Life's a zoo

Living in Denver has proven to be much more expensive than living in Cody, so I got a job doing security at the zoo.  Not the most glamorous job really - all I do is make sure people obey certain rules so that the animals don't get fucked up.  Lots of standing around doing nothing, but it's nice to be working again and to be around people.  And don't forget the animals, the animals are pretty great to be around.  Every time I walk past a creature I think, Oh that's my favorite!  I seem to say that about most of the zoo.  Go figure.

I am experiencing some emotions that I never expected to surface as a result of working there, and I'm hoping they will go away because dammit, they're uncomfortable.  Naturally there are a bajillion people with small kids who visit, and we were no different when Amanda and Brandon were little.  I have many memories of walking that very zoo with my small children, and seeing all the little kids while I'm working provokes memories that make me miss those little years terribly.  

It's the ache of those happier times, when the family was still intact and we had our dogs, and we had Dad.  So fucking much has changed since then.  It's been a rough ride.  As I sit and watch all of the little kids who are possibly in their own stages of familial innocence, I constantly wonder how my own kids will look back on their childhoods.  Will they have good memories in spite of all the shit?  Will they wish it had all been different?  Will they hold it against me?

Those little years go by so fast.  SO. FAST.  I know I was mentally present and accounted for during that time, but it's such a short blip in the scheme of things that no matter how much you pay attention, *POOF*, it's done and all of a sudden they are teenagers.  Amanda, who is now thirteen, is in full-blown teenager mode.  There is just nothing child-like about her anymore and that kind of bums me out.  I'm not ready for her to grow up.

Brandon is still my little guy, and I am desperately trying to hold onto his boy-ness as much as I can, for as long as I can.  He's little and scrawny and very much still a little kid, and I'm not sure I'll be able to handle when his voice drops and his slight frame grows into a man.  Once he's grown, that's all she wrote.  Little kid game over.

Is it too early to be excited for grandkids?