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After Josh got the methotrexate, he had to wait until it was out of his system, and then we could take him home.
However, it took forever, or that's what it felt like to me. To add the cherry to the cake, Josh had a stomachache due to the chemotherapy- not fun. And he had to stay for four days, after all, twice as much as he had thought he would at first, which, naturally, he didn't like. However, as always, Josh put up a good face and made the best out of the situation, teasing nurses and visiting other kids in the Oncology Ward. Still, he couldn't help being bored most of the time. A hospital is no place for a child.
Meanwhile, at home things were getting rather out of hand. Mike had begun to enjoy yelling on the top of his lungs and running around the house with his hands full of wet, fresh paint. Jamie had gotten into the habit of trying to add to the noise by imitating Hilary Duff as loudly as possible- and experimenting with different sounds and off-tune melodies. And Ryan, probably the most quiet of them three, was being a typical moody teenager, and would grumble all the time and mostly stay in his room and do nothing. Or sleep.
I needed a bit of Joshua around here, someone calm to pull us together and calm us down a bit. Because I admit, I was a bit off the walls, as well, and more paranoid than usual.
So when I was about to go crazy, at about 7:30 p.m., Josh was finally out of the hospital and back home.
And tired. Sound familiar?
Well, hopefully we would settle back into a routine. Hopefully the kids would calm down, Ryan would get out of his foul mood, Josh would feel well and it would be an uneventful week. It wasn't much to ask to have a nice Christmas, was it?
It was not quite a week until Christmas, and it was probably the year that it seemed the least like the Christmas season around my house. No fresh cookies, no tree, no ornaments except some paper snowflakes that Michael had cut out and pasted on the windows, no CD's of carols at any time, no gifts appearing magically under the tree (there's wasn't a tree, to begin with). Anything that remotely reminded anyone of Christmas arriving was the calendar that was hung in the kitchen. Otherwise, you couldn't have known. And even that had writing all over it: Josh- chemo, Josh- psychologist, Jamie- Parent's meeting, Ryan- basketball game, Ryan- birthday, etc.
And I would have totally forgotten Ryan's birthday, otherwise. My little Christmas present, I fondly called him, for he arrived late on Christmas Eve. I could remember his tiny little body, and rosy cheeks, his head still a little cucumber shaped from the birth, his hair non-existant... And yet so perfect. A perfect Christmas present. Nearly seventeen years back my first son was born.
Life was perfect then. Julia was by my side, we'd been married for about a year and a half, we had our first son, a perfect house, the perfect job.
Things started going down hill a long time ago. I've matured, I now know that life's isn't perfect. Mine was at some point, but not any more. There's no sense in lingering in the things of the past. Now, we must look at the future, and try to build it and make it better, and to smile and be content with what we have. I have so much still. I've got four awesome children. I'm still rich, and I've got a great house. And I've still got music.