this little blog has retired.
sniff. sniff.
goodbye sweet blog.

follow along with us over here...
http://momboyandstuffeddad.blogspot.com/

we had been waiting for him.

my emotions have been fuzzy. not a sweet kind of fuzzy but a numb kind of fuzzy. flat and confused. tired. overwhelmed. anxious.

i keep trying to wrap my head around what happened to my little boy and what has transpired since.

the first week of august brody started having horrible nightmares. crying himself to sleep. waking up in the middle of the night bawling. refusing to go to the bathroom alone. wetting his pants.

luckily for us, brody talks. and talk and talks.

to our horror, he recounted stories about friday the 13th, teenagers being drowned, children being terrorized with axes at summer camp, candyman in the mirror...on and on. when asked who told him these stories he said his teacher did during camp fire at school.

he's 4 years old.

luckily for brody, his parents fight back.

he was pulled from the school immediately. it wasn't convenient. it wasn't simple. we juggled him at home for a week. he asked us everyday why he couldn't see his friends. we called over 20+ schools with no openings. it's preschool. it's fall. they were all full.

going back to the old school wasn't an option. the teacher was still employed in his classroom and the director was threatening to dis-enroll him for what she said were false allegations, claimed that we were being difficult and they were spending too much time dealing with it.

we finally found a new school. he is happy. we are happy.

the director is likely losing her job. rightfully so. we'll find out next week.

many parents reached out to me. gave advice. gave hugs. helped find daycares. listened to me. set up play dates with brody so he could say goodbye.

some though didn't. some distanced themselves from me. as if i were a threat to them. a threat to how others may perceive them. some took sides with the preschool as if we did this. as if we were the problem. we didn't ask for this to happen to us. my little boy didn't ask to be told these cruel stories. but when someone hurts your child and you don't fight back...you have already failed them at a very young age.

i wonder sometimes what i will say to the director if i run into her. most things are better left unsaid but i will indeed tell her that she messed with the wrong kid.

i let my little boy drive off on his bike tonight. speeding up ahead of me.

usually the scene is something like this ---
wait bro! slow down! stop! omg! stop! stop!
---as i chase after him.

instead i saw the stop light ahead of us and just let him go to see what he would do.

wait for it.
(i am going to die)
wait for it.
(my heart is shattering in a million pieces)
wait for it.
(why do i have to let him grow up?)

you know what he did?

1/2 a block away from me.
he stopped his bike.
gently climbed off of it.
walked to the cross walk.
pressed the cross walk button.
climbed back up on his bike.
and patiently waited for me to catch up to him.

he's all grown up.

...and i'm still gonna die.

i am saying goodbye to this blog soon (sniff sniff). this documentation of healing. of grace. of breaking. of rebuilding. of a little boy and his momma. of looking at life straight in the eye.
before doing so, i need to thank you for reading about my life over the past two years. and for believing i was far bigger than what was happening around me.

i also need to thank my sister, who in the midst of raising her own family and living nearly three hours away, listened. she just listened. and oh boy did she have lots of listening to do. she knew what i needed. bc she just knows. after thousands & thousands of shared memories, she just knows what to do. she is my lifeline to myself. my reminder of every age we have ever been, who i was then, who i am now and everything in-between.

i've had an old royals cup at work for like ever. i fill it up at the water machine instead of buying bottled water. i want to say it's to save the earth but the truth is it's just closer to my desk than the cafe.

i get so pissed though bc it never just fills up in a steady stream. i have to manipulate it. like move the cup back and forth. up and down. side to side. and it just stops. like it's tricking me. after a few cuss words, i walk away in complete frustration. every single time.

i mean, why won't the damn thing work?

so i got a new cup. the other one was old and i don't even like the royals.

the new one is orange. with polk-a-dots. pink polk-a-dots. and a lid. and a straw.

and guess what? the water machine miraculously works now. evidently the sensor can't sense clear cups. just colored cups.

it took me 11 years to figure that out.

there isn't a box big enough in the world to mail a 2' long rapunzel wig.
in case you were needing to do that today too.
to save you the trouble, you will need 2 postal workers and a helpful onlooker to go through every box in the back room of post office.
when that fails, you will need to remove the wig from the ridiculously long box.
then re-wrap it using priority mailer tape.
bc the post office doesn't just let you use the clear scotch tape.
then just for fun, stand there holding the 2' long blonde wig to see how many people will ask what you are doing.

i was fighting at school today with my friend, david.
are you supposed to fight with your friends, brody?
well, i fight-ed with him, then i stopped being his friend and asked gentry to be my friend.
how would you feel if someone did that to you, brody?
well, then i would fight them.
but we don't fight our friends. we are loyal and kind to our friends.
well david's not my friend anymore bc he pulled my shirt.
why did he pull your shirt?
bc i pulled his shirt first.
why did you pull your friend's shirt?
bc the teachers weren't looking.
do you think it's ok to fight with your friends when your teachers aren't looking?
ya, bc then i don't get in trouble.
but you should never be mean to or fight with your friends, brody.
ya, i know. except when the teachers aren't looking.

oh.my.god.

mommy, you don't know nothing and james knows everything!

well, little buddy, i do know that you just used a double negative and the james that knows everything put his shoes on the wrong feet this morning. so i know a little something.

to be nobody but yourself in a world that's doing it's best to make you somebody else, is to fight the hardest battle you are ever going to fight. - e.e. cummings

that's all i know.