A Long Winter's Night

I'm late this morning.  I don't like being late, but it was a long night.

Usually I do my best writing early in the morning when the house is dark and quiet.  For some unknown reason during this time of day I can take a nugget of an idea and run with it.  If I don't have a thought to roll with then things get dicey.  I fret and fuss about it all day long.  Eventually I get down to business and come up with something.  It takes me three times as long to get words on paper (or monitor if you will). Edits can take even longer.  But eventually something is written and ready to post early the next morning.  This process allows me a good night's sleep.  I hate going to bed knowing I am going to disappoint the masses in the AM.



For some reason it didn't happen that way yesterday.  There was a date with the VW dealership that had me in the shower during my scheduled blogging time.  And it went downhill from there.  A second trip back to the "big city" to obtain a power chord the clerk neglected to include with the new cable box, a stop at Wally World for groceries, the pet store for dog food and last minute Christmas shopping for Henna.  (You can't forget the dog at Christmas, they remember it all year long.)  Besides, no nuggets of blogging humor or wisdom were dancing in my head. And of course there was the anticipated arrival of my first born son.

C had gotten off to a late start (no surprise there), pushing his arrival time into the wee hours of the morning.   I fell asleep on the couch where I remained until roughly midnight.  Eventually I trudged off to bed assured that Henna would raise a ruckus when the front door was opened, I would give C a proper hug and return to my bed for the second half of a good night's sleep.  Not so fast.  The Kid (who has now contracted the "thing") was coughing, and sneezing and snorting up a storm.  Sleep was slow to come.  Finally at 3 AM I gave up.  Awake and fidgety with one ear tuned to the front door I decided to get out of bed.  He should be close.  I tried his cell phone.  There was no answer.  His phone went to voice mail.  I figured he was just around the corner and messing with me so I waited.  At 3:15 I hit redial.  Still no answer.  Maybe he had stopped for gas.  3:30 AM ....silence.  I knew his phone wasn't dead because it rang several times before going to voice mail. 3:45 AM.  4:00 AM.  4:15 AM.  Still now answer.  By this time I was beside myself with worry.  I was certain he had fallen asleep at the wheel and was crushed in his vehicle or scattered somewhere along I75; convinced that the next knock on my door would be that of a State Trooper bearing the tragic news.  At 4:30 I was making funeral arrangements in my head. It was then that I heard the faint sound of a car door closing.  The tall figure looming in the shadow of my front door was not wearing the hat of a state trooper.  In fact it was eerily familiar and the best sight I had seen in a long time.  I couldn't decide whether to hug him to death or kill him for ignoring his phone.  Turns out his phone malfunctioned somewhere around Gainsville and wasn't working properly. He was exhausted and headed straight for bed.  As for me, it was awhile before sleep would come.

And there you have it.  That's why I'm late and I don't have a thing to say.

The End.