Tag: The Shining

Without You

Daily Prompt: What’s the most time you’ve ever spent apart from your favorite person? Tell us about it.

Studly Doright and I have been married for 39 years, and he’s one of my favorite people. Thanks to eight job transfers, all for his career, we’ve spent quite a bit of time apart. 

Physically the longest period of separation was during our last move. He headed to Tallahassee in July of 2012 while I stayed in Mahomet, Illinois, to sell our home. It was Thanksgiving before we were reunited. He did fly me down for a long weekend, though, to house hunt. As separations go, it wasn’t too awful.

The toughest time we had to deal with was our move from New Salem, North Dakota, to Great Bend, Kansas. Studly left us in November to begin his new job while the kids finished the school semester at New Salem (Home of the Fighting Holsteins), and I readied the house for sale. It sold quickly, and we made arrangements to move, but then both kids and I came down with the flu. 

We finally recovered only to have one raging blizzard after another paralyze our part of the country preventing the moving truck from getting to our home. The crew got through to pack up our belongings, but couldn’t get the big truck up to the house. 

Finally fed up with delays, I packed overnight bags, stuffed the kids and the cat in the car and headed due south, leaving detailed instructions for the movers. I could barely see the road for the snow, and every now and then I’d have to skirt around abandoned vehicles stuck in drifts. I prayed a lot. 

As soon as we crossed into South Dakota the skies cleared and the temperatures warmed. I felt like we’d escaped from a Stephen King novel, The Shining 2.0.

With all my heart I hope we are through with moving and the separation it brings.  I’ve told my family I’ll consider going to an assisted living community some day, as long as Studly comes along.

Peace, people!

A little Harry Nillson for your listening pleasure. Damn, I love this song.

http://youtu.be/_bQGRRolrg0

To Sleep, Perchance to Dream

When our first son was very young, perhaps not yet two, he and I were snuggled under the covers on a cold, snowy morning. Studly Doright had left for work, so little Doright and I were catching a few precious zzzz’s.

As we basked in that delicious laziness that comes with sleeping in, little Doright asked sleepily, “Mommy, who is that man?”

I said, “What man, sweetie?”

“That one, Mommy, in the curtains.”

I saw nothing, but my heartbeat sped up just the same. Who knows who or what little Doright saw.

On another occasion I awakened from a nightmare in which Studly was chasing little Doright and me with a knife. I’d just finished reading Stephen King’s The Shining, so that dream was something of a logical consequence. However, from his crib in the room next to ours I heard little Doright crying, “Daddy, don’t hurt us! Daddy stop!”

Whoa! That was a surreal moment! Written in response to The Daily Post’s Daily Prompt.