Coming Around Again

I have not posted in 6 months! How did this happen? I blame a WET spring, LOST, one of the best Survivor seasons ever, moving my mother TWICE and a general laziness on my part.

Mom and I took Robby fishing this past weekend for the first time. It was free fishing weekend in Oregon and we went to the Bonneville Dam Fish Hatchery. They hosted a fishing clinic on Saturday. Kids got to fish for free. Robby had to go to seven stations to learn all about fish, water safety and taking care of the watershed. The kids four and under got to fish in the big bins and the kids five and older got to fish in their stock ponds. Robby got two rainbow trout and was so excited you could actual feel it in the air around you.

Yeah, I caught two fish, Mama. I'm super cool!

He was so proud too!

I was amazed once again at the parents I saw. Twice Robby was pushed by an adult so that they could get in front of him. It reminded me of the Easter Egg Hunt a few years ago where all the adults rushed out to "help" their kids find eggs. Adults were grabbing eggs with two hands and most of the kids (including mine) didn't get to pick up one single egg and put it in their basket. Aren't these things supposed to be about the kids having fun? I don't get it. Those fish were not going anywhere. A grown man who pushes a four year old boy out of the way so he can see a trout before him deserves to be punched in the face. Period.

I remember catching my first fish. I caught four catfish! My great grandfather was there, as well as my grandparents. It was just outside of Parks, Arizona where my grandparents had an acre of land where we would spent our weekends escaping the heat of Phoenix. My grandma got an old curtain rod and hung them out on it so I could hold those four catfish up for a picture. I can still see that picture in my mind. I was wearing a striped shirt and I didn't wear glasses yet. My hair back in a ponytail. I remember how my grandmother looked taking that picture. She told me once to be still and NOT MOVE while she was taking my picture or she would CUT MY HEAD OFF. She meant cut my head off in the picture, but I took her literally. She never took one single blurry picture of me in my life as a result of that.

Robby got to share catching his first fish with his grandma just like I did. That should fill my heart with a sense of happiness and wonder at the circle of life. It does fill my heart - almost completely. I admit, part of the day I spent reflecting on how my grandmother missed this moment. She missed it not because she is dead, but because she has chosen to miss it. I tell that little girl inside me she missed it because she is sick. Dementia is so cruel not only to those whose brain it consumes but to the people around them who lose them and are robbed of those last years together. I tried to stay in the moment and be grateful that I got to spend the day with my son and my mother, but that little girl with the ponytail kept thinking about how her Nanny should be here to see this too.