So, I like art. I like dance. I like music. And when I see those things, I think about how terrific it would be if my own kids would end up being musical or athletic prodigies; and then I realize that it’s probably too late and I should have enrolled them at age 14 minutes for them to be able to catch up to the amazingly talented young performers of the world.
The problem is that most guys I know don’t appreciate these things (because they’re a bunch of heathens. You can tell them I said that). A musical? Forget it. An amazing dance routine that should bring tears to the eyes of every human being? Totally wasted on these fellows. A vivid paragraph that deftly defines the intricacies of human nature? Wasted ink. Me figure-skating a routine in a tan leotard? Probably worth thousands of dollars a ticket, but they refuse to see the value.
Braeden categorically denied liking a (favorite) song from “The Greatest Showman” to his friend last week, after the other kid had insisted that all musicals were terrible and how he would never watch them. Stephanie and I had a good talk with Braeden afterwards, and told him that he absolutely did NOT have to pretend to have or not have interests simply based on what his friends said. He was convinced, and spent the rest of the day repeatedly listening to the soundtrack. I was proud of him.
For sake of posterity, here are a few quotes from this week:
“Dad, when you were a kid, did they have vacuum cleaners?” -Braeden, after a couple of days of discussing the good ol’ days when we used rotary phones and the internet wasn’t a household thing.
“Does [the road sign] DIP mean Die In Peace?” Braeden, perfectly timed after his grandmother nearly drove us off the road.
“Did you eat your French toast, Eliana?” -Dad
“No.” -Eliana
“Why?” -Dad
“Because I didn’t like it. It was not good. It was not good for me, babies.” -Eliana
“I told you once! Go…to…bed! Cuz you not being nice!” -Eliana, to her mother
“Emergency, emergency! Sawed arm….now add some cream [to the arm]….and sugar.…yum yum yum! You had an emergency. Stay home, and you’ll feel better soon!” -Eliana, playing doctor.
“DADDY IS MY BEST FWEND! DADDY IS MY BEST FWEND!” Sing-song at the top of Eliana’s voice in the grocery store, for the duration of the visit.
On another note, I’m teaching my children well because Eliana came into our room the other day with the statement that she’d been picking her nose and eating it.
By the way, she was doing this thing every morning where she joyously yelled a greeting at the top of her voice approximately 1 second after awakening. There is a 1 in 5 chance that she yells my name. It might be my favorite thing to wake up to, EVER.
So, several months ago, I had this amazing idea about how we should use the extra money earned by my post-hurricane disaster work in Puerto Rico. First, I bought a generator. Then, I built a bathroom.
Well, I didn’t exactly build it. It was already there to begin with; it was just a terrible bathroom. I put on my muscle t-shirt, kissed my walnut biceps, and told myself “Here goes nothing” while sawing into the fiberglass shower enclosure. I tore out the separating wall, re-framed another wall, ripped out the flooring and carpet, relocated the shower plumbing and p-trap, fixed some sub-floor, took out the vanity and toilet, then died of exhaustion.
I revived myself a few weeks later and got to work, this time doing small projects with days lapsing in between, with my virtual tutor (YouTube) coaching my on how I was screwing everything up and needed to re-do it.
And we’re there! Shower is tiled with the enclosure installed, a faux beam has been made, vanity is in place, a new porcelain throne has water in it but not around it, pipe shelves groan under the weight of decorative towels, and there are only a couple of areas that Stephanie says look “terrible!” that need to be fixed.
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