TRAVEL PLANS FOR THE NEXT TWO YEARS

Hi, Mel,

I am sorry about your loss of your stepfather--l am glad you liked him. Did you grow up with him for a dad?

I hope you and your kids can go on the trip--probably the most fun thing I did as a child was go on a trip from WA to WI to visit my grandmother's sisters.

Alice,

The retirement funds were eventually found and are what we live on.

Don,

My husband had hip replacement surgery in October and is doing great, but we need to get to someplace warm where we can both walk outside and get out of the cold. Somehow we got through the last months of disability and are now hitting the road!

Mel,

I hope you get to go on that trip with the kids! It doesn't matter how far one goes, just to get out and about is fantastic.

Love, Carol

A. W. Nutter wrote:

Hi Alice wishing you a safe and exciting trip. Take a laptop along so you can keep in touch.

Thanks, Nutter,

I love rmy laptop--I even took it to the hospital with me.

Hi Mel,

The smiley appeared because the numbers were converted to a similey face. I removed the smiley. If you join you can edit your own posts, add a signature and put links in your posts.

Mel,
I think the trip will be exciting for the family. Just be prepared, after several hours of driving, for one the kids to say, "are we there yet?"

Abe,

She will be lucky if they wait for several hours--it might be a few minutes.

Our kids loved to travel with us and still do on occasion. They preferred to fly--so do I.

Alice, the kidney all better, thanks. I've traveled so much of my life, I just don't enjoy it anymore, my escape is in my writing.

Don,

I am glad you are feeling better and by all means write--I enjoy your writing I will take it with me as I travel.

Ed (my step-dad) came into my life when I was sixteen. We had little love or tolerance for each other. He was the "other man". We tried to stay out of each others way as much as possible although I do recall a few times when he went to bat for me when he didn't have to.

He didn't have much patience and wanted everything a certain way. Of course, that collided fiercly with my teenage sensibilities. So through the years things went that way. We never disliked each other, we just didn't share a warm affection for one another either until years later.

Later on we did share a good relationship. I'm not sure when that began, it just did. I talked to him about everything, things I couldn't talk to my own dad about. We were very close. Although Ed preferred to be called grandfather, my kids called him Papaw. We're in Southern Indiana, you know.

He was their papaw all their lives. They loved him a lot even though he tended to snipe at them from time to time. He loved them too. His own grandkids rarely saw him or cared. This hurt him a lot, but maybe we helped some with that. He told me many times how he wished I was his own daughter. In a way I was. He knew that. We shared a lot of laughs together. I miss that humor he had and I still miss talking to him about things that I can't talk to others about. He always told me straight, whether I liked the answer or not. Many times I did not.

He told me he never wanted to replace my own dad. And I let him know how fortunate I was to have two dads who cared for me so much.

So the year anniversary of his death is next week. The pain isn't as raw, but there is still an empty space in my life and my heart. But he will always be remembered. I have our memories, the ones that were special to just the two of us and I have opportunities, just like this one, to share what a special person he really was.

Ed 7/08/1938-2/11/2008


Shelagh, thanks for editing that post. I am still cautious about joining, but thank you for the invitation.

Mel,
Seventy was not very old either. Again-- I am sorry.

Mel,

Thanks for posting that; you have described your early experience with your stepfather just the way it is with my niece and the new man in her mother's life. You have given a glimmer of hope that she might learn to love this man the way you came to love your stepfather. Sometimes, it just takes time.

My son-in-law's father left the family early in his life. He had a stepfather and also an uncle who took him and his brothers hunting and was like a dad to them. Unfortunately his uncle died last Sunday at the age of 63 and his funeral is tomorrow. He never married and his nephews and nieces were his kids. It will be a sad funeral, but I know they will share some good stories.

Mel, I'm sorry about your stepfather. Anniversaries of those days can be sad.

Carol

Shelagh, the recipe for a lasting relationship between a stepfather/child must contain many ingredients, different for each relationship. Key ingredients are respect and patience. Respect is a two way street, a difficult route for any teenager. Respect must be earned to be given where each person does their part. The stepfather of your niece should never try to replace her own father, no matter if her father is a saint or a loser. He is still her father. He must not hover or smother, and give her room to find her ease with him in her own way. Strong words should only be used with regret, or nothing should be said at all. He should handle discipline with her with only kid gloves. Leave the discipline to the mother. I remember Ed trying to tell me what to do. When he did, I did the complete opposite just to spite him.

Ed didn't really try to form a relationship with me, and it was the same for me. Neither of us put a lot of effort into it. I think this is the reason why it did finally work for us. In our minds, at one time, we didn't really care if we got along or not. But we both did care how we affected my mother. Maybe that made the difference. So since we didn't try, then the relationship was given the proper timing to flourish on its own, in the best possible way. We were great friends even after our history together at first. This took many years, but it was worth it.

I hope this advice will help you see the relationship between your niece and her stepfather. It was not easy, not at all. But I wouldn't trade it away.

One of my fondest memories of him is how he didn't want anyone to park in the driveway at his and mom's house, but pull in the side gravel instead. So for years I did pull in the gravel so I didn't have to hear him complain about it. A couple of years ago he gave me clearance to pull in the driveway. I was about the only one he allowed to park there. Two days before he died mom was telling me about the hospice nurse who would be coming on Monday (turned out to be the day he died). Ed spoke right up and said that nurse needed to be sure to pull in the gravel. I reminded him that he allowed me to pull in the driveway and he gave me an impatient look and said, "well, you're different!"

Which meant that I was "in the club", and in Ed's eyes I was pretty special. I realized later that we had come full circle on that Saturday last February. He was not only my stepfather, but also my friend who cared very deeply for me. I don't regret the years that we were not so close. It happened exactly the way it was supposed to, even if, from beginning to end, it took twenty two years.

Carol, sorry about your son-in-law's uncle.