A Valentine’s Day To Remember Written by Justin Gaynor It’s a busy time of year and the weight of the world is on my shoulders right now. “Mom! Sean won’t stop!” “Sean! Leave your sister alone. Come on we have to get you two to school.” Moments of reflective contemplation are all too often interupted. The important giving way to the urgent, and then slipping off somewhere into an ethereal land of “I’ll get back to those thoughts.” This is the rhythm of my life right now. Their dad isn’t here to help anymore. Not that I can completely blame him, though I want to. Bastard wasn’t ever much help anyway. These things just happen, right? I don’t know, I don’t have time for this right now. As we pulled up to St. Thomas Elementary, I can’t help but to run through the checklist in my mind a tenth time. Backpacks, check, lunches, check, Sean’s got clean clothes for gym class, I put them in his bag, check, oh, shit! I need to stop and get gas. I’m going to be late. “Alright guys, listen to your teachers! And make sure you get any missed assignments from last Friday.” I had let them play hookie from school last Friday and we took a three day weekend to the shore. It was a much needed breather, but now I have so much to catch up on.
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