Happy 2012

It’s hard to believe that 2011 is almost over. It seems that just yesterday we were ringing in the New Year and here we are about to do the same for 2012. As I recently mentioned, it seems that time is going faster and faster each year. You blink your eyes and a day is gone; take a little snooze and a week is gone; go about your business and a month is gone; pause for a moment and look at where you are and the year is over. Sometimes I feel like, stop this merry-go-round of life, I want to get off. Not for good, just for a quick breather so that I can enjoy things a little longer and a little more.

I’m really not big on New Year’s resolutions, but an area I definitely want to change in 2012 is just enjoying things more than I do now. I can get caught up in what needs to be done, all the little details and preparation, and not enjoy an event as much as I could. Sometimes I have a hard time just sitting and doing nothing with the people I love and instead feel like I should be doing something. Only after I miss out on a great time do I realize that something that “just had to be done” most certainly could have waited.

In 2012 I want to spend more time with more people, be they family or friends, and just enjoy that time together, whether we’re having dinner, playing games, watching a game, just hanging out and talking, or even doing nothing together. During that time I want to forget the stuff that doesn’t need to be done right then and things that don’t need my attention, and just enjoy the time and the company. Maybe then it won’t seem that the merry-go-round is spinning so fast.

                                                                                                          

As 2011 slips away, I hope that you can say that it was a good year for you. I know it was for me and my family in many ways. Whatever your goals, dreams or resolutions, let’s make 2012 a great year, even better than 2011. Happy New Year!

Oh Christmas Tree

Do something well once and suddenly it becomes your job. That’s what has happened to me when it comes to picking out our Christmas tree. We had a fake tree for years, and although it looked quite real, my wife wanted to get a real tree. She had grown up with real trees and the fake one just wasn’t doing it for her. I grew up with a fake tree and thought the one we had was just fine, especially when compared to the one we had when I was a kid in the 1960’s and 1970’s. Even with assorted balls, bulbs, lights, tinsel and whatever other decorations we could find, you could still tell it wasn’t a real tree. Most people thought our 2000’s fake tree was real until they got real close to it and saw that the trunk was just a green circular piece of wood.  

So a few years ago we started getting a real tree. Last year, armed with instructions from my wife, I went to pick out the tree by myself. I just looked for one that wasn’t too big or too small, that didn’t have any glaring bald spots, that didn’t drop all its needles if I banged it on the ground, and that was actually green (not all of them were). Everyone thought we had a great tree! I was happy that I picked out such a great tree, proud even, but little did I know the trouble I caused for myself.

When it came time to get a tree this year, I mentioned to my wife that we should go out and get one – together. “Why do you need me?” she asked. “You did such a great job last year!” I protested that I didn’t want to do it myself, that last year was a fluke, beginner’s luck. “You picked out a great tree last year” she responded, “You can do it without me.” So now it was on me to get a tree, something that everyone who came to our house until sometime after New Year’s was going to see, something that was going to set the tone for all the other Christmas decorations in my home. The pressure was on and I wasn’t liking it. I should have come home with a Charlie Brown tree last year and it would never have been my job again!

I put the pressure aside and went out – by myself – to get a tree. I took my time, checked out all the trees that were there and made mental notations as to which ones I liked the best to narrow it down to three or four. I then went back and checked them out again. Now I was feeling the pressure again. What if I went home with a clunker? What if it didn’t look so great in the light of my house? What if there was a critter hiding in the branches like in the Griswold’s tree in Christmas Vacation? I chased these thoughts from my mind and chose what I thought was the best tree and brought it home. Much to my happiness, my wife loved the tree when she saw it!

As we have been doing for many years, we decorated the tree as a family. I don’t know if the kids enjoy it as much as my wife and I do, but it was a lot of fun. We have some ornaments from before the kids were born, some that they made in pre-school or elementary school, some that are just a couple of years old and one little felt Santa Claus I made in third or fourth grade that holds special memories for me. We laughed when we saw the ones the kids made, especially the ones with their school picture on them; we “Aaaaawwww”-ed when we saw the ones that hold special memories, like the one for my daughter’s first Christmas, which is now eighteen years old; we shook our heads at the what-were-they-thinking-when-they-made-this ones, like the red, white and blue eagle ornament that we got at SeaWorld in Orlando. When we fit on as many of the ornaments as we could, we stepped back and took in the scene: a beautiful Christmas tree that lit up the room, warmed our hearts and made us all smile.

Yeah, I guess that picking out the Christmas tree will be my job every year. Merry Christmas!

Childproof No More

This past weekend we had some of my wife’s family over to our house to do a gift swap with our kids since we can’t get together on Christmas Eve or Christmas Day. Their kids ranged in age from about 18 months to 12 years old. My daughter, who is in her first year of college, wasn’t home but my 15 year old son was. Because my kids are older we are not used to having small children in our house. Our house is no longer “childproof” so we had to watch the little ones all the time. However, being seasoned veterans of child rearing, we know that is pretty much impossible, so every so often some of us would check on what was going on.

At one point all the adults were sitting in the kitchen, talking and eating, and we weren’t really paying as much attention to the smallest kids as we should have been. My brother-in-law and I went into our family room to find that some of the kids had got into a few of our games that we thought were put away in a safe place. There on the floor were the games Life and Apples to Apples. All the money and little pieces for Life were mixed in with the 500 or so cards from Apples to Apples. They weren’t just in neat little piles, separated by game. No, as only small children can do, they were mixed together all over the place, along with about 50 Matchbox cars. When I say all over the place, I mean all over the place; the cards for Apples to Apples were under the couches and under the coffee table. It took a long time to find all the cards, put them all the same way so they fit into the slots in the game box and put them away. And yet, it only took a few minutes to make the mess! Even with our diligence we later found Scrabble tiles in different places.

The smallest child still wears a diaper and of course at some point it needed to be changed. I find it funny that people will pick up their child and smell their behind, cringe and with watery eyes say, “Oh, that’s a bad one!” Really? The rest of us knew it was a bad one without having to cause brain damage by taking a whiff. So then it was on to the changing. Like I said earlier, we’re not used to having small children in the house, especially my son. He was eating in the room off of the kitchen when the dirty deed was done. In about 2.5 seconds he was out in the kitchen with his shirt up over his nose to block the smell. To say he was having a hard time with the smell would be a huge understatement. There was about a 50/50 chance he was going to lose his lunch. He then went outside to get some fresh air and away from the smell, his face slightly pale.  

I found the whole incident amusing. I remember those days when I was younger and my older brothers or sisters were changing the diapers on my nieces and nephews. I couldn’t get far enough away! In my mind, I thought I’d never be changing a poopy diaper because I was going to let my wife do it. Then I got married and had kids and realized that would never fly. I think that’s about where my son is now. Just the thought of changing a nasty, poopy diaper is enough to make him physically ill. Someday he’ll be changing them like a pro.

I changed my share of diapers and even gagged on a few of them, but for the most part you get used to the odor. But now that it has been so many years of poopy diaper-less living, I have to admit that I wasn’t quite ready for the onslaught to my nose. I wasn’t gagging, but I was happy when my son went outside for a minute and left the door open. It helped clear the air so I could actually enjoy my food again and so we could get back to our normal conversation instead of discussing poopy diapers.

Later, after everyone was gone, I sat down on the couch and just reveled in the quiet in my family room. I have forgotten how loud small children can be when there is a group of them in a house. The silence was almost deafening. I got up to put away the last couple of Matchbox cars left on the floor and discovered a few more Scrabble tiles that had been missed. Some day we’re going to play Scrabble and find that the Q, the X, or the Z is missing when one of us has an incredible word with Triple Word Score potential. Then we will fully realize that, although we are seasoned veterans of child rearing, our house is most definitely not childproof anymore. 

Open Your Eyes

I recently had to have my pupils dilated for a test with the eye doctor. It is a relatively simple process; they put some drops in your eyes, you wait 20 – 30 minutes and then your pupils are dilated enough that they can take snapshots of the back of your eyes so they can see all the blood vessels and veins and such. While it doesn’t hurt, it was a little uncomfortable for me because…well, your pupils aren’t supposed to let in that much light.

While this was going on it got the wheels turning in my brain and I was thinking about how cool it would be if there were some drops you could put in your eyes and you would see things more clearly. Not just more light would be let in, but everything would be seen like it was in HD. Imagine the possibilities:

·     If you misplaced something, you’d be able to see it quicker. No more lost keys, cell phones, or kids.

·     When you went shopping and tried on that outfit you “just have to get”, you would see that although it looks great on other people, it just doesn’t look so good on you.

·     When your kids came to ask for something, you’d know right away if they were up to something. You’d see it in their eyes.

·     When you asked your kids a question about a test at school, or if they had any homework, they wouldn’t be able to lie. Again, you’d see it in their eyes.

·     When you got lost driving and didn’t have a GPS, you’d clearly see the way you needed to go to get back on track.

·     Before you put any junk food into your mouth, you’d see what it was going to do to you – both now and in the future.

·     You would be able to see what is important in life.

That would be awesome, wouldn’t it? Or would it? I started thinking some more and realized that in addition to seeing all those things, you’d see a lot of other things, too, because those drops would allow you to see much clearer than you do now, such as:

·     When you asked someone how they’re doing and they said they were doing fine, you’d see that they’re actually not doing very well and maybe even in a lot of pain.

·     You would also see that many people that have a big smile on their face are actually crying on the inside.

·     You would see that some people that seem to have it all together are hiding something that would tear their world apart if it ever got out.

·     You wouldn’t be able to fool yourself any more and you’d see that maybe your own life wasn’t what it was cracked up to be.

·     You would be able to see that some of the things you thought were so important in life really aren’t important at all.

I like to think that I have good insight into people, but I definitely don’t pick up on a lot of things. I’m not sure I’d really, truly like to see everybody exactly as they are and everything exactly as it is – the good, the bad and the ugly. I wouldn’t mind the good, but I’m not sure I’d want to see the bad and the ugly, especially in myself. As with the amount of light being let in by my pupils in the dilation test, I don’t think I could handle that much.

I Can't Wait Until...

Quite often I hear people say something like, “I can’t wait until…”, where the “until” is somewhere in the future, sometimes many months or even years. I hear people say at Thanksgiving that they can’t wait until Christmas (like I did last week) because it’s the most wonderful time of the year. I hear people say at Christmas that they can’t wait until New Year’s because with the new year is a new start, resolutions and all. I hear people say in January and February that they can’t wait until spring when it starts getting warmer, and the trees and flowers come back to life. I hear people say in April and May that they can’t wait until summer when the weather gets really nice and they can take a vacation. I hear people say in August that they can’t wait until the fall when it’s a little cooler, the kids go back to school and the leaves on the trees turn amazing colors. I hear people say in October that they can’t wait for Thanksgiving because… On and on it goes.

What’s the matter with right now? It seems that we as humans are always looking to the future, looking forward to something further on down the line, something that isn’t… now. Whatever it is, it can never come too fast and it always takes too long to get to that point. Too many times, the things we’re so looking forward to finally come and they disappoint us because they don’t live up to what we built up in our minds. What then? Well, we already have the next thing to look forward to.

I remember growing up and looking ahead to many things and feeling like it was taking so long to get there. As I’ve mentioned before, I always looked forward to the day I could beat my older brothers at something, or at least be as good at something as them. When I finally got there, it didn’t matter because they had moved forward just as I had. Around 4^th grade I started looking ahead to the day I’d leave elementary school and go to junior high school (what’s now middle school) in 7^th grade. While it was nice to leave the “little kids” behind, I quickly found out how much I missed, and never appreciated, recess. When I was in junior high I looked forward to the day I’d go to high school because that meant I wasn’t a kid anymore. But when you’re a freshman and the low man on the totem pole, you’re still a kid to all the upper classmen and you’re treated as such.

When I was first in high school I couldn’t wait until I got my license and could drive, then I would have true freedom! However, there was often not a car available and when it was, most times there was an errand that had to be run as part of being able to use the car. So before I could go out with my friends I had to run to the store and get some milk or bread or something. Oh, yeah, don’t forget to put some gas in the tank, too. I guess I learned that with freedom comes responsibility – and expenses. When I was in my junior year of high school I couldn’t wait until senior year when we would be top dogs of the school. Then senior year went by so quick that we never really got to savor our lofty position and it was on to college.

After two years of college I couldn’t wait until college was done. Not that I didn’t enjoy it, I truly did. I loved the schedule, the way you didn’t have to go to class, the way the professors treated you like an intelligent young adult, not a kid. But I was tired of the homework, the studying and trying to get everything done while working 30 hours or more a week. Two years later, my last final finally arrived and I whipped through it feeling elated as I passed it in to my professor, thinking that I’d never have to do this again. A few of us finished at the same time and talked in the hallway as we went to our cars. One person was going to grad school, another person already had a job and the rest were going to start looking for a job. However, I had never thought that far ahead; I just wanted to be finished with college. I got to my car and just sat there thinking the same thought for ten or fifteen minutes, “Oh my gosh. I’m done with college and I HAVE TO GET A REAL JOB!” I felt like that was it, my carefree, young adult days were over and now I had to get a full-time job and be an (gulp) adult. I turned the key, took one last look around and started driving home. That ride home was the longest, most depressing ride I had ever been on. In a short amount of time, maybe half an hour, I had gone from the highest elation to the lowest depression, all because “I couldn’t wait until…”

Now that I’ve hit the half century mark I have a bit of a different attitude, or maybe perspective. I feel like the passing of time is going faster and faster every year, not staying the same and definitely not slowing down. If there were a Father Time, I’d find out where he lives and tell him to knock it off, to stop speeding up time for me. I’d tell him I want time to pass as slow as it did when I was in elementary school, when it seemed like the school year took forever; like it did when my brothers were always bigger, stronger and better at sports than me; like it did when eighteen seemed like it was so far away that I’d never get there. I’d tell him to ease back on the throttle a bit; that it’s OK, because I CAN wait until Christmas and New Year’s and spring. I like right now and want to enjoy it a little longer before it’s gone.

Thanks

It’s hard to believe that it is already the one year anniversary of 8 of Nine. When I started my blog a year ago, I didn’t know if I would post every week or just post a few and then quit. While I didn’t do 52 posts, I did do 40-something posts, which I think is pretty good. I also didn’t know if anyone would even read the posts, but apparently some people have stuck with me through the year. I just wanted to say “Thank You” to everybody who has visited 8 of Nine over the last year.

Whether you’ve read one post, all the posts or somewhere in between, thank you for taking the time to read all that you did. There are a lot of blogs out there, but you came to mine. I’d like to think that I offer more for your entertainment dollar than others do. For those who have posted comments, sent me emails about a post or went old-school and said something to me in person, thank you for your encouragement. Just knowing that a post made you laugh or brought back happy memories for you makes me feel that my long hours in front of the keyboard are well worth it. For those of you who have become a follower of 8 of Nine, thank you for daring to be associated with me and being willing to put yourself out there for me. It would be a huge blow to my ego if I had zero followers after one year of writing. So to all of you, thank you, thank you, thank you!

I’m very grateful that the blog anniversary coincides with Thanksgiving this year. Thanksgiving has always been one of my most favorite holidays. The turkey and all the trimmings, the pies, the football games – I loved all of them and still do. On top of that, people pause and take some time to be thankful, or more thankful, myself included. I am truly thankful for my wife, my kids, my parents, my brothers, my sisters and my friends, without whom I wouldn’t have a blog. Thanks for inspiring me and encouraging me to do something I truly love – writing.

You may be thinking, “Hey, Joe. What are you going to do to keep us amused over the next year?” Well, I have a few ideas:

·     I think it is time for a new look, so I’m going to pick a new template and change things up a bit.

·     I’ve thought of doing a series on famous family sayings that were heard around my house when I was growing up. My brothers and sisters shared some of these with me recently and I will probably write about them occasionally, here and there, as a change of pace.

·     I found a few old writings from when I was a kid and may use them as part of some posts. One is an assignment written in 1973 about what it would be like in 1999, another is a story I wrote when I was about 11 years old. There’s some funny stuff in those two items.

·     Hopefully people around me will continue to do and say things that trigger memories that are filed away in the archives of my brain. And hopefully, I’ll be able to extract those memories and write about them before they go the way of my youthful good looks, my athletic ability and my energy level.

At least that’s my plan for now, but you just never know what’s going to happen, so I guess you’ll have to keep coming back and see for yourself.

In the meantime, Happy Anniversary to 8 of Nine, Happy Thanksgiving to all of you, and thank you for visiting my blog. I am truly grateful.

Beards Everywhere

I found out last year that November is now called Movember in some circles. According to their website (http://us.movember.com/about/), Movember is a movement where men grow mustaches in order to raise funds and awareness for prostate cancer and other cancers that affect men. Mustaches are OK, I even had one for a while when I was in college, but I always thought beards were better. When I was kid, you could even say that I was obsessed with facial hair, especially beards. I used to draw pictures of a hippie with long hair, dark sunglasses, a peace sign shirt and a full mustache and beard, which I just happen to have a picture of:

Hey, it was the early 1970’s; a lot of people looked like that. This picture is from a 1973 school assignment about what we thought life in 1999 would be like. This was my representation of a “typical” man in 1973. As far as typical goes, I can tell you that my Dad did NOT look like that! My Mom saved the paper for me (by the way, I received an “A” on it), and between the two of us it has been around for almost 40 years.   

I used to think about growing a beard when I got older and actually had some facial hair. That I would have to shave for a while before being able to grow a beard never crossed my mind. In addition to my hippie pictures, I would draw beards on the faces of people in pictures in the newspaper and in magazines. Man or woman, it didn’t matter. Richard Nixon gave a speech? Our paper showed how he would have looked giving the speech with a beard. The Queen of England visited the U.S.? Our Ladies’ Home Journal showed how she would have looked in her hat and pearls with a beard. It’s too bad Mom didn’t save some of those pictures; we could have had a Rogues Gallery of Bearded Famous People. For some reason, I found it amusing to draw beards, mustaches and sunglasses on woman and very clean-cut men. Maybe there’s a psychologist out there who can tell me what that means!

If you think I’m exaggerating about my facial hair obsession, let me give you another example of my artistic talents. The Red Sox were in the 1967 World Series, I was six years old, and I drew a mustache and sunglasses on one player, and a full beard on another. How do I know I did that? I still have the paper:

Bob Gibson with a mustache and sunglasses – how cool is that? Clean-cut Jose Santiago with a full beard? Nice. You see players like that today, but not back in 1967. Maybe Brian Wilson of the San Francisco Giants got his look from my guy.

You can also ask my sister who is a year older than me about my facial hair obsession. She had a doll called Little Lost Baby, a doll that had three faces that you could rotate; sleeping, happy and sad. One day I got the bright idea (probably motivated by my older brothers!) to draw a beard with black magic marker on one of the faces. I’m not totally sure which face I did it on, but I vaguely recall it being the happy face. After doing my art work I rotated the face so it wasn’t visible and went about my day. Later that day, I heard a scream and a yell for Mom, and I knew she had seen my workmanship. I think Mom tried to wash it off, but it was done with a permanent magic marker and didn’t come off. I’m pretty sure my poor sister needed therapy after that incident! A number of my sister’s Barbie dolls also decided to grow beards and mustaches, but I cannot take credit for most of those. The guilty shall remain nameless. I really do feel bad for her though, having to deal with us knuckleheads for all those years.

I continued to draw mustaches, beards and sunglasses on pictures for a while but, alas, I did not have much artistic ability. I also grew a beard in the winter for a number of years, starting in college, and I did have long hair, too, but not as long as my 1970’s hippie. No, I was never quite that cool. And while I think Movember is a great idea, I’m haunted by the idea that there’s a Little Lost Baby at the bottom of some landfill, still not decomposed and still with a black beard on her small, smiling face.