Wouldn’t you know it; Adam woke up in the middle of the night last night. Just who does he think he is? Can you believe the nerve of some babies, filling their parents with false hope like that? He sleeps through the night for a few nights in a row, so I let my guard down, then WHAAA, WHAA, WHAAAAAAAAAA, it’s heads up at 2:30 a.m.
Cheryl got up first. I heard her rustling in the…
Our weekend dinner routine goes something like this:
J – “What would you like for dinner?”
C – “I don’t know. What would you like?”
J – “I don’t know, I asked you first.”
C – “So, what’s your point?”
J – “Custom dictates that whoever is asked first must yield to the questioner prior to posing any…
I’ll say this for my wife: there’s nothing wrong with her reading comprehension and retention. The occasion for this revelation was my mea culpa on a spending incident. I bought a book, on nutrition no less. Yes, the king of the candy bar, the sultan of snack machines, now owns a book on nutrition. Who woulda thunk it?
As it turns out, my mistake was not buying the book on nutrition…
There is a fog of contentment when your child is born. Those first days in the hospital are exhausting, yet exhilarating.
And then the baby comes home.
By the end of the first week you are still exhausted, but by now the exhilaration has worn off, leaving just the exhaustion. Midnight feedings and three a.m. diaper changes become the rule. Six hours of sleep becomes a really good night. Caffeine…
Inertia is a term most often associated with physics, but it can also apply to the sweet science of psychology. What I’m not sure of right now is if something can have varying degrees of inertia, or if inertia is just a universal property. For example, if “John” is just a name for the gestalt that makes me “John,” then I can’t be any more or less…
Last night was ugly. The baby was crying, my daughter wasn’t listening, and the adults were behaving like children.
This morning it was bad. Once again the baby was crying and my daughter was running late.
Then just as I was about to leave for work, my daughter ran up to me and gave me the most heart melting farewell. My son was peacefully eating, but paused to give me a big goofy grin as…
You may not know this, but my wife and I are a pretty damn good team. What makes us a good team? The answer is simple: I do pretty much whatever she asks me to. What makes this arrangement work? My wife knows what not to ask me.
She learned pretty early on not to ask me clean the bathrooms. Using my past performance and the rest of my family as a guide, it’s clear that Cheryl and I simply…
On the second day of our week’s end, we carefully crafted a day with a special event as its centerpiece. An area mall was to have snow, and we planned to travel twenty miles to see it.
In the grand tradition of Saint Walt (the patron saint of tourism based economies) we Floridians manufacture what Mother Nature does not provide. As is often the case in December, the elements have denied us…
Dim light from a child’s nightlight washes the room in an orange glow. You stand still; your gaze fixed on a small, stuffed Snoopy. Your infant son is in your arms; his head turned sideways, breathing restfully into your shoulder. The crown of his head rests in the cranny between your lip and nose, his sparse hair provoking the slightest tickle. You smell the scent common to everyone of his…
My wife and children were fast asleep. I was enjoying a rare moment of peace when I heard a loud squeaking noise. It sounded suspiciously like a non-traditional entrance to our home being jimmied open. If I hadn’t just gone to the bathroom, I fear I may have left a damp spot on our new couch. However, since the tank was dry (so to speak), I quickly got a hold of myself and went off to…