It’s Just 20 Minutes

Value of TimeAs I turned the car towards the driveway, I turned to BR.

“Do you have the key?” I had given him the house keys prior to me taking him and SJ to the dentist’s office for their semi-annual appointment. It had been his responsibility to hold on to the keys. Now, he needed to produce them.

“They’re in my jacket.”
“Okay.” He was in his shirtsleeves. “Where’s your jacket?”
He looked down at his feet. No jacket. “It’s at the dentist’s office.”

There was no key at the neighbor’s house like their usually is. Instead, it was in our house after the boys had to borrow it during their last miscommunication. The garage was locked.

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Fighting Off The Creep

The creep is self-doubtThere’s a creep trying to get in. I’ve shut the doors. I’ve locked the windows. But still the creep is trying.

Stories

“You used to think you could do anything?”

“Huh. What do you mean?”

My aunt went on, “When you were little you used to think you could do anything your older brothers could do.”

I laughed.

My aunt must have had a reason for telling me this. Yet, I don’t recall.  All I remember is we were on Brookmont Road which is just a couple of blocks from my childhood home. She was driving us somewhere.

But I believed I could do anything she says. Little me running after my older brothers. I wouldn’t be left behind. My mother tells a similar story.

“You wanted homework.”

“Why?”

“You said your older brothers got homework and so you wanted homework.”

“How old was I?”

“Kindergarten.”

I laughed.

I believed I could do anything.

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Time Is Not Like Spaghetti

Children over time.

My children through time.

You always end up making extra spaghetti – right? Luckily, spaghetti is one of the all-time great leftover foods.  I have been known to eat cold spaghetti a day or even two after it was originally served. Yes, spaghetti can be saved in order to be eaten later.

You ever have a topic seemingly just keep popping up? It’s as if G-d or fate is tapping you on the shoulder and imploring you to listen. Well, that’s what happened for me with the movie Boyhood. First, a buddy of mine brought it up and asked me if wanted to see it.  A few days later I saw a review  on the How To Be A Dad site. A few days after reading the review, my brother and sister-in-law mentioned  Boyhood and praised the movie greatly.

So, this past weekend I actually saw the Richard Linklater movie. For the uninitiated, Boyhood takes place over 12 years and follows a boy, Mason, from the time he is in kindergarten till the age of 18 and his first day in his college dorm. The boy is now a man. It literally took 12 years for Linklater to make the movie as he filmed for a few days over each of those 12 years.

Patricia Arquette stars as the mother of Mason and his sister Samantha. Ethan Hawke is her estranged husband. Arquette goes through some turbulent times as she suffers through two marriages to drunken men. She does grow tremendously professionally and becomes a college professor. Hawke goes from a shiftless guy who means well to a responsible man with a new wife and child. However, the focus of Boyhood is the children and Mason in particular. The audience learns about him through snippets of his life and sees him grow into adulthood.

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A Son Grows, A Dad Wonders

Dad and child.

Jack and his daughter.

They change right? Our children that is. They grow up and when they do, we want them to do better than us. Isn’t that the rule?

Well, my fellow Dad Blogger, Jack, who blogs at the TheJackB surely feels this way about his son who seems to be growing rapidly right in front of his eyes. Jack, a writer and author of 39 unpublished books and three screenplays, fashions himself as a would-be superhero fighting for truth, justice, and the American Way. Over at the TheJackB, the husband father and friend covers a wide range of topics including business, technology, parenting, politics, education, sports and religion.

Trust me: the TheJackB is an engaging blog which I read regularly. So, after you read this, head on over there.

“Dad, they shouldn’t give us so much homework to do during summer. It’s not fair and it’s not right.”

I nod my head and tell him part of me agrees with him, but it doesn’t matter because this isn’t a debate. His homework is his responsibility. It’s part of the joy of going into 8th grade and getting ready for high school.

High school.

It doesn’t seem possible that my son is almost old enough to be in high school. It is hard to fathom how fast time has gone, but it’s growing easier to imagine a time when he will not be a little boy any more.

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