Dad Entry #176

I have never done this before, but #176 is only going to be a quote, from William Broyles. He's a Vietnam veteran and a writer / editor whose feathers include the screenplays for Apollo 13, Cast Away, and Jarhead, among others. Oh, and he's a dad...

"Next time my son and I came to the mountains we’d be ready, not that it would make any difference. We hadn’t earned a next time. The bear had given it to us. Grace came as a gift from unexpected givers. And if you weren’t grateful, if you didn’t thank God or nature or the Great Spirit for your life, your children, for being granted the moment to walk on the earth, then a bear might as well eat you and shit you out as a green puddle. You could get a big house and an expensive car, send your kids to the right schools and give parties for people like yourself, but there would always be that booby trap on the path, the ambush from the flowers, the grizzly in the woods, waiting for you. We made a wide circle away from where the grizzly and her cubs had gone into the woods..."

Dad Entry #175

I gave Megan an espresso this morning. She had an important standardized test at school. I’m kidding; I didn’t give her any espresso. I made extra for myself, though, and quickly drank too much and gave her one helluva pep talk.

I pulled into Sara’s driveway the other day and then exited my car when it was still in Drive. Yeah, I didn’t put it in Park. Are you wondering what happened? We were late for Michael’s basketball game, for one thing.

Before the annual pheasant hunt, I told Megan, “I’m goin’ huntin’, Baby.” Her reply was swift, “Can I come?” Her unawareness and innocence is cute. Bird hunting, for me, is an awesome aggregation of fresh air, countryside, tobacco, great boots, shotgun blasts, pulse-pounding bird flushes and knockdowns and retrievals, amazing dogs, friends, evening alcohol, humorous profanity, story- and lie-telling, and blood (we kill, clean, and eat the birds, after all). Yeah, those are the biggies and, currently, Megan might only embrace the dogs and expensive footwear parts (although she has flashes of proficiency at lie-telling). But Megan won’t be a half-pint forever, and someday we’ll tote guns together over vast fields in cold, wet, nasty weather in search of pheasants. It’ll be fun. I’ll get her a tin of Skoal Long Cut Cherry and she can use Papa Mike’s reasonably-weighted 20 gauge. Did you know they have Apple, Berry, Citrus, and Peach Skoal now? Our deceased rural patriarchs are rolling over in their graves.

So anyway, my car idled forward – very briskly, it seemed to me – and I jumped back into it and slammed my foot on the break. I hit the correct pedal, thank God, and instead of accelerating, the car stopped… but not before it crashed into Sara’s garage door. The damage was less than I feared, but I am suddenly afflicted with a very specific kind of terror and paralysis; I am afraid to get out of my vehicle even after I’ve turned it off, and I’m sitting there holding the key, which is nowhere near the ignition, and the engine is silent as a church mouse. The whole thing happened, of course, because I was thinking hard about how to be a better parent, when I should’ve been concentrating on my driving, or my not driving, or my parking or whatever it was that happened. Such are my flaws.

Dad Entry #174

For several weeks now, both kids have had a rattling cough, and very robust – and often visible – mucus masses blocking one or both nostrils. Megan's wet snot often sags and teardrops to the extreme of coating her upper lip at which point I recommend a Kleenex. I hope she catches on before high school. Megan's nose was dry – and nearly clear – last night, though; there was only a single, crusty hanger I desperately wanted to pick as I admired her flawless face. She was reading to me. I said, "Booger, Sweetheart," and pointed to the right side of her nose and she dug and flicked it away. Who cares; I vacuum. Megan was reading aloud a book about a girls basketball team. This is good, since I will coach her soon and want basketball on the brain! On her brain, I should clarify; basketball is always on my brain, especially with Michael’s team at 3-0 and Iowa State ranked 17th. I’m excited to coach Megan’s squad of eight-year-old girls. I’m also terrified. But if my suspicion is true, I’ll benefit from the fact that girls pay more attention and work harder than their male counterparts. Michael's team, albeit older and maybe less tearful, is rambunctious and easily distracted and pretty much annoying as shit. They are also very good and undefeated. Do you think I’d take fewer wins if it meant fewer annoyances? HELL NO!

Outsmarting eight-year-olds isn’t easy. And that holds true for seven, and six, and five, and so on. Speak for yourself, you say? Fair enough; I realize I am the one and only common denominator in my experiences with all the precocious, prodigious kids I’ve been parent, uncle, cousin, coach, friend, and acquaintance to. Maybe you know how to outsmart grade-schoolers, but I don’t. I have a long record of failure. So yeah, anyway, I can’t wait to be in charge of a whole team of eight-year-old girls.

I mentioned Kleenex above. I really love it when Megan leaves a tissue in her pants-pocket, and it ends up in the washing machine with a huge load of laundry. It leaves beautiful little snowflakes – super-thin and impossible to remove – on all of our clothes. It’s so festive!