It's a happy enchilada and you think you're going to drown

Sorry for my long absence and lack of updates. More on that later...

First some deeply important mustache rambling. I firmly believe that the man makes the mustache and not the other way around. When Steve Prefontaine toed the line of a race with a finely groomed mouth brow it struck fear in his opponents. Teddy Roosevelt ran the country with a hairy lip. So the man can carry his lip foilage onto greatness. Or the man can make it creepy like my high school math teacher that always called the same girls up to the whiteboard in class (what are the chances he is reading this?).

John Prine has one of my favorite lip rugs of all time. It has stood the test of time and had the privilege of hearing some of the sweetest folky tunes from one of the best storytellers in music. I've been spending lots of time with John Prine, Jeff Tweedy, Neil Young, Elliott Smith and other fine songwriters (not all mustached) the last month or so. I've carved out this little corner in our living room for this time. I put an incredibly fashionable vintage green chair there, a turntable, some books, a painting from a local artist and I even made a hipster lamp out of an old globe. It is a sweet set up and a nice place to drink a beer at night and contemplate life after the family has passed out. I've put in lots of time in that chair the last month or so.

Treatment kicked Jordan's ass last week. There is no other way to put it. A five-day dose of chemo (twice the strength of her first dose) and two IV treatments in two days that took several hours each. She was worn out and beaten up. Her speech was comically bad and she lost lots of her strength that she had regained over the last month or so. She wasn't sleeping well. It was a rough week. Yet by the weekend she was rallying for a night out with our co-workers, having friends (and kids and kids and kids) in town for the weekend and going to a musical with friends. Jordan is resilient as ever even in the face of all this.

I've noticed that we have all changed though. Jordan, I and the kids are different. How could we not be? I've spent some nights trying to remember what life was like this time last year. I simply can't wrap my head around it. It feels like a foggy memory. Coming home from work together, having dinner, playing with the kids and getting everyone ready for bed. It was ordinary. It was beautiful. It is gone. That reality doesn't exist anymore.

One of the things that I have been struggling with the last month or so is trying to put words to how I'm feeling about this. I've found more and more that I just don't know what to feel, what to say or even what the questions are. I've been sitting in my green chair (did I mention that I got it for $5 at a yard sale?) and just losing it lately. The emotions are there. They are real. They are raw. I just don't know where they came from, where they are going or what they are called. There is an awesome Wilco song called Box Full of Letters that is just a gem. There are some lines there that just got me the other day:

Wish I had a lotta answers,

'Cause that's the way it should be

For all these questions,

Being directed at me

I just can't find the time

To write my mind

The way I want it to read

I can totally relate because not only have I not wanted to blog, I haven't wanted to think. I've gotten caught up in this fog/funk in which I stopped naming what lurked in my mind. In that, I lost the ability to hold on for dear life in all this craziness. Even though it feels good to name that uncertainty right now it also feels like that knot in my gut isn't going away anytime soon.

A big fear of mine is what will we all become from this? Who will Jordan and I be in a week, a month, a year from now? What kind of father will I be for my children? How will this shape my son and daughter? Where is this taking us as a family? Did the Astros really win the Series? Living in the right now is hard with all of these questions looming big. I'm ok with not knowing the answers but the emotional ride in my fancy green chair (did I mention that it spins all the way around?) is a bumpy one.

I think we would all be a little better off if I left you with a little John Prine:

I was sittin' in the bathtub just countin' my toes

When the radiator broke, water all froze

I was stuck in the ice without my clothes

Naked as the eyes of a clown

I was cryin' ice cubes, hoping I'd croak

When the sun came through the window, the ice all broke

I stood up and laughed, I thought it was a joke

That's the way that the world goes 'round

That's the way the world goes 'round

You're up one day, the next you're down

It's a half an inch of water and you think you're gonna drown

That's the way the world goes 'round

-Brack

Fall is beautiful here!

Always great to get out into the woods for a bit.

Pretty cute Trick or Treaters!

Showing off some Chick-fil-A swag we got in the mail.

One joyful little girl.

Click on this picture and check out the view that is just a few miles from my house!

Peanut Butter and Jelly running with Parker during Parkdale Pumpkin Run.

Sorry, Parker is the cutest one in the family by leaps and bounds right now.

Jordan is always up for an adventure.

Beautiful night for a campfire and some smores.

Packing out a whole row at Fiddler on the Roof.