Category: Family

Scoot over

As a parent, there is really no more terrifying feeling than answering a call from one of your children and hearing wailing on the other end of the line.

I received one of these calls the other day from my 16-year-old daughter. I answered the call and heard what sounded like, “WARBLE GLOBBLE FRAMBLE!!!” followed by sobs.

“ALLIE!” I said, trying to get her to calm down. “WHAT IS GOING ON?”

She took a few deep breaths, and eventually translated “WARBLE GLOBBLE FRAMBLE!!!” into “I think I broke my foot.”

Well that’s not good.

She had been at school rehearsing for a play. During one of the dance scenes, she did a little jump move and came down weird. “I heard a pop,” she said. Also not good.

We got her home and I began to inspect the damage. My wife was out of town, and she is the in-house health care provider for most things. It’s not that I am against helping out my kids when they are hurt. It’s just that she is WAY better at it than I am. But I was going to have step up and fill that role, meaning I could not give my usual medical advice, which is, “Wow, that stinks. Hope it feels better soon!”

My daughter’s ankle and foot were starting to swell. I put some ice on it and told her to elevate it. This doctorin’ stuff ain’t so tough! She’d be on the mend in no time.

Yeah, not so much.

She couldn’t put any pressure on it, and she was in intense pain. By the next morning, her foot was turning a gnarly purple. Time for a real doctor.

I took her to get an x-ray. This was where it became REALLY fun to have dad at the doctor’s office with a teen daughter. As they were getting ready to take her back to x-ray her foot, the nurse began asking her a series of questions. She looked over at me and said, “OK, Dad, I now need to ask some, uh, personal questions.”

“I’ll step out of the room,” I said.

After a few minutes, the nurse poked her head out and said we were ready to have her foot looked at. I went over to help my daughter into the examination room. When it was just the two of us, we had this conversation:

ALLIE: Dad! They asked me if I was pregnant!

ME: Well, you better have said no.

ALLIE: DAD!

They x-rayed her foot, and fortunately found no break. The doctor said it was probably a sprain, but that if it continued hurting after a week or so, we may need to get an MRI on it to see if there was ligament damage.

They put a hard splint on her leg and wrapped it tightly. They then gave her some crutches. Have you have ever seen those videos of a baby horse trying to take its first steps, wobbling around all unsteady? Yeah, that’s how she looked trying to use the crutches.

I took her to school and checked her in, and the school assured her she had extra time to get between classes.

About an hour after dropping her off, I got a text from her: “It’s really hard to get around…” Having been on crutches a few times, I concur.

I went to a medical supply place and rented one of those scooter things where you rest your knee on it and roll around. When I picked her up from school, she agreed immediately that the knee scooter was vastly superior to crutches.

Her little brother, of course, found it remarkably unfair that she got something to ride on. “I wanna hurt my foot!” he said. No, you don’t.

Fortunately, my daughter only needed the scooter for about five days. (Which was enough time for my son to take plenty of laps around the downstairs on it.)

She is pretty much back to normal, so it appears we will not have to get an MRI. I’m glad it was just a sprain, as it could have been much worse. She could have warble globbled her framble.

Mike Gibbons was born and raised in Aiken, S.C. A graduate of the University of Alabama, he now lives in Mt. Pleasant. You can e-mail him at scmgibbons@gmail.com or follow him on Twitter @StandardMike.

Family

Grand Familyfest Hotel

My family spent a few days at a hotel over the holiday. It was a nice stay at a lovely complex with lots of fun and exciting things to do. A few observations from the stay:

Pushing a button is not exactly roller coaster exciting, yet there is something apparently hard wired in siblings where they HAVE to push the button first. I saw several times with parents saying, “No, you pushed it last time. Let you brother push it first.” Mine are teens now. And we still have to do that, for some reason. I haven’t been on an elevator withany of my three sisters in years, but I wonder if we would still have the same desire to compete. Or if they would just let me go ahead and push the button, since it’s clearly my turn.
My children are inherently loud people, as they come from a long line of inherently loud people, myself included. We just talk louder than most. I was pleased that my kids were able to turn down the loudness during the stay in the hotel room.
That said, many people can’t or don’t turn down the loudness. And several of them traveled in large groups in the hallways early in the morning.
There was a heated pool at the hotel, and my son really wanted to go one night and burn off some energy. I agreed to go down there with him, and told him that if there was no one in the pool, we could throw a ball around. Well, a heated pool is nice, even when the air is rather cool. You know what is even nicer? The hot tub connected to the pool. We decided to sit in the 100-degree water and pitch the ball back and forth in there, enjoying the super hot water. After a few minutes, an older woman approached and started to enter the hot tub. Parker knew it was going to be time to stop throwing the ball. As she entered the hot tub, she said, “Don’t stop throwing it on my account. I’ll dodge it if it comes my way.” I like you, ma’am.
We were staying in Stone Mountain, Ga., which is positively gorgeous this time of year. Normally, when driving in the car, I don’t particularly care if my crew members are on their phones. Keeps ‘em occupied and lets me focus on other things, such as not them. However, the brilliantly vibrant changing leaves and the amazing views of the lake as we traveled the winding roads of the park were just too breathtaking. “Phones up everybody.” Nothing like a direct order to enjoy nature, stat!
I had never played chess on a giant chessboard before. This one was outside over a space of about 12-feet by 12-feet. It had pieces about three feet tall. And it was awesome. I played my son, and reminded him that sometimes, especially in chess, there is no mercy.
Hotel coffee is one of the greatest gifts to mankind we have ever known. I know lots of folks love their gourmet coffee that costs like $5 a cup. But there is something deliciously rewarding about some single-serve coffee in a styrofoam cup, especially when sitting on a patio overlooking a lake. Keep in mind, I’m a guy who finds gas station hot dogs delicious, so I may not exactly be a gourmand.
I don’t have a cleaning service at my house, but if I did, I feel confident I would be the person who cleans up the entire house before the maid comes over. That’s how I am before leaving the room before room service comes in. “Come on, everyone. Let’s tidy up the room before the people who tidy up the room get here.” Fairly certain housekeeping comes into my room and says, “Have we already been here?”

Glad we had a nice visit, and glad my family can be a civilized group when the need arises. I look forward to our next stay in a hotel, when we will be quiet and, of course, take turns on who gets to press the elevator button. Pretty sure it’s my turn.

Childhood Family

Baby, it’s (already too) cold outside

Post author By Mike Gibbons
Post date November 17, 2016
No Comments on Baby, it’s (already too) cold outside

The weather is getting cold, which means it’s time for getting the fireplace into the action.

In case you are wondering what I think is cold, it is currently 55 degrees outside, and I consider this almost too cold for humans to venture out in.

Those of you who love colder temperatures, good on you. You are a hardy, robust people and the reason our lands were settled. Were it up to me, we as a nation would probably be concentrated somewhere around Tampa.

Anywho, it’s fire season, so of course it is time to stock up on firewood. I don’t have a set firewood acquisition strategy. It varies from year to year. Last year, it was grab a bundle at the grocery store every few days. Previous years I’ve headed into the woods with my dad and some friends, armed with chainsaws and axes and filled up truckloads of firewood, and then drove said trucks home fueled solely by the near record amounts of testosterone produced.

This year, I opted for a middle of the road approach. There’s a guy near my house who has a front yard full of firewood for sale. There is a large board out front with his phone number spray painted on it. Personally, I find things advertised for sale on giant signs with spray paint to be a part of our treasured Americana.

So I called the number on the sign. No answer. Recording began. At the beep, I said, “Hi, I was calling about the firewood. Whenever you get this message, if you could…”

“Hello?” I heard.

“Oh, hi, are you there?” I said.

“I’m here. You were calling about the firewood?”

We chatted for a few minutes about price and pickup, and I told him I’d be back at his house in about a half hour.

I hung up the phone and looked at my son, who had a puzzled look on his face.

I was pretty sure he wasn’t confused about the firewood acquisition, since we had just had this conversation:

ME: We should call that guy and get some firewood from him.

HIM: Yep.

So I said to him, “What’s the matter?”

My son shook his head. “How … how did he answer while you were leaving a message?”

It was at that point it dawned on me that my son has always lived in a world with electronic voicemails, rather than answering machines.

I explained to him how answering machines worked, and how back in my day we had to actually dial a big wheel to make a call, and you didn’t even know who was calling, and even if you did want it to go straight to voicemail, you had to wait for it to ring a whole four times, not just push a magical “decline” button. Kids today.

Once we came back from our trip down Memory Lane, we were poised to load up the back seat of my car with firewood. Normally, I would use my wife’s SUV, but she was going to be gone for, like, two hours. And I have, well, no patience. I got it in my head that we were getting firewood, so by goodness we are loading up the back seat of a Honda Civic with it.
I covered the back seat with a tarp and we headed to the gentleman’s house. I parked my car and gave the man some money. I grabbed a few logs from our section of purchased wood and walked it about 15 feet to my car. I then said out loud, “Yeah, that was dumb. I should move my car up to the pile of wood.” My son and the firewood man both nodded.

In no time, my son and I had the wood unloaded at our house and covered with a tarp. We have had our first fire of the year, and it was glorious. Tonight’s weather will dip even lower, to a practically unsurvivable 48. But it will be toasty inside, with a fire roaring. And I can spend the evening regaling my kids with other foreign ways of life from my childhood, such as when we didn’t have cable, and when we had to write letters by hand, and worst of all, that awful time it got into the 30s.

Adventures Childhood Family Uncategorized

Me Tarzan. Me stuck.

There I was, 35 feet above the ground, the grip on both hands weakening, and my arms quivering.

So this is how it ends, I thought.

No, not my life. I had a harness on and was securely latched to a cable a foot above my head. This is how my son’s social life at school ended, crashing and burning in a pile of ashes as he forever became known as The Kid Whose Dad Had To Be Rescued During The Ropes Course Field Trip.

Parker and me before our climb. The Tarzan ropes are over his left shoulder.

I had agreed to chaperone this field trip because I want to be there for my kids. But also because, hey, ropes course. I have twice agreed to chaperone kayaking field trips. Because, you know, to be there.

When we got to the park, I started eyeing some of the 72 different obstacles. There were three levels of difficulty. Once we were outfitted with harnesses, helmets and directions, I noticed many of the kids in the class, my son included, migrated to the most difficult levels as quickly as they could. I eventually made my way up toward them as well.

I navigated an obstacle here and an obstacle there. I am not afraid of heights, and I am fairly agile and coordinated, so I was feeling pretty confident as I made my way from one elevated platform to the next. Then I arrived at the Tarzan obstacle. While many of the obstacles have wooden slats or metal cables to walk on, Tarzan does not. It is just a series of vertically hanging ropes, each with a few knots in them. You can either go across grabbing each rope by hand a la the eponymous jungle swinger. Or you can put your feet on top of the bottom knot of each rope as you go from rope to rope.

I know my limitations. I was not going to be able to do the prior, at least not the whole way. So I opted to hop from knot to knot. First knot, no problem. Second knot. Good deal. Only 43,000 ropes to go. (Perhaps fewer than that. My memory is fuzzy.) Each rope I went to, I had to hoist myself up and swing my feet over, capturing the next rope with my feet and sliding them down to the knot. I then had to shift my right hand to the next rope, followed by my left hand. And that takes more energy than I realized.

About two-thirds of the way across, my body stopped cooperating. I moved my feet over to a rope. I tried to lift myself up high enough to swing my body over to the next rope. My arms laughed at this notion. They were no longer interested in this obstacle, they informed me.

I still had my feet securely braced on the knots. I’ll just hang here for a second, I thought, until my arms are better.

At that point, my legs informed me that if my arms didn’t have to work, then they didn’t either, and also informed me that they were about to play a fun little game called Jelly Legs.

If I let go, I was pretty sure I would be in trouble, and probably not making it back to the platform without some help of the crew. It is really not promising for your social standing for your entire class to have to see your dad get hauled to safety from the ropes courses they were navigating like squirrels.

I had to make one final stand. I looked over my shoulder. A crew member was on the platform behind me. “Just put your feet on the platform and you’re good,” he said. If only he knew about the limb revolt.

With every bit I had left in my body, I grabbed as tight as I could with my hands and pulled up as much as I could, and then launched my feet toward the platform. My heels landed solidly on the wooden stand. I was now in a sitting position. I gave the rope a little swing back and then forth, and then pulled as hard I could, digging my heels onto the platform for leverage. I let go with my right hand and grabbed the last rope. I repeated with my left. One. More. Pull. After a few seconds, I was standing upright on the platform.

While I did not complete the Tarzan obstacle in the purest of fashions, I consider it a win on my part. I went from one platform to the other and did not require rescue. That’s a win in my book. For me and my son.

Family Home improvement

Weathering the storm

When Gov. Nikki Haley issued the evacuation order last Tuesday for Charleston, she was about on the third syllable of the word “evacuation” when my wife was on the road.

OK, maybe that’s a slight exaggeration. But my wife made it clear to me a while back that, should a hurricane even consider coming to visit, she would not be there to welcome it. Perhaps this is because of her folks living on the Florida coast and having endured several major hurricanes over the years. Perhaps this is because she is no dummy.

Mostly, though, it’s because when the remnants of Tropical Storm Julia came over our house, we sat in our den, rain pouring and winds swirling, and she said, “Nope. Not doing this if it’s bigger than a tropical storm.”

I was very much in favor of this plan. She and our son headed on out ahead of much of the traffic, while I stayed back with my daughter to secure the house.

This was a good call for a few reasons. First, our son is not a fan of storms. I blame this on me, as when he was a toddler I decided to make a mad dash to our car during a thunderstorm. Hey, here’s a fun fact: you know what a transformer getting hit by lightning sound like when it’s about 20 feet from you? It sounds like you are about to die. Yay, fun!

So when storms do come a calling, it’s not exactly his thing. Plus, as with many tasks in life, streamlining your work force makes for a more efficient process. You can only bring one patio chair in at a time, so no need for a traffic jam at the sliding glass door.

Also, this was one time I was going to use teenager apathy in my favor. Our daughter is 16, and (mostly) a quite lovely human. That said, she is also a teenage girl, and often lets her mood drift into the category best described as “whatever.”

But I decided to use this to my benefit. With earbuds firmly entrenched and the soundtrack to Hamilton blaring, the approaching storm did not even enter her mind. She just very efficiently and robotically brought chairs and bird feeders and such inside, occasionally stopping to belt out a line from the show.

It only took a few hours to make sure everything was as secure as we could make it. Lots of folks asked me if I planned on boarding up or taping the windows. Nope. I brought stuff inside, locked up the house, hit the road and hoped for the best.

When we got home, we were pleased to see that our house had been spared of much of the damage. We had a lot of debris in our yard, but nothing that couldn’t be raked up and hauled to the curb.

The process of moving all of the stuff outside was done mainly by me, as I was in the car with my daughter, and my wife and son were about an hour behind us. My daughter wanted to go see a friend, and I saw this as an opportunity to have the absolute most streamlined work force possible. It probably took me 30 minutes, tops, to get my outdoor stuff out of the indoors.

When my wife and son arrived, he was eager to get on his bike and pedal off some pent up energy, which we gladly encouraged. My wife and I actually enjoyed the couple of hours of yard work required to clean up from the storm, as it was a chance for us to enjoy a beautiful day and spend some time outdoors together.

I’m glad that Hurricane Matthew was not as bad as it could have been for us. But I’m also glad we had a good test run of evacuating our house.

When the next storm approaches, I’m confident we know what to do and how to do it. We’ll send half the family on early and tell my daughter to crank Hamilton, because we’ve got things to do.

Adventures Animals Childhood Family

The possum king

Sometimes, you’re just where you’re supposed to be in life.

I was off to my local grocery store recently, as I was hunting and gathering for the night’s spaghetti and meatball dinner. I parked and headed into the store. As I approached the entrance on the right side of the store, I noticed there was a barricade of carts blocking off the entrance. Odd, I thought. Perhaps the door was broken. Perhaps a customer had dropped a jar of Newman’s Own spaghetti sauce, and the staff was cleaning it up, and it was the last jar of fire roasted tomato and garlic and thus I was not only going to be inconvenienced but spaghetti and meatball night would be just ruined.

I walked toward the other entrance. I saw a young employee emptying trash cans and asked him why the door was barricaded, bracing myself for the possibility of there not being fire roasted tomato and garlic sauce. “There was a possum by the trash can,” he said.

My time to shine.

I reversed course and went back to the barricaded area. I separated two carts and stepped into the quarantined area. There, behind a trash can, was a medium-sized possum, doing what possums do, which is mainly nothing.

As I was sizing up the situation, the door opened. A manager emerged. I took the lead. “I’ll get the possum for you.” He was not quite sure what to make of this. “Trust me, I’ve done this plenty,” I said. Which is true.

I pulled out my phone and called my son, who was on a bike ride in the area. When he answered, I said, “Hey, meet me at the grocery store. We’ve got a possum.” “Be there in a second,” he said. It’s how we roll.

The manager said that he was going to call a pest control company and that he was absolutely not asking me to get the possum. “It’s OK,” I said. “All on me.” I should carry around an “I’ve got this” waiver form.

About that time, my son pulled up on his bike. “Where’s the possum?” he said, in full-on mission mode.

A crowd was gathering at the store door as well as on the sidewalk. I saw the little critter’s tale at the back of the trash can. I told my son I was going to grab it, but he was the front flank, should I miss. (Fun fact: I never miss.)

I darted my hand in and grabbed the possum’s tale and pulled it out from behind the trash can. At this point, I realized I had not planned my exit strategy 100 percent. I said to Parker, “Here, hold this,” and handed him the possum. As I walked to my car to get a cloth bag, I looked over my shoulder and saw a lot of folks staring at my 13-year-old, standing just outside the grocery store front door, holding a possum. I am sure several folks had some parenting questions about me.

I returned with the bag and Parker dropped him in. I tied up the handles, which would be plenty sufficient for the short transport to some nearby woods.

I had quite a few questions from the onlookers. What was I going to do with it? Can’t it bite you? Why? (Answers: Release it. Yes. Because why not?)

I know we’re not the normal family when it comes to wildlife. I’m the son of a biologist who grew up catching critters. My son has led a similar path. We know which ones we can handle and which ones we can’t. Possums, we certainly can. I just wanted to get the little fella off into some woods so he could go do his possum thing for the rest of his life, which I hope does not include staring blankly into oncoming car headlights.

When I returned a short while later for my actual grocery shopping, the store staff shared with me that their day at work had been kinda cool thanks to the possum adventure. Glad I could help.

The grocery store now has, by my count, zero possums. And, more importantly, by my count, plenty of fire roasted tomato and garlic spaghetti sauce.

Family Home improvement

Home sweet home

Two years ago, I was relocating my family to Charleston. My new job was starting just about the same time school was starting, so this was a perfect time for everything to just magically fall into place and all of us start anew together.

Turns out, the Charleston housing market doesn’t believe in short-term magic. We made several trips down looking for places to live. Because we had not sold our house, we were just going to lease for the first year.

We looked at a few places with our Realtor, and at one point we were pretty sure we found the right place. It wasn’t ideal, but it would work. For one thing, it was on some water, and my son saw an alligator, so as far as he was concerned, it was perfect.

And then that fell through. Plan B. Nope, taken. Plan C. Taken. Look online and see a listing about seven seconds old. Taken.

And school was approaching. We had decided on the schools we wanted the kids to go to, as I can drive to work from anywhere. Unfortunately, the school district doesn’t accept “We promise to move here just as soon as we find a home” as an address. Some friends of ours who have a second home here said we could use theirs as a stop-gap, which was incredibly generous and kind, and at least made my wife and me slightly less insane for the short term. It also thankfully ruled out my plan, which was just to camp under the Ravenel Bridge.

Shortly before school started, still not having a permanent residence, our Realtor called. “I made an executive decision and got you a house to rent. I hope you like it.”

She had been to enough places with us to know what we needed in a home. We trusted her.

After the first year in the house, we started looking at houses to buy. We again went to our Realtor and starting talking about various houses we found online. And pretty much every house in our neck of the woods, when it goes on the market, immediately gets 8 bajillion offers on it. So we upped the lease for another year.

As the second year of the lease neared expiration, we began talks with the homeowner. And by “we” I mean my wife, because, let’s be honest here, she’s the brains of this operation. It’s why I turned over bill duties to her some 20 years ago, as apparently you are supposed to pay them EVERY month. Who knew? (She knew.)

Turned out the homeowner was getting tired of having a second home and would be willing to sell the house to us. The house would never see the light of day on the open market thereby avoiding 8 bajillion competing offers for the house we had occupied for two years.

We decided to ask the kids what they thought of buying the house we were in. It’s a pretty darn good houses in a great location with wonderful neighbors. Turns out, opinions on such matters are as fluid as the teen hormones flowing through their bless-their-heart bodies. Their opinions ranged depending on the time of day, the weather, astrological signs, etc. But the end of the day, however, they both agreed that not having to box up all of their belongings and move again pretty much trumped anything else.

A few weeks later and with virtually zero effort, and — boom — we were sitting at closing. OK, there was a lot of effort. My wife did all of the heavy lifting, as she often does, because she is good at this type of thing. My main tasks involved driving paperwork to the mortgage company and signing things. Again, not the brains.

There are some things I will miss about leasing a home. Mainly, the next time something breaks, I have to fix it. But I am looking forward to making this house our home and putting some touches on it that we have held off on for the last couple of years because, well, it wasn’t ours. We’ll make it our true home in due time. Everything, it seems, is falling into place. It just takes magic about two years to happen here apparently.

Mike Gibbons was born and raised in Aiken, S.C. A graduate of the University of Alabama, he now lives in Charleston. You can e-mail him at scmgibbons@gmail.com or follow him on Twitter @StandardMike.

Childhood Family

Back in my day…

I remember the first time that I really saw how much smart phones were changing the world.

My wife and I had gotten iPhones in probably 2009 or so. My wife and I were heading back from a trip to Atlanta and we pulled off the interstate to get something to eat.

We saw an Arby’s, and my wife and I both said, “Let’s get that.” We pulled into the drive-through line. The backseat chorus chimed in. “What do they have!?!?!?!?” My wife whipped out her phone, hit a few keystrokes, and in no time had the Arby’s kids menu pulled up. She rattled off the kids menu choices, and by the time we were at the speaker to order, we had everyone’s selection. This … this changes how we live, my wife and I said. Immediacy. This is the future, and the future is awesome!

That said, I cannot let the technological advances of our day overshadow my parental obligation to harp to my kids about how their life is infinitely easier than our incredibly difficult childhoods.

I, of course, tell my children all the time what it was like in my day.

I use foreign phrases to them such as “card catalog” and “land line” and “1984 was one of the greatest years alive because Red Dawn — the only Red Dawn I recognize — came out.”

But I do have to remember to keep a few of the other ones in the reserve bin for when I need a good “Back in my day…” comment. Among those I have stockpiled:

Back in my day…

We only had to dial five numbers to make a phone call, which, oh, by the way, was on a rotary phone. My wife is from Atlanta, so she was all fancy and dialed all seven numbers in her day. City folk.
If you need an immediate answer now, it’s easy enough. Our Google? The set of encyclopedias sitting on the shelf, or our parents. Let’s say we had a paper due the next day on, say, Venezuela. We could grab the World Book (U-V edition), and look up what we wanted. Or we could ask our parents, and possibly then include in our term paper a fun made-up fact our dad thought was funny, such as stating that Venezuela got its name because they were big fans of Fernando Valenzuela, but didn’t want to be too obvious.
Our TV shows weren’t on demand, and the concept of “binge watching” was nonexistent. My daughter watched the entire run of “Friends” over an especially unproductive weekend. I told her it took her mother and me a full decade to watch “Friends,” and we did it because we liked it that way. Harumph.
We had to read maps. Made out of paper. And that could rarely be folded back into their original form. My father-in-law is a real estate appraiser, and my wife brags that she learned early on not only how to read maps, but how to fold them back like a champ. Kids today…
The phrase “Be Kind, Rewind” means something to us. Sure, you get your Redbox DVD or your iTunes download. But we used to have to do some heavy lifting in our day, and that required waiting patiently while your VHS copy of “Weekend at Bernie’s” wound all the way back to start, lest you get fined by your movie overlords at Blockbuster.
You kids today have your privacy on a phone call, because you have a cell phone and you can go anywhere to make your calls. Back when we had those wall-mounted phones, we had to get our privacy the old fashioned way — with a 20-foot cord that you added to the phone so you could go far away from everyone else to make your call. This was exceptionally challenging if you were one one of my three older sisters and, during that call with your friend, your little brother repeatedly opened and closed the sliding glass door on the cord, hoping he could introduce a little chaos into your life because, well, little brothers are awful. (Source: I am a little brother, and also the parent of a little brother.)

So the world has gotten better than when we were kids. But kids today need to remember that their parents endured some mighty struggles. And I am sure they, too, will one day be able to tell their kids about the hardships they endured, with non-Wifi hotspots and such. I wish them well, and hope they can convey to their kids the struggle they endured. In particular that terrible time when Redbox was out of their movie.

Adventures Childhood Family

They see me rollerin’

I am a survivor.

Six hours in a car. Ten hours at an amusement park. Four teenage girls.

Survive.

OK, so it wasn’t that bad. It was my daughter’s 16 birthday, and she wanted to go and ride roller coasters with some friends. So I piled the four of them in a car and set off toward our destination, three hours away, which means I spent the next three hours hearing songs from “Hamilton” being sung, occasionally breaking for a quick trip to “School of Rock” songs.

When we arrived at our destination, the energy in the car got even higher, as when you near the entrance to Carowinds, you see huge sprawling roller coasters dotting the horizon. Big ones. Fast one. Scary ones.

We entered the park and I did what a responsible father would: I told them all to stay within five feet of me the whole time, and make no eye contact with anyone.

Ha! Made that joke to my daughter. She just stared at me. I told the girls to head off and have fun, and I’ll see them a bit later. The best present a dad can give his daughter on her Sweet 16? Space, in particular if three friends are with her.

I met up with my wife and son. We traveled the park hitting various rides and questioning occasionally why we thought a theme park in August was a good idea, since clearly the earth had moved twice as close to the sun as normal.

I did make a few observations while strolling the park:

We are a confident nation. As I walked through the park, I saw quite a few folks and thought, “Wow, that person woke up, but on that ensemble, and said, ‘This is who I am gonna be today.’” Good for you, confident person! Own your look.
It’s a shame some people don’t understand how lines work. It appears some people don’t realize the purpose of a line is to have an orderly manner in which to proceed. Rather, it seems some people are under the misunderstanding that a line is a challenge in which they have to see how many people they can gradually slip past. Surely it’s that and not just people being rude.
I am not suggesting that people should sprint through a theme park. But the Mosey Off that some folks are participating in? Lawdy. Pick it up a smidge, please.
I love me a good roller coaster, and Carowinds has plenty, including their newest one, Fury 325, which goes nearly 100 mph. While those are awesome, there is something about a good old fashioned wooden roller coaster, and not just because you are thinking to yourself, “Doesn’t wood sometimes rot or catch fire?” thereby adding to the adrenaline rush.
I found out I can tie a shoe, sort of, with one hand. Just as the shoulder harness locked into place on the quite speedy Afterburn, I looked down and saw that my right shoe was untied. Since I was about to go do flips and spins upwards of 60 mph, I figured I probably wanted to correct that. Unfortunately, I couldn’t get both of my hands to my shoe because of the harness. I kicked my foot upward toward my right hand and, somehow, managed to fumble and fidget and cross the laces once, then twice, and pull them tight. It wasn’t pretty, but that bad boy was snug for the whole ride and, most importantly, on my foot when the ride ended.
I am not as bothered by selfies as some people. It really doesn’t affect me, so I feel no need to get my feathers in a bunch over what someone else does. That said, I was a bit surprised how many times I saw people trying to take them on roller coasters. Normally, this was on the ascent up the big hill. I have no idea what they were doing during the fast parts, because I was holding on for dear life. But I sure as heck wasn’t holding onto my phone. My phone was safely stowed in a backpack that was left in bins back at the beginning of the ride.

In all, it was a great, tiring day. Most importantly, my daughter said it was an awesome birthday. On the ride home, her friends all fell asleep in the car, so my daughter spent the bulk of the ride just chatting, which was a nice close to her Sweet 16.

She’s eager to go back to the park and ride the roller coasters again. I’m down for that. As soon as the earth moves back to the distance it’s supposed to be from the sun.

Childhood Family

Keeping him in stitches

My son was staying with a friend a couple of hours away recently. After his first night there, I received a call from, around 10 in the morning. Just checking in, I figured.

“How’s it going?” I said.

“Well, I’ve been better. Took a spill on my bike. Cut my knee. But I think it’s OK,” he said.

Well, who better to diagnose the severity of a cut than a 13-year-old. On with my day!

A short while later, my wife and I both received the same text, with a picture attached. It was from his friend’s mom. “Does this look like it needs stitches?” Attached was a picture of his knee.

Yep.

My wife was in Atlanta at the same time, so she was about seven hours away. I was two hours away. My wife said, “I’ll go.” Maternal nature is sweet. But that just wasn’t practical.

I hopped in my car and headed that way. His friend’s mom offered to meet me halfway, but I told her I’d just come on that way. For one thing, they have a friend who is a doctor and would be able to stitch him up. Our pediatrician doesn’t do stitches, so we would have to go to a clinic to get it done here. I’m sure that would have been fine, but a doctor they know and trust made me feel a little better.

I arrived at the clinic about the same time they did. My son was doing his best to be brave. When we went to see the doctor, it was not what you typically expect. The dude was huge, and very fit. He was exceptionally tan, with a shaved head and a sharp, short-trimmed white beard. He wore jeans and sandals and a henley shirt. He strode over to Parker exuding cool. He offered him a fist bump and told him he’d fix him up. My wife texted me to ask how it was going. I texted back, “This doctor is cool. I could start a bar fight, and I think he could finish it by himself.”

I don’t think that’s what my wife meant with her question.

Parker hopped up on the table, and the doctor told him he was going to give him a shot, and that it would hurt for about 10 seconds, and then it would be over. He was true to his word. Maybe 10 seconds of “YOWCH!!!!” from Parker, and then nothing. The doctor told him he could watch him stitch it up if he wanted to. With the leg numbed, Parker found the procedure to be fascinating.

Five quick stitches later, the cut was sealed up. The doctor fist bumped Parker and gave us a few quick and easy instructions for keeping it clean for the next 10 days.

Once done with the stitches, we set out to plan the rest of the week. Parker had planned to stay with his friend for a few more days. In the end, we decided the best move would be for him to come back with me and we’d let the boys pick up their adventure once his knee was healed.

The wound is healing nicely, and my normally grubby, nasty son (as pretty much all 13-year-old boys are) has been very diligent about tending to it, putting Neosporin on it and replacing his bandage as needed.

I hate that he got hurt and that his time with his friend got cut short. But I am glad he was in caring hands and that I was able to get there and be with him.

Plus, he’s going to have a dandy little scar, which will go nice with the umpty-six other scars he has on elbows, forehead, etc. As the old saying goes, “Scars are tattoos with better stories.”

But the biggest takeaway from the whole event? If I ever feel the need to start a bar fight, I know who I’m calling.