It was a great vacation, but it was definitely over.
Jeff Hanson, his wife Elaine and their two small kids had spent 10 days at a sunny resort with perfect weather and soft sand beaches. Connor and Jenny spent every day paddling around in the ocean and the pool, building sandcastles and making friends with the other kids. Jeff took diving lessons. And after a lifetime of avoiding it, Elaine learned that she loved coconut after all.
But the fun came to a crashing halt on the afternoon of the last day of the trip, when three of them came down with terrible head colds and went to bed early. Jeff assumed he’d gotten off easy, but his cold struck the next morning. Before their noon flight, he was using all the Spanish words he knew and making a few up to negotiate the purchase of enough cold medicine to keep other passengers from throwing his coughing, runny-nosed family out an airplane window on the way home.
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It was even more obvious that the holiday was over when Jeff and his family stepped out of the airport.
“Wow!” said Connor. “How are we going to find the car?”
Regina was under a storm warning. There was a foot of new snow on the ground, and more snow swirling and falling. They squinted against the cold and dragged their suitcases over the snow-covered pavement. Eventually, they found their SUV. They loaded the luggage, scraped the windows, buckled in the kids and headed for home.
The going was tough. There wasn’t much visibility, and the sinus medication made it harder than usual for Jeff to concentrate.
“Why did we come back here?” Elaine said, not really meaning it, but missing the warm weather.
“Because our dollar’s no good anywhere else,” Jeff said. He didn’t really mean it either, but he was wondering what it would be like to live full-time in a place where the weather wasn’t cold enough to actually kill you.
“Mommy, can we go to the beach tomorrow?” Connor asked from the back seat.
This made Jeff and Elaine laugh until Jeff started coughing.
“No, buddy,” Elaine answered. “Our beach days are over. But if your nose stops running you can go to playschool while your dad gets over his cold.”
“Oh,” Connor said, sounding a little confused. “Good.”
“We’ll see if he makes it to playschool,” Jeff said, coughing. “With this cold, I think I’m going to need to stay home and rest for a few days to recover from our vacation.”
“Well, we don’t have anywhere to be,” Elaine said. “I’m sure your mom and dad have everything under control on the farm. We can take a few sick days before we have to do anything important.”
But there would be no staying home for Elaine. Her phone rang before they were 20 miles out of the city.
“I have to go to Saskatoon tomorrow,” she explained to Jeff when she’d hung up. “There’s been some federal ag research announcements, and my policy committee’s having a meeting to figure out our position.”
“Are you sure you’re up to it?” Jeff asked, sniffing. “I wouldn’t be.”
“I guess I’ll manage,” Elaine said. “I phoned in for the last couple of committee meetings. If I don’t actually show up at one pretty soon, they’re all going to forget who I am.”
“Good luck. I’ll look after the kids,” Jeff said.
When the Hansons passed through Weyburn, they made a quick stop at the grocery store. “I’ll just run in and pick up some milk and fruit,” Elaine said. “You guys keep warm in the car.”
Elaine was trying to choose the best looking bananas when Ethel Anderson, one of their widowed farm neighbours, tapped her on the shoulder and made her jump.
“I didn’t notice you there,” Elaine said.
“I’m so sorry dear. I hope you’re alright,” Ethel said.
“I’m fine, Ethel,” Elaine said. “It’s just a cold. It’ll clear up right away.”
“No, no. I meant coping with Ed,” Ethel said.
“Coping with Ed?” Elaine parroted back.
“Is he doing better? I’ve heard he was likely to have a pretty slow recovery. That’ll leave a real gap for you,” Ethel said. “I understand Ed still does quite a bit of farm work.”
When Elaine just looked blankly back, Ethel kept talking.
“It’s hard to recover from strokes, dear,” Ethel said. “Everyone takes these things at their own speed.
Stroke? Jeff’s grandfather? Elaine saw a spark in Ethel’s eye, and remembered how much Ethel enjoyed being the first to know the bad news. She dropped her bananas back in the bin and backed away from Ethel. “I have to go. I… I left something in the car.”
Back at the SUV, Jeff was hanging up his cell phone.
“Elaine. Grandpa’s had a stroke,” Jeff said.
Dale and Donna Hanson hadn’t wanted to ruin their son’s vacation by giving him the bad news while he was away. “It’s not like Jeff can do anything about it from there. And even if they changed their flights and came home early, there’s nothing Jeff and Elaine can do for Ed,” Dale had said. But when Jeff had phoned his dad from the grocery store parking lot, Dale thought he’d better break the news of Ed’s stroke before someone else did.
“I already heard,” Elaine said.
They talked it over on the way home. It was still too early to know how long it would take Ed to recover, or if he would fully recover.
“I’ll have to get busy, finding someone else to help out during seeding,” Jeff said. “Grandpa’s been putting in quite a few shifts in the field. And Dad hasn’t had time to think about that yet.”
“Maybe the oil collapse is good for something,” Elaine said. “There should be someone you can hire.”
“I hope so. I’m probably going to need help sooner. Dad said there’re a few things that needed fixing in the cleaning plant. He’s been too busy driving Grandpa and Helen back and forth to the city for doctor appointments to do any work. I’ll start in on that tomorrow.”
Jeff’s phone rang again, and he answered over the SUV’s Bluetooth system. “I heard about Ed, so I didn’t want to bother your dad,” the caller said. “But I’d sure like to come and pick up that flax seed tomorrow afternoon.”
After he hung up, Jeff turned to Elaine. “Geez. It’s going to take all morning to move enough snow away from those north bins to get that flax seed out. There won’t be any time for me to stay in bed.”
“I’ll find a sitter for Jenny,” Elaine said.
They drove in silence for a few miles, except for the sound of Jeff’s coughing, until Elaine finally spoke again. “You’ll be filling in for your dad and Ed quite a bit for the next while,” Elaine said.
“Yeah.” Jeff thought for a few minutes. His mind drifted off to the view of the ocean from his beach chair, then jolted back to the driver’s seat of the SUV, and his view of swirling snow. “This is going to be a rough spring.”
