An Open Letter to Our Children

Dear Kids,

We love you very much.  All three of you.  All at the same time.  You give us endless joy each and every day.  Without a doubt you are the center of our universe and we are all the better for it.  But before we were parents, we were a young couple without kids, and for a day and a half this weekend we got to be those two people once again!

Thanks to two babysitters, Emma C. and Emma J., and Grandma as a back up, we went to Wilmington, NC without you!  A whole twenty-seven hours without parental responsibilities.  It turns out we're still a little cool and can still relive a little of the past.  Of course it helps that Wilmington is a lot like Ithaca, NY - only in the South and on a river.  Except for the water/ocean/southern style theme in the stores, historic downtown is remarkably like Ithaca Commons.

The artisan shoppes at the Cotton Exchange with hand blown glass works, paintings, pottery, and antiques are no different than any store we used to walk through in two minutes in Ithaca.  That's not to say there wasn't some really nice things to look at, but it was hard not to think we hadn't seen it before.  The people didn't seem much different either.  The streets were full of with college students, stoners, bikers, tattoo artists, freaks, geeks, gays, and tourists.  It made us feel more at home to people watch.


In the middle of the day we walked from our bed and breakfast inn down onto to Front Street - which, although clearly in its second life as a tourist attraction, was well past whatever prime it had seen in the 1950's, '60's, or maybe even '70' - and into the Front Street Brewery and ordered beer first and food second.  Without you to look after and answer to every other second we could catch a little buzz off of their IPA and ESB brews and continue on to the next bar - although, to be honest we didn't have another drink for a while - but we could have if we wanted too!  A pub crawl has never really been our thing, but if we didn't have other plans for the rest of the day we could have visited ten different bars all within a half mile of one another.

On the roof top bar on Front Street we got to watch the sun start to drop behind the USS North Carolina across the Cape Fear River, without worrying about any of you dropping something (like yourselves) off the side to the pavement six stories below.  We talked about things that were on our mind; our cares and concerns, work and life and the balance we try to find between the two.  Most importantly we talked about our love for one another and how truly blessed we are. 

I rediscovered my sense of humor exclaiming out loud as we left that establishment, "Lisa, I'm sorry.  I didn't know it was a clothing optional bar," as other patrons entered. Almost as funny as, "What do you mean the baby isn't mine?!," I say in Wal-Mart.  And if I had a dry erase marker on me I might have changed their sign on the street level too!  Next time.

Thanks to Lisa's reality TV savvy, we went out to dinner at Catch - a very nice and very expensive restaurant that we could never, ever, have taken you to.  E-v-e-r.  It is owned by a man who was on Top Chef, and well, of course we had to go because he-was-on-TV!  It was great to have food that was over the top in its presentation and taste.  Truly the best calamari I ever had and the best rice, yes rice, I ever tasted.

We got to be adults who could get a little drunk, have a little adventure, and not worry about which one of us was putting you to bed!  We didn't stay out late - but we could have if we wanted to!  And we got to sleep in late.  A rarity for us!  Being met with breakfast already to go, not having to cook or clean up afterwards - Oi! what a treat.   

Sunday morning we just walked around the old neighborhoods around 2nd and 3rd Avenue without an agenda but taking in the homes with wrought iron gates, big wood doors, and historical markers on the front of most of them.  I reminded myself and Lisa that my handyman skills are somewhat limited and that a house like any of these would take constant maintenance lest either one of us get grandiose ideas of owning such a home.  In fact, I think we settled on an RV with some ramblings about a sailboat.  Before we got in the car for the drive home we discovered something else...
 
Kids, we have a love between us that exists without you.  That's not a bad thing, or selfish, or mean.  We don't get to have that too often because of the love that we share as a family.  Over the next two decades we will watch each of you grow and leave us for your own lives and loves.  We will be taking more of these trips before we ever find ourselves with an empty nest and no idea what do next.  They will be longer and farther away too! 

Don't worry we'll send you a postcard.