A surprise....

My parents and I have arrived at our vacation destination. SuperNan took me boxing day shopping and we found me my first ever pair of skates. Ther very first skates I've ever owned that haven't been owned by a big brother or two before me.

The problem? They are girl skates. They have picky things on them and I think that if I fall down and break my teeth on the ice and end up with a broken nose and have to have plastic surgery, I may well throw myself off the docks and straight into Georgian Bay. I'm that scared of breaking my teeth.

This post, however, has nothing to do with skating or teeth or vacations, even.

It has to do with Big Brother. The one who is supposed to be in Afghanistan.

A day or two before we left for our vacation, the phone rang. It was my sister-in-law's number displayed, so I settled in for a chat with my number one girl.

But it was Big Brother's voice on the other end. At first I just assumed that the wires had crossed somehow, that when he hung up from talking to her, he called us so quickly afterwards that the call display said her name.

I kept on repeating myself because if the connection was that screwed up, I was likely to lose him fairly quickly.

But then he said that he was with his wife, in Ontario, Canada right that moment.

My heart sank below my knees, right through my feet, and into the basement. I was so sure that something terrible had happened to him. In hindsight, I suppose if he had been injured, he would be in an army hospital on the other side of the world.

He kept on telling me that he was with his wife, at her parents' house, and I could hear a little smirk, a little giggle in his voice.

If he had been near me I would have slapped him. I was so stunned that someone who is supposed to be in a war zone on the other side of the world was mere hours away from me.

He was offered leave in November, but he turned it down. An opportunity for him to come home for ten days came up this very week that we are visiting his wife and the Princess. And he took it. And he surprised us all.

I can't quite imagine how his lovely wife felt when she saw his face. The constant worry, the constant fear, the thoughts in your head every time the phone rings: these are very real things you deal with when you have a loved one overseas. When I heard his voice on a phone that wasn't connected through satelite, I can't quite explain how my heart felt light and easy.

Tomorrow I am trying out my new skates and then going for an afternoon with big brother and his family.

I'm not sure if it's the water-y air, or that Big Brother is safe and sound, or the fact that exams are done, or any of a number of other factors in play here, but I've been sleeping better the last few nights than I think I have ever slept in my life.

Toonses