Speak Now is the best written book I've ever reviewed for this program. It is an account of the Hollingsworth v. Perry civil trial which resolved the conflict surrounding California's Prop 8 and eventually made it before the Supreme Court. The trial is recounted by Kenji Yoshino, a married gay Professor of Constitutional Law at the NYU School of Law.
Regardless of your views on the controversial subjects explored in the trial, the books is excellent reading. Yoshino presents a compelling case for why trials (instead of popular referendums) are the appropriate venue to force an "unusually direct, disciplined, and comprehensive confrontation between opposing sides." In reviewing the documents and retelling the story of the trial, Yoshino accurately and concisely documents what the plaintiffs and proponents of Prop 8 had to say about the nature of rights, the definition of marriage, the history of discrimination, and the future of the family. Along the way, Yoshino makes some important distinctions between legislative and adjudicative facts and the process of rational-basis review that would be otherwise lost on laypeople like myself.
While Yoshino does write from a position of admitted bias, he portrays his political and ideological opponents with dignity and sympathy, further underscoring his point that the courtroom is a just and humane venue to hold civilized argument over one of the most pressing issues of our time. I would highly recommend this book to anyone interested in the subject.
Sunday, June 28, 2015
Wednesday, June 24, 2015
Home Destruction
I'd been bugging J to come to Home Depot with me for a few days. "I want to make sure that you pick exactly the shelves you want," I told her "and I think you need to be there in person." She always found a reason to put it off, however, such as "if I'm not here to take the cookies out of the oven they'll get burnt to crisp and set the house on fire" or "both of your children haven't napped in twelve hours and are screaming their lungs out in the backseat" or "it's illegal and dangerous for both of us to leave the house without an adult present."
She agreed yesterday morning that we could make a trip first thing. I needed to get a replacement exterior spigot, since our old one had been continuously dripping ever since we moved in. There was a massive icicle off of it all winter and when the snow and ice finally melted I had to put a five gallon bucket on the ground underneath to avoid a perpetual muddy mess just outside the back entrance of the garage. I disliked this, and looked up information on how to replace the old spigot with a new one that didn't leak.
The internet is a great resource for rookie homeowners like myself, because there are lots of youtube videos and do-it-yourself tutorials for every conceivable problem. I'd had a string of successes attempting home fix-it projects recently, including some pretty complicated repairs along the lines of:
1) hanging pictures on a wall
2) hanging different pictures on a different wall
3) fixing James' marble run
The point is that I had developed hubris. Hubris doesn't just mean pride--it's insolence to the gods. I don't know which deity I offended when I spoke to J the other day, but somewhere on Mt Olympus a cloud-gathering brow was furled when I declared that "You know, all this home repair stuff isn't rocket science. You read the instructions carefully, you make sure you have all the right tools, and as long as you've done your preparation beforehand most of it is just a matter of familiarity with the process." I was just begging for a smiting.
This is why I was quite confident yesterday morning that I could successfully replace the spigot by myself. Step one was to turn the water off to the house, a task I completed confidently and without issue. (There's a big yellow lever right next to where I practice with a black arrow pointing down that says "OFF") Next I needed to unscrew the old spigot and bring it into Home Depot with me so that I could make sure the replacement was the right size. As I was heading outside, J asked me "How long exactly will it take before we leave? I want to make sure that I can time Owen's next feeding just right." "Well, it could be 20 seconds, and it could be 20 minutes. You never can tell with these sorts of things." How humble of me.
This is where it all fell apart. I brought James out with me, because everything is way easier when your three-year old is attempting to help. He held a hammer, and he swung at the spigot whenever my hands were out of the way, and occasionally when they weren't. I sprayed the threads with WD-40, gripped the pipe with one set of pliers, then attempted to wrench the spigot loose with another. Pound, pound, pound, went James. Nothing was loose yet, so I sprayed some more lubricant and wrenched harder. I looked up the directions again, and as is always the case, the instructions made the process look easy and straightforward. There was no word at all about a spigot that wouldn't move. I pulled harder on the pipe and felt something move. Then I gave a yanking tug left and felt the spigot come free, along with the rest of a pipe. And then I heard water spilling from inside the basement.
J was feeding Owen at this point. She heard a noise in the basement, and footsteps hurrying down. She heard concerned climbing, scrambling, and James asking "Why's that all wet, Daddy?" It was not a reassuring experience for her
I had broken the 1/2" pipe leading to the spigot. Fortunately there wasn't much water to drain out of it, but I saw that because of the angles of the pipe there wasn't much chance I was going to be able to pull it through. I attempted a couple of different tacks, without giving much explanation to J about what was going on--"Well, it doesn't look too bad down there...hmm...I didn't expect that...I wonder what..."
Eventually I gave up on trying to get the spigot unscrewed. As I learned later, the "spigot" didn't screw onto the pipe behind it all, but was all a single piece called a "frost-proof sillcock." I don't know the origin or meaning of the word "sillcock," but I'm fairly certain that "frost proof was an inaccurate descriptor.
There was more experimenting with trying to remove the pipe and to shut off the water to just that set of piping, but that just led to water gushing out all over the basement floor. Eventually we had to give up on turning the water back on before we left, which meant that James couldn't have a drink. (He was thirsty after all his hammering) and J couldn't wash her hands after changing Owen's diaper or her face before heading out into public. It wasn't a particularly cheerful ride to Home Depot.
From a family relations perspective, things didn't improve once we arrived. I couldn't find any of the equipment I needed to complete the repair, largely because (as I progressively discovered) I hadn't the fainstest idea what I was doing. Both of the plumbing specialists had called in sick, and my first attempt to call J's Dad wasn't picked up. Owen was cranky and awake in the carrier, and James was asking about the name and purpose of every piece of merchandise in the store, most of which were completely opaque to me. Eventually he gave up on asking questions and just waved his Greek flag around in the cart, shouting at the top of his lungs that he'd scored a goal in hockey.
We found some other things that we needed, and then when I got ahold of Dad he talked me through one solution that would involve some complicated sets of parts requiring precise measurements and perhaps a blowtorch, and another solution that involved capping off the broken pipe until someone who knew what they were doing could get a look at it. I chose option B, and picked up a Sharkbite slip on fitting. I wasn't exactly sure I had the right measurement for the pipe (do you measure outside to outside, or inside to inside? What if you get a different measurement every time you hold the tape measure up? What if your three year old is hitting you in the shin with a hammer while you take the measurements?)
It turned out to be a simple fix. We got home, J took the screaming Owen inside, James ran outside to wave his flag some more and and celebrate his hockey triumphs (or Greece's hockey triumphs, I suppose) and I went down to the basement with the fitting. I had to finagle (that's the technical term for pushing really hard) the fitting on, but when I tentatively turned the water back on, the fitting held. We had water again! I came back upstairs and declared triumphantly to J "It worked! I fixed it!" As she washed her hands in relief, she asked whether the exterior spigot was working too. "Well, I fixed it in the sense that there's no longer water gushing into the basement and the house is in worse shape than it was this morning at the time I first emptied my toolbox...but at least there isn't any water gushing into the basement."
At that point I decided I would take a bit of a break from attempting my own repairs, at least without some really thorough research and perhaps some expert assistance.
That resolution lasted until 4:00 in the afternoon, when I decided that installing the new doorknob on the bathroom door couldn't possibly be that hard. J was busy with something, perhaps teaching, and I brought both of the boys up with me. I opened up the instructions and glanced over the first page. Installation time, 15 minutes, I read.
I'm learning to take those estimates with a grain of salt.
To my credit, I even double-checked the process in a large Home Maintenance reference book I have on a bookshelf downstairs. There were lots of colorful pictures of a man using a screwdriver, then pushing together the two knobs of the lockset and screwing in the faceplate. Easy, right? The boys could even play together next to me while I worked.
This particular repair was necessary because the inside handle of our bathroom door had broken off sometime before we moved in. This made it difficult to even close the door completely, and impossible to lock it. With a three year old whose favorite adjective is "curious" roaming the house, this made privacy almost impossible. For both J and myself, it's a regular event to have James pull open the shower curtain as you're attempting to wash yourself off and ask you a question that he needs your help with right away, the floor and boy getting soaked the whole time, and then once you tell him that you don't know where his "favorite roof slat" is, to get some helpful comment along the lines of "Hey, you're really wet." About intrusions during toilet usage we will not even speak.
I attempted to read the instructions as James began bringing all of his worldly goods into the bathroom to show to Owen.
1. Mark door edge approximate 36" (914mm) from floor. Fold the template along fold line. Place center of template on marked position. Not relevant to me, our door already as the lock hole cut. Let's skip this.
2. Drill 1/8" (3mm) pilot holes as marked in step #1 for both the 2-1/18" (54mm) and 1" (25mm) holes. I don't think this applies to my door either. Let's skip it.
3. This step is for interchangeable latches with face place converts to either radius or drive-in. Not applicable to mobile home latch. You know what, I think I'm just going to start unscrewing.
The unscrewing part went fairly well, although J began to get nervous again as she listened up the stairs and heard things like:
"Well, how's that supposed to come off?
"James, don't cover Owen's head with that blanket."
"Hmm...well, that could be painted over."
"Owen, don't eat the trash, that's siwwy!"
"Oh, Owen, stay out of there."
"Oops..well, I think that would be covered up anyway."
"Wait, what's all that wood doing there?"
I managed to get the old knobs off with some prying, and discovered there was lots of...random wood?...still in the middle of the door. Enough so that I couldn't fit the knew knobs into the old lockset, which had been my time-saving intent. As I was going up the stairs with a drill, J wisely decided that now was a good time for her to take over the supervision of James and Owen. She asked when I'd be done, since she wanted to go on a walk.
"Well, the instructions say fifteen minutes..."
She's learned to take such things with a grain of salt as well.
I started looking further down the instructions to see if there was any information about what to do in my random wood blockage...
5. Press exterior knob/lever against exterior surface of the door making certain the stems are positioned horizontally so they go through holes in the latch case. Note: the exterior knob has blah blah blah, you're holding a drill, turn the drill on. The drill is fun! You know what you're doing! You won't mess it up!
An hour later, as we got ready to go for a much shorter walk, I triumphantly declared to J that the bathroom door still didn't really lock very well, and that the knobs didn't move particularly easy, but if you pulled really hard you could shut the door and that at any rate there were knobs on both side of the door now.
When she asked what the problem had been, I gave the highly technical explanation that "There turned out to be a lot of door in the way, and the pointy things wouldn't fit through, and then when I opened up some holes using paddle bits (I think they were paddle bits) to push those through there was some more metal in the way, so I had to take everything out again to get rid of some more wood, and then the screws wouldn't quite go in right...so..."
So now I really AM off of home repairs for a good long bit. At least until we put in the corner shelves this afternoon.
She agreed yesterday morning that we could make a trip first thing. I needed to get a replacement exterior spigot, since our old one had been continuously dripping ever since we moved in. There was a massive icicle off of it all winter and when the snow and ice finally melted I had to put a five gallon bucket on the ground underneath to avoid a perpetual muddy mess just outside the back entrance of the garage. I disliked this, and looked up information on how to replace the old spigot with a new one that didn't leak.
The internet is a great resource for rookie homeowners like myself, because there are lots of youtube videos and do-it-yourself tutorials for every conceivable problem. I'd had a string of successes attempting home fix-it projects recently, including some pretty complicated repairs along the lines of:
1) hanging pictures on a wall
2) hanging different pictures on a different wall
3) fixing James' marble run
The point is that I had developed hubris. Hubris doesn't just mean pride--it's insolence to the gods. I don't know which deity I offended when I spoke to J the other day, but somewhere on Mt Olympus a cloud-gathering brow was furled when I declared that "You know, all this home repair stuff isn't rocket science. You read the instructions carefully, you make sure you have all the right tools, and as long as you've done your preparation beforehand most of it is just a matter of familiarity with the process." I was just begging for a smiting.
This is why I was quite confident yesterday morning that I could successfully replace the spigot by myself. Step one was to turn the water off to the house, a task I completed confidently and without issue. (There's a big yellow lever right next to where I practice with a black arrow pointing down that says "OFF") Next I needed to unscrew the old spigot and bring it into Home Depot with me so that I could make sure the replacement was the right size. As I was heading outside, J asked me "How long exactly will it take before we leave? I want to make sure that I can time Owen's next feeding just right." "Well, it could be 20 seconds, and it could be 20 minutes. You never can tell with these sorts of things." How humble of me.
This is where it all fell apart. I brought James out with me, because everything is way easier when your three-year old is attempting to help. He held a hammer, and he swung at the spigot whenever my hands were out of the way, and occasionally when they weren't. I sprayed the threads with WD-40, gripped the pipe with one set of pliers, then attempted to wrench the spigot loose with another. Pound, pound, pound, went James. Nothing was loose yet, so I sprayed some more lubricant and wrenched harder. I looked up the directions again, and as is always the case, the instructions made the process look easy and straightforward. There was no word at all about a spigot that wouldn't move. I pulled harder on the pipe and felt something move. Then I gave a yanking tug left and felt the spigot come free, along with the rest of a pipe. And then I heard water spilling from inside the basement.
J was feeding Owen at this point. She heard a noise in the basement, and footsteps hurrying down. She heard concerned climbing, scrambling, and James asking "Why's that all wet, Daddy?" It was not a reassuring experience for her
I had broken the 1/2" pipe leading to the spigot. Fortunately there wasn't much water to drain out of it, but I saw that because of the angles of the pipe there wasn't much chance I was going to be able to pull it through. I attempted a couple of different tacks, without giving much explanation to J about what was going on--"Well, it doesn't look too bad down there...hmm...I didn't expect that...I wonder what..."
Eventually I gave up on trying to get the spigot unscrewed. As I learned later, the "spigot" didn't screw onto the pipe behind it all, but was all a single piece called a "frost-proof sillcock." I don't know the origin or meaning of the word "sillcock," but I'm fairly certain that "frost proof was an inaccurate descriptor.
There was more experimenting with trying to remove the pipe and to shut off the water to just that set of piping, but that just led to water gushing out all over the basement floor. Eventually we had to give up on turning the water back on before we left, which meant that James couldn't have a drink. (He was thirsty after all his hammering) and J couldn't wash her hands after changing Owen's diaper or her face before heading out into public. It wasn't a particularly cheerful ride to Home Depot.
From a family relations perspective, things didn't improve once we arrived. I couldn't find any of the equipment I needed to complete the repair, largely because (as I progressively discovered) I hadn't the fainstest idea what I was doing. Both of the plumbing specialists had called in sick, and my first attempt to call J's Dad wasn't picked up. Owen was cranky and awake in the carrier, and James was asking about the name and purpose of every piece of merchandise in the store, most of which were completely opaque to me. Eventually he gave up on asking questions and just waved his Greek flag around in the cart, shouting at the top of his lungs that he'd scored a goal in hockey.
We found some other things that we needed, and then when I got ahold of Dad he talked me through one solution that would involve some complicated sets of parts requiring precise measurements and perhaps a blowtorch, and another solution that involved capping off the broken pipe until someone who knew what they were doing could get a look at it. I chose option B, and picked up a Sharkbite slip on fitting. I wasn't exactly sure I had the right measurement for the pipe (do you measure outside to outside, or inside to inside? What if you get a different measurement every time you hold the tape measure up? What if your three year old is hitting you in the shin with a hammer while you take the measurements?)
It turned out to be a simple fix. We got home, J took the screaming Owen inside, James ran outside to wave his flag some more and and celebrate his hockey triumphs (or Greece's hockey triumphs, I suppose) and I went down to the basement with the fitting. I had to finagle (that's the technical term for pushing really hard) the fitting on, but when I tentatively turned the water back on, the fitting held. We had water again! I came back upstairs and declared triumphantly to J "It worked! I fixed it!" As she washed her hands in relief, she asked whether the exterior spigot was working too. "Well, I fixed it in the sense that there's no longer water gushing into the basement and the house is in worse shape than it was this morning at the time I first emptied my toolbox...but at least there isn't any water gushing into the basement."
At that point I decided I would take a bit of a break from attempting my own repairs, at least without some really thorough research and perhaps some expert assistance.
That resolution lasted until 4:00 in the afternoon, when I decided that installing the new doorknob on the bathroom door couldn't possibly be that hard. J was busy with something, perhaps teaching, and I brought both of the boys up with me. I opened up the instructions and glanced over the first page. Installation time, 15 minutes, I read.
I'm learning to take those estimates with a grain of salt.
To my credit, I even double-checked the process in a large Home Maintenance reference book I have on a bookshelf downstairs. There were lots of colorful pictures of a man using a screwdriver, then pushing together the two knobs of the lockset and screwing in the faceplate. Easy, right? The boys could even play together next to me while I worked.
This particular repair was necessary because the inside handle of our bathroom door had broken off sometime before we moved in. This made it difficult to even close the door completely, and impossible to lock it. With a three year old whose favorite adjective is "curious" roaming the house, this made privacy almost impossible. For both J and myself, it's a regular event to have James pull open the shower curtain as you're attempting to wash yourself off and ask you a question that he needs your help with right away, the floor and boy getting soaked the whole time, and then once you tell him that you don't know where his "favorite roof slat" is, to get some helpful comment along the lines of "Hey, you're really wet." About intrusions during toilet usage we will not even speak.
I attempted to read the instructions as James began bringing all of his worldly goods into the bathroom to show to Owen.
1. Mark door edge approximate 36" (914mm) from floor. Fold the template along fold line. Place center of template on marked position. Not relevant to me, our door already as the lock hole cut. Let's skip this.
2. Drill 1/8" (3mm) pilot holes as marked in step #1 for both the 2-1/18" (54mm) and 1" (25mm) holes. I don't think this applies to my door either. Let's skip it.
3. This step is for interchangeable latches with face place converts to either radius or drive-in. Not applicable to mobile home latch. You know what, I think I'm just going to start unscrewing.
The unscrewing part went fairly well, although J began to get nervous again as she listened up the stairs and heard things like:
"Well, how's that supposed to come off?
"James, don't cover Owen's head with that blanket."
"Hmm...well, that could be painted over."
"Owen, don't eat the trash, that's siwwy!"
"Oh, Owen, stay out of there."
"Oops..well, I think that would be covered up anyway."
"Wait, what's all that wood doing there?"
I managed to get the old knobs off with some prying, and discovered there was lots of...random wood?...still in the middle of the door. Enough so that I couldn't fit the knew knobs into the old lockset, which had been my time-saving intent. As I was going up the stairs with a drill, J wisely decided that now was a good time for her to take over the supervision of James and Owen. She asked when I'd be done, since she wanted to go on a walk.
"Well, the instructions say fifteen minutes..."
She's learned to take such things with a grain of salt as well.
I started looking further down the instructions to see if there was any information about what to do in my random wood blockage...
5. Press exterior knob/lever against exterior surface of the door making certain the stems are positioned horizontally so they go through holes in the latch case. Note: the exterior knob has blah blah blah, you're holding a drill, turn the drill on. The drill is fun! You know what you're doing! You won't mess it up!
An hour later, as we got ready to go for a much shorter walk, I triumphantly declared to J that the bathroom door still didn't really lock very well, and that the knobs didn't move particularly easy, but if you pulled really hard you could shut the door and that at any rate there were knobs on both side of the door now.
When she asked what the problem had been, I gave the highly technical explanation that "There turned out to be a lot of door in the way, and the pointy things wouldn't fit through, and then when I opened up some holes using paddle bits (I think they were paddle bits) to push those through there was some more metal in the way, so I had to take everything out again to get rid of some more wood, and then the screws wouldn't quite go in right...so..."
So now I really AM off of home repairs for a good long bit. At least until we put in the corner shelves this afternoon.
Monday, June 22, 2015
Messy Boys
We decided to cook over the fire pit tonight. Food tastes better outdoors, especially when you're eating hot dogs. J had picked up some good brats from Wegmans, and we ate them alongside a fresh fruit salad and some zuchinni, squash, onions, and mushrooms roasted up in basting oil over the fire as well. Finish that off with a s'more, and you can imagine what both of the boys looked like.
James' face was completely covered from cheek to cheek in marshmallow goop, bits of graham cracker, blueberry stains, and ketchup. At one point he had dropped the hot dog out of his bun and into his lap, so he had big globs of ketchup sticking to his shirt and his shorts as well. All the mess on his face didn't bother him a bit, but he's rather particular about keeping his hands clean. Any time he sensed he was getting some marshmallow or ketchup on his hands, he'd get up and rinse them off in the five gallon bucket under the leaky spigot, tracking through a mud puddle in the process. But at least he had clean hands.
Owen, on the other hand, had been continually dribbling peach juice down his front for the entire time we were outside. At various points he made a grab for my hot dog and my blueberries, achieving some success each time. He dived into the grass and managed to get some of that in his mouth whenever anyone wasn't looking, and he finished off the evening by eating oatmeal cereal in his high chair which he spread all over his face and hands.
It was bath time.
I stripped James off of everything but his socks and underwear, and tried to help J get Owen cleaned up enough to carry up to the tub. James reappeared a moment later, declaring that he had the hockey puck in his pocket.
The bath was run, Owen was put in, and then James climbed in after him. Almost immediately, he declared that he was going to pee in the tub.
"Don't pee in the tub James."
"But I need to pee in the tub."
"Can you wait until you're out of the bath?"
"No, I need to pee now."
I lifted him up, dripping everywhere, out of the bath, and set him on the toilet seat just as J cautioned me that he was probably slippery. Sure enough, he fell into the toilet with two little legs sticking up out of the bowl. He was retrieved, did his business, and then deposited back in the tub.
The actual bath part went smoothly. Owen laughed at everything James did, and James found the one remaining bath letter (the letter B) and held it in his mouth for the entire length of the bath. ("I'm just biting the letter B.") J asked him if he could think of any words that started with the letter B, and after thinking it over he decided that the letter M was a word that started with the letter B. We played the Imperial March, per his request, as he got out, and here he is looking like a Sith Lord. You can't see it, but the B is still in his mouth.
Afterwards we dressed them both in basketball shirts. We tried to get a photo of both of them smiling at the camera, and....well...this is what happened...
James' face was completely covered from cheek to cheek in marshmallow goop, bits of graham cracker, blueberry stains, and ketchup. At one point he had dropped the hot dog out of his bun and into his lap, so he had big globs of ketchup sticking to his shirt and his shorts as well. All the mess on his face didn't bother him a bit, but he's rather particular about keeping his hands clean. Any time he sensed he was getting some marshmallow or ketchup on his hands, he'd get up and rinse them off in the five gallon bucket under the leaky spigot, tracking through a mud puddle in the process. But at least he had clean hands.
Owen, on the other hand, had been continually dribbling peach juice down his front for the entire time we were outside. At various points he made a grab for my hot dog and my blueberries, achieving some success each time. He dived into the grass and managed to get some of that in his mouth whenever anyone wasn't looking, and he finished off the evening by eating oatmeal cereal in his high chair which he spread all over his face and hands.
It was bath time.
I stripped James off of everything but his socks and underwear, and tried to help J get Owen cleaned up enough to carry up to the tub. James reappeared a moment later, declaring that he had the hockey puck in his pocket.
The bath was run, Owen was put in, and then James climbed in after him. Almost immediately, he declared that he was going to pee in the tub.
"Don't pee in the tub James."
"But I need to pee in the tub."
"Can you wait until you're out of the bath?"
"No, I need to pee now."
I lifted him up, dripping everywhere, out of the bath, and set him on the toilet seat just as J cautioned me that he was probably slippery. Sure enough, he fell into the toilet with two little legs sticking up out of the bowl. He was retrieved, did his business, and then deposited back in the tub.
The actual bath part went smoothly. Owen laughed at everything James did, and James found the one remaining bath letter (the letter B) and held it in his mouth for the entire length of the bath. ("I'm just biting the letter B.") J asked him if he could think of any words that started with the letter B, and after thinking it over he decided that the letter M was a word that started with the letter B. We played the Imperial March, per his request, as he got out, and here he is looking like a Sith Lord. You can't see it, but the B is still in his mouth.
Afterwards we dressed them both in basketball shirts. We tried to get a photo of both of them smiling at the camera, and....well...this is what happened...
Saturday, June 20, 2015
Father's Day Vignettes
I'm seven years old, and Dad takes me aside while Mom keeps my little brothers occupied with s'more-making at a pond-side fire. He asks if I have anything important in my pockets, and then he tells me the plan. He's going to pretend to get angry at me, and I need to run away to the dock. Then he'll run out to the edge of the dock (pretending to be angry) and throw me into the pond with all my clothes in. My little brothers will have no idea that we were just pretending. Dad is my buddy.
I'm eleven, and I just brought in a load of firewood from the hedgerow behind the house. I led Pax and Calvus back there with a sled, and we hauled it through the snow (sometimes Calvus was riding instead of pushing) up to the house. We made a fort with it, and then stacked it in the wood pile. Dad comes up to me afterwards and tells me that he noticed I did some work without being asked. He says that was a really good thing to do, and it means I'm growing up. Dad's impressed with me.
I'm fourteen, hiding out in the barn, and I just cracked my Dad's ribs. I was lying around on the couch, putting off cleaning the room that I was supposed to be moving into downstairs since I've been complaining so much about sleeping in the hall. I was provocative on purpose, just looking for any excuse to argue and say something dramatic. I managed to get him angry enough to grab me, and when I scuffled back I legitimately hurt him. I'm so ashamed of myself I can't imagine ever coming back into the house again.
I'm six, and Dad tells me to get into the car for a surprise, but not to tell any of my brothers. I ask him what the surprise is as we drive towards Medina. He defers the answer a few times, and I look out the window as we drive by my cousin's house and out of town. I wonder if we're going to the hardware store. We take a turn that I'm not used to, and he suddenly turns towards me and declares that he and I are going to see a Buffalo Bills game at Rich Stadium! It's a preseason game, and the Bills beat the Atlanta Falcons. I even get to see Jim Kelly warming up. But best of all, I get to sit with my Dad all alone at a Bills game.
I'm nine, and Dad has been sick for three days. I can tell Mom is worried, but most of what she says about insurance and the doctor is right over my head. I haven't seen Dad come out of his room the whole time, but he's real busy with the new business right now anyway, so I don't think much of it. When he comes out he hasn't shaved, and he can hardly stand up. He has trouble walking, and he looks real thin. Mom's putting out toast and soup for him, but he doesn't really eat any. I ask him some questions, but he doesn't answer. Dad isn't supposed to be vulnerable.
I'm fifteen, and I'm about to play my first trumpet audition. We're driving down to Houghton College, where I'm hoping to get early admission so that I can leave high school early. I feel dreadfully sick, and I think it's the hills. But really it's the nerves. I want to suggest that we turn back, and then I want to suggest that we stop the car. Mom asks me how I'm doing, and I say that I'm not feeling well. Dad tells to look at it this way: that I get to skip school, and that I get to go play the trumpet, which is something I love to do anyway.
I'm five years old, and I'm storming around the downstairs of the house furiously. I know that the bus will be coming any moment now, and I can't find my backpack. I need my backpack. I accuse all of my brothers of stealing it, and I'm getting even angrier because my Dad is laughing at me. Finally he has mercy and points out that my backpack is already on my back. He tells me I take myself too seriously.
I'm twelve, and my parents ask me to come into the kitchen. They say that we need to have a talk. I guess what the talk is going to be about from their tone. I've been sent to the library during health for the past few weeks of 6th grade, and I suddenly panic, knowing that they're going to want to talk about sex. They ask me what I know about...about..sex. I lie spectacularly, telling them that I know about what men and women do and how it can make pregnancies if they don't use contraception. (Contraception is the most important sounding word I know about sex.) They look immensely relieved, although a little puzzled, and conclude the conversation quickly, to everyone's relief.
I'm four, and my Dad brings me to work with him at Photos by Bruce. He has all kinds of fun sports equipment for me to hold, and I get my picture taken with a tennis racket and a basketball and a football. We even bounce the basketball back and forth a little bit afterwards, although it's a little big so I'm kind of scared of it. Dad tells me that he will develop the pictures in a dark room and I'll get to see myself looking like an athlete, which is what I want to be when I grow up.
I'm thirteen, and I know everything there is to know about music. I've been reading my Mom's old music theory textbooks that I found in her closet, and I've even taught myself how to read bass clef. My Dad is practicing his bass guitar down in his bedroom and I listen to him outside his door. I knock, and then I go in. There's a pipe lying on his woodstove, and he's been practicing a jazz song I recognize. I ask him how he knew what to play, and he says he was playing it by ear. My pride is wounded, but I more admire him.
I'm six years old, and I'm begging my Dad to put on the Star Wars record again. My brothers hear and join in as well. We all want to sing along with the main theme. Dad says the record player is broken, but he goes into his closet and gets out his old trumpet. He plays a scale or two to warm up, and then he plays the main theme from Star Wars on the trumpet. We all can't believe that he's playing Star Wars!
I'm ten, and Dad tells me that I need to come out back and help stack the woodpile that was delivered yesterday. The pile is enormous, and I'm sure that we'll never get through it all. And if we need to stack it, I'd rather make forts with it with my younger brothers. Sam and Pax start out helping, but each of them fade away pretty soon and need to go back in the house. Just Dad and I are left working, and although we don't get it all stacked, I can see the progress that we made. He tells me some funny stories about him and his friend Doug, and once we're finished we throw the football back and forth, just the two of us.
I'm eight years old, and my Dad has driven the minivan up on his two metal auto-ramps to change the oil. He's telling me about his high school chemistry teacher. He says "you'll pay for everything you don't know how to do." I crawl around under the car with him and blink as soot gets in my eyes. I see how grimy his hands are from wrestling with the drain to the oil pan.
I'm thirteen years old, and Sam is gone for a few weeks this summer. We all load into the van, and baby Martha is buckled in. Before Mom turns the van on, Dad looks back at me, Pax, Calvus, and little Lux. He says "We want you boys to know that we got your report cards last week, and we haven't talked about grades or about your concerts in a long time, because we didn't want Sam to feel bad. But we talked it over, and we want you to know how proud we are of you..." He keeps talking, but I've slid down the seat and am squeezing my eyes shut so my brothers won't see that I'm crying. I didn't realize until he talked about it how long I'd wanted to hear that.
I'm seven years old. Dad turned the game off because the Bills were losing so bad. He turns it back on to check the score, and it turns out the Bills have scored a touchdown. He calls me back into the exercise room, and we listen on the radio as they all of a sudden score again and again. I'm tired from being up early at church that morning, but I stay awake even as things slow down in the fourth quarter. The game goes to overtime, and the phone rings with Dad's friends. He won't talk anymore, because the game is back on, and Nate Odomes made an interception. When Steve Christie makes the game winning kick we pump our fists and jump up and down and scream louder than ever before and jump around the exercise room dancing and hugging.
I'm twenty six years old, and I've been a father for one day. Mom and Dad came and brought me dinner while J was still in labor, and then Mom was able to see James (but not hold him) for a few minutes on her way to work the next morning. I hold my newborn son to offer him to my Dad for the first time.
It's my eighth birthday. My Dad gives me a brown plastic case with only one working latch. It's a musical instrument. I open up the case upside down, and then turn the tarnished brass over, and look at the new instrument I'm holding in my hands. It's a cornet.
As a matter of fact, pretty much every good thing in my life came from Tom Smith.
I'm eleven, and I just brought in a load of firewood from the hedgerow behind the house. I led Pax and Calvus back there with a sled, and we hauled it through the snow (sometimes Calvus was riding instead of pushing) up to the house. We made a fort with it, and then stacked it in the wood pile. Dad comes up to me afterwards and tells me that he noticed I did some work without being asked. He says that was a really good thing to do, and it means I'm growing up. Dad's impressed with me.
I'm fourteen, hiding out in the barn, and I just cracked my Dad's ribs. I was lying around on the couch, putting off cleaning the room that I was supposed to be moving into downstairs since I've been complaining so much about sleeping in the hall. I was provocative on purpose, just looking for any excuse to argue and say something dramatic. I managed to get him angry enough to grab me, and when I scuffled back I legitimately hurt him. I'm so ashamed of myself I can't imagine ever coming back into the house again.
I'm six, and Dad tells me to get into the car for a surprise, but not to tell any of my brothers. I ask him what the surprise is as we drive towards Medina. He defers the answer a few times, and I look out the window as we drive by my cousin's house and out of town. I wonder if we're going to the hardware store. We take a turn that I'm not used to, and he suddenly turns towards me and declares that he and I are going to see a Buffalo Bills game at Rich Stadium! It's a preseason game, and the Bills beat the Atlanta Falcons. I even get to see Jim Kelly warming up. But best of all, I get to sit with my Dad all alone at a Bills game.
I'm nine, and Dad has been sick for three days. I can tell Mom is worried, but most of what she says about insurance and the doctor is right over my head. I haven't seen Dad come out of his room the whole time, but he's real busy with the new business right now anyway, so I don't think much of it. When he comes out he hasn't shaved, and he can hardly stand up. He has trouble walking, and he looks real thin. Mom's putting out toast and soup for him, but he doesn't really eat any. I ask him some questions, but he doesn't answer. Dad isn't supposed to be vulnerable.
I'm fifteen, and I'm about to play my first trumpet audition. We're driving down to Houghton College, where I'm hoping to get early admission so that I can leave high school early. I feel dreadfully sick, and I think it's the hills. But really it's the nerves. I want to suggest that we turn back, and then I want to suggest that we stop the car. Mom asks me how I'm doing, and I say that I'm not feeling well. Dad tells to look at it this way: that I get to skip school, and that I get to go play the trumpet, which is something I love to do anyway.
I'm five years old, and I'm storming around the downstairs of the house furiously. I know that the bus will be coming any moment now, and I can't find my backpack. I need my backpack. I accuse all of my brothers of stealing it, and I'm getting even angrier because my Dad is laughing at me. Finally he has mercy and points out that my backpack is already on my back. He tells me I take myself too seriously.
I'm twelve, and my parents ask me to come into the kitchen. They say that we need to have a talk. I guess what the talk is going to be about from their tone. I've been sent to the library during health for the past few weeks of 6th grade, and I suddenly panic, knowing that they're going to want to talk about sex. They ask me what I know about...about..sex. I lie spectacularly, telling them that I know about what men and women do and how it can make pregnancies if they don't use contraception. (Contraception is the most important sounding word I know about sex.) They look immensely relieved, although a little puzzled, and conclude the conversation quickly, to everyone's relief.
I'm four, and my Dad brings me to work with him at Photos by Bruce. He has all kinds of fun sports equipment for me to hold, and I get my picture taken with a tennis racket and a basketball and a football. We even bounce the basketball back and forth a little bit afterwards, although it's a little big so I'm kind of scared of it. Dad tells me that he will develop the pictures in a dark room and I'll get to see myself looking like an athlete, which is what I want to be when I grow up.
I'm thirteen, and I know everything there is to know about music. I've been reading my Mom's old music theory textbooks that I found in her closet, and I've even taught myself how to read bass clef. My Dad is practicing his bass guitar down in his bedroom and I listen to him outside his door. I knock, and then I go in. There's a pipe lying on his woodstove, and he's been practicing a jazz song I recognize. I ask him how he knew what to play, and he says he was playing it by ear. My pride is wounded, but I more admire him.
I'm six years old, and I'm begging my Dad to put on the Star Wars record again. My brothers hear and join in as well. We all want to sing along with the main theme. Dad says the record player is broken, but he goes into his closet and gets out his old trumpet. He plays a scale or two to warm up, and then he plays the main theme from Star Wars on the trumpet. We all can't believe that he's playing Star Wars!
I'm ten, and Dad tells me that I need to come out back and help stack the woodpile that was delivered yesterday. The pile is enormous, and I'm sure that we'll never get through it all. And if we need to stack it, I'd rather make forts with it with my younger brothers. Sam and Pax start out helping, but each of them fade away pretty soon and need to go back in the house. Just Dad and I are left working, and although we don't get it all stacked, I can see the progress that we made. He tells me some funny stories about him and his friend Doug, and once we're finished we throw the football back and forth, just the two of us.
I'm eight years old, and my Dad has driven the minivan up on his two metal auto-ramps to change the oil. He's telling me about his high school chemistry teacher. He says "you'll pay for everything you don't know how to do." I crawl around under the car with him and blink as soot gets in my eyes. I see how grimy his hands are from wrestling with the drain to the oil pan.
I'm thirteen years old, and Sam is gone for a few weeks this summer. We all load into the van, and baby Martha is buckled in. Before Mom turns the van on, Dad looks back at me, Pax, Calvus, and little Lux. He says "We want you boys to know that we got your report cards last week, and we haven't talked about grades or about your concerts in a long time, because we didn't want Sam to feel bad. But we talked it over, and we want you to know how proud we are of you..." He keeps talking, but I've slid down the seat and am squeezing my eyes shut so my brothers won't see that I'm crying. I didn't realize until he talked about it how long I'd wanted to hear that.
I'm seven years old. Dad turned the game off because the Bills were losing so bad. He turns it back on to check the score, and it turns out the Bills have scored a touchdown. He calls me back into the exercise room, and we listen on the radio as they all of a sudden score again and again. I'm tired from being up early at church that morning, but I stay awake even as things slow down in the fourth quarter. The game goes to overtime, and the phone rings with Dad's friends. He won't talk anymore, because the game is back on, and Nate Odomes made an interception. When Steve Christie makes the game winning kick we pump our fists and jump up and down and scream louder than ever before and jump around the exercise room dancing and hugging.
I'm twenty six years old, and I've been a father for one day. Mom and Dad came and brought me dinner while J was still in labor, and then Mom was able to see James (but not hold him) for a few minutes on her way to work the next morning. I hold my newborn son to offer him to my Dad for the first time.
It's my eighth birthday. My Dad gives me a brown plastic case with only one working latch. It's a musical instrument. I open up the case upside down, and then turn the tarnished brass over, and look at the new instrument I'm holding in my hands. It's a cornet.
As a matter of fact, pretty much every good thing in my life came from Tom Smith.
in tempore illo
How do you convince a three year old to listen attentively to 18th century lute music? Why, the answer is quite simple. Just tell him that the composer is none other than the obscure Italian musician, Giovanni Zamboni. (He is a real person)
Also, for those of you who have interest in watching videos of the boys, the most recent purging of photos data (we're both running out of space on our phones) led to a bunch of new uploads on the youtube page. Here's the link, if you don't have it:
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UChtZIIZmDIgdzKo3LG9CoxQ/videos
Also, for those of you who have interest in watching videos of the boys, the most recent purging of photos data (we're both running out of space on our phones) led to a bunch of new uploads on the youtube page. Here's the link, if you don't have it:
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UChtZIIZmDIgdzKo3LG9CoxQ/videos
Friday, June 19, 2015
How the Campout Went
It was actually quite successful. Perhaps acknowledging that up front takes away all the drama from the blog, but I didn't really have anything to complain about.
About 7:00 I went outside and had a fire with James and Grandma Davis, who is visiting for the week. We made s'mores, James dripped his all over his chair and pants, and then we started bringing out all the necessary provisions. I attempted to set up the tent, which went reasonably well. Safety is always a big concern among the Outdoor Goods community, so the manufacturers of our tent were kind enough to make it virtually assembly-proof, which keeps us very safe from being harmed while inside it. On a related note, Calvus pointed out to me that I should never have any trouble remembering the Hebrew word for tent. ('Ohel.)
We did get the tent set up and tarped, and then Grandma Davis pointed out when I returned from taking care of something indoors that it had nearly flown away several times in the wind. I improvised some tent stakes from sticks in the firebox, then brought out the final load of supplies for a night of roughing it outdoors: one child sized sleeping bag, one child-sized pillow, one Curious George book, one illustrated Bible story, Five Little Monkeys Wash the Car, a lantern, two adult sized blankets, a water bottle, a tumbler of scotch on the rocks, the Greek New Testament, Ovid's Metamorphoses, H.W. Joseph's Introduction to Logic, the Oxford Book of Latin Verse, Dickens' Master Humphrey's Clock, the Cambridge Companion to Mussorgsky's Pictures at an Exhibition, headphones, an iPhone 6, Hebrew vocabulary flashcards, three pens, two pencils, a yellow highlighter, and two blank notebooks. And George and Steven. You know, only the necessities.
If you couldn't tell, I was really hoping to get some reading done.
It didn't exactly work out. James and I had a lovely time reading his books aloud while he waited for it to get dark enough outside to justify turning the lantern on. At one point J arrived back home and came out to say goodnight, and when I saw that it was nearly 9:00 I told him that it was time to say prayers and go to bed.
"Are you going to bed too, Daddy?"
"I think I'm going to stay up and read some of my books for a bit."
"I want you to go to bed too."
"Tell you what, do you want to stay up a little longer and look at the pictures in your books while I read my books?"
"Can I turn the lantern on?"
"Yes, that's fine."
"Daddy, can you tell me what the words say?"
"James, you have that book memorized. You know exactly what the words say."
"Can you tell them to me?"
"Daddy, I wanna go to sleep."
"Okay, do you want me to turn the lantern off?"
"No, I wanna keep the lantern on."
"Okay, sleep well little bear."
"I want you to sleep too."
<moment of resigning ambitions of staying up late reading by lamplight>
"Okay, I'll go to sleep too. Do you want me to sleep next to you?"
"Yeah."
"Okay, night night James. Do you have enough room?"
"No."
"How about now?"
"I need you to move a little bit more further."
"How about this?"
"I need you to move a little bit more further."
"James, I'm all the way on the other side of the tent now."
"I want to sleep next to my books. Can you put them on my pillow?"
"Okay. But I'm going to turn out the lantern now."
"I still need to hold it."
We both woke up briefly after midnight when it sprinkled on the roof of the tent for a few minutes, and I went in to use the bathroom around 3 AM. He didn't stir when I opened or closed the tent, and I didn't hear anything else from him until 5:30 AM when it began to get light out and he woke up. That was the coldest it had been all night, but he wanted to read each of his books one more time before we went inside.
He was too scared of Grandma Davis sleeping on the couch downstairs to admit he needed to use the bathroom, so it wasn't until he had already eaten a donut and I was halfway through frying up some bacon that he told me he needed to go pee-pee RIGHT NOW. I ran him upstairs as quietly as possible, sat him on the potty, then snuck back down to take the bacon off the burner. It didn't get too badly burned. I made a delicious breakfast between the meat, some fried eggs, and some sliced mushrooms that I sauteed in the bacon drippings with freshly squeezed lemon juice. He turned his nose up at all of it and generally behaved like a child who'd lost three and a half hours off of his normal sleep schedule.
He just went down for a nap after doing reasonably well for the rest of the morning. He wants to know when we can go out and sleep in the tent again.
About 7:00 I went outside and had a fire with James and Grandma Davis, who is visiting for the week. We made s'mores, James dripped his all over his chair and pants, and then we started bringing out all the necessary provisions. I attempted to set up the tent, which went reasonably well. Safety is always a big concern among the Outdoor Goods community, so the manufacturers of our tent were kind enough to make it virtually assembly-proof, which keeps us very safe from being harmed while inside it. On a related note, Calvus pointed out to me that I should never have any trouble remembering the Hebrew word for tent. ('Ohel.)
We did get the tent set up and tarped, and then Grandma Davis pointed out when I returned from taking care of something indoors that it had nearly flown away several times in the wind. I improvised some tent stakes from sticks in the firebox, then brought out the final load of supplies for a night of roughing it outdoors: one child sized sleeping bag, one child-sized pillow, one Curious George book, one illustrated Bible story, Five Little Monkeys Wash the Car, a lantern, two adult sized blankets, a water bottle, a tumbler of scotch on the rocks, the Greek New Testament, Ovid's Metamorphoses, H.W. Joseph's Introduction to Logic, the Oxford Book of Latin Verse, Dickens' Master Humphrey's Clock, the Cambridge Companion to Mussorgsky's Pictures at an Exhibition, headphones, an iPhone 6, Hebrew vocabulary flashcards, three pens, two pencils, a yellow highlighter, and two blank notebooks. And George and Steven. You know, only the necessities.
If you couldn't tell, I was really hoping to get some reading done.
It didn't exactly work out. James and I had a lovely time reading his books aloud while he waited for it to get dark enough outside to justify turning the lantern on. At one point J arrived back home and came out to say goodnight, and when I saw that it was nearly 9:00 I told him that it was time to say prayers and go to bed.
"Are you going to bed too, Daddy?"
"I think I'm going to stay up and read some of my books for a bit."
"I want you to go to bed too."
"Tell you what, do you want to stay up a little longer and look at the pictures in your books while I read my books?"
"Can I turn the lantern on?"
"Yes, that's fine."
"Daddy, can you tell me what the words say?"
"James, you have that book memorized. You know exactly what the words say."
"Can you tell them to me?"
"Daddy, I wanna go to sleep."
"Okay, do you want me to turn the lantern off?"
"No, I wanna keep the lantern on."
"Okay, sleep well little bear."
"I want you to sleep too."
<moment of resigning ambitions of staying up late reading by lamplight>
"Okay, I'll go to sleep too. Do you want me to sleep next to you?"
"Yeah."
"Okay, night night James. Do you have enough room?"
"No."
"How about now?"
"I need you to move a little bit more further."
"How about this?"
"I need you to move a little bit more further."
"James, I'm all the way on the other side of the tent now."
"I want to sleep next to my books. Can you put them on my pillow?"
"Okay. But I'm going to turn out the lantern now."
"I still need to hold it."
We both woke up briefly after midnight when it sprinkled on the roof of the tent for a few minutes, and I went in to use the bathroom around 3 AM. He didn't stir when I opened or closed the tent, and I didn't hear anything else from him until 5:30 AM when it began to get light out and he woke up. That was the coldest it had been all night, but he wanted to read each of his books one more time before we went inside.
He was too scared of Grandma Davis sleeping on the couch downstairs to admit he needed to use the bathroom, so it wasn't until he had already eaten a donut and I was halfway through frying up some bacon that he told me he needed to go pee-pee RIGHT NOW. I ran him upstairs as quietly as possible, sat him on the potty, then snuck back down to take the bacon off the burner. It didn't get too badly burned. I made a delicious breakfast between the meat, some fried eggs, and some sliced mushrooms that I sauteed in the bacon drippings with freshly squeezed lemon juice. He turned his nose up at all of it and generally behaved like a child who'd lost three and a half hours off of his normal sleep schedule.
He just went down for a nap after doing reasonably well for the rest of the morning. He wants to know when we can go out and sleep in the tent again.
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