I Can't Believe You Signed Up for This

Oh my gosh, I'm in trouble... Do you see these crazies that I live with? Although one is six and the other 27, my interaction with them is generally the same. I even mix their names up from time to time, when I'm yelling at them for something they didn't do.

"Jor-- I mean, Helena! Go to sleep!"

"Hele-- Jordon, you left the faucet dripping again!"

True, there are times I feel like a parent to both of them. What with their mutually exclusive clumsiness, the spills I wipe up, the clothes I pick up from the floor, and spells of their unending jibberish conversations

"Jordon, what does 'hoonky lonkey' mean?"

"It's when a ferocious warrior comes down with a cold."

In spite of all of that, ...actually, not even in spite of all of that, maybe because of all of that, I feel lucky. It's not easy to be a single parent. It's not easy to feel like you shouldn't fall in love again because things didn't work out so great for you the first time or because you don't want just anybody coming around your kid. You don't want to fall in love with someone your child won't like. Or worse, have a person enter your world that you both love, get attached to, and then they leave. Yea, these are all things that ran through my mind when I got divorced. And, to be honest, I thought I was pretty much done with love at that point. I didn't have a very good taste of it and couldn't really figure out how anyone else could fit into mine and Helena's crazy little world.

I'm not usually quick to admit this, but I was wrong. And thank God I was wrong, because somehow – after years of telling myself that it wasn't in the cards for me – I fell in love. A real kind of love that I only hope most people know, but don't think they do. I stumbled upon a man who fell in love back, and took on the duties of a role model in a way so seamless it's like he's been there all along. There are days I'm sure he thinks what did I get myself into? There has to be. Even I have those days. But he is patient and kind and has never once made me feel like the little Hellcat is anything less than the amazing little human that she is.

And once, where I imagined nobody could fit into our lives, I wonder now how we would ever get by without him. I'm pretty sure he feels the same way, although I bet he'd have a much easier time playing video games.