional way of inside and nine to five, please let me know. While also home-schooling our kids but where I don't have to teach them everything. With plenty of social opportunities, while living in a cabin in the woods. With a hockey rink.
And while your at it, maybe you could stretch the summer season a little longer here in AK and make the temperature this morning warmer than 29 degrees. 59 would be nice. Reverse that frost that killed all my Dahlias still covered with buds yet to bloom.
That's all. Thanks.
In the meantime, I'll be coughing.
I think we were supposed to start an internet company in the 90's and retire early....then that cabin and rink would be ours! Rest well and don't worry, the dahlias will come up again next spring.
Posted by: fleming | 09/21/2013 at 08:11 AM
That was not the relaxing weekend I had envisioned for you. Hope you are all better soon.
Posted by: Kate | 09/21/2013 at 01:07 PM
anyone feeling better yet?
Posted by: fleming | 09/23/2013 at 07:14 AM
If you figure it out, please share. Something tells me that if we had that, complete satisfaction still would elude us. What I would pick out of that story as a keeper is that Elias was able to find you and crawl in your lap. Forget the puke part though. ;)
Posted by: Greta | 09/23/2013 at 07:54 PM
I wish I was more tech savvy Flem and that could have been our ticket but yes, I think Greta is right, even then, if I had what i think of as an ideal schedule and the money to support it I'm sure I would find something lacking.
So I'll live with my reality, which at the moment has all three of us on the mend, though Olive and I are still coughing. And Elias, well we are dealing with more transitions at his school as his new T.A. left on Friday for a different job and I am still waiting for Special Ed to fill the position...oy, more on this later. I'm just hoping a sub picked up the job for the rest of the week and i don't walk in there this morning to the news the position is vacant.
Posted by: Christy | 09/24/2013 at 06:43 AM
Dear Christy, Rough week, huh? I'm thinking of you as fall descends in my neck of the woods--though not with the swiftness of an Alaskan autumn, I'm sure. I am glad you are on the mend and hope the cough gets better soon. And here's hoping for a fa new TA for your bony wiggly boy. Cheers,
Danielle in Zurich
Posted by: danielle | 09/28/2013 at 10:02 AM