The Charlie Brown Question
“I going kill myself.” No sooner did it leave his lips than I pounced on his statement with a question. “Where did you hear that?” His little formative 3-year-old mind had already moved on to more fertile pastures, a grouping of Lego blocks for the moment. “Where did you hear that, Finn?” I didn’t want [...]
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Top 5 Fatherhood Songs of the 90′s
I’m something of an audiophile. My father loved music. My mother loved it equally, but in more sentimental ways. So it’s no wonder I slowly gained the ability to listen to an album and know which three songs would be the band’s first, second and third singles. It became a parlor trick I used to [...]
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I Turn My Head for Just One Week
I’ll never forgive myself. Or the Universe. I was gone for a week. Just one week! I’m in his room playing and he just said “those” instead of “dozes.” One Day Earlier Lugging my bags to the curb, I met my family with a mountain range of a smile set against the gray sky of [...]
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Room with a View
When I was 14, I read a passage by Homer (not the Simpson variety) and the words clung to my consciousness until, as last, they were forgotten. But I recall them now as if I’d authored them myself: This is Finn’s wish tree. At Avara’s baby shower, everyone wrote their wishes for him. “Everything is [...]
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Where Do Callouses Come From?
Finn and I walked through the park holding hands, like manly men often do, and spoke of the world. “Ambling” is probably a better description of how we proceeded but I’m in no mood to be poetic. I’ll leave that to the lonely, crying men. Having barely walked the long expanse of a trail leading [...]
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Living Man Declared Dead
Lately, I’ve been trying to find humor in a world on the brink seriousness overload. So, I’m (re-)reading a lot of Kurt Vonnegut. I guess I’m busy trying to bury my head up to my neck like an ostrich, in books. They don’t actually do this. At all. You know you can trust someone who [...]
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He never let go of my thumb…
The Noobie He’s only three years old. He’d never been trick-or-treating. So, it was excusable that Lucas was supremely deficient in the Clue Department when it came to Halloween. When I asked him what he was going to be, he put on his low, gruff serious voice and laughed, saying, “Ho ho nooooo, Daddy!” as [...]
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How To Announce Your Pregnancy & Keep Them Guessing
You should all know by now that taking us seriously can lead to disastrous results. You’ve already seen my birth announcement, right? Well, today I want to show you how I announced that my wife Avara was pregnant… and teach you how you too can create foolproof plan to trick everyone. It was April 1st, [...]
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Fear of Falling
Sometimes, we don’t realize what we’re ACTUALLY afraid of until we experience that which scares us, like the fear of falling when you’re waking from a dream. As a younger man, I remember the first time someone asked me to hold their baby. I was so nervous and uncomfortable. Why did they ask me? I [...]
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