A Word About My Kids

Yesterday, while eating my lunch, I brought up Facebook on my cell phone to discover that my kids had become embroiled in two of the most contentious debates in all of Christendom, Phil Robertson’s comments on homosexuality, and homeschooling. In both instances the wounds were self inflicted. Kaitlin had offered a dissenting opinion to a pro-homeschooling screed posted by a friend, while Patrick had voluntarily weighed in on the Duck Dynasty controversy by offering his own take on the subject. Neither of their opinions are the kind that will get them invited to the Focus on the Family Christmas party.

First, a disclaimer. I didn’t agree with everything either of them wrote. I registered my disagreements with my son behind the private message screen where only he, I and the NSA could see. Having said that, seldom have I felt more proud as a parent than yesterday, reading the words of my children. Pam and I have somehow managed to raise and unleash upon the world two critical thinkers, unafraid to voice a deeply held opinion, even if that opinion might not be universally admired. Their arguments were intelligent, well reasoned, and free of accusation or venom, and most gratifying to me, well written!

As a parent, it’s asking way too much to have your children agree with you about everything. The best we can do is give them the tools that help them come to their own conclusions. We hope that when the dust of their education settles, they will embrace their faith, and become fully functioning, caring human beings who will become a blessing to others and make a difference in this world.

It is true that we not only taught them how to think, but on many occasions, what to think. I make no apologies for such indoctrination. There comes a time in life, for example, when kids must know without doubt or nuance that placing their hand on a hot stove is for all of eternity a terrible idea. For me, an equally important truth is the reality of God, the fact of his Son, and the existence of transcendent truth. These lessons are more difficult to teach, and there are no guarantees that they will learn. Each one of us has to come to these beliefs ourselves through personal discovery. As a parent, you can lead them to water, but you can’t make them drink. So, you expose them to spiritual things, you try to live out an example of a Godly life the best you can, then you turn them loose into the world and hope for the best.

If you’re lucky, you even learn a few things about transcendent truth from your kids. After all, learning and personal growth didn’t stop when I graduated from college. I have learned a few things from them about tolerance, forbearance, and letting go of a few knuckleheaded ideas. They have learned on their own that some of the eternally true things I warned them about back in middle school are in fact eternally true.

Having children to raise is a beautiful thing, never more beautiful than when you pull up Facebook on your cell phone and discover that your little ones are now…adults!

Culinary Goddess

After an especially intense workout that involved 30 minutes on something called the Stairmaster 2000, I was starving by the time dinner time rolled around. The kitchen was abuzz with activity, with my wife feverishly preparing her latest triumph… although, I must say that I felt rather deflated when I saw the bag of Brussels sprouts on the counter.

 

It’s not that I won’t eat them. Pam, like my mother before her, has trained me to eat whatever is placed before me without complaint. It’s just that when you’re really hungry, Brussels sprouts isn’t your meal of choice. I mean, just look at them, tight, green, little balls of vegetation better suited for ammunition in a cafeteria food fight than for eating. I’m sure that they are positively packed with all sorts of life-giving nutrients. A diet of these babies would probably take ten pounds off you in a week. But on this night I was hoping for something more potatoe-y and steak-y and less…green. I smiled at her and said something like, “Looks great Hon.”

Thirty minutes later, she places a plate in front of me that would have given Ina Garten an inferiority complex. First, there was a baked chicken breast covered in a Dijon mustard, sautéed mushroom sauce. Beside that was a helping of seasoned brown rice. Just to the left of that were the barely recognizable Brussels sprouts. She had cut them all into quarters, and drizzled them with some sort of exotic oil and baked them in the oven to a caramelized brown color. There was a crunchy edge to each of them. When I took the first bite I realized that my wife is a culinary goddess. She had somehow made Brussels Sprouts taste like bacon. When I went into the kitchen after dinner to clean up, there were a couple of helpings left on the stove stop. I shoved them into my mouth with both hands…just like those cooking show judges would have done.

My wife, I think I’ll keep her!

Annoying Christmas Letter

This time of year brings to our mailboxes that hardy perennial, the Christmas letter. Accompanying a card or a family photo, this letter more often than not is typed on festive green or red paper, and catalogues the manifold blessings that have rained down on the McNugget household over the past year. We are treated to news of Junior’s acceptance into Harvard, or John’s promotion at work, along with  victories, large and small, won by the happy McNuggets in the game of life throughout the year. Reading through these letters is the literary equivalent of Pinterest, everyone’s lives sound awesome, a series of titanic accomplishments interrupted by heartwarming vignettes that make your own life sound rather empty by comparison. And, make no mistake, these letters are all about comparisons.

Well, this year I’ve decided to fight back. I have written my own Christmas letter, but unlike the garden variety brag-fest, I have taken a different approach…news of the ordinary:

Dear Family and Friends,

         Hope everyone is healthy and happy this Christmas season. I thought I would get you all caught up with news from the Dunnevant family. 2013 has been a pretty average year actually, but what follows are some of the highlights.

January was just about the suckiest month in history for crappy weather. I swear, if there had been one more day of 40 degrees and rain, I would have sold everything and moved to Key West. February wasn’t much better, and by the time March rolled around everyone at 3308 Aprilbud Place was on suicide watch. But, with improved weather came improved spirits. I ended the first quarter in good shape financially so that helped. Kaitlin was withdrawn into her thesis-writing shell, so I hardly heard a peep from her for three months. Patrick was busy accumulating grad school debt, but enjoying every minute of it, despite working two jobs and having to put up with New Jersey 24/7.

April was great. To distract everyone from the fact that I was about to turn 55, I took the family down to Myrtle Beach for a Spring Break week of family togetherness. We stayed at my friend’s condo, and had a blast. The weather was phenomenal and it would prove to be one of the best vacations ever, which was a good thing because the month of May was about as bad as it gets. My dog Molly was diagnosed with cancer and died 3 weeks later in my arms, a soul-crushing experience from which I have still not recovered. May did manage to redeem itself when Kaitlin graduated from Wake Forest with a Master’s Degree in English Literature.

To add insult to the turning 55 injury, I had to undergo rotator cuff surgery the first week of June. It was just as horrible as everyone warned me it would be, and if I had it to do over again, I probably would have put it off. But, what’s done is done. Pam was very patient with me through all the moaning and groaning, as she always is. Actually 2013 was another banner year for her, what with her new found fondness for baking gourmet cup cakes, and the fact that she once again finished the year looking younger than she did the year before. Secretly, I resent her. If this trend continues, before long some old dude at the mall is going to ask me how it feels to have such a beautiful daughter.

We did manage to have a wonderful Dunnevant family beach vacation down in Hatteras. Kaitlin’s boyfriend Jon finally managed to screw up enough courage to ask me for her hand in marriage. I said “yes” and the whole family rejoiced. While I’m on the subject, just recently my son, who is famous for withholding any and all information about his love life from his parents, arrived at our house for Thanksgiving and suddenly wouldn’t shut up about a girl he is currently dating, a positive development. As if on cue, and just in time for Christmas, his car blew up, stranding the two of them on the side of some God forsaken snowy New Jersey road around midnight. Sometimes I think that God is just screwing with me.

So, there you have it. 2013 had some good stuff and some bad. There were weeks of productivity, happiness and good health. There were also weeks of grief, despair, and raging diarrhea. I lost my beautiful, loyal dog. I watched my daughter graduate. I made lots of money and managed to write a novel. I remain married to a wonderful woman, and I put on 8 pounds during my shoulder rehab that I can’t get rid of, so it was a mixed bag.

2014 will soon arrive and I have no idea what it will bring, probably some good and some bad. I look forward to it with great delight since it’s the only life I have. Hope you and yours have a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!

                                                                                             Sincerely,

                                                                                             Doug

Surreal

We have now officially entered the back stretch of 2013. The last two weeks of December take on a certain surreal character. We aren’t quite on vacation, but not entirely working either. In my case the books are about to be closed, there’s no one else to see, just a string of paperwork to complete. January will come in with a vengeance soon enough, but for now there’s a break in the action.

I’ve had a good year, and after two mediocre ones, prosperity feels better. But as always, life has cobbled together diabolical schemes to separate me from my wealth. Just last week, my son’s 1998 Volkswagen Jetta finally gave up the ghost. I had bought that car for him during the summer of his junior year in high school, and it had served him relatively well ever since. My hope was that it would make it one more semester, let me get through Kaitlin’s wedding bills before it blew up. That would have been asking too much of fate, I suppose.

So, over the weekend, I did some internet shopping on Carmax.com. I e-mailed Patrick a few possibilities. Then in a frantic five hours on Saturday, took a couple of test drives, texted him a few pictures, made the decision, secured financing, and purchased a 2011 Honda Civic. Now I have to figure out a way to get the car to Princeton, New Jersey, and myself back to RVA before Christmas. Of course, the down payment, cost of the warranty, title, taxes and fees (which one should NEVER finance), amounted to about what I had been planning to spend for Christmas. Surreal. Is it asking too much to be allowed to enjoy a season of plenty, the security of a respectable surplus in my capital accounts? Apparently so.

After the 24 hours of buyer’s remorse fades away, my good fortune becomes clearer. How blessed were we that Patrick’s car didn’t blow up on the New Jersey turnpike at 2 o’clock in the morning on his way home for Christmas? How fortunate that this should happen at a time of prosperity rather than scarcity? How much easier will it be to not have to worry every time Patrick drives his car to Newark or Philadelphia or Richmond? There is comfort in the details.

Maybe God knows me too well. Maybe he will never allow me to accumulate a suitable safety net, because in comfort I would become someone he wouldn’t like. Perhaps if I were rich I would become insufferable. Some might say I am already insufferable, a fair point. Regardless, God’s famously mysterious ways remain mysterious.

Affluenza??

Antonio grows up on the mean streets of Newark. His father was incarcerated for selling drugs when Antonio was only six. His mother is a crack addicted welfare queen. Consequently, Antonio is left to his own devices and soon turns into your garden variety thug. At age 16, on a whimsical impulse, Antonio decides to randomly cold-cock the first old woman he encounters on the street. He does so with lethal result. Unfortunately for Antonio, the attack occurs on a street that is covered by security cameras. The tapes reveal beyond doubt that he is the killer. He is arrested and tried for murder in Juvenile Court. Even though he’s a minor, he is convicted and sentenced to a minimum of ten years in prison.

Jonathan grows up in a gated community in Fort Worth. His father earns a seven figure income as a hedge fund manager and his mother is the tennis champion at the most exclusive Country Club in Texas. They don’t particularly get along very well, but the one thing they do agree on is the fact that their son can do no wrong. His every whim is indulged from the very first day that they handed him to his Hispanic nanny until his 16^th birthday, when he decides to steal a couple of cases of beer from a convenience store, then go for a drunken joy ride in his $40,000 pickup truck. Unfortunately for Jonathan, he plows into four people on the side of the road fixing a tire and kills all four of them. He is arrested and charged with DUI and vehicular homicide, and tried in Juvenile Court. Only, instead of ten years in prison, Jonathan is released into the protective custody of a swanky California retreat for therapy that will allow him to ride horses, surf, and work on his tan while getting in touch with his inner child. Jonathan’s lawyer successfully argued that he was a victim of affluenza, a heretofore unknown affliction, whose victims are insanely rich white suburban kids who have never been taught right from wrong by their upwardly mobile parents, consequently develop an entitlement complex that makes them resistant to impulse control, and therefore cannot be held responsible for their actions.

So, apparently being a spoiled brat is now a winning defense for murder. Set aside for a moment the fact that when I was a kid, being a spoiled brat served as an explanation for bad behavior, not an excuse for it. The fact that an actual sitting judge bought this argument is the real outrage here. Jean Boyd is her name. Her decision in this case is the sort of thing that historically has sent people pouring into the streets with torches and pitchforks. Her reasoning amounts to stupidity on stilts and she is a disgrace to the bench.

Everyone understands that money buys preferential treatment. It is the way of this fallen world. No legal system ever conceived on this planet has been able to free itself of its influence. But every legal system worth its salt makes the attempt at justice, strives mightily for the impartial application of the law. When this sort of case comes up, when money prevents justice so egregiously, it shakes us, or at least it should. When our legal system becomes the best legal system money can buy, the foundations of society begin to rumble. When Jonathan’s parents are allowed to casually write a $450,000 check for their son’s therapy spa vacation, but not one red cent to the families of the victims lying dead on a north Texas road, something is dreadfully wrong with our civilization.

Sleep well Judge Boyd, sleep well.

 

Stupid Cats!

They tell me that everyone dreams, every night. It’s just that we wake up with no memory of the dream most mornings. I suppose that’s true, although this particular scientific assertion seems to be on a par with global warming, that is, it’s safely unverifiable, therefore impossible to disprove. But, I digress.

Last night was the exception to this rule. I had a dream that I remembered in all of its terrifying detail the very second I awoke, and honestly am not convinced yet, 4 hours later, that it didn’t actually happen. I dreamed that I was asleep in my bed. OK, yes, I know this is a rather lame setting for a dream, but it is what it is. Anyway, all of a sudden, a tiny yellow kitten hops up on the bed, and props itself on Pam’s hip. The cute little thing then tries to engage me in cat play, which I steadfastly refused…it being a cat and all. For me, cats are only one or two species above squirrels in the evolutionary order. They make me sneeze; they poop and pee inside my house, and are generally disinterested in anything other than themselves. This particular kitten would not take no for an answer. It persisted in taunting me from its perch on my wife’s hip. Only suddenly it began to grow. Before my eyes, this tiny semi-adorable kitten was morphing into something very much like a mountain lion. With each growth spurt, it became angrier; its teeth longer and more menacing, the playful swipes of its paws getting closer and closer to my face. In desperation, I lifted my left leg and gave the brute beast a swift kick full into its fang-filled pie-hole. I immediately woke up to the angry protestations of my wife who I had nearly kicked out of the bed. The time was 4 am. No more sleep for me.

I’m certain that a trained Psychiatrist would have a field day with my dream. All I know is, I laid in bed tossing and turning for nearly two hours trying to convince myself that there wasn’t a mountain lion roaming through my house. Just before 6 I got up and cautiously went downstairs to make coffee, keeping my eyes peeled for strange movements. For a moment I felt that I was about to sneeze, then I thought my eyes were beginning to water. Once the coffee was brewed, reality had me back firmly within its grasp. Crisis averted.

Stupid cats!

Tis the Season

Today is audit day. Every year someone impeccably dressed from the headquarters of my Broker-Dealer shows up at my office door looking very official. He or she demands to see a few randomly selected client files. Then they want to see all of my compliance files. There’s the correspondence file, the checks received blotter, and the thankfully empty customer complaint file. Then he or she disappears into the conference room where they pour over it all looking for a mistake. Eventually they leave without saying anything except, “If there’s a problem, you will hear from us.”

Somewhere in the witches brew of my DNA is a molecular strain that predisposes me to rebel against authority. I have always struggled with the concept of having a boss, which is most likely why I ended up working for myself. Still, there is no such thing as total independence. Everyone has some form of a boss. In addition to my wife, and the IRS, I must ultimately answer to the suits at my Broker-Dealer. I do so reluctantly. I have never been able to buy into the fiction that they are “on my side, and that we are all in this together.” My view has always been that they perform their intense oversight of my business to protect themselves, not me. If I became a liability they would run away from me faster than a southern democrat running away from Obamacare in November.

Nevertheless, I never fear these annual audits for one very simple reason. In thirty years, I have never done anything intentionally deceitful to a client. I have never taken advantage of a client’s ignorance. I have always tried to do what was in his or her best interest, not my own. I say this not as a boast, but rather because merely as a practical matter, honesty is so much easier than deceit. Imagine how Bernie Madoff had to feel every time his office was audited. His mind must have been filled with tortuous worry. Would all of his schemes escape scrutiny? Would an indiscreet moment or an ill-filed report turn up? I cannot imagine having to endure that every minute of every day. Honesty allows for peaceful sleep. Honesty doesn’t require a good memory. It turns out that your Mom was right all those years ago when she warned you that if you became a liar, your lies would eventually catch up with you.

Now, this is not to say that I have nothing to fear from these audits. I am not the most organized person on the planet. My record keeping skills often leave something to be desired. But, administrative mistakes seldom get you carted off in hand cuffs. Better to be unorganized than a liar. I guess Bernie was the worst of both worlds…an unorganized liar.

When this audit is over with, I’ll have to get prepared for next week’s OSJ audit. Tis the season!