BACK TO ‘NORMAL’

Bobby 'MUSCLES' Marinara Del Bloggolo!

After a few weeks away from my life as I know it, as a husband, father, and grandfather, I am back to the same old, “same old” of my life. Visiting my daughter at the rehab is taking away a big chunk of my day. Life doesn’t stop and goes on in spite of my presence.

I learned a lot from my visit to Burbank, California. The source of my lessons is from the most unlikely of sources, a 4-year old and a three-month-old. The 4-year old is struggling to make her life normal, understanding her mom’s disappearance and being the above normal child she really is. I look at her and can’t understand her courage, where she hides her grief and how she explains it to herself enough to cope with the transient road of childhood understanding. I can see the strain on her in that she is unwilling to do some things, is afraid of being alone and yet presents her self as a sweet and loving daughter, kind of a surrogate wife in a way with my son.

Then there is a 3-month old who takes no prisoners. He is always smiling and seems to be putting everyone he sees in a prison of love and the incredible need to bite his cheeks. Yet when I look at him I feel the pain that he will eventually go through without a mom. He has a wonderful influence on his nanny, a lovely woman who has taken the two children to her heart in the best way possible. He just smiles and smiles some more.

Of course, my life lessons don’t stop with Darby and Bobby, there is also my daughter Ellen, who is sitting in a rehab angry for what life hands her every day. I wonder what her crime is that she is condemned to her whole life of not understanding her life or why it needs to be this way. Hitler was treated in life better than my innocent daughter and I defy anyone to rationalize the reason. She has no idea what a dance is, a great meal, a moving painting, a story to hold her attention. Her joy is in seeing my wife or me.

My children have always been special to me for their own reasons. #1 Son is logical, caring just like his brother, #3 Son, who has made his own meritorious world of compassion and kindness. #2 Son did not live long to my satisfaction but left a legacy of bravery and love I will never forget.

They all seem to have the knack of facing adversity and placing one foot in front of the other, not in self-pity but in the realization that in the end, no one will care unless you do yourself. God bless them for a change.