❤️ Amanda Keller's Heartbreaking Reflection Of Her Son's 21st Birthday Party

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:01):
And Amanda jam Nason.

Speaker 2 (00:03):
Can I give you the clap you so richly deserve
for putting on a fantastic twenty first for your youngest
son on Friday night. I'm always worried about twenty first
because they're fraught. I've put on a couple of myself
and I think, ty worried that's going to be okay.

Speaker 1 (00:18):
You know what, Jack's eighteenth had to be canceled because
of COVID, and I was so relieved I lost a deposit.
Who cares because eighteenth's a fraud. I thought at twenty
one they're a little bit better. But then you describe
what the bathroom looked like, and I said, maybe not.
But we didn't have it at home. We rented a
room in a pub and they are about one hundred
and ten people something like that. And the pub, I

(00:41):
shall give them a shout out, was the Clavelli Hotel.
It was the Ocean View Room. Because they were brilliant
to deal with and they brought up food. They you know, pizzas, cheeseplates,
all of them, alcohol, soaking up.

Speaker 2 (00:54):
Food, all that brought up in the trough.

Speaker 1 (00:58):
I'm just not the young men, what are you going
to do now?

Speaker 2 (01:01):
I walked in there and I went, hey, boys, and
I started to just you know, I started to pick
up some glass and I thought, there's nothing I can
do here. It looked like sygone, well.

Speaker 1 (01:12):
Let's bye the bye. That's that was.

Speaker 2 (01:14):
Away from that.

Speaker 1 (01:15):
Away from that, it was a fantastic night. We had
a DJ and it was just great. And you know,
it was It was a hard week for me leading
up to it because normally I wanted to put some
slide a slideshow together to play throughout the night. And
normally that is Harley's domain. He has been the guy
who will make the kid's birthday invitations. He's very creative.

(01:36):
He will work on the computer to do this funky stuff.
Normally he would have done all of that. And with
the way things are with Harley at the moment, he's
got he's got Parkinson's disease and things are just hard.
So that kind of skill set isn't with him anymore.
He doesn't have dementia any of that stuff, but that
stuff's hard for him to do now. And so, and
also I was going through a whole lot of photos

(01:57):
on my phone and seeing photos of when he was well,
and it was a very emotional week leading up to
the twenty first, and I'd like to give a shout
out to Jenna here who helped me put together the
slide show, and to Netty who did an amazing job gitching.
They gave me the work laptop, all that stuff. But
leaving the house to go to Jack's party, I thought,
and it's not right that Harley can't come. I really

(02:19):
felt lonely, thinking it's our son's twenty first, but how
hard it is for Harley and how much he would
have loved to have been there. So there we are
having a great time. The speeches are about to start,
and my friend Kate said to me, there's Harley, And
I looked over and I know what it cost him

(02:41):
to be there. He and our friend Pam and our
driver friend Cole had conspired to get Harley there for
the speeches, and it was so moving. And then to
see Jack without a beer in his hand for ten minutes,
to sit with Harley, and to see Liam and friends
come over and say a lot to Harley. And a

(03:04):
lot of people were shocked because I hadn't seen Harlee
for a while. But I know what it cost him
to get there. And he said to me, how could
I not be here? So anyway, it was an amazing,
amazing night. Harley was there for about an hour or so,
he didn't hopefully have to see that horror in the bathroom.
And it was everything I was hoping that night would be.

(03:25):
It was fun, it was rollicking. Jack's friend Louis made
a hilarious speech. It was just a great, great night,
and I'm so glad you and your family were there.

Speaker 2 (03:34):
I'm just grateful that we're invited. And you know, as
I said, it was just that's what a twenty first
year is. It's all the people from your life. And
I've known Jack and Liam since before they were born,
and I've known you and Harley for years. And yeah,
it was a very emotional, but at the same time
a very joyous night.

Speaker 1 (03:54):
It was such. It was a hilarious, funny, joyous night.
Jack's girlfriend was there, Liam's girlfriend was there. I met
her for the first time.

Speaker 2 (04:02):
That's a lot of pressure, it's a lot of It
was just.

Speaker 1 (04:04):
The most brilliant, brilliant night, and I wish I could
live it again and again and again, but without that
bathroom situation.

Speaker 2 (04:10):
Apologies for that.

Speaker 1 (04:13):
It was just great