Stress Tests

Jiejie and Meimei have been running fevers since Friday night, sleeping fitfully, whining, asking for their cool drinks in the baby bottles they turn to, sometimes for fun and sometimes, I think, because they need to be babies.

Mommy is still fighting whatever virus she had, but she is very far behind and has missed a few important deadlines and a day or work, not to mention all of Memorial Day weekend.

TJ is over his tonsilitis, but we have not heard the last from his tonsils.

In two weeks Daddy starts his new job -- or rather his old job in a new place -- about 120 miles away. That is just a few weeks after his mother, Grandma Mollyne, died suddenly, just when she was getting her strength back and planning to travel to Germany for an exhibit of her paper mobiles.


It's all rather overwhelming. No wonder Meimei is crying at preschool and TJ is making us promise never to go to China again. (He is afraid he will have to stay there, and that this is all temporary.) The children's sense of stability and security is shaken. They will not be happy to hear that for the next nine months or so, through the first semester of the next school year, they will see a lot less of Dad because of the long commute. And Daddy seems almost too busy to grieve. He was in touch with the office almost without interruption during the three days he took off after his mother died.

Still, there is a lot to be thankful for. The kids had a perfect Mother's Day at Grandma Mollyne's apartment, surrounded by art, complete with ice cream cones scooped by Grandma. In her apartment there was a pile of plaster hands, life size, gaudily decorated. They hung from trees on Governor's Island for a show a few summers ago. Everyone could use a hand now and then ...


Mom and Dad will have been married 25 years on July 5. That in itself is an accomplishment.  And somehow, in spite of tight work schedules, we will get to the beach this summer. 

So, the garden isn't planted, TJ has no Social Security number yet and the taxes are not filed. The summer is likely to bring a tonsillectomy before we see a ripe tomato, and a recent house guest was right when she said our home was in the same disarray it was in after we moved here two years ago.

But soon we will be moving on toward a new set of challenges. If you're ready, raise your hand!