One of my own...

Sorry for abandoning you, Blog. Life has be hectic lately. Where to begin...

I'm going to school now. Due to other previous schedule promises, I'm only taking one five-credit class this quarter. I hope to go full-time next quarter. I don't want to be in college forever. I barely want to be there now. I have class Monday through Thursday. And then I'm babysitting over in Milwaukie, Oregon Thursday through Monday. My responsibilities over there have grown so much once school started. I wake the kids up on Fridays and Mondays and I get them ready for school while their mom sleep. I feed them lunch and I feed them dinner. I practically live over at that house now. Which brings me to a topic I didn't plan on writing about in this blog entry. Now that I think about it, this is the reason I created this blog; to share the stories of people and their real lives. I've spoken of other people's sad "When Life Hits..." stories, and now it is time for one of my own. The tears are already starting...

On May 12th of this year, a man I am proud to have called a friend passed away. I had been watching his 8-year-old twins for the past few years. I've been in their lives since their first birthday, so that always looked up to me. One day, he asked me to watch his kids the following Thursday. I walked in that Thursday, surprised to find his wife there in his place. She was supposed to be at work. That's why I was needed. She didn't know I would be coming that day. The previous night, her husband, "my" kids father, and my friend lost his life down near Battleground Lake. I didn't discover that he had actually taken his own life until the memorial service a week later.

Sometimes I wonder if the night he asked me to come by that Thursday, he knew what he was about to do. Sometimes I feel that he had everything planned out. I was there that night for his wife. I cried with her. I looked at old pictures with her. I was there. I wonder if that's what he wanted when he asked me to come over. I hurts me to think that he planned this far ahead.

There were no warning signs. No depressed feelings from what I could see. He was getting out and about; going fishing and going to UFC matches, doing what he loved to do. He had a loving wife and loving kids. I don't see why he felt the need to leave us like that...

And now, every week, I travel half an hour to watch his kids, because his wife works at night, and therefore needs to sleep during the day. I feel like I have to do this. She has nobody else to turn to. These kids know me and listen to me. I can't just stop going over there. Yes, it pays, but it's interfering with my school work. I won't be able to keep this up forever.

I don't know what I'm going to do...