I fear days like today. In our two-parent life, we would have juggled a full summer Sunday from morning church to evening fireflies. In my single-parent life, my sons slept through church and got kicked out of a bookstore, then a concussion had them in bed early and me wondering how long I should stay awake. Not sure if I’ll get around to the poetry, but I know I can’t stare at this screen for too long.
This is when I question my capability to be a single parent. I still haven’t found a way to think of it as natural. Children are made in union together, shouldn’t they be raised that way? I never spent time thinking about any other way when I was married, we were going to raise our children together, it was assumed. Even at our rockiest times, we were committed to the union and to supporting each other. There was no reason to imagine one of us would be doing this alone.
Perhaps the worst part of the fear is that I have had a taste of co-parenting since my wife’s death. To see a woman care for my sons in a nurturing and loving way was bliss. But we made no promises and there was no union to work on, no commitment to each other’s children.
It was enough to lend heavy credence to my assumptions of the superiority of the two-parent life. It wasn’t enough to maintain them.
It’s certainly not just to have a motherly figure for my boys, I crave companionship as well. Especially when I’m sitting here with a likely concussion and no one to talk with.
So I’ll turn to my journal and see if I can’t crank out some Concussion Poetry.
God bless and thank you for reading,
Jason