I've read a couple of blog posts this morning that seem to summon up my state of mind.
The first is rather bleak - over at the normally upbeat
Looky Daddy!What's the point of drawing your attention to this? Well, because occasionally there is still dark moments when considering what has happened to our beautiful, innocent children. Amidst the frequent celebrations of successes there are still (blessedly infrequent) thoughts that feature the phrase 'why him? why us?'. The cheerful congratulations that accompanied Tom's skiing achievements are tempered, for example, by a fleeting 'this shouldn't be a big deal - this should be normal'. It sucks.
Most of the time I can tell myself that a self-indulgent pity party is not appropriate, particularly after spending a week with a group of families coping brilliantly with the same set of circumstances - or worse. But sometimes the thoughts linger.
I don't think its any coincidence that this has reared its head now - its anniversary time. Three years since Tom contracted meningitis and we wondered whether anything good might happen again.
But of course good things happen all the time.
The second post is by the rarely seen Magic Daddy - father to the wonderful Tom doppelganger Ethan, subject of
Ethan's World, and splendidly illustrates the day-to-day, mostly joyful reality of parenting our resilient survivors. Brave, strong kids.
See what a mess of emotions it is?
While I catch you in this delicate state, one of Tom's grandpas is doing
something special for The Meningitis Trust this weekend - climbing Ben Nevis with a number of his cronies. He deserves all our support.
So they did it - Tom's Grandpa Will organised an assault on the summit of Ben Nevis in aid of the Meningitis Trust and they all made it unscathed. That's snow on the ground you can see but still proudly wearing short sleeved T-shirts emblazoned, if you look carefully, with Tom's grinning face.
