taking stock

taking stock of 2017. (a terribly disjointed entry this year.)

not sure i'm going to make it to midnight, so i'll just say thanks to the many who have gotten me to a better place than i was this time last year — kelli, jack, steve, michael, dan, my beautiful kristina, our beautiful babies and my wonderful, supportive family and friends.

i am the beneficiary of countless prayers and intercessions by countless saints — on earth and in heaven. i am grateful for all of you who have been put in my path. i thank the Lord for you and ask that he may always bless and keep you.

and as per tradition, in my sadly neglected paper journal, i recount my resolutions for the coming year:

1. continue to pray — i have listened better to the call in the night to renew my meditations
2. give your wife a bedroom she can be proud of
3. keep working — earn that work qualification
4. get your wind back — focus on cardio this year
5. LISTEN TO YOUR WIFE — pay better attention to what she is saying; she deserves at least that much. you'll do this if you love her as much as you say you do.

that's it; a couple more things than last year, but you've made a little progress from last year. let's work to make it happen this year.

as ever, thank you, Lord, for your countless and constant blessings. may i live my life as an offering of thanksgiving. amen, amen and amen.

happy new year, y'all.

blue

so much left undone. another hurly burly holiday whizzed past. a dirty, dull coolness ahead.

it's after christmas and i feel so bleh.

little girl

girl talk.

six as of 1436. smdh. becoming less little and more girl by the day. smdh.

bedtime song

after saying their prayers, the kids still get a lullabye before bed.

tonight, the girl asked what "woo" was after i sang "baa-baa, black sheep."

first, i explained "woo," then, i told her that mama and i have been saying "wool," which i also explained.

i love that both these kids sing songs heedless of knowing lyrics.

from "elf: the animated musical"

"just sing a christmas song/it's no problem if things go wrong"

(actual lyric: "just sing a christmas song/it's like magic when things go wrong")

from "deck the halls"

"down we now our daily prayers"

(actual lyric: "don we now our gay apparel")

from "uptown funk"

"it's too hot/hot day"

(actual lyric: "it's too hot/hot damn")

from "hello"

"i'm sorry for breaking your toys"

(actual lyric: "i'm sorry for breaking your heart")

of course, i think i still get lyrics wrong. but the ones from the kids possess an innocence of language and meaning that is sweet and endearing.

i'm going to keep my ears open while they still sing loud and clear and unabashed about not making sense or getting the words wrong.

hi, tech; bye, tetch

this was the boy about a year and a half ago, tackling a primary school, learn-to-read story from featuring lego d.c. comics characters.

he and his sister have since acquired their own library cards and choose their own books on their visits.

the girl, now learning phonics and sounding out words just as the boy did almost two years ago, approaches her reading with a mix of resolution and anxiety. she doesn't want to make a mistake.

the boy is pretty confident, deftly jumping word to word, gulping down meaning, fishtailing through curves before righting himself on the straights. he rarely stumbles on words, figuring them out on his own and seldom asking us for help.

i've appreciated how he comes to recognize words in common usage that he sees for the first time in print and banks them as another piece to his vocabulary.

what i've come to equally appreciate are the less-common words — those mommy and daddy read regularly but don't use in daily conversation.

"high tech" is one of those words, as are any constructions of using the compound modifier "mecha-."

the boy loves him some robots, spaceships and superheroes and picks up a goodly number of books featuring them. he also enjoys drawing pictures of his own creations as well as writing and illustrating comic books where they figure prominently. (inspired, no doubt, by dav pilkey, of "captain underpants" fame.)

cyber kids, 8 dec 2017

well, among his latest creations over the past month or two have been high-tech devices and mecha-characters and possibly high-tech, mecha-characters.

thing is, as a now-undaunted reader, learning words on his own, he's read and pronounces these words phonetically, e.g., "high-tetch, metcha-characters."

the "ch" sound as he's learned it bookends "church" and finishes "arch," not like a "k," as in "character" or "anchor."

i never corrected him when he spoke the words because, well, i guess because it kept him little, still reading like a young boy and i still want him to be my little boy.

today, though, he made a lego weapon that was part rock and part machine, a mecha-rock gun. (the "rock" was lava.) he described the mecha-device to me and i grinned a little and was impressed by his imagination.

his mama, though, when shown the gizmo and listening to his description, corrected his pronunciation: "mekka-rock gun" and "high-tek"system.

i tried to rein her in, but he began correcting himself afterward. (a fool's errand and disservice to him, i know.) so ... another page turns in the book of our boy's journey to literacy.

this time, 40 years ago

i was in traction in the hospital with a fractured femur and a bolt through my left knee after a car hit me after school not nine hours earlier.

ten years ago, i wrote my recollections and thoughts of being the parent of a child lying unconscious on the road.

i'm still befuddled every time one of my nieces pukes on me. i can only imagine the stress it placed on my parents having to watch their boy drifting in and out of consciousness for 24 hours.

now i've got kids of my own and, Lord knows, having watched my siblings and the news, every time something bad happens to a child, it just tears me up.

God bless all those worried, loving parents of children in pain.

kid stuff

first of all, here's the girl's impromptu video tale of a space monkey that she made with a kid's meal toy. (she went on a field trip today and the class ate at wendy's for lunch.)

i like its short, simple story told in her tiny voice. i also like — i think — how she and her "big bruvvy" take to the smartphone like the proverbial duck to water.  (no problems swiping from shooting still photos to video. freakin' digital natives.)

that said, though, the two seem not to suffer from any lack of imagination so far, which we hope will serve them well as they grow up. (but not too fast, please.)

speaking of which — second — her imagination and expectations hit a speed bump this morning when she arose early this first of december ready to search for a christmas elf on the shelf and found no sign of him.

while she wailed and gnashed her teeth on mama's bedside, daddy still woke up to her trying to console her daughter with assertions that the elf doesn't appear until the tree is up and that it wasn't even advent yet.

the boy's make-good

this did little to placate her as she told her mom that her friends didn't have their trees up and that their elves were already making appearances. (i guess since thanksgiving was good enough for their less discriminating elfin brethren to begin their hijinks.)

mama's sleepy yet stern response was that comparing oneself to one's friends was a bad road to get on this early in life and sure a path to misery. she assured her daughter that once our tree was up, "ginger" (our elf's name, i had to be reminded) will make his appearance. (he's got a beard, so i'm guessing he's a he, but it's possible she has a lot of testosterone in her.)

the boy, on the other hand, chose a slicker, more 7-year-old savvy approach to the magical no-show: breezy, diplomatic correspondence. surely, no elf could resist such an entreaty.

so, since we were planning to get the tree tomorrow anyway, i have a strong suspicion our tiny bearded friend will make his appearance fairly soon.

ho. ho. ho-o-oh ... my. Lord.

regrets, i've had a few

i got an email this evening from my journalism school seeking an update on my status since graduation.

i suppose because it offered the convenience of online registration, i took the bait and gave my information — name, address, email, degree, whatnot — but left blank the field asking about any exciting news.

arek socha/pixabay

i typed, then walked back the exciting news that i had a new, official government public affairs job, mostly because, well, i believe the nature of my work probably requires i stay in the background and not draw a lot of attention to myself or the agency. (it's not secret spy stuff, but it pays to be discreet.)

so as much as i'd like let the school and the world know what i'm doing, well, yeah, it's probably best i don't say too much.

meantime, all those years when i modestly chose not to document my promotions and awards are behind me, with no record of my accomplishments at the school that taught me the skills and judgment that led to a successful newspaper career.

in my mind, making the effort to put pen to paper to list my milestones was itself boastful and self-congratulatory. i'm learning a little late in life that a degree of self-promotion is necessary to create top-of-mind awareness.

while those close to you might recognize your quiet effort and ability, you are a blank slate to someone who doesn't know you at all; it's best to have your best stuff written on it.

so where does that leave me?

while i'm in a good place now, it's time for the old dog to learn a few new tricks. i received a professional development document this afternoon that seems to provide a road map to bolstering my qualifications in my new line of work.

i believe if i do this right, i could be well-suited to advance my career — or at least be able to transfer those qualifications to a new job should my time at this agency end.

there aren't many chances to make up for lost opportunities or make amends for past mistakes. good Lord willing, i may yet be able to turn those naive, regrettable choices into learning experiences that lead to new successes.

pre-advent

tabletop tree trimming

large cat tries to stake her claim

a little christmas began this week in the house. as i told a friend, we're segueing nicely from the sugar rush of halloween to the mounting mania of advent and christmas.

the boy still seems to remain in the thrall of the jolly old elf and his minions. there's no question that his sister is a true believer.

i can't get over how tall they're both getting, though.

thanks

signed, sealed, delivered.

i wanted to write something eloquent but figured i'd probably think it to death and never write anything at all, so i'm just going to say it.

first of all, after more than a year of uncertainty as to my employment, i'm thankful that i got signed from my "temporary" job to a real contract with benefits. government benefits. for that, i, and the lady who pays the bills, are most grateful.

in that vein, i'm first thankful for the job tip that got me here from longtime newsroom colleague and friend, lauren.

thanks to my first friends at the new job: leslie, cici, andrea, jim, sarah, lloyd, sue and zuni. their professional excellence, paired with their sense of irreverent fun, made me feel like i'd never left the newsroom.

thanks to the folks i met after they moved on: dave, tom, chad, lucy, charlie and kelly. they helped pull back more of the curtain on the mysteries of government public affairs and planning.

a whole lot of folks in other departments gave me a better appreciation of what our agency does and offered great friendship and mentoring at the same time. it might be shorter to list their specialties than to list all the people i got to know there: infrastructure, housing, hazard mitigation, historical preservation, logistics and recovery.

(i'll mention jeff by name, because he's going to be my supervisor.)

finally, there was a string of officers who busted their butts to keep me on staff and made me realize that my work was not just appreciated but valued: regis, jack, kelli, jacqui, steve, michael, kevin and dan.

most of all, thanks for the support of my beautiful wife, kris, a constant source of encouragement and motivation, the bright sunniness of our children, and my family and friends for their prayers, hopes and good wishes.

all these i count as blessings from the Lord, not merely because they eased my transition to a new profession, but their efforts felt like a joyful outpouring of love.

i've always considered myself a man of faith to some extent but i'm not sure i ever leaned on it — or learned from it —as much as i have over the past year. that is a blessing unto itself.

amen, amen and amen. thanks be to God. alleluia, alleluia.

blogger app

does this even work? 

well, i guess the app works for posting but not editing. hmm. 

all saints

Happy All Saints Day! It’s a Holy Day of Obligation, don’t forget to go to Mass! Who are your three favorite saints? Tell us in the comments! #Catholic #saints #prayforus #feastday #party #faith #prayer

A post shared by Catholic News Agency (@catholicnewsagency) on Nov 1, 2017 at 1:28pm PDT

our new music minister suggested singing with a saint, living or dead, as a prayer partner as he accompanied on an all-saints song he sang at mass today.

i rely on many prayers from many saints. and i try my best to pray for those in need of prayer every day.

amen.

halloween

candy rush.

the kids dig halloween in a way i never did.

the boy especially starts thinking about costumes and drawing tableaus in the summer. the girl likes candy and dress-up.

gutting.

we bought these gorgeous pumpkins at the aldi store at the start of the month, but held off on carving them after the ones we did early last october rotted within a week.

drawing.

we didn't get to hacking until all hallows eve eve. (kris thought it was too late, but i knew the kids wanted to decorate, so i took on the task.)

the kids drew their designs and daddy carved them out. the funny thing was despite the large canvas presented on the large pumpkins, they both made small features — the girl especially.

but the templates each had their charms and turned out to translate well as kid art onto big gourds.

the big night took us out on a lovely fall evening for about an hour as they filled their buckets to overflowing. i just enjoyed greeting our neighbors and getting into the spirit of the holiday, if you'll pardon the pun.

upon our return, mama doled out their evening's ration and set aside some for later. the rest, daddy was taking to the office.

wonder twins.

the girl ate until her belly ached. the boy just knew when to stop.

mama figures the boy won't care nearly as much about his costume next year and will probably choose to wear it again. we'll see. he'll be 8 then, maybe more interested in being cool with his friends and not being seen with mom and dad and sis.

the kids keep growing. i'm doing my best to enjoy their being kids.

lit.

belated anniversary

sent to me at work, 23 october 2007.

so this girl's been with us now for ten years and one week.

when we first got her, we thought she was a boy, so we gave her a boy's name. then we found out differently.

also sent to me at work,
28 september 2017.

she lives with us under any number of titles — "dirty and smelly," "horrifying cat" or any combination of those and others too vulgar to write here — but she remains a member of the family, beloved, even by those disgusted or unnerved by her.

thanks for sticking around with us, smidge, and for making our lives so interesting.

progress, i think

selfie, yesterday.

i think the boy, in the background with daddy, is wholly in the throes of his hormones.

my old belief remains that the hormonal jangling that contributed to his harrowing toddler behavior has been somewhat modified to include his ridiculous 7-year-old boy behavior, including inexplicable decision-making, manic emotional swings and general goofiness.

so i find some consolation in hearing that he tests well, albeit points off in math for hurriedness, lack of care and the resultant mistakes, and that he is considered a kind and thoughtful kid.

today, though, his teachers reported that he exhibited a remarkable sweetness: he used his "good grade/behavior points" to "buy" a lunch pass to sit with whomever he wanted. the thing that killed them was that of all his classmates and friends, he chose to sit with his little sister.

first day of school.

she was apparently over the moon with his decision and very pleased, proud and happy to have a "big kid" sit with her at the little kids table. she came running out of school to her mommy to share the great news.

the boy explained to mama that after this year, he wouldn't have the same lunch period as his sister, so he said he'd dedicate whatever "points" he earns over the year to lunch passes with his little sis, so they could have as much time together as they could while they could.

i think mama almost died from the endearing display. she noted that for the rest of the day, the two were inseparable and very affectionate and kind to each other.

i'm telling you, while i have no idea how this guy's mind works or what direction it's headed in, i hope he never loses his sweet nature.

three-day weekend

this weekend's benefactor.

when you work at a daily paper, you learn there are no holidays you don't work: christmas, easter, election day — it doesn't matter. the news has to go out.

working now for the federal government, i'm getting days off i never imagined, like martin luther king jr. day, president's day and columbus day. columbus day!

at the paper, i could always count on two three-day weekends, memorial day and labor day. (the summer wild card was independence day. at the old charleston daily mail, you had to work at least one of those days.)

for some reason, that third day always held a sort of promise for me: the chance to unwind or get some housework done or something productive or beneficial.

more often than not, though, laziness, illness or an unscheduled commitment would steal a day and disrupt a flow or dither away a good start.

i'd wind up disappointed and regretful and wondering where the time went or why i'd even gotten my hopes up in the first place.

i've now got three days lined up, two sick kids, the promise of a sunny saturday and a wet sunday and monday.

my only ambitions at the moment are laundry and a state inspection on monday.

my only real pipe dream would be clearing out a corner of our cluttered den. (i'm becoming familiar with the term "managing expectations.")

that's it. the detours i see are an outdoor car show on the boulevard tomorrow and, if the boy is feeling up to it, hitting tennis balls at one of the local parks. there is also the distraction of west virginia's ballgame against texas christian in the afternoon.

but that's just one day. with any luck/planning/discipline, that can be the donut hole in an otherwise useful, three-day weekend.

october

Absolutely gorgeous day at the @YeagerAirport Airshow! pic.twitter.com/uUeTZ9Zjgm

— Tim Carrico (@TimCarrico) October 1, 2017

in three hours at coonskin park on a beautiful fall day:

• saw an aerobatics display 
• watched the kids play with their friends 
• had a nice chat with one of their dads
• caught a glimpse of the nation's no. 1 ranked, division iii men's soccer team 
• hit tennis balls with my son 

i'm tired. good night. 

bugger

just swell.

just finished enjoying a tasty burger at a friend's cookout and was getting up from my spot on the patio when i shooed away some good-sized mosquitoes on my legs.

i also shooed whatever was on my arm before it gave me an f-u sting and buzzed away. damn thing was a yellowjacket — the first one that had laid a stinger on me since august 2015, when i nearly died from an angry nest of the nasty little effers.

i dismissed the little prick as a nuisance and put together a second cheeseburger.

i'd gotten about halfway through when the stress of kris commenting on a redness in my face and constantly monitoring the welt around the sting led me to chuck the rest of the burger into the trash, down the rest of my beer and bid farewell to our hosts.

turned out the medical assistant at the med express who took my vitals was the same lady who caught me when i passed out from the first yellowjacket attack. she said i looked a lot better than the first time she saw me. ("no color" was her descriptor for me as was laid out.)

i gave her my thanks after the physician assistant prescribed a few days worth of prednisone to go with the benadryl i was supposed to take to keep the swelling down and reduce the reaction.

headed back to the car, kris said, "i should spank you."

i don't think she — or the boy — have quite gotten over the original ordeal. (he was fidgeting with worry and apparently trying not to cry in the waiting room; the girl was wondering how long i was going to have to stay in the hospital.)

anyway, i'm alive and well and can sleep with a little more peace of mind knowing i passed the clinical tests with flying colors.

futbol fields

soccer complex

on the pitch and on the field for the first day of fall.

jv db

the nephew is now playing high school football.

se

finally got a new phone. that is all.

bloomer

the girl has gotten too big for her britches. literally. 

after more than two years of being potty trained and in big girl underpants, she's moved to the next size up. 

funny thing was among her assortment were her "dora the explorer" bloomers, which made her feel so grown up. 

the next size up, though, featured the tweener "dora and friends," who has forsaken her magic animal friends in favor of pre-teen relationships and dilemmas. 

this is what the girl is striving for: becoming a teenager, already, at age 5. i don't think there's much i can do to dissuade her from being in such a hurry, but i'll do my best to enjoy her still being my baby right now. 

home game

so this was nice ...

🎥 Check out all the highlights from today's 56-20 win over ECU:#HailWV pic.twitter.com/8AHWgCORKt

— WVU Football (@WVUfootball) September 9, 2017

but this may not be as much ...

Now 2 games into the books and It is clear the D has some work to do, especially considering how Tech O struggled against Delaware

— John Antonik (@JohnAntonik) September 9, 2017

but this was really nice, too.

little no. 7 meets big no. 7

all in all, a pretty good day. 

dumbasses

boarding up the frou-frou home improvement store

the guy on his knees isn't evacuating because he's "the man" at his workplace. even the goddam ceo of the company who was supposed to visit with him tomorrow couldn't make it because of the weather.

not sure a category 5 hurricane is the occasion to prove to a bunch of suits that they picked the right guy for the job.

I combined the images of Hurricane Andrew (1992) & Hurricane Irma (today) at scale in a gif. Irma is a damn leviathan. pic.twitter.com/4HEw1NNxxd

— Joel 🌮 (@JoelNihlean) September 7, 2017

errands

errand buddy

so i took the girl with me to the post office after dinner while the boy went to karate class.

we spent the whole time talking, her sharing songs she learned at school and me trying to decipher the lyrics. learned a new one, about "tony chestnut."

toe (foot) knee chest (torso) nut (head) nose eye love you

which was awesome.

as we walked up the post office ramp, with her gladly holding my hand, i asked her if she said she'd still love me when she was 10 (yes) and when she was 15 (yes) and when she was 20 (also yes). i'm taking her at her word.

she asked questions as i did the self-serve kiosk and affixed the postage to the package. she put the parcel into the bin and i closed it up. good job.

once we got belted into the car, she said she'd love me and mommy for 1,000 years. when i told her that if we lived that long nothing would make us happier, she got a puzzled look on her face. the idea that we couldn't live that long seemed completely foreign to her.

we took a trip past the statehouse to see if that was the building she was thinking of (looks like a jail with lots of stairs near kitty's doctor where we saw a parade). it was the columns that she remembered. i couldn't remember a parade.

we talked all the way home. i used to run lots of errands with her back when i had fridays off. same with her brother, before he started school. i should remember to take these opportunities while spending time with daddy is still something that's really great.

10:25 a.m. friday 25 april 2014

home alone

vanilla milkshake

so halfway through some intense training, we learned our mission changed from registering applicants to manning help hotlines.

by the end of the day, we were fried — and most of us hadn't completed the program. i called kris to say i wasn't making it to her folks this evening; we had one more day to finish the registration training and then begin helpline training.

i went to church, where i was distracted by thoughts of dinner. did one last look for a birthday present for the godson before visiting ye olde b.k. lounge (aka "burger king").

picked up a no. 1 meal with a milkshake for my semi-annual whooper, fired up the flatscreen and, on this first weekend of college football, found a game off the digital antenna.

i'm tired and ready to pass out, but oddly satisfied. good night.

the days grow short

when you reach september. 

long work day helping organize call center for hurricane harvey relief registration. 

made an email distribution list, wrote informational email and tried to liaise with their contact person to set up our communications. that took much longer than you'd expect. 

then mostly completed my friday chores before calling it a day.

now my ass is tired. good night. happy september. 

the little things

from the moment i began my temp job, i was certain it was going to be just that: a way station to something bigger and better.

i thought my leap of faith wouldn't be much more than a quick step off a rock mid-stream to the other side of the creek.

oath, 2016

after an initial phone interview with some nice folks in morgantown just weeks after i'd started, i felt good. "get ready to move fast," i told kris, confident that hiring process was merely perfunctory and that a quick decision would be rendered.

an in-person interview and two months later, i had to find out on my own that i "wasn't a good fit." thus began the aerobatics that would characterize the long, long leap fraught with dead-ends, fizzled leads and dispiriting disappointments.

i brought a clipboard from home with a notepad ready to grab in the event of a call from a potential employer, so i could duck into an unused room and jot notes. i got to do that a number of times, each one bringing with it relieved optimism and promise.

ultimately, though, it was a request by an interim officer last month to see him that led to where i am now. i didn't even have my clipboard with me when he broached his idea for a job.

on monday, i found myself grateful as i walked to our front door after work. for the first time in a long time, i didn't have to anticipate this question from my wife upon entering in regard to my employment search: "any news?"

i had a real job and there was no question about it.

a year to the day ...

... well, almost.

i, state your name.

nearly a year to the day after i took an oath for my temporary job, i took a new oath for a government job that i hope keeps me here for a long time.

my first thanks goes to my friend lauren, who sent the facebook message that pointing me in the direction of the job that was originally listed as a six-month gig.

plenty of time, i thought, for me to find work. after a visit to morgantown two months later, i thought this was exactly the cushion i needed before we'd move the family for a new job at west virginia u.

unfortunately, that didn't materialize. neither did another government job i interviewed for a month after that. (both of those i thought were slam dunk jobs, though i felt much better about my wvu experience than i did about the train wreck of a federal phone interview.)

the new year began with a steady stream of job applications for jobs that were simply appealing punctuated by sprays of desperate inquiries for anything i was even tangentially related to my experience.

(the leisurely pace of picking and choosing was pretty much part of a cycle that got ginned up after outright application rejections or looming release dates from the temp job. the cycle would begin again after extensions were granted or actual interviews were conducted and i was awaiting decisions, usually for weeks on end.)

at least twice, jobs disappeared after face-to-face visits — not from positions being filled but from being eliminated entirely from an employer's plans.

here, i will say virginia tech was terrific for job seekers. their online system would tell you in a reasonable amount of time if your application was rejected.

i was fortunate enough to merit two interviews for two different jobs; both times, i was informed in timely fashion that i wouldn't advance. (disappointing, yes, but it sure as hell beat that dispiriting cocktail of waiting, wondering and fading hope.)

one employer i finally had to call to get my own bad news after non-committal responses to emails following the interview. another i have yet to hear from, more than three months removed from a morning-long visit out of town.

workers playtime

all of which led to this day. apparently, my conscientiousness, my approach to work and my relationships with staff and leadership served to convince a succession of officers to keep me on the job through three extensions past the original february release date, and, ultimately, into a two-year contract.

i thank jack, regis, kelli, jacqui and steve for their efforts to keep me at the office, and, more importantly, for valuing my work enough to go through those pains to retain me. (some of it required some mighty creativity indeed.)

thanks also to the original crew that showed me the ropes of a new line of work: public affairs, a kissing cousin in journalism. thank you for teaching, mentoring and advising during and after their deployments: lesley, lloyd, sarah, andrea, jim, cici and zuni.

additional appreciation goes out to the folks who kept helping me even after i was shifted to a new section: chad, lucy and dave, who kept me in the writing loop even though i was no longer a writer, and, tom, who helped me learn a new set of job skills. (a new tool in my swiss army knife.)

most of all, i thank my family and friends who gave encouragement and support in words, prayers and leads — lots and lots of job leads.

to my beautiful and brilliant kristina, thank you for wisely budgeting our finances, keeping the household running and nurturing our lovely, wildflower children. thanks, as well, for keeping your ear to the ground for job openings and opening my mind to the possibility of applying for them.

your dad was right. after i asked his blessing on our engagement, he said we made a good team. ten years later, his assessment still rings true. thank you, thank you, thank God for you.

and thanks to almighty God the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit for sustaining us through this search and the exertions in plumbing the depths of our faith. thanks for our gifts and the people you put in our path.

hallelujah. amen and amen.

that escalated quickly

while it's not "facebook official," i think i can say i've got a job — hopefully one i'll have for a long time.

workplace confusion

after getting word on friday the fourth that plans were afoot to keep me at my temp job in a more long-term capacity (my boss said, "i don't intend to fail"), then growing despondent a few days later that i wouldn't qualify, i learned at the end of the week that i'd be offered a job title more in line with my journalism skills.

then, after a contract pay grade mix-up and slight drop in the originally offered salary (disappointing, but i'm just being greedy), i got the final offer yesterday, which i accepted.

paperwork has already ensued. i hope more training lies ahead. this really could be transition from newspapers i wasn't sure i was hoping for.

the Lord is a wise, kind and funny person. i'll give my best work as an offering in thanksgiving and pray that it's a good start to give him his due.

amen and amen and amen.

expectations

had one of those occasions when you die a little for your kid.

the boy and his sister had been looking forward to his school's big welcome back pool party all week.

we didn't take him his first couple of years at school first because he couldn't swim, then because he wasn't a strong swimmer. this year he's better.

we'd been there about an hour, his mama and i watching from a deck, and it appeared the kids were having a great time.

then, the boy starts walking away from the pool with his hands cupped under his face. i'd thought he bloodied his mouth, but he'd gagged on some pool water and barfed up a mouthful of his big pizza dinner.

after a trip to the restroom, we sat him down for a few minutes. his mom didn't want him back in the pool as some sort of courtesy; i thought he was fine. he was upset that he couldn't go back in and i prevailed upon kris that it was no big deal and that he should be allowed to go ahead.

the party was almost over but kris noted that his friends were asking about the puke episode. it seemed to me that he was grabbing at them to keep them from swimming away. i left my perch to tell him to stop wrapping his arms around their necks. that seemed to be the end of the story.

mother and son

our departure seemed non-eventful. i picked up a pack of cookies for the ride home. i held the girl's hand and the boy walked with his mama.

once in the car, though, i caught the tail end of his being admonished by his mother for responding to a query with "duh," which led to a terse rebuke and threat of corporal punishment from me.

the drive-home lecture ensued.

after a shower, he was in bed. i told him i was upset that i took up for his return to the pool even though he wasn't actually feeling well. he said he was fine until he started turning somersaults underwater.

the real source of his disappointment, though, had nothing to do with his gagging episode and his friends' reaction so much as none of his friends wanting to play with him. my heart sank.

i had to explain to him that sometimes you go somewhere expecting something great to happen and it doesn't work out the the way you were hoping at all. it happened to daddy a lot, i said.

learn to adjust, i told him, and make a good time with the people you're with. i tried to explain that deflated expectations are a part of life. i'm not sure that did him any good.

in retrospect, i appreciate that he opened up to tell me his true feelings and that he felt comfortable sharing them. i've got better appreciation of his sensitive soul. despite its ease of bruising, i'm glad that his nature is inward-seeking and aware. i hope that it develops into a true empathy for others. i hope he continues to be open with me.

this boy. he is me. i hope i can convey to him that it's ok.

release date

my computer on monday.

today was supposed to be the last day at my temp job. but by the grace of God, it wasn't. i got an extension and, with any luck, a new job.

i'm working to take in all that grace. (it's harder than you think, what with the balancing of glee and focus on the tasks at hand, but joyous.)

thank you, again, Lord. amen and amen. and thanks for all those who prayed for and supported us. amen and amen.

that's no. 2

gappier toothed smile

the boy had come back from karate — more on that later — and was getting ready for bed. i thought i heard him shout "i pooped!" from the bathroom and got confused.

"on the floor?" i thought.

then when his mama came in to check, he said he had wiggled his tooth "a little" and out it came. last week at his 6-month check-up, his dentist predicted it would be out by monday. she was just a few days off.

incisor

as it's only tooth no. 2, he still gets a terrific thrill out of their getting loose and, of course, once they come out.

i think it's a combination of his being one of the last in his class to start losing teeth and, obviously, the remuneration by the tooth fairy.

i need to start burning into my memory his wonder and excitement at the simple things in his life. at this age, he still thinks he's very good at a lot of things and doesn't yet feel beaten when his performance doesn't meet his expectations — at least for the things in which he's not fully invested.

he's probably not many years away from being an unimpressionable teen who is bored by everything because he's so cool, but i hope not. i'd wish he could keep seeing his world with fresh eyes and take delight in it all.

day one

back together again.

for the first time in two years, the monkeys are going to the same school. (it didn't seem so long ago that they were at the same preschool.) they've got four more years of this coming. now the skids are really greased.

the divine praises

i don't say this prayer nearly as often as i should, but today, after a long-awaited phone call, i did:

Blessed be God.
Blessed be His Holy Name.
Blessed be Jesus Christ, true God and true Man.
Blessed be the Name of Jesus.
Blessed be His Most Sacred Heart.
Blessed be His Most Precious Blood.
Blessed be Jesus in the Most Holy Sacrament of the Altar.
Blessed be the Holy Spirit, the Paraclete.
Blessed be the great Mother of God, Mary most Holy.
Blessed be her Holy and Immaculate Conception.
Blessed be her Glorious Assumption.
Blessed be the name of Mary, Virgin and Mother.
Blessed be St. Joseph, her most chaste spouse.
Blessed be God in His Angels and in His Saints. Amen.

amen and amen and amen.

thank you for the opportunity, my Lord. and thank you for your prayers, all you angels and saints. and thanks to all my loved ones near and far for your prayers and support.

tired ...

Insane photos from a @DailyProgress staffer, who was there right as a car struck dozens of protesters: https://t.co/jMGuXcPyVA pic.twitter.com/n1Hg95v9wM

— Jake Jarvis (@NewsroomJake) August 12, 2017

... and sick of it.

fear.

If it looks like a Nazi, chants like a Nazi, and salutes like a Nazi, then it probably is a fucking Nazi. pic.twitter.com/vbW5OjnjuP

— Hanna Flint (@HannaFlint) August 12, 2017

these are people afraid of anything different from their sad, uninformed, myopic worldview.

these days, they are so sure that a broader community agrees with them that they believe they will suffer no repercussions for their very public stance — not from their families, not from their employers, and not from their fellow congregants at their houses of worship — and they are unconcerned about showing their faces.

what is the source of their rage?

is it from the ignominy of having to share the political and cultural stage with those they deem beneath them? is it the desire to not learn of the sufferings and contributions of those not like themselves? is it a lack of caring?

Myth: Racism diminishes as time passes.

Reality: Racism fluidly adjusts to prevailing political and economic norms. #Charlottesville pic.twitter.com/qwgn1cUCFr

— Khaled Beydoun (@KhaledBeydoun) August 13, 2017

every assimilating culture learns about the majority culture; as that majority slips, it should probably pay to learn more about the new folks who are coming in. maybe they'd like it, celebrate it, even, or at least learn to respect it.

it's been a long day of catching glimpses of this surreal drama unfolding: anxiously waiting for something bigger and awful to explode in massive bloodshed and chaos and wondering when all sides would express their concern that something was very wrong.

Republican lawmakers encourage Trump to specifically call out white nationalists | Fox News https://t.co/aagPfbsr7g

— Scott Finn (@radiofinn) August 13, 2017

is this what our world will devolve into? 

my only solace came from a homily from our deacon at mass today: in the face of howling storms and uncertainty, focus on the Lord and work steadily.

i frequently hold my tongue in the interest of getting along with those i encounter and with whom i interact. at some point, though, you're going to have to make clear which side you're on, bluntly and without sugarcoating.

today was that day.

Slavery, the Holocaust, the Movement for Civil Rights...this moment is but another in a chain of opportunities to choose what you stand for.

— LeVar Burton (@levarburton) August 12, 2017

some days ...

... what the Lord says just speaks to me. like today:

Amen, I say to you, if you have faith the size of a mustard seed,
you will say to this mountain,
'Move from here to there,' and it will move.
Nothing will be impossible for you.

matthew 17:20

got a bit of news yesterday that i hope signals that if we just hold on a little longer, we'll actually stick the landing from our leap of faith.

thank you, Lord.

more kids tv

the boy got his first run-in with not being such a high priority for his cousins today.

after being being promised a trip to the dock at mom and dad's place at the lake so he could fish before we went home, his cousins sat in front of the television watching a video and frittered away his hour.

he was in tears when he learned that he wouldn't be able to go. they're not my kids, so i can't force them to do him a favor. it was a disappointing lesson to learn that even your family that loves you can also let you down.

kids tv

the children are moving at quite a clip now toward teendom.

the girl, at age 5, is still firmly entrenched in "disney junior," but the boy? yeah, the 7-year-old is exploring "disney xd," the mouse channel's next step up for tweeners.

fading into the distance are the "blues clues," "thomas and friends," "bob the builder" and "little einsteins."

the girl is enjoying her magic creature shows, like "my little pony," "alena of avelor" and, of course, "dora the explorer." she still shies away from real bad guys and evil plots but she's leaving behind the pacing of preschool fare like "daniel tiger."

the boy is sitting through "pirates of the caribbean" and "captain america" enthralled by the action and the easily grasped plotlines. no longer so squeamish is he to the build-up to conflict, confrontation and conspiracy.

i suppose it reflects his observation of his world and the tiny interactions he sees and concocts in his play. he's slowly developing nuance and appreciating complexity. i think it scares him a little.

he still loves his play but i don't think he wants to totally let go of his childish things. he seems to be holding on to his stuffed animals a little harder now. when presented with a cache of toys that had been set aside during a mass cleanup, he was delighted to see a bunch he'd given up for lost — and he had to pick a small bag of the ones he wanted to keep.

there's nothing we can do to stop it. better to remember that mourning like i am robs me of the present, where they are still little kids and still our babies.

tis the season

member since august 2017

i joined my first west virginia university message board today.

my long-held belief was that these sports fan message websites were the bastion of the truly fanatical and hopelessly trolly. myself being the non-confrontational, thin-skinned type, i stayed in the shallows of the well-policed comment sections of my two favorite wvu blogs, the "smoking musket" and the late, lamented "wvu sports with mike casazza."

last month, however, mr. casazza left the amazing sports blog he created with the equally late, lamented charleston daily mail to join the cbs sports-affiliated "eer sports."

he left in his wake not only some of the best gateway content and side features in online sports, but one of the best communities of sports fans by way of general knowledge, devotion, humor and, last but not least, civility and decency.

so here we are, barely a month before the mountaineers' opening kickoff, and i've been jonesing badly for the nuggets of original news from training camp and snappy repartee of the casazza blog but had no idea how to scratch that itch.

then i saw this:

I can hear practice from my house. Lots of cheering and hollering today, the first day in shoulder pads. It matters. https://t.co/0Kkhh4n5el

— Mike Casazza (@mikecasazza) August 1, 2017

and i followed the link.

lo, and behold, a blurb and another link. it wasn't exactly like old times, but it seemed like a format adapted from casazza's former home. maybe it could work.

i registered, added an avatar, and i'm now able to participate in comments, which could be a scary prospect. on the other hand, i'm also able to follow casazza's output, along with a couple of other writers. there appear to be a few other aspects to the site waiting to be explored, but there's plenty of time — and available content — for wandering.

i'm just glad that i may have found my wvu sports fix to get me not only through these next few weeks, but hopefully many more years to come.

the nerd life

"spider-man: homecoming"

so the boy watched his first grown-up action movie yesterday: "spider-man: homecoming."

as we left, his mama joked that she couldn't believe she was allowing her son to watch a comic book movie in the company of his father and his best nerd wing man.

it was a fun sunday afternoon: we did it up with jumbo pop corn and cookie dough candy, caught the previews — "star wars: the last jedi" and "thor: ragnarok" — and took a selfie in front of the movie poster.

and the movie?

a big hit for the boy, who managed to have the adult-ish language wash over him, since the script used its modest profanity matter-of-factly and not gratuitously. (his one question was to a bit of comic relief, where the punchline was "porn," which daddy sidestepped.) the action sequences were suspenseful and stirring but not scary, which was just the thing his young imagination craves.

(side-note 1: he said to me today that he especially liked that the superhero was a real kid. it's funny how i'm finding relateability is a big thing for the kids.)

(side-note 2: speaking of which, remind me to write about how important "dora the explorer' is to his sister.)

(side-note 3: my buddy brad, in texting me about watching the movie, referred to the hero as "'pider-man," which i think is what the boy called the web slinger when he was but a toddler. i guess i must have told brad that.)

in addition to daddy's relief that the "parental guidance reviewer" was pretty much spot-on, i was just very much pleased at what a terrific comic book movie it was. while i pretty much revere "spider-man 2" as probably my favorite superhero movie for its inspiration and imagery, i enjoyed this one for its heart. it was simply a well-made confection of fun, action and character.

i was just glad we all had a great time. good Lord willing, this will be the first of many father-son movie moments.

the kids

yesterday, the boy learned to play scrabble.

from the twitters:

boy, playing his first scrabble game, smiles at his tiles: "i can spell 'fart'"

today, he scored 182, including a 44-point "quiz."

nice thing is he gets to practice his spelling and his math, what with the double-letter and triple-word scores and the like, not to mention just keeping score.

the girl, apparently, continues her infatuation with music from the 1980s. today, i heard her singing snippets of steve perry's solo effort, "oh, sherry."

add that to her love of naked eyes' version of "always something there to remind me," cyndi lauper's "true colors" and on and on, and it's an interesting phenomenon to witness. maybe that will be her inspiration for the 80s revival she'll kick off in her rise to pop stardom.

up

it's hard letting go of things i can't control.

jump!

so about a year after month-long, twice-weekly winter and spring swim lessons, the kids finally seem to have gotten the hang of it.

i'm not sure if it's the age or having daily swim lessons for about six weeks that did it, but the splashing and flailing and stiffening into panicked anchors seem to have given way to a rudimentary freestyle, complete with actual strokes and kicking.

all we need is a membership to someplace with an indoor pool and maybe we can improve. (and maybe daddy and mommy can regain some of our lost fitness.)

so happy to see progress, though. and thankful. for this and many other things.

wired

finished my second cup of coffee around noon today. should have left plenty of time to cycle out. tired. 

a year in

office, late, a year ago

officially, this shot was from my last day at the newspaper; unofficially, i still had another office to clean out — and that would take another couple of days.

i've had a year to live with a choice and been blessed to have the luxury of time to grapple with it.

what have i learned?

first, that i had faith enough to make a leap.

second, that i lacked the wisdom to know that it would take a long time to land.

i mean, i knew in those first couple of weeks that things wouldn't be easy, but i didn't have the faintest idea that things wouldn't be easy for a year.

third, every time i think my faith has been stretched to its limit, i find that it stretches a little more.

fourth, i've had a lot of people placed in my path. their sharing of their journey has helped sustain me. (shout-out to lauren and chuck, who showed me the lifeline that's kept us going.)

but my wonderful, wonderful family — my beautiful, brilliant and patient wife, my joyful children, my prayerful, hopeful mom and dad (from both sides), and my cheering sibs — have been the rock which has kept me steady through it all.

friend along the way.

looking for work is hard. it is full of leads to nowhere and hopes raised and dashed. it makes you question your ability and your worth. it's also forced me to weigh the pursuit of my chosen profession against the need to have a steady paycheck in a different field.

i've been saying for about nine months now that if you'd have told me a year ago i'd be doing whatever it was i was doing that day, i'd have said you were crazy.

well, if nothing else, i've learned that i'm capable of doing all kinds of things. hopefully, i'll soon settle into something that i can do for a long, long time.

thank you, Lord, for leading me and my loved ones this far; i pray we may continue to follow you in faith to where we are supposed to go.

threats

had to make good on one yesterday. it cost us the last two days of tennis camp.

i'd stupidly warned the boy that if he didn't stop putting his racquet in his sister's face, he was done with tennis.

a few minutes later, he did it again.

"that's it," i said, and reached back for the racquet. "we're done."

i was mad because i made a stupid threat and i was mad that i let myself react to horseplay i glimpsed in the rearview mirror. and i was mad until i fell asleep.

i let my tiredness and impatience and frustration at the typical thoughtlessness of a 7-year-old trip me up and make a rash decision to follow through on a hastily made threat.

he'd already gotten a month's worth of lessons, but now he's not going to finish.

boys are boys and they're hard-headed, easily distracted and don't listen. i'm the grown-up.

apparently, we both learned a hard lesson yesterday evening.

last year

i had no idea what the day would bring. a lot has happened since.

birthday

with our two of his ten. lucky guy.

a few days late, but, yeah. that's 81 years in the books; thank you, Lord, for the gift of him and bless him with many more.

(meantime, i helped him fill out a new job application. wants to keep practicing medicine. good.)

caprice

the finished product

barely two years later, the thing the boy clamored for on his visit to disney went out with the trash.

dismantled and abandoned, it was victim of a young boy's curiosity and loss of novelty. it was a fine toy for adventures of the imagination until it got taken apart. 

so long, custom lightsaber. 

whoops

missed again. i liked that in today's reading "sarah laughed" at the Lord's promise. 

also this morning prayed that the Lord help me to receive his grace. 

pride. what a maddening thing. 

punkin

gap-toothed smile

so it happened today. his mama says it happened while he was trying to take a nap. wiggle wiggle wiggle and out it came.

she reported a great whoop. didn't seem that long ago that he learned it was loose, but it's been more than a month.

such joy at growing up. to him, it's a lost tooth, to his mama and me, he's just that much less a baby.

so i said

"Lord, i give up; i can't do this."

maybe he's been waiting a long time for me to say that.

Lord, take away my worry; Lord, take the wheel.

busy weekend

in just over 24 hours covering a saturday and sunday, we crammed in camping ...

























and a movie ...

 

("captain underpants: the first epic movie.")

while there was plentiful admonishment for playing with pointed sticks and fire, the food was good, we were near a stream with a sandy bank, and were across the street from a playground.

the boy's favorite part: captain underpants; the girl's? the s'mores.

dead tired. a good time. thank you, Lord.