Reality Never Sleeps In

The sound of the Pack-N-Play rustles to life at 6 am.  A nappy head with sleepy eyes pops up, followed by the cheerful sound from our two-year old moments later.

“Hi Mommy.  Hi Daddy!”

Such a sweet sound to us first thing in the morning.  Her genuine excitement and joyfulness fills the room.  It might have sounded a bit more joyful to us, had we gone to bed earlier than 2 am the night before.

The writing was on the wall.  It was going to be one of those high-octane coffee kinds of mornings.  The kind that you drink with a fork and a knife.  More accurately, it was time to pay up.

We had headed back to my old stomping grounds the night before for an evening out.  Just the wife and I.  There was a benefit planned back in my hometown for a high school friend of mine.  It was something that I had been looking forward to for several weeks.  Not only were we were going to see some of our old friends, but my wife was actually going to meet several people that I had literally grown up with.  Some of which, going all the way back to kindergarten. 

We had tried several times to do things like this in the past.  A night out for the two of us.  These attempts were often stymied by cataclysmic parent-related roadblocks.  Sequences that usually started with us lining up one set of grandparents to watch our beloved offspring for the evening, followed by us packing the car for the eventual overnight road trip to their house.  It may seem like a lot of time and effort for just a couple hours…but if the end result was a much-needed night out for my better half and I, the prep work involved doesn’t matter a whole lot. 

Unfortunately, what typically transpires after this process is nothing short of epidemic plague and pestilence.  Calamities of biblical proportions.  I smite thee!  Ka-blooey.

One instance had us driving to my in-laws for the day.  The goal was to drop off the kids that afternoon and go out to dinner with some of our friends.  About 45 minutes into the trip north, projectile vomiting ensued from the back seat.  After coming to a screeching halt in front of a local police station and an animated, private conversation with my maker, a field-improvised sanitization plan was devised. 

It’s really too bad that we didn’t happen upon a fire station instead.  I probably would have been better off using one of their hoses for that particular decontamination activity.  That, and maybe some of that sawdust stuff that they used for comparable biological disasters on school buses back-in-the-day.  I have to be honest.  Much like the effects that Ginger Ale has on my psychological feelings of queasiness, the smell of that sawdust will forever be engrained in the darkest recesses of my nausea psyche.

The U-turn trip home that afternoon was brutal.  Although I adamantly denied it at the time, I really did intentionally aim for that skunk running across the road.  Anything to provide a scented variety to my nose.

On yet another occasion, we drove north for a friend’s annual summer cookout.  Old friends, good times, and extremely loud guitars.  Same scenario.  This time, we actually made it to my in-laws.  Five minutes after walking in the door, our daughter throws up all over their dining room floor.  After executing yet another Federal Superfund initiative, I immediately repacked the car and we headed home.  Evening thwarted once again.  Although the drive home that time was odor-free, I couldn’t say the same for the quarantined vicinities of my in-law’s house.

You get the idea.  These outings with my wife are few and far between.  They are also apparently subject to clearances and/or waivers by the EPA and the CDC.  On those off-chances where the Gods of Bedlam do overlook the inevitable smiting of our plans and we actually make it out for an evening alone, we are prone to take full advantage of it.  Unfortunately, taking advantage of these instances also tends to give us that “first week college freshman” mindset. 

“Freedom!”  Kilt and blue war paint optional.

It’s a scenario ripe for exploitation and abuse.  Circumstances that often lead to humanly-toxic doses of Pepto-Bismol and caffeine the next morning.

The benefit that Saturday night turned out to be a great success.  All kinds of people turned out from my days in high school.  It was great seeing some of those people that I had literally grown up with too.  Amazing that after all of these years, that handful of us really hadn’t changed that much.  Good, bad, or still pending sentencing.

After the benefit had wrapped up for the evening, the wife and I decided to take advantage of the remainder of our evening by having a nice dinner and a couple of drinks.  Upon sitting down for our meal, it was discovered that several of our friends were also visiting the same establishment.  Our table was consequently abandoned and a respectable corner of the bar was taken hostage for the evening.

I monitored the time pretty frequently over the next couple of hours.  10:00, 11:00, midnight.  We were so busy catching up on good times, that the time didn’t seem relevant.  It had never had previously…at least, before kids.  I kept telling myself that it wasn’t getting “late” because “late” used to equate to “sunrise” a decade or so ago.  I was convinced and determined that my 40 year old carcass could still hang.  At least for another ten or fifteen minutes.  Maybe.

Deep down though, I knew we’d be required to pay up come sunrise.  And that this reality was going to hurt.

Now close to 1 am, my wife suddenly realizes what time it is.  Pumpkin status…officially outed.  The fact remained that we still had to drive 45 minutes back to my in-laws house and get up with the kids at o’dark:30 tomorrow morning.

Correction.  THIS morning.  Duly noted.  It was time to go. 

Although I had the temporary, misguided delusion of being a college freshman for a couple of hours, the reality is that we successfully made it out for the evening and had fun.  We got to spend time together, see old friends, and have grown-up conversations.  Conversations that didn’t end with the catch-all quip “because I said so”.  Of course, while temporarily entrenched in these adolescent delusions, one often doesn’t take into consideration the reality of following day’s responsibilities.

Because reality doesn’t sleep in.

Buckle Up

There is no such thing as a “quick trip” to the store anymore.  Those days of yore when your mom would literally throw you in the backseat of the car and be at the local grocery store in three minutes are long gone.

Today’s time-intensive replacement routine has become nothing short of pre-calculated child appendage weaving and high-impact parental calisthenics.  The aerobic saga of strapping your darling brood into their car seats, that is.  It’s an endless myriad of military-grade carbon-fiber buckles, snaps, straps, latches, pads, mounting brackets, bubble-wrap, and eight-point racing harnesses.  It’s the equivalent of prepping a NASCAR driver for a couple hundred laps…just without the assistance of a pit crew or a toddler-sized shoe-horn. 

Couple that routine with the actual effort that it takes to actually strap one of those things into your car.  And if you’re lucky enough to have one of those older cars without that “latch system” installed?  Best of luck to you.  You’re basically left to fend for yourself, using thousand year-old origami techniques on those shoulder harnesses. 

You must also ensure that you use the proper leverage during the installation phase.  Otherwise, be dazzled upon initial speed bump impact, as you witness junior’s car seat begin to spin counter-clockwise like the knife-throwing “Wheel of Death” act from the circus sideshow tent.  Not that I’ve personally witnessed anything like that before…

My installation technique usually involves jamming my less-than-narrow 210 pound frame into my child’s car seat in order to achieve that maximum, required leverage.  Once I’m thoroughly wedged in and the car seat is properly weighted down, I tighten the straps to attain the appropriate placement tension.

Although masterfully resourceful and highly effective, it also leaves the neighbors curious as to why a grown man would sit in a toddler seat and violently rock back and forth…all while cursing like a North Atlantic sailor.  While debatable, I have found that a frequent smile and wave provides them with the needed assurance that all is right at the asylum and communicates that the local constables aren’t required at this juncture.  Not that they’ve personally witnessed anything like that before…

I really do understand the safety benefits behind all of it.  The way my family staggers, teeters, and pavement-bounces their way through life, safety-first is essentially requisite for simple survival.  After a humorous New Year’s Eve discussion on the matter though, it begs the question.  Where were these safety measures when we were kids and how did we survive without them? 

Think back.  Yesteryear’s car seats were basically mom or dad reaching into the backseat to hold you in place while swerving and braking.  Occasionally this technique would go awry and you would wind up on the floor under the passenger seat.  However, you’d always manage to score that handful of loose change that had fallen under there for future candy machine use.  Concussion winning! 

Much like car seats, bike helmet safety has evolved as well.  Modern helmets are now fully-equipped with the latest blast-proof foam, adequate ventilation, and engineered to withstand a head-on collision with a 747.

Head protection in my era was basically your eleventh-hour attempts at strategic flailing.  Aerial efforts skillfully executed to target your delicate melon towards the hydrangea in the neighbor’s front yard.  The end result of a failed bunny-hop of the curb at 15 mph, followed by the subsequent, twisting catapult over the handlebars.  A hydrangea, by the way, that never quite grew back…much to my neighbor’s chagrin. 

Even if you were smart enough to wear a helmet in those days, it was probably one of those flimsy toy helmets that you entrusted with your cranial well-being.  It probably had more to do with looking like “Speed Racer” than actual safety in most cases, but the general idea was there. 

Unfortunately, my mouse pad has greater impact-resistance than any of those helmets ever did.  Thinking back, I never recalled seeing that ASTM certification sticker next to the “Made in China” stamp either.  In hindsight, the lead byproducts in those things probably did even less for my cerebral development than my epic hydrangea dismount ever did.  That explains a lot, actually.

Outside of car seats and bike helmets, US Government child safety directives of my youth could probably be best summed up by the cars of the late 1970s.  Those spectacular, twenty-ton battleships labeled by “The Big Three” as the “family station wagon”.   Part 350-horsepower battering ram; part cross-country touring hearse.    

Especially endearing to these automobiles was the built-in babysitter.  The rear-facing “way-back” seat.  Not only could you completely ignore what your kids were getting into, but it was seemingly designed to eliminate all instances of kid-related static through a combination of distance and rear-facing projection acoustics.  Well-played, Detroit!  A prime example of demographic marketing at its best. 

Ironically, this was apparently where my wife “quietly” spent most of her childhood.  Maybe that’s the reason why she gets that look of complacency when the kids are screaming “huh, what” from the back seat.

I have to be honest.  After all of those exploding Ford Pinto allegations of the time, you really have to wonder how the idea of a “way-back seat” over the gas tank ever really gained traction and came to fruition.

So where does this all leave me in my quest to shave seven minutes from my trips with a carload of children?  Cutting corners by off-roading through people’s front yards at high speeds?  Jumping over neighborhood retaining ponds like those “Dukes of Hazzard” did?  Although an enticing personal challenge, I’m not 100% on the amount of “air” that I could get out of that minivan.  Not yet, anyway.

Maybe the reappearance of the automatic seatbelt would help trim some time.  Belts that automatically strap your youngsters in for you.  Remember those wonderful safety devices of late 1980s fame?  Your head out of the window, talking to a member of the opposite sex after school.  Looking cool.  Then, upon turning your car off, the seatbelt suddenly rolls forward across your neck and pushes your face into the steering wheel.  Coolness personified.  Not that I’ve been personally scarred by anything like that before… 

On second thought, I’ll take my chances jumping the retaining pond.

Monster Dive

"I've been training it, but we're not sure if we're going to use it.  We'll keep training it for another week and maybe make a decision.  It's a 3.8 in difficulty." - Former USA diver Laura Wilkinson on the “monster dive” she was practicing as part of her program in the Beijing 2008 Olympic Games.

The difficulty referenced, short for “Degree of Difficulty”, is often referred to as the "DD" in competitive diving.  The DD takes into consideration the number of twists and somersaults planned in a dive, among other criteria.  It’s one of the elements used to calculate a diving score.  It is multiplied with the judges' scores to create a total score for an individual dive.  The scores are added together for a final total score, with the highest score being the winner.

Simple enough.

So how does scoring work for plain-old recreational diving?  Those events where the only judges are your peers?  And with any luck, an orthopedic surgeon or two in attendance as well.  Coupled with the scoring criteria rationalized in competitive diving, I’m of the firm belief that your health insurance deductible should also be taken into consideration as well.  My thinking is that a high insurance deductible should add a solid two-tenths of a point onto one’s difficulty.  An unwritten directive in the sport of non-competitive crib-diving.  This would have given our toddler a solid 4.0 DD for her monster dive and a sure Sunday night Olympic Gold.

Sunday night…  Why is it always a Sunday night?

There was a loud “thud” from the second floor.  It’s a sound similar to those that we have become accustomed to hearing with our older children and their ritualistic, galloping burst of pre-bedtime lunacy.  Problem was, they were already quietly reading in their beds.  To break our monotonous routine, the noise was followed up with a piercing, painful cry erupting from our toddler’s bedroom.  This was certainly an added twist.

After laying her down for the evening, she managed to scale up and out of her crib…only to triple-pike and one-and-a-half twist herself into the carpet below.  Based on the height of the crib and the numerous technical/aerial possibilities, I’m guessing that her DD was epic on this particular dive.

As procedurally requisite by household edict, panic promptly ensued thereafter.

Once we were finally able to determine that she hadn’t permanently maimed herself, we started assessing her overall condition.  She favored her left arm and could barely lift it.  Having dislocated my shoulder in an icy snow-skiing debacle back in college, it looked awfully familiar.  To ensure that nothing was separated or broken, we deemed it necessary to perform a series of basic medical tests to gauge her overall diagnosis of damage.  The fact that neither my wife nor I are trained medical professionals just took the episode’s ridiculousness to an all new level of idiocy.

I promptly administered a mixed bag of assessments that included such battlefield-proven and AMA-certified tests such as “give daddy hugs”, “raise the roof”, and “grab the toy that I’m holding over your head”.  Luckily, it was determined that a trip to the ER was required before I was able to make her do “The Dougie”.

In the end, it turned out that it wasn’t her shoulder at all.  It was a buckle fracture of the wrist.  It was this obvious ineptitude in the medical diagnoses department which explained my high school guidance counselor’s propensity for giggle fits at the mere mention of my medical school aspirations.  To my defense, I did narrow the injury down to the correct appendage.  However, the overall success rates in defending the “round-about” diagnosis technique probably wouldn’t play out particularly well in a malpractice suit.

To ensure that her fracture healed correctly, the orthopedic surgeon stated that she was required to wear a hard cast over her wrist and forearm.  A little pink cast that would be required to stay on her arm for three weeks.

“Three weeks?  That’s it?  Three weeks is nothing!” 

It lasted roughly 24 hours.  After the swelling had gone down, she wasted no time in yanking it off with relative ease.  She casually strolled into the kitchen and handed us her cast.  Unfazed and completely unassuming, she followed it up with a firmly verbal “off” before leaving the kitchen.  I interpreted this in adult-speak as “silly minions, your petty restraints are no match for my iron-will and unrelenting determination”. 

Game on. 

I’ll see your “will and determination” and raise you “two unremitting parents”.  A trip back to the orthopedic doctor the following day warranted her a smaller, yet tighter cast.

Her second cast lasted considerably longer in comparison.  About five days to be precise.  You can’t fault her for a lack of trying though.  Tugging, pulling, even throwing herself into a tub of water in an ill-conceived attempt to bob for apples at a friend’s Halloween party.  Personally, I think that successfully snagging said apple while achieving little-to-no splash upon entry should provide for at least another two-tenths cushion in the DD department.  We’ve got to be up to a stellar 4.2 at this point.

In the end though, she managed to yank this one off too.  Yet another trip to the orthopedic office.

In a move that could be characterized as nothing short of desperation, the third cast was applied over her forearm and bent elbow.  Matching wills, we were just as determined to keep this one on as she was to get it off.

Good luck with that one, Houdini.

The third cast represented our “Alamo”.  A final stand that would limit her ability to do the everyday things, but also ensure that she had no way of getting it off.  A week later, however, we found it sitting next to her in her crib.

“Off.” 

Duly noted.

With only a couple days left on her three week immobilization period, we waved the white flag and conceded defeat to a determined two year old.  We were beaten.  Outwitted.  It had become apparent to us that her head was obviously harder than any of these casts were.  Besides, I think we were officially “black-balled” by that particular orthopedic practice after the second cast anyway.

Three casts in two and a half weeks.  Houdini, Copperfield, and Angel?  Those jokers were mere illusionists...  This kid was a magician. 

Even as I struggle to figure out the contorted physics behind her multiple escape acts, there is something to be said for her unconditional resolve.  As with everything else that she does, she doesn’t rely on others.  If there is something that she wants or doesn’t like, she simply grabs the bull by the horns…and cannonballs it.  There simply isn’t a DD measurement for that kind of monster dive.

Her teens ought to be a riot.

Flight of the Lemmings

Parents often refer to them as “making memories” or “character-building” events.  Kids typically look back on them as “disaster scenario <insert number>” or as “that time dad went postal”.  Seems most parents are pre-wired to make these attempts at providing memorable, lifetime experiences for their children.  Good, bad, or skit comedy of errors, it’s a rite of passage passed down from generation-to-generation.  More appropriately, lemming-to-lemming.  My parents did it, my wife’s too.  So obviously we're going to swan-dive off of that cliff and follow suit with our own children.

Much like my father used to, I go into these ideas with the best of intentions for my family.  Seeing nothing but the end goal of adventure, happiness, and togetherness.  Conveniently, and oftentimes deliberately, looking past the dozen or so traps that lie along our harmonious path to victory.  Traps that frequently turn into that psychotic, Clark Griswold “Wally World” impression.  Whistling “Zip-A-Dee-Doo-Dah” indeed…

My grand aspiration this time was to take the family camping in the mountains.  An early Fall weekend of camping and hiking, all while taking in nature’s incredible, scenic backdrop.  The kids were genuinely excited about going and the wife and I love it up there.  It was to be an ideal weekend outdoors, away from all of life’s stresses.

The weather forecast quickly put a damper on this plan though.  Ninety percent chance of rain on Friday.  Forty percent the rest of the weekend.  Friday was obviously out.  The weekend though…  With my college statistics professor vehemently shaking his head in the background and several Vegas bookies salivating nearby, the wheels began to spin. 

“Forty percent is less than half, right?  I’ll take those odds!  We’ll just leave on Saturday.”

Nearing the mountains that morning, however, I noticed a pillowy blanket of grey covering their tops.  Dense fog.  In keeping with that mentality, I kicked my native realism to the curb and continued to plow forward on our memory-making mission.  Stubborn and undeterred, I was certain that the fog would burn off in the afternoon sun. 

But alas, there would be no afternoon sun.  The fog was so thick that you couldn’t even see the next campsite.  We spent the better part of that afternoon chopping wood for the warmth of a much-needed fire.  Other than my in-laws, who were staying at a nearby lodge, we didn’t get many visitors stopping by to socialize.  Mainly due to the fact that our enchanted campsite possessed a scary-looking bald guy standing in the mist with an eight pound axe-splitter dangling from his hands.  The only things missing from this macabre vision were the gratuitous hockey mask and the screeching strings score from Hitchcock’s “Psycho” echoing in the background.  A precursor, perhaps?

In time, the fog became intermittent enough for us to get a quick hike in before dinner.  Once or twice, I think I actually saw the valley through a brief clearing in the clouds.  Verification of this fact, however, will be oft-debated for decades to come. 

Well after sunset, or at least after the fog darkened, we were finally able to collect on the moment that makes it all worthwhile.  All of that packing, unpacking, and setting up.  The skies cleared for that ever-so-brief moment of heavenly bliss.  Sitting fireside and seeing a billion stars in the absolute darkness of the wilderness sky.

Twenty minutes and two shooting stars later, the clouds and fog meandered their way back in.   Spiritually rejuvenated, and realizing that our window for star-gazing had officially closed for the evening, we retired to the tent for a wonderfully sound-slumber in the fresh air of the great outdoors.

I was awakened roughly an hour later by a dog barking from a nearby campsite…followed by low growling noise.  This wasn’t your typical Lassie “Help, Timmy fell down the well” growl.  This was a low and feral feline growl.  I sat up and listened again carefully.  Same growl followed by a loud, angry snarl.  My mind raced.  “Cat.  Biiiiiiiiig cat.  Mountain lion?”

A second vicious snarl, closer to the tent this time.  Axe, hatchet, and serial-killer mask packed consciously in the van, I reached for the only weapons available next to my sleeping bag.  A flashlight and a four-inch pocket knife.  What luck!  Perhaps I could distract it with hand shadow impressions.  Or, in the final throes of a life-or-death, man-versus-nature struggle, I could blind and tickle it to death.  My personal Animal Planet “I Shouldn’t Be Alive” episode was starting to read a lot like the “Airplane” movie script.

“I am serious…and don’t call me ‘Shirley’.”

My wife still laughs at the “mountain lion” reference.  In all honesty, it was probably nothing more than a bobcat.  But in the blackened silence of the woods, and in a tent with my wife and young children sleeping soundly nearby, the Fancy Feast cats might have sounded a lot like the Ringling Brothers main event to me.  In retrospect, I guess that would have made me the bearded lady.

After fifteen agonizing minutes of “Crouching Mike, Hidden Bobcat”, the campground finally quieted enough for me to confidently stuff myself back into my sleeping bag.  That’s when the rain returned.  A steady, pouring rain.  It started about 1:30 and never let up. 

That firewood that we had been chopping all afternoon?  Saturated and sitting in a full inch of mud next to the fire pit.  There would be no fire that next morning.  Not without a flame-thrower and the contents of our gas tank anyway.  No breakfast pancakes, no breakfast sausage.  Nothing but dry cereal and potato chips.  Oh, and beer.  For some odd reason, I suddenly became a little reminiscent of college…

At sunrise the next morning, and I was taking my watch’s word for it, we decided that it would be in the best interest of sanity to join my in-laws for breakfast at the lodge.  With no conveniently scheduled Jeff Probst appearances on the docket, it was decreed that a hot meal and a chance to dry out were mental essentials prior to packing up our campsite.  I’m not ashamed to admit that bit of outdoors “man-law” blasphemy.  I take solace in my belief that even fellow-survivalist, Bear Grylls, would have thrown-in-the-tourniquet by that point. 

After an hour of packing, our car was finally loaded with our waterlogged belongings.  Relieved to be headed home, I exhaled aloud as I turned the ignition key.   A buzz sound greeted me.  Dead battery.  The apparent result of leaving the car doors open for about an hour.  My lips trembled, but I managed to mute myself.  With the grace and elegance of a gorilla, I immediately leapt from the driver seat and ran to the rear of the car to unload a barrage of growls and hisses that would have put any cat to shame.  Cougar, bobcat, or Meow Mix.

After the throbbing vein in my forehead had finally subsided, I wandered the campground looking for a jumpstart.  Since most of the smart people had vacated their campsites early that dreary Sunday morning, there weren’t many people around to help us out.  I eventually found someone who had cables and was willing to lend us a hand.

Leaving that campsite a tired, wet, and beaten man, my wife asked if we could grab a hot coffee for the ride home.

“Would you like one too,” she asked sympathetically.

“Yes, please.  Irish.”

In the end, much like my ancestral lineage had before me, we managed to create a memory for our children that weekend.  It was probably more Stephen King than Shel Silverstein, but a memory nonetheless. 

Ironically, prior to this trip, my father reminded me of a camping trip from my childhood.  An overnight outing so cold, that the liquid crystal display in his watch had actually frozen solid.  Much to my children’s chagrin, character-building in this family apparently also includes a healthy dose of hypothermia.    

Lemming lessons from that trip?  Extra socks and a temperature-resistant watch.  I’m officially adding a portable jump start system and a couple cans of Friskies to future supply lists.  Potentially a couple of those BASE jumping wingsuits as well, for some much needed style points.

The Disney Business

As a surprise for our children, my wife thought it would be a wonderful idea to plan a week-long trip to Disney next year.  Hey, count me in.  I loved Disney when I went with my family roughly thirty-plus years ago.  My parents took us for the day while we were visiting family in Florida.  We stayed at a Days Inn and ran around the Magic Kingdom the entire next day.  What fond childhood memories!

With the naivety of that kid still painfully evident, I hadn’t taken into account the amount of things that may have changed over the course of those thirty years.  I should have realized what was in store when Disney offered a free vacation planning DVD when you visited their website.  Free planning DVD?  Come on.  How hard could this be?  After all, wasn’t it Disney that taught us “hakuna matata” meant “no worries”? 

After inquiring with some in-the-know friends, visiting a few internet message boards, and delving deeper into the actual website though, we were slapped with the cold reality that successfully navigating a vacation to the “Happiest Place on Earth” these days was the virtual equivalent of deciphering the CIA’s Kryptos sculpture…or ordering a cup of coffee at your local Starbucks.  Gone are those days of just popping in for an “amusement park” visit.  This kind of planning required serious travel agent business acumen, appointment juggling skills, and extensive up-front prep work.  Ironically, the exact characteristics lacking in nonchalant, happy-go-lucky simpletons such as myself.  Shocking…I know.

In an effort to avoid rambling and for the sake of pure sanity, I’m going to entirely leave out the seemingly infinite number of actual theme parks and their own related organizational pandemonium.  I will concentrate merely on the basic, essential logistics of accommodations and meals.

First, you have to decide on an accommodation plan.  This is basically a choice of everything from your standard four-walls-and-a-bed hotel to Buckingham Palace.   Once you’ve selected an accommodation plan that is within your budget, it’s time to pick the themes and amenities that you desire in your hotel.  Keep peeling back the layers until you finally get to pick that hotel.  Did I mention that it helps availability if you burn incense and offer up a ceremonial sacrifice beforehand?

Next come the meal plans.  Pick through a list of dining plans based on the number of meals that you will require in a day and that is within your budget.  You can customize these as well.  Of course, each plan and associated customization thereof comes with about enough “if-then” stipulations to make even a BP liability attorney bow down to the almighty House of Mouse.

Now with your meal plan in place, it’s time to select your dining.  There are varying types to choose from.  They run the gamut from PB&Js on paper towels to sprawling five-star dining.   When you’ve selected your dining types in conjunction with the guidelines surrounding your respective meal plan, it’s finally time to start picking and choosing through the millennia of offered restaurants. 

“Just keep swimming, just keep swimming…”

Now that you’ve finally zeroed in on those restaurants of choice, you must now jockey for reservation days and times at those restaurants with roughly half the world’s population.  Revisit the aforementioned availability ritual above. 

On a side note, I also coupled this ritual with Iron Butterfly’s "In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida" and a constant flickering of the light switch.  In theory, I was shooting for maximum ceremonial effectiveness.  The wife didn’t appear as sold on this practice as I was though.

It’s also essential to keep in mind, when making these reservations, that you have a firm plan in place of which parks you are visiting and on what days.  I would imagine that being in one park and having your dinner reservations at a restaurant in another is a lot like flying into Orlando with your family and having your luggage land in Calcutta.  On second thought, let’s not go there.

In looking at this whole restaurant facet, I have to be honest.  The fact that reservations to these establishments open exactly 180 days prior to your visit is still completely unfathomable to me.  I can’t tell you what I want to eat an hour from now, let alone in 180 days.  Worse yet, my wife found that if you don’t log on and pick those restaurants and reservation times precisely at 6:00:01 am on that 180 day milestone, you’re essentially stuck eating lead paint chips for dinner at 3:00 in the afternoon.

Hats off to my wife though.  She pulled it off.  She took it upon herself and organized the entire trip.  Countless hours, days, and weeks in front of the laptop.  Constantly arranging, rearranging, plotting, and scheming.  With that amount of preparation now on her resume, I firmly believe that she’s qualified to run an international crime syndicate.  In fact, in an effort to punctuate her promotion to Consigliere within the cyber Disney Planning Cartel, I have started referring to her as “Vinny the Mouse”.  “Hakuna matata, Don Corleone.”

I, on the other hand, was about as productive as a potted fern.  Upon asking for my input, my wife was generally met with “I’ll eat whatever” or “yep, sounds great”.  Honestly, if this gig were left up to me, it would have been the Bankruptcy Suites, dollar menu, and Disney service entrance booked roughly two days before leaving.

Now our kids have a wonderful surprise week with Mickey and friends next year, thanks entirely to my wife.  Their experiences will last a lifetime.  I’m hopeful that my wife’s newfound insistence on having to plan everything 180 days in advance will not. 

Walt Disney himself was once quoted as saying, “It’s kind of fun to do the impossible”.  I’m not sure how many would vouch for that “fun” part, but it’s respectfully noted by my better half.  To Walt’s point though, I think that we merely have to keep in mind the hidden meaning within the hardships of actually planning and executing this trip.  “It's not personal, Sonny.   It's strictly business.”

"Life's tough. Wear a helmet."

My wife and I are alike in many ways.  We often find ourselves finishing each other’s sentences or ending conversations with each other’s jokes.  Although she won’t admit it, we also have the same sense of humor.  Mine may be a shade or twelve darker and slightly more twisted, but she often finds humor in many of the same places as I do.  I attribute most of the instances to being married for twelve years.  There are also those physical similarities too.  The ones that I am referring to, in this case, revolve around that perpetual klutz-factor. 

For myself, if there is a thumb to be found with a 20 ounce framing hammer, it’s usually mine.  Typically while in full assault mode.  Same could be said for the baseboards and their ongoing maiming of my toes.  Oh, and let’s not leave out the conspiring staircases that randomly grab my feet in an effort to throw off my graceful sense of equilibrium.  This, mind you, while my arms are full of heavy objects.  Revisit that cursed toes reference.  Even those rocks and sticks that are systematically kicked up by the lawnmower will inevitably plot to hit that invisible bulls-eye permanently affixed to my forehead.  The list is endless. 

The same could be said for my lovely wife.  In fact, her twisted ankles have become somewhat of a running punchline for me and my arsenal of ridicule.  Her ankles seem to subconsciously seek out that one, lone pothole in a fifty acre field.  A sick, biological mutiny of self-maiming. 

Unfortunately for our darling brood, we often find many of these same traits in our children as well.  Falling down the stairs, falling up the stairs, falling off stairs…just to give you an idea.  Carrying out those fate-tempting illustrations of mayhem that their father often refers to as that “agony of defeat” moment from yesteryear’s “Wide World of Sports” opening scenes.  A vast and endless comedy of errors filled with scraps, bruises, and dents...much like we remember self-inflicting upon ourselves as impressionable daredevils.

It’s these memories that prompt me to provide ominous warnings to my children when they see an opportunity to push the envelope.  I fully understand the need for kids to learn on their own, much like we did as kids.  However, there is a part of me that feels the need to vocally address the associated risks via firsthand experience in the creation of self-induced havoc.  To pass along sage advice bestowed upon my youth by a number of industry professionals.  General surgeons and orthopedic specialists, that is.

It was one evening after dinner that my daughter received some of this advice from dad, yet proceeded to tempt universal aerodynamics and most of the physical laws of momentum anyway.  Much like her father though, she was determined.  Mentally hard-headed…and fortunately, physically as well.

We decided to take a walk after a big dinner.  It was a nice evening and we thought that the kids could use the fresh air.  My two oldest decided to take their Razor scooters along for the trip for entertainment.  We walked down our street and up the hill to the next street.  Walking up a hill on the first leg meant going down a hill on our return trip.  I didn’t give much thought to it at the time.  However, somewhere in a galaxy far, far away, there was a shimmering disturbance in Newton’s Law.

Our home is situated on a street much like the home that I grew up in.  Fairly flat, but surrounded on both sides by large hills.  I can vividly remember just how perfect it was for bikes, skateboards, Radio Flyer wagons, and other assorted wheeled projectiles to achieve maximum speed.

And oftentimes associated maximum devastation…

The return trip seemingly channeled the inner Evel Kneival in our children.  Previous walks resulted in a slow, careful walk back to the house.  This time, however, they looked down the hill and shrugged.  Consequences?  What consequences?  Against my better wishes and in spite of my numerous narratives of personal carnage, they decided to conquer the hill.  Son and daughter blazing down the hill on their scooters, well in excess of twenty miles per hour.

My back was turned as I refused to watch the ensuing pandemonium.  I awaited the fate's background symphony of twisted metal and carnage.  To my relief, they both made it down unscathed.  I breathed easy.  Maybe my love-hate relationship with asphalt skipped a generation.  But then I heard fate’s satirical rebuttal. 

“Let’s do it again!”

For some reason, I turned to watch their second descent.  I should really have my head examined.  I lived this repeatedly as a child.  I know better than to watch!  Daughter rocketed down the hill at maximum speed yet again.  Then, that climatic moment that defies nature’s law of gravity.

She must have hit a rock at the bottom of the hill.  As my grandfather used to say, she went “can over tea-kettle”.  I looked up and immediately saw Neo’s bullet-dodging scene from the movie “The Matrix” play out right before my eyes.  Arms and legs flying everywhere with blinding speed.  Only, she was inverted and spinning wildly in the air for a brief, breathless moment, before crashing to the asphalt.  Somewhere in the distance, from a circa 1978 color television set, I visualized that infamous ski jumper followed by Jim McKay’s introduction of America to “the agony of defeat”.     

There was road rash galore.  Arms, elbows, shoulders, and yes, helmet too.  The fact that not a single scrap adorned the lower half of her body just solidified the fact that she indeed went tea-kettle first while sliding across the pavement.  Luckily, there were no broken bones or missing teeth.  Much like that “Matrix” scene though, it was really kind of tough to see “what-landed-where” at that rate of speed.

Much to my amazement, my son continued to follow through on his second descent as well.  Even after watching this cataclysmic event unfold.  He sped right by his battered sister and her fresh road rash.  So much for that witness deterrence aspect…  Then again, he is my son.  If I didn’t learn things the hard way, I wouldn’t have learned anything at all.

Luckily, lightning did not strike twice. 

As for my daughter though, there was a bottle or two of antiseptic and a small cache of band-aids in her future.  She was fine though.  Shaken, not stirred.  She was even back on the scooter the next day.  Although since that evening, I have not gone out of my way to suggest any additional after-dinner walks with their scooters.

That evening presented valuable lessons to the family in Newton’s Law of Motion.  For everyone except my son, apparently.  “For every action, there is always an equal and opposite reaction.”  I dub this quote the family law of “Kneival-ness”.  Though you may be able to avoid rocks, ditches, and associated personal havoc, you can never avoid those genetically-fueled “agony of defeat” moments. 

Asphalt is now officially up on me, as well as my family, by a score of thirty-seven to zero.  Unfortunately, life has no mercy rule.  Better strap on a helmet.

The Lost Art of Aging Gracefully

‘Tis the Season.  The time for a plethora of regurgitated “You Know You’re Turning Forty When…” jokes.  You may have heard a few of these.  “Your new easy chair has more options than your car.”  “People call you at 9 pm and ask if they woke you up.”  “Conversations with people your own age become a duel of ailments.”  Typical amateur-hour, tongue-in-cheek humor.  I will admit that the last of those hits rather close to home though.

To the satisfaction of Hallmark cards and Spencer Gifts stores everywhere, I always had this mental image of hitting my 40^th much like a train slowly cresting the top of a mountain.  Sluggishly decelerating, following the last desperate attempts to retain the youthfulness of my 30ish body and mindset.   Looking over my shoulder one last time on my three decade ascent, before rounding the top and officially declaring my youth a DOA.  I envisioned that the accompanying post-summit descent would start slowly and pick up momentum as the years passed. 

What I hadn’t expected though, was for my body to completely jump the tracks as it neared the top and meteor violently towards the Earth in a blazing death spiral.  Then again, my life has always seemed firmly planted in the oft-magical world of fate and irony.  It has a lifelong public record of ad-libbing and creating its own satirical punch-lines when the prospect of self-humiliation presents itself.    

Said tracks came out from underneath of me a few weekends ago.  My father, father-in-law, and I spent an entire day installing new vinyl railing on my front porch.  It was a lot of running up and down stairs, cutting, drilling, squatting, and more running up and down stairs.  We put in some long hours that day, but managed to get the majority of it completed.  It was only after I had developed the inguinal hernia a day or two later, that it became apparent my body was of the firm belief that it was more a two or three day job.     

Precisely.  A hernia less than three weeks before my 40^th birthday.  Of course, when people ask how it happened, I don’t have that riveting, extreme-sports story to fall back on.  The one where I walk away from an insanely perilous stunt…with only a hernia and bruised ego.  No skydiving with a snowboard, no kayaking over a waterfall, and no participating in the “Running of the Bulls” with a red jumpsuit.  Not in the cards.  Somehow, hernia via vinyl rail installation just seems to lack that overall manly luster and accompanying prestige.

Truthfully, in the back of my mind, I always thought there was a common misconception about hernias only happening to “older gentlemen who still think they’re athletes”.  Apparently not.  They also happen to “older gentlemen who overdo home improvement projects”.  “Man law” blasphemy defined…

Ringing in my birthday with such mockingly dark overtones is exactly what I should have expected.  I make it a habit to approach life with a belief once penned by an 18^th century Danish philosopher.  “Irony is a disciplinarian feared only by those who do not know it, but cherished by those who do."  To that point, I have decided to travel my remaining 30s with a snare drum and cymbal attached to my side for the opportunistic rim shot.  Oh, and a pre-recorded laugh-track on standby. 

Life has emphatically announced that there will be no slow and orderly descent into my 40s.  My tranquil Hallmark vision of cresting that mountaintop gracefully was quickly replaced by the unpleasant image of a rusty car transmission seizing up one day before the warranty expires.  Now well-versed on this pending expiration date, I’ve added both Kevlar and a hard hat to my birthday wish list. 

After seeing a host of doctors, it was determined that surgery was required.  Days of hounding them incessantly and laying on the urgency of “getting me fixed quick”, I finally received a call on my surgery date.  Rim shot, please.  The day of my 40^th birthday.  Cue laugh-track.  But wait, it gets better.  Not only on the same day, mind you…but at the exact time of my birth as well.  Red flags and premonitions abound!  Good luck penning this one, Hallmark!

Reminded on a daily basis of just how eerily unpredictable irony and fate can be, my superstitions got the better of me.  I quickly rescheduled the surgery for August.  I'm abruptly equipped with this newly-mangled mental image of turning 40...and this dark, celestial alignment of events was scheduled to take place on my birthday as well as my exact time of birth? 

Maybe I have seen too many “Twilight Zone” episodes as a kid or too many “Final Destination” films.  I’m thinking “Man has uneasy premonition and doesn’t get on plane.  Plane explodes upon takeoff.”  Just go ahead and substitute “surgery” and “hernia” in that sentence wherever you see fit.

When all of this is over, I plan on shopping my chilling account to Spielberg and DreamWorks Studios.   Although in the end, Pixar just may be the better fit.