Team Silas

 We are back in Columbia for the second half of our October grand parenting assignment—to take care of Silas while Kaitlin is back at work. So far, so good.

Yesterday I was tasked with getting him to take a one and a half to two hour nap. It started off great when he fell asleep after one book and a couple of songs I sang while he nodded off. An hour and forty-five minutes later he woke up abruptly, took a brief look around and immediately began to communicate his grave disappointment in this new reality. Either he had a bad dream or was upset that I wasn’t Lolli. Either way, he cried and cried—real tears and everything! But soon all was well after I took him outside for a walk around his neighborhood. He loved the flowers and the feel of the wind and the sun on his face. Then he destroyed his bottle like a champ and was good as gold for the rest of the day. While he was asleep for his nap I was able to take a couple of pictures…

It is quite remarkable how much my life has changed since I retired and this little boy was born. Spending two hours nap-trapped was not exactly how I pictured what retirement would be like but here we are. 

When Kaitlin told us she was on her way home Pam had us all gather out on the front porch to greet her. When she pulled up in the driveway she looked so happy. She whipped out her cell phone and snapped this picture…

That’s right. Behold TEAM SILAS!

The Purpose of the Internet

 I have come to the conclusion that the highest and most useful purpose of the internet is the curation and distribution of dad jokes. All other uses of the internet are a net negative and do nothing to promote human flourishing…

I saw an old man in the Publix parking lot collecting shopping carts.

He must have been pushing 70.

I recently got fired from the gym because I couldn’t bench press thirty pounds.

I had to put in my too weak notice.

My wife saw me buy two handguns from a T-Rex and said, “What the hell was that??”

I said, “He’s my small arms dealer.”

I paid $300 to rent a limo only to discover that it didn’t include the driver.

All that money and nothing to chauffeur it.

English Man: Are you two ladies from England?

Ladies: Wales!

English Man: Are you two whales from England?

Two windmills standing next to each other on a wind farm strike up a conversation. One of them asks the other, “So, what’s your favorite kind of music?”

The other says, “I’m a big metal fan.”

Morning Rain

 I love rainy mornings. There’s something soothing about waking up to the sound of rain on the roof. It slows you down. You see that it’s a rainy day and you think, what’s the rush? You walk downstairs and stand at the back door watching it fall on the deck. The grass is greener. The trees are darker, their leaves slick and glossy. You make your coffee then stand at the window drinking it. It tastes better this morning. You think of that old Bible verse about how the rain falls on the just and unjust alike and you’re glad it works that way. Even Lucy notices. She pauses at the top of the deck steps, lifts her nose high in the air and breathes deeply, in no particular hurry, just like me.

It occurs to me that I had nothing to do with the rainfall’s arrival and I will have no say on when it stops. This is out of my hands. More powerful forces are at play here. Human beings might take credit for a great many things, but we don’t conjure rain from the skies. And yet, if it suddenly stopped falling every single great civilizational advance made in the last 4000 years would turn to dust.

So when I wake up to the sound of raindrops on my roof I am thankful for the life-giving provision it brings. I’m grateful that it falls on me whether I’ve been good or bad.

I let Lucy back in. She knows the drill. She walks around in circles on the towel I have placed on the floor at the back door to dry her feet. There is a brightness in her eyes. She knows that rain is a good thing somehow. For her it means that Mom and Dad will be calmer today, less hurried. It will be a good day.

My DA…and a sermon

 Pam has been in Columbia taking care of Silas since September 30th. I was with her for the first five days, then I drove back to Short Pump. I’ve been taking care of Miss Lucy ever since and doing basic adult things like buying groceries, cooking meals, and cleaning house. I’ve discovered that I much prefer it when Pam serves as my designated adult. Actually the best part of being married for me has always been the fact that Pam has always been an excellent DA. First of all, she knows how to do stuff around the house. I only kinda know how to do these things. I almost called her the other night for a refresher course on how to run the dish-washer, but at the last minute I figured it out. Pretty soon I will have to ask her for a reminder of the correct procedure for doing the laundry. Wouldn’t want to run the risk of ruining a basket full of perfectly good clothes.

Ok, I know what some of you are thinking—“how can a man be 67 years old and not know how to run a washing machine?” I do not have a ready answer to this question. All I know is that for all of my life I have had reliable DA’s who did this sort of thing for me—my Mom, my sisters and now Pam. There has never been a compelling reason to learn these skills. But, having said this, I feel obligated to point out that Pam woudn’t know the first thing about the intricacies of lawn care, not to mention the fact that she would be lost if asked how to properly diversify a portfolio, let alone name the starting lineup of the 1969 New York Mets. We both have our strengths and weaknesses.

However, even though I am indeed an old dog, I have been able to learn a few new tricks. Pam has been slowly bringing me along in the kitchen to the point where I am able to turn this—-

…into this…

Lest you think that I am a one-trick pony in the kitchen, behold this…

So, I have a reasonable set of skills thanks to my wife’s patience and guidance. 

Pam sends me Marco Polo videos of her and Silas engaged in adorable activities. I watch them over and over. Then when I head over to the Cafe I make everyone else watch them with me..yeah, I’m THAT grandparent.

The plan was for Pam to come home next week since Kaitlin will be on Fall break for the first three days of next week and then Jon was going to take the last two days off to take care of Silas. But, that was before the government shutdown furloughed him. Now, if the shutdown is resolved sometime over the next few days, he will not be able to take those days off. The best laid plans held hostage by leadership incompetence. Either way, I will head down the third week of October to give Pam some help. Turns out that taking care of babies is very much a young person’s game.

A parting sermon, if you will allow me.

Politicians love to do a lot of talking about being pro-life or how much they support the family. Ok…so why is it practically impossible for a young couple to afford to have children unless both of them work, and even then the cost of daycare is insanely expensive? I hear people say, “well, why doesn't one of the parents stay home and be a full-time parent? That way they wouldn’t have to pay for daycare.” Ok. That’s exactly what Pam and I did when Patrick was born. However, there were some big differences in our situation. I was in a profession where I had control over my income. Although nothing was guaranteed, I could make more money by working harder. Today, most jobs don’t come with limitless upside potential and even if they did, not everyone is suited for that type of risk-taking and lifestyle. 

I know several young couples where both of them work and are doing quite well. But neither of them makes enough alone to allow the other to stay home for several years to raise a child. I don’t know how we got here but if we are serious about being “pro-family” we need to find a way to make it affordable for people who aren’t wealthy to have children. The only tool government has to help is the tax code. Government has no money of its own, it only serves as a distributor of everyone else’s tax dollars for the alledged common good. So why not expand the child tax credit to a meaningful enough level to make it a game changer? What’s more beneficial to human flourishing, tax policy that favors and encourages growing families or the pass through deductions and stock option deductions that allow profitable companies and people making over a million a year to avoid taxes? I’m not trying to suggest that those deductions have NO benefit. What I am saying is that governing is about making priority decisions. No government scheme can help everyone at the same time. Someone has to make a judgement on what is most important for the greatest number of its citizens. I submit to you that supporting young families trying to raise children in today’s world is as important as it gets. Start there.

Nap Time and a Battle of Wills

 Tomorrow morning, October the first, Kaitlin goes back to work for the first time since Silas was born. Her daycare provider isn’t available until November the first. Lucky for her she has two recently retired parents who are thrilled to step in for the next 30 days. 

Usually my main job as a “caregiver” is running errands for the real caregiver—Pam. I have managed to add, “guitar player” to my resume of skills since it seems to distract him from various fits of fractiousness. I am also quite adept at laying on the floor and playing with him, making him laugh and sharing advice on proper pooping technique. But yesterday I was given a real caregiver task—putting him down for a nap.

Technically, the “putting him down” part isn’t accurate. Around here we prefer what is referred to in modern baby care parlance as contact napping, ie we hold him as he sleeps instead of putting him in a crib. At this point I should mention how little your opinions on the advisability of contact napping mean to me. I can practically hear some of you muttering—he’s going to spoil that boy. My response to this is—mind your own business. If any of you had a grandson this beautiful you wouldn’t plop him in a crib either.

So, yesterday my big moment came around 11:50 when Pam handed Silas to me and left me alone in his nursery with these instructions, “He needs to sleep for about and hour and forty-five minutes. He will want to wake up every thirty minutes or so, but don’t let him. Good luck!”

For the first ten minutes, Silas had no interest whatsoever in sleeping, despite the fact that he was very tired. He squirmed. He cried. He squirmed while crying. He got red in the face from squirming and crying. I soldiered on, determined to triumph. I whispered. I soothed. I patted his bottom. I stroked his nose…all the tricks Kaitlin had taught me. At the end of this ten minute battle of wills, Silas’ eyes finally drifted shut and he fell asleep in my arms. I sat down in the rocking/rotating chair by the window of the nursery and watched him sleeping. This is one of the few things I recall from when my own children were this age. I remember how soothing it was—for me—to watch them sleep. Nothing has changed.

As predictable as the tides, at the thirty minute mark his eyes popped wide open. He looked up at me and a huge smile ran across his face. My heart melted…but I wasn’t about to go for this head fake. I had been warned that every thirty minutes he would want to wake up and I had been given specific instructions NOT to let this happen. So, once he started again with the whole squirming and crying bit, I stood up and tried the old walk while bouncing up and down thing. As most of you know, this parenting technique has been employed by every parent since the Bronze Age and for good reason—it works. The down side of the bounce/walk strategy is that it doesn’t agree with my 67 year old back. After a minute or so I could feel the beginnings of a spasm coming on, so I abruptly abandoned the bounce/walk for the trusty 180 degree spin move, whereby you twist at the waste from side to side in a slow rhythmic motion. As soon as I began doing this his little eyelids began to flutter. I had hit on a winning strategy. All I had to do was continue this for another couple of minutes and he would be out like a light!

But..there was a problem.

I am 67.

To my great embarrassment and frustration, I discovered that the 180 degree spin move was making me dizzy. There was the very real possibility that I might eventually pass out—which I don’t have to tell you all would NOT be optimum. So, I improvised. I decided to try widening my stance. Luckily for me I was in a dark room and there were no other people there to see my performance. Try to imagine how awkward and dorky a man would look if he was holding a baby while spinning 180 degrees at the waist with his feet now three feet apart and his legs bent slightly at the knees! I probably looked like a Yoga Pose gone terribly wrong. However, the good news is, the dizziness went away and soon Silas was once again sound asleep.

An hour and forty-five minutes after I started, the little guy started to wake up, my mission successfully completed. I handed him to his mother, feeling pretty good about myself. Then I attempted to rise up out of the rocking/rotating chair…

There is a price to be paid for this contact napping business when you’re my age. On the one hand there’s the pure joy you feel watching this beautiful, tiny human being sleeping in your arms. All the problems of this world melt away. But…when it’s over and you stand up your back feels like you’ve just finished walking ten miles carrying a 25 pound backpack.

Small price to pay for this…

Coming Apart at the Seams

 In the last couple of weeks in my country, these things have happened:

An ex-marine veteran of the 2003 Iraq war drove his pickup truck into a church building and started firing, then set fire to the place, killing two and injuring 8 others.

Another ex-marine veteran of the 2003 Iraq war drove his boat up to the dock of a waterside restaurant on the coast of North Carolina and started firing, killing three and injuring 7 others.

An illegal immigrant working at a Dallas hotel attacked his boss with a machete, decapitating him in front of members of his family, then kicked his head like a soccer ball across the parking lot.

Closer to home a man was killed on interstate 288 in a road rage incident, where a shooting caused the truck the victim was driving to burst into flames.

In a separate road rage incident, a young man was shot at nine times on Midlothian Turnpike by another driver, one of the bullets going through his knee. The victim in this case was the boyfriend of my niece. The shooter was sent into this unhinged rage because he got cut off.

At the Ryder Cup, the MC of the event introducing one of the competitors for the European team led the assembled crowd in a rousing chant of F**K YOU, RORY!!! The “comedian” who the event hired to handle the player introductions was dismissed from her job and forced to apologize to Rory McElroy and the entire European team, but not before she embarrassed herself and every decent American unlucky enough to hear her epic display of rudeness.

Yes, I know that these incidents are not equally egregious. But all of them seem emblematic of what my country is becoming—a place where people are losing their minds. If you’re keeping score at home, we’ve now had 324 mass shootings this year alone. Road rage is becoming so prevalent, it has actually changed the way I drive on the interstates. My son recently told me that when he gets on an interstate in Nashville he starts from the assumption that every vehicle on the highway is driven by someone with a firearm and a hair trigger. Instead of paranoia, this sounds like a perfectly reasonable strategy.

It doesn’t take a genius to see that our society is coming apart at the seams. Our Lord tells us to not be overcome by evil but overcome evil with good. 

But, how???

Loving Parenthood

 I was reminded of something about myself today by someone who is very dear to me—I loved being a parent. I use the past tense incorrectly since I am still a parent and will never stop being one, but you know what I mean. My kids are all grown up so my parenting duties are much curtailed, but back when we were in the midst of it, Pam and I loved everything about being parents and having kids…and still do.

Was it demanding, frustrating and overwhelming at times? Yes, yes and yes. Did the responsibility of it all seem burdensome? Of course. Did we struggle with feelings of inadequacy most of the time? Probably. But the magical part of it was that with the passage of time, those moments of frustration fade from your memory. What is left is a treasure trove of wonderful moments.

Being a Grandparent is like being a regular parent, but without the demands and frustrations, and with none of the responsibility! It’s the greatest gig in the world.

But the more I think about this the more it occurs to me that what I really enjoy is supporting and encouraging younger people. My own kids were young, new to everything, largely helpless. It was up to Pam and I to provide for them and teach them the best we could about the world, about what being a human being was all about. If we had thought more about what a huge job that was we might have been paralyzed by fear of failure. As it was, we were so exhausted most of the time we didn’t have the energy to waste on too much navel gazing. We just prayed and trusted them to God’s care…and made sure they were wearing clothes whenever they left the house!

Now that they are grown up we still feel that our job is to support and encourage them as they struggle through the same challenges that we overcame and some that we never encountered all those years ago. When a grandchild comes along our job is exactly the job that our parents performed for us back when our kids were babies. How can we help? What can we do?

But beyond being a parent and a grandparent, there’s also the privilege I have as a retiree with lots of time on his hands. I get to look around me at church and in my neighborhood and see young men and women, many of them with small children of their own and ask myself, How can I encourage them? I know what they are going through. I remember how hard it was some days. So, I bide my time and wait until I catch them doing something really smart and that’s when I take them aside and say, Dude, you are killing it right now. What an amazing job you’re doing! I remember every single time when an older adult did that for me when I was younger and just trying to figure it out. It made me feel like a million bucks that someone had noticed that I wasn’t a complete screwup. Now that it’s my turn to do the encouraging I’m finding that it’s a target rich environment out there if you’re paying attention. There are lots of young people out there killing it. Take the time to notice, come along side them and let them know that you see them.