One Cool Remove

McKibbin has always been cool. I don’t use the word cool, here, in the high-school hierarchical sense. It’s the kind of cool that is just a little distant. At any gathering you’ll find my husband skirting the edges of the room. He’s in the kitchen or outside having a cigarette. Listening, engaged, ready to shell out a zing or two to make everyone laugh, but seldom in the center ring.

Even among the three of us (three being our family's magic number) McKibbin will often play it just a little cool. He sleeps a little later, lingers in the dining room to clear the dishes, sneaks outside for a cigarette and often walks into whatever conversation Naomi and I are having mid-stream. Sometimes serves as fact-checker or delivers a punch line to make us laugh, but usually pulls back again.

His latest work schedule magnifies this cool habit. Our family routine and his work schedule are polar opposites with Naomi asleep before he arrives home. It’s only a 12 week stint with this schedule so we'll be ok. The newness of it prickles a little.

This morning, though, Naomi and I were zipping up her school backpack in the front hallway, and McKibbin (summoned by the coffeepot) trudged down the stairs. Tasked with un-sticking the backpack's zipper I barely glanced in his direction.

Naomi gasped with glee at the sight of him.
“Dad!” she squealed and flew across the room.

I think McKibbin was still on the stairs when she flung herself around him. And, for just an instant, my husband's cool demeanor completely evaporated. He didn’t mind being the rock-star of Naomi’s morning. Not one bit.