I Think Therefore I Dad

Cowboys and Muppets: Lullabies of Choice

When my oldest daughter was a baby, we tried all the things to see what worked to calm her down and get her to fall asleep. Some of them to our own detriment. Though video clips on YouTube calm them down, they are the toddler equivilent of crack. We seriously had to ween her off of Simple Songs vidoes. And God help us if she wanted to watch….*looks over both shoulders to make sure no kids are watching*…baby shark, or the trash that is Cocomelon. If you think all little kid videos are the same, you are sorely mistaken. Simple Songs is to Cocomelon like Oreo is to Hydrox.

Anyway, we tried a few different things but for now at least we’ve found something for each kid that works. The key is music. Perhaps it is a holdover from her various past routines, or maybe she just has a broader musical taste, but my oldest daugher works a variety of music into her bedtime routine. She has a radio in her room, which she will listen to until she falls alseep, or we’ll play her a preselected mix of songs – mostly from Disney movies, some 80’s and 90’s pop. She really likes Billy Joel’s “For the Longest Time” and Selena’s “I Could Fall In Love.” So far her musical taste is pretty good, and I consider it part of my parental duty to keep her unaware of K-Pop until she’s 32.

My younger two however, appear to be much more set in their musical ways.

My Baby Loves 90’s Country Music

Part of the experince of bonding with a new baby is figuring out what they like, and it turns out me and my baby boy are bonding over a shared appreciation of country music made between 1992 and 1997. It started with him being very whiney and needy while teething. He needed be to soothed completely to sleep and my wife wasn’t having any luck. One of her great joys in life is to have a baby fall asleep on her, but this litte guy doesn’t go for that. He needs to move. He has litterly fallen asleep in his jumper. So I picked him up, walked him around the living room, and sung him the first mellow song that came to my head – the Garth Brooks version of “Night Rider’s Lament” Of course.

Little bugger was out like a light.

It worked then and it has worked over the last month or so, every damn time. He could be beside himself in tears when I pick him up, and sound asleep before I get to the second verse of “Texas Tornado.” Generally I find the more meloncholy the song, the better it works. Sing that little guy a song about a girl that done somebody wrong and he won’t make a peep for the next twelve hours. At first I though if these songs are the right kind of impression I want to give. Should sad bastard drinking songs be absorbed by a spongy little baby brain? Then I sung him “Rockabye Baby” once and realized how terrible that is, and decided that a song about rodeo cowboy whose woman leaves him for another man is way better than a song about a baby plummeting to their death.

I have tried other calm sad music too, but he really does prefer country. Much to my disappointment, Phil Collins only seemed to get him more upset. Under normal circumstances that would be a deal breaker on our friendship, but he’s my son so I guess I’ll let it slide….for now.

“The Rainbow Connection” Is the Ultimate Lullaby

In stark contrast to my oldest daughter, my two year-old daughter has a much more specific musical taste. And not just one genre like the boy, but only one song – “The Rainbow Connection.”

I am in no way exaggerating when I say that she had demanded this song every single night for the last month. Though she hasn’t picked up on the fact that the name of the song is repeated several times, so she calls it “Da-de-da-do.” Apparently the last five seconds of a three minute song are the ones that really resonate. I mean, it works for “Stairway to Heaven” right? Know a couple of words at the begining and couple at the end and you’re all set.

The only thing she has changed, is that she now asks for a back rub while I sing it. If that last sentence doesn’t make it clear, she is something of a princess. She asks for it every night, and it works every night. A few days ago she didn’t specifically ask for it and I thought I’d see what happens if we didn’t do it. About a half hour after I tucked her in, she came out of her room and reminded me that I need to go back in there and sing it to her while I rub her back. I did. She slept.

The song also extends beyond just her. Twice last week my oldest asked me to rock her and sing her a song, which she hasn’t done in at least six months, and do you know what song she asked for? The Rainbow Connection. Though, she couldn’t come up with the name either, but at least she was closer asking for “Songs About Rainbows.” I am tempted to try on the baby boy, but I fear it won’t work as nobody in the songs drinks themself to death. What can I say, he likes what he likes.

I’m not here to give advice, but if you’ve got a kid that has a hard time settling down for bed I suggest you try something by a sad cowboy or a whimsical muppet. I mean, what else do you really need in life anyway?

An Awareness of Genitals

After our first two kids were girls, my wife and I agreed that when it came to anything related to their anatomy “ask your Mom” would be a totally acceptable answer on my part. I would take the kids when they throw up, she would take them when they had questions about their lady parts. A perfectly fair division of responsibilities. Along those same lines, we decided that if we were giving the kids showers, she would be the one to take a shower with them. They’re all working with the same equipment, it would be easier from a practical standpoint and an avoidance of awkward questions standpoint. So as far as I know, it wasn’t until they help changed their baby brother’s diaper that they saw anything different than what they’ve got.

I was curious to see how they’d react. I assumed at minimum it would be “What’s that?” and probably a good amount of giggling. Worst case scenario, some poking. However, much to my pleasant surprise, they had pretty much no reaction at all. I don’t think they asked any questions the first several times they watched us change his diaper. Eventually they asked what that was, we told them, they moved on, and it’s never come up again. It felt too easy. Should they have more questions? Is it weird that they didn’t? I wasn’t about to bring it up. They asked a question, they learned a thing, and they can file it away in their brains never to be thought of again until biology class. Right?

Yesterday my four-year-old was sitting at the kitchen table drawing a picture. She told me she was drawing me. She held it up to show me. It has all the basic elements – a head, eyes, arms, legs. It lacked a torso, but who am I to critique her creative vision. And while I had no chest, she did accessorize me. I was wearing what looked like a Colonel Sanders style tie. My initial thought was “how the hell does she know who Colonel Sanders is?”

“Do you know what that is?” she asked as she pointed to my tie.

“What?” I asked.

She didn’t say anything, but as a sly grin came across her face she pointed down to betwixt her legs. She had drawn my dangle.

At once my mind was filled with so many thoughts, and yet remained completely blank. I knew I couldn’t over react, but I also didn’t want her to think that including my misters would be the new normal in my portraits.

“No thank you,” I calmly replied. Perfect response. Polite and to the point. How everybody should respond when faced with uninvited genitalia.

She didn’t respond, and I didn’t present any follow up questions. Though I do have questions. Aside from “what the hell?”, I would like to know where that came from? Did she absorb the fact that guys have different parts seven months ago and it has taken her this long to put the pieces together that I’m a boy too? Is this what kids talk about around the preschool playground – “Tag you’re it! By the way, have you seen your Dad’s peeper?” Was it that little son of bitch Isaac?

Perhaps I should ask these questions, but I feel that really starts to blur the established lines of “ask your Mom”. If someday my son draws boobs on a drawing of his Mom, I’ll field that one. But I guess the parts of the human body are now extending beyond head, shoulders, knees, and toes, and I don’t like it. Knees and toes. Maybe I should buy her a Ken doll.

Boss Is a Four Letter Word

I like to think my kids don’t have the capacity for hate. Surely these sweet little people can’t have a mean still-developing bone in their bodies. I know there are things they dislike – spicy food, baths, sitting still long enough to play a game – but I didn’t think they could hate. However, there is one thing they hate with a passion. When one of them is being bossy.

In the world of kids, there is nothing worse than being bossy. Pee your pants? Fine. Eat Play D’oh? No big deal. Be bossy? I’ll see you in hell you little tyrant.

I don’t understand where they pick this up. I know a lot of what they say and do is absorbed from us as parents, and I know that I’ve never told my wife she’s not the boss. As far as I know she’s never stormed out of the room to complain to the kids that I was being bossy. Unless she has…in which case I’ve got bigger fish to fry than figuring out my kid’s issues with a perceived power structure. Just in case, I’ll demand my wife not give my kids the impression I’m bossy.

At school, I’m fairly certain the teacher didn’t introduce herself by saying “Hello I’m Mrs. Robinson and I run shit here.” I think this must be some organic issue that kids bring up among themselves as soon as they learn the word boss. In which case, maybe let’s not teach kids the word boss. Always had kind of a negative connotation to it anyway. An assertive kid knows what they want. A bossy kid is being a little bitch.

Perhaps there is something in the psychologic make up of children that not only needs boundaries, but people clearly assigned to enforce those boundaries. It’s ok if Mom or Dad is bossy, because that is in the job description. If a brother or sister is bossy, then the only reasonable course of action is to run and tell Mom or Dad immediately. Fun fact – children develop the understanding of what a boss is before they do what a tattle tale is. If they have a hard time with grasping the concept of being told what to do by their peers, I wonder how much they’ll struggle with the concept of snitches getting stitches.

Because, of course I am never actually there to witness said bossiness. It only happens when they are off playing in another room and the giggles turn to screams, then the boss accusations start to fly like it’s the Salem witch trials. “Mine sister doth a boss! J’accuse!”

So one kid is crying because the other kid won’t play with them, and in response to the bossiness, drops the a-bomb of “you’re not my friend anymore.” The other kid is informing me that their sister is, in fact, not the boss. Everyone is crying. And I’m standing there like “Ah-oh, oh-ay, who’s the boss here?” They agree that Mom or Dad is the boss, and forget they were declared not friends anymore. There is peace. For about 45 minutes.

I assume, like most other annoying things kids do, this is a phase and there’s a brand new life around the bend. Maybe if I ignore it, they will get the picture and stop doing it. Like how you’re not supposed to acknowledge it when a kid swears. Then again, if left unchecked, will it get worse? I could see either side. But there’s a path you take and a path not taken, the choice us up to you my friend.

Also, Mona was the boss.

Official Ranking of Holidays for Parents

The holiday season is just around the corner, and as I start looking forward to the things I’ll do with and for my kids, it got me thinking about how you approach the holidays differently with kids. Mostly there is less, or at least more discreet, drinking involved. (All manner of booze can be enjoyed out of a coffee mug on Christmas morning.) Gone are the days of “T-Man and Patty’s Christmas Explosion” – an actual annual Christmas party thrown by my college roommate and I – and in are matching family pajamas. Don’t get me wrong, I loves me some festive lounge wear, but the times they have changed.

So thinking now about the new joys, and the new pains, that come with being a parent on holidays, I give you the official ranking of holidays to celebrate as a parent.

1. Christmas

Still the undisputed champ, no explanation needed. What is understood doesn’t need to be discussed.

2. Halloween

Trying to get to multiple to parties in one night has been replaced by trying to get my kids to enough houses trick or treating and get back to my house to pass out candy in one night. Both are fun, but in very different ways. The best costumes used to be a mad libs game of “Sexy [noun]”, now they are seeing what adorable thing I can dress my kids up as. Spoilers – anything you dress a little kid up as is freaking adorable. If you put a tiny person in it, it immediately becomes the cutest skeleton, penguin, bear, monkey, snowman, pumpkin, cupcake, any random inanimate object you’ve ever seen. So between the fun of costumed kids and the parent tax on candy (I’ve got to wet my beak), Halloween is an upgrade after having kids.

3. Easter

This one is also heavily influenced by the adorableness of undersized people dressed in overly elaborate clothes. Fancy little dress and a floppy hat on a girl or a tiny vest and bow tie on a little guy – I’ve never wanted more to live inside of a J. Crew catalog. My family would be best friends with the bi-racial family on the next page wearing cable knit sweaters while sitting out on thier dock, I just know it. Also similar to Halloween, the amount of children’s candy that I eat is substantial. I’m not going to let a two year-old eat enough chocolate to even make a dent in a chocolate bunny, but I sure will let me. And maybe it’s just my kids, but three days after they get the candy, the completely forget it exists. If I purposely move it out of their sight lines, it’s two days and I’m crushing jelly beans like Ronald Reagan on bender.

4. Martin Luther King, Jr. Day

This one shoots way up the ranking with kids compared to without. I get a day off of work but the kids are still in school and/or daycare. It’s a holiday that is a day filled with nothing but me time, and isn’t that every parents dream?

5. (Tie) Labor Day and Memorial Day

I have a hard time remembering which is which, and they are pretty interchangeable. You’re going to either stay home, barbecue, and do yard work, or take a little weekend trip somewhere and be amazed at how much you have to pack for your kids when you’re only going to be gone for three days.

6. Thanksgiving

This one definitely drops a few spots as a parent. The food is still great, watching the Detroit Lions attempt to play something resembling professional quality football is painful, and it’s still one day too early to start listening to Christmas music. But the major change is your actual enjoyment of the meal. The effort needed to get small people to eat more than a roll and one bite of turkey is truly staggering. I don’t think its tryptophan that makes people sleepy after dinner, we are literally exhausted asking for one more god forsaken bite.

7. Mother’s Day

You’d think a day devoted specifically to honoring a parent would be higher on the list, but it just ain’t so. I assume it will change when my kids get older, but right now they are too little to really do anything other than come “help” me shop for something, so this is really more like Wife’s Day. And when you’re married to me, isn’t that everyday?

8. Father’s Day

Same as Mother’s Day, the celebration of this falls on my wife. Dad has to take a backseat to Mom, so they aren’t tied for 7th. I also find it interesting that Mother’s day usually means a nice brunch somewhere, and Father’s Day means getting something to grill, so I am essentially making myself dinner on my own holiday.

9. Valentines Day

This one also suffers with the addition of small humans who can walk into your bedroom at any moment. And who doesn’t love a nice romantic dinner that you’ll spend the whole time talking about your kids anyway, and then making sure you’re home in time so you don’t have to pay the sitter extra. But hey, more chocolate.

10. St. Patrick’s Day

Not sure if it’s being a parent or just being older, but this one sure is past it’s prime. I’m not though. The holiday is. I’m not too old for this shit, I’ve just got to get the kids off to school in the morning. I could still hang. Are you looking at my hair line? I’m not old, you’re old. Why is the music so damn loud? Get off my lawn.

11. New Year’s Eve

I’m already so tired all the time and now I’ve got to stay up to midnight on purpose? New Year’s used to be one of the best parties of the year, now it makes me understand what Dan Fogelberg was singing about.

12. 4th of July

You mean I get the option of taking my kid to a parade or an overcrowded beach and either way I get to carry them and/or all their crap and sweat through all my clothes? And the added bonus of people in my neighborhood lighting off fireworks all night with complete disregard for the baby I just got to fall asleep? The hardest of passes. Pre-kids this was a top five holiday, with kids it’s last. My daughter’s birthday is close to July 4th, maybe we can just start skipping this one and tell her that everybody is just really excited for her birthday?

That’s the list. Apologies to anybody who celebrates a holiday that isn’t on the list. If I haven’t experienced it I don’t know how to fairly rank it, but I have heard nothing but good things about Hanukkah and Dia De Los Muertos looks cool. Ah, to be a Mexican Jew.

Reintroducing My Kids Shopping

Back when I took my kids places, I think my kids were pretty well behaved. At least as well behaved as toddlers can be. Did I have to walk back into a restaurant to retrieve a shoe? Yes. Did I ever have to drag a screaming kid out of a store? No. Did childless people take pity on us and buy our breakfast for us because, surely, we could use all the help we could get? You Bet. Kids will be kids, and anytime you can take them out in public with out them having a complete meltdown or being a complete embarrassment, that’s a win. But my kids haven’t been to a restaurant in over seven months, and I just recently took them into a store. There was some rust to shake off. For all of us.

Lucy Gets a Donut

I took Lucy, my 4 year-old, to Target to pick out a new outfit for going back to pre-school, and she did fine. She wore a mask no problem, was well behaved, and took my gentle guidance on what outfit she really wanted to get. Pointing out that “ooh this one is so pretty,” really goes a long way in helping a little girl make up her mind. As part of this outing we also stopped at a bakery. Because she was so good in the store, I told her she could pick out whatever she wanted, knowing of course that she’ll pick out a basic donut with sprinkles.

Fact: Sprinkles and bubbles are absolutely irresistible to small children.

We walk up to the case and I start looking for the ones with sprinkles so I can say “ooh this one looks good!” Before I can spot the donut she’ll want, I hear “I want this one!” She has found a donut that is roughly the size of my head. With sprinkles. I guess that’s what I get for saying she can pick out anything. Perhaps I should have known better, but it had been a while since I’ve taken my kids out for food, and even then its not like they could read the menu. As far as they know, every restaurant in the world serves only pancakes and mac and cheese. Comically oversized baked goods was a new development. I got her the humongous donut, and she ate half of it over the course of two days. I also made a mental note not to let her pick whatever she wanted anymore.

Evie Gets a Dress

A few weeks after that I took Evie, my 2 year-old, to pick out a new dress too. While she was also well-behaved, she had clearly forgotten what it was like to go to the store.

For a kid, one of the great joys of going to the store is the shopping cart. It’s fun to ride in, it’s fun to help push, and apparently it’s easy to forget. I carried my daughter from my truck into the store, and as we walked in she asked me, “Daddy, where are you going to put my dress?” She was worried that if I was holding her, how could I also hold a dress.

“We’ll use one of these carts,” I said as I walked up to the row of empty, waiting carts. I folded down the seat and when to put her in, and she clearly had no idea what I was doing. She was like a thawed cave person looking at basic technology for the first time. What is the brightly-colored box? I go inside of it? It has wheels?! It rolls!? What sorcery! Her first instinct was to stand, so I tried lifting her back up and setting her back down at an angle to put her legs through the leg holes. This confused her more.

“You’ve got to sit down,” I told her still re-lifting her up and back down, hoping to jog some muscle memory from shopping trips of days gone by. No such luck, though she did start to sit. Sideways. Lounged across the kiddie seat with her head to the left and her legs stretched out as far as the cart would allow to the right.

“No sweetie, sit facing me.” This time she got the hang of it and sat it in like a normal person, and was very pleased with herself for this accomplishment.

Now that she solved the riddle of sitting down, it was into the store we went. Her goal was to get a new dress with long sleeves that she could pick out all by herself. My goal was to influence that decision so she picked the one I wanted her to. Can’t have her walking around looking like she came out on the wrong end of a fight with a bedazzler.

Side note: what is with girls clothes? At some point they switch from having Minnie Mouse and bunnies on them to being covered with glitter, or sequins, or sparkles, or emojis, or glittery sequined sparkly emojis. Or unicorns. Girls are supposed to love unicorns apparently. Don’t get me wrong, I’m all for embracing a sense of whimsy in your wardrobe, but why must the unicorn be so dominant? Always in your face, always shimmering, always crapping rainbows. You’ve never seen a shirt with a unicorn on it, but you have a seen a unicorn shirt.

When we get to the kid clothes section of the store, she is overwhelmed. Something with Elsa! Something with Belle! Something that exists outside the four walls of my house! I talk her out of wanting the 12-month sized t-shit with a giant Elsa face on it, and find the dresses her size. I offer several options, each hyped up with an “ooooohhh this one is so pretty!” Each one is chopped down with a cold “No, I want something else.” Still have to remind her not to put a passie in her mouth after it falls on the bathroom floor, but when it comes to fashion apparently she has become quite discerning. After five or six of my suggestions are unceremoniously dismissed, she sees it. It is shiny. It is poofy. It is a unicorn dress. This is what I get for telling her she could pick out whatever one she wanted. I should have seen that coming. Should I really have expected her to pick out a very understated dress with in a nice stripe pattern in first trip to the store in over half a year? Thats like sending a kid into a bakery and expecting them not to come out with a donut that could double as a spare tire.

Hot Dogs Are To Be Bitten

A great thing about kids is their innocense and goofyness. They say and do pretty much whatever without much awareness of what they are doing, and therefore have not yet developed a sence of what should be embarassing. In a way, it is wonderful. They do their thing in their own world and don’t care what anybody thinks. In another way, sometimes they do inappropriate things with their dinner.

The other day, my two-year-old daughter, Evie, pretended her hot dog was a popsicle.

I don’t know if I can pinpoint what the most awkward part of my life a parent so far has been, but right now it’s hard to think of anything worse than watching your precious little girl hoover a Ball Park. I always figured the worst thing my kids would to with a hot dog is put ketchup on it. This had never entered my mind.

When she started doing it, my wife and I immediatly locked eyes across the table, sharing a stare that was half horror and half trying not to laugh. Its one thing when your kid accidently uses profanity not realizing what they are saying, its quite another for that profanity to turn into a game of charades. Adding a layer of difficulty to the attempt not to laugh, you must keep in mind I have the sense of humor of a middle schooler. The next time somebody at work talks about thier duties and I don’t giggle will be the first.

“It’s a popcicle!” she joyfully blurted.

I died a little inside.

“Why don’t you take a bite?” I encourage her.

“No. I’m pretending!”

Part of my soul is perminently blacked.

“Show me a good bite sweetie,” I implore.

“It’s a popsicle!” She said with complete disregard for my risk of stroke.

“Evie….bite the hot dog.”

I don’t know how long her game of pretend went on, but it felt like roughly an hour and half.

I have to say, I am pretty proud of myself for how I handled it. I didn’t laugh. I didn’t make a big deal out of it. I simply informed her that was not the proper way to eat a hot dog, and kept her innocent imagination completly intact. Wish I could say the same about how I will forever view my daughter, but hey, that’s parenting. I’m sure I’ll be able to look her in the eye at dinner again eventually, but just to be on the safe side I’m going to stop buying bananas and cut up her hot dogs for her until she moves out.

Fighting Dad Stereotypes: Dad Clothes

In my ongoing attempt to address harmful Dad stereotypes head on, I next take on the issue of dressing like a Dad.

Close your eyes and picture what a Dad wears. What do you see?

The Sterotypical Dad Outfit

A t-shirt – it’s probably from a vacation destination. Could be from a civil war battlefield, might just say Arizona. It’s definitely tucked in.

Shorts – likely khaki, though maybe denim, with a number of pockets totaling more than four.

Socks – going at least a third of the way up the calf, yet never so low as to stop right at the ankle or go so high as to reach the knee.

Shoes – white. Tennis shoe by name, walking shoe by defined purpose.

Other accessories may very. A hat that that was a free give away item at some event being worn too high on the head, more perched on the head that actually covering it. Belts of various materials, but most likely woven. Sun glasses that spend an equal amount of time tucked into the neckline of the previously mentioned Smokey Mountains t-shirt as they on the face.

I’m sure it is generational, but if you are in my generation that is what you see, and that is the fashion stereotype that seems to be unfairly placed on the modern dad. And I wonder how this started? Was some secret council convened in 1988 and the dress code for Dads was set in place for the next quarter century? Or did somewhere in Nebraska a Dad woke up one day and randomly picked out a pair of jean shorts, a t-shirt from the San Diego Zoo, and his most sensible pair of shoes and the trend just spread across the nation from hardware store to hardware store? And we thought COVID was the worst thing to sweep the country. Zing!….Too soon?

Actual top Google search results for “dad clothes”

Anyway, are there actually Dads out there that dress this way – yes. Perhaps these are the also the guys who don’t buy their own clothes and rely on their wife’s discretion and corporate swag to assemble their wardrobe. I ask for my wife’s input on clothes from time to time, but outside of Christmas and birthdays, I am fully in charge of what clothes end up in my closet.

My Approach to Dad Fashion

I own no t-shirts serving as billboards for states, cities, national parks, casinos, or restaurants. 99% of the time I don’t even tuck in button up shirts, so I certainly have never, and will never tuck in a t-shirt. My shorts and pants are not defined by somebody else’s occupational use – no cargo, no carpenter. I’ve not owned a pair of white shoes since high school, and the shoes that I do have are never grass stained. I wear fitted hats that I purchase on purpose.

Part of this is conscious choice – to purposely not “dress like a Dad.” But part of it is not changing my style just because I’m a Dad now. I didn’t throw out my Chucks and replace them with a pearly white pair of New Balance when my first daughter was born. I didn’t swap my slim fit jeans for cargo pants when I had more baby things to carry. Dad Tip: you don’t need more pockets when you have kids, because you know what has a ton of pockets? Diapers bags, back packs, strollers. You don’t need to sacrifice your style so you can have quick access to the back up pacifier.

The only noticeable change in my wardrobe after having kids is an increase in golf apparel. Which is more a reflection of my change in hobbies as I get older. Though now I wonder, is that what my kids’ generation will picture when they think of somebody dressed like a Dad? Brightly colored Under Armor polos? Or maybe graphic t-shirts? While I don’t have any t-shirts that announce I once went to Nashville, I do have t-shirts letting people know what TV shows and movies I watched in the 90s. Will my kids some day roll their eyes at me in my Boy Meets World shirts and jeans? Will neon Asics be the new white Nikes? Will Hawaiian shirts be the new…well actually those will still be Hawaiian shirts – good style never goes out of style. Wore them when I was 15, wearing them now at 35, and you better believe I’ll be rocking luau casual at 55 and beyond.

But regardless of what my kids will think of how I dress, my Dadness will not be a factor in my fashion choices, and surely there must be others out there like me. Sadly we are are the unnoticed majority, blending in with all the normally dressed people with our cell phone in our pockets and not in holsters. Just dudes with kids dressing like dudes, with kids. I mean, if my kids get a t-shirt that says “World’s Greatest Dad”, you bet your ass I’m wearing that thing. But I will won’t tuck it in to jorts, and God as my witness I will never wear a woven belt.

Summer is Officially Over. Good.

However you choose to mark the end of summer, mark it. Kids are back in school (virtual or otherwise), Labor Day weekend has past, and the weather is cooling off. For some this change of the season comes with a sense of melancholy. They are closing their pools, packing up their cottages, and already longing for the days to get longer and hotter. Well I don’t have a pool or a cottage and hot weather is uncomfortable.

This summer in particular was a complete waste. Between having a little baby and going through a pandemic, we really didn’t get out much. We thought of a few things to do next year, and looked forward to things we’ll do in the fall, but the list of summer time activities that didn’t take place in our own backyard begins and ends with going to get ice cream. Which, isn’t that the best part of summer anyway? Any other good part about summer can also be done just as, if not more, enjoyably in the spring or fall with the simple addition of a sweatshirt, but not the mom and pop ice cream shops. I don’t know that there is a wrong way to eat ice cream, but if you’re getting ice cream in July from a place that is also open in January, you sure ain’t doing it right.

We didn’t get to the beach at all this year, and while I do think that it would have been a good experience for the kids, I don’t think they missed it. Granted, they are young, but they never once asked to go. They were perfectly content to have their aquatic experiences be playing in the water table in the back yard and running around with the hose. And I was certainly happy not lugging a car full of kids and stuff to the beach, all of which will inevitably come back packed full of sand. Didn’t miss the frantic rush to get a kid out of their wet bathing suit and onto the potty in time either. I’m not sure what’s more difficult – getting a dry pants onto a still slightly wet kid, or getting a wet bathing suit off of a slightly dry kid. Either way, skipping the beach helps avoid both. Also didn’t have to worry about the amount of sand a drooly fisted five-month-old will consume. The more I think about it, not going to the beach was a great parenting decision cloaked in the excuse of pandemic related safety.

I did blow up our little inflatable pool a few times for the kids to splash around in, and what a treat that was. Like any lazy modern dad, I have an air compressor to blow it up with, but the necessary tip to adapt it to the little tube on the pool was missing. I had to do it the old fashioned way of pushing my lungs to the bring of passing out face down in the grass. Just like dads of days gone by. Except they did half way through a pack of unfiltered Camels. Greatest generation indeed.

We didn’t take any trips, camping or otherwise. I would someday like to get the kids into camping, but this wasn’t the summer for it. The fun thing about camping when you’ve got a baby who is completely reliant on breast milk is nothing. So we’ll aim for next year. But again, camping in the fall is better than camping in the summer. A camp fire is better when it is an actual source of warmth, and sleeping in a sleeping bag is more comfortable when your tent isn’t transformed into a sweatlodge with the first ray of morning sun.

I feel the only things we really missed out on were going to the zoo and going to a baseball game. But all things being equal, I’d rather do those things when the heat isn’t making parts of me stick to other parts of me. Next year we’ll go to lots of early season and late season baseball games. I’ll get my kids team hoodies, we’ll get hot chocolate, it’ll be great. Also, those places are less crowded outside of the peak summer season, so no having to take turns hoisting my kids up so they can see over the rows of kids crammed against the glass to get a good look at a monkey. Side note, if your kids are the kids who squeeze thier way past everybody else who is waiting so they can get right up to the front to see the monkey, I hope the monkey throws poop on your kid.

I get what summer has going for it – no school and good PR. But my kids aren’t old enough to be in school so they don’t appreciate not having to go, and I can see through all the pro-summer propaganda. Summer is the third best season behind fall and spring, but pop stars sing catchy party songs about summer and indie bands sing sad bastard songs about autumn so there you have it. We’ve been sold summer the same way we’ve been sold Pepsi. Well you know what, pumpkin spice is the taste of my generation!

I Must Protect This House. And These Garbage Cans.

So there I was working from home, sitting in my basement on a Slack call when I hear a sustained car horn – at least a solid four seconds of honk – followed by three or four muffled sounding booms. I’m intrigued.

My house is on a corner, so my first thought is car accident. I go upstairs to have a look, but when I look out the window I see no cars. I scan the intersection and see no debris or evidince of any vehicular foul play. What I do see is a lady walking down the sidewalk appearing to be gesturing at somebody down the block. I can’t hear what she’s saying, but she is definitly yelling. I try to look down the street to see who she is yelling at, but from my vantage point I can only see two or three houses and there is nobody else in sight. Perhaps she is yelling at the person who honked and has since driven away? Well she keeps walking so I keep watching, though I move to a different room in the house to get a better view of the street.

She is now four or so houses from when I first saw her and she is still yelling at what appears to be nobody. At this point I assume she was yelling at the person in the car and is now just venting some very public frustrations. This is a good time to give a bit of important informaiton – it was garbage day, so several houses had their garbage cans out. One such house, was the house she was approaching, and at this point she turned the focus of her anger from nobody in general, to garbage cans in particular. She shoved over all three that were sitting out in front of this house. Luckily the trash and recycling had already been picked up, so no strewn garbage.

The guy who lives at this house now comes out to confront her, but before he can get off the porch his dog runs out barking. Between the distance from me to them and the barking dog I still can’t really make out what is being said, but I can get the gist that this lady is quite certain that this guy is going to hell. It seems that this row is a dispute between neighbors. Good old neighborhood drama. I continue to be intrigued.

So the dog is barking, she is damning the guy to hell, and he is telling her to go away. Now that the garbage cans have felt her fury, she needs a new outlet for her rage. She walks from the base of the driveway over the side of the yard and finds her target. A medium to large sized landscaping rock. Actually, I’d safely say this thing was a downright stone. She bends down and picks it up, and my immediate thought was “oh my God she is going to crush his dog!” She did not. She gave a heave and it landed maybe two feet infront of her. I have to say, she was never going to get much distance given her lifting form. This is why its so important to lift your legs people.

Needless to say, this really set the guy off. He came down from his porch returning his own promises of hellfire back to her and encouraging her to leave. And she sort of did. Rather than go back from whence she came, she crossed the street, apparently still looking for more objects to rage upon. Luckily for her there is a bank of mailboxes right across the street from the guy’s house. Now, these are burried, if not cemented, in the ground, and she’s is a lady in barefeet with fury to dispence and not a teenager in an F-150 with a baseball bat to swing. These mailboxes are not in immenent danger, but rage on them she must. With all the hate-filled force she could summon she flung open every last mailbox door! Take that! You know, a good angry door slam is great. An angry door open? I guess it depends on the kind of door, but a tiny mailbox door sure ain’t it.

At this point, she is in the street and clearly not satisfied by her assult on the mailbox doors, and really, how could she be? This is when a car pulls up and stops next to her. Could this be the original horn honking car? The driver rolls down their window, and while I can’t hear what is said, it clearly doesn’t go over well. The lady open-hand slaps the car and the driver the floors it to get away. Perhaps she gave a brief thought of giving chase, or was just looking for more inanimate objects to unleash herself upon, but she now started making her way down the other street that forms the intersection of which my house is at the corner. So my view is only getting better.

*Picture of my actual garbage can replaced to protect the victim.

I don’t know if she has a plan, but it’s clear she has garbage cans on the brain. And also probably meth. The house across the street from me has their garbage cans out too, and she makes a beeline for them. She quickly topples them and is looking to move on. She looks across the street to my house, where all three of my garbage cans are sitting out. Of all the days for it to be trash, yard waste, and recycling on the same day.

At this point I shift from guy-watching-from-between-the-blinds to Man Protecting His House. I walk to my front door and as I’m opening it she is dropping my garbage cans like bad habits. I feel the need to say something, but I also don’t want to escalate this lady. I need to be firm yet respectful, so I ma’am her. “Ma’am, can you pick those up?” I ask.

She doens’t respond.

I hit her with it again, “Ma’am, can you pick those up?”

I’ve got her attention now. She pivots and starts heading right toward me. As she gets closer I can see that she’s got the crazy eyes. I stand my ground though, and ask again, “Are you going to pick those up?” She gets closer, almost up to my porch now. I decide to treat her like some kind of wild puma, and I stand firm and look right back at her in her crazy eyes. Mind you I actaully have no idea what to do should you encounter a puma. I have read a book on bear attacks, but waving my arms in the air and screaming “Hey lady! You get out of here! You get!” doesn’t seem like a great option.

Just a few steps from my porch now she is staring at me with a mix of rage and total mental vacancy. And now that I have a good look at her face, I know that I have never seen this lady before. Not that I know everybody in my neighborhood, but I am fairly certain I could pick the people that live within a few houses of me out of a line up. “Do I even know you?” I ask.

“God knows you!” She replies. “And you’re going to hell!”

Plot twist! Turns out she’s not overflowing with rage from a run-in with a neighbor, she’s overflowing with the holy spirit! And also probably meth.

Now that I’ve joined the guy across the street in a sentense of eternal damnation, she’s decided I should also join him in having my landscaping feel her fury. I have no rocks, but I’ve got plants. She reaches down and grabs a handfull of leafy green growth and throws it at me. Much like the mailbox doors incident, this does not have the effect I’m sure she was hoping for. The leaves gently flutter to the ground without making it even half way to me. Clearly unsatisified from her leaf throwing, and again, who could blame her, she finds a more substantial target – a planter. Now, this thing is pretty heavy and awkward to grab, so she gives up hope of chucking it pretty quickly and settles for tipping it over. Apparently this satisfies her and she walks away.

I watch her go back to where she was coming from originally and back into a house which I assume is hers, though like I said, I have never seen this lady before. I take a mintue to wrap my head around what the hell just happened, and to keep an eye on the house to see if she stays in there. It seems her path of destruction has come to an end so I go back out to pick up my garbage cans. It is then that the thought enters my brain -what if she comes back out with a gun? I’m out here with no cover tending to my fallen cans. I wonder what the odds are she has a gun. She’s a middle aged white person with anger and/or substance abuse issues. Of course she has a gun. I go back inside and make sure all the doors are locked.

EPILOGUE:

I keep looking out the window peridically to see what happens next. Pretty quickly the cops show up. They knock on her doors and windows, and I can hear one cop say to another that he can see her sitting at the kitchen table. They keep knocking and trying to talk to her through the window, which apparently she finds annoying because she gets up, pulls down the blinds, then goes and sits back down. Bold move.

Over the next hour or so, a total of three cop cars, one paramedic unit, and one fire truck show up. There is also an industrial food supply delivery truck parked outside at one point, which I assume is either unrelated or a family member came from work to check on the situation. Which, of all the times to borrow a company car, you choose this one? “Hey boss, I gotta go check on a public disturbance my sister is causing, and I’m parked way out back. Is it cool if I take the giant cube truck with our company name on the door?”

Eventaully the paramedics wheel her out on a stretcher. Her hands and legs are strapped down. Did she have a mental breakdown? Was it drug induced? I don’t know. But I do know this – my kids are sure as hell skipping that house at Halloween.

Time Is a Traveler

Maybe it is part of being older, or maybe it is part of being a parent, but the value of my time is something I think about more now than I did a few years ago. Actually, I don’t think value is the right word – you can’t put a price tag on time, and you can’t buy more of it. Importance maybe? Though is time itself important or what we do with the time we have that is important? I’d argue the latter. The paradoxality of time. I think that’s probably accurate. Time is both limitless and limited.

It’s been a big week in our house. My oldest daughter is going back to pre-school in a few days, my younger daughter is nailing potty training, and the baby boy is adding oatmeal to his diet. All milestones and achievements worth celebrating, all happening so fast – at least it feels that way. I mean, wasn’t my oldest just in diapers? Wasn’t the baby just born? How can I even have three babies, wasn’t I just in high school? What the hell is going on here?

Also this week, I had a terrible client give me an excellent reminder of the importance of how I should perceive time. Some technical glitch in his iCalendar (though I am not 100% sure it wasn’t user error on his part) didn’t adjust the meeting invitation for time zone differences and he showed up to a conference call three hours early. In the angry phone call to me that followed, he reminded me no less than three times that he bills $650 per hour, and that his time is too valuable to have to rearrange his schedule. I had two immediate thoughts. First, his clients are getting absolutely robbed. Second, his time is in no way more valuable than time, nor mine any more valuable than his. If he wants to tell me the services he provides during his work day are more valuable, sure. But if he wants to tell me that the time he spends on this Earth is more valuable than mine, then I have some suggestion on what he can do to himself with some of that time.

I’ve been reading a lot about Stoic philosophy the last new months, and a central tenet is that we are all going to die. Some uplifting stuff, am I right? But the point is that we don’t control how long we get to live, and that dying isn’t anything to fear or even avoid. Death is a natural occurrence, and as such it can’t be bad, because it is part of the natural (and therefore good) course of things. The most powerful Roman emperor is just as dead as poorest slave, and some day my most arrogant client will be just as dead as me. Time went on before us, and time will continue to go on after us. And in my moment of frustration, I found a small measure of comfort in that.

Whether time feels like it crawling or flying by, I want to challenge myself with making more intentional choices on how I spend my time. If my kid wants five minutes my attention, is that an annoyance or something worth way more than $650? Time spent with my wife, time spend with friends, time spent running, time spent eating some cake, it all must be time spent on purpose. Otherwise it is time that’s gone without being taken full advantage of. So when one of my kids asks for Daddy for the thousandth time when they should have been asleep an hour ago, is that waste of time or is that exactly what my limited amount of time is for?

Time will keep going no matter how much of it I choose to utilize wisely or waste. Now that I am at a point in live where I am thinking about these things, I can’t help but look back at time I’ve wasted. I mean, sure it was fun in the moment playing so much NCAA Football on my PlayStation, but in the grand scheme what did I get out of my twenty consecutive national championships?

Time is a traveler. It will keep on going. It is up to me to make the most of my trip.