THE DIGNIFIED RANT
HOME FRONT ARCHIVES
"...But You Can Look Down On It?" (Posted November 26, 2005)
The saying is that "you can't go home again." In my case it is quite literally true since the family homestead burned down years ago (after my family moved out). But with the magic of Google satellite imaging you can look down the haunts of your past. Amazing stuff, really.
Of course, my old home isn't in this picture--just an open lot now. But the neighborhood I grew up in is still there.
Yeah, there's the gas station where we nicknamed the gas tank valves "the three sisters." We probably annoyed the people who worked there by driving over the air hoses and ringing the bell over and over again. I still remember the sign in the window that proudly proclaimed that they had a "certified mechnic" on duty. Just a bit away was a party store where we could get pops and candy.
There's the cemetery where I drove a car before I even had a permit. My dad took me in their after school and set me loose. I was shocked since I hadn't had lesson one yet. But I gave it a go. Who was I going to hurt?
Next to the cemetery I think I can see the gravestone carver where we built bike trails behind the building. After hours we'd go back there and have anything from bike tag to pea shooter wars. And up the road is that "Cadillac Hills?" These were hills overlooking the parking lot where workers loaded cars built nearby on to trucks. Bikers would go up the hills. We on our bicycles would go down the hills. Looks kind of flat, though. Was it further up the road off map?
And I can see my old school and church up the road. I can see enough detail to see the parking lot a cut through to get there and the two entrances I used depending on the grade. The young ones went in one entry where the stairs to the basement lunch room/auditorium. The older went in on the West Vernor entry.
The public school where I went to kindergarten is visible, too. At only 4, I walked the few blocks to school. What seemed so normal then is unacceptable now. I would never let my son walk to school like that. Even in Ann Arbor. I'm sure I'm just way over-protective, but even in Detroit where I witnessed police chases and Molotov Cocktails, life seemed so much more innocent.
And there's the neighborhood where the first girl I ever went head over heals over lived. Her name was Susan. I confess that some years ago I Googled her and discovered she worked for Lockheed and lived out west somewhere. I forget where now. But she probably isn't 14 any more.
And that's where Mike lived. And Mikey lived up the block. And Ed around the corner. And Leslie with his brothers and sisters across the alley. And my best friend Tony a couple blocks over. We went through a lot from wargaming to hanging out to running from the police in Patton Park (Er, Mom and Dad, I can explain...).
And there's the "new" apartment building that went up on the way to school. It seemed so sad to live in a big box and not a house. That the young professionals who moved in there did not seem miserable was incomprehensible to me. People lived in houses. I didn't know who lived in apartments.
The backyard of my house probably doesn't have the marks of the many golf courses I built over the years back then. Kids from all over the block came to play my back 9. If I never carried golf into adulthood, you have to understand that my golf game used marbles and old curtain rods for clubs. But we had a ball!
I can easily make out the Patton Park Rec Center where I went swimming so many times in the summer. Next to the building was the small hill that I went sledding on in the winter. I can even make out the parking lot and ice rink where my parents took me for my first ever double-bladed skating try. My parents waited in the car in the freezing cold while they sent me alone, at the tender age of 3 or 4 I'd guess, on to the cold, hard, unforgiving ice. I took one step out on the ice, slipped hard on my butt, got up and walked to the car to get in, and never went skating again. Sorry for all the effort for a total of one second on the ice but it was a futile effort. I hate winter sports to this day. Going from the car to indoors is my idea of an outdoor sport. At the other end of the park is the tennis court I played at quite a bit.
You can't go home again. This is true. But with overhead imagery, you can look down on your past and remember all the good parts. The definition just isn't good enough to see the bad parts.
"Best. Game. Ever"
(Posted
Mister and I went to the University of Michigan-Penn State football
game on Saturday. Back in the spring when I purchased tickets through the
alumni association, I got pairs of tickets to the
Anyway, this year the EMU game was fun but there was no
tension. We clobbered EMU without even trying. Players I never heard of were
cycling into the game. But it was fun.
And the game was beyond anything I’ve been to. I’ve been going to games—not every year in that span—for about 25 years. After a disappointing start with only a close win against Michigan State to hang on to (and working in Lansing, that counts for a lot, let me tell you), Penn State was really the last chance to salvage the season. A loss against the undefeated Lions (although their paw print logo sure looks a lot like the Blues Clues logo …) would have reduced our season to pride and a shot at Ohio State to at least beat our barbarian rivals to the south (my gratitude for their being a Red State notwithstanding). So a lot rode on this game.
This game was simply the best game I’ve ever been to. Bar none.
When we headed out for the
That’s really a blimp. It is a tad in the distance.
The walk in is pretty special as we go past the tailgaters
all the way of Main Street—especially at Pioneer High School where a lot of
people bring RVs to just tailgate all day I imagine. Crossing the street
diagonally at
We scoped out the bathrooms near our section and headed to
Section 13, Row 19. I’ve never been quite that low but with the goal post just
to our right we could see the south end zone great. We had a couple
Mister is a solid Maize and Blue fan and he knows that one
day he’ll go to the
The game was low scoring with two missed
Despite the lack of scoring it was a tense first half with every play seeming critical. We headed out for the long bathroom lines and to get hot dogs and lemonade for the second half. With a long line just to get out of the seating, we missed the first minute and a half of the second half. Once in we hardly had a chance to sit down for the rest of the game.
We experienced heartbreak when Henne
had the ball stripped from him and
When we went ahead on a Rivas field goal with little time left and with our defense doing a good job and their kicker shaky that day, I had confidence we could hold Penn and win by a field goal. The cow bell prompting the “Go Blue!” chants kept cracking me up as I thought of Christopher Walken and “more cow bell” in a hilarious Saturday Night Live skit. But the levity only lasted a moment as every play and every second seemed crucial to whoever would win. I had started exchanging good natured comments with the guys in front of us and at this point I said to them, this is a great game whoever wins. This is what college football is meant to be. Really, two teams were playing their hearts out and though there were a couple calls that both sides can probably question, this was just a good hard-hitting game.
With little time left and the sky darkened, the lit up
stadium was just alive with cheering. The fans were going full out.
And nobody was leaving the Big House.
With the lights shining on all, the aisles were clear and
the seats for full. With less than a minute to go down the field and score a
touchdown—no field goal would do down by four—the Michigan fans reached out to
the players and let them know we are with you to the end. This is it. I don’t
know how much the players look at such a thing but to me it seems that if
players see fans streaming for the exits more concerned with getting home and
complaining about errors, it is easy for players to give up figuring the fans
have given up on them. We had faith. Even Mister, who can sometimes get
discouraged when we are down, held firm in his belief that we could-would-win
this game somehow. I don’t know if it was my repeated lectures about not giving
up and how
Breaston pushed the door ajar with his tremendous run back from the corner to mid-field. The Wolverines were coming toward us in the south end zone, getting closer with each play and stopping the clock each time in a methodical drive down the field. The Wolverines were close and time was dwindling. Drawing breath became hard as each play raised hopes of a break through and fears of a turnover.
And then we were out of options. It was fourth down and one second left. We’d at least have no wasted downs to complain about and no complaints that our boys didn’t fight to the last moment with everything they had.
When
And the score board showed a final victory with no time left:
Mister was thrilled and exhausted:
Unbelievable. I was exhausted.
And nobody made a move to leave. The fans just cheered and
nobody left. I dialed to my dad and held up my phone so he could hear. I did it
three times because I wasn’t sure if I was connecting because of the noise. My
dad dislikes
Then Mister and I just sat for a while just to rest our legs
a bit. When the crowds finally thinned out, we started to go down to the wall
to get a better look at the stadium field since this is likely our last trip to
the stadium this year. The
Mister and I looked at the field and then headed out. We walked home in the dark, retelling favorite moments and moving with the flow of foot and vehicle traffic heading out.
Mister fell asleep in a flash not long after when I put him to bed. I cracked open a celebratory beer to cure my heart which had seemed close to bursting during the game.
It was the best game ever. I salute
And I actually wish
“Gone Blue” (Posted
So
far the
So
we started out just fine. The EMU game was an easy blow out, of course. But
just being at the stadium was fun and the walk in on a cool September day was
great. Hot dogs and lemonade at half-time. And a nice
walk home, too.
Then
we lost to Notre Dame. That hurt. And not just for losing the game. My dad—and
I love him anyway—is a huge Notre Dame fan. And worse, for some reason he has
always disliked
The
MSU game seemed like the big step back. Since I work in
But
Now
we are playing for pride. And I teach Mister that we owe it to our team to
stick with them in their darker hours since they give us so much in their good
years. And bad years are few and far in between. In the end, after the
disappointment of the loss, Mister is looking forward to going to the
We’ll
be there cheering on our Wolverines and enjoying the best damn stadium in the
best damn college with the most inspiring football team in college. And we can still have the pleasure of beating Ohio State. No season is a loss with that opportunity!
Go
Blue!
"Take a Ride on the
Mister has wanted to graduate
to regular Monopoly for some time. I
didn't want him to get discouraged by jumping from Monopoly Junior so held off,
even though the junior version is mind-numbingly boring and has the unfortunate
design flaw of sometimes lasting forever. Despite my best efforts to cheat to
lose! Ah, what a great dad I am, right? Protecting my son
from getting in over his head.
Perhaps his ability to go
from easy to hard level and beat the computer in chess in less than a month
should have been a warning sign. But a
month ago, we played Monopoly. We each
had property sets. Mister had the four railroads and I had the
I know better than to
complain of bad luck. With good playing, you can absorb bad luck and still win.
I had some bad luck but it did not cause my defeat. Mister played well and when
he had bad luck, he survived it. And
over the next five games we played, the scenario was much the same. We'd each
get some property set or sets and then Mister would accumulate the money to buy
houses and still have money to spare for emergencies. Desperate to counter his
income advantage, I mortgaged property to buy houses for my sets. I did not get the streak of luck I needed and
would go broke.
Six in a row! Defeated by my
son when only a few months earlier I had been trying to throw Monopoly Junior
games! Good grief, was my dominance restricted to
Sorry! Games? I
did have the Stratego advantage, even when playing
with all my pieces showing to Mister. But that was several months ago.
So I changed my strategy in
Monopoly this last holiday weekend. On the second game. I decided to play defense first and took
advantage of my son's disdain for the cheap properties. I only bought property to block his sets,
never buying more than one and looking for the chance to buy the sets on the
cheap end of the board. I managed to grab one railroad and blocked every
set-building attempt, buying only when he had a color in the set. I kept my
money free for this and needed little money to buy the three light blues.
Mister had chances to stop me but he wouldn't lower himself to buy the cheap
stuff.
Haahahahahaha!!!! He even laughed when I put my first houses up and
said he could pay that rent all day! But
as the game went on, I added houses. Even two weren't enough to worry him. He
had plenty of money, he said as he waved his 100s in the air. At three houses
each, Mister started to notice the cost. When I put hotels up, the cost was
hurting. And I started hitting the good cards and collecting tax refunds and
beauty contest winnings. When I finally
picked up
And I finally did get the dad
points with my son despite my victory.
Mister commented that he really liked Monopoly and that the junior
version was really boring by comparison. Then he asked, "If it was boring to
me it must have really been boring for you!" Well yes, but that's what
dads do. We play and do stuff that no sane person would do because we love our
sons and like to see them have fun. We like to teach them what we know. And we
even like them to knock the snot out of us as they learn and start teaching us
how to play the game. Really.
It really is a joy to take
care of Mister. I
like what this guy wrote:
There will come a time – and terribly
sooner than I would realize – when I would give anything to have Jackson down
the hall, in his room, waiting for me to come and kiss him goodnight. I would
give anything to have a time machine, to be able to come back in time to just
this moment right now, to be able to have him there in his bed in his room, to
kiss him good night just one more time.
I was immobilized by these thoughts.
Then I realized that I did have a time machine of sorts – that of my
imagination. I imagined that it really was years in the future, that Jackson
was grown up and gone, that all I had were the memories – and then a genius
friend invented a time machine and let me use it to transport myself back into
time to this very minute.
Were that to occur, instead of walking
down the hall on mental and emotional autopilot, I would be indescribably,
deliriously happy and grateful. Walking down this hall, opening
I always keep in mind that
the days of my son wanting to sit at a table and play games with me; or watch
me play a video game he has not yet mastered from my own glory days of college
(praise be, he likes Gravitar and Asteroids!) are
limited. When he asks questions, I can usually answer them and when I can't, he
is surprised because I know everything. No, I don't. Not even close. He'll
still willingly take my hand to cross a street and he doesn't look ill when I
hug him or give him a kiss on the top of the head in public. I can tell him I
love him without him getting embarrassed. One day all too soon, Mister will
want to do his own things with his own friends and oh by the way would you drop
me off around the corner so my friends don't see your lame car. That's life. It
is how it is supposed to be. So very soon I will look back on these games—even
the Monopoly Junior—and be delighted that I could do this. Mister's call on my
time and attention is a monopoly I embrace.
I'm in my time machine
thrilled with the chance to be with my son right now, and I rarely think that
I'd like to be doing something else. Friends tell me I should be out there
dating and though I gave it a try after divorce, I just don't have the time to
really succeed. I'd have to slight my son and even the small amount of time I
could squeeze out of that loss wouldn't be enough to sustain anything real. I
can't imagine a woman being satisfied with a relationship like that. And for
random dates, it surely is not worth it.
So set up the board, son, and
we'll give it another go to see if I can even up my record. If I can't, I am
going to steer Mister to business school! And in a few years, I can even
introduce Mister to the board wargames of my younger
days. He couldn't beat me in these,
could he?
“Spring
in
Ah, spring! Last year Mister and I enjoyed the anomaly of sledding on April 1 in one of the last snow storms of the year. Mister was giddy with the idea that we hit the slope so late.
Well this year, with both of us nursing illness that has hit me hard again this year (between Mister and his sister, Lamb, I’ve been constantly exposed to various bugs. Add my workplace where nearly everybody seems to have young children these days and I can’t escape anything), we woke Sunday up to see this on the ground:
Of course, with illness, an excuse to just stay indoors and muck about at home was kind of welcome.
This was also an opportunity, actually. As reports at the end of last week said we might have snow accumulation, I hoped for snow and hoped that Mister and I would get better in time. You see, we haven’t gone sledding that much this last winter. I think we’d gone a couple times. Either the snow was too deep, or it was bitterly cold, or one of us was sick. Despite the high snow level, sledding was a rarity. And to add to the problem, the last opportunity (or so it seemed at the time) was missed since I decreed that a bout of whining that Mister wouldn’t end (about wanting to drive the block to the hill instead of walking!) had to end or we wouldn’t go sledding. I assumed that would do the trick. I wanted to go sledding. Mister wanted to go sledding. Logically, the whining bout would end.
It did not. So with my credibility on the line as we were literally standing in the doorway unlocking the door, I cancelled sledding. I wished I’d threatened a different consequence but I didn’t. So we did not sled on what I thought was the last chance of the winter.
So sledding on April 24th was a gift from God to erase that memory of missed sledding. Yet we were still sick and Mister, though recovering nicely, had missed four days of school from this sickness. What to do?
Mister wanted to go. I wanted to go. Mister was well behaved. But sick.
So I compromised. On the way back to his mom’s Sunday evening (it’s spring—so it was still light out! And still about 32 degrees) we packed the sled in the trunk and drove to the hill. Then we trekked up the hill and spent about five minutes sledding after I blazed a path down the hill. Mister loved it:
It was only about four trips down the hill but Mister loved the idea of being able to go into school on Monday and say he went sledding. No complaints that we were out only a small fraction of the time we’d usually sled. Mister took the opportunity in the spirit it arrived and enjoyed what we had knowing that I didn’t want him to relapse in the process.
Perhaps I’m overstating things, but it seemed to be just a small reminder that life is good and God looks over my shoulder now and again to help me recover from my mistakes and failings—big and small. This was just a small item but I took the chance to make up for the bad experience of before. As did Mister, for that matter.
Life is good. I never forget that. Not for one minute.
"Ah, Literacy" (Posted
I took Mister to his school's
"literacy night" last night.
For a week he's been complaining that he did not want to go. As it turns
out, part of the night involved the students reading their own
"books" (that they wrote and made) in classrooms turned into little
coffee house cafes. Students and parents could sit and sip lemonade while
students read their books. Mister didn't quite finish his. Not that he was slacking. Looking at it
compared to the others, it was "The Rise and Fall
of the
All week I had told him that
he'd enjoy it. Still
protests. So I told him I'd talk
to his mom about going (was there something about this horrible outing I did
not know about?); but that if I said we were going, that was it. I also told him that he didn't have to read
his story and that if they tried to make him, I'd just say no thank you.
On the way there Mister was
still not so happy about the event. He
did have a backup plan in case he had to read his book. He thought up a quick
ending that he'd just say even though it was not written. Good plan, I said. I
actually was impressed that he had a backup idea just in case and that it was
actually a constructive plan rather than an elaborate "I'll tunnel my way
to freedom" plan. But I also mentioned to him that as the only person in
that entire school who has actually spoken on the floor of the Michigan House
of Representatives (I don't actually know that to be true but it sounded good
and is probably right) he'd do a great job.
We got there way early. I had left work a
half hour early and was still in my suit but it was unnecessary. The event
started an hour later than I thought. On the other hand, we were able to shop without
crowds at the book store set up from his list of books he wrote up while in
school. Of course, this led to a mistake
on my part. I bought Mister a four-pack of Judy Blume
books. He's read them in school but I forgot that my Ex and I had discussed
these as too mature for an 8-year old. I'd just remembered that he read some in
school so bought them. Now I get to take them back and put them away for a few
years. Oh well. Mister has lots of books
to read. Including the Revolutionary War book he selected, too.
We got the reading issue out
of the way quickly. One
of the teachers who manned the sign-up table, young, female, and stunningly
gorgeous, tried to get Mister to sign up for one of the cafes. No thanks, I said, keeping my promise. It was
tough. I was ready to toss Mister to the wolves to go hang out by that table.
Heck, I was ready to sign up. But alas,
this was not to be dad's night …
The school also ran a game in
the gym where kids could win books and he won a couple, including one for Lamb,
his little sister, when he couldn't find a book he liked at the end of the
night.
One of the neatest things we
did was make a small book in the art room. Staple some paper together. Glue
fabric as a hinge on thick cardboard for the cover. Add lining paper. And voila!
We had a small book. Really cool and the best thing is,
I could easily replicate this at home should Mister want to do another one. Quite simple, actually.
Of course, an evening at
school isn't complete without one moment of anguish. When Mister's name was announced as the
winner of a prize for his class, he ran down to the office to pick up a
bookstore gift card. Pretty
cool. We can go the store this
weekend and pick out a book or two. Hopefully this will make up for the Blume Retraction Incident which will take place by then.
Anyway, when Mister returned to the art room where I was stuck with an as-yet
unbound book, he noted that it was unusual to have such a good reason to go to
the office. "Usually," he added, "you go for a bad reason."
Pause and stab of momentary
doubt.
"What do you mean by
'usually'?" Mostly in jest (really)
I added, "Just how often do you go down to the office for a bad
reason?"
I actually know he isn't an
office reprobate. But his reaction was funny. "No dad! I'm just saying,
you know, that other kids …" I know son, I'm just teasing.
Heh.
Anyway, a good night and you
are darned straight that I pointed out my wisdom of overriding his objections
to going. It's a parent thing. Gotta build that street cred for the hard
decisions of the future.
“Holy
Crap!” (Posted
There are dangers involved in being in a conversation on auto-pilot. The other day, Mister and I were driving along and he starts an animated description of playground happenings. Now, don’t get me wrong. I love hearing this stuff. In insist on it, in fact. I want to know what is going on in school and since my work schedule keeps me from picking up Mister very much now. I need to ask him (I love election years, I get to adjust my schedule a bit and I adjust it to pick Mister up from school a couple times a week. But the election is long gone and so is that schedule.). And sometimes I have to drag it out of him after a “fine” response to “how was school today?”
So I stay engaged in these conversations when he is enthusiastic. But I may have been tired, or perhaps I was looking for something. Or perhaps the banality was being compounded by the length of the story. I’m not trying to be cruel but not all things bright and shiny new to Mister are fascinating to me. Anyway, I was on auto-pilot, responding with “wow!” and “really?” and other assorted place holders to keep him going. Mister was gaining speed and didn’t seem to notice my relative inattention. As he built to his crescendo of an amazing story, I was picking up on the crisis point of the story, and as he completed one segment, I exclaimed, “Holy crap!”
It was automatic. I didn’t mean to say it.
There was dead silence from the back seat.
I started to have a faint realization that I may have said something I shouldn’t have. I very rarely utter a profanity in front of Mister. I actually started cleaning up my language right after Mister was born since I knew it would take me a while to stop and I also knew that babies pick up language before they speak. I did not want to be in a store and hear my son blurt out “what the F***, daddy!” I asked myself, did I just say holy crap? I think I just said holy crap.
Anyway, my “holy crap” was noticed.
“Uh … dad?”
“I meant, holy crud.”
Then he snickered a little. Yep, he noticed. Holy crap…
Mister hasn’t repeated that expression, at least. Neither have I.
