I like proper grammar. I am certainly not an expert on the subject, nor would I claim my writing/language to be the pinnacle of proper use of the English language. Regardless, I prefer well articulated thought and language. I encourage my children to pay attention to the rules of grammar and not fall trap to “lazy” habits such as saying “like” or “you know” every three seconds. My older girls have struggled with “lazy” language habits; my son doesn’t speak fast enough or often enough to really have any use for language habits in general. It always seems to be a struggle to ensure that my kids (and wife) speak properly and in a fashion that doesn’t leave them sounding like uneducated miscreants.
Knowing what I know about my penchant for proper language skills and habits; I can’t help but chuckle at my own hypocrisy when it comes to my youngest children. My 5-year old has a bit of a lisp and pronounces words in her own special way. I don’t know what causes a child to speak with a lisp. I would like to blame my wife for drinking too much Dr. Pepper while the babies were still cooking in her womb. Alas, I don’t believe there is any scientific basis for that argument. I’m sure the solution is something much more pedestrian such as: I am being punished by god because, for a short period in my life, I didn’t think Angelina Jolie looked like a man (Jon Voigt specifically, but that is another discussion — yes, I know about the father/daughter relationship). Whatever the reason, and I honestly don’t care how it came about, I am not offended by listening to her speak. To be honest, I love it! As a teenager I had the hots for a girl who went on to become a speech pathologist; she would probably tell me that my “kids need to get that speech defect fixed.” I’m not sure I’m ready for my kids to outgrow it. It seems that the lisp is also contagious because my 3 year old has acquired it too.
A couple of weeks back I had a birthday. As part of the birthday celebration my wife purchased a single mylar balloon for me. The balloon is still floating above one of the dining room chairs proclaiming “It’s your special day!” I was talking to my three year old about the balloon when I realized that she has a very special word for balloons: she calls them “gumbloons”. Just writing that word for this post melts my heart and makes me long to hug that little squirt. I have no idea what the thought process was that lead her developing mind to settle on “gumbloons” when all the adults were saying “balloons” but I love witnessing the development. I don’t think I could ever correct her “butchering” of the english language. I want to bottle it, stuff it away in the very back corner of my sock drawer and pull it out for a listen on days when adult life has beaten me down. I want to remember her cherubic face muttering that word with a slight lateral lisp on the end.
My three year-old also speaks of herself in sentences structured for speaking in the 3rd person. She doesn’t refer to herself in the 3rd person, but she will say things such as “him gives the iPad to me…. now.” You must understand that she is not stating a fact with this sentence, she is asking me to enforce her request to have her brother turn over possession of the iPad to her. Ending the sentence with the word “now” is neither demand nor request; it is, oddly, her own “lazy” habit — she says it all the time, after nearly half of all her sentences, whether it is applicable or not. I like to think that her whole life is happening in that “now” that she utters 100 times a day. Kids grow so quickly that she is always a new person from one “now” to the next. She is simply trying to help us keep pace with her evolution!
My son also had words that he used when he was little that I found to be so endearing. I always swore that I would remember them and cherish them. As most parents do, I forgot them. In my youthful confidence I gave my memory more credit than it really deserved. Gladly, I was able to remember that for a few years he would call “elephants” by his own moniker “felnats.” I loved that word then, and I love it now. My own mother once told me, in front of some of my teenage friends, that when I was a toddler I couldn’t remember the word for “bumblebees” so I came up with the term “stumbleflies” to give them a name. I was embarrassed that she would share such a “un-macho” story in front of my friends. I stared at her in shocked disbelief. She looked at me with a smile I didn’t recognize as her eyes twinkled. Leaving the room, she kissed me on the forehead and patted my belly. At the time I couldn’t decipher the gleam in her eye; but, I assure you, I know its meaning now. There is nothing more dear than knowing, without a doubt, that you are loved as much as you love your own little ones. Even if they butcher the English language.
I think I am a sentimental guy. I don’t find anything to be ashamed of in that statement. Sure, it’s hard to hide misty eyes when my kids excel at sports, academics or serving others; but I don’t go out of my way to disguise my pride. I feel blessed to have a sentimental tilt. I think sentimentality is partly a realization that these great moments we have in life (and they are great) are, in fact, fleeting and the most precious of these fade far too quickly. The longer I live and the more parenting that I do makes this point even clearer to me.
I have been reminded of both sides of this eternally revolving coin this spring. Through deaths in my own family circle and deaths experience by friend’s families I have been able to view many lives celebrated in eulogy. I have seen through picture and anecdote alike the true value of life on this earth and it is seldom what we put most of our daily efforts into. I have yet to hear statements like “my dear old Dad was sure great at his job” or “I am so happy he spent long hours at work” from any person at a funeral. I have heard things like “I’m sure glad he was at our wedding” or “he sure loved the outdoors, and I remember that time when he and I…” I think these are the things we speak of when we lose loved ones, because these are the things that make us who we are and how we will be remembered.
Make no mistake, there is great value in work. Work is an important part of our lives and development. I’m just finding that it’s not as important as I always thought that it was or should be. It is not a foundation for a great life — it is a room in the house you build with your life. My mom (who has since passed) always got after me for focusing too heavily on my job and not enough on my young family. I bristled at her comments because I was certain that I WAS focusing on my family by providing a good life — a life I always wanted as a kid. I thought work was a magic machine into which you poured time, honest effort and brain power in one side and it would squirt out the ‘good life’ from the other end. I don’t even know what the ‘good life’ really was, it just always seemed a couple bonuses or another promotion away. I don’t remember holding it in my hand and feeling misty…ever.
I love architecture. I think it has the power to change mankind and actually design a better world for everyone. I want to practice architecture the rest of my life and design great things with great people. Still, I want to know my kids forever. I want to see them become… Become whatever their version of greatness is going to be. I want to goad my wife into laughing at my stupid jokes – forever. There just seems to be a grand difference between family and architecture.
So, with all my sentimentality intact, I have ventured to Phoenix this weekend -with my son- to experience Spring Training Baseball with the Angels. I wish I could express in words the look on his face and his reaction when I told him that we would be seeing and having dinner with The Angels. Alas! Some joy is ineffable and speaks solely to our hearts. Today, as we sat in a warm spring sun, he fell asleep on my arm for an inning. He was tired from a flight and chasing autographs from his baseball heroes. I sat in that cramped seat, afraid to move lest I wake him, and watched a baseball game as the arm upon which he lay fell asleep. The stadium was full, the cheers were loud and dramatic, but to me we could have been alone in the world. Me and my boy. Father and son. What could I ever do that is greater than this?
Okay, before I start this story, just know that I feel terrible. As much as my dog has been a headache and driven me nuts for over a year now; I assure you that this didn’t go down the way I planned. There are many things that I have “planned” in my life that have fallen apart, in fact. Not that I should have been surprised that this was a bad idea, it falls within my recipe for family disaster as described here or the fact that I am a terrible parent, as described here. Regardless, of my inadequacy as a parent or the broken synapses in my male cerebral cortex, I cannot be excused for this blunder.
Don’t get me wrong. I am not a violent guy. I don’t spank my kids (though I believe in spanking), I don’t get in fist-fights on the weekend; and even though she eats poop: I don’t beat my dog. Not that any of that changes the story.
To tell the story; I was shooting a BB gun in the backyard with my son. We were “zero-ing in” the site on a small daisy BB gun during a break in the action of the Super Bowl. Once we had this calibrated correctly, we started shooting old tomatoes off the tomato plant in the backyard. It should be noted that this is one of those “pump action” BB guns that required 7 or 8 “pumps” to penetrate the skin of a tomato. I was almost done with my fun and was about to turn the gun over to my son for him to shoot when I heard loud voices from inside the house. “NO! GET DOWN!” was all I needed to hear. I knew instinctively that the dog had snookered everyone while we were outside and was now inside the house enjoying our Super Bowl snacks. My teenage daughter was doing what she does best: over-reacting and dramatizing the whole event inside the house. The dog retreated to the back door.
Primitive man was not very concerned with reasoning or debate. He saw a problem and he fixed the problem. Often these solutions were not cognitive or cerebral solutions to problems; they were strictly physical. Many great things in the world have come through this primitive male brain; sadly, this event wasn’t one of those ‘great things.’ Here is the thought process as best I can recall it:
I saw the dog in the door.
The dog had been disobedient.
I had a BB gun in my hand.
The dog needed to be punished.
A BB gun couldn’t do any “real” damage anyway. (I saw National Lampoon’s vacation and John Candy made an excellent observation when he said
Lasky: That’s not a real gun, is it Clark?
Clark: Are you kidding? This is a Magnum P.I.
Lasky: It’s a BB gun!
Clark: Don’t tempt me. I could poke an eye out with this thing.
Lasky: You couldn’t even break the skin with that thing.
I would only give the gun 2 “pumps” so it was just like a swat on the butt.
aim.
fire.
YELP!
It totally broke the skin. Lasky, the security guard at Wally World, was totally wrong. My dog scurried under the kitchen table. My devious smile immediately faded to a heart-sick grimace. “crap, that wasn’t a good idea” I thought to myself as I scrambled inside to check on the family pooch. I coaxed her out from under the table and tended to her wounded butt. The BB didn’t go in, but there was some blood. I put her on the counter and stopped the bleeding while petting her on the head and telling her how sorry I was. She looked at me with the same dumb expression that she always has, probably wondering if I knew that standing in front of the back door could lead to serious pain in your backside — out of the clear blue sky. My wife walked in the house at this point, she stood at the door flabbergasted. I think she tried to give me the “death stare” that she uses on the kids. It didn’t work on me. She muttered her favorite line “you have got to be kidding me” and moved on. I tended to my patient and moved to the living room with her. I sat with her on the couch wondering how I could make it up to her; thankful that her cognitive reasoning skills would not allow her to connect the dots and know that I was the cause of her pain. I felt like a dork.
The dog was back to normal in about 10 minutes. Sniffing around my bean dip and chips, stealing brownies from the toddler and being a general menace. I was glad that she bounced back so well. As the evening progressed I began to feel a sense of normalcy return and a hope that I could one day forgive myself. About 9 o’clock my 5-year old showed her mom the picture she had been drawing on the IPad. I saw the picture and knew that I wasn’t out of the woods yet and that I might never live this down. Though she never cried about the incident, she obviously wasn’t ignorant of what took place. As i studied the picture, the knots in my stomach returned. Here is her picture.
There are times as a father when you really need to earn your stripes. This was obviously one of those times. My little girl was trying to process her puppy being injured. She played it off as an image of “her and her future husband and how their dog got hurt” she said that Lily died before she got married. “This was TOTALLY another dog.” she reassured me. I was able to see through the charade. I pulled her close, gave her a hug and told her I was sorry for shooting her dog. I told her that I knew it was wrong and that I wouldn’t do it again. She reiterated that the picture had nothing to do with her dog, and she went back to coloring pictures.
I think it will be a long time before I forget the lessons of yesterday. Not that I can promise my decision-making tree will be better vetted or without poor selections. I just know that somewhere, I owe that dog an extra chance. She’ll probably use it up this week, but still. I owe my daughter something too. I’m not sure how to make up those things; I’m not even sure that I can. I’m thankful that there was no class I had to take or license I had to get in order to have kids — I obviously would have failed; but, the thing I am most thankful for is that little kids forgive dumb parents easier than the dumb parents forget dumb decisions. As for dumb dogs… Well… They are dumb, so they love us even when we are dumb too.
I hope with all my heart that the dumb decisions stay minor and that they all stay within the realm of puppies. I hope my kids grow up normal in spite of me; and, I really hope one of them makes the dumb split-second decision to shoot the family dog.
(thanks to the Ipowerproject)
It began as a real line, drawn in the dirt or marked by a fence or rail, restricting prisoners in Civil War camps. They were warned, “If you cross this line, you’re dead.” To make dead sure this important boundary was not overlooked, guards and prisoners soon were calling it by its own bluntly descriptive name, the dead line. An 1864 congressional report explains the usage in one camp: “A railing around the inside of the stockade, and about twenty feet from it, constitutes the ‘dead line,’ beyond which the prisoners are not allowed to pass.”
Nothing could be more emphatic than dead line to designate a limit, so we Americans happily applied the term to other situations with strict boundaries. For example, the storyteller O. Henry wrote in 1909 about crossing “the dead line of good behavior.” But it was the newspaper business that made deadline more than just a historical curiosity. To have the latest news and still get a newspaper printed and distributed on time requires strict time limits for those who write it. Yet many are the excuses for writers to go beyond their allotted time: writers’ block, writers’ perfectionism, or just plain procrastination. (Perhaps the writer is a deadbeat (1863)–another dead word invented by Americans during the Civil War.) Seeking the strongest possible language to counter these temptations, editors set deadlines, with the implication that “Your story is dead–You are dead–if you go beyond this time to finish it.
I suppose the same goes for all of us… though I have never heard of any architect who actually died from missing a deadline. Anyone care to test the waters?
We just moved in to a new office. It is plum full of new smells, sounds an many other unexpected surprises. It’s always a little unnerving to be in a new place at night with the new creeks and clomps that any building will have. Still, the building we are in has a large pigeon population and that makes the creeks and clomps a little more interesting. If you get past the shellacking of pigeon feathers and poop you can find a nice building. Pigeon’s are not good neighbors.
While you may assume the life of a pigeon is relatively simple: (find food, wait until human is distracted, take food, repeat ad infinitum) the truth is not always that rosy. My super-secret spy cam caught this video earlier today. I have added some images to set the stage for you as today I saw the darker side of pigeon life in the form of a sexual assault that took place next to my desk.
See the video here
I get a lot of windshield time. Most of that time is spent plotting to take over the world. Oftentimes I get the treat of figuring out what earth changing message some fellow traveler has encoded on their vanity license plates. It is great to see the English language butchered by words filled with numbers and punctuation marks. My drive to work has become a phonetic word game of Mad Gab.
I can enjoy a good puzzle during my drive to work and can usually solve most of them. Give this a try: “These If Hill Wore” …. Did you get “the civil war?” see, even you can win on the highway! The one thing I cannot understand (and am beginning to dislike) are the multitude of symbols and stickers that people put on their back windows — think minivan or suburban — that gives a cute synopsis of family members in graphic form. What is the point?
I was greatly disappointed by a recent rear window I came across last week. This window had five bear’s head stickers on the back: a daddy bear, a momma bear and three little bear heads (two girls and a boy.) The girls were easily identifiable by their cute white bows. The coup de grace was a quaint little label under the heads that said “Bear with Us.”
First, enough with the family graphics! What is the point? Is it so after Mom gets all the kids into the car and she sneaks around to the back of the car for peace and quiet (and a few nips of ‘uncle Charlie’s cough medicine’) she will have a visual reminder of how many kids are in the car?
Perhaps it is something more devious. It could be that this is an alien plot to simplify the menu when they come to eat humans as they take over the world. Imagine, as the aliens capture a minivan full of tasty treats and they can immediately know what flavor lies within. Bare feet stickers on the back would indicate ‘out-doorsie’ folks and perhaps a little bit tougher meat; while stick figure stickers could indicate a sort of alien weight watchers. It should also be noted that this scenario also works if Godzilla is real.
My greatest concern with the ‘bear with us’ bears – apart from the silly over simplification – is the language used. I mean, what kind of chance do those kids have to make a good first impression with that title on the car? As soon as I read it I pictured mass chaos behind the tinted windows. In my mind’s eye there was a weeping woman behind the wheel wearing her muumuu and disheveled hair. Farther back, deviant children throw fruit snacks, chicken nuggets and feces around the back of the van. Thus, a very reasonable warning was placed on the back of the van. This was no place for the faint of heart.
I’m sure the truth of what happens inside that van was much more tame. Regardless, the tone was set without even having met anyone from that family. What good comes from that statement? I don’t think there is anything cute about demeaning ourselves, our children, spouses or families. I know that the person who bought that sticker actually thinks that they have awesome kids. There is no shame in that, but why hide from it?
I think our kids get plenty of mind-numbing reality outside our homes and cars. Let’s devote ourselves to giving them a solid minimum 18 years of having number one fans at home. They will get our discipline at times, but they should never think we are ashamed or wary of presenting them to our friends, coworkers or neighbors. They are certainly not something we should ask complete strangers to ‘bear with.’ They deserve better.
Now, If only I could get “Eye Mull of Musheen” on my license plate.
My wife has gone out of town for the weekend. This is great for her, she deserves some time for herself. I am happy to spend a Dad-only weekend with my daughters and son. I planned this weekend for my wife without reservation or concern. She left this afternoon.
My wife has officially been out of the state for 4 hours.
She needs to come home.
Now.
Let me explain: I came home from work and was hanging out in the living room with my daughters. Youngest daughter was bouncing on my leg jumping up and down. This felt like it went on forever, or at least until my thigh muscles felt like they were going to explode. I explained to her that my leg was tired (her horsie was pooped..) She seemed to accept this and trotted down the hall. I assumed she was going to the bathroom. She is being potty-trained and is doing a great job.
I pulled out my phone and began rescheduling a meeting for work on Monday. Gradually the smell of poop reached my nose. Despite what you might think, this is not normal at our house. I assumed the dog let one loose and kept on working. The smell got stronger. “Where the heck is the dang dog?” I muttered to myself. My 5-year old overheard me and said “she stinks dad.” I agreed.
After what seemed like the plausible amount of time for the odor to pass, I became concerned because it had not. I asked my 5-year old to go check on her sister. She came back and said that there was poop that looked like pee. I asked what that meant. She couldn’t articulate a proper response. “Do I need to go back there?” I asked as my stomach sank. “Yes!” was her reply. Her exuberance masking what I was about to discover.
I turned the corner into the bathroom (the smell growing ever worse as I traversed the hallway) just as the dog was making its way out of the bathroom. The dog had diarrhea all over its mouth and lips. I was disgusted and furious. “Out! Out!” I shouted at her as my finger stabbed the air in the direction of the back door. She dutifully tucked her tail between her legs, cowered close to the ground and made her way to the backyard. I would deal with her later.
My daughter was on the bathroom rug sitting on her knees with her forehead on the ground and her hands holding her temples. She didn’t have pants on. The smell was gag-inducing. I asked her if she was okay. She mumbled something incoherent (I should mention that it is probably coherent to other 3-year olds, just not to those who speak adult) I asked her if she had an accident. She nodded. I noticed she had poop on her thigh. I stepped past the toilet to start the bath.
I stepped right into a puddle of diarrhea mixed with pee. My foot slipped and my toe slammed into the cold, hard side of the bathtub. I grunted under my breath, dutifully swore in french (so the child wouldn’t understand) and sweetly smiled at my daughter. Through clenched teeth I inquired “did you also poop on the floor?” Her eyes grew to the size of saucers and welled with tears. No words came, but I had my answer.
I screamed to my 11-year old “Get me a mop!” She informed me that we didn’t have one. I noticed the bath was full of baby toys. I couldn’t put a poop-stained baby in a bathtub full of bath toys that she played with every bath time. I frantically searched for a place to put the toys. The floor wouldn’t work, it was covered with poop. It seemed the toilet was the only place that DIDN’T have poop in it. My wife would be proud to know that I resisted the urge to put the toys there. I noticed paper towels on the back of the toilet. I unrolled the entire roll of paper towels in about 8.3 seconds and covered the floor with towels. Where I could find a dry paper towel, I put toys on it.
I threw the baby in the bath, turned on the water and turned my attention to the lake of diarrhea and pee that was lurking under 2 inches of a Brawny cap sheet. I ordered the baby to the back of the bathtub and quickly washed my own stained foot. Snapping around I pushed all the paper towels to the center of the floor and threw the whole mass of towels, urine and excrement into the bathroom trash. Bingo, bango, bongo! Half the battle was won. After 20 minutes of cleaning half the tile floor in the house with Mr. Clean while on my hands on knees, I was almost in the clear.
I asked the baby where her pants were, she pointed. They were covered with diarrhea inside. I asked where her underwear were. She said upstairs. I sent my 11-year old to look upstairs. She found nothing. “Where are your underwear?!” I asked more urgently. “Upstairs.” was the only reply I could get. There are no underwear upstairs, there are no underwear downstairs. I am assuming that she wasn’t wearing any. (she has a habit of taking them off whenever we aren’t looking… she takes after her Mom) The only other option is that the dog somehow ate them.
Things have settled a little bit now. The youngest girls are playing together with baby dolls. The 11-year old is playing video games. The 16-year old disappeared upstairs about 10 minutes before “The Event” and hasn’t been heard from since. Part of me thinks she planned this. The dog is still outside. Call me crazy but if you eat poop in my house, you don’t get to live here any more. I can’t fathom letting her poopy-mouth back into my house. I chatted with the kids about the dog going to live “somewhere else” and I think they agreed. Minimal tears, some sniffles.
Although I have survived the first couple hours of my “Dad’s Only” weekend. I do not want to participate in any more of the planned or unplanned activities. I want my wife to come home. I want her to take the dog to the pound tomorrow. I want her to find out if the baby was really wearing underwear and if I need to worry about some feces-stained article of clothing turning up tomorrow afternoon. I don’t want to be Mr. Mom anymore.
Where the heck is my remote control?
I apologize for missing yesterday, I actually had to go to work, so the countdown was on hold. Today’s exploration is an early 20th century favorite known affectionately as The Toothbrush.
While this was a widely popular facial hair style of the time, Charlie Chaplin was probably the first to ‘own’ this mustache. Regrettably, the next individual to own this mustache was a psychotic mass murderer and, consequently, the mustache has fallen out of favor. Tragically, it became a type of facial hair that was only attributed to one man.
My own Grandfather Dave Roberts was never one to bow down to conventions. He was a great man in his own right AND he sported The Toothbrush off and on during his lifetime. He is proof that we can overcome stereotypes.
I believe I am going to take the kids out to IHOP and give this ‘stache a test drive.
Until next time!