The Bride

I am fast approaching my anniversary with "the Bride". When you have ten kids strangers will often feel they can ask you anything about this relationship they want just based on the number of children you have. "Do you know what causes that," "Do you not have cable" and some that just make you blush, not for yourself but for the other person for not having the tact and manners to be polite. Yes, we know what causes these children and we have cable (basic)and this is the life we wanted. But, it did make me pause the other evening while I was watching my bride work in the kitchen with the kids. I had just had back surgery and she was taking everything on that we would normally do together. And she was smiling and laughing with the kids and making them feel like they were the only kid in the room. Later, she helped me get around the house in my gimpy, post operative state.

I think what people really are saying when they ask those questions is, "why didn't I get that." "Why isn't my relationship that tight." And I can't answer that for them. I know that what my bride and I have pulled together wasn't driven by luck, but by hard work and a touch of plain old hard nosed determination. Oh yeah and a heap of that love stuff, flaming hot burnin' love stuff.

Cause as a wise woman once told me, "ya gotta have the heat boy."

Thanks Grandma.

finite amount of time

It's been a rough couple of weeks with school starting and work ramping up hard. I need another couple of hours each day just to keep my head above water, and those are just for me need the rest of the world to pause or something while I scramble to do work or read a story for a little girl. The best analogy I can come up with is having two wooden cups, one named family and one named work, half full of water with the top of each cup on fire and the only way I have to put the fire out is to pour water from one cup into the other one to fill it. But, if I leave either cup empty for too long it will burn down to ashes so I have to keep pouring the water from one cup to the other so that neither cup stays full for very long. That "water" is the time I have each day and I have to keep my "work cup" from buring down to ashes so that I can keep the lights on and the mortgage paid and such. But my "family cup" is the one that means the most to me.

scans and such

Well, back to the CT scanner for me. Thought I had all the pain stuff cleaned up from my accident almost two years ago but it has raised its' ugly head again. At lest I made it through the hike in the mountains of New Mexico with no issues. Hate being crippled up, have too many kids left to wrestle/soccer/basketball/run/jog/football/dance/baseball with to be "old dad" who can't run. At this point, chewing vicatin to keep active would be o.k., if it just didn't make me so sleepy . . . .

with love from State Farm

I recieved a check the other day from State Farm for $1.75. And while I hate to look a gift horse, even such a small one, in the mouth I did wonder at this little bitty windfall. So I called my agent who informed me that this was due to my policy being cancelled. And when did I do that I asked. "Well we did this back in March Mr. Johnson."

Why pray tell are you cancelling my insurance ?

Your oldest son had two tickets and a chargeable accident in six months time.

Really?

Yes sir, really.

Well, I can't argue with that but I never recieved a notice so now what.

After some scrambling the nice young lady comes on and tells me that since I did not recieve a notice my insurance would not be cancelled but, in another year, my oldest son would have to look elsewhere for car insurance. I passed along this opportunity for growth to my son with a smile and a "welcome to the real world" grin.

The Punisher

Would that you got to at least wear the cool costume of The Punisher when you were called for to "punish". But instead it usually happens when you are standing in your underwear giving three kids a bath. Trying to keep my sense of humor is always my first line of "why in the flip did you do that" coming out of my mouth, but it is not always the case. Recently one of my boys was very very disrespectful to his Mom, and she got him right where he lives, the cell phone. It just went "blink" and now it is just a big timepiece for his pocket. Having to deal with this kind of stuff is not mentioned in the "parenting is great" brochure, maybe it is in the terms and condiditons section that none of us read when we sign up for a service or product, kind of like the owners manual. Wouldn't that be the biggest kick in the head, if in all that crap paperwork they give you when you are leaving the hospital with your little squalling bolonga loaf there was a checklist to follow so your son or daughter would grow up to be the next Mother Teresa or Mahatma Ghandi, but since we don't as a rule deal with the details well we get Teresa the waitress or Apu the slushy machine operator. Sigh,

Oh well, sometimes parenting is like field dressing a deer, you know it has to be done but you also know that your going to be getting something nasty on your clothes to get it done.

Be strong, and use spray and wash on your "deer stains".

back to the blog

Alright, I'll do it. I'll start writing again. Sometimes though I just havea hard time writing anything that I think is profound. Or worth the time to read. All I can really hope to do is make someone who reads this go, "man, at least I am not that crazy/messy/stressed of a dad. That would be fine. I guess. I'm not sure. But to give this some frame of reference we'll probably just march our way slowly through teh alphabet. Next post will be simpley "A".

Summer Camp

Every year I go with my boys on their boy scout summer camp trip. This year the troop decided to go to southeastern Oklahoma, in the summer. By day three you begin to realize that there was a reason that Lord of the Flies was written about a bunch of school age boys with no adult supervision. Showers were something heard of in a fable, tooth brushes were to be used to clean knives, hairbrushes sat unattended in the bottom of the pack as after all we are wearing hats. In order to save our female members of the family too much mental anguish we do encourage the boys to take the night before we go home shower. You can almost hear the shower floor weep when this is done.

But we are home now, and the camp gear is airing out in the garage, for now.