A Day In The Life

Disclaimer:

If you are a parent, you will probably do a lot of nodding during this blog.  

If you don’t have any kids, you will probably do a lot of nodding off.

Either way, I hope you enjoy it. 

It is Sunday night and we just completed a marathon.

Not a real marathon, that’s too much work, but...

It all began Friday night with game one of my son’s weekend baseball tournament.

Following a satisfying win and an even more satisfying meal with the family, we got back home at around 9:30.

It was a quick lights out as the alarm clock was scheduled to go off at 5:50am to get us ready for game two.

A quick lights out for everybody but me.

I’ve always been a night owl and no matter what is scheduled for the next day, I always have a hard time getting to bed early.

I have this little unwritten rule in my head though, as long as I sleep five hours or more, I am fine.  

Four hours and 59 minutes or less and it is guaranteed to be a two coffee day.

For this night, my goal was Midnight 50.

This time I made it, but barely.

For the last five plus months, the highlight of my day is getting everybody to sleep so I can sit down at the computer and put together a new blog.

Hey whatever keeps you happy, right?

That process usually takes about an hour, but Friday night I was writing blog #100, so I wanted it to be extra special.

For this one I set aside 75 minutes.

Bottom line, I made it to bed just in time to satisfy the five-hour rule.

My son’s tournament was about 40 minutes from our house, so when you factor in a coffee stop and getting lost, we were up with the roosters.

Usually our coach wants the kids there an hour before each game, but with a quick turnaround, he said we could get to the 8:00am game by 7:30.

How does 7:42 sound?   Damn directions.

That was just the beginning of a Saturday to remember:

 5:50am -- Alarm clock goes off

 6:30am -- Try to leave for my son’s game

 6:55am -- Actual departure time

 8:00am -- Weekend baseball game #2

10:00am -- My wife leaves the baseball game to get my oldest daughter to her dance practice and my youngest daughter to her tee ball game

11:15am -- Dance Practice

12:00pm -- My son’s second baseball game of the day, third baseball game in 19 hours

1:00pm  -- My youngest daughter’s first tee ball game of the year

By 2:00pm I was ready for a nap, but there’s no time for that.

On the way home, my son and I stopped at my mom’s assisted living facility for a quick visit and to get her to take care of some monthly paperwork.

With my weekdays now being gobbled up by work -- what an inconvenience that is -- I needed to carve out some time this weekend for mom.

So my son and I stopped there, which was fortunately on the way home.  We spent about 20 minutes saying hello, how are you, sign here and be well.

From there, we made a quick pit stop at the gas station, followed by the grocery store to pick up some food to throw on the barbie.

Those errands got us home by 4:30ish, just in time to flip on the grill, make dinner for the family and inhale a meal.

But wait there’s more.

While cooking, the email came in from the other members of my new band, The Clearance Rack, that tonight was the night they wanted to practice.

Really?   Cool.

It would be pretty diva of me to say I was too tired for band practice, right?   Even though I am the lead singer and all that.

So after I got the kids to bed, I made a quick late night stop at Starbucks for a half-caf something or other and I headed to the studio.

(Well its actually a garage, but studio sounds more official.)

Two hours and three new songs later, practice was over.

By this point, the clock had struck, Sunday.

As in Sunday -- day three of my son’s baseball tournament, which brought another 5:50am wake up call.

If I left band practice immediately, I might’ve, just might've made it home just in time to get my five hours of sleep.

But nooooooooooooo.   We had to have a philosophical conversation in the parking lot about music.

That’s so Axl!

I love being in a band.

Thanks to the iPhone and youtube, we were able to watch and listen to both Nick Lowe’s Cruel to be Kind and Marshall Crenshaw’s Someday Someway without any interruption.

Of course by this point, the clock was ticking.

I got back in my car my Midnight 45ish, well aware that I would be lucky to get even four hours of sleep.

What an exhausting day!

And I wouldn’t trade it for anything.

Honorable Mention

I am officially running for Father of the Week.

I realize it is a long shot, and I know the week is not over, but I feel like I’ve done my part to at least be under consideration for the award.

Of course, I have my good friend unemployment to thank for giving me this great opportunity and a boat load of free time.

The week began on Monday with Field Day.

Field Day is the official name for “kids get a day out of the classroom to play a bunch of games in a local park.”

It always comes at the end of the year and ours included a BBQ, jumpy castle, pickup soccer games, softball, lacrosse and a whole lot of quality gossip time.

My daughter and her friends seemed to enjoy the last part more than anything.

She took full advantage of the break to hang out with her buddies, but we did sneak in a four-on-four flag football game before lunch.

There were probably more than 200 students there, representing sixth, seventh and eighth grades.

The sixth graders occupied most of the field, playing every game possible.

The seventh graders huddled in groups, talking about... ...whatever seventh graders talk about.

And the eighth graders were counting the minutes to the end of their middle school career.

Even though I was not invited into the gossip groups, I think I earned major points for just being there.

Tuesday was a day for daughter #2, child #3.

And it was a big day too.   It was her Kindergarten graduation.

Tuesday is also the day that my 80-year old mother and I get together each week for a little nosh.

But instead of a meal, this time I picked her up at the assisted living facility and brought her to school for the ceremony.

I wouldn’t say I am Captain Sentimental, but I certainly enjoyed the concept of giving my mom the opportunity to be there.

If you’ve ever been to one of these events, it’s 90% who cares and 190% the greatest show on earth.

(The 190 part is anything involving your child.)

I don’t know how they did it, but this Kindergarten sendoff somehow turned into a one-hour production -- full of songs, stories and a nicely edited music video to pictures of the kids.

At the end, my daughter came over to give everyone a hug, including my mom, which forced me to use the final kleenex in the box.

My mom has been through hell and back in her life, so to see her enjoying herself, even for an hour, is a great occasion.

Article #3 in my bid for Father of the Week came on Wednesday with another field trip.

This time, my son’s fifth grade class took a trip to a Tattoo and Piercing Convention....

...better known as a local amusement park.

I’m not one to judge pure beauty, but I’m guessing a LARGE percentage of the people drawing on and cutting into their skin will regret it at some point in their life.

Heart tattoo on the arm with your kid’s name.  Cool.

Nose piercing.  Hip.

Gallons of permanent ink covering your face and/or neck.   Disgusting.

I realize I sound 196 years old, but I’m just sayin.

Nevertheless, we spent five hours going on rides that took us upside down and inside out.  There were more twists and turns than the Lost finale.

We got there early enough to avoid any lines and by the time it got busy we were back on the school bus headed home.

It was a great day.

I really thought I had clinched the award.

Or so I thought.

As hard as it was, I refused to give in to each of my son’s requests to spend money at the park.

And there were many of them.

Dippin Dots.  Cotton Candy.  Funnel Cake.  Stuffed Animal.

No, no, no and no.

The last thing he needed was ANY of that, especially at those prices, but I must say seeing your child with puppy dog eyes usually works -- even at age 11.

It definitely worked for the new favorite for Father of the Week.

One of the dads on the trip was determined to win his daughter a GIANT stuffed animal in one of the carnival games.

And the game looked pretty easy.

You have five metal disks -- each the size of a DVD.   All you have to do is drop the five disks, one by one, onto a wooden board and cover a red circle that is about six inches wide.   

Cover the circle, you win.

Leave any part of the red showing and you lose. 

Each game costs $3 or you can play twice for $5.

You only need to win once to take home a bear three times the size of your child.

That should’ve been his first clue.

Or his 17th clue.   Or 33rd.

When all was said and done, he had donated $110 to the arcade and had exactly zero wins.

I can only imagine what a trip to Las Vegas costs him.

The high schooler working at the park must’ve felt really bad for him, so he gave the determined dad a much smaller stuffed animal as a parting gift.

Mission accomplished.

I saw the little girl smiling from ear to ear as she boarded the bus with her new friend.

Playing countless carnival games to win your daughter a new stuffed animal.  $110.

Spending the week with your kids.  Priceless.

Maybe I am still in the running to win the award after all.

On The Road Again

What an almost perfect weekend it was.

I’ll get to the almost in a bit, but like the good book, let’s start at the beginning.

I got a call a few days ago from a friend who said that she was going to be in the neighborhood this weekend.

Well, not exactly the neighborhood, but my state.

Considering she lives in a different time zone, a two-hour drive was the least I could do.

So I loaded up the car and took the two older kids on a road-trip.

My wife stayed home with our six year-old and the dog.

The ride there gave me and my 12-year old daughter and 11-year old son a great opportunity to catch-up as they entered their spring break.

I’ve got satellite radio in my car so we had a lot of musical options.

For the most part they wanted the Top 40 station and I gave in to be a good dad.

Did you know that Lady Gaga and Lady Antebellum are not related?

Who knew?

At one point, I was looking to get a little break and give the kids a little culture, so I flipped on preset #7.

The Broadway Channel.

I really don’t listen to it much, but everyone could use a little Orphan Annie from time-to-time.

The first song to come on was one of my old favorites, “I Can Do That,” from A Chorus Line.

A Chorus Line was one of the few eight-tracks my mom owned, so whenever we would go on a long drive when I was a child, we were sure to hear something from that show.

Maybe that’s why I knew all the words.

Well the rest of the drive went well as did the entire weekend.

It was great to spend quality time with the kids and show them off to my friend.

For the ride home, I was able to take control of the radio and get a little sports in the background, but it was the discussion in the car that I really enjoyed.

Kids really do say the darndest things.

At one point my daughter asked me if I thought life was short.

Wow, that one came out of left field. I didn’t even know she liked baseball.

I thought for a moment and then said, "life is not short, but you do need to take advantage of every moment you have."

Then, with my mind scanning like a Google Search, I shared a story with them from 2001.

I remember having dinner with my wife, my dad and his wife in March of that year. At one point during the meal we started talking about Notre Dame, my favorite college football team.

My dad worked in sports for my entire life and most of his, but he had never been to South Bend.

He said one of these years we will go.

“One of these years?,” I said. “Let’s do it this year!”

Sure enough we went that fall and watched the beloved Irish defeat USC, 27-16.

(For the record, I am 3-0 at Notre Dame Stadium.)

The trip was absolutely amazing. Just father and son watching sports.

Now my dad and I had A LOT of great father/son sports moments, but I don’t remember an entire weekend when it was just us, no distractions.

We went to the Pep Rally, walked around the campus, sat next to each other for the entire game.

We enjoyed every moment.

Six months later he died of a massive heart attack.

I never had a chance to say goodbye.

Like I told my daughter, enjoy every moment.

Well, almost every moment.

One moment I did not enjoy this weekend was about 90 minutes into our two-hour ride home when I was clocked going 80 in a 55.

The officer was kind enough to lower it to 79, so I didn’t have to make a mandatory court appearance, but $225 later, it really bummed me out.

For a little bit.

Not even a speeding ticket or the $225 it will cost me on my unemployed budget could wipe away the perfect weekend I had with the kids.

Well, almost perfect.

A Super Bowl Memory

There are several family traditions that I hope will never change, no matter the situation.

Turkey on Thanksgiving.

BBQ on the 4th of July.

Gambling on the Super Bowl.

I certainly realize that being unemployed should trump dipping into my savings account to guess whether or not a team is going to win the coin flip, but I have always been very disciplined in my gambling, NEVER betting more than I can afford to lose.

Of course, we have passed on those rules to my 12-year old, 10-year old and six-year old.

Child services, on line four.

My son, the middle of the three, is a HUGE sports fan, just like me.

Like me, he would watch any sport at any time.

I used to think that he really loved sports, but as my wife explained to clueless old me a few years ago, he just wanted to bond with me.

Looking back, I think that was probably true when he was younger, but now he is a REAL sports fan.

The last thing he does at night is check the scores.

The first thing he does in the morning is watch the highlights.

Well, Super Bowl Sunday is kind of a religious holiday in our parts.

Unfortunately, our team is never good enough to play in the big game, so we have to adopt a new team each year.

The best way to do that.... is to bet on them.

We don’t usually bet on a team to win. That would be boring.

We bet whether a running back will gain 50 1/2 yards or more.

Or the first team to call a timeout.

Or that a guy wearing an even numbered uniform will score the first touchdown of the game.

This year was no different.

In fact, when the Saints intercepted the ball and ran it back 74 yards for a touchdown with 3 minutes and 12 seconds left, we hit the trifecta.

The 3:12 was significant because my wife bet that there would be a score in the last 3:30 of the game.

The interception was significant because my son bet that there would be a defensive touchdown.

The 74 yards was significant because I bet that the Saints would have the longest touchdown.

If only my six-year old had bet heads instead of tails, it might’ve been a perfect day.

We spent the big day at the house of some friends from our kids’ school.

Not your typical, “Super Bowl Extravaganza”.

We ordered Pizza and watched the game.

Of course when the interception took place, you would’ve thought you were in a Vegas casino with all the screaming and yelling.

After all, we just won like $30.

It sure made the game a lot more fun to watch and the extra cash made the result a lot more exciting.

After the game, as we were preparing to leave, my wife noticed a series of photos of the kids’ mom and a very handsome young man.

The man was her brother.

Her late brother.

About 11 years ago, he was killed in an unsolved hit and run accident.

Because she was seven-months pregnant at the time, they would not let her read the police report about any details of the accident.

Not that it would’ve changed anything.

For the next 15 minutes, we learned about her sibling. His sense of humor. His warmth. His brotherly love.

For that 15 minutes, nothing else mattered.

Not the Super Bowl.

Not the interception.

Not my unemployment.

When you hear somebody describing the loss of someone as close as she was with her brother, it puts EVERYTHING back into perspective.

I lost my 75-year old father to a heart-attack and as sad as it was, and still is, he was very fortunate to live a full life.

Her 21-year old brother didn’t get that opportunity.

I never met him and unfortunately never will, but to see the pain on her face, 11 years later, after losing someone that meant so much to her, was absolutely heartbreaking.

It will be my lasting memory of Super Bowl 44.