The JackB

"When you're in jail, a good friend will be trying to bail you out. A best friend will be in the cell next to you saying, 'Damn, that was fun'." Groucho Marx

Archives for March 2015

He’s Just Another Dad Blogger

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meantobe
There is a teenage boy who went to sleep feeling frustrated and guilty because he is nervous about going to school tomorrow.

I told him that he did the right thing and that the appropriate response to what happened with this other child isn’t something he should worry about but I know it didn’t ease the unrest inside his head.

He says he wants to be more like me because I am good at not worrying about life the way he is and I laugh.

Before he asks me if I am laughing at him I put a hand on his shoulder and tell him I am laughing because I used to be him and in many ways I still am.

I haven’t ever tried to describe parenting to him as a crazy Japanese game show because he wouldn’t get it and I wouldn’t expect him to.

Doesn’t mean I haven’t tried to give him some insight into this gig because I have but it is the kind of crazy you never understand until you are in the midst of it and even then you don’t always recognize just how nutty it sounds.

Sometimes Dad Doesn’t Know What To Do

I didn’t tell him about all of the times I wasn’t sure what to do and just did my best to make a smart choice because uncertainty here would make him more nervous.

Didn’t tell him how his problem feels simple to me because I feel like I am watching a tsunami form in front of me and I haven’t figured out yet whether I am going to get to high ground before it hits or if I am going to try to ride that sucker out.

It is a funny feeling to look at the mass of water and wonder what kind of pounding I’ll take if I fall off of the board this time while thinking that if I do I am going to have one hell of a story to tell.

Sometimes when I am not certain about how I want to proceed I pretend that I am outsider looking in at someone else and I try to figure out what sort of advice I would offer.

This time all I heard was some guy giggling, “he’s just another dad blogger trying to generate more page views.”

Stood up, walked over the medicie cabinet and told that reflection in the mirror to admit he is nervous because he hasn’t a clue what to say because he is ‘winging it.’

It Went The Way It Had To

A few weeks ago I watched an episode of The Walking Dead and listened to one of the characters talk about an event on the show.

“It went the way it had to, The way it was always going to.”

That line keeps bouncing around inside my head, pin balling back and forth.

I hear it and I think about my expectations for the future and how I am working to make them materialize.

It is me working hard to take charge of life and to control my destiny. It is me working my ass off to make things happen yet so much is outside of my control.

All I have to do is look back upon my life and there are 1,983,983 examples of how my plans didn’t always work out and how I did my best to manage things.

Sometimes it worked out beautifully and I couldn’t be happier with the outcome and sometimes it wasn’t quite as nice.

And let’s be honest, some of those moments were awful, moments that I would prefer not to relive or experience again.

I haven’t forgotten the times where my best effort didn’t work out the way I thought it should or how I felt when it felt like best effort translated as failure.

Back then I would have looked at Lennon’s quote and told him he needed a double dose of STFU and a size 12 boot to the ass because that sort of song lyric is wasted prose.

But today I am not who I once was and not yet the man I think I am on my way to becoming. Now I look at those words and figure it does not matter whether I am meant to be in this place or not because I am.

I am here and all I can do is try my best to make it all work.

Can I Skip School Tomorrow?

Right after I read the email from the school to my son he asked me if I thought he could skip going to class.

His rationale wasn’t completely off base because he figured that if this other kid might react poorly and that it wouldn’t hurt to give him some time.

But I told him no because sometimes the only way to get to the other side of a situation is by going through.

He nodded his head and we shared a few more thoughts and then I told him that sometimes the hardest part about being a father is you don’t always get to be the hero any more.

When he asked me what I meant I pulled out my Geek Card and told him that in Star Wars parlance it meant I am Darth Vader and that if we were talking about the Lord of The Rings it meant I am Gandalf.

I won’t bore you with the discussion about whether I could be Yoda or if Gandalf is better and just share this quote below.

our time

When he said he thought it was a cool quote I smiled and said I agreed and then I told him I have had plenty of moments where I wished I didn’t have to deal with certain things but that life doesn’t ask us if we want to or not.

It just puts a situation in front of us and gives us a chance to handle it or run away and we don’t run.

What’s The Appropriate Response?

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knowing

What is the appropriate response to learning another child wishes yours was dead.

That is not the sort of comment or question I ever thought I would be asked to contemplate.

Had you asked the Jack who had a pregnant wife but had not yet become a father to list what frightened him he might have said he was worried about his child getting hurt in a household accident.

He might have said he was concerned about them falling out of a tree or getting hit by a car but he wouldn’t have said he worried about school shootings or kids saying they wished his child was dead.

I suppose if you pushed him to empty out all of his fears he might have said he wondered if his children would ever deal with antisemitism and wondered how he would handle it.

But I can’t remember a single moment where I imagined a day would come when my son would come home and tell me another kid had told the other children at school he wished my son would drop dead.

Fact is when my son told me it made him nervous and uncomfortable I told him I thought the other kid was just exaggerating and said he shouldn’t worry about it.

*****

The two of them have had a bit of a rocky relationship for a while now and for the most part I have tried to stay out of it.

I have made it clear that he can always talk to me. Made it clear I would listen and share thoughts/ideas but said I would only get involved if it looked like he couldn’t manage things.

It wasn’t because I don’t care or wasn’t bothered by it because I was and I am but I figure it is a good life lesson. It is important to learn how to deal with difficult people.

Not to mention that in my day the worst thing you could do was involve your parents in something like this. That would have invited more trouble and it is precisely why I didn’t tell my parents about disagreements with other kids.

That didn’t stop them from finding out. You can blame that to a black eye, some bruises and a little sister who had no problem telling my folks when I had another fight.

Yeah, there was more than a couple of those and if life was still as it was then I might have told my son to punch this kid in the throat.

But today you get expelled for fighting and I would prefer that he not do it if he can avoid it.

Anyhoo, reminiscing about what once was won’t help solve the challenges of today so I am forced to ask the question.

What’s The Appropriate Response?

I am not the type of person who freaks out at potential boogie men or jumps every time says boo. I don’t put on a sweater because you are cold and I don’t believe most people really mean for someone to die when they say they wish Timmy were dead.

Yet this is my son we are talking about, my child, and a father’s responsibility includes protecting his family.

It felt wrong to panic and wrong to not do anything about it but the question I asked myself was what was an appropriate response.

Part of me wanted to go visit this kid and have the sort of conversation with him that would ensure he understood it would be safer not to speak with my son again.

But the courts frown upon forty-something-year-old men having those types of conversations with teenage boys and I still wasn’t certain it was necessary.

So I took a short walk and intentionally thought about other things. I figured it wouldn’t hurt to clear my head for a few and see if that didn’t provide some clarity.

Otter: Dead! Bluto’s right. Psychotic… but absolutely right. We gotta take these bastards. Now we could do it with conventional weapons, but that could take years and cost millions of lives. No, I think we have to go all out. I think that this situation absolutely requires a really futile and stupid gesture be done on somebody’s part! – Animal House

That is an excerpt from one of my favorite scenes in Animal House. Sometimes when I am feeling a bit stressed out I pull it up in my head to lighten the mood.

Most of the time it helps take the edge off and that is always useful for making decisions.

I needed it tonight because in spite of my insouciant appearance I took this seriously and wanted to make the best decision I could based upon what I know.

What I Did

I wrote the school a short but detailed letter outlining the past problems with this boy and mentioned he has said he would like my son to drop dead.

Part of me was hesitant to do so because I am not convinced he truly meant what he said yet I felt it was better to err on the side of caution.

Better to make them aware of what this boy has said.

Better to document this and put them on notice so that if this escalates at all I can point out that we notified them about the problem.

Chances are it is nothing but talk but better safe than sorry.

This parenting business isn’t for the faint of heart.

The Beginning Of The Story

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wit
The man in the mirror looks at me and shakes his head but I am not sure why.

Is it because my little sister told me that at almost 46 I can’t keep up with my nephew’s high school football team and I disagree.

Or is it because I spent a large chunk of the day feeling like I haven’t a clue anymore as to what I am supposed to do with myself.

Could be one or the other but it is probably both.

The man I am and the man I once was aren’t willing to accept that we/I are too old to run with the high school boys the way we used to.

I am prepared to say I can’t do the workout today but it is nonsense to say I can’t get myself in shape for it. Nonsense to say that I am beyond the point where I can’t run with those boys.

It is not a question of can I do it but will I.

The man in the mirror agrees with me on this point and we decide that even though it is something that is driven by ego it is a realistic option.

Coffee With Bruce Springsteen

The man in the mirror gives me a look I know far too well. It is the one that is reserved for those who wallow in pity and aren’t willing to pick themselves up and move.

He tells me we have gotten punched in the mouth before and kept fighting.  Reminds me that we have always given as good as we have gotten and that we aren’t the kind of fellows who crawl under the blanket to hide.

I tell him bravado only works when you can back it up and he laughs.

“We can, and we have. Suck it up.”

Pour myself an extra large coffee and turn on Tunnel of Love. The Boss is singing One Step Up and I am nodding my head because one step up and two steps back is exactly how it feels like life is going now.

My daughter points out that a few grey hairs are popping up in places on my head and I smile.

“You gave me those”

She shakes her head and tells me that I can’t blame her for me going grey and tell her that she is responsible for me losing my hair too and I shake my head.

“I can, I have and I did.”

She giggles and runs into the other room and I wave goodbye.

In a few I’ll finish writing down a few thoughts and it will be time to bang out some more pushups but not because I have to keep up with those high school boys but because I need the exercise for me.

It is part of how I clear my head.

The Beginning Of The Story

In many ways this blog has been the master chronicle of the changes and adjustments my life has gone through.

It is where I figured out that things were off track and where I worked out how to adjust, pivot and sidestep my way back.

You can look through the posts here and find snapshots in time where I was happy and moments where I was miserable.

I remember the moments of misery because some have been recent and because I am lucky enough to be one of those people who remembers the scrapes and bruises.

But I remember the highlights and great happiness too.

Stephen King says it is a good thing.

There is truth in this.
There is truth in this.

I agree.

It helps when I write my stories and create my characters.

When I look at everything, all of the posts that make up this blog and all of the moments of my life I see now as the beginning of the story.

Sometimes it frustrates me because I wish I could have known all this years ago so that I could have made some changes.

Don’t bother with the comment about how all of these experiences have made me who I am because I know that and I am not in the mood.

Some days I listen to those platitudes and shake my head yes and sometimes I take my gorilla hands to your neck and squeeze off your head.

Blame this crazy feeling now on the tick-tocking of the clock I hear inside my head. Don’t know where it came from or why but it is there and I am very aware of how fast it all goes.

The funny thing is I am still convinced that I am going to be around for another 5o years or more but that is not enough time for me.

There is so much I want to do and experience.

life
I have a very clear vision inside my head about the life I want to lead and what I want to do.

If you were to step inside you’d see a vast hall and the images running through it and you’d know what I want and how I am trying to get there.

But that doesn’t mean I have never suffered from self-doubt or asked hard questions.

Today was one of those days where the man in the mirror and I fought about whether that vision is smart, silly or sensible.

Bruce is singing about that Tunnel of Love now and I am bouncing my head back and forth. I was in college when the album came out and it has carried me through more than a few moments in time.

It has been a part of helping me to decipher the whispering of heart and head and I am hopeful it can do it again.

What A Father Does

When my children ask what a father does I want them to understand it is more than just help provide food and shelter.

It is values and it is an understanding that when you don’t like the story of your life you have the will to change it.

And you keep going even if it is three steps up and two steps back.

Should Bloggers Be Great Marketers?

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Evening approaches and the carnival barker that lives inside my head is screaming at me because I haven’t spent time promoting my posts.

Wrote a solid 10,000 words but didn’t publish most of it for no reason other than I just didn’t feel like it.

Maybe it is fatigue, maybe it is frustration or maybe it is a combination of both but it doesn’t really matter now does it ‘cuz I didn’t press publish.

Didn’t press publish because for a moment I wanted to buy the sucker’s bill of sale that if you write it they will come.

There is a whole section in that last link in which I talk about how bloggers need to have realistic expectations. It is good stuff, solid material and if I ever write an ebook I’ll probably include  it.

Should Bloggers Be Great Marketers?

Some people think so.

They’ll fill your head full of thoughts, ideas and dreams about what you can accomplish by becoming an effective marketer.

Ask them what is required to take your blog to the mythical next level and they’ll tell you about how you can build a blog Voodoo Doll that will stifle your competition and cause your readers to see your content as being the most insightful, exciting, entertaining and profound stuff they have ever read.

All you need to do is swing a chicken over your head and promise to fill it full of your sins. Afterwards you put that sucker down, cut off its head, smear some blood on the keyboard and howl at the moon.

Really, that is all you need to do to make your readers think that reading 10,000 stories about how hard it is to change a diaper on a plane or to take 2 kids shopping at Target is classic reading.

Don’t take that the wrong way new parents. Some of us are a bit jaded these days

Some of us are a bit jaded these days and even though we remember being crazed about every last detail about parenting once the bright and shiny wears off you don’t quite remember it the same way.

Doesn’t mean we don’t love our kids any less. It just means that the five second rule makes a boatload more sense.

That is the beauty of experience, after a while you see your kids don’t break very easily.

But What If I Broke My Boy

I am a damn good father in large part because I had great role models and much of this comes naturally to me but that doesn’t mean I don’t have those moments where I hope I didn’t break my boy/girl.

That is not a reference to anything physical but a comment about how I react sometimes when I see how they respond to certain challenges.

They’ll go on about something that happened in school that I think is minor and I wonder if I screwed them up and made them less capable of dealing with the crap we all have to handle.

And then I remember that when you are in 5th grade or finishing middle school you don’t always respond like an adult would and I relax.

But that doesn’t mean I don’t get to pull out the old “act your age” line that every parent has used from time to time because every now and then it is useful.

Musical Interlude

  1. Ain’t Back Yet- Kenny Chesney
  2. Somewhere With You- Kenny Chesney
  3. Tunnel of Love- Bruce Springsteen
  4. Happy- Bruce Springsteen
  5. Institutionalized- Suicidal Tendencies
  6. Tangled Up In Blue- Bob Dylan
  7. Life’s Been Good- Joe Walsh
  8. Reelin’ In the Years- Steely Dan
  9. Carefree Highway- Gordon Lightfoot
  10. Hurt- Johnny Cash

It Wasn’t Worth Getting Arrested

People still read this post and ask me to tell them the whole story.

I probably shouldn’t be surprised because sometimes they read this one and ask for more details too.

It does make me wonder if I should spend more time writing those stories because they seem to get more traction than some of the others.

On the other hand I know if I write more posts about mean girls and how to unfriend people on Facebook the readers will find their way here too.

Still posts like What Is The Value of a Comment are a guaranteed hit because bloggers love to write and read about blogging because somewhere out there we are going to figure out what tiny little step is preventing us from getting book, television and movie deals.

The Secret To Being Successful

Sometimes my kids ask me to share my secret to being successful and I want to stop them because I don’t feel like I have reached that point yet.

I want to stop them and point out how many times I have fallen short of the mark I set myself but I don’t because they don’t need all that negativity.

And because when I look back at it all I see a lot of success and a ton of victories and I think about how it could be a great teaching moment.

But then I wonder if I am spinning things in my head and decide to go a different direction.

So I tell them the secret is to be willing to work very hard and to know how to pivot, sidestep and adjust when life requires you to move.

If you learn how to go along, you can get along.

Now if only I was better about listening to my own advice.

It Is A Question Of Values

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best friend

I have been thinking about About Walt Whitman & A Dog That Lives Forever.

Thinking about my furry best friend and wondering what it would feel like to run with him now and I can’t quite figure out why other than I must have dreamed about him again.

Doesn’t happen all that often, or at least I don’t think it does but I am always glad to see him and a little sad to say goodbye upon waking.

So I suppose I’ll share this with you again.

…last night he visited me in my dreams. We were both young. I was a twenty something year old kid at the park and he was about two. And in that dream we did what we can’t do together any more. We ran. He was always just ahead of me, but never so far that he was out of sight. He was headed towards traffic and I was yelling for him to stop, fearful that he would do something stupid and get hit by a car.

And then a few dogs started barking at me and he was at my side, tail pointed, deep bark warning them to stay away. At the same time I yelled at them too- told him not to worry that I would find a way out of it for us. But mostly I was secure in the knowledge that the big lug had my back because he always did. Who listened better to my stories than he did. He never got tired or them or acted judgmental- he just loved me.

My kids don’t remember him as a young dog.

My daughter only remembers climbing upon his back and trying to ride him like a horse. It doesn’t take any effort to see those dark soulful eyes of his ask me how long he had to put up with that.

He never complained, never snapped, just wagged his tail and waited.

lug

That big lug and his monstrous head weighed about 125 pounds and on his final day I carried him into the car and laid him down as gently as I could.

It felt like the worst betrayal and I just shrugged my shoulders because we weren’t supposed to go out that way. It wasn’t supposed to be like that.

We were going to be heroes who went off together in a blaze of glory forever remembered for saving the world, except that is not how it went.

He is gone and I am still here.

Now he is a memory of a time and place I’ll never visit again and I am ok with that. He would be too.

That bastard wouldn’t even yell at me about it. He’d just wag his tail and bring me another beer.

I’ll always miss him but I’ll always remember him too.

ba68bhus9ma-jake-melara
The kids are sleeping just down the hall and I am shaking my head because I promised myself I would go to sleep before midnight and I didn’t follow through.

I promised to comment on more blogs than I have been too but haven’t done that either.

Blame it on the amount of effort I am putting into moving my world into orbit.

The guys tell me they can see steam rising off of me on the court and ask me how an old man like me can keep slamming into walls and diving on the floor for loose balls.

They don’t know I consider this moment in time to be among the hardest and most frustrating time of my life.

It is because I have clarity on what I want and what I am trying to do but life isn’t cooperating the way I want it to.

I am a Taurus and there are people who say my attitude and behavior mirror the classic description of the classic Taurus.

I don’t know if that is accurate or not nor does it matter to me.

That is because this behavior is…classic Jack. It is me. It is natural.

Nor does it mean I am being stupid or headstrong. My eyes are open wide and I have my ears to the ground.

Twenty-five years ago I would have grabbed The Big Lug and walked into battle and we would have won.

But he is gone and I am not that man anymore.

I am dad and dad always looks out for his family.

It Is A Question Of Values

My children used to go to a private school. It was a Jewish day school and I was very pleased with the education they received, friends they made and the values that were imparted.

Things happened, life changed and we had to adjust.

Took the kids out of private school and put them in public. That had always been the plan but the intention had been to do it later.

Except life doesn’t always go as plan so you pivot and adjust as best you can.

One of the things I liked about putting them into day school was it avoided the schedule conflicts that come with Hebrew School and extracurricular activities.

It always bothered me that I had to give up playing some sports because practice interfered with Hebrew School. Mom and dad shrugged their shoulders at me and told me to find something else to play.

So day school made it possible for the kids to play sports and not worry about the conflict.

Both got into soccer and until this year we didn’t have any conflict because practices were not on the same day as Hebrew school.

This year my daughter made the All-Star team and so her season has continued but what hasn’t is the lack of conflict.

The coaches just changed the days we practice on and now I am stuck. Stuck because Hebrew School is important and I don’t want her to miss a ton because of soccer.

And stuck because we have taught her to respect being part of a team and to understand the committment that comes with that.

I guess it all comes back to a question of values.

The Dumbest Dad Blogger Of Them All

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life

Been thinking about the blogger I used to be and the one I want to become.

Been staring at The Shackled Writer and asking myself what is the same, what has changed and where I want to take this crazy ride to next.

Remember when I said He Named His Intention Texas?

Nothing has changed there except my desire to go back has grown stronger each day. Ask me why and I can give you a bunch of reasons but the truth is my gut is what is really driving me.

A feeling that I need to go back because that is where the next part of my story starts.

That is important and not just because I am always the guy to ask What Is Your Story?

The Dumbest Dad Blogger Of Them All

Some people say the best way to deal with trolls is not to feed them but I am not always good about following that particular course of instruction.

Several years back I received some hate mail and one of the emails said I am the dumbest dad blogger of them all.

I wrote them back and thanked them for giving me free rent inside their head. They sent me a few other notes and I sent a few other responses and then I went silent.

Maybe I got the last word and maybe I didn’t.

Doesn’t really matter because when you’re the dumbest dad blogger of them all you do things differently and travel the road not taken.

Don’t know that I really want to be known as the dumbest dad blogger of them all but the talking heads say there is no such thing as bad publicity.

Truth is I disagree with that position vehemently because I am certain some publicity can kill you but I have no desire to learn whether this is fact or fiction.

Go the distance


In concept the pictures here are supposed to help encourage people to pin and share these posts.

In concept they are supposed to help add another layer to the tales I am trying to tell and make these posts more compelling but sometimes there is a distinction between concept and execution.

That is my long-winded way of saying sometimes I put these things in for me because I want to remind myself to follow the advice/instructions I see in the picture.

*****

Turned off DISQUS and turned CommentLuv back on because I am curious to see what happens with the comments.

Some people said they didn’t comment because they had issues with it so I figure it is worth taking a look to see if it makes an impact or not.

Someone else told me they don’t comment on some of these posts because they don’t know what to say. They said some of this is too personal and it makes them uncomfortable.

I don’t publish anything I am not willing to accept comments on but if I did I would turn the comments off.

That doesn’t mean I never publish posts that make me squirm a bit because I do.

Great writing is often scary and if you are not willing to go deep and try to share what lies beneath the surface you do yourself and your readers a disservice.

Even if you are writing fiction and sharing stories about Writing, Ranches and Relationships you need to tap into the joy and the pain of life because it is how you’ll connect with your readers.

Bloggers Need The Write Stuff

Yeah bloggers need the write stuff and that is made up of a million different things and nothing.

Sometimes writing is like trying to catch smoke in the palm of your hand. You can wrap your fingers around it but as soon as you unclench them you’ll find nothing but the faintest hint of what was once there.

There is a part of me that says I should narrow my focus again and spend more time writing about the kids. It is the part of me that says acting more like a traditional dad blogger would be good for building the blog.

Focus on the child-rearing and parenting stuff and you’ll get more readers.

But I always come back to the same place with that.

My kids are too big and too old to share the traditional stories like I once did.

I haven’t had to change a diaper in a thousand years and the last time one of them spit up on me was 500 years before that.

The tales about how to travel with the kids aren’t filled with the same crazy stories about having to carry 983 pound of gear for one baby.

When we fly everyone carries their own carryon and is responsible for managing their suitcase.

Now I am cautious about how much I share because I don’t have the same ownership of their stories and I have to be concerned about what happens if they or their classmates ‘Google’ themselves.

So I take a different tack and try to measure and mix things up a bit.

evolution


One of the goals now is to try to figure out how to become a better father and to share some of that tale with you.

Part of that is relating the struggle to find the balance between doing what is best for my career and what is good for the children.

It is about trying to figure out what happens if I do something that will be more rewarding and potentially provide more cash in pocket.

The theory goes that provides not just the material benefits that come with it but a much happier father and those benefits can be huge.

That is not to say I am miserable now or so unhappy that I can’t see straight but I am definitely not where I want to be.

So the question is how much of my life do I subjugate for my kids.

The thing about life is sometimes the only way you can find out the answer to some question is to walk through the door and see what lies on the other side.

And that is exactly what we are going to do. We are going to open the door and walk through it.