Unlicensed

(Hi… yes, yes it is awkward to begin an essay with a parenthetical aside but I’m going to, hell, I might italicize it as well, being unlicensed and unregulated and all. I just wanted to say that there are several links to previous posts in this one.  Feel free to check them out if you care to.  But, hey, maybe you could read all the way through this one before you do, because, I’m pretty sure that if you jump elsewhere on your phone, I probably won’t see you again.  Thanks.)

They came to take away my "dad blogger" license away back in September.  A couple of guys sporting beards and superhero tees knocked on my door.  The one with the bigger beard suggested that I knew why they'd come. I did.

I hadn't done the obligatory back-to-school post yet.  I scrambled mightily to get one up on time the year before, but this year… yeah, nothin'. Also, I haven't posted in a long while, which is usually pretty forgivable but, months...?  I've also made a concerted effort to talk less directly about the boys, again, understandable, but, sort of off brand.  And, I neglected to do a Father's Day piece, which is, well, unheard-of.

I was informed that I can only wear my cargo shorts to do yardwork, which seems reasonable and I'd already been doing that.  They wanted my "World's Greatest Dad" mug as well but decided I could keep it when I told them it was in the back of the fridge full of bacon grease (which in and of itself makes me the world's greatest dad).  They also asked for the decoder ring I used to translate the stuff the boys wrote and said early on which didn't make sense.  I told them I'd like to keep it because I've actually got drawings and stories and such that I haven't yet figured out.  They seemed cool about it.

There were a few other caveats as well.  In honor of my nearly ten years of service to the community of dad bloggers, I am allowed to post anything I want on Father's Day and the first day of school – no questions asked.  But, I mustn't post new sentimental slop as I did for so many years at any other time, at least dad slop, I guess.  I can, and this surprised me, repost old pieces when I'd like.  I gather this is a result of the "throw-back Thursday" clause.

The one thing that really had the whole system messed up was that the name of my blog here is, and shall always remain, "ihopeiwinatoaster."  I guess not having a reference to "daddy" or "father" or "pop" or anything Star Wars lets me keep using my same domain.  Usually, you are asked to archive your "Dad" period and, if you wish to continue blogging - which no one in their right mind should - you need to start afresh.  Ha, I knew that stupid handle was a good idea.

There was a lot of mumbo-jumbo legalese.  I had to initial off on a few subjects I'd need to stay away from - Lego and tee-ball and doing laundry and broken arms and, let's see, uhm, homework and math and misspellings, whimsical writings and inexplicable drawings and, oddly Harry Potter – because, apparently, it's the dad's with younger kids turn to write about the good stuff.  I can see all that, really, and there's a really good cadre of fresh dads taking up the cause… God love 'em.  I had to write a piece to say I understood the terms of the dissolution and to say goodbye, see above.  However, because of the domain name loophole, I can just keep posting here.

Listen, I actually think it's good that they stopped by and took the license, I may go rogue every now and then and talk about the boys, but I think in principle the gag order is valid.  There is a sweetness and a sentimentality in writing about babies, toddlers - just children in general - that should be explored.  I certainly have read a great number of posts from men about their kids over the years which have moved me to tears.  And, you know what, I hope that continues.  However, I'm not really the guy to do it anymore.

The wickets get a bit stickier as children turn to adults or, in my case, boys grow into men.  The stakes are a little higher, tales of teddy bears and movie scares and misspellings and odd math no longer seem appropriate, even, as I worked very hard to do, if they are told tenderly and lovingly.  It's no longer my business (was it ever?) to tell you about them.  There are crushes and heartbreak and failures and successes and books and fights and glories coming to learn from, and they will.  But, those are now their stories to hold or to share.

So, I was supposed to have this submitted to and approved by the Blog dudes by the end of last year, but, well... I didn't.  That's because I didn't want them to see this last part.

You see, I'm not done yet.  I've got more to say, a few more stories to tell, some advice to give.  I've worked very hard to honor and respect N and Z over the years I've been doing this and I think I can still do that.  Not by sharing their awkward and embarrassing teenage angst and pubescent bodily functions (which I see bloggers using more than I'd like to), but by offering a little help to them as the years go forward.

I can offer them a little more of me by sharing my past dreams and even my current hopes, perhaps…

There is an undeniable arrogance in assuming your kids will want to know more about you as they go on in their own lives.  It's embarrassing but, here's the thing, two things really - I'd give a lot to see something like this from my own father and I've heard that from a lot of guys over the years.  Also, over and over again folks say to me that the boys will treasure the posts I've done here over the years.  I've been proud to curate their childhood, proud to have thought deeply about them, considered them, and I've been so very proud that they are my sons.

There are a lot of folks I should thank from those years I was sorta in the scene… but I won’t.  I would hope they knew, know, whatever.  Some offered me much needed technical support, others lifted me when I was falling, some were frank in criticism, some just liked the words I lined up into weird rows.  Trying to name them all would be irritatingly long and probably ill-advised.

However, there is one individual I would like to call out: You, kind reader.  Yeah, you.

When I write, I don’t imagine a big audience or entertain the notion that there’s some sort of “ihopeiwinatoaster Nation” out there.  No, I’m pretty much talking just to you on the porch watchin’ the trees grow and the wind blow or in the kitchen waitin’ for the coffee to finish and the biscuits to bake.  I’ve tried to keep it casual and soft here - although, I have gotten my britches in a bunch a few times - and I intend to keep it that way.

Thanks for stopping by, I know you are busy, I hope this maybe slowed you down a bit.  Feel free to poke around in the basement archives if you’d like, but that’s hard on the Blogger phone app… oh well.  It’s a sad truth that blogging was meant to be done on a computer monitor, not a tiny screen in your palm.

God’s peace to you kind reader. 

Here's a picture of me in a blue workshirt.  Not a picture of the boys. (Sorry, it was required... weird, I know.)

Cheers...

On Groundhog Day, 2002

A select few hurt my heart a little but, overall, it has been relatively easy to write the pieces I’ve done here over the past eight years – four-hundred-and-eight-eight of them.  Earlier on I was so blinded by and enamored of the boys that, honestly, if there hadn’t been the time restraints, it’d be in the thousands.

As the boys got older, I attempted to transition away from talking about them, I started talking about myself.  It is both easy and hard, liberating and confining, joyful and miserable, to talk about oneself.  I’ve taken to it alright, though, with the exception of how to present the other players in my past.  I’ve tried to skirt the issue – you know, the old “the names have been changed…” thing – but anyone I’ve represented in these tales would immediately recognize themselves in my words.  This has made some stories impossible to tell, some of which I’d very much like to share.

You may wonder, as you often do, what I am getting at.

I’d like to tell you a little bit about my wife, Marci.  I’m in a weird situation here, the vast majority of the folks that read this know her, so, I don’t really need to give her curriculum vitae.  I don’t really feel like it’s my business to share her business, so, there’s no need to tell you all what she does, short of that what she does is in service to others.

She’s a wonderful wife and mother.  She’s my best friend and confidant.  She’s funny and cute and usually pretty happy.  She is kind and understanding and clever and…

Listen, I could tell you about this Christmas, about how the Nintendo Switch the boys got glitched out and “error code” died.  She got on her phone and laptop and dealt with it for hours.  In less than two days a new one arrived and the old one was gone.  I would have just gone ballistic on someone and we’d still be waiting for resolution.

I could tell you about how just this week the boys needed to work a rough plan for classes and “paths” and requisites, both pre and co, and such for high school next year.  She patiently sat down with each of them and figured it out.  She went to the parent orientation, met their counselor (no doubt a new friend, she’s good like that), quickly understood the whole process, all of that, and then patiently sat down with each of them and figured it out.  I found it all overwhelming and, frankly, I’d’ve sucked at helping them, that’s the truth.

I could tell you how easily she makes friends, how she’s good friends with the ex-wife of an old college friend of mine and the current spouse of another, and they get together more than I see my old pals.  People are drawn to her.  People care deeply for her.  She shines.  Me, not so much.

I could go on with these “I coulds” but I won’t.

What I will say is this, she’s made me a better person.  Fact.

I am kinder because of her.

I am more joyful because of her.

I am stronger in my Faith because of her.

I am more content than I have ever been because of her.

My love has never run so deep.

Because of her I have a family and a home and a dinner table and good shoes and self-worth and… sons – things I never knew I wanted or were even possible for me. 

Dreams I never knew to dream have come true.

She’s given me so much and I’ve no idea how to thank her for it all.

There’s a song from a band called Sister Hazel, the chorus is:

“It's hard to say what it is I see in you
Wonder if I'll always be with you
But words can't say, 

And I can't do
Enough to prove,
It's all for you.”

It might seem trite, cliché even, but it’s true.

Can I be honest with you?  Over the years I’ve read a lot of bloggers and the like who seem to, well, bitch a lot about how hard being a parent, especially a stay-at-home-parent, can be.  Mostly they complain about the labor of washing and cleaning and cooking and such, but they also whine about how emotionally difficult it can be.  I’ve never felt that way, in fact I’m always surprised at, and, even found offensive, some of these notions.

I’m not saying it isn’t hard, ‘cause it really is, or that it’s not emotionally draining, because, well… kids.  But, to resent that seems counter-indicated at best, but, mostly, it just seems sad.

I don’t hate every load of laundry I do, every floor I sweep, every meal I prepare.  I don’t sit and seethe on the tractor as I mow the lawn on a hot summer day.  I don’t wait fuming in the school parking lot waiting for play practice to let out.  I don’t mind the snow-shoveling or the weeding or the wood-splitting.

I never cussed at the dirty diapers, or projectile vomiting.  I never hated the messes.  Never rued the long trips in car seats or the hot afternoon t-ball games.

I won’t hate waiting up late for them to get home as they get older.  I will not be afraid to teach them to drive in just a couple of years. I won’t question their decisions – if made wisely – or try to change them. 

Do I, did I, will I find these things hard?  Of course, yes, labor and hard emotional effort suck sometimes.  But, I knew I was better for doing them, in fact, I know it's the least I can do for what I've received.

But, more than anything, I love what I have been given the opportunity to do.

It is because of Marci that I have this chance - this chance to be of service, to help, to teach, to love, to preach, to be a good man.

“It’s all for you,” sweetheart, you’re the best one.  I cannot underemphasize that.

On February second, two-thousand-and-two we were married at Bellarmine Chapel on the campus of Xavier University.

02-02-02.

Seventeen years.

And, yes, the second of February is indeed Groundhog Day, thanks for asking.  (There was a groundhog groom's cake.  True story.)

Thanks for coming around today.  Try to remember the honor and joy at serving others and at being served.

I hope it's not seemed to corny, but, love goes that way sometimes, don't it?

Peace.

I love you, Miss Marci...  thanks for saying yes.