Ode to Black Dog
There’s this black dog in my house. Let’s call her Black Dog. She’s been here for two weeks, and I just told my wife to say her goodbyes. *** I absorbed my old dog’s...
Category: Suburban warrior
A New Year’s wish
My three-year-old son just fell asleep on my chest. It’s gray outside, spitting little wet snowflakes and rain on cold ground. It’s the kind of weather that makes you sleepy no matter how much...
Dads
My dad died a year ago today. I was in China when it happened. In the hours I struggled to get back home from halfway around the world, I remember wondering how I would...
Mastodon Weekend 2012: Evolved
I didn’t think I needed medical attention when the first guy leaned over me and asked, “Are you okay?” I told him I was and that I just needed to catch my breath. He...
Second grade soldier
My son learned to roller skate less than 48 hours ago. He’d be ashamed to admit it, but there were tears at first, but then lots of skating. Twenty-four hours earlier, I took him...
Finish line
“I am as nervous as I’ve ever been.” That was my son this morning, up before the sun for his first youth triathlon. At eight years old, he would be among the youngest of...
What they don’t tell you about parenting…
is that one night everything will go perfectly, the boys will eat their dinner without complaint–with compliments!–and offer almost no protest at bedtime. You will pour a glass of wine, sit down to watch...
How to make a Moscow Mule
The fiber swam-viscous, milky, sexual-on the other side of the amber glass. I pressed my eye as closely as I dared. My heart felt precious little shame as I thought, “That must be what...
Father’s Day 2012
My kids and wife brought me breakfast in bed–good black coffee, some egg whites with chopped peppers and Sriracha–and four hand-made cards. There were gifts, too: a couple of beers and limes in a...
12-year gift: Fireflies
Fourteen months ago, my wife and I bought this home. It had its flaws. It had its places it could be improved. It’s a slow and sometimes frustrating process turning someone else’s house into...
Some things never change
You can move from one house to another. You can mature beyond your age. You can grow up as fast as fate allows. But sometimes the unavoidable gravity of youth pulls your face back...
Mastodon Weekend returning to Greenville?
Details are still to come (you’ll see them right here sometime in the next week or two), but for now, if you ever thought, “Wow, it sure seems like those cats in Greenville are...
The weeping cherry
I was blind to it at first. The property I’d just bought had more trees, shrubs, and plants than I could count. You couldn’t turn your head five degrees without seeing a new explosion...