Perfect Day

Every once in a great while you experience a perfect day that you know you'll remember the rest of your life.It can be the first time you realized you were in love, a special night with friends or a family event. For me, I remember a camping trip with my best friend in high school right before graduation, the first time I saw Star Wars (the original, in 1977), the last night all my buddies were together in college, my first kiss and of course that first time.

Adding to those memories was a day with my six-year-old son. I've spent many days with him, but what made this particular day special is that I lived it on his time.

Usually when he visits I can't quite shed my agenda. I still have to work (albeit can do it from home, with him present). I have a schedule. Places to be and things to do. It's no surprise that after one trip his mothers reported he'd learned a new phrase from me: "I'm busy." Ouch.

So, the week before Thanksgiving, with things quiet for once at work, I took time off. And on Monday afternoon my son and I ventured down to the Sculpture Garden Ice Rink to ice skate, at his request.

We had pizza for lunch, I attempted to teach him to ice skate (something of the blind leading the blind) and then we explored the sculpture garden, taking time to play on a park bench and to horse around the park. That one of the security guards admonished us at one point gave us the feeling of co-conspirators, two kids in adult-land. On the way back to the car we stopped at a food vendor cart and got snacks and sat together people-watching.

The thing that made all this so magical was not just spending time with my boy, but doing it without deference to the clock. There was no need to hurry, and we lingered in each spot as long as we simply felt like it and the enjoyment of it sustained us. That afternoon, my son showed me what it is like to live in the moment. It was magical. I will remember it for the rest of my life.

The picture of him above was taken that day. The joy in his face was mirrored in my own.

Conversation with Eli

Eli: It's fun being sick. You get to stay home and play and watch movies and stuff.

Me: But you're sick. You feel yucky.

Eli (matter-of-factly): And I'm okay with that.

My Kid Eats Better than Your Kid

Eli has returned to the West Coast with Pappa and I am cleaning out the remaining Eli food from the fridge that I know we won't eat. My neighbor who has two kids around Eli's age was in his backyard, so I hollered over, "Hey, I've got two lunchables here left over from Eli's trip, do you want them?"

"No," he replied, "Our kids aren't allowed to eat lunchables."

Well. Um. Well, my kid isn't allowed to eat lunchables either, I just made it sound like that so you wouldn't be embarassed if you took them.

Fully humiliated, I dumped the offensive food in the garbage. I could have left them out for the rats, but was afraid they would be above eating it.

How Managing a 5-year-old is Like an International Incident

Sometimes it's like Eli and I are two hostile countries, with me playing the superpower and Eli the upstart nation. Today, for example, we had opposing goals. Negotiations began. We were making progress, but suddenly, Eli broke off diplomatic relations and recalled himself to his room. I responded by imposing sanctions. He retaliated by launching a flurry of tears. This led to an internal peace protest within me, but I stayed the course. Finally, Eli offered reparations. Negotiations resumed and a truce was called.

All of this will be repeated tomorrow.

Republicans will denounce me as weak for not spanking, but I will continue to seek diplomatic solutions.

Conversation with Eli

While sitting at Potbelly's watching (endless) construction at 14th and Irving:

Eli: Construction workers are amazing. They can make so many things.

Me: Yes they can (in my best 2008 campaign spirit).

Eli: They can't make everything, though.

Me: (so much for "yes we can" enthusiasm) Oh? What can't they make?

Eli: (thinking). Humans. God has to make some things.

Me: (thinking this the first time I've heard Eli mention God) What do you know about God?

Eli: (thinks again) Nothing.

Me: Me either. And I've got more than 40 years on you, trying to figure it out.

I Taught My 5 Year Old that Abe Lincoln Was an Axe Murderer

I'm a geek but not a very imaginative one.

My favorite historical figure is Abraham Lincoln. He's one of the most written-about figures in the English language (I once read second only to Jesus Christ) so I'm hardly alone in my interest in him. But it's not very original.

I blame my maternal grandparents. They were some kind of Lincoln nuts. I first heard about him from them. I can remember my grandfather saying Lincoln was president for only "half of the United States." To which I said, "which half is President Nixon President of?"

Of course, when my grandparents were little, they too were hearing stories about Abe Lincoln. Except they were hearing it from people old enough to have been alive when Lincoln was. Think about that -- it's 2010, and I can say I talked to people who knew other people who lived through the Civil War. See? Geek excitement!

But I digress. So I'm a Lincoln nut too. I've read every bio of him I could. Two cartoons about him from newspapers from his time hang in one of the rooms of my house that contains other Lincoln Administration era artifacts.

So imagine my surprise and interest when I heard about a novel called "Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter." It's written by the same guy who wrote "Pride and Prejudice and Zombies."
And I saw it at the airport bookstore in Seattle when I was there fetching my son to bring him back here and of course I picked it up.

So there I am, on the plane, next to Eli, devouring the contents of this book (it is a good book) when out of the corner of my eye I saw him staring. At the cover of the book. Which has a photo. Of President Lincoln, in his long frock coat. As you would expect. Except bloodstained. All over. In one hand the rail splitter held a blood stained axe -- in the other, the decapitated head of a vampire.

"Who's that?" my son asked of my hero.

Oh shit.

One of the hardest parts of being a sometimes parent is the transition from an all adult world to one intended only for general audiences.

Um, that's Abraham Lincoln.

"Is he a bad man? What's that?" he said, pointing to the decapitated vampire head. Oh dear.

I know kids are supposed to be able to distinguish between fantasy and reality. But what do you do with something that purposefully blends reality with fantasy?

I remember seeing the classic Star Trek episode where Kirk and company end up on a planet with historical good guys and bad guys, including Mr. Lincoln. During the episode a Klingon (maybe a Romulan) kills Lincoln with a spear. "oh that's how he died," I remember thinking. It took me a while to sort that out with the whole theater thing.

I took off the Lincoln the Vampire Hunter book cover and wouldn't let Eli see it. He now needs a reintroduction to Mr. Lincoln -- I think I will take him to the Lincoln Memorial sometime during this trip.

And pray he doesn't ask where they keep the vampire heads.

Here's a wicked cool video promoting the book, Abraham Lincoln, Vampire Hunter.

Remember, it's fiction.

Eli in the Snow

Fascinating

I didn't know my hotel at BWI would have a Star Trek Sick Bay theme. (on my way to Seattle to fetch Eli for Christmas. Phasers on joy).

Time Travel -- A Story of My Grandmother and My Son

Can everyday objects connect different people and different times?

The other morning, as I do every day, I opened the large brown ceramic bowl next to the coffee pot to pull out a package of splenda for my morning java. That bowl has served that purpose for almost 22 years, holding the artificial sugar that Dave and I put in our coffee to start the day.

I looked at that bowl and traveled through time.

Not literally, of course. But my mind went instantly to two places, one in the recent past and one in the (hopefully) distant future.

The past I thought of was immediately after my maternal grandmother's funeral 11 years ago.

After the service, we went to her house. My grandpa had died several years earlier and my grandmother spent the last months of her life in "a home," as they say. My mother had recently auctioned my grandparent's things off to help pay expenses. After the funeral, all that was left was an empty house, with a few scattered items the auctioneers didn't want. It looked like the place was ransacked.

That was hard. I spent some of the happiest moments of my childhood in that house, with them. I walked through its emptiness now, picking up the discarded items. And the memory of that made me think, that morning, looking at that brown sugar bowl, of the yearbook.

My grandma's high school yearbook, 1927, to be exact. I had discovered it sometime when I was a teenager and was transfixed. When I was in college I snatched it. I think I did tell her sometime that I had it, but I'm not sure.

I loved it because it was a link to my grandparents that somehow made them more, well, like me.

Yearbooks in the 1920s -- at least those from small, southeastern rural Ohio towns -- were mostly "do-it-yourself" affairs. You had to write in all the events and paste in your own snapshots. But the basics were the same -- highlights of the school year, pictures, friends writing in your book.

I learned, from the yearbook, that Grandma was Captain of her high school girls basketball team (Grandma played basketball?) Her team, according to her handwritten record, was 4-5 her senior year.

In a section labeled "Stunts, Doings and Jokes" she has written little tidbits that mean nothing to me, but must have been memorable to her. Why didn't I ask her when I had the chance?

This entry: "January 17, 1927: "You can't get away this time... Reva & Eva" (my grandmother was Eva and Reva was her best friend). What mischief were they up to?

And: "Remember always, July 4, 1926" Why? Was it a first kiss? A night with best friends? When she realized she was in love with my grandpa? What?

And speaking of my Grandpa, his photo is in here too, pasted in by my grandmother. It's a candid shot (and the last one in her yearbook) with him seated, collar crooked and hair (he had hair!) slicked back with a cocky smile on his face. I can look at it and only come to one conclusion: Grandpa was hot.

As I said, they wrote notes in their yearbooks, but they were all little poems that must have been well-known cliches at the time. My Grandpa wrote this in my Grandmother's yearbook:

Friendship is like a silken tie
That binds our hearts together
And if you never break the tie
We will be friends forever.

Someone with the initials "J.S.D." wrote the same poem, but apparently my Grandpa had it all over him, because the man my grandmother spent nearly the next 60 years with was not J.S.D. And I guess my grandparents were an item in school, because someone else wrote:

A pair in a hammock
Attempted to kiss
When all of a sudden
They went like [this]

In the book the the "this" is written upside down. And below it is written: "Pair = Eva and Forrest" -- my grandparents.

I love that little book. And I thought of it as I looked at that brown sugar bowl. I thought about her holding it, when the pages were white and not brown. When the memories were fresh like spring. When she was a serious girl with an ornery streak like you see in the picture of her with Reva. When she held the book as she wrote in it with long, slender smooth fingers not stained with age or warped by hard work. When she was young and full of hope. Before a Great Depression, a World War, the tragic death of her father and ill health turned her into an anxious old woman.

Boom. I looked at that sugar bowl, remembered the yearbook, and was connected to this young, dead woman.

But I also thought of the future.

The sugar bowl is a fixture in our kitchen and, unless it breaks, will likely be there until the end. When Dave and I are both gone, I imagined our son holding it, one of the "worthless" possessions left behind he will have to deal with. It doesn't contain the detailed memories of a yearbook, but oh, the many mornings that his Pappa and I began with our hands reaching for that little brown bowl. The many early morning conversations it lay a mute witness to.

When Grandma held that yearbook in her girlish hands I doubt she knew her grandson would pour lovingly over it 80 years later. When Eli holds that brown sugar bowl in his hands after we are gone I don't know if he'll envision all the mornings his Daddy and Pappa started their days with that dish. But in that one second, the other morning, all those events, past, present and future, were one.

Can everyday objects connect different people and times?

Conversation with Eli

The iPod is playing over the speaker. I sing along:

Me: Imagine there's no heaven...

Eli: Daddy, stop singing, I want to listen to the other man singing.

Me: OK. That's John Lennon singing

Eli: John Lemmon is a nice man

Me: Yes, honey, he was

John Lennon: You may say I'm a dreamer. But I'm not the only one.

Thanksgiving with Eli

Thanksgiving this year was wonderful fun, primarily due to Eli's visit with us. It included snowball fights, sled riding, turkey (of course) playing with cousins, swimming, weight lifting (the LTR's competition) and long adventurous bed time stories. All things, you know, a part of the radical gay agenda. Here are some photo highlights.

I have returned.

Back from Hawaii. I fetched our son home for Thanksgiving.

My Boys and Sunflowers

Happy Birthday, Eli

My son is four today.

The story of his birth day is here.

Summer Days

Is there any better way to pass a hot summer day than with a garden hose? These pics weren't taken today, but were taken during Eli's visit here this month which ends tomorrow. The LTR is taking him back to Hawaii on Friday. This is the second time I have been left behind when he returns and I'm dreading it. These pictures...and others I'm going to post...remind me of the happy visit we had.

"Daddy?" "Yes?" "I love you."

Heaven.

Like a back yard, a hot day, and a garden hose.

Conversations with Eli

Eli and I have been having some cool conversations, including one the other night when he told me he wanted to be an astronaut when he grows up so he could go visit other planets -- but he would have to ask Mommy first. Which made me visualize some future launch where the flight controller is going through the pre-launch checklist on pressures and temperatures and the like and someone yells "check" after each one. Finally, the controller yells out, "Commander Eli's mom?" and this little gray haired lady knitting in the corner yells "check!"

Then we had the following conversation.

He wants to ride a motor boat and I told him we used to have one. When? He asked. Before you were born, I said. When I was a glint in Mommy's eye? He asked Yes, I said.

Why? He said.

We had the boat before you were made, I said.

There was a pause, and he said, "Daddy, when will I die?"

I didn't see that one coming. First, so much love, hope, planning and effort went into his creation that his -- and I am pausing here to even write the word -- death is unthinkable. In fact, like all parents, I assume I will never have to face it, knowing the odds are great that I will meet death first. Second, I'm amazed that a three-and-half year old would be asking these questions. And while at 44 I've lost the hubris of youth that assumes indestructibility, I certainly don't comprehend death. I know it happens, I know it will happen to those I love and I know it will happen to me. Beyond that I'm clueless.

Daddy, when will I die?

I said not for a long, long, long time.

He asked, will I go to Heaven?

This was an even tougher one. It's hard for me to tell him sincerely he was going to a place I'm not sure I believe in. But it sure is a nice, convenient construct for moments like this and I took it, allowing myself one caveat.

I said, "lots of people believe in Heaven and you will go there and be very, very, happy."

The next day he asked a related question about life after death and I tried to BS my way out of it. And I could tell he knew I was BSing. Why couldn't we talk about the birds and the bees? At least I believe in that.

Fortunately, although three-and-a-half year olds have big questions they can also have short attention spans and I was able to change the subject.

The picture was taken by a friend at a dinner party we went to last week, an evening of laughter and fun with friends who are really family and a part of Eli's life. Hopefully, for years and years to come.

Shower Ballet

We have a large shower in the master bedroom suite big enough for, well, a lot of people.

Last night we gave Eli the choice of a bath or shower and he chose shower.

What happened then was beautiful -- he danced with the water as it fell on him, moving slowly and gracefully. Eli gave an uninhibited display of human expression in concert with the sensations he was feeling, the soft lighting, the gentle warm and flowing water covering him.

What struck me was the freedom of expression in his movements -- no conscious thought of what he was doing, no judgment about whether what he was doing was masculine or feminine. This was beaten out of me a long time ago and it was a joyous experience watching my son just be.

I hope he never loses that sense of freedom.

He Likes It

Ker-Chow!

Eli returns tomorrow. We replaced his crib with a Lightening McQueen bed. When I was his age I was forced to sleep in a bed shaped merely like a, well, bed. Clearly I was abused. This probably explains a lot.

The bed was easy to put together. The stickers, not so much. And Lightening McQueen has a lot of stickers (remember, Sally in the movie calls him "Stickers." If you don't know this you haven't seen Cars a gazillion times. If you want to know what you're missing, come sit with Eli. You'll get more than a chance).

There are a few wrinkles in the stickers. My dad would have been able to put on the stickers wrinkle-free. I got the part of the genes that wants perfection, but not the part of the gene with the patience to achieve it.

I will say this about fatherhood: it makes you appreciate your own father all the more.

Ker-Chow!

Postcards from April 08

Some snapshots of Eli's visit in April. Highlights included a trip to Akron for Grandpa Ray's 79th birthday party; attending Daddy's last concert, a trip to the Smithsonian to see Imax Dinosaurs in 3D; a trip to the Reston Petting Zoo and Great Falls. Double click to go to my pisca album for captions.