Sandwiched

That is a verb, as in “stuck between the two pieces of bread.” It is more like being chopped ham with pickle relish and mayonnaise (yuck), spread on the bread, the other piece of bread placed on top, and then the bully in the class sits on it.

I’m in the sandwich generation. That is a term for the people who are still responsible for their offspring, but their parents are getting to the age of needing care, so they are in the “sandwich.” You could say that they are pulled in two directions, but I feel more like I’m being squashed.

Our remaining parents are age 89 and 90. We still have two kids who are “in our household” although, we are officially empty nesters.

There isn’t a usual age range for having to take care of parents. There are people who still have the responsibility of smaller children who find themselves splitting their time caretaking their parents. I know people in our congregation who are retired, with grey hair and wrinkles, but their parents are still alive, but needing help.

I’m in a sandwich between two of my children. Mark Twain said, "When I was a boy of fourteen, my father was so ignorant I could hardly stand to have the old man around. But when I got to be twenty-one, I was astonished at how much the old man had learned in seven years."

My girl, a college student, still thinks I’m the dumbest thing on two legs. My son, officially just graduated from college, calls me almost everyday to ask advice. Some of the things he has asked me would take an omniscient God to answer. No, I don’t know where you are to turn when you are driving on Washington Ave. I don’t know where you are going, and I don’t know where you are presently.

My daughter’s comments really dig at me. Part of me thinks, “Am I really that bad?” Part of me thinks, “Did I really do that bad of a job raising her?” And then she says something so over the top that I know it is about HER not me.

On the home front, I guess the house is the sandwich filling. The sewer pipe seems to be frozen solid about 70 feet from the house. The bread on the other side of the sandwich is the incoming water line….something is wrong. It is too cold to have this diagnosed, much less fixed. Maybe next week.

My husband was also sandwich filling. I called my husband at work earlier this week to warn him that he would be coming home to a sewer problem. I had to call him again today to tell him about the pump problem and suggest that he buy a certain device. He was wise enough to know his ignorance about this situation and did some research on the internet. He decided that my solution wasn’t the answer, so he saved $200.

So it goes. I worry. I know that worry doesn’t help anything. I pray. I need water. We are getting company. So I write.