Parenthood and Children – Page 2

2021 Nutshells, Getting old ... er ... older, Parenthood and Children

Not quite the ‘whoopers’ we used to be

July 25, 2021 No Comments

“Dang,” I said. “I really thought we were going to ‘whoop it up!’”

Definition of “whoop it up!”: To enjoy oneself and have a very noisy celebration. You know … to party. To cut loose. To go out drinking all night. And to drink things that are lit on fire. Maybe get in a bar fight. Definitely get arrested. But not like major-crime arrested. More like, “Sir, reciting Shakespeare in the middle of the road is definitely frowned upon. I mean, who even reads Shakespeare anymore?”

To cut loose. To run free. To live.

Whoop … it … up!

Because … that’s what you’re supposed to do when your kid goes away on a summer retreat for a week, right? Your 15-year-old daughter. Your only child. Which really means you’re only ever alone when she goes on a youth retreat to North Carolina. And once when she took a middle school trip to Washington D.C. And before that? That 5 minutes she was sleeping in the womb, right before she woke up with a startle and kicked your wife so hard she swears there’s still a bruise on her stomach.

“We are going to ‘whoop it up!’” I remember saying before she left. “We might even cash in your college fund and fly to Vegas. Because we are free, sucker!” (I’m not exactly the greatest parent.)

2021 Nutshells, Family, Parenthood and Children, Travel

Trials and tribulations on a summer road trip

July 4, 2021 No Comments

Ah, the good ‘ole American road trip. Nothing makes you feel more alive and in touch with your roots than cramming more stuff in your car than you could use in a year. You set off down the highway in a vehicle so unbalanced that a ladybug fluttering at you aggressively could tip it over. And before you make it two blocks, you realize you forgot your wallet, your toothbrush and maybe even your child.

Two blocks and you’re already heading back home.

Yes, it’s the greatest of experiences. Your back aches. The coffee is usually bad. Most of the hundreds of miles you see are entirely unremarkable, aside from the occasional billboards for “adult stores” that truckers frequent and you have to explain to your child why people like us don’t go there. Luckily, my child is now 15, which means she has zero interest in looking out the window. She has an iPhone and a Kindle that she watches simultaneously, and I spend most of the trip yelling: “Those are going to rot your brain. Now look out the window and count the garbage!”

2021 Nutshells, Family, Parenthood and Children

A different kind of dad this Father’s Day

June 16, 2021 No Comments

There’s an odd book sitting on our side table. It’s not like the other books. The biography of Hamilton. The science fiction tomes. The light and breezy books on financial planning. So comical and perfect for a day at the beach.

This one has a whole different feel to it. Its own vibe or mood. Truthfully, it seems like it’s from some kind of parallel universe. Somewhere alien and un-relateable, as if written in an entirely different language. Kind of dark and foreboding.

It has a word in it that causes heart palpitations and intestinal backflips every time I read it: College.

Which is a little funny considering the fact that I work and teach at a college. Rather love the place. The idea behind it and all that it means. A place of learning. Of higher thinking. Of pushing your level of knowledge and critical thinking as you set a career path and figure out who you are. Oh, and beer pong! Plus, gluing your sheet to the ceiling of your dorm room for no better reason than: a) you have a sheet, b) there is a ceiling, and c) … beer pong!

2021 Nutshells, Family, Holidays, Marriage, Parenthood and Children

Pulling off the almost-perfect Mother’s Day

May 13, 2021 No Comments

How to make a perfect Mother’s Day? It’s all in the preparation. And the technique. And knowing not to say things to your wife like, “Wait, why do I have to do everything? You’re daughter’s the one you gave birth to! Why isn’t she doing the dishes?” Well, maybe not perfect. But here’s a look at how we pulled off the almost-perfect Mother’s Day this year in case you’re taking notes for future years:

• Be careful what you buy. For instance, my daughter came up with a great idea she saw online: A facial jade roller and skin massager. It sounded wonderful. Relaxes and soothes your face. Rolls across the skin, nourishing and replenishing your cells. Reduces line and wrinkles. WAIT!!! What?!? “Oh heck no!” I told her. “We can’t buy your mother something that is supposed to reduce wrinkles. That’s signing our own death warrant.” My daughter pointed out that she doesn’t have any wrinkles, and that it’s just something relaxing. But I wasn’t about to ruin Mother’s Day with a, “Hey, just in case you get some bags under your eyes, here’s a jade roller!” We would both be sleeping with the chickens.

• When your 15-year-old daughter yells from across the house, “Mom? Mom! MOM!!!” smile and say, “Isn’t it just the sweetest sound? Really captures the spirit of the day, and the wonders of being a mother, doesn’t it? I bet you’re SOOOO thankful right now.”

2021 Nutshells, Family, Florida, Parenthood and Children

A new driver dodging and weaving through downtown streets

April 7, 2021 No Comments

The wait is over. The day has arrived. Anticipation has given way to reality. It has all come to fruition.

The kid has a license to drive.

The kid. The child! The wee little one … who isn’t so little. They permitted her. The state, in all their wisdom, noted that she was 15. Made her complete a course on alcohol and drugs. Required her to study a manual about driving – hands at 10 and 2 on the wheel, don’t run over small animals on purpose and all that – and then quizzed her on it. She passed it, of course. And then they checked her eyesight – she could generally tell the difference between a “B” and a “D” – and gave her a learner’s permit.

A license to drive!

It comes with some restrictions. The main one is that she must be accompanied by a licensed driver in the front passenger seat of the car at all times.

The FRONT passenger seat!

2021 Nutshells, Childhood, Family, Getting old ... er ... older, Parenthood and Children

Childhood memories of dirty hands and grass-stained knees

March 9, 2021 No Comments

Nothing reminds you of your own childhood like watching a 7-year-old boy topple headfirst into a bed of ferns and filth.

And the sound of his father screaming across the backyard, “Striker! What did I tell you about being in the dirt?!?”

The child popped up like a groundhog, ferns and filth dripping from him.

Ah, to be a kid again.

This child is my nephew, Striker. His father is my younger brother, Scott.

This was at least the 75th time my brother had barked: “Striker! What did I tell you about being in the dirt?!?”

Now the boy had been summoned for a talk. The 75th time.

2021 Nutshells, Coronavirus, Parenthood and Children

Reflections on a year with COVID

March 2, 2021 No Comments

“You know, you said we would be out of this in 2 weeks?” my daughter told me as we were driving last week. It was almost out of the blue. She was talking about COVID-19, of course. As if I needed to tell you that. As if, like everything else, you couldn’t just assume.

“I said what?” I replied, incredulously. “I don’t think so. When?!?”

“Um … a year ago,” she said.

A year ago? No! … Wait … Really?!? … Um …

“Oh,” I finally said. “I guess I did say that.”

I hadn’t thought much about the anniversary of COVID-19 up until that point. How this marked the beginning of the world turning upside down as the virus gained a deadly foothold. Forced us to upend our lives and alter almost everything about our daily routines. Things we never could have foreseen – toilet paper shortages, home haircuts, virtual schools, masks that hide precious smiles. And more important things, like lost family and friends.

For all the news stories about this milestone, it wasn’t until she said this that it really hit me.

A year ago it all began.

2021 Nutshells, Family, Parenthood and Children, Technology

Things you learn about yourself struggling with technology

February 10, 2021 No Comments

It’s remarkable what technology can teach us about ourselves, especially when it all goes wrong. When we’re at our lowest. The lowest of the lows. Down deep in that great digital pit of despair. Drowning in bits and gigs and bandwidth and lots of other strange names that you know guys with goofy eyeglasses once came up with: “Yeah, this will mess with their minds. Let’s call it a ‘Flamingshnagel!’”

I hate those guys!

I learned a lot about myself this past week after my daughter permanently locked herself out of her iPhone by accident – yes, you read that right — and then the Phantom of the Modem wreaked WIFI havoc and killed our Internet. Lowest … of … the … lows! Two tech trials that tested my mettle and gave me a glimpse at who I REALLY am. It was ugly, and here is what I learned:

• I’m really bad at spinning bad news. When my daughter locked herself out of her phone after changing her passcode, but mis-remembered the number, she went on to exceed the number of tries Apple allows you before they lock you out completely. It’s a security technique that doubles as cruel torture for teens. But no worries. All you have to do is reset the phone and then restore it to the most recent backup. You know, when you last plugged it into a computer to save all of those precious images, files, contacts and settings? You know, the thing you’re supposed to do at least monthly? You know … you did do that, right? Because if you don’t, you’ll have no choice but to deliver this kind of report to a distraught 15-year-old: “So, the good news is, I was able to find a backup. Pretty good news, yeah? Pretty impressed with myself. Now, in ever-slightly worse news … uh … it’s a backup from 2017. But … BUT, that’s better than 2015, right?” No good way to sugarcoat that one.

2020 Nutshells, Coronavirus, Family, Holidays, In the News, Parenthood and Children

Reflections on 2020: A @#!%$ year like no other

December 21, 2020 No Comments

It was a pretty haphazard, thrown-together Christmas card. Conceived, shot, produced and sent to the store for printing in no time at all. We’re talking less than an hour. Maybe a record!

We crowded around the Christmas tree in whatever we were wearing. We had a dog, a cat, a chicken and a blind Florida yard lizard. All the while a camera on a crooked mount fired off photos. The lighting was mediocre at best. We took at most five shots, found one where the dog didn’t look deranged and then uploaded it to a digital Christmas card template with holly around the edges. We sprinkled in some words my wife heard somewhere:

“It’s fine. We’re fine. Everything is fine.”

It sounded like a song. A refrain. Something a kid says after launching himself on a bike off a wobbly ramp and plowing face-first into the dirt. Pop-up as quick as you can like nothing catastrophic just happened. Lift your hands high into the air to show your bones are still nominally attached. Smile through the terrible pain, and the fact that some gravel is now permanently affixed to your skull. Scream out in sing-song fashion: “It’s fine. We’re fine. Everything is fine.” Then collapse in a heap and wait for the sirens to arrive.

All-in-all, kind of sums up 2020, doesn’t it? Just get through it. Get done with it. As quick as you can. As best you can. Everyone will give you a pass. It’s a COVID-Christmas. NEXT!!!

2020 Nutshells, Family, Florida, Holidays, Parenthood and Children

The magic of Christmas decorating with dead lights and lizards

December 7, 2020 No Comments

Ah, the decorating for Christmas. Nothing speaks more to who you are as a person, not to mention your familial skills, than how you handle the annual tradition of turning your home into a holiday extravaganza. Most see it as a festive, joyous occasion that lets family come together and bond. Hooray!

OR … a complete disaster when everything goes wrong and two lizards get loose in the house. Because … yeah … 2020. Booo! But I imagine these are common events as people dress up their domiciles for the holidays. How many of these traditions did you cross off your to-do list this year?

• Only in Florida do you get lizards perched atop a Christmas tree like the traditional star, or maybe even a Baby Jesus. In other parts of the country you might worry about snow or leaves or even squirrels getting lodged into your tree. But Floridians have to think about shaking out reptiles. I didn’t, so we ended up with two of the little buggers running around and needing to be corralled. “Oh, just leave him,” my daughter pleaded. “Look how majestic he looks up there surveying the land.”

• Then there are the Christmas tree lights that don’t light. That’s OK. Nothing lasts forever, and thank goodness they supplied extra bulbs and fuses. But I ask you this: In all your years of Christmas decorating, have you ever got a string of lights to spring back to life thanks to extra bulbs and fuses? I never have. I immediately turn to the fuses, always thinking, “Hey. I’m Mr. Fixit. I’ll save the day because I know stuff and my family will celebrate me as a hero!” What I don’t know is that replacing fuses that are about the size of dust mites requires the same kind of microsurgery equipment found only in the top hospitals.