One would think we would be pretty good at good-byes by now. A hug, a wave, a "see you soon" with a cheerful smile (that fools no one) have been repeated ever so many times over the past year. J at least remains true to his feelings, although his manners leave much to be desired. While he did agree to ride along in the car to the airport on Friday, he refused to give any hugs, say good-bye, or even look at my parents and grandmother as they exited our car in front of the International Departures area of the Melbourne airport. I think, I hope at least, that they understood. Life brings many painful moments, and surely for most of us it is easier to pretend those moments aren't happening rather than to face them head on.
S may well have made up for J the night before after our final meal together. She has always been a hugger, loving nothing more than giving and receiving a squeeze.
One silver lining in the trip home for my dad was his very first opportunity to ride on the A380. Much to his delight, the A380 appeared back in the flying schedule for Qantas on the route between Melbourne and L.A. just two days before their flight home.
From all accounts, the flight was much enjoyed, and my dad at least hopes to make one more voyage on an A380. Since he didn't include any pictures of himself hard at work at our house in the post that he wrote, I thought I would throw in a few for you. The drain in the picture below is one that overflowed at the outset of the monsoon, sending most of the rain through the doorway into our garage, and from there, into our house.
One last, much appreciated "repair" was an attempt to collect the lint from our dryer, which most unfortunately vents right back into our laundry room rather than to the outside.
And just to show that he didn't spend all of his time holding the place together, here he is reading my mom's Kindle in our backyard:
After completing the airport run on Friday, J and I had little time to spend moping. Fortunately we had been given important work to do: We were in charge of the fairy bread for afternoon tea that night. I had volunteered several times previously to help with afternoon tea at cricket, but for some reason my name never ended up on the roster. Apparently this time it was felt I could handle doing the fairy bread, so off to the store we went to purchase the necessary items.
The three ingredients of fairy bread are white bread, butter, and one hundreds and thousands. J was quite excited over the final item on the list, and proved to be a very willing helper in both the preparing and consuming side of things.
Painful as good-byes are, we do realize we have been blessed to have visitors once again. They will be missed, have in fact already been missed, but we are grateful for the memories and look forward to creating many more in the future.
Your Grandma has such happy eyes.
You have the best Dad in the world.
You are SO blessed, my friend!
Great post---wondering what the deal was w/the plane though.
Posted by: Shanda | 02/26/2011 at 12:14 AM