Last Wednesday was shaping up to be a colision of familial love that includes the unintended potential for hurt feelings. Our daughter and I had been missing each other for several days on the phone. She had "Skyped" (a new verbal form of a technology noun - like "Googled" or it participle form "Googling") her mother a couple times and I was missing. So she had set a "Skype" appointment with me for 9pm Wednesday night.
Later the same day, my wife called to say that Kyle had called and wanted to talk with me later. This made sense since he had been telling us for weeks that he had some big news for us, but that it was confidential. I assumed that he had promoted or something like that. It seemed likely that Kyle would want to tell me the news directly. He would be calling at ... you guessed it ... 9pm Wednesday.
Now we have always tried to not play favorites - letting each of our kids know that they were, in fact, our favorite (only a parent understands how that works). But now I was being forced to make a decision on which of the two I was going to talk with at 9pm. But as the hour approached, the situation was complicated even further. About 8:45pm I received a call from the third of our kids (actually the first born) who stated with great enthusiasm that he had something he wanted me to see. I told him about my pending phone appointments and he said he was in the neighborhood; it would only take a minute.
As he bolted through the door he said, "I got something from Iraq in the trunk and I want you to see it. I think you are going to get something from Iraq too." This made perfect sense for two reasons: 1) Kyle loves to spend money on people that he loves, and 2) He had sent flowers to his mother, sister and sister-in-law a week earlier. So I followed to the trunk of the car to see the gift from Iraq. As our oldest son popped open the trunk he motioned to indicate into which part of the trunk I should be looking. I dove headlong into the trunk and started rummaging about for something Iraqi looking. The voice over my shoulder said, "Look a little deeper." I went further, moving aside the camofloge backpack that was impeding my progress. "Its under that blanket." I worked harder on my quest, thinking that it must be a small item and that I had overlooked it.
It was only then that some pieces started to tumble into place - or more accurately - the pieces were not fitting. The voice behind me, though very similar, had changed tamber slightly. And the backpack that had been in my way looked for all the world like Kyle's and it had his last name on it. Slowly I backed out of the trunk to further investigate the confusion in my head, only to see that the voice over my shoulder was dressed in ACU and looked remarkably like Kyle. YAHOO! Kyle's home for 2 weeks leave.
More to come ... (like the details of his 7 day trip home - without a shower)
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