Category: blood

Family, easy!

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until then, she’s mine

Hiiii internet. It’s me again. Back for another round of typing. You wanna hang out for a while? I think I may download some music and eat a bowl of cereal. Sit for a while and keep me company, OK? Yeah… you do what I say.

This past Friday we went to a wedding. I’ve written before about how I get at weddings, but, this time, I thought the story of my almost-tears was good enough to expand on a bit.

First off, the wedding itself was set square on the south shore of the incredible Lake Tahoe. The scenery made for quite a backdrop, the endless lake and snowcapped peaks towering all around was the vista from within the reception hall, where the entire back wall was glass.

So, the mood was already somewhat established by the whole man-in-nature vibe the venue itself gave off – this was an auspicious occasion, and, like any wedding, a celebration. The folks who were becoming one flesh that day are friends of ours, but we’re not terribly close or anything. For that reason I figured I would be fine in terms of my typical over-emotional response to the ceremony, not having a particularly strong emotional stake in the matter and all. And, as the reception speeches began I sat proudly dry-eyed, easily letting mushy anecdotes and proclamations of undying cosmic love and friendship bounce right off my tough skin. That is, until she took the mic…

The bride, that is. Her words were fine; heartfelt, kind, sincere. She moved from one person to the next, saying something nice about each. Soon, shifting the sights of her speech around the room from target to familial target, she eventually landed on her father. And then, dear friends, the thick dusty curtains hanging over my heart were rent to bits word by stabbing word. All of the sudden those TV-chimes sounded and I was the me of years from now, at my own daughter’s wedding, Keaton taking the form of the bride before me in the present time – speaking to me.

I can’t remember the entirety of her words, as all my powers of logical thought were lined up in defence of the hostile charge mounted by my emotions, but I do recall some particularly amazing (paraphrased, I’m sure) bits: “And, dad. You made me what I am today; taught me how to be a good person. I credit you with my spirit, the way I never give up. Thank you for making me into what I am.”

Oh, Lord… I can barely write about it without getting misty. To think that one day I’ll be sitting at the “family table” listening to Keaton say something (hopefully) similar, about broke me down. At one point I had to consciously break my attentions and focus instead on some boats scooting across the smooth surface of the lake on a sunset sail. I just couldn’t take it.

The brutality, the pure barbarity of having to, as a dad, “give away” your little girl. Biting back tears of sadness while at the same time damming the flood of tears from the pride and happiness filling you to bursting. You think I’m gonna let some guy take her away from me? Yeah… I guess I will… but not for a long time. Until then, she’s mine.

‘Night. Hold ’em tight.

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pull up those blinds

Ahhh… pull up those blinds and let’s open some windows in here, it’s dark and stuffy. I’m gonna go check on the garden, see what’s growing and what’s not. Yeah, the lawn does look good… must be that fertilizing I gave it before we left – I’ll have to mow it again before the week’s out.

No, I’m not going into the sawmill – I’m gonna work from here instead, the flight getting in late would make it a waste to drive down there for two hours now.

See, doesn’t the breeze blowing through and the sunlight make this place feel better? It’s a gorgeous day outside, I think I’ll take Keaton for a walk later.

I’m gonna go grab the stuff out of the car and unpack a little, then I have to run up and get my new suit fitted. OK, love you too.

Home again. Had fun away.

Hello from back in California guys (and girls). Hope you all had good mom’s days, and that someone did something nice for you (providing you deserved it). As mentioned in my soliloquy above, it truly was a beautiful day we returned to here today – warm and sunny and slightly breezy. And I did end up taking Keaton for a walk around the block, she pushed her doll in her Keaton-sized stroller and picked flowers (which are really tall weeds gone to seed in peoples’ lawns) along the way.

Anyway, this house is familiar, and I like being here.

And yes, the picture that goes along with this post is Keaton watching the “Volcano Sisters” episode of The Backyardigans (her absolute favorite episode of her absolute favorite show, thanks Mike and Tricia) on Daddy’s iPod whilst flying home from Oregon. She looks so grown up with her little headphones on.

Thanks for hanging in there for another week friends. Stick around, maybe you’ll like it around here – I’m even gonna do another poll next week. Wheee!

Goodnight.

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to know, and maybe even love

Hi folks. I had planned this Monday’s entry to be some kind of triumphant return to blogging, what with us being on vacation all last week and my expectations that I’d not blog much at all.

Turns out I was able to throw something together for four of the five “regular” bloggin’ days – which either is or isn’t bad, depending on your view of getting online whilst on vacation. For me, it’s as natural as reading a book or watching TV, just another vice of the modern-world… so it didn’t detract from me properly vacating. Here, then, is a normal ho-hum Monday post on sounds familiar, the kind you’ve come to know, and maybe even love. For my part, this intro is finished.

On our first day back from Mexico and I had all sorts of things planned: I was gonna finish fixing the fence that blew down eons ago; was gonna go get a haircut; was gonna maybe mow the lawn; unpack; sort through the mail… all kinds of things. Instead, I sat around playing with Keaton and watching TiVo’d episodes of Saturday Night Live. What a waste of a fine day to be outside. (I’ll tell you a secret… if I really wanted to get that stuff done today, I’d’ve done it. The fact that I didn’t get it done just means I never really planned to.)

With the new week, I’m going to do another You Decide Friday poll, where you, my dearest readers, get to cast your vote and let me know what I should write about come week’s end. The rules are simple, vote for your top choice, with the understanding that just because something wins doesn’t mean the other topics are cast away for good – they’re all just binned ideas from my running list anyway. What are you waiting for? Flex your democracy people:

[poll=3]

Wow, a few paragraphs… a poll… not bad for getting a late Sunday night start, eh?

Oh, and guess what? Whipped topping!

I managed to get a respectable collection of images from our Mexico trip up online today, and only one day back from the vacation. I deserve some kudos for that, right? Yeah, I do. Give it up. You can surf over to the aforementioned gallery by clicking right here. Enjoy.

Gonna tack on something that doesn’t really fit, deal.

While we were flying there-and-back for vacation this past week, and in light of all the recent airlines folding and facing delays in financial problems, I’ve come up with what I think is a pretty solid airline bailout or recover plan. Most MBA students know the story about Delta and the three olives, and I think my cost-saving idea may be even more revolutionary than that. Here goes: You know those plastic bags attached to the oxygen masks? The ones that the airline tells you every time you fly “will not inflate, but oxygen will be flowing?” Brace yourself: Get rid of those bags.

Dudes, really. You’re equipping each of your passengers’ oxygen lines with little plastic bags that only cause confusion, as evidenced by the fact that your flight attendants have to explain that, while it’s obvious they aren’t doing anything, they are “working” anyway.

You’re welcome. I just saved you millions on bag-costs.

Oh, nevermind.

Goodnight then.

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starting our own “thing”


Bad news this threatening-to-rain Wednesday evening, folks: For the first day in a while, I’m not really in a huge writing mood.

I’m not quite sure what this might mean for today’s entry yet, but clearly it doesn’t bode well. Lately it seems like I’ve no shortage of things to write about or work on here at the blog, and I seem to be sailing through even the most voluminous entries with ease (note: voluminous != good, necessarily). I guess it had to dry up at some point, maybe tonight’s the night. I guess it could be good prep for the bumpiness that’ll likely lie ahead as we travel the next couple weeks.

All day at work today I kept catching glimpses of the little weatherbar plugin in my Firefox window, which was saying it was going to rain tomorrow (60% chance). That, and the fact that the lawn was overdue for a cut, meant I was out mowing right after work today so I could beat the showers. I hate mowing right after work, it’s like coming home from work to do more work – and I hate doing work after work. Actually, that’s not entirely true – because I sometimes enjoy working after work (as long as it’s not on work stuff), I just need time to decompress, to transition from “work” to “home.” Usually, I get this time with a Newsweek magazine (I haven’t always been as learned) in the crapper – the one place and activity where I’m unlikely to get interrupted. Locked there in my stinky little coffin reading about politics or the Middle East (Newsweek has a huge hardon for both), I transition. Anyway, I’ve gone off topic… what I meant to say was that I mowed, and sweat, and subsequently showered. Now I clean with greenish fingernails, typing.

Today I booked our Thanksgiving trip back to Florida. Usually, this would be a Christmas trip… but we decided that this was the year we’d start instituting our own “family” Christmas traditions. After all, we are some kinda family or something of our own now – I think. It feels odd, really, because we’ve been going to Florida for Christmas nearly every year since we moved here to California (save the very first year, when we were simply to destitute to do so). In fact, spending Christmas in warm, sunny Florida with Sharaun’s family and our friends has become a tradition I look forward to. A while ago, however, Sharaun and I both agreed that we’d like to start doing “our own” Christmas thing eventually – and this year seemed like a good time to start.

Originally, my motivation was Keaton turning two – and now requiring a full-fare ticket for the round trip flights. But, that really doesn’t hold up to much scrutiny, as we’ll still be going to Florida at some point (or several points) during the year. So, I guess it just comes down to wanting our own thing. Anyway, we’ve sort of traded off holidays – and we’re headed back this year for Thanksgiving instead. Actually, we’ve invited my family down here for Christmas this year… so who knows, maybe that’ll turn out to be part of our “thing.” Or, maybe we won’t have a “thing,” and will be nomadic Christmas transients instead… that could be a “thing.” What the heck am I on about?

Before I go, today’s the day the new “You Decide Friday” poll closes, so cast those last votes and let me know what I have to write about tomorrow night. Oh, and I promise I didn’t upvote anything… if you’re curious about the ungamed results, “When we used to go hoboing” has six legit ones, while “The first time I got a girl to take her pants off” has a mere two which are “real.” The other two each have zero… which means that… duuude… eight people? I spend way yonder too much time on this thing…

I dunno what to do with that… maybe write about hoboing? Maybe not. Maybe both… but that’s a stretch. What do you think?

Either way, here the poll again. What are you waiting for, g’head, do it:

[poll=2]

Well, turns out I didn’t have any issues filling this page with stuff again. Guess I was wrong about that. Goodnight.

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they weren’t that far off


Well, it’s 8pm on Wednesday night and I’ll be leaving for the airport in about 30min to retrieve my wife and daughter. At long last, our family reunited. Sharaun’s feeling better, but not 100%. She called from Chicago during her layover, and I heard Keaton in the background playing in a rocking chair. Taking a suggestion from a friend more thoughtful than I, I stopped off after getting a haircut today to pick up a mylar Backyardigans “Happy Birthday’ balloon which I’ll use as a welcome home prop for Keaton at the airport. I didn’t get anything for Sharaun, I hope that’s OK (that’s OK, right blog?). Anyway, I wrote just a tiny bit upon getting home from work today (I split a little early for lack of concentration). Here it is, be warned: I took license.

It’s been a thousand years or more since I bedded the woman under the sun.

I remember it fondly because our communal joy was used as the basis as a new religion, the point-infinity of zero-time in which the people of that world consider consciousness to have begun. As trees thrashed in the soil, our wrestling drove up mountains, broken and shattered peaks looming around us in the midst of our eternal ecstasy. Our fantastic perspiration dotted the firmament with a flood of salty oceans and seas. Living beings sprang forth from the union of our flesh, animals winged and legged sprouting where we brushed, budding from the rich loam of our combined corpus, pushing through that single-skin and living, breathing. The sound of our tryst established the pantheon of world-language, each rumbling low and trilling high adding depth and soul to spoken word, the genesis of communication.

Each coordinated push of our bodies establishing the regular cadence of time, the cradle of eternity, the friction of our motion warming the surface of the world and giving life to all manner of plant and flower. Beauty bloomed around us, tickling our ticklish bits as it pushed through to touch our flesh and bend to the sun of our union. The fluid results of our strained efforts being the Philosopher’s Stone, that golden egg from which all base and divine sprang and will one day return – Aqua Vitae. As breath filled the first lungs ever to breathe, some of those infant-beings glimpsed our culminating love and the imprint of that God-Union was burned red-hot into their consciousness, destined to be collectively passed down and re-interpreted throughout time, understood and misunderstood by the legacy human froth spilled foaming from our joy.

They called it the Big Bang, and they weren’t that far off.

How’s that for blasphemy? Goodnight and happy Lent.

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ch-ch-ch-ch-changes


Hi Tuesday. Back to work today, fresh of my latest trip on ship-sick. Felt OK, the busyness of the day working to keep my mind from dwelling on how I felt, letting me instead be washed away in the stress and decisions of my daily eight-hour farce. I suppose that means I have to go back tomorrow, so I will. Today, I went a little mad near the end there (sorry about breaking the no-cussing streak, blame Art). Let’s do this.

♫ Ch-ch-ch-ch-changes… ♫
♫ Oh, look out you rock ‘n rollers… ♫

Just within the past few days, Keaton has begun stuttering. At first, I thought this was utterly cute. She’s always done some amount of stammering or word-repetition at the beginning of her phrases, and I’d always chalked that up to her knowing she wanted to form a long string of words, but needing some extra time to process what she wanted to say and buying it through repetition. This recent stuff though, this is different. All of the sudden at my folks’ place in Oregon last week, she started getting really hung up on her ‘W’ lead-words. “Where’d the doggy go daddy?” turned into, Wh-wh-wh-wh-wh-wh-wh-where’d the doggy go daddy?” With the ‘W’ sound repeated an almost comical amount of times. Actually, with the ‘W’ sound repeated a downright comical amount of times.

“W-w-w-w-w-wan-wan-wan-w-w-w-wan-wanna use the potty” began to replace the previously smooth and fluid “Wanna use the potty.” Again, the amount of repetition on the lead word was so prominent I figured she must be doing it on purpose as a reaction to the giggles we initially reacted with.

Within just the past forty-eight hours, though, she’s branched out from just ‘W’ words and now hangs up on all sorts of words. She draws out initial words too, like, “Iiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiii wanna bite daddy’s cheese,” or “Mmmmmmmmmmmmmmy babydoll is sleeping.” Still, I saw no reason for concern, and figured it was some sort of normal speech pattern per development. Sharaun, however, was a little more prudent, deciding she didn’t like the new Keaton-speech and doing some online research. Here’s what the sage internet has to say about toddler stuttering:

Many children go through a developmental stage of speech disfluency that’s often confused with true stuttering. This normal disfluency does disappear over time without need for treatment.

Children with true stuttering tend to repeat syllables four or more times (a-a-a-a-as opposed to once or twice for normal disfluency). They mmmmmay also occasionally prolong sounds.

Hmmm… sounds like our Keaton…

Children with stuttering show signs of reacting to their stuttering — blinking the eyes, looking to the side, raising the pitch of the voice.

Oh yeah, blinking eyes, screwing up her face, seemingly looking into space for the words: check, check, and check. Hmmm….

True stuttering is frequent — at least 3 percent of the child’s speech. While normal disfluency is especially noticeable when the child is tired, anxious, or excited, true stuttering is noticeable most of the time.

Well, as long as the internet is still an infallible source of information and a viable method of self-diagnosis, I’m convinced: Our baby may have a legitimate stuttering problem. The doctor on the internet said we should alert our pediatrician, so that’s what we’ll do.

Still, I secretly think it’s cute, and am not really too concerned. Call me naive.

♫ Ch-ch-ch-ch-changes… ♫

Tomorrow I’m dropping Sharaun and Keaton off at the airport bright and early so they can catch a flight to Florida to see Keaton’s brand new cousin, baby Hobson (blog-style congratulations to Aunt Breck and Uncle Doug). After that, I’ll be on my own for five whole days. Cast back into the shadowy realm of bachelorhood (well, minus all the wild stripper-pole parties I used to throw in my true bachelor past, ahem). On my own for meals, clean boxers, sexual gratification (nothing much new there), bedtimes and waketimes, and whether or not I have to don knickers on the weekend. My barnburning plans include the cleaning jag I’ve outlined here before, and completely eschewing the television in favor of the iPod. In some ways I’m looking forward to the time, but in reality I think I’ll start to miss my girls right-quick.

♫ Ch-ch-ch-ch-changes… ♫

Has anyone ever heard an old fable, or story, or Mother Goose or… something… about a man, or king, or maybe it was a pauper, who woke up one morning to a solid-gold reflection of himself in the mirror? Yeah, I figured not, because I just made that up. But today was my solid-gold day. I was untouchable. I walked on water. I touched souls. The heart-hardened wept open-mouthed as babes for tit.

Below please find the actual photo that sits unblinkingly on my sawmill’s badge. Note the lethargic smile, crooked nose, and fucking hair. It was taken some eight years ago now, and I’ve worn it around my neck five days a week for those long years like a sinner’s millstone. While this is, in what I hope would be anyone’s opinion and not just my own, a spectacularly awful picture of me, it’s constantly displayed on my chest in miniature contrast to my real face just a foot above it.

I like to think I see something better than that in the mirror each morning, and usually I do (changing that pitiful post-college hairstyle really opened up new avenues for me, how on earth did I ever pull tail with that gel-back?). In actuality it’s likely not that far off the mark. They got the underlying concept right.

I hate that picture. Hate.

So imagine my apoplectic joy when, this morning, smiling back at me in that reflective glass, I saw instead an Adonis of an alpha-male, chiseled face sculpted from shining polished gold. I took avenue-wide strides all the way to work, stepping from cloud to cloud and smiling down on creation from my appointed place in the Heavens. I called lightnings with my fingers, distilled the entirety of human consciousness into my hands and cast it to the wind as worthless. I was amazing.

When I got home at 6pm, the chump from the badge was back, only he was eight years older and balder. I berated him, tore him down layer by putrid layer and tried to rebuild him again in all the gilt perfection of twelve hours prior. Resisting my efforts, he slithered back into decline, rusting in real-time, biodegrading on a hook in the backyard.

It’s not over.

♫ Ch-ch-ch-ch-changes… ♫
♫ Pretty soon you’re gonna get a little older… ♫

To those of you who were lucky today and didn’t even know it – Goodnight and sweet dreams.

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snack-a-cheerios


Mondays mean I have to go back to work, so normally Mondays blow. This Monday, however, was quite pleasant. I got a ton of work done, hung out with friends at lunch, and came home to a big “Hi Daddy!” and hug from Keaton. I got home a little late (meeting ran long and I hung around talking to Ben a little bit), and we had leftovers for dinner (which I like, honestly, since I do dishes and leftovers mean less cleanup).

Tonight Keaton and I called Grammy and Grandpa together, we do that sometimes. Keaton likes to use the phone, and can actually hold something of a conversation (well, a two-year-old talks to an adult kinda conversation). Tonight, it went a little like this:

Grandpa: Hello?

Keaton (at Dad’s prompting whispers): Hi Grandpa! I love you Grandpa!

Grandpa: Why, hi Keaton! I love you too! Want to talk to your Grammy? (Ahh… the classic dad-answered-the-phone handoff, “Hey there!… let me get your mom.”)

Grammy: Hello?

Keaton (more whispers from dad): Hi Grammy! I love you Grammy!

Grammy: Hi Keaton! I love you too! What are you doing?

Keaton: Snack-a-Cheerios!

Grammy: Oh, you had some Cheerios?

Keaton: Yeah.

Grammy: We’re they good?

Keaton: OK.

Keaton: Me hold-a baby Colton!

Grammy: Yeah! Did you see baby Colton?

Keaton. OK.

Awkward silence….

Dad: Keaton, can you tell Grammy what you did today?

Keaton: Today.

Dad: What did you do today?

Keaton: Slide-a-Krittal.

Dad: Oh, that means “Slide with Crystal,” mom. That’s the person at the gym’s childcare.

Grammy: Oh, you went to the gym?

Keaton: OK.

Grammy: Did you have fun?

Keaton: Had-a-Cheerios!

…

And on and on and on it went like that. But, Grammy never seemed to tire of the conversation.

Well then, I am going to paste in something I wrote a while ago… maybe it’s interesting, let’s see:

Did you guys know that, no matter how you cut it, there is a certain element of the earnable respect a person can have which is entirely age-based? Well, I’m telling you that there is, whether you knew it or not. Now, people may tell you that this is false, but they are either misinformed or lying. If you’re a young whippersnapper, no matter how much of a superstar you are at what you do, and regardless of the number of millions you make, you’ll be still deprived at least some percentage of the respect you could garner (from those older than you) because of your age.

Furthermore, I bet I can roughly quantify that percent-deprived by looking at the median age of your peers (those who do the same tasks as you in your chosen profession) and subtracting your age from that. For instance, if you’re a thirty-two year old middle manager at your dead-end warehouse job, and the average middle-manager at the warehouse company is actually thirty-nine years old, you’ll be deprived of about 20% of the respect you could earn were you seven years older.

Now I know there’ll be a lot of fast-trackers and young up-and-comers out there who’d completely disagree, and maybe even argue that they are, in fact, more respected than some of their elders. And I’m not saying that can’t be possible or doesn’t happen (because, in point-cases, I’m certain it does), I’m just saying that, in a general sense, they’d be wrong. Sure, if there’s a deadweight fifty year old who’s coasting along as your peer, you may indeed be more respected in comparison. But, in general, those who are older than you will still have it in the back of their heads that they’ve “been around” and you’re “fresh off the tit.”

Seriously, you’re gonna have to work around this. It’s just a simple fact that you trust people who are your age or older because your brain tells you they’ve had at least as much, or more, experience than you yourself have. Think about it, we inherently think of those younger than us as less-experienced than we are (and, because physics says that time flows forward, we’re probably right in doing so). Young people are expected to “earn and learn” their way to the top. Just look to the longstanding, pre-medieval, concept of apprenticeship, or the way lawyers and accounts log hours to win partner.

Anyway, I’m actually not criticizing the concept – it’s common sense. I’m just saying, if you’re planning on being number-one top-cheese in your chosen field by thirty-one, you may be surprised. You might even make it to CEO by that age, but you’d better bet some of the musty members of the board are looking down their noses at your unwrinkled brow and perky breasts. Hey, I’m OK with it… just gotta do the time (or get insanely rich, cash out young, and run for the hills).

Hmmm… I dunno if that was an entertaining read or not…

Hey, Keaton made Megan’s photoblog: check it out.

Love you guys and your unwrinkled brows and perky breasts. Goodnight.