The Sweetest Thing

My parents loved the World Series. They'd each pick a team they'd root for and then watch every game. Who ever picked the loosing team had to pay for the others dinner. (Which I think is super cute anyways considering most of the time my mom didn't work, which meant technicially my dad always paid. But it was a fun bet they always did.)

I remember years of watching these games through dinner, or walking into the living room and seeing my parents both there watching the games. At times my dad would be to work, but mom would watch and fill him in on the highlights. I remember thinking how cool that was that my parents loved baseball so much, they'd make a game out of it. It was fun to see how excited they'd get when their teams would win. It was also fun when we'd have a babysitter come watch us so the looser could pay the winner with dinner.

A couple weeks ago Jared, out of the blue, asked if it was going to be hard for my mom. I had no idea what he was talking about. He said, "The World Series starts this week." I can't believe I'd forgotten that?! Instantly my heart melted. I was shocked that Jared remembered their bet. I didn't think he even knew when the world series was. We never watch baseball. Jared thinks it's boring, so we've never gotten into it.

That next night I walked into the living room to find Jared sitting in his green chair with the t.v. on. I found him watching The World Series! I asked him what he was doing and he said he was going to watch it and try it out, cause my dad liked it so much; then he could talk to my mom about it. Again, heart melting! I could hear at diferent times when the boys would walk in and ask what Jared was doing. He'd tell them what it was and say, "Grandpa used to watch this."

Over the next couple of weeks, I'd find Jared watching each of the seven games, and soon the boys were joining him. He even watched it with Jim up at my parents house after Sunday dinner this past week. We wanted the Giants to win, and sure enough, last night they did.

That has to be one of the sweetest things I've seen Jared do, especially considering he's always hated watching baseball. But you know what? After about the second or third game, he was upset he had to turn it off to leave for something. He told me it was actually getting pretty intense. It made me smile inside. We might just have a new baseball watching fan on our hands around here. I'm sure my dad was smiling through this.

I love that guy.

Duke died tonight. Jared ran him over. T.J. told me earlier that he broke his chain. Later I found out it could have been fixed pretty easily, but T.J. didn't do that. This is a hard way of learning a lesson for T.J.. And I didn't handle it too nicely. Especially after I noticed he was loose. And then to hear it could have been fixed. Duke liked to chase after us as we'd leave. He would chase our bikes even. Especially T.J. as he'd leave for work. He'd even howl as he'd ride away. Dang it.

Dang it!!!!!!!!

Seriously!

When will things turn around?! I feel awful because Blakeley absolutely loved that puppy and would always say, "Go boys house? See Duke?" It breaks my heart that we have to tell her now that Duke is in heaven with Grandpa.

What a freakin' summer.