Goodbye Polly

Pablo and Polly.

While we are happy to have Pablo home from CHLA, there's current of sadness in our house. Polly has postponed her move back to Sacramento a bunch of times—all to prolong her time with Pablo—but today is the end of the line. Today is her last day with our family.

I've had this post brewing for some time in my head and heart, so I have some idea what I'm going to say. Even though she will be hundreds of miles away from us, and no longer physically working with our family, she has become a member of our family. For a start, she loves Pablo more than I can describe on a blog. And he loves her. They have a thing together: lingo, jokes, patter. It's been wonderful to watch it blossom.

Polly has been with all four of us through hundreds of nights and hundreds of days. She has seen us at our best, and has endured the most challenging stuff. She's helped Grady with his homework in two different grades, and she's seen Pablo learn how to dress himself, count and tell jokes with narrative command. Polly has seen Jo Ann venture into improv classes—and the effect that Jo Ann's improv has had on making fun of me. She's seen me become obsessed with cycling and drop more than Pablo's body weight (ie, she knew me in my fat phase). Most of all, Polly has shared life with us. We welcomed her into our home and into our lives, and she joined us—going far beyond punching the clock and running home at the end of her shifts. She and Jo Ann have stayed up late many nights talking about acting (Polly has a theater degree from Carnegie Mellon) or Grady's schoolwork, or, more recently, Pablo's treatment. Polly and I have common ground in music—The Smiths, Love And Rockets, Bauhaus. It's not just about musical and theatrical compatibility. We've sailed the seas of life as a five-person crew. And now one of us is leaving before the cancer journey—can't underestimate that—is over. Not sure how this is going to feel in the morning. We'll have to let life unfold and take it from there.

Tonight, we are taking Polly out for dinner at Malo. There is no restaurant more indicative of our time together than Malo. That's where we were—with Polly—in the hours leading up to Pablo's diagnosis with cancer. We're taking Pablo (how else could we take our nanny out for a farewell dinner?), and we are hoping he won't get sick at the table. If he does, that will be OK. Actually, it might be part of the perfect send off—one last snapshot of what our collective life's been like this year.

We'll post dinner pics and pick up on this topic more tomorrow. I'm getting too sad (and too hungry) to go on. More tomorrow. Night night.