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The night before last I finally got to talk to Steve for more than a few minutes - with the World League schedule, the 23-hour trip to Brazil and the time change, it's been tough to find time to chat - and despite the fact that we were both super exhausted, it was such a relief to finally catch up on a few things. This facebook status post followed: I miss my husband I miss Italy and I love love love my boy... Because, we had more to talk about than the regular what've you been up to how's the weather how's the visit with your parents stuff; Hendrik had an appointment with a pediatric ophthalmologist on Monday and the doctor brought up the possibility of surgery - big, big sigh.

We were referred after I mentioned something in a regular check-up appointment a few weeks ago - his left eye is a bit wonky sometimes (or all the time?), but it's not something that we've thought too much of or have been overly concerned about. We had one visit to the clinic and then another one (Monday's) and the verdict is that his eyes are misaligned and not working together in unison (due to a combination of amblyopia and strabismus), and the recommended fix is a combination of surgery and patching. I've been surprisingly calm about it until Tuesday night when I looked at the info sheets we came home with and a few blogs I found after searching strabismus repair surgery (imagining him under the knife, uncomfortable etc) and so I wanted to / needed to talk to Steve and feel assured and come up with some sort of game plan for what to do and how to feel. After we talked I went back and looked at pics from our last few months in Italy, and I really noticed the inward turn of his left eye - how did that escape me so? Anyways, I guess that's beside the point; what matters is that it's nothing incredibly urgent (the surgery), and despite the fact that his eyes aren't working together all of the time, his vision is near perfect. It's just a bit scary to think of him needing surgery, of him having surgery - and then the recovery and the potential for other issues down the road. Steve and I have barely had time to look into things let along talk about anything, and that's definitely on our to-do list pronto; also, the wait list for the surgery is close to a year, so we have time to wrap our heads around everything and learn learn learn. Until then, we're working on getting him to wear an eye patch for 90 minutes a day, to keep the strength of his left eye up with that of his right one. It's been so far so good... yeaaaaay! We're starting slowly and working our way up - with the help of an iPad yesterday (and Buppa, thank you thank you!) and a new trunk of toys today, we're getting there. After our long overdue skype convo the other night, I went in and looked at Hendrik sleeping and felt so overcome by love and thankfulness; we have more than anything I could ever wish for, with him and with our family, and this is, I hope, really just the most minor smudge in the big picture of his life, of our lives.

love love love love love

So! Onwards. We're in Vancouver and it's rainy and cold - yay to the Vancity bit, but boooooo to the weather. We had a pretty decent trip out, thank goodness for the extra seat between Hendrik and I and Dennis (name in cursive on the sweatshirt sleeve), our private and gruff middle-aged man-neighbor. Hendrik fought sleep by insisting on flailing his legs here and there, and I felt like I had to straightjacket him in my arms to get him from pissing off the guy in front of us - uggggh... But eventually he fell asleep and I got a bit of time with Mma Ramotswe and her gang before catching some shut-eye myself. There have been so so many fabulous bits in this latest edition of the No.1 Ladies Detective Agency (it's the best one I've read in a while) and I'm sure it won't be long before I give in and share some blog-side. If I had it right here with me now I'd find something fabulous, but it's upstairs with Hendrik in Claire's old room, so it'll have to wait.

The rest of the visit with my parents was great - the sun came out and we got some good hide and seeking in, cleaning done and ... yeah, it was good! They flew to Toronto yesterday morning, and Shanti ferried the two of us out to the airport later in the afternoon; Steve will join on the 19th and I can't wait!