#18 -- Be a hypocrite

So, a while ago, I got married. As typically will happen in situations such as this, some kids eventually came along and chaos ensued. Happily, kids start out as babies. Babies are nice. They’re fun and they’re cute, but they’re also frequently messy and require loads of attention. At some point in the growth process, these things start to change. They become difficult, unruly, and at times downright obstinate, but you still can’t help but love em to death. There does, however, come a place in time where most of us parents would rather just hand the reins over to someone else and step aside for a while. For some this stretch of time can shrink to days and in some cases even hours, but for the large majority of the population, I believe that the “endless days of potty-training” are a nemesis that we all wish could be avoided.

We’ve been through three of these times so far, my patient wife and I. Mostly she’s been through them, I’ll agree, but I certainly got my…well, I won’t say fair share, but certainly a bundle of it. The worst part is that every single one of the three experiences has been entirely different. Wouldn’t be “fun”, I guess, if all the kids acted exactly the same.

Our first seemed to do rather well during the transition time, with relatively few accidents (that I remember), and with the proud parents patting themselves on the back at a job well-done. Unfortunately, the fun had only begun, because for some reason our first decided to do a little reverting and slide back into unpottytrainedness. Not only that though. It’s even worse than that. In fact, I distinctly remember walking into the kids room one day to find our oldest without a stitch on, staring up at me and smiling as she let loose the floods onto the carpet.

Now, how exactly is one supposed to respond to such an insult? Do actions like that not just scream impertinence? Ha, ha! You thought you were done with me, but now that I’m peeing on the floor what are you going to do about it? I just don’t understand the drive for children to push boundaries, but they do it nonetheless. They find them, and then they push and they push and they push. The bad part is that if you don’t hold those boundaries firm, then eventually they’ll end up walking all over you and your supposed authority.

So, we introduce punishments.

These can vary across the board, from harsh to wimpy. Everyone has their own special way of doing this. The point is that in order to avoid incorrect behavior there needs to be a consequence when the “rules” are broken.

Such as, no peeing on the carpet. I mean, seriously.

The joys of our second hit that stage. He was a bit behind the curve. Boys usually are, I think you’ll find. They just take a bit longer to figure it out for some reason. This time around, he’d get dressed, go outside to play, and come in fifteen minutes later with wet shorts. Mom would change him, and he’d go back outside, and fifteen minutes later…repeated ad infinitum. Eventually he made it. All praise and hallelujah.

Our third, on the other hand would get dressed in the morning, go out to play with the kids, and just stay out there whether she was wet or not. This meant repeated checking and asking and…man, does this stuff ever end?

Now, all this progression doesn’t really mean that they’re “cured”. Oh no. There’s still copious holding, and grabbing, and crossing of legs, dancing and squatting and any number of whacked-out body positions that will hold things back. We still have the occasional child racing to the bathroom at speeds approaching the proverbial roadrunner. Still, by and large we are through the accident stage.

Why do they do this? Well, I very much remember wagging my backside as I sat on the classroom floor in first grade, needing to use the restroom, but not wanting to miss out on the very wonderful story that my teacher was reading to us. I waited and waited and waited, and finally Mrs. B noticed me and told me to go to the restroom, that she’d wait for me to get back, but not making it. In fact, I didn’t even make it out of the classroom. Good buddy of mine and I were at the nurse’s office shortly thereafter--me, for waiting too long, and him for laughing himself into release. It’s just so much fun to be a kid. Who’d want to spend the time on something as boring as hitting the facilities when you could be out playing with friends, or listening to stories, or a myriad of other grand activities that fill our days.

No one, that’s who. Instead, they’d rather wait until the last minute, dancing and jigging the whole way until they just can’t take it anymore.

So…

A few months ago I was perusing the advertisements for ShopKo and found that once more they had their el cheapo bookshelves on sale. What luck! I thought, for I had recently come upon a barrier in my spatial capacity for shelving books. (I believe that I’ve mentioned before that I’m an addict…) Through some means (I’m actually still not sure which) I talked my lovely wife into letting buy one of these bookshelves.

We all took off for the store, bought the thing, brought it home, assembled it, and then came the fun. I pulled nearly all my books off the shelves, installed the new shelf (right next to my side of the bed, unfortunately. One of the down sides of having a small bedroom, I guess), and set to organizing and categorizing my books.

Removing price tags, fixing torn dust jackets, grouping by author and series, checking that all titles were on my list of books (so I don’t buy multiple copies of the same book). I lost myself in the work. At various points in the process my kids would come in and help out, or mess things up, or try to talk to a very preoccupied me. The time flew by. I couldn’t have told you how long it had been, and to tell the truth I didn’t really care.

Then, as I was nearing completion, I noticed something about myself. I was dancing. No, there was no music playing on the stereo, in my head, or otherwise. Still, I was shifting and turning and sitting in ways that I hadn’t in a LONG time, and I suddenly made the realization that I had to use the restroom. So, what did I do? Continued organizing my books of course. What kind of question is that? It didn’t take very long though until I hit that critical point and had to bail. Afterward, I was able to return to my books and finish the fun.

So these days, I tend not to be too harsh on getting after my kids for dancing a little. Hey, what can I say? Yes, I might be a hypocrite, but I’d still like to think that this experience taught me something about being distracted to ignorance. Plus it gave me a chance to laugh at myself, which can never be a bad thing. Keeps me humble.

#17 -- Have regrets

This post has been a long time in coming. A long time. It's one that I've been thinking about for forever, and waffling between writing it and not. In the end, I decided that I need to post it. One, to get some of this stuff written down somewhere. Two, because I really want to make people think when they read my blog. Yeah, sometimes I try to be funny. Sometimes I'm writing to prove a point. Mostly though, I want to be able to write the stuff that gets people's gears turning. And I think that this might be one of those.

Unfortunately, I feel like I need to give a disclaimer at the beginning of this one. This stuff has been buried, deep, for a long time. But just because I'm putting this on my blog doesn't mean that I'd love to talk about the specifics associated with this post. In fact, I'd never talk about the particulars of this blog post with anyone. And I mean anyone. I don't care who you are, or what relationship I have with you. I will not talk about it. I don't mean to be rude. I'm just telling you how it is. So please, don't test me on this one. Okay? Thanks.

And now, to the heart of the matter.

Regrets.

Lots of people have them. They're all over the place floating around, getting in the way, popping their heads up at the most inopportune times. If there's one piece of advice that I've heard over and over, it's that we should always live our life so that we won't have any regrets. And right now, as much as I can, I do my best to live by that standard.

But it hasn't always been that way. I've made some pretty stupid decisions along the path that my life has taken. I think that everyone does to some extent. But there's one particular time in my memory that haunts me continually. It never lets go. No matter how hard I try to forget, no matter how badly I want to let go of it...I can't.

Kids are stupid, yes? Now, I'm not talking about that ten year-old neighbor that comes over to your house, takes your kids toys, and then leaves them lying in the street, or in the middle of your driveway, or even in the other neighbor's pool. I'm talking about the grown up kind. The ones that think that they know everything, when in reality they haven't the first clue.

For me, there was one particular time of my life, when I was away from my family and the world that I had grown up in. I was still learning who I was and what I wanted, but was doing my best to be a good person and make good choices. And in the chaos of that period, I became friends with two people in particular. Two people that should have been the closest friends that I had during that time. They should have been the last ones to suffer from my stupidity, from my poor choices, from my selfishness. Yet they did. And worse yet, it seems, even today, as if they were the only ones to be hurt when all was said and done.

The first, a girl, I'll call M. The second, a guy, I'll name R. Foremost, for anonymity, but also because when it comes to this subject, I find that I'm still a coward.

I became friends with R and M at about the same time. There were a bundle of us that would all hang out and enjoy one another's company. We'd eat together, and go to the movies, and watch tv; play sports, stay up late, and stare up at the nighttime sky. I think that we all became good friends during that time, but R and M rose to the top of the pile for me.

I considered R to be one of the best guy friends that I had at that point. He was really bright, spontaneous, contagiously funny, and just all around a great guy. I like to think that he thought similar things about me.

I dated M for a while, if you could call it that. I never really did all that much to be considered a boyfriend, but I suppose that for a while we were an item. I was pretty new to the scene, with very little experience behind me and no idea what I wanted out of a relationship with someone. Just that I liked what I was seeing. But my problem, which I can see now but couldn't then, was that I didn't know who I was. I was too worried about what the guy in the next booth was thinking about me. Too worried about someone else's opinion that shouldn't have mattered a lick. But like I said, I couldn't see it. So, things with her kind of fizzled as my time counted down.
Down to the day when I had to move away.

The days were full and fun and crazy. But then in that last week, I made a decision that made R completely turn away from me. I can still remember that point, the very second, when I realized just how directly he had been impacted by this decision I'd made. I still get a hollow feeling in my chest when I think about it. I can't help it. He didn't talk to me the next day. Or any day afterward, for that matter. Moving day came and went, and I had to move on.

Time away from M was odd. I ended up writing to her a handful of times while we lived in different states. I'd like to say that our relationship grew during that time. I don't really know if it did. I know that I opened up to her in those letters more than I had to anyone else in my entire life. And maybe it was all just stupid stuff, but I don't ever remember her laughing at anything she shouldn't have. Just the stuff that I really wanted her to. I thought for a while during those months that I might have some future with this girl that had chosen me where there were so many other options. But it wasn't to be. Why? Because I was stupid.

A few years later, I tried to contact her. I sent a quick email, asking her how she was doing, what she was up to. Her response was short, but cordial. I emailed back, commenting on some worry I had that she might not want to talk to me. Again, she responded, this time questioningly and still short. I remember thinking, when I read that last email of hers, "Wow, I don't think she understood me." The next time I responded, I found that her account had been deleted. A short time later, I went back and read those emails again, and after reading that last one of hers for the second time, I thought, "Wow, I didn't understand myself."

I hadn't realized until that point just how deep my regret had gone, how far down it had buried its head. I realized that I wanted her to hate me. Why? Because I hated myself. I hated what I had done, what I had decided, where things had ended. How they had ended. My two emails were dripping with that expectation. Every word seemed to point to the fact that I had hoped that she'd just rip into me with claws bared.

As I've been thinking about my experiences in relation to this, I've found that I have that same hatred of myself for driving away my friend R as well. I want him to hate me. I expect him to. And if I saw him on the street? I'd fully expect him to pummel me until my body was black and blue, till I couldn't stand upright any long, until I finally blacked out and he could finally bring himself to walk away from me. And would I do anything to stop him? No. I don't think I'd raise a finger to stop it. Again, why? Because I expect it. Because I think I deserve it.

The problem with my expectation in each case is that R and M are good people. They've probably completely forgotten all aout this mess. Moved past it at least. I doubt they think about me at all any more. Why would they? But I can't say that it's the same for me. I think about those two all too often. I have good days and bad ones. Okay, being truthful, sometimes I have bad weeks. But I get through them.

Now, I don't want you to get me wrong. I don't regret where I am in life right now. On the contrary, I'm very happy with my life. But I just wish that I had done things differently in connection with these two. More than anything, I do. Is that too much to want?

This post really isn't for me. I'm not writing this with any sense that sharing this somehow absolves me of my fault in the matter. And it's not for R and M. I'm not looking for them to somehow stumble across my blog through a random twist of fate and see just how sorry I am (or even how completely tormented I am about it). Yeah, I'd love to patch things up with them if I could. If I'd let myself. But this post isn't for that either.

This post is for you. For the readers. In reading this, I hope that you can take away the message that I hope to convey. That you really do need to live your life so that you don't have any regrets. Use that noggin of yours. Don't make choices that will hurt yourself. Don't hurt the ones you love. Why? Because you'll hate yourself for it. Now and for a long time afterwards, you'll hate yourself for it. So love them. And stay happy.

Live to have no regrets.

#16 -- Forget the power of the wind

So, I was going to call this one:

Learn about aerodynamics...the hard way,

but decided that it just didn't accurately describe what this post was about. I mean, I've already learned about aerodynamics in school. I've taken classes on fluid flow, and compressible flow & shock waves, and turbulence. I actually understand the basics of aerodynamics. I've learned why wingtips on airplanes are bent upward, and how lift is created by the flow of air over the wing's shape (called a foil). I've learned about what turbulence really is (not the jittery motion of the plane) and even how the shape of the internal foils within a jet turbine engine change the pressure of the air inside the turbine and ultimately make the airplanes move. Not to mention the fact that I didn't really learn this lesson the hard way either. I almost did. Let me assure you. I'm getting ahead of myself though.

So, those who know me know that I suffer from frequent headaches. It's a problem that I've always had for as far back as I can remember. Headaches and me -- we're a pair. Anyhow, recently I went through a rash of "remedies", searching for the one that was going to free me of this monkey and let me live a normal life. After several tries, I resorted to one possibility that I swore I'd never try: a chiropractor.

Now, don't get me wrong. I know that chiropractors do a lot of good for a lot of people. They have ways of manipulating bones and such that solve loads of problems for those that are in pain. I just have a difficult time believing that they REALLY know EXACTLY what they are doing when they start popping people's bodies in all those funky ways.

Anyhow, I went to this chiropractor who did gave me his song and dance, cracked my bones a few times, and did a decent job of helping to alleviate some of the pain that I've associated with the pre-headache regime. Unfortunately, he did something to my middle-lower back along the way that really screwed things up.

Suffice it to say, I stopped going to see the guy, and the problem with my back persisted. I'd wake up with horrible backaches. Mostly muscular pain. It was limiting the amount of time that I could lay down on anything, and ultimately resulted in me throwing my kids foam mattress onto the floor and sleeping on it to avoid the regular pain of the morning.

This lasted for less than a week before my wife said we were going to buy a new mattress.

We did need one. Really we did. Had this first one for nearly nine years. It was time for something new. And hopefully (I was crossing my fingers at this point) a new mattress would help to solve my issues with morning back pain.

Furious shopping ensued.

We ended up getting the $600 mattress at the local store instead of the $1500 Seely for obvious financial reasons. I am still a poor college student. I have told myself that money from my first advance for my first book will go toward two thing: buying a REAL mattress, which I will love, and a trip to Hawaii for my wife and I. But I digress.

So, we found the mattress that we wanted after some deliberation. Then, one dark and not-yet-stormy night, I set out for the mattress store with my American Express in hand. We'd been to the same store earlier that day and had been told that they had a California King-sized version of the mattress that we wanted and could get it that day. So, imagine my surprise when I'm sitting at their desk, after they've swiped my card, and they say that they don't have the mattress there at that store, but that it's in their warehouse, about 20 miles away.

Nice.

So, they guy says that they can deliver the mattress tomorrow, or I could go and pick it up at their warehouse.

Now, that's not exactly the choice that I heard when they said those words. Because, you see, I'd taken our old mattress and dropped it off at DI (believe I've mentioned that second-hand store in previous posts) on my way to the mattress store. So what I heard was:

Either you can go and pick up the new mattress at our warehouse, 20 miles away, or you and your wife can sleep on the floor tonight.

Well, I really didn't feel like I had much of a choice on that one.

So, it was off to the warehouse. I got there in one piece, with the sky threatening to begin raining on me, and after only a few shennanigans found myself loading the plastic-enveloped mattress onto the top of my minivan. I pulled out a shank of rope from the back, and started to.

And then this awful thought popped into my head:

You know (I said with a grin) this could become another blog post for me. I could call it:

Lose a mattress on the freeway.

I should have stopped right there. I know I should have. Especially after the incident with having to dig my car out of the snow bank. But I didn't. I kept right on tying the thing down, blithely skipping along the path of emminent destruction with a grin the size of Texas on my face. That would never happen, after all. I'm good with knots. I was a Boy Scout.

Ramp to the freeway.

Things looking good.

Spedometer at 35.

Things still wonderful.

Spedometer at 45.

Everything fine and dandy here.

Suddenly it sounds as if the world's biggest zipper races down the top of the van and I look out and up. The front of the mattress is about three feet off the top of the car. Well, okay, so I didn't pull out my measuring tape and make sure it was exactly three feet, but it sure did look like it from that vantage point. I'm all freaking out, cursing myself for even mentioning the blog only minutes before. On go the hazard lights and I get down to about 40 MPH as other cars are whizzing past me with driver's heads cocked awry, each trying to see what idiot has attempted the Car-Top Mattress on the Freeway routine this time.

Luckily I got to the next exit in one piece with the mattress still tied to the top of my car, and proceeded to take surface streets back to my house, never once exceeding the critical speed of 40 MPH.

That was a close one, let me tell you. And $600 never felt like so much as it did when I saw that mattress up in the air threatening to take leave of me with nary a care for what I wanted it to do.

But I learned from this experience, let me tell you. I did. I learned that next time I'm doing something, no matter what it is, that if I have any particular thoughts along the lines of:

You know, this could make a great blog entry. I could call it...

that I should turn and run from said circumstances.

Case in point:

Less than two weeks following the aforementioned circus, I found myself at church playing basketball one Saturday and needing to take a moment to visit the commode. I entered said facilities with my keys in my hand (for some inexplicable reason) and made for the nearest stall. I needed to put my keys somewhere and thought for one brief second that the top of the toilet tank looked like a likely resting place for them. I laid them there carefully and had a thought come to mind.

You know, I said to myself, this could make for another interesting blog post. I could call it:

Have my key ring fall into a toilet full of...

Well, you get the point. Suffice it to say, I removed my keys from the top of the tank and placed them on the floor. After taking care of things, I retrieved my keys and returned to play some more ball.

You see, I do learn. Sometimes, it just takes a while to sink in.

#15 -- Break another one

So, I've decided that I should just stay off of toilet lids. They just weren't made with people like me in mind. They need to make 'em out of stainless steel or something. Anyone know where I could get one like that?

#14 -- Have to dig myself out

This is a story about fate or karma or whatever you want to call it. It's that overlying power that seems to resonate throughout the world and will quite frequently turn to bite you in the butt. In this respect more than any other, it reminds me, not so fondly, of my toilet seat.

So, first let me say that I'm an Arizona boy, through and through. I've been living in Utah now for more than a decade, and still I feel like if it's going to snow that it'd be better if the stuff just fell on the grass and roofs, and stayed off of things like streets, and parking lots, and most definitely the sidewalks. As such, I don't think that I've fully gained the proper respect for what a good snowstorm's capacity for annoyance could be. That is, I didn't have one until tonight.

For some reason when I got in my minivan, preparing to make a quick run to the public library and to our favorite super-mega store, I thought how funny a blog entry named "Have to dig myself out" might be. But I didn't have to worry. I mean, I don't live in Wisconsin or Montana or anything like that. We just don't get that much snow here.

Enter karma. Insert butt. Copious pain to follow.

You know, I don't think I have much of a proper respect for the power of karma either.

Anyhow, yesterday it snowed a bundle. Something like a foot. For me, a desert-raised city boy now living in Utah, that was quite a bit, but nothing that might cause annoyance. So when, a second storm decided to ride in on the tail-wind of the first and dump another foot or so on us, I didn't think much of it either. Even when I started noticing piles of snow that were taller than me, found my leg sinking to the knee as I tromped across what should have been the lawn, and noticed that the level of the snow around my car came clear up to the bumper, it still didn't much phase me so much.

Eh, no big deal, I thought, as I climbed into said minivan and shifted into reverse. I'll just drive right out and make it to the library before it closes. Boy that blog entry sure would have been a good one.

Over the next ten minutes or so I proceeded to get myself royally stuck. The tires spun, the car rocked, we made it eighteen inches back, and then came forward once more. I was sure that if I just turned the wheel the right way, that I'd be able to climb right out of the depression I'd made in the snow. Out of the car I came, repeatedly, in an attempt to clear the way with my car-window scraper, slapping at the piled snow like a kid pulling a toothpick through a sponge cake. Back in, rock the car, spin the tires. Into the snow to dig some more, chunk up the ice I was making through friction.

Before too long, I had worked up a good sweat. In fact, it had started dripping down my face and neck and really got quite annoying. Why was I so blasted hot? I wondered. Looking around, I noticed for the first time that the heat inside the car was blowing full-bore into my face, and was quite warm due to all the engine revving that I had been doing. Not so hot then, just the snow melting from within my bird's nest of hair. That problem was solved easily. With the heat off, I realized that the radio too was blaring. How had I missed that? Radio off, and suddenly I could really hear the engine whine. Bonus. I'd be out in two seconds now.

Back to work I went. Rock, rock. Forward, back, repeat. After a few attempts, I noticed that my tires were now up over the curb and I was tearing the grass out from underneath the nice pack of snow we had. Oops. It was only a few more minutes before I had really gotten myself stuck good. So good in fact, that I couldn't move the car at all.

And the snow just kept on coming. Ah, the lovely snow.

It took me another ten minutes to get myself unstuck (with much luck), and the car back to it's original position. Well, almost it's original position. As it ended up, I had shifted it in the passenger's direction about a foot, up onto the grass. Well, I decided that I had to do something, or the manager of the complex would string me up by my toes the next day for ruining his grass.

Enter shovel.

Another ten minutes of back-breaking labor, and the way was clear. Then I got my wife out to steer as I pushed on the front bumper, and to my great wonder and amazement the car was free to leave. And it had only taken me forty-five minutes to do it. My but what fun this stuff can be.

Never let it be said that I don't learn from a lesson so forcefully stuffed into my face. I immeditely added "Ice Melt" to my list of groceries, and said good-bye to my wife for the second time that trip.

Well, there was no Ice Melt at the store. Yeah. Guess everyone got there before I did. Wonderful. So, I decided that good old non-iodized salt would take care of the problem just as well, and bought two cans of it. It's all the same right? Actually, I have no idea what Ice Melt salt actually is, so don't quote me on that. It went on pretty easy though. We'll see how it worked tomorrow morning.

As I was finally coming back into the house from this wonderful adventure, a recent conversation I had with a friend of mine came to mind. He said that his father (a very wise man) had a very good reason for living in Arizona: you don't have to shovel sunshine.

And after this experience, I only have one thing to say: A-men.