I'm on the road.
I'm in southern Illinois now, sitting inside Denny's, using mass quantities of their free wireless and making mental notes on how one manages to eat relatively healthy food here. I'd rather eat my road food, but hey, we gotta pay for this free wireless somehow.
I need to be on my way again, but I have the most wonderful news, and I can't hold it in without posting it.
Walter is a grandfather today. A perfectly healthy baby boy was born to his elder daughter, after only one hour of labor.
A very few of you know about the tragic death of her first child last year. At one and a half years old, the little girl needed a heart transplant. They ultimately decided to just do repair surgery instead. Her heart defects, at birth, were extensive. The surgery was extremely serious, but she came through that, she improved, and went home from Vienna back to Slovakia to continue healing.
She was a highly intelligent, very sweet, and very articulate little girl. She talked on the phone to Walter after her surgery, the only time he ever spoke with her, and she stole his heart away.
A few days later, she succumbed to an infection and died.
She was the reason Walter was finally reunited with his family in Europe. The manipulations of his unscrupulous ex-wife had left him estranged from his daughters for some fifteen years, and heartbroken, he didn't communicate much with the rest of his family either.
Last year they called a friend of Walter's to see if he might talk to them. They needed help with the little girl's surgery, you see. Now - now, after some hesitant and careful opening communications, they've come to know that man as he really is. He got to talk to his father too, who passed away, at age 92, soon after the granddaughter.
Their lives have improved tremendously from knowing each other. All of them. Walter's two daughters and his brother and sister all call him now to ask his advice on business and life and law and the family and all that great stuff.
It was the beautiful little girl who brought them all back together.
Her mother, a very courageous and loving and fine woman, grieved and thought and talked to her husband and took some time - and decided to have another baby.
Today, that baby was born. He's 6 pounds 8 ounces, about 19 1/2 inches, and his heart is perfect.
They named him after Walter.
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7 comments:
Whewww...so much news!
I'm glad some of it is, finally, good news!
Congratulations to Walter...and you, too! :)
awwwwwwwwwwww.....that is soooo sweet. congrats, I'm so happy.
How Wonderful! No baby is a replacement, but many of them are instruments of healing. I'm so happy for Walter ---Hey does that make you a step-grandma??
Methinks it does! Congratulations, Grandpa and Grandma! I hope they are sending photos soon.
Drive safely.
Oh how wonderful! I can just imagine Walter, beaming and strutting! Congrats all around!
"They named him after Walter."...that just brought me to tears.
Oh, we're all STILL walking on air! The celebrations in Europe haven't begun to slow down yet. Everyone is just fine, mama too.
I keep grinning and crying and grinning again.
Kid's a self-starter. He wasn't supposed to show up for another three weeks, so we weren't really expecting this yet. Looks like SOMEONE miscalculated there, huh?
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