Bleah.

I just feel like saying that right now.  nothing that is really causing me to say that.  Bleah just seems like a fun word to say right now.  It looks even better written in front of me.  I think I will italicize it and add a bold font.

Bleah.

Yippee.  That makes me smile.

This has been one of those days that has not gone as intended or planned.  I am on a one day weekend, yesterday the one mandatory Saturday work day of the year, so I planned to do my own thing most of today.

Laundry.

Plan the week’s menu.

Do the checkbook.  Pay the bills.

Read a book while kicking back on the couch watching the Packers get demolished.

Take a shower and shave.

And it’s 5 PM with none of the above accomplished.  Today has been a very snowy Sunday.  My wife does not drive in the snow.  I love love love LOVE driving in the snow.  So I have been running here and there and everywhere since around noon.  Right now I am waiting for my kids to get out of the movie they are watching, sitting in a restaurant goofing around with my laptop.

So I say ‘bleah’.  And ‘yeah’ because I AM getting to drive in the snow.

Looking forward it looks like there is a lot of potential for stress.  Thursday, as I walked from my car into the building at work, an ambulance pulled up and picked up a coworker.  Mike is the other senior guy in my department, the one who makes life easier for me.  He had a heart attack, minor but still enough that he won’t be back at work until next month at the earliest.  I know who will be expected to pick up his work load.  Thank goodness one of my biggest headaches, main contact for our facility in Shanghai, is now being shared amongst my department rather than all their requests being handled by little ol’ me.  I have a two million dollar project to finish tomorrow, then my boss will be looking at Mike’s projects to see what needs to be done.  On the up side, the added hours will mean a better paycheck.  I get paid hourly.

My body is weird today.  Just today.  I had a lot of coffee this morning, a chocolate chip cookie for breakfast, and a Big Mac for lunch.  Not only am I not hungry, I feel stuffed.  Weird.  I should be hungry.

Speaking of dinner, I met some old friends on Thursday night for dinner, people who had been employees of mine over 25 years ago when I was a manager for Bob Evans restaurants.  They found me on FB before Christmas and it’s been fun reconnecting.  However, 25 years is a long time.  I was a bit reluctant to meet them because, well, I am 52 years old now, pudgy from the holidays, and did I mention I am 52 years old?  I had to stuff the feelings of inadequacy, say it really doesn’t matter what I look like now, just have fun meeting old friends.  Good thing I did.  It was only an hour or so, but a lot of fun.

Weather forecast is calling for temperatures below -10 degrees.  Should be interesting tomorrow.  My PT Loser is NOT going to want to run in the morning.

And that is enough of this rambling blog.

Wonderful Worry

This is a season of great wonder.. with a pinch of worry mixed in as well as a large dose of anxiety.

Knowwuttimean?

There I go again speaking in Ernest.

Every December I find myself contemplating on what a journey life is.  For me it is very circular, a certain deja vu niggling at my brain (does using the word ‘niggling’ make me a racist?) and telling me that much of my experience takes me back to a place I have been before.  December is always tough, a financial conundrum destined to bewilder me and chase me in my dreams.  Christmas is looming large, bills are weeping unpaid in my happy place bill box, and the frigid northern Illinois weather tests the limits of anything mechanical until it breaks.  My world is a universe governed by Murphy, so if it’s going to break it’s going to break at the worst possible moment.

Every December I find myself reaching deep for that final sprint to the finish line.

And every time I make it there, limping a bit and holding my hamstring, but across the line on my own power nonetheless.  I hesitate to say it that way because, well, it’s never my own power that gets me there.  What gets me there is a combination of wills — faith in God’s will, my own will and determination, the support of others, maybe even a bit of luck.  I keep expecting to break down, fall short of that year end finish line, but experience has shown me that there is always that little bit left that gets me there.

So I survive weeks like this one, where it felt like the huge December cloud emptied itself on me all at once.  This week started off with the cloud dumping double car failure, house failure, even library failure on me.  When I felt like those were about to be tackled, the PT Loser decided to have a flat yesterday morning.  I stood outside at 7:15 in the morning, my work personal days used up and an 8 AM punch time looming, in frigid 3 degree weather while I looked at a flat tire, searching for my emergency air compressor and car jack.  The dark cloud of depression descended on me, so much that I could literally feel it enveloping me and the physical signs evident.

I stopped myself.  Walked inside the house, warmed my frozen soul, prayed for calm and found it.

I also found my compressor.  Last night.  It took twenty minutes of pleading, but Mir gave me a ride to work in the rental car we had from the day before.  I made it.

It’s December.

Give me a ho ho ho.

Marriage is not about the other person

Tags

fatherhood, guy stuff, marriage, reality, relationships

I just read a blog that seems to be going viral right now, reposted on WP and FB by several friends.  The blog is titled “Marriage Isn’t For You”, written by a young man who wants to share the advice given to him by his father as that young man struggled with the questions any one has while engaged — is marriage for me?  The advice, in a nutshell, was that marriage (and love) is best when it is about the other person.

I and a lot of people can’t help but agree.  In principle I do wholeheartedly agree.  And it was good advice at the time it was given.

As usual, I couldn’t help but throw my two cents in.  My comment:

The advice you received is good advice to build a marriage on, in my mind a restore point that you can come back to at any place along the marriage continuum.  I have been married 21 years, with two kids, and experience has taught me that the only way to be in it for the long haul is to learn to put self aside.  That seems to really be what you were told.  Put self aside.  Not an easy thing to do, especially since there will be times when it feels like that is all you are doing.

So you need to learn to say to yourself that it’s OK for marriage and fatherhood to be about you now and then.  It really does need to be.  The advice you received is only part of the picture.  You also got married because you found someone who you know wants your marriage to be about you.  You know her well enough already that you know she has learned that, that she will be able to come back to that point you are at now.

What I just said may be difficult to understand for those who don’t have the experience.  Trust me. It’s true.

It doesn’t take much knowledge about me to understand my reasoning in the comment.  For years I have struggled to accept not being a priority, the concept of marriage being about the other weighted too much in the direction of my spouse.  While I understand and even relish the role of provider/husband/father, I have come to the point where it just needs to be about me now and then.  That is not selfish.  No one can exist without reward.

Why do I have a vision of myself guarding a red stapler right now?

Sometimes you have to reward yourself.  After 22 years of marriage, advice my own father gave to me becomes more and more true each day — “Son, if she isn’t going to make it about you at all — and she doesn’t in my opinion — then you have to just make it about yourself.  Find ways to make yourself happy.  Do your own thing.”

This past weekend was an example of what I have learned — sometimes it’s OK to reward yourself.  In a marriage where my own thing isn’t always acceptable, even viewed as a sin, I just need to do what I want to do.  Go out with the guys.  Have that beer now and then.  Ride my bike.  Go somewhere without my wife or family.  This weekend I went on a trip five hours away to southern Indiana for a mountain biking trip with two friends, Jim and Jon.  We had an absolute blast.  It was my last hurrah, my surgery postponed until the middle of November so I could take the trip.  We did what we wanted to do, which was ride our bikes off road five and a half hours on Saturday, five hours on Sunday.  Boy, did I need that.

And trips like that is what may help my marriage to survive another 22 years.  My wife has had to learn to encourage me to do things like I did last weekend, have my own time, accept it.  Years ago I would have spent the weekend and the days leading up to it living a guilt trip before I even packed my bags.  I came home to perhaps might be the first time in quite a while where I felt this whole thing might just be about me too.  I need that.  Every husband, every wife, needs that.  Do we need to reciprocate?  You bet.  But if we’re not getting it back, even the strongest won’t survive.

Tags

St. Louis Cardinals

Four World Series appearances in a ten year time frame.  In the last three years, the St. Louis Cardinals have appeared in the World Series twice, narrowly missed playing the Series last year.  As a sports fan, a baseball fan, I could not be more happy.  My team really does not need to bring home a Series championship this year, although I will be ecstatic if they do.  I feel like a winner just being associated with the Cardinals as a fan. 

I also enjoy having a reason to be smugly annoying.  Friends and haters have accused Cardinal fans of being the Midwestern equivalent to Yankee fans, the bring-a-dish-to-pass -Sunday-go-to-meeting version.  Many express their distaste for “The Cardinal Way”, dismissing the notion that the Cardinals win because of the way they and their fans approach the game.  They also find Cardinal fans because of sentiments like I expressed in my first paragraph of this blog.

They are all jealous.  All, every one of those who dismiss the Cardinal Way and resent our annoying celebrations, would love to be in our shoes.  It’s OK.  Like I said, I enjoy having a reason to be smugly annoying.

Cardinal fans expect to win.  We have no reason to expect anything different from a team, an organization, that has given us otherwise.  Our swagger is deserved.  Yet, our swagger is not like the typical swagger.  Cardinal fans have a realistic humility, much like the team they support, that also makes fans of other teams admit their appreciation.  My friends dread seeing that goofy smile I get when my team has won, but they also like me for it.

I love baseball.  I bleed Cardinal red.  Baseball is one of my favorite topics of conversation and some of my best friends are baseball fans.

Go Cardinals!

 

“Hey Steve. I wanted to use our fish

Tags

believe me, blog commenting professional, I is an indirect author

“Hey Steve. I wanted to use our fish conversation we had the other day in my book.  My protagonist is a huge fan of sardines and anchovies…it plays out in a few parts of the book.  Would that be okay with you?  To steal some of your puns…rather use poetic licence with them?  🙂   Let me know. Thanks Stevil.  I think you may be on vacation now, so have a great one.”

I’m published.  Not directly, but I am published.  My friend who also writes, decided to taint her book with comments from our Facebook conversations.  The book is published.  I am sure that you can find it in a Cracker Barrel gift shop nationwide.

Seriously.

http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/14654741-what-the-heck-dec

My friend Betsy’s use of the word ‘droolicious’ is not something she stole from me.  I am likely the inspiration for that Declan character though.  It’s often that I am spotted with eye candy on my arm.  I usually swat it off.

Any book described as a ‘wallbanger’ (any book that becomes annoying you want to throw it against a wall) is a book that I likely was involved with, even though I didn’t write it.  I didn’t read this one either.  But I wrote part of it as you all witnessed in the quote.

I’m usually funnier when I am commenting on someone’s blog, especially if I am commenting on someone who is already so funny that they don’t really need me to make them that way.  Here in WP land, I comment regularly on a humor columnist’s blog named Ted, and our comment threads get pretty schtinkin’ hilarious if you ask me.  Go ahead.  Ask me.  Ted has not asked me to leave yet, even when his very own significant other wife expressed her appreciation of my talents.  My comment wielding talents.

My blog life has been that way, days spent commenting on my blogs and others as a means of combatting boredom or just plain having fun.  A good friend of mine, Sandy, has teamed up with me to drive many an OCD blogger insane with our friendly banter.  We’re wicked together in a very nice brother and sister sort of way, so much that some people have mistaken us as a brother and sister couple.  Or worse.  Married.  That would not make us funny together, however, unless you look at us.  We met in a bathroom and have pretty much stayed there since.

It’s true.  Wish I still had those pictures.

Shake my hand and congratulate me for being indirectly published.  I washed.

I have a back yard full of teenaged

Tags

band nerds, dad brag

I have a back yard full of teenaged band nerds.  Gathered around a little bonfire I built for them in the family fire pit.  It’s past my bedtime and I should be asleep.. because I am an old fart and old farts need their sleep, dang it.  But you never know what mischief band nerds, MARCHING BAND nerds, are going to pull.

Probably none.  I should go to bed.

You know what?  (I heard that.. someone said “No, what?”)

I did something right.  There are times, few and far between mind you, but there are times.  I bought that fire pit last September with the hope that my lovely daughter would want to have her friends over.  AND SHE ASKED ME TO BUILD A FIRE AND LET HER HAVE A PARTY TONIGHT.  Yeah.  This dad rocks.  He rocks a fire too.  It’s smokin’ hot.

I probably should not tell them why there is white smoke coming from the fire.  I just might be making use of the wood, white painted wood, from the picket fence I took down last year.  Mir has been be(u)gging me to get rid of that wood.

Oh, and the kid that Alyssa went to a movie with last night is out there.  Mayyyyyyybe I should make an appearance out there and introduce myself.

Naaaaaaaaa.

Good night.  I will sleep well.  The Cardinals beat the Cubs.  The Blackhawks won.  The Tour de France starts Saturday. 

(Brag time — Nate, my newly 14 year old son, won the Golf competition at the high school golf camp today, as an incoming freshman.  He is psyched.  He also scored a 38 in his golf league match on Monday.  The kid is hooked on golf.  I’m accepting donations to help support his habit.)

NaNo thoughts

Tags

NaNo, National Novel Writing Month

It’s a good thing my NaNo novel has a survival theme.  That is a bit of what the exercise feels like.  I’m not saying I am not having fun.  I am.  One thing I have learned from previous NaNos is that making the time to write each and every day is the key to success.  The reality is that being a family man means that I need to keep focused, squeeze out every opportunity, or else that time may not present itself to me.

Our clothes dryer broke as I began my first evening of writing on November 1.  Nate practically shrieked in desperation for me to help him with his homework (that he wants my help is a rarity).  Later on that evening, he and Mir announced to me that the webcam was not working on the family computer.  My expertise was required immediately in order for his project to be completed that night.  Mir also decided that she needed to have a chat with me about our finances that night.

Yet I made my word goal that day.  Woot.

I probably should include this blog in my word count.  No.  Wait.  Temptation to fudge the word count, fighting said temptation that is, is also key to survival in the whole NaNo exercise.  Yeah, there are no police who will come wailing in if one cheats, but the personal shame of cheating just isn’t worth it.  Even if a usable novel does not result from the month of word frenzy, the pride of making the 50K word goal is worth it all.

Alyssa is writing a NaNo as adult this year.  Two years ago she completed a young adult NaNo of 20K words.  She is taunting me in a very new age, teenage way — through FB, text messages, and by plain old face to face stick out your tongue taunts.  So far writing has been easy for her and she’s cranking out her novel very quickly.  She is over 11K just five days into the challenge.. and she is letting the world know that she is going to celebrate being ahead of her dad while she can still say she is ahead of me.

That’s OK.  Maybe I’ll let her stay ahead.

Having my daughter writing along me has created an acceptance, once the November 1 debacle passed, that is unprecedented in my household.  The non-writers Mir and Nate usually don’t accept the interruption of my attention.  But Alyssa loves that I am writing, so our world is suddenly in peace.  Did I say how much I love my daughter?  I do even more these past few days.

Alyssa even persuaded me to attend my first write in last night — “Dad, you will never get the peace you need to concentrate if you don’t get out of the house.”  I agreed.  I also needed to get away from the clothes dryer project that had sucked my time most of the afternoon.  I packed up my laptop to head for the write in at a Wheaton Caribou.

Yikes.  Why are NaNo people so “socially awkward” (weird, strange, howl at the moon demented)?  Mir said I must have fit in quite well when I told her about my first write in experience.  I did come home with a nifty plot bunny.  However, no one knew that a group of high schoolers had also planned a poetry slam in the same space and time as the write in.  I snap clapped through 2000 words and the plot bunny toothed NaNo woman who shared the small coffee shop table with me.  A girl who called herself Squiddich nervously twitched next to me the entire evening of writing.

I had fun.  This whole thing is fun.  Word count is 8346 and just a few words ahead of the goal.

Keep up.  Wish me luck.  And to my American friends, vote early and vote often.

NaNo NaNo.

Handy

Tags

family

Everything I know I learned from watching my dad.

That’s not a new concept but one that certainly applies in my life.  Dad is one of those guys who is master of none, a fly by the seat of your pants mechanic, a hit or miss technician – one of those people who has the philosophy that nothing is worth fixing if he doesn’t attempt to fix it himself first.  One exception is his carpentry skills, learned from working side by side with his father in law, honed by building several houses of his own.  He also grew up farming, not on one of those prosperous farms, but on rented land that his family farmed for others.  If they didn’t fix their equipment themselves, it would not get fixed simply because they didn’t have the money to do so.  Dad’s attitude is what soaked into my brain more than anything else.  I too will attempt to fix most things before I will pay to have a professional perform the deed.

Mom learned her nursing skills not only by patching me up, but also by patching dad up during his many handy adventures.  Personal injury is another thing I learned from watching my dad.  Still etched on my brain is the horror of watching dad manage to stick a screw driver into his forehead, drive a nail into his hand, gash his forearm with a chainsaw.  All injuries involved blood, never broken bones, so mom kept a large kit filled with bandages and salves.  My job was usually to run for nurse mom when dad injured himself.  You would think that I would have become a paramedic when I grew up (whenever that happens) from all the experience I had in triage for my father.

Dad and I did keep nurse mom busy.  I had my share of bloody adventures, compounded by my being one of those barefoot boys who tossed his shoes aside as soon as he went out the back door.  Mom even took to calling the mothers of my friends and brought my shoes to me.  She had reason – a ripped open foot from sliding underneath a chain link fence while playing backyard football, a crucified foot from dropping a nailed board on top of it while building a canal system in the neighbor’s yard, and various other blisters and burns from walking across tarred roads in the middle of summer.  Then there was a ripped open hand (playing with a hubcap), a broken collar bone (bicycle accident), a concussion from dropping a baseball bat on my head (yes, it’s possible), or the messed up face I suffered the night I decided to try alcohol.  Mom was a very busy mom nurse.

Dad and I eventually grew up.  No longer is it necessary to keep the hospital on speed dial.

Yesterday, as I enjoyed a beautiful autumn day outdoors while replacing the battery cables on my PT Cruiser-To-The-Auto-Parts-Store, I took a moment to stroll around my yard.  There is still one fence post left in the back of the yard, one of the posts I put in to replace one of the many rotting posts as the picket fence began it’s death by old age.  Our shed had a fresh coat of white paint and repaired doors.  A screen door stood partially open in front of the sliding glass door, both which I have fixed with my own hands.  The screens on the house windows all sported fresh aluminum mesh, another one of my attempts to save money by doing it on my own.  Carefully maintained bicycles fill one bay of our garage, parked in the cool little bike rack I fashioned from PVC pipe, wire baskets, and wood.  I don’t really feel like a handyman, but I guess I learned a little from watching my dad.  The evidence glared at me on that little stroll around my yard, satisfaction filling me last evening as the car repair was finished and my family relaxed around the fire I had built from firewood I had cut myself and in the fire pit I installed in our backyard.

I wonder what my own son is learning from watching me?  An appreciation for bicycles, most likely.  A penchant for creativity, I hope, although that one seems to be my daughter’s thing.  Attention to detail, something that comes natural to him as evidenced by the way he approaches any sport.  We’ll see.  He’ll see, I suppose, when he gets to my point in life.