Grown daughters

When Daughter One was still in a crib, Mary had to go out of town for a few days on a sales trip and I had my first taste of being a single parent. Which should have been fine. Mary and I had never been real dogmatic about our division of roles and with the exception of breast feeding, I was comfortable with all the chores attendant upon raising small children.

So, while Mary was a bit conflicted at the idea of leaving her baby with a mere male, I was anxious to prove my mettle and so I sent her off with a kiss and a promise to keep our daughter and the house in original condition. I had plans for a park visit, play dates with the toddler across the street and plenty of reading time. I had taken the first day, a Friday off and Mary would be back Sunday evening. What could go wrong?

I started to find out about two hours after Mary left. I’d been feeling a bit off, nothing specific but then I went to prepare a bottle for my little girl and I was still okay until the merest whiff of sweet-smelling formula made its way to my nostrils. At which point, with neither warning nor reaction time, my just-consumed breakfast undertook an explosive relocation.

This may well have been the worst flu I’d ever had. I won’t go into detail here; let’s just say I didn’t spend much time in a standing position that weekend. It’s amazing how many critical household chores one can accomplish with actually standing upright.  At my request, our nurse neighbor called me every hour or so to make sure I was awake and continuing to care for One. And the weekend was ve-e-e-e-ery long.

The last couple of hours before Mary was due home, I was counting minutes. So imagine my dismay when at the appointed time she walked through the door totally green at the gills and proceeded to advise me that she shared my malady and had actually begun her own purging process on the drive home.  We got through that flu alive and One never did catch it, so we counted at least that as success.

Fast forward twenty-two years.

I flew in from elsewhere today to find Me Beloved stricken with a bug at least as virulent as the one that laid us low way back then. She’d kept nothing down all night, was bedbound and generally out of commission. With me out of town, she could have been in a bind just to care for herself.

Not to worry.

Daughter One happens to be home for a visit and she is no longer reliant on us for bottle feeding. She totally stepped up and nursed Mary, did the cleaning and some laundry and picked up Dear Old Dad at the airport.

Grown daughters are the best!