I'm Still Alive!

Hey everyone! Happy Friday the 13^th!

You guys have probably been thinking that I dropped off the face of the Earth or something, but I'm here to assure you that the rumours of my demise, as they say, have been greatly exaggerated. It's been a long time since I posted anything here, and I apologize for that. Life has been hectic and crazy as always, and we've had some changes around here over the last month or so. Some of us are still trying to adjust.

Where do I start? I realize Halloween is old news by now but, considering the last time you guys heard from me was a couple of days before Halloween, let me tell you anyway, okay? Pax's first Halloween with us was a big event, not soon to be forgotten, and I'd feel bad if I didn't at least give it a mention.

The family Pax had been staying with before he found his way to us celebrated Halloween of course, so he already had a basic idea of what it was all about but, as I may have mentioned before, Pax wasn't really a part of that family even though he was living in their house. From what I can tell, they treated him more like a pet than a person. I don't think they explicitly excluded him from anything, but it seems that he never got to participate fully in family events and holidays like Halloween and Christmas. It makes me sad whenever I think about that. I mean, I'm grateful that those people kept him safe and gave him a warm place to sleep and lots of food to eat, but I don't understand how they failed to recognize that Pax is an intelligent person.

A few weeks before Halloween, I explained the whole thing to him and then asked him what his costume was going to be. He told me that he wanted to think about it. Sini and I both interpreted that as his way of saying that he wanted to consult with his friends to see what they planned to dress up as. However, what really happened was that Pax's friends, Sammy and Oliver, took their cue from him. Pax decided he wanted to be a banana, and so his friends decided to dress up as food, too. Oliver was a hotdog. Sammy, who cleverly constructed her own costume, was a box of Pop-Tarts. Oliver and Sammy had a great time describing each other's costumes to me when they came to our house. It was like a contest between them to see who could give me the most detail. They both find my blindness fascinating and seem to enjoy telling me all about how things look.

Pax went out trick-or-treating with Oliver and Sammy. Oliver's dad, who I'm now convinced has the patience of several saints, volunteered to chaperone all three of them. I wouldn't have wanted that job, mostly because I'm pretty sure I couldn't have handled it by myself. Maybe next year, Sini and I can go out together with the kids. Skyla will be old enough for trick-or-treating next year as well, so we'll really be able to make it into a family adventure.

This year, Sini and I stayed home to help Sapphire hand out treats. Mostly everyone else was out at one event or another. Michael went to Josh's party, which was by all accounts, the craziest party in town. Rommie didn't go with him. She stayed here and occupied herself with her kids and Skyla, but she did come downstairs to see Cassie and her friends in their costumes, and to see Pax and his friends in theirs.

I guess I don't need to tell you that we had some hyper kids around here when everybody got back from trick-or-treating. Pax, Sammy and Oliver staked out their turf in the living room where they sorted out all their loot and traded with each other for treats they liked better. Somehow, Pax ended up with a lot of miniature Mars Bars. Later he explained to me that he got all of Oliver's Mars Bars because Oliver prefers salty treats and he got all of Sammy's because she said Mars Bars are the best candy for someone from another planet. He traded a lot of Goldfish crackers and Doritos for them, which I suppose was great for him because he's not a big fan of anything cheese-flavoured. He'd rather have sugar.

Oliver and Sammy didn't stay as late as they wanted to because it was a school night. They whined and moaned while Oliver's father and Sini helped them pack up their stuff, and complained how it's unfair that they have to go to school and Pax doesn't. Then, Pax started saying how he thinks it's not fair that Sammy and Oliver go to school while he has to stay home.

Pax has been begging us for weeks now to let him go to school with his friends. Sini and I recognize that he needs an education and that we can't keep him at home forever, but we're not sure how to deal with his desire to go to our neighbourhood elementary school. Sini teaches him reading and math as best she can at home but she says he's reached the age where his learning potential is at its peak, and she says he'd already have started attending school with his peers if he were on their home world. Apparently, all Erisan children are home-schooled until they reach the age of about fourteen or fifteen. After that, they go to learning centres which, as far as I can gather from what Sini tells me, seem to be set up more like universities than high schools. Erisans don't do formal education in the same way a lot of Earth cultures do. Teenagers go to the learning centres for four to six years – until they've completed the fundamental courses and whatever advanced programs of study they enroll in after that – and then they can either look for work or seek higher education.

The main problem Sini and I have with sending Pax to school here is that we have no idea if we can even register him with the school district. We'd have a lot of explaining to do, I think, and neither of us are really prepared for a potential administrative nightmare right now. Then there's the issue of what grade he should be in. Physically he's sixteen years old, and most sixteen year olds are in tenth or eleventh grade, but he's got the emotional and mental maturity of a highly intelligent ten-year-old, so I'm pretty sure the fifth grade would be more appropriate. The school board, however, might have a problem with a sixteen-year-old in grade five.

The other worry I have about sending Pax to school is how he'll get along with the other kids. He's great friends with Oliver and Sammy, and he's fine with the other kids in our neighbourhood, but the atmosphere in a public school is a lot different than it is at the park on Saturday. Kids can be cruel, especially toward anyone who's different. Pax's friend Sammy has had terrible problems with bullies at school this year, and even though Oliver sticks up for her, I think it's still really tough for her to cope.

Sammy is adopted, and the reason kids are picking on her is because she's brown and her parents are white. That's it. Sammy is a smart, playful, funny kid. She's a good kid, and she doesn't deserve to be tormented simply because she's the brown girl with white parents. How much worse would it be for Pax as the pointy-eared green kid, or the teenager in grade five? I don't want to let him go through that. It would seriously break my heart to have him come home crying every day like Sammy's father says she does sometimes.

That is the exact reason why my parents kept me out of public school, too. From kindergarten until third grade I attended a special school for the blind. It was in the city, so for nine months of the year my mother and I lived in a tiny apartment a few blocks from my school. Michael was in public school in the country and Dad had his veterinary practice, so they didn't come to the city with us. Mum and I came home on weekends and of course we went back to the country for the summer, but the situation wasn't easy for any of us. Mum struggled just as hard as I did to learn how to read and do math in Braille. She came to all my singing lessons and piano lessons with me, attended my mobility classes and even learned to do things blindfolded just to see what it was like for me. We would make a game of it sometimes. I remember her going around our apartment with her blindfold on, bumping into stuff she couldn't see, and then laughing when I ran past her without bumping into anything. I really miss those times. Back then, I had no doubt that my mother loved me. I know she still loves me now, but I usually didn't have to remind myself of that when I was a little kid.

Once my mother was confident in both our abilities, my parents decided that it was time for Mum and me to come home to stay, and they also decided that Michael and I would be home-schooled. Kids had been giving Michael a hard time in school, and I guess Mum and Dad felt that if my smart, athletic and – most importantly – sighted brother was having problems, it'd be ten times worse for me. I'm grateful to my parents for that. I'm not sure how my life would've turned out if I'd grown up in fear of my own peers. I understand how damaging all that harassment and bullying can be, and I'm glad my parents wanted to protect me from that. I want to protect Pax from it, too. I would hate to see our wonderful, confident, outgoing boy change into someone who's scared to go outside the door.

I told Pax we'd have to think about school. Sini and I need to discuss it some more. We're not going to make any decisions about it before the end of this term anyway. Sini says we've got more pressing things to focus on right now, such as getting me through my first-semester exams and then getting ready for the arrival of our new baby.

Sini says she thinks the baby will come before March. I'm not sure if that's good news. Don't get me wrong; I'm really excited for our new arrival, but I'm also very aware of how quickly time is moving along. Back in the summer it seemed like we had all the time in the world to prepare for our new little one. Now, it's like she's coming soon whether we're ready for her or not. Or him. I still don't really know. I just like to think of her as a girl.

While I'm really happy about the way things are going with my little family, I have to tell you that I'm still pretty upset about how things are going with my brother and his family. Last time I updated all of you on the situation with Michael and Rommie, they were in a pretty bad place. I wish I could say everything's fixed and they're all doing better but, unfortunately, I can't. Michael has officially moved out, although he still comes over just about every day to see Jack, Cleo and Lucy.

As you might well imagine, Rommie is in a predicament right now because she doesn't have any income of her own. Michael's using his money to pay his share of the rent at his new place and to pay for all the incidental items like food, personal care products and bus fare. I don't know if he's giving Rommie very much of his pay cheque. Rommie thinks she's going to have to look for a job, which is a problem in itself because then she'll need to find child care, too. It's okay for Sini to baby sit sometimes, but I put my foot down when Rommie suggested that Sini could watch all the kids every day. I don't think it's fair to expect Sini to look after three toddlers and an infant as well as Cassie and Pax, not to mention our new baby when she comes. Rommie was annoyed with me, I think, but I couldn't help that. I love Rommie and my nieces and nephew, but my priority is to take care of Sini and our kids.

Sini thinks I should talk to Michael again, but I think Michael is done talking about his marriage. He'll have a conversation with me on just about any subject except that one. Besides, I have no idea what I could say to Michael that he doesn't know already. Our parents raised us to be responsible, and part of being responsible means doing what's best for your family. Michael doesn't need me to tell him that.

And while we're on the subject of Michael, I should let you know that he had his eye surgery this past Tuesday. I went with him to the hospital, just as I'd promised, and I didn't tell Rommie what was going on. I wanted to, but when I explained it all to Sini, she seemed to think it would be better if Rommie didn't find out about it from me. The surgery went well according to Michael's doctor, and she is cautiously optimistic. He has to go back and see her for regular monthly checkups for a while. He's not too happy about that, but I told him that I thought it was a pretty small sacrifice, all things considered.

Michael isn't the only one who's had his turn with doctors during the last couple of months, either. Remi is having a really hard time adjusting to his first Canadian winter, and he seems to have been fighting off one minor illness after another since the middle of October. Cold, flu, sore throat, ear infection...you name it. It's becoming clear to everyone around here that Remi isn't a fan of winter and that he absolutely hates snow. He might even hate snow as much as Pax does, but at least Pax doesn't have to go out if he doesn't want to. Remi found a job at a menswear store in the mall, so he has to go out every day whether he wants to or not.

Xander says Remi looks twice his normal size after he's done putting on all his layers of clothing every morning. Sini secretly laughs at him, something for which I've admonished her. I've reminded her that not everyone loves winter as much as she does. She's been known to take off practically all her clothes, go outside and roll around in a snowdrift. For somebody from a warm planet, she seems to enjoy snow quite a lot. She says it's a sensual experience. Maybe so, but it's not one I'm personally willing to try.

Like Remi, I've had my own round of medical issues since October. I was really sick early in November and missed over a week of school and a few shifts at work. I swear it was the worst bout of gastroenteritis that I've ever had. I was in an absolutely mind-numbing amount of pain, and I couldn't even swallow water and manage to keep it down. My doctor admitted me to the hospital because he said I was dangerously dehydrated. For some stupid and utterly inexplicable reason, I didn't want to stay in the hospital even though I knew I needed to be there but, fortunately for me, no amount of desperate begging on my part could convince Dr. Cho to let me suffer through my illness at home.

I was in the hospital for three days, which brings my grand total of days in hospital for 2013 up to seven. That's pretty good, considering I accumulated nearly a month of days in the hospital in 2011. My goal in life is to have a hospital-free year. I wonder if that'll ever happen?

It took me a while to recover fully from the reason for my latest hospital visit. I lost a lot of weight while I was sick and, believe me, my body can't really afford to lose more than a couple of kilograms. Even after I came home and was able to go back to work and school, I was still really tired all the time. But...enough about that. I'm feeling a lot better now, and it's a good thing that I am, because I have a million and one things to do before MY BIRTHDAY PARTY tomorrow night!!!

Yes! I really am having a birthday party after all.  It's a couple of days before my actual birthday, but nobody was really into the idea of having a major party on a Monday night, so Saturday it is.  Sapphire said it was okay, as long as she didn't have to do anything except show up to it. She's busy at work right now and she's getting ready to go away for Christmas, so she hasn't really got time for party planning. Dylan and Beau were only too happy to help and, much to my surprise, so was Xander. I think Remi might've talked Xander into it, but you're not going to hear me complaining as long as Xander is helping out. Sini is helping too, although I told her she doesn't have to. She hasn't been feeling very energetic lately and I don't want her to overtire herself.

Michael is invited to the party, since it's his birthday too, but he says he hasn't decided whether he's coming or not. I think I'll be disappointed if he doesn't come. Even if he fails to make an appearance, though, I plan to enjoy myself anyway.

Another one of our big projects this weekend was supposed to have been to decorate for Christmas, but Sapphire says she doesn't want us to do that until after the party. We'll probably start working on the Christmas stuff on Sunday. Yeah...it's going to be a wild couple of days.

As always, I'll do my best to keep you guys in the loop.