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Reality – What It’s Really Like

This post is part of a series titled, “A-B-Cs – What It’s Really Like”. Each week a new letter and its word will be revealed. Each word’s explanation will illustrate significant personal meaning, application and ultimately demonstrate, What It’s Really Like… Back in 1998 MTV debuted the reality TV show Real World/Road Rules Challenge – better known as simply, “The Challenge”. In reflection of my current life I have found that much my own reality is impacted by challenges from the real world and the rules of the road. *** BASED ON ACTUAL EVENTS: 4:30AM – the alarm rings out. The real world will begin after a few open handed smacks of the snooze button. Is it mommy or daddy’s turn to take the boys to school? Whoever’s turn it is has the first shower. I can’t remember what she said last night. Was it me or her? She’s not moving. Shit, I think it’s my day. Yep, it is. OK I’m up. Ouch! How many times am I going to kick that laundry basket before somebody moves it? Where is the light? What’s the difference? I can’t see anything anyways. Toothbrush. Man, the lights are bright. I’ll try to rub my eyes a few times to clear my eyesight. Whoa, wish I could not see again. You look like crap. When is the last time you worked out? Ugh, I guess I’ll weigh myself. That might motivate me to run tonight after work. Please don’t be high. WOW. How is that possible? I feel 25 pounds heavier than that. I still feel like crap, though. Lucky. Probably still won’t run tonight, anyway. Pounding sinus headache. Not a sip of alcohol last night and I feel like I’ve pulled an all-night bender and just stopped drinking an hour ago. Time for the shower. Don’t forget to turn the light on in Little room before you get into the shower. It is taking a lot longer for him to get out of bed lately. Maybe today I can get him dressed on his own without World War III breaking out. Doubt it. What the hell do I wear today? This closet selection is so sad. God, I hate ironing my pants. Why don’t I do this the night before? Oh, Kathy’s up. I’m not going to say anything. She’s not a morning person. That’s ok. I feel like my head is going to explode and I don’t feel like talking either. Let’s see if Little B is up while I wait for the iron to warm up. Nope. He won’t even move. Why can’t he sleep this hard EARLIER in the night? I’ll shake him to get things going. “Hey, buddy. Time to wake up. Rise and shine!” “No, no, nonono, GO AWAY DADDY. Leave me ALONE!” When did my toddler turn into a teenager? “Five minute warning and we are going to get dressed.” “No, no, NOOOOOOOO!” I’m so glad he hasn’t learned any cuss words. I half expect him to use a few one of these mornings. OK, I am dressed. Now let’s get him dressed. This has to be the worst part of the day. What is my strategy? He’s been terrible to wake and get ready lately. Sneak attack? No, that makes things worse. I can’t bribe him this early. Let him make the choice. “Who do you want to get you dressed – Mommy or Daddy?” Classic line. He usually picks the opposite. “Noooooo! I DON’T KNOW” That didn’t work. Now what? Have to try the bribe. “If you get up and get ready without crying we can go get donuts on Friday morning before school. Do you want donuts?” “I don’t want donuts. I don’t want to go to school. Leave me alone, Daddy!” This is turning into a hostage negotiation. *15 minutes pass* I can’t take this anymore. I am going to start yelling. Now I’m yelling louder. OK, now I am threatening to spank him. Should I spank him? He just woke up. That’s really not right. He is really pissing me off today. I’m going to be late. Enough is enough. Well, that didn’t work. He’s bawling now. Kathy just walked in. THANK GOD. He has everything but his socks on now. Good enough. She can brush his teeth and comb his hair. I’m out of here. I am starving. It’s 6:25. SERIOUSLY?! I have not even eaten yet. Why are there no clean spoons? Cereal sucks when you ate the same exact meal as a snack before going to bed. ARRRGHHHH! I just remembered! I have to pack my lunch. Unreal. I have no time for this. I hear Little B coming down the stairs. How did she brush his teeth so fast? No wait, he’s at the top of the stairs refusing to come down. Awesome. He hasn’t eaten yet either. Let’s try the line again. “What do you want for breakfast? Mommy or Daddy’s cereal?” “I don’t want breakfast! I want NUFFING!” I look at the clock. It is 6:29. Zero hour is 6:30. The commute is only 15 miles, but traffic is horrific. If I don’t leave before 6:30 I won’t make it to work until after 8:00. Screw it. Leftovers. Where is the ice pack for my lunch? Of course I forgot to put it back in the freezer yesterday. Good thing we have a backup. Cute, real cute. The backup ice packs are so fat that the Tupperware doesn’t fit in my lunch bag. Guess I’ll have to make a sandwich after all. “WHAT DO YOU WANT FOR BREAKFAST?” “NUFFING!” I’m pouring a bowl, I don’t care. At least I can say that I tried. “Here’s your cereal” “I DON’T WANT IT” “OK, Daddy is going to eat it or throw it away” “NONONO!” (crying ensues) “I want to eat it!!!” “Sit down at your little table and eat it then.” “Ok… I WANT A BIG SPOON! I DON’T WIKE THE GREEN BOWL! I WANT THE BLUE BOWL!!!!” You’ve got to be freaking kidding me. You know what, I am not even going to fight him today. Where is that damn blue bowl? Dirty in the dishwasher. Figures. Well that’s out the window. “EAT IT OR IT GETS THROWN AWAY!” (Sobbing ensues) What time is it now? 6:34. I can still make decent time if I am in my truck by 6:45. COFFEE. This can’t be happening. THERE IS NO COFFEE. I have no time to make coffee. “Welp, there is no coffee!!!” “I’m so sorry Brody, I can’t do everything around here!” Oops. That wasn’t for her to hear. She did get Little B and Baby K ready without my help. Doesn’t matter anymore. I explode. I light into everything in the kitchen. Little B, Kathy, the freezer, coffee maker. I’ll even cuss out my lunch bag while I’m at it. Shut up and get out before you ruin everyone’s day. Truck keys. I’ve got to get out of here. I’m going to be late. I feel horrible for not helping Kathy. She won’t want my help now because I yelled back at her. Why do I do that? *15 minutes pass* We are all loaded up. Deep breath. We made it. Start the truck, garage door down, aaaand adjust radio. No Country this morning. I need to calm down. Where is the Jazz station? There that is better. Silence. “Daddy, I hungie (hungry)”. *** For me, reality comes in one giant cycle commencing and culminating with two massive countdowns for launching (departing the house) and landing (bedtime). The road rules quality time spent with my children during three hour commutes in which I stare at the rearview mirror into the backs of their little eyelids after they have passed out from a long day at school. The reality of “R” is a challenge that each of us faces every day. Rise, retain, remain, retire. Repeat. ...

Stronger Because Of It

My oldest daughter, MJ, has type I diabetes. I don’t write about it frequently although it is very much ingrained in our daily lives, but nowadays life just rolls along without much incident as far as the disease goes. I can’t figure out how something that drives me nuts multiple times a day and has a good bit of control over some of the function of our days has become sort of ho-hum and mundane. Our journey–which sounds euphemistic, but nightmare might be a little extreme–began six years ago. MJ had been symptomatic (unbeknownst to us) for probably about a year. Hindsight is so enlightening. I’m not a worrier, and she would complain of things that were isolated and seemingly normal or had a reasonable explanation. She would come home from school with a headache, and I would assume she was tired or needed a snack. Other days she would just be moody. Occasionally she would complain about her vision, while sitting 20 feet away from the kitchen counter, chewing her dinner, and telling me she couldn’t read the microwave clock. (I tried it–it’s impossible.) Anyway, the big tell was when she started getting up to use the bathroom EVERY night. Sometimes twice. Sometimes THREE times. We refused water before bed and still she got up. I was still pretty clueless, but my husband’s spidey senses were tingling. His brother is a type I diabetic diagnosed thirty years ago at the age of four. Type I diabetes is not considered to be hereditary, so we did not immediately jump to that conclusion. And one might think that having someone in the family with it would have given us a leg-up on the recognition factor, but The Sugar is quite a bi-polar animal. Low blood sugar is a serious concern for a lot of type I diabetics and my husband remembers being told what to look for if his little brother got dizzy or looked unwell. He remembers him passing out occasionally. Back then insulin was less reliable and so much less was known about the disease. What we were unknowingly dealing with was the opposite end of the spectrum and not uncommon for undiagnosed type I–our daughter’s blood sugar was through the roof. My husband was insistent that something was wrong, but I felt that whatever it was could be dealt with at her annual well-check, scheduled a few weeks from then. I said, “If you really think there is something wrong, then you call and get her an appointment sooner.” He did. The appointment was two days away. I was annoyed because that was Trick or Treat night in our town and the appointment was for 2:00 PM, so I had to take her out of school early. We got to our family physician’s office and went over the symptoms. She asked a lot of questions, drew some blood, and took a urine sample. Then we waited and waited and waited. For about 45 minutes. I was not thrilled about the wait and was starting to get anxious. What could be taking so long? Never in a million years would I have guessed that the doctor would come back in the room and say, “I suspect your daughter has type I diabetes.” The Sugar. My immediate thought was that we were going to get a pamphlet, go home, and come back in a few days for a follow-up visit. I had no idea. I think it took some time for the shock to wear off. Neither of us started crying until we were in the car on the way to the emergency room. Driving to a big hospital and an even bigger Unkown. It was probably a blessing we found out that day. If we had taken her trick-or-treating and then let her have one or two pieces of candy–our usual MO–she could have gone into a diabetic ketoacidosis. This is a serious condition that occurs when the body breaks down fat–as opposed to glucose–for energy. This is what makes extreme low-carb diets work. Breaking down fat produces ketones which, in large amounts, are poisonous to the body. This is what makes those diets potentially dangerous. Her blood sugar had been so high for so long that there is no telling what would have pushed her over the edge from functional to something life-threatening. Normal blood sugar should range between 70 and 100. Hers was over 500. In addition to the extreme thirst and blurry vision that MJ experienced, high blood sugar (hyperglycemia), can cause mental confusion. They tested her blood glucose level several times at the emergency room because they couldn’t believe she wasn’t acting loopy or having any issues functioning relatively normally. She is pretty tall for her age but was thinner than she should have been at the time since she hadn’t put much weight on the previous year due to her body burning fat for energy. The doctors surmised that her body had learned to adjust to its prolonged hyperglycemic state. We stayed in the ER for a few hours before being admitted. One thing the hospital was pretty good about was making sure that you were comfortable with the day-to-day care before they sent you home. In other words: we were in for a few days, at least. I think spent less time learning how to care for her when she was a newborn–when I had less experience and more to do. Right away my husband and I agreed that we wanted MJ to try giving herself the insulin injection and that we would proceed based on her willingness or ability to do so. With some practice on a teddy bear designed specifically for that purpose, she mastered it. We were hugely proud of her. If someone had told me one of my children was going to be diagnosed with an incurable disease I would not have pegged her as one to take it so well, but she did. For all this disease can take away, it seemed to give her a certain confidence she never had before. It’s basically a big numbers game, but the numbers change constantly, so you can’t just skate by at any given meal. You have to do the math every time. It’s hard to get comfortable with things when you are measuring food, researching food and administering life-saving medication to your child. And that’s not a bad thing. But somewhere along the road things do get comfortable. You learn a lot, and then you learn some more, and a lot of things start to become commonplace in your life. Carb counts, test strips, ketones, syringes. It’s been six years this fall and things are not much different. We constantly assess how she is doing; we adjust things as necessary. We see the pediatric endocrinologist every three months. It is the ho-hum and the mundane. It is simply “Life As We Know It.” I occasionally wonder if we are too relaxed about it, but the alternative is living in fear, and I don’t think that is healthy. Could serious things happen with her diabetes? Absolutely. Do I want her in a constant state of worry about every detail of every activity and every bite of food? Absolutely not. Several years ago MJ wrote an autobiographical essay for school. She wrote about her family, places she had lived, things she liked to do, what she wanted to be when she grew up. She never mentioned her diabetes. I was a little surprised, since we deal with it constantly, but then I realized: as ubiquitous as it is in her life, it does not define her. She is not it, but she is stronger because of it. ————————————————————————– This is a guest post from Melanie Madamba from The Not So Super Mom. You can find her on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram....

Q: Quality – What It’s Really Like

This post is part of a series titled, “A-B-Cs – What It’s Really Like”. Each week a new letter and its word will be revealed. Each word’s explanation will illustrate significant personal meaning, application and ultimately demonstrate, What It’s Really Like… Traditionally when facing a major upcoming purchase I try to settle on a selection where performance meets value. Usually there comes a point when I determine whether or not the price justifies the quality of the item. “Quality” items generally harbor fine qualities, but not the finest. For most, quality generally floats somewhere between the best and good enough. To me it’s more than that. My grandmother used to have a clear drinking glass that had Morris the Cat embossed on the side of it. (For those of you not familiar with Morris the Cat, he was the mascot for 9lives cat food back in the 1970s.) There was an illustrated thought bubble that was pointing from Morris’ head that said, “Morris on glass is like Sterling on silver.” Apparently, Morris felt that the quality of his drinking glass was pretty damn good. There were three things that my grandmother was fond of: sterling silver, genuine leather (she liked to pronounce it gen-U-whiiine leather) and Tupperware. None of which boasted the finest qualities, but quality nonetheless. “It is better to have second hand diamonds than not at all”, she used to tell me. I suppose those are quality words to live by. Quality comes from the old school. Literally. Craftsmanship is a lost ability, even sometimes on me. Many people do not know how to use it let alone spot it. I occasionally tell my dad that I am disappointed in myself for not learning to be more handy and technically skilled with my hands like he is. He has told me several times that my handy skills will be there when I need it. I was proud of myself recently for selecting a beautiful solid oak desk from a local second hand store to replace our wobbly “L-shaped” corner desk we purchased from Staples for $75 several years ago as newlyweds. I know that this is a quality item because the craftsmanship, detail and finish are a thing of beauty. Plus, the thing weighs about 1,000 lbs. so there is no doubt that it was made well. There is no substitute for quality. They definitely don’t make them like they used to. Speaking of the old school…as a teacher I have discovered a lost academic art is in handwriting and conversation. The handwriting of today’s teenagers is absolutely atrocious. Carrying on a conversation can be even worse. So many quality learning experiences are lost to the quantity of information attempted to be absorbed by an insatiable need of a smart device. Take a walk down any high school hallway during a class change and you will see it firsthand. Count how many students have their heads down while they walk, glued to their cell phones with ear buds in their ears. It’s no wonder why this new upcoming generation has been said to be on the “race to nowhere”. It is probably no coincidence that a capital cursive ‘Q’ appears to be shaped like the number ‘2’ and that it takes two people to carry on a quality conversation. In the baseball vernacular, when a starting pitcher completes 6 innings while allowing less than 3 runs it is known as a quality start. As a parent, my QS% is quite low when my wife and I struggle to get our two boys out of the house each morning. A parenting quality start should be a combination of no tears, fights (between parents or children), forgotten daily items, and making it to work on time. Lately I have found myself asking myself about quality quite frequently. I often wonder where I spend quality time vs. where my time is most spent. Within that poses the question of quality of life. Personally, where does performance meet value? It is why some of us opt for the car wash over spending time washing by hand or why some of us choose to put a loaf of bread in the refrigerator. The tradeoff is time spent vs. quality of life. I guess that is why my wife and I have decided we prefer quality of life by relocating back to our hometown to be near our families. It may also be why we likely continue to keep putting the loaf of bread in the refrigerator. It’s all about preserving the quality of life....

P: Poise – What It’s Really Like

This post is part of a series titled, “A-B-Cs – What It’s Really Like”. Each week a new letter and its word will be revealed. Each word’s explanation will illustrate significant personal meaning, application and ultimately demonstrate, What It’s Really Like… Poise – verb – to hold (something) in a balanced and steady position The season of fall features a great dose of excitement for sports fans. Playoff baseball, college/professional football, hockey and basketball all joust for the spotlight in the late months of the year in America. As the days grow shorter, so do the sleep patterns of most sports enthusiasts attempting to absorb as much of the action as possible while still being able to have the strength to function on a day-to-day basis. I have always been able to sit down and immerse myself in an athletic contest even without knowing anything about either team playing. The art of competition is fascinating. As in most sports, skill, will and a bit of luck all play a role in determining factors in the eventual outcome of a game. A man I used to coach with used to tell our players the competition was about weathering the storm. Players should anticipate a violent storm during the contest. It would be inevitable. Would they allow the storm to disrupt the game plan and their top goal or would they hold steady during inclement conditions? Most times, but not always, the team that does the best job at balancing the highs and lows emerge victorious. Saturdays and Sundays in the fall place a popular focus on the football gridiron. Each game a significant amount of attention is paid to the quarterback position. This is understandable for the large number of responsibilities the signal caller holds on each play. Having played the position before I have an insurmountable respect for each player that gets under center. Beyond ball handling and arm strength the quarterback position requires many intangible skills; most of which cannot be taught: composure, leadership, decision making, instinct, adaptability, internal clock and moxie. Aside from athletic talent, all of those skills can be boiled down into one classification: poise. Great poise is undeniable. Coach K writes in his book (Beyond Basketball) “…poise is the opposite of panic…it (poise) requires maturity. It’s about remaining mentally and emotionally balanced all the time, no matter what is taking place around you.” I obviously no longer play football, but that does not mean that I have stopped trying to sidestep the oncoming rush of the opposition. One of the first cardinal rules to follow as a quarterback is to take care of the football and maintain a possession. Many aspire to be placed in a position to call the shots having no idea what it takes to stand in the pocket and play the game. When faced with pressure are you converting or turning it over? When the rush is on and the pocket is collapsing how do you protect what is important and maintain possession of something you have worked so hard to claim? Poise or panic? We all play our own game. We all face a different opponent. Only you can answer that question. “Clear the mechanism” -Billy Chapel “Ease the pounding of your heart by quieting your mind” -GMa “Keep calm and carry on” -WWII Brits Evidence and reminders of poise are all around. Face each day possessed with optimism, meet your opposition with poise and keep on converting. ...

O: Odor – What It’s Really Like

This post is part of a series titled, “A-B-Cs – What It’s Really Like”. Each week a new letter and its word will be revealed. Each word’s explanation will illustrate significant personal meaning, application and ultimately demonstrate, What It’s Really Like… Did you fart?? These are the famous last words of parents with children under the age of five before discovering the source of a particularly pungent smell. This statement is usually uttered while driving down the road or while settling in the living room to watch a little late evening TV. If you are a parent you know the job can be smelly business. I am still waiting for Mike Rowe to do an episode of Dirty Jobs on the occupation of parenting. Our house possesses no shortage of a variety of smells. Some days are better than others. It usually is a balance somewhere between locker room, gourmet kitchen, waste water treatment plant and field full of wildflowers. Like Father, Like Son Unfortunately, my oldest son has inherited his parents feet. His feet are wide like mommy’s and stinky like daddy’s. Since he is growing so quickly we usually elect to buy him shoes that are an off-brand to save money. I am not sure if the lower grade material amplifies the smell or that his feet stink that much. Living in the south produces challenges on its own with high humidity and high average temperatures. You can imagine the stench that is produced when a sweaty preschooler removes his shoes in the back of a car after playing hard for an hour in the July Georgia heat. *Author’s note – Although he has been running around the house today without shoes on, my son just ran by and crop dusted me on the way to the “potty” as I was sitting here typing this post. Trash Tricks Another problem that poses itself in the southern heat is the trash. During the summer months my wife and I have to strategize the week’s menu based upon its “smell factor” by which it decomposes in the trash can. I can always count on having chicken on Tuesday or Wednesday leading up to trash day on Thursday to shorten the life of the horrendous rotting odor that is emitted with discarded chicken scraps. Typically perfectly cooked chicken can turn over in less than eight hours in the southern summer months. Fallen Soldiers Leftover snacks, juice/milk sippy cups and fallen foodstuffs all leave an undesired wasteland in family vehicles. Some of the items are immediately found others are discovered later when the real catastrophic mess happens. Usually by then the damage has been done and the smell has made itself permanent. One of the most difficult things to do is to keep a car clean with a toddler and a newborn. This is near impossible to accomplish this feat in the interior of a newer car. Tack on a wife who has the family nickname, “Puddles” and you could have yourself a real problem. Dirty Deeds Done Dirt Cheap I used to have a roommate in college who thought the lyrics to this ACDC song were, “Dirty deeds and the Dunder Chief”. After he was called out on his lyrical snafu, some of my college friends actually considered dressing up as the Dunder Chief for Halloween. After much debate and many adult beverages, the costume idea died after no one could decide on what the great Dunder looked like. That story reminds me of another fine skill that I learned in college, The Smell Test. You can only imagine the types of smells coming out of an all-male college apartment. (Let’s not omit the other gender population. Ladies, I have been in plenty of all-female college apartments 10-times as nasty as our little hole. I will not pass judgment or gender discriminate. In elementary school learned about Santa and in college I learned that girls are not sugar and spice and everything nice.) The dominating odors that I recall lofting through my college apartment were a delicate perfume blend of stale beer, rotting pizza, Hawaiian Breeze Plug-ins and musk. Somewhere in the barrage of college life, hopefully one does laundry. During the hustle and bustle of a college week, laundry comes and goes and most of it rarely gets put away. Laundry does not come with a born on date so it is often difficult to know its shelf life. This is especially true if you were anything like a typical college student that when it came time to do laundry chances are you took a truckload of it home with you to your parents’ house every four weeks or so. It was there on campus that I perfected the smell test with the motto, “When in doubt, sniff it out”. The Smell Test has become an important attribute of fatherhood as it can signify a diaper change, time of death of a fallen soldier (see above) or when a toddler DIY post-#2 “all by myself” wipe might not have been mission accomplished. Parenting requires the versatility of steady nose and the ability to breathe out your mouth. “Where Did That Come From?!” Potty training your toddler will cause your nose perk up and ask, “Where did that come from?” and your eyes ask, “WHERE DID THAT COME FROM???” Flatulence, bowel movements, “tee-tee”, formula burps, spit up, projectile vomit, snot waterfalls – parenting is not for the faint of heart or the non-iron stomached. In high school, my brother’s friends could make our friend Mike almost instantaneously vomit just by making gagging gestures and barfing noises. Today he is the father of two beautiful children. I am still not sure how he persevered during the “bodily fluid years”. I will never forget on a recent road trip home for Thanksgiving with my first born son. We drove straight through the night so that he would be asleep for most of the trip. Around the beginning of rush hour we were making our way through Cincinnati, Ohio. While maneuvering in and out of traffic at 75 miles-per-hour my wife and I hear a gurgling sound from the backseat that was surprisingly louder than the car radio. She and I looked at one another wide eyed and turned around. We knew that the enormous amount of dairy that he had just consumed at the hotel continental breakfast (milk and yogurt) was about to appear in the backseat. Nearly three seconds later there was a milky shower pouring in, out and over his car seat. The sour odor of dairy by-product immediately filled the warm interior of my car that had its heat blasting to take the chill off from outside. After several treatments with carpet cleaner and Febreze, I resorted to covering nearly my entire backseat with baking soda. I rode around for the next month and a half until the remedy finally conquered the smell. Absolutely awful. Take it from me, as a parent of two boys and after changing an infinite number of diapers I now know exactly what the Dunder Chief looks like (and smells like)....

N: Navigation – What It’s Really Like

This post is part of a series titled, “A-B-Cs – What It’s Really Like”. Each week a new letter and its word will be revealed. Each word’s explanation will illustrate significant personal meaning, application and ultimately demonstrate, What It’s Really Like… “When you come to a fork in the road, take it!” – Yogi Berra Few items have revolutionized the transportation industry over the last 25 years have been as have navigation and global positioning systems (GPS). I have fond childhood memories of family road trips that I can picture my mother riding shotgun with a large map of the current state we were in sprawled across the dash and on her lap. When it comes to the most stressful occupations, a few come to mind: emergency first responder, airplane captain and being my dad’s co-pilot – in that order. Usually the only time my brother and I stopped picking on and fighting with each other in the backseat was to witness the fireworks between my parents if we made a series of consecutive wrong turns. It was in the family minivan I learned the finer qualities of hostile negotiations, crisis management and conflict resolution. Personal GPS devices enable us many fantastic features such as fastest route, shortest route, points or interest and lane assist – just to name a few. You may find the speedometer, compass, elevation and destination arrival time to be most useful. All attributes of a personal GPS are of magnificent use, but what happens when your anticipated journey does not have a destination? What if you do not know where you are going? How will you know when you arrive? Typically when using a navigation system the first step is to enter a desired destination. Most users can punch in an exact location, others may use smart features of the device to find a destination that is near or sounds like the user’s manual entry. If you don’t know where you are going when using a GPS, chances are the unit will provide you with a destination – whether you like it or not. For example, depending on what side of town I am on my Garmin provides me with two identical addresses when I use it to assist travel to my grandmother’s house. The first, and incorrect selection, is located 15-20 minutes from her home. This is just one primary example of how confusing driving in and around Atlanta can be (I am certain there are over 100 Peachtree Roads in ATL). Over the past year my own internal, human GPS has stopped working. In the past I have had the ability to have some insight to predicting future outcomes or final destinations. It seems that as I have gotten older I have lost the reliability of this skill. I have recently discovered that my internal GPS did not come equipped with Lifetime Maps. It is either time to upgrade or to drive blindly to the next stop. Several of my destinations have recently come into question – personally and professionally. What location is best for my family in order to be near family members that are ailing? What career track should I take? Ultimately, what are the best routes? Are these destinations along the route we are currently traveling or should we head in a different direction? “Recalculating!” You don’t hear this annoying alert on newer GPS devices. Instead, more modern units silently shift and adapt mapped routes to help ease the tension of the driver either by default or anticipation. This alert has also stopped functioning for me. Are we certain that the directions have refreshed and that we aren’t heading back the way we came? Sometimes I feel as though we have been driving in circles, passing the same landmarks every year at the same time. It is difficult to trust your instincts when most everything that we use in our daily lives is automated. During a recent lunch break conversation with colleagues, we were discussing our individual bouts with horrendous Atlanta traffic. When it became my turn to share I began rattling off my daily trip itinerary from home to day care and to school. Eventually I found myself listing off roads and highways along with departure/arrival times. During my rapid fire deliverance I began to see the eyes widen on some of the members in our lunch group. The comment was made, “For someone who is not from around here you sure know your way around. How do you do that?” I explained that once I get somewhat familiar with a location I stop using the GPS altogether. I choose to remove the proverbial “crutch” or “training wheels” so that I can obtain more from my surroundings that goes far beyond what is on a 3.5-inch screen. It’s a trait that I learned from my grandfather well before I ever sat behind the wheel. He said that if you knew the general cardinal direction before setting out on a journey you will never get lost. From that, I have always had a great sense of direction. As of late, not so much. I am a firm believer in faith. I am a firm believer in learning the roads you travel and the value of the experience along the journey. I am a firm believer that I am a good driver. Where do I want to be? Who do I want to be? How should I get there? I have confidence that I can navigate through life without a GPS and whatever road I choose to take will eventually take me to where I am meant to be....

M: Memory – What It’s Really Like

This post is part of a series titled, “A-B-Cs – What It’s Really Like”. Each week a new letter and its word will be revealed. Each word’s explanation will illustrate significant personal meaning, application and ultimately demonstrate, What It’s Really Like… “God gave us our memories so we might have roses in December” You would be surprised how much you can pick up while dining on a ham and cheese sandwich, three bread and butter pickles and a can of 7up. You might even be shocked what you may learn on a Friday at noon while sitting around consuming a weekly traditional Friday McDonald’s Fish Filet. You would certainly be astonished to discover what can be absorbed while sitting around the dining room table after a Sunday family dinner over coffee and a piece of pie. Most of the memories in my life are not shrines to individual occurrences but a museum of eclectic experiences that draw on meaningful connections meriting reservation deep in the vault of my mind. These collections are deeply enriched with attributes of all the senses: sight, sound, smell, taste, touch – the more of the senses that are involved with a meaningful experience, the clearer the memory. For me, emotion is the X-factor in my personal memory because in recalling a vivid memory I can likely tell you how I felt in that exact moment. Food plays an important role in memory for me personally. Most of the meaningful education that I would ever receive was not obtained in a classroom, on an athletic field, or on the job, but around the dinner table. This is where I learned to communicate, manners and respect and about my family’s heritage. It was here that I also learned the art of storytelling and to appreciate the craft of an authentic, genuine narrative. Maybe that is why I became a history teacher. Some of my most fond memories were of the chronicles, sidetracks and matter-of-facts that my grandparents would tell during and after a Sunday family dinner. Most often we would take turns exchanging material on a topic only soon to be lost in a distant memory of “who is he/she related to” and “how do we know this person so-and-so and to whom is he/she related”. This traditionally would go on for hours leaving me glued to the finish of our dining room chairs and convinced that my grandparents knew every single person on the face of the earth. Many of those stories are now lost upon me either because I could not follow the viney scaffolds and extensions of our family tree or because it has been replaced in my mind with something far less meaningful, for which I am ashamed to admit. One of my most prized possessions is my memory. One of my biggest fears is losing this possession. I often get after my wife because I believe that we do not take enough pictures of our family and experiences. A memory I will never forget is from the 6th grade. Our teacher chose to do a class service project for senior citizens in a local assisted living home. I was so excited when I learned that it was the same home that my great-grandmother was in. Each member of the class was to be assigned to one member of the home and to create a greeting card to deliver on a visit during the late fall. I made sure that my great-grandmother would be receiving my card during our class visit. My great-grandmother had been placed in assisted living because she was suffering from severe Alzheimer’s disease. Periodically, I would ride along with my grandfather to visit her. At a very young age I saw her on very good days and very bad days. I remember how scared and horrible I felt when she did not recognize my grandpa. During my excited preparation for the delivery of my greeting card to my great-grandmother, my mother cautioned me that she may not recognize me on the day of our class visit. I shrugged it off and had a strong feeling that she would be having a good day when I would stop by. On the day of our class visit the senior home I could hardly contain my excitement. I was the only one in my class who had a relative staying here and I of course let everyone know that I was going to see my great-grandmother that day. To help out, my grandpa let me tag along on a visit a few weeks before to potentially help increase the odds that she would recognize me. He never told me that, but I knew what that visit was all about. When I arrived I spoke softly and clearly. I introduced myself and handed her my card. After she read the card she thanked me. I wanted to make sure she recognized me. I reintroduced myself by stating my name and that I was her great-grandson. She replied, “Oh yes, you are Rhoda’s son.” I was elated! I couldn’t believe that she remembered! Looking back to that visit I believe I had five good minutes with her. It was just long enough to feel confident to safely give her a hug and a kiss and introduce her to my best friends. Quickly, I would transform from family member to complete stranger. By the end of the visit she had no idea who I was. As I walked back to the school bus I did everything that I could to hold back my tears. I grew up a lot that day. Even as painful as that experience was I learned a lot from what memory can and cannot be. Over my lifetime I have developed an innate ability to remember. I had a best friend in high school that told everyone that he didn’t need to remember anything because I would remember it for him. In high school I was a walking Rolodex, telephone book, sports encyclopedia and jukebox. I could tell you when, where, stats, lyrics and just about anyone’s telephone number (pre-cell phones, folks). I suffered several head injuries before I was the age of eighteen. With all of today’s neurological studies on the brain, most notably in contact sports, I would have likely been disallowed from playing high school football if these findings had existed then. One of the worst concussions I ever experienced was in 4th grade where a sled riding accident left me not knowing who I was for nearly 48 hours. Several other minor sports related concussions would follow. Around the time I was a sophomore in college I started to notice that I was losing my short term memory at a very rapid rate. I was not sharp and I grew increasingly frustrated that I had become extremely forgetful virtually overnight. I feared that the consequences of too many concussions had caught up with me. I was scared to see a doctor, flashing back to thoughts of my great-grandmother and what a life without memory was like. I decided that rather than seek medical attention that I would try to retrain myself to remember day-to-day activities. I bought myself a bunch of post-its and began to write down various to-do lists for tasks that I had coming up that day, week, the following week and the month. Each day I reviewed the post-its (some days several times) and soon I retrained myself to remember short-term. Still do this day I have to write things down. I am convinced it is not because I need it, but simply good sound organizational practice to be thorough and reliable. My biggest fear is that at some point in my life I will have absorbed so much meaningless information that it will begin prioritizing space in my brain; much like a computer hard drive or the dwindling memory of a base model iPhone. What to store and what to delete? Do I/Will I have control over that? In education, we teach students that the brain is a muscle that must be exercised or it will atrophy. If you do not use your brain power you will lose it. How can you possibly exercise the brain enough to possibly maintain all that it possesses? My brother gifted all of the groomsmen in his wedding with a leather bound journal with each member’s name engraved on the clasp. He requested that we use the journal to record out greatest life experiences. Although I do not write in the journal daily, I have committed myself to recording my greatest experiences in order to answer the question I posed at the end of the previous paragraph. Hopefully this will allow me to take back my cognitive capacity, rid myself of the cobwebs and render myself less of a victim when it comes to degenerating memories. It is my hope that I can always remember the lessons I learned over lunch with my grandparents so that I can share them with my own grandchildren. Even the lesson on how to shoot the paper off of the straw while sitting at the table (thanks, GMa!). After all, the mind is a terrible thing to waste. “Nothing is a waste that makes a memory”...

Letter to My Kindergartener | WIRL Project

The Kindergarten Milestone – The First of Many Lasts

To my third child on her entry to kindergarten: I’m not sure why kindergarten is the milestone that it is. After all, you are a baby used to being in childcare. I am accustomed to dropping you off, handing you into someone else’s loving and capable hands for the hours I have spent working. After five years of childcare and two children before you, I should be used to this by now. But this is kindergarten – THIS is different! I wanted you to be hesitant and clingy, but you weren’t. With all the excitement and exuberance of someone going to her own party, you hugged me and turned to run for the steps of that bus. You were so eager to leave. You stepped on that bus, by yourself, and started down a road that only leads forward. Perhaps it’s not the handing off of you to someone else, but how confidently you left me. You are my last to send off and I expected that it would be the same kind of experience I had your brother and sister. I thought it would be a celebratory milestone – and it was – but I hadn’t realized the finality of it: there are no more of this milestone for me after you. You are my last to go. Maybe that’s why it’s such a big deal to send you off to elementary school. You will have the blessing and curse of having the last of many milestones, marking my time as the mother of three school-age children, turning adult. What’s become real is that one day, youngest, you will leave our home and either live a grand life on your own or find someone to share it with. That person, I hope, will be your best friend. That person will get all the goody at the end of your day like I get when you step off the bus. That person will hear your joy, your hope, your fears and disappointments, regularly. That person will be the first to comfort you and the first to celebrate with you. Right now, that’s me. In the future, it most likely will be someone else and, while I know you’ll give me some of that precious opportunity, losing my position holds little to no pleasure for me. When life hands you something really great or really hard, you (like me) will call your mom to celebrate or to make it all better. I hope you do. I want you to. But today, watching you walk toward the bus stop with a backpack almost as big as you are, I take a mental picture and put it in my precious scrapbook of memories. One day the barbies will not be strewn across the floor. I will not have to pick up endless remnant ponytail holders from all over the house. You will not ask me to quickly do your hair while you eat a bowl of cereal at our breakfast table. There will be other frustrations and moments of inspiration that come along after you are truly on your own, but nothing as sweet as those that come with you and your brother and sister. The moments that seem mundane today will live in my memory as jewels and will make watching you grow one of the best and most bittersweet things I will ever do. Welcome to kindergarten, sweet girl, and the first of many last milestones we will experience together....

9/11 Never Forget

We should never forget September 11, 2001. However, we do need to move on, to continue living our lives without fear. I was in the 11th grade sitting in English class. I remember one slightly eccentric teacher running down the hallway between classes that morning screaming, “We are under attack – We are at war.” Life would never be the same. I presume, to avoid panic on that pristine September day, the school turned off the televisions. We were stuck to wonder. It was a world before smart phones. We scoured the internet during our French class for bits of information, even though the teachers had been instructed to turn them off. September 11, 2001 changed our lives forever. But, to not let the terrorists win, we must carry on without fear. Shortly after the attack I was selected as a participant for Presidential Classroom. This week long educational experience in Washington D.C. was late winter and just a few short months later. It was my first time flying alone. The Reagan Airport had been open about a month. I was seventeen. There was a large gaping hole in the pentagon, I flew right over it, saying a prayer for those that were lost. We overcome by living our lives as close to what they were before the attacks as possible. To continue to travel, fly, go to work. My first job out of college was a Flight Attendant. Live without fear. We should never forget the lives lost, never forget the tragedy, but also, we should never let them take our freedom....

L: Longing – What It’s Really Like

This post is part of a series titled, “A-B-Cs – What It’s Really Like”. Each week a new letter and its word will be revealed. Each word’s explanation will illustrate significant personal meaning, application and ultimately demonstrate, What It’s Really Like… This will only take a second. Usually when you long for something the feeling is often short-lived and temporary. What happens when the longing feeling has been lingering for a long, long time? I’ve been longing for: …a place where mulch beds outnumber pine straw landscaping …where the most popular cars are not Mercedes, BMW, and Lexus but instead Ford, Chevy, and Barely Runs …places where I don’t primarily need GPS to help me find a destination …a place where 12 mile drives aren’t 45-60 minute commutes …a family get together not requiring 6-months of planning …Grandparent visits …small town diners with placemats that advertise businesses I recognize …a profession in which you are respected and appreciated …an occupation with clear, reachable directives not moving targets unattainable of achieving …outdoor spaces for my sons to play that aren’t the size of postage stamps and restricted by uniform picket fences …“running to town” …seasons …start to finish rainy days …the smell of fresh cut hay …summer fires …autumn leaves …hoodies and sweatshirts …homegrown friendships …the beautiful struggle of rural living …Home....