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Posted
02/26/06 @ 1pm

Tagged
personal, family

This doesn’t mean I’ll be doling out favors at my daughter’s wedding

Having not blogged since earlier Friday, let me offer a brief note of congratulations to Karl before digressing into one of my strange little recollections.

The 24 hours between Friday evening at ten and last night at ten were among the most tiring yet, but with all the confusion and weariness, some good did come of it.

Friday night a little after ten, I was sitting in a booth at a Philly area pizza shop enjoying a slice and some wings with a friend. That conversation turned a bit sour, or maybe unsettling is a better word. I’m still not sure what to think of it, but I didn’t get too much sleep Friday night, which was problematic, given what I was to do Saturday.

Saturday morning, a little past ten, I was sitting in a slightly different kind of booth in a diner in West Amwell, New Jersey. Instead of pizza and wings and a friend, I had eggs, hash browns and my parents in the booth. About two hours later we were at our destination, preparing to attend a series of baptisms, at which I became a Godfather. It went well. After being inducted into the Godfatherhood, it only made sense we should wander a few blocks from the church to a local restaurant, where thirty-some fellow attendees were enjoying some excellent Italian food, wine and cake.

I’ll admit that around the time we were beginning to gather ourselves to go back to the hosting house, I was beginning to feel the effects of my sleep deprivation from the night before. Eventually I got home, but instead of going straight to bed I turned on the Sixers game and watched some of it, right up until I conked out around ten o’clock.

During the time I was watching the game, I thought of different things. I wondered if I should call my friend from the night before to talk, but I quickly ruled against it, as I was even more tired than the last time we’d talked (and that didn’t go so well). I wondered if I would really be such a great Godfather, but I hope so. I thought those three-pointers Andre Iguodala was putting in last night were a good sign for his career development, and I thought of how my hopes for Andre were similar, in some ways, to the hopes I have for those children I was with earlier in the day. And I started to recall the little signs of promise I see in those kids every time I see them.

Then I faded. There’s something about weariness that makes things seem cloudy. I don’t always notice it when I’m tired, but afterwards, by comparison, it’s usually obvious. I’m glad my weariness hadn’t kept me from seeing my wonderful nieces and nephews get baptized, but it probably should have kept me from trying to hold a serious conversation with a friend. Or maybe it would have just delayed me saying what I meant to say. I’m not so sure. But that was the day, for better or worse.

NOTE: To the interested parties, I will be posting photos on Flickr pertaining to yesterday’s events, but I will probably wait a couple days, ‘til my broadband connection has been re-established—finally.


3 Comments

Posted by
Ellen
26 February 2006 @ 9pm

With the conversation w/ your friend – immediate reaction may not have been what you want, but you can hope that your friend can keep in mind the spirit of the talk and not the actual words/tone (I know I try to get the brain cells to do that when I’m similarly on the receiving end). Best wishes.

Oh – and to date my fave role in life has been “Auntie” (and I’m a godmother to a nephew too) and best wishes w/ that as well.


Posted by
howard
27 February 2006 @ 5am

I’m not too hopeful at the moment on that first subject, but on the second one hope springs eternal. Thanks for the wishes!


Posted by
the smedley log :: Through the Waters
5 March 2006 @ 2am

[…] That is 5-times mother but not til this day Godmother Christine on the left holding Dara (#4). And on the the right (where else?), you’ll find the inimitable Howard, proprietor of these blog-parts, and Godfather of these beautiful kids. At center is my lovely wife Robin (Howard’s sister), and, just in case you think it might be rude to ask, yes that is our #6 (if experienced prenatal ultrasound technicians may be believed, Esther Linda) riding along with her. Your scribe is the grey-haired guy with the hopelessly fat tie. As Howard alluded to earlier, we went to our local friendly Italian place for an “intimate” dinner for about 30 people. […]


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