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 Solicited Advice

I try not to give advice.  I could, mind you, and I do when it seems like it might help.  But, giving unsolicited advice is basically “mansplaining” – which I loathe – mixed with high self-regard – which I also disdain.  It’s like “I’m going to detail my opinion, which you don’t want to hear in the first place.”  I don’t really take advice well either, I mean, I take it when it is good but, speaking of high self-regard, I probably came to the same conclusion already.

So, uh, I’m… well, I’m gonna offer some advice today.  You already know all the big advice, the general things - make sure kids get enough sleep, feed them a relatively healthy diet but do not fret if they won’t eat, keep on a schedule, read to them often and early, wait as long as you possibly can to introduce electronic devices, you know them – but, I like specific things, details.

For instance, you know all that stuff kids bring home, especially in the early years, well, you can’t keep it all – I’ve tried – it’ll all soon crumble and turn to dust.  However, my advice is to take that smartphone, the one in your hand right now, and take a picture of it, or scan it if it’s not chalk and leaves and sticks.  If you are new to this blog, that’s what I did initially here and…  I’m really glad I did.

We still do it, just the other night we were at the middle school play and Marci to a quick snap of their little “bios” in the program:

Yeah, I know, they are pretty sweet kids.

Also, once in a while, print some pictures and put them in a photobook.  I treasure the ones my mother so lovingly made, I think the boys will love theirs as well.

It seems I could go on giving advice.  Huh, maybe I do give it…

Believe it or not, I did come here today with a point, and an actual idea of what I wanted to say.  I just haven’t gotten there yet.  I said above to read to them often and early.  I mentioned here before that for probably nine or ten years, we read to the boys before bed, often at the very table I’m at right now, and usually with an apple or crackers or ice cream snack.  Narnia, Potter, Magic Tree House, Artemas Fowl  and, well, a bunch of others.  These days, if we can, the boys take a half hour or so just before bed to read (and detox their eyes from the chromebook screens) and have for the past three or four years, I’d guess.

So, they have read a lot of books in those years and, finally, here’s my suggestion: if there is a book your child really enjoyed read it yourself.  Both Marci and I have done this over the years - in fact I remember a post about a book called Pie, which Nick very much liked - and it helps a couple of ways.

Foremost, I’d say it is a way to honor and respect your kids.  For them to know that you value their opinion on a book and are willing to read it, that’s a good thing for a child.

Secondly, well, you get a nice look into their intellect and likes and hopes and, if you don’t mind me getting too hippie-dippie (a psychosocial analytical term) you can get a peak at that soul they, and you, are slowly getting to know.

Recently, Z-man finished a book and was raving about it.  It is a book called The Looking Glass by Janet McNally.  There is a quote from a review on the cover, “A bittersweet modern fairy tale, tinged with magical realism, that will touch hearts.”  The inside cover describes the novel as being about two sisters, both upcoming ballet stars, one disappears and the other, younger sister, goes on a quest to find her.  Not a subject I would have thought Z would have gone for.  Frankly, and I hate to say this, but it is true and the world can’t seem to get away from it, it is probably a “girl” book.

Both Marci and I were intrigued enough by his enthusiasm to read the book.  I don’t think Marci thought it was all that, and, actually I didn’t either.  But here’s a few things I think I came to understand about him, things I probably already knew, but which were reinforced by the book.

I won’t go into deep detail, I don’t want to bear his heart here, but I can circle around the things I think drew him in.

There is a strong magical realism element, particularly in one device the author uses well -  a childhood book of fairy tales which both girls loved sort of reenters their lives.  Later, the younger sister, the searcher, begins to see scenes and vignettes which seem to come directly out of the books, or, they could simply be coincidence.  This is never made quite clear, leaving the reader to decide that for himself.  Zack really liked that part.

The older sister, the one who runs away, is an opiate addict struggling to get clean.  I know, rough stuff, but I think he feels ready for these themes and difficult subject matter.  Heck, Twain and Orwell and beautiful, tender Scout, and so many masterpieces are headed right for them and I think books like this make them, the boys, ready for those.

There is gay best friend, a strong and dependable new boyfriend, other good and trustworthy friends and a sibling love and rivalry that is indeed “bittersweet” as so many are.

I’d better stop there.  I will say that when I was a freshman in high school, just a year older then the boys are, a dear librarian gave me a book to read.  A big book, Herman Wouk’s The Winds of War. One of the main characters in the book, Natalie, was my first well, crush, I guess… you know.

I think, more than anything, what I learn about the boys when I read the books they love, is that they are ready.  Perhaps they are trying to tell us this.  I worry that they are too naive and tender for this century we find ourselves in and perhaps they have picked up on that.  Maybe they are trying to signal to us that they are ready.

I hope so.

We find ourselves, you and I, kind reader, at the beginning of a new year and I wonder how it will go.  I sense change in the wind of time, but, honestly, isn’t that always the case?  Lots of things will change – the boys will enter high school, likes and interests will be different, girls may become a bigger, uh… point of focus – all those happy starts Shel Silverstein wrote of in his last book, published posthumously:

“There are no happy endings.
Endings are the saddest part,
So just give me a happy middle
And a very happy start.”
― Shel Silverstein, Every Thing on It

(Thanks, Kevin.)

But, I sense a different change.  It is not a foreboding feeling it’s just that…

Nope, I can’t quite figure it.

Here are a couple of things from Marci’s “...things you don't expect to hear from the backseat ...”

"If you want to get the girl, you have to fly a kite."

I love non sequitars, especially when they hold some truth.

Boy: "Are you taking us to military school?"

Mom: "No."

Boy (pointing): "That looks like military school."

Mom: "That's P&G, honey."

Boy: "My point exactly."

That’s funny right there.

Peace and Happy New Year and all that.  I’ll get back to you when I figure what’s blowing in, if I do.

Thanks for stopping by