The Frosty Paws 12-Step

So, the dog.

Lola is a six-pound Cuban silk dog, otherwise known as a Havanese, and a not-too distant relative of the poodle. This makes her a perfect fit for the house full of OCD, germaphobic asthmatics that is our family. No dander means easy breathing; no shedding means no mess. The allergies are problematic since we truly are a dog-loving people. Unfortunately, more than five minutes around the wrong breed means two days of popping antihistamines, wheezy breathing and dull sinus headaches.

I don't know many, if any, Cubans, though I romantically choose to believe Lola must represent the culture well. Small, but feisty, with a determination and stubbornness inordinately disproportionate to her size, Lola manages a charming disobedient gruffness that melts most people who meet her. The fact she doesn't mind being handled like an old rag doll doesn't hurt. Perhaps "doesn't mind" isn't the correct assessment. When you're slightly larger than a guinea pig, and much better smelling, you really don't have much choice in the matter. People pick you up.

Being of a diminutive breed, and even runt-size for a Havanese, Lola's stomach can be a temperamental thing, like a supreme court nominee during a hearing except with a strong possibility of puking. (Well, actually, then exactly like a supreme court nominee during a hearing.) It took some trial and error to find just the right brand and size of kibble so we wouldn't revisit breakfast and dinner each day. We also avoid giving her table scraps as a general rule. Cheese is an exception, since she can stomach it, it's a great way to get her to take pills when necessary, and it keeps her distracted for at least five minutes when melted into her kong. She has also discovered an intense fascination with turkey due largely to the one Thanksgiving when, unbeknownst to us, turkey grease overflowed the cutting board and dripped from the counter. Lola happily lapped it off the floor while a steady stream struck her squarely on the head, ruining her coat. She looked like a rescue animal from the Exxon Valdese oil spill for several weeks.

Recently, to celebrate her fifth birthday and our daughter's twenty-first birthday, we bought her a frozen treat called Frosty Paws. To be clear, the dog got the Frosty Paws, not our daughter. We had to choose from two flavors -- original and peanut butter. I suggested peanut butter might be best, only because I wasn't exactly sure what the "original" flavor of a knock-off ice cream dog treat might be. Dog anus? Dead squirrel? Regurgitated breakfast kibble? The prospects seemed endless and potentially horrifying to consider once I started thinking about all the things I've witnessed dogs sniffing, licking or eating during my fifty years on this planet.

After devouring an entire cup of peanut butter Frosty Paws, it quickly became apparent a few spoonfuls might have made for a sufficient treat. Lola's eyes glazed over, she became lethargic and took on the countenance of a college freshman who has imbibed too much beer on his first outing. She limply passed the next hour or two being shuffled like a potentially explosively vomitous hot potato from one family member to another until eventually recovering to something slightly closer to her normal self than a bloated narcoleptic with crusty peanut butter face. Upon waking the following morning, the spring was back in Lola's step and we, though possibly not she, decided Frosty Paws might be the hard stuff our tender little puppy was not built to tolerate.



2018 Mark Feggeler

The Ginger & the Blueberries

Not long ago, perhaps five years, I picked up a small blueberry seedling while doing the weekly grocery shopping. This is not an uncommon thing for me to do. Some people's impulse buys are candy bars, shiny trinkets, or a pair of shoes. Mine are plants, and the cheaper and more impractical the better. A packet of watermelon seeds for only sixty-seven cents? Perfect. I'll take one of those and one of the carrot seeds, too. Do they grow in the kind of sandy soil surrounding my house? Who cares, but it might be fun if they do.

Another good example of this impulse can be found in the gangly remains of wildflowers outside my office window that appear to be nothing more than overgrown, un-plucked weeds. The bag of wildflower seeds found its way into the earth around the same time as the blueberry bush and, due largely to the scorching mid-day sunshine of North Carolina, amounted to nothing more than a smattering of reedy green stalks with yellow blooms. They're nothing to look at, but they make me smile every time I peel my eyes away from the computer screen to gaze outside.

Recently -- after considerable time, effort and expense invested in revamping both the front and side flower beds -- we experienced rousing success with five or six hostas in the front bed. They were purchased from a proper landscaping company and planted in a semi-circle around our best crepe myrtle. The hostas flourished, quickly doubling and then doubling again in size, inspiring us to buy seven more to complete a border across the front of the bed. One week later, our leafy hostas were reduced to lifeless stalks by local rabbits and deer. I've learned two things since then. Miracle-Gro doesn't really work miracles and Repel All gives your plants that extra bit of seasoning critters love.

The blueberry bush has benefited from having been planted out of reach from the larger garden invaders in our fenced-in backyard, in the only spot that isn't laid bare to the unrelenting sunlight of summer. And, since spring in North Carolina has transformed over the last twenty years into a rainy season of tropical proportions, the bush receives plenty of nourishment from good old Mother Nature during that important time when buds appear, develop into delicate bell-shaped blooms, and eventually turn into berries, disappointing the bees and littering the ground with white confetti. That's when you can start counting the harvest you might reap if birds and bugs are kept at bay.

Ever since the plant went in the ground, our ginger-haired son (aka, the German) has obsessively anticipated its annual production. Why? I don't know, because he doesn't eat blueberries, or any color berries for that matter. The only way he might voluntarily choose to eat a blueberry is if you dehydrated it, ground it into a powder and reconstituted it as a chip packed in a canister with other identical chips. Blueberry Pringles. Bringles. Even then, loaded with additives, preservatives and blue dye number eighty-seven, it might still be too healthy for his tastes. Regardless, he watches as the berries develop each year and reports back on their progress.

"There are going to be a lot of berries this year," he'll say in his trademark monotone way. "They're going to be really big, too."

That first year, our little blueberry seedling yielded three edible berries. The next year, maybe twenty. Production has since expanded exponentially. This summer, we can expect to pluck close to one thousand blueberries by the time the harvest is complete, and that doesn't include several hundred from a second blueberry bush we planted this spring. I'm almost tempted to see if any other parts of the backyard are fertile ground for these little fruits.

Our pending blueberry bonanza aside, and even though the side flower bed is doing well, our thumbs remain only middlingly green-ish. Basil, oregano, rosemary and thyme thrive in the same section of yard as the berries, while our tomato-less tomato stalks defy the basic impulses of self-propagation by refusing to yield anything close to fruit. I doubt this concerns the German, though, since tomatoes are just giant red blueberries that he wouldn't eat anyway.


© 2018 Mark Feggeler

Shutting the Shuttle Down

Twenty years. That's how long My Lovely Wife and I have run the shuttle. This September will mark twenty years of transporting the transportationally-disadvantaged to any number of locations within a 20-mile radius of our home for any number of reasons.

• Doctor appointments
• Daycare
• Day camps
• Pre-school
• Gymnastics
• Dance classes
• Elementary school
• Sunday school
• Girl Scouts
• Boy Scouts
• Birthday parties
• Middle school
• Dance recitals
• Sleepovers
• Summer camps
• Church youth groups
• Band camps
• High School
• Band competitions
• Concerts
• Robotics competitions
• Track meets
• College tours

Logging sufficient hours each month to earn a chauffeur's license isn't the half of it. Child safety seats required for small children come equipped with a complexity of straps and harnesses worthy of the greatest puzzle masters. When strapping your first born into a car seat outside the hospital, they ought to warn you to prepare yourself for a buckling system so ridiculously intricate it should come equipped with a flight attendant to guide you through the procedure every time you leave the house.

"Take the right shoulder strap, feed it through the plastic chest thingy and down between your child's legs. Take the left shoulder strap, feed it through the other side of the plastic chest thingy until you realize you have the chest thingy backwards. Undo the right shoulder strap, reverse the chest thingy, feed the right shoulder strap back through the chest thingy, then the left shoulder strap, and place the two metal tabs at the ends of the straps together. They should fit like puzzle pieces, but they won't snap together because that would be cheating. Holding the two metal tabs together with one hand and picking up your child's fallen binky with the other, press the conjoined tabs into a narrow, invisible groove that lies directly beneath your child's heavily diapered buttocks. Spend the next three minutes struggling to fit the conjoined tabs into the invisible slot while cursing. Once you find the narrow slot and have inserted the metal tabs, press with a force much greater than you believe is safe for your child. If your child is not crying when you have finished, then he or she is probably not securely buckled. Return to step one and repeat the entire process."

It isn't just infants who need car seats. As your children grow, car seats morph like Transformers from back-facing infant seats, to forward facing infant seats, to half-infant/half-toddler seats, to small toddler booster seats, to large toddler booster seats, to the my-child-is-way-too-freaking-big-to-need-a-booster-seat booster seats. If there weren't a cut-off for age, most people I know would be riding with booster seats because the cut-off for height is six-foot-three.

If you're silly enough to have more than two children -- in fairness to us, effective family planning is impossible when they choose to arrive in pairs -- you'll need a vehicle of size, if not two. When our first child arrived, half our fleet was instantly hobbled because the Mazda Miata was not designed to serve as a baby-transporting device. The Miata, itself, is barely bigger than a pram, with almost enough leg room for a tall dwarf and head clearance adequate for a medium-height badger. With the invention of twins, it didn't take long for us to embrace the minivan, and later the minivan with automatic doors. Scoff if you must at the unsexy middle-aging of my family unit, but few things liberate the middle-class American more than pressing a button to eject children into the school drop off line. It's like all the convenience of tossing them out the window, only with a brief stop and the assurance of a soft landing.

Don't think older children are any easier to shuttle. Sure, you can celebrate ditching the diaper bag, bottles and spare onesies, but they are quickly replaced by school bags, instruments, dance bags, and after school club supplies. If children aged without taking on extracurricular activities, which I believe is a perfectly reasonable expectation, then life might get easier, but they don't. Before you know it, you're running each of them in a different direction for a variety of reasons that all begin at the exact same time at locations miles apart, and finish in 30 minute intervals conveniently spread over the dinner hours. Artistic programs such as band and dance are the best, by which I mean the most obnoxious, because there's something about artistic people that instills in them the belief that their programs represent the most important commitments your child will ever make. Every rehearsal and performance is mandatory. Absence or tardiness -- regardless of how many of your relatives just tragically died from powdered sugar inhalation at the donut factory explosion -- results in the stripping of privileges or public shaming. As if you weren't already stressed about managing a multi-stop municipal bus route, now your child is fussing at you to drive faster so she won't have to do push-ups in front of the rest of the kids in marching band.

With one child halfway through college (how the fu-hell did I get that old?) and the twins mere months away from being granted their driver's licenses, it might be possible that M&D Taxi is coming to the end of its days. I say "might be" because we so far have been colossally wrong about each coming stage being easier than the present one. I can not, however, in my wildest imaginings foresee the need for continued shuttle service, at least not on a daily basis, even with the twins sharing a vehicle.

Should the end of the shuttle era truly be at hand, the ramifications will ripple through our personal and professional lives with immeasurable results. My Lovely Wife and I will be able to spend the kind of time together we haven't enjoyed since September 1997. If we're smart, we won't leave the house for a month.



© 2017 Mark Feggeler

An Extra Plate

The work day is done and dinner is heating on the stove top when I reach inside the cabinet for plates. Five square ceramic plates clatter on the granite countertop and I head for the silverware drawer. 

Five forks, five knives and five spoons, counted out and placed on the stack of plates in a jumble of clinks and clunks. Five paper napkins follow, each to be folded in half and set on the dining room table to the left of each plate and under each fork. 

I realize something is wrong while folding the first napkin. I don't need it. Four will be enough. Four napkins, four forks, knives and spoons. Four plates. Only four. There is an extra plate.

For the last month, there were five mouths to feed. Five is too many to seat at the small table in the breakfast nook, which is why the dining room table is still set for service. Table pads and black tablecloth ready for five plates and accompanying silverware, along with bowls and trays and serving utensils, glasses and drinks and a game of cards afterward. 

Four fit in the breakfast nook. It's cozier for four and easier than carrying things out to the dining room. Four is an easier number, in general. Easier for setting the table, easier for meal planning, easier for clean up. Four is simpler. Four is quieter and quicker. 

Four still means conversation and games, laughter and delicious meals. Four can be tremendously infuriating or joyously enlightening. There is absolutely nothing wrong with four, with the single exception that it isn't five.

The days of five are numbered. Holiday breaks and summers off from college are now on the endangered species list. At least we have four, for now. 

Strike Up the (Marching) Band

High school football starts today, which means it's time to get excited about watching kids I don't know play a game about which I don't care so I can enjoy the marching band for fifteen minutes during half-time.

Our Daughter marched in the band during her four high school years. We marched along right behind her, loading trucks, chaperoning special trips, hauling pit equipment onto the field, and volunteering at band competitions across central North Carolina every fall. There's nothing like six consecutive Saturdays eating band competition concession pizza, combined with six Fridays eating football game concession cheeseburgers, to help ensure you won't need a belt to hold up your pants by the end of the season. If the concession food isn't bad enough, then there's all the tailgating.

People don't bring health food to tailgating. You bring five boxes of Little Caesar's pizza and a basket of home-baked pretzels, or buffalo chicken dip and chips, or deep-fried jalapeno poppers. You bring the Colonel's chicken, or Mexican black been taco salad, or bowls of pulled pork barbecue and cornbread. You bring sliders, or pigs in blankets, or cookies and cakes. The family that brings vegan hummus-stuffed lettuce coils in a balsamic chanterelle reduction does not get invited to the next tailgate party because you don't need all that fiber and roughage coursing through your colon when you're facing four-hours of bleacher squatting on a hot night.

Weight gain aside, marching band season is a manic, sleep-deprived time filled with dramatic highs and emotional lows. Instruments will break, uniforms will tear, notes and steps will be missed, and the weather will gradually change from hot and humid to freezing damn cold. Concurrently, awards will be won, routines will be flawlessly executed, camaraderie will blossom, and important life lessons will be learned. The kids somehow manage to keep up with school work while dedicating weeknights and weekends to performing and practicing. The adults somehow manage to make it all happen football game after football game, band competition after band competition, without killing one another or their kids.

Tonight's season opening home football game marks our return to the marching band scene as our sons, both rising freshmen, take up their instruments. The German plays the sax, the Italian the trumpet. By all accounts, the German is loving it and will probably stick with it all four years. The Italian is enjoying himself, but has his eyes fixed on other interests, so this season might be his only marching band experience. Regardless, the two of them have spent the past few weeks immersing themselves in a demanding group activity and developing friendships with kids from all grades.

As the usual suspects gather at the high school auditorium this evening, we will follow the double-line of uniformed marchers to the stadium to take our seats and wait, as we do every year, for the football teams to get off the marching band field.



2016 Mark Feggeler

Dropping Like Flies

The older you get, the less reason there is to pussy-foot around the topic of mortality. I'm not purposely trying to be morbid. I realize that "almost 50" doesn't directly equate to "one foot in the grave."

We're all as young as we feel, in which case my relative age changes more rapidly than Donald Trump's estimated net worth. In the span of any given day I can go from feeling like an awe-inspired toddler to a tottering old fool depending on how the day plays out. My general take on mortality is to ignore it, live each day as it comes, and try to go to bed content in the knowledge I haven't wronged anyone and, with any luck, have made the world a slightly better place in which to be.

Then the alumni newsletter arrives in the mail.

Brimming with pictures of people I don't know doing things in a place from which I am now 26 years removed, the alumni newsletter is a mildly entertaining distraction. It's nice to see my alma matter keeping up with the times and bettering the lives of its students. I particularly enjoy issues of the newsletter that don't dedicate 75% of their space to college sports. I couldn't possibly give less of a fornication which team won what trophy, or what player was named All-American. Didn't care when I went there. Really, really, really don't care now. I'd much rather read how the university is preparing kids for the future, not how many of its alumni will suffer early-onset joint trouble and concussion-related memory issues.

Like many alumni, the first section of the newsletter I flip to is the one in which alumni provide updates on their wherabouts and doings. And why not? It's the most directly relatable part of the newsletter. There might be a name I recall, or a photo that jogs a pleasant reminiscence.

    "Look, there's so-and-so! He's vice president of a bank!"

    "And there's what's-her-name! She supervising physician at a teaching hospital in Oxnard!"

Stuff like that. Every now and then, I might even see my own name in there and hope someone, somewhere, sees it and says something like: "There's that guy! I remember that guy! Says here he just self-published his third book. Poor bastard still doesn't have an agent..."

Unfortunately, adjacent to that section of the newsletter is a page titled "In Memorium." The college obituary column; the list of names that, until recently, was largely free of people my age. The section that once was occupied mostly by deceased alumni from the 1970s and earlier decades. The section of the newsletter that really didn't apply, or if it did, marked a singularity; a unique tragedy; a cancer or car accident that caused an anomaly in the life-expectancy statistics. Not so any longer.

I counted ten names in the issue that arrived this week. Ten names of people my age or slightly younger who apparently dropped like flies at a Raid-huffing party without even warranting special comment as to how, or how tragically young they were when it happened. So many of them together in one list probably makes it difficult to find space enough to put much more than their names and year of graduation. Besides, alumni from the 1950s and 1960s were hogging all the column inches.

Rather than worrying about silly things like aging and dying, however, spotting so many of my former classmates In Memorium has made me wonder what I'm leaving behind. What have I accomplished to be proud of? What legacies -- apart from encouraging the daily consumption of chocolate and teaching my children it's okay to laugh at highly inappropriate times -- am I responsible for that will make the world a better place once I'm gone?

I've written a few books and a few hundred blog entries. I've tried my best to be helpful to people throughout the course of my life. I've tried to be as responsible a person as my degree of attention deficit disorder permits. My Lovely Wife and I have saved money, worked hard and tried to provide an example for our children to follow as they move into adulthood. Perhaps, in the end, that has to be enough.

I won't last forever and nothing I create will, either. But, with a little luck, the children we brought into this world will brighten a few corners of it. I'm good with that.

Long Journey Home

The privilege to travel to different cities is one I frequently take for granted and often resent. I am a homebody at heart. The call of the open road doesn't resound in my soul the way it does for others.

That doesn't mean the experience is completely wasted on me. This recent trip to Phoenix is a good example. Did I want to travel all day to Phoenix on a Saturday without My Lovely Wife and children? Of course not. Did I want to sit though several days of meetings? Certainly not. However, it needed to be done and, under such circumstances, one can choose to be miserable or one can make the most of the situation. 

Outside the lovely hotel our company booked for us stood a small hill with a reasonably steep climb to the top, from where the intrepid could take in the breadth of the city skyline and the desert mountains beyond. Returning to the bottom following a hasty, gravity-fueled descent, we allowed the momentum to carry us to the open air market of the Aloha Festival a block away. The connection between Arizona and Hawaii was lost on me, but the sun had only just begun beating through the mild morning air and it felt refreshing to wander aimlessly a bit longer amongst smiling, sunburned faces as someone not quite far enough away sang of the many glories of spam. 

After a shower and change it was time to visit the local spring training baseball stadium of the Los Angeles Angels, a team whose name I struggle with because I understand it directly translates to "The The Angels Angels." If one could pre-order a day suitable to an afternoon baseball game, it would be the kind we experienced on Sunday. The sun was hot, a mild breeze provided occasional relief, and the sunscreened crowd was a sea of red caps and jerseys that cheered in unison at every quickly turned play and home run. We exited the stadium with a couple innings remaining to avoid the long lines for the trolley ride back to downtown Tempe that would surely form once the game ended. After another quick shower and change we gathered for the official start of our corporate function, a poolside reception with good company and lively conversation. 

There were other entertaining activities in and around the scheduled meetings of the subsequent days, such as when a small gang of us invaded a nearby dueling piano bar and lost our voices shouting along to one of the best shows for which I've never paid, or watching my coworkers ride a mechanical bull after an evening of cornhole and ladder ball. I managed to avoid the peer pressure being applied to those choosing not to ride the bull by adamantly adhering to the philosophy that I will not participate in any activity requiring my signature on a waiver, particularly when the waiver is handed across by the same guy serving fireball shots. 

All these are pleasant experiences I will long remember and about which I will reminisce with coworkers at future meetings, which is their purpose -- to provide a few common, unifying experiences for people who otherwise are distanced from each other by hundreds of miles or the deafening silence of cubicle walls. Beneath each experience for me, however, is an undercurrent of regret over not sharing them with those who matter most. The kids would have loved the ballgame and the festival. The wife would have loved the hike, the hotel, and the chance to tour a strange new city. 

I've heard it said your loved ones travel with you if you carry them in your heart, but it really isn't the same. From my vantage point, I didn't leave home for an experience without my family. Instead, each experience I've had since leaving was one more task completed before being allowed to take the long journey home to the place and people who hold my heart. 

2016 Mark Feggeler

The New Normal

There’s no point counting down anymore. The time has come to let go the apron strings, loosen the heart strings, and watch Our Daughter and her best buddie roommate recede in the rearview mirror as we drive away from her college dorm.

Not long ago, or so it seems, she cried at the thought of leaving home for college. She practically made us promise never to send her away.

Sure, she was a kindergartener at the time, but what has that got to do with anything? Just because she has managed to maturely accept the concept of living on her own and is eagerly looking forward to the sundry, looming freedoms awaiting her doesn’t mean I can’t hyperventilate every now and then.

Or openly weep.

In public.

While picking out strawberries at Walmart.

Somewhere along the way, and without any regard for my wishes, she changed from a happy, if slightly insecure, little girl to a confident young woman. Play dates have been replaced by plans to meet up with friends. Preschool in Pinehurst has given way to Pre-Dental studies at UNCG. I don’t recall ever giving permission for any of this to happen.

This is the same kid who once blew out a diaper so badly we spent thirty minutes washing poop out of her hair. She’s the same girl who ate so many fish crackers she ended up projectile vomiting all over her mother and the surrounding fifteen square feet of shag carpet. This is the girl who spent the better part of nine years learning how to ride a bicycle. She’s the one who got on the bus for the band trip to Disney without remembering to pack her instrument, and we’re going to trust her to manage her time wisely and, at some point in the not-too-distant future, drill holes in people’s teeth?

And, yet, it is happening, regardless of all my concerns, fears, trepidations and unwillingness to see her as anything but that cute little bundle with the puffy cheeks and tremendous brown eyes we brought home from the hospital nearly eighteen years ago.

Her bedroom has been raked over in search of treasures to either bring with her or pack away, and to make way for her twin brothers to finally have their own rooms. There’s a large pile of stuff in the basement – linens and clothing, textbooks and small appliances – waiting to be packed in the van tomorrow night in preparation for the journey to their new home in Greensboro. And there’s the girl herself, in limbo, struggling with short-timer’s disease, eager to gleefully leap into her studies with familiar wide-eyed enthusiasm, waiting for the next exciting phase of her life to begin.

In a few months, possibly even just a few weeks, it will all become the new normal. We will eventually stop calling it her bedroom. We will adjust to dinners at the smaller table in the kitchen nook instead of the big table in the dining room. The dog will stop searching the house for her and we will accept the fact she is capable of moving on without us into the life for which, if we have been even a faint semblance of the perfect parents we like to think we are, we have prepared her. She will be fine, and so will we.

However, you might want to avoid the strawberries at Walmart for a little while. They might be a bit salty.

2015 Mark Feggeler

In the Spirit!

It’s Spirit Week at the middle school and our boys have been participating whole-heartedly, which is just one of the many differences between my children’s educational experiences and mine. I never learned to embrace school, or extracurricular activities, or sports, or band, or homework, or clubs, or girls.

Apart from a few good friends, my K-12 education consisted of navigating from one class to another, one year to another, while calling as little attention to myself as possible. Just a few steps shy of pathologically uptight, I avoided anything I saw as a potential threat or danger, which meant the last time I used a school bathroom was that day in fifth grade when a sixth grader popped open the door to my stall and stood there laughing. Why was it funny? I have no idea, but I never stepped foot in another school bathroom again. Perhaps the only thing of real lasting value I learned from school was how to hold it until I got home.

Needless to say, I didn’t go to many (okay, any) parties, I didn’t join any clubs, and I didn’t participate in Spirit Week, if we even had them back then. Dressing in school colors might be too conspicuous. What if the green I wore wasn’t the correct shade of green? And Pajama Day? Not likely. I was one of those kids who inhaled half a can of Aqua Net to make sure each and every hair conformed to the code of the mushroom helmet. I might not have had any style, but my lack of style – from my dad jeans, to my tucked-in shirt, to my old man sneakers – was immaculately represented every day. There was no way I was going to spoil it by wearing plaid pajamas to school.

The great thing about time passing is how effectively it can mellow you. Somewhere between 18 and 25, I began to allow many of my more diagnosable inhibitions to fall away. The result was wonderfully freeing. If one of my coworkers were to announce tomorrow is dress like a baby day, I’d be the first to run out and buy adult diapers and a giant baby rattle. Pajama Day? Please. These days you’d be lucky if I didn’t overdo it and wear women’s lingerie.

And in the interests of overdoing it, there are several new Spirit Week themes I would like to recommend that I believe would prove beneficial to the young people of today. After all, kids can wear school colors any old day, and pajamas would be a step up from most of the clothes kids choose to wear. My Spirit Week themes would forego such silliness in an effort to teach adolescents practical life lessons, such as the benefits of cleanliness and proper hygiene.

• Monday: Dress Like You Brushed Your Teeth Without Being Reminded Day
• Tuesday: Take Your Gritty Shoes Off Before Entering the House Day
• Wednesday: Wash Your Hair Properly (Like, With Shampoo) Day
• Thursday: Deodorant Is Your Friend Day
• Friday: Your Bedroom Really Shouldn’t Smell That Way Day

Or how about the hazards of chemical dependency?

• Monday: Dress Like Snoop Dog and/or Rush Limbaugh Day
• Tuesday: Bring Your Parents’ Secret Stash to School Day
• Wednesday: Dress Like Your Favorite Incarcerated Former Politician Day
• Thursday: Dress Like Your Favorite Overdosed Celebrity Day
• Friday: Dress Like the Kid Who Sells Weed In the School Bathroom But Hasn’t Been Busted Yet Day

Or even general responsibility?

• Monday: Dress Like You Own a Mirror Day
• Tuesday: Don’t Back Out of the Driveway at 50 MPH Day
• Wednesday: Dress Like You Own More Than Just Your Favorite Shirt Day
• Thursday: If Your Homework Says “Show Your Work” Then Show Your Work Day
• Friday: Dress Like You’re Not an Under-Aged Stripper Day

The possibilities are endless, and certainly more educational and entertaining than silly old Pajama Day.




Copyright 2015 Mark Feggeler

Little Puppy Is Lonely

Little Puppy has been lonely lately. So has his friend, Hoot, and his cousins, Giraffy and Brownie.

Not too long ago, this gang of plush playthings were as essential to a good night's sleep as the bed itself, or pajamas. The world simply was not spinning in proper rotation unless the Italian had Little Puppy and Hoot tucked up under the covers with him, and likewise for the German with Giraffy and Brownie.

When you're a parent of three young children, the fact each child has his or her essential nighttime toys can be both endearing and infuriating. A forgotten or lost toy can be the difference between harmony and hell when you're ready to call it a day. Like the time we were cruising and couldn't find Squirrelly. Squirrelly wasn't even a first string player; he was back up. Squirrelly was one of those substitute toys you brought on trips because, should something untoward happen to Squirrelly, life would go on. He eventually was found under a mattress, but bedtime suffered a delay and his temporary misplacement caused some small measure of emotional duress for the German.

In Our Daughter's time, there were dolls Shu-Shu and Miranda, in addition to dogs Dottie and Bernie. It became second nature to grab one or all them on the way out the door the way you grab your wallet and keys. She has long since outgrown them.

When she was just four or five years old, Our Daughter heard about college. The concept of leaving home to live and study in a strange city panicked her to tears. I assured her she wouldn't be going anywhere for a very long time. That very long time has now come and gone like the flickering of a candle.

The same will hold true for the twins. Before we know it, thirteen will have turned to eighteen and it'll be their time to tour college campuses and complete scholarship applications. Just around the corner are the dissolution of bedtime rituals and the packing away of the silly toys of early childhood. Our recent housecleaning over the holidays offered proof these days are coming. The ease with which they let go of things that were, only last year, must-keep essentials was equal parts freeing and frightening.

So, what will become of Little Puppy?

For now, he sits atop the dresser overlooking the bed he once occupied. He might end up in a bin under the bed, or a drawer in the closet. Rest assured, there will be an intervention before his well-being is ever in jeopardy. Maybe Little Puppy will end up on the shelf in my office. Whenever I look up to give my bleary eyes a break from staring at the computer screen, I'll see Little Puppy and be reminded of the words from the Paul McCartney song "Little Willow."

"Bend little willow,
Wind's gonna blow you
Hard and cold tonight.
Life as it happens,
Nobody warns you.
Willow, hold on tight."

It's a song I sang hundreds of times to the children when they were babies and toddlers. I wonder, sometimes, if I was singing it to them or to myself.


© 2015 Mark Feggeler

Merry Eating Day!

The holidays are here, which means it's time to bloat the twenty extra pounds I normally carry around with me to a seasonally appropriate thirty. It also means massive quantities of food must be prepared in order to provide at least five pounds per plateload, regardless of whether we're talking about a salad plate, a dinner plate, or a dessert plate.

Yesterday (Christmas Eve-Eve) was primary cooking day for our Christmas day celebrations. In two days, we will feed a total of eight people -- the five who live under our roof, plus my parents and Brother Tom. Naturally, then, we browned three pounds of sausage, rolled eight pounds of beef and pork into meatballs and browned them, then tossed all of that browned meaty goodness into a vat of homemade sauce.

Next came cookies. Simplicity was the motto of the day, so we kept it to one kind of cookie -- the ubiquitous peanut butter Kiss cookie -- that could be easily thrown together and baked without distracting too much from the browning of the meatballs and sausage. Fresh from their morning meat-rolling calisthenics, the kids helped roll out four trays of peanut buttery deliciousness, in addition to shucking several dozen Hershey's Kisses.

After a brief break to clean a pan, or seven, it was time to experiment with something new -- cinnamon pumpkin roll with chocolate mascarpone ganache.

I've baked many things, but never a finished cake that had to be rolled. It seemed like an awful lot of work to go through just to create a delivery method for getting pumpkin cake and chocolate ganache to my mouth, but I was game. Besides, Giada de Laurentis and the Food Network wouldn't steer me wrong.

To Giada's credit, both the cake and the ganache are amazingly delectable, however rolling the pumpkin spice cake might not have been my finest culinary hour. I passed the first test, flipping the pan and dropping the cake onto a towel dusted with powdered sugar. Trouble is, my definition of dusting is slightly more aggressive than Giada's. The cake landed with a satisfying plop and shot powdered sugar up and out like a Christmas-tinged mushroom cloud full of elf fairies and pumpkiny aromas. The next bit, actually rolling the cake without breaking, mangling, tearing, shearing, or otherwise causing traumatic damage to said cake, was less messy but much more sketchy. In the end, I manhandled it into something that roughly resembles a rolled cake.

Today continued with more baking. After all, you can't serve seventeen pounds of meat and sauce without homemade Italian bread, and where one loaf might suffice, two certainly will provide that measure of overkill necessary for a proper holiday feast.

Oh, did I mention the cannoli? Yeah, I bought twenty pre-made cannoli shells (half of them covered in chocolate, because they were there) and prepped two pounds of filling so we can stuff them on Christmas day short before we sit down to eat our six-and-a-half pounds of meat, sauce, pasta and bread each. That way, the cannoli can set up in the fridge without getting the shells all soggy. You have to plan ahead for these things, you know.

The end result is that, by the time we tuck the kids into bed tomorrow night, I should have gained almost the entire extra ten pounds. I'll leave a tiny bit of space for that last cookie before bed.



© 2014 Mark Feggeler

Progeny Perfected

You might think your children are special, but mine really are.

I know all parents believe their kids are beautiful, handsome, smart, talented, witty, mature and precocious. Problem is, only one pair of parents can believe that and actually be correct. My intent here isn't to tramp muddy footprints all over your dreams of being the perfect parent. You've tried exceptionally hard to raise perfect children and your kids genuinely appreciate your efforts. I'm here to point out the simple fact that our kids make yours look like they came from the reject bin at Big Lots. No offense.

Take the Italian, for example. The Italian has read more books this year than I have in my entire life, which really isn’t much of a comparison, because my reading skills loosely match those of an underdeveloped Gibbon monkey.

He's also a blossoming computer whiz. The Italian's idea of light entertainment is to prepare point-by-point comparisons of this year’s Apple Worldwide Developers Conference to last year’s Apple Worldwide Developers Conference. He’s thirteen. When I was thirteen, I was more concerned with which episode of Gilligan’s Island would be on after school than I was in getting the inside scoop on the latest advancements in world technology. When I was thirteen my brothers and I were content with playing Dig Dug off five-inch floppy discs on our Commodore 64. The Italian has been breaking out the laptop each morning to teach himself HTML coding over breakfast. And, well, why wouldn't he?

Then there’s the German. The German is sweet natured to a fault, he's an ace hockey goalie, and he plays saxophone as soulfully as a sixty-year-old in a smoke-filled night club. And he enjoys practicing. When I was his age, I recorded myself playing the trumpet for ten minutes and hit play twice to fill out the rest of the half hour I was supposed to be practicing.

The German also is our Lego master. I’m not talking about the 30-piece police car Lego set we got for Christmas forty years ago that I'm still trying to figure out how to put together. I’m talking about 2,000-piece movie prop replicas that are half assembled before the wrapping hits the floor. I’m talking about sitting at a laptop to program code for a WiFi Lego robot that recognizes different colors, utilizes touch sensors, and performs complex tasks.

Between the two of them, the twins have the necessary knowledge and access to technology to hack our online banking and transfer our assets to offshore accounts, all while holding us captive in our own basement with a robotic Lego army.

The ring leader of our perfected progeny is Our Daughter. If I even attempted to maintain half the busy schedule Our Daughter keeps on a daily basis, I would have been dead three-and-a-half years ago. I can count on one hand the number of clubs I joined during my K-12 years, yet this girl's resume reads like an alphabetical listing of every possible extra-curricular activity available.

She's also taken more AP classes than I have clean pairs of underwear. I'm lucky I know how spell AP. She wants to graduate with honors, get a bachelor's degree in biology, a master's degree in dentistry, and ultimately become an orthodontist. At her age, my only goal was to pass the next test and avoid anyone at school who might be interested in giving me a wedgie. Our Daughter has the next ten years of her life planned out whereas my long-term goals include gassing up the car and making sure I leave enough time after getting out of bed each morning to reach the toilet before I wet myself.

I'm certain many of you reading this are making all kinds of mental notes in preparation of a rebuttal of my assertion that my children are better than yours. You're wasting your time listing out your childrens' grade point averages, academic accomplishments, personal triumphs, and tallying the number of times they've been Snapchatted or re-Tweeted. Please, if it makes you feel better, go ahead and launch a well-prepared defense of your children. So long as you're prepared to eventually acknowledge the unquestionable superiority of my kids, we won't have any trouble.



© 2014 Mark Feggeler

Spreadable Nightmare

I've made many sandwiches in my lifetime.

I can spread peanut butter, jelly, mayonnaise, mustard, ketchup, horseradish and many other primary sandwich ingredients and condiments like nobody's business. I've plated up everything from basic, slapped-together sandwiches, to tremendous Dagwood specials that could choke a horse (but that did not choke me).

What I'm trying to say is, I'm no novice at this task, and neither is My Lovely Wife. We have three kids. We've been making sandwiches for seventeen-plus years without any difficulties. Until recently.

Some months ago, our children discovered the joys of Nutella. If you've never experienced Nutella, please stop reading. Not only can't we be friends, I really don't want to have anything to do with you. Stop reading this post immediately, go to the store, buy some Nutella, and eat an entire jar by the spoonful. Return here only after you've digested the delicious chocolaty hazelnut glory of Nutella and accepted that your parents didn't really love you, because if they had they would have introduced you to Nutella years ago.

As scrumptious as Nutella is, however, if you've ever tried to make a Nutella sandwich, you very likely know that it puts up a serious fight.

The first sign of trouble is when you plunge the knife into the jar and it stops dead in its tracks. If NASA were to measure the force required to drag a butter knife through a jar of Nutella, it probably wouldn't register on any existing equipment. Nutella should come with an elbow brace and a sling, because you're going to need them by the time you extricate knife from jar.

The second sign of trouble is the massive damage caused to the bread when attempting to spread the Nutella. Not only didn't this stuff want to leave the jar, now it clings to the butter knife with a death grip, shredding the slice of white bread like a savage animal in the process. You've got two options at this point:

1. Hold the bread down with your fingers and spread around them. You might not end up covered in Nutella to your third knuckle, but don't count on it. You'll probably need a shower.
2. Press down hard enough with the knife to ensure spread vacates knife. You might not completely destroy the integrity of the bread, but don't count on that, either.

I strongly encourage method number one. It's definitely messier, but the chances of success are far greater. Plus, you get to lick your fingers for the next hour.


And if spreading Nutella weren't already an impossible task to achieve, everyone knows the best accompaniment for Nutella on white bread is marshmallow fluff. Unfortunately, the only substance less easily spreadable than Nutella is marshmallow fluff. It's like an overwhelming, sandwich-themed, cosmic joke.

By the time both ingredients are sufficiently applied, the bread sufficiently mangled, and your nerves sufficiently shot, you might have achieved a final product resembling something close to a sandwich. But trust me, one bite is all it takes to prove the final product is worth the struggle.



© 2014 Mark Feggeler

Red Sock, Blue Sock

A tribute to Dr. Seuss, or a glimpse of a day in the life of a busy family? You decide. All I know is we had two mismatched socks and my daughter was cranky (really!), so I wrote a poem. I'm warning you now that this isn't a very good poem, but then I never have liked poetry. You can blame Walt Whitman's "Song of Myself" for that. Anyway, here it is:

Red sock, blue sock, one, two, three.

What's up with the day’s laundry?

There’s one sock here where two should be.

Red sock, blue sock, one, two, three.

Sleepy, sleepy, one, two, three.

My daughter’s cranky as can be.

She threw a banana muffin at me.

Sleepy, sleepy, one, two, three.

Inside, outside, one, two, three.

The dog won’t make a poop or pee.

I walked her 'round the block with me.

Inside, outside, one, two, three.

Nagging, nitpick, one, two, three.

The twins are passive aggressively

Sniping at each other incessantly.

Nagging, nitpick, one, two, three.

Red sock, blue sock, one, two, three.

Really  laundry – seriously?

The machine is eating my BVDs!

Red sock, blue sock, one, two, three.

Turn the clock back, one, two, three.

Our daughter looks like a young lady.

She’ll always be a little girl to me.

Turn the clock back, one, two, three.

Check my heart rate, one, two, three.

The dog just scared the heck out of me

By barking at something I cannot see.

Check my heart rate, one, two, three.

Open the window, one, two, three.

The twins’ room smells adolescently,

And now they’re starting to play hockey.

Open the window, one, two, three.

Growing older, one, two, three.

Spend a few moments leisurely

To enjoy the kids before they flee.

Growing older, one, two, three.

© 2014 Mark Feggeler

The Mother of Exiles

There’s a reason the Statue of Liberty is not an armed warrior standing guard over the shores of New York and New Jersey. There’s a reason she is called Lady Liberty instead of Defender of the Homeland, and a reason she raises high a lamp to guide people safely to our shores.

The chains at her feet represent freedom from oppression, tyranny, and lack of opportunity, or maybe just the chance to leave the past behind and begin a new life in a place with no memory. Her presence at what once was the gateway to America has served as a symbolic gesture of welcome and acceptance to millions of people, even those who didn’t enter the United States through Ellis Island.

But she is, after all, only a statue. A metal frame covered in copper. She gives nothing tangible to anyone and doesn’t truly represent the mood or policies of our country on any given day. We often hear the excerpted quote from The New Colossus, the sonnet so closely associated with the Statue of Liberty because it is there on Liberty Island for visitors to see:  “…give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses…” Unfortunately, too few people can finish even just that one line of the famous poem.

As a native New Yorker who willingly left the state a quarter century ago, there is little about New York that gets me choked up anymore. But, if I am truly honest with myself, the Statue of Liberty and the ideal for which she stands still do, which is why I find it difficult to stomach recent media coverage of the bile and bigotry being displayed by some of my fellow citizens at Central American children who have crossed our southern border seeking refuge from harsh conditions.

Think what you will about our immigration laws – the most impactful of which to the situation was put in place before the current administration took office – the sight of privileged adults angrily protesting and attempting to block the arrival of children who themselves are wrapped in bureaucratic red tape is sickening. Lies and rumors about diseases and drug cartels are being spread by local, state and federal elected officials to drive hysteria among ignorant isolationists and racist conspiracy theorists while these children live Spartan lives, drawing pictures and learning basic school lessons, as they await their fates.

And talk about missed opportunities! Rather than shouting horrid insults at twelve-year-olds and throwing up makeshift roadblocks to keep buses from entering your town, why not form a welcoming committee? You want these children, some of whom very likely will become American citizens, to love their new country? You want the ones who end up being deported to still dream of a United States that actually lives by the ideals it spouts to the rest of the world? Then what better way to accomplish that than by doing what most modern religions say is the right thing to do and offer love, hope and support to those among you who are less fortunate?

The Statue of Liberty might be situated far from Arizona, Texas and California, but she is a national symbol.  Do yourself a favor. Read on a bit and take a moment to understand the meaning of all of the words of the sonnet by Emma Lazarus. In a country where only an infinitesimal percentage of our population can claim true native heritage, the words offered up by the Mother of Exiles should inspire us to be better than we have been of late.

Not like the brazen giant of Greek fame,

With conquering limbs astride from land to land;

Here at our sea-washed, sunset gates shall stand

A mighty woman with a torch, whose flame

Is the imprisoned lightening, and her name

Mother of Exiles. From her beacon-hand

Glows world-wide welcome; her mild eyes command

The air-bridged harbor that twin cities frame.

"Keep, ancient lands, your storied pomp!" cries she

With silent lips. “Give me your tired, your poor,

Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,

The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.

Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me,

I lift my lamp beside the golden door!”

Release the Kracken!

So, we have a new dog. Her name is Lola (chosen in honor of The Kinks, not Barry Manilow). She is a replacement dog. You know, one dog dies, so you get another one to replace it. A replacement dog. 

The need for a replacement dog came about last Thanksgiving when our dog of 9 years, a poodle named Lily, passed away from congestive heart failure. Lily was a special member of the family. She was my grilling buddy and my officemate. She welcomed all visitors and kept watch over our house from her favorite perch on the German's bed, from where she could see the neighborhood's comings and goings. She loved us all equally, only some of us more equally than others, which is a matter for continuing debate. 

Our boys were quite young when Lily came into our lives. I suspect for them she was just another part of the furniture. Our Daughter's attachment was more visceral. She never fully understood that Lily belonged to all of us and not just to her. 

Lily's last few days were a roller coaster ride of health problems and emotions. Near the very end, just as we were ready to do the merciful thing and end her suffering, she rebounded. She ate more food than she had eaten in days. Her breathing sounded almost normal and that young puppy light was back in her eyes. But the recovery was short-lived. By the following night, we made her as comfortable as possible and knew she had come to the end. She joined us in the family room, sat at My Lovely Wife's feet for several minutes, then came over to sit next to me. She gave me one last kiss on the head, rested her body against me and was gone. 

We all cried and mourned her loss. We told the kids that we would start searching for a new dog when they were emotionally ready. Less than three days later, the boys announced they had found "the one." 
Due to allergies, our pets need to be hypo-allergenic. Most people think this means a pet that doesn't shed, but it isn't the hair that gets you. Hypo-allergenic pets will never need Head and Shoulders shampoo because their bodies produce no dander. It's the dander hanging onto the shed hairs that waft into your sinuses and send your immune system into a five-alarm panic.

Long story short, we brought Lola, a mostly black Havanese, home with us from a breeder in Garner, NC. Five days might seem like a quick turnaround, and perhaps it is, but the lack of not having a dog in the house for the first time in twenty years hung heavy in the air. 

My greatest concern for Lola was that she would carry the expectation of living up to the high standards Lily set in so many ways. Apart from recurring medical issues, Lily truly was a low maintenance dog. She didn't bark much, she listened well, she enjoyed the company of people, and she was smart. What we are learning now is that exceptional canine companions come in more than one make or model. 

I knew Lola would fit in well the moment she vomited on Our Daughter's boyfriend, Señor Awesome. He is, so far, the only person to have been so christened, with the exception of a stray happy piddle on my Dad's shoe just the other day. Obedience is a bit of an issue. I imagine trying to lead a three-legged cat in heat in a straight line through a fish market might prove easier than taking Lola on even the shortest stroll down the street. Apart from that minor character flaw, Lola is proving smart and sweet and intelligent.

Best of all she likes sleeping in her crate at night, something Lily never would have done. The moment you closed the crate door on Lily she began digging like a crazed Chilean miner to escape. Lola, on the other hand, hangs out in there and sleeps until we open the door and announce "Release the Kracken!" to unleash unbridled puppy energy throughout the house.

And now we are temporarily dogless again as our little Cuban is spending the night at the vet's. Today was the big day for spaying, fixing a small hernia, and pulling baby teeth that refuse to give up the ghost. We are all anxious to have her back, because once you're accustomed to the unquestioning, uncompromising, blindly loyal companionship of a dog, your house simply isn't a home without one.



© 2014 Mark Feggeler

The Vominator

There's no way to ease in to this topic, so I'm going to leap in with both feet -- VOMIT!

Actually, leaping in with both feet is more than just the cliched use of a literary device, it's a literal fact. In order to deal with the Italian's vomit situation early Sunday morning, I truly had to walk through approximately twenty square feet of vomit-covered hardwoods and carpeting. And why? Because the Italian was in the living room and needed a clean shirt and a blanket from his bedroom. When your kid is sick and shivering, you walk through vomit to help him.

I was in bed when it started, having finally fallen asleep around midnight. The Italian woke me up at one-thirty by poking me in the back.

"Dad?" Poke, poke. "Dad?" Poke, poke, poke. "Dad, I threw up."

It doesn't matter how soundly asleep you are, those words wake you up in a hurry. For starters, your son is sick and needs to be cared for. Secondly, somewhere in the house is a mess that needs to be cleaned, and the sooner the better.

We've enjoyed our share of award-winning vomits during our parenting years. There was the time the German puked up Cheetos all over the back of the driver's seat in the van. There was the time Our Daughter projectile-vomited goldfish crackers four feet across the room, smack into the middle of her Mother's chest and deep into the piles of a shag carpet. There was the time Our Daughter, having finally had the chance to try RavioliOs after years of resistance from My Lovely Wife and I, permanently stained the carpet around her bed. The Italian's Sunday morning vomit easily qualifies for nomination in several categories.

Let's begin with coverage. I walked over to the kids' bathroom to survey the damage only to find myself caught in that fragile mental state between uncontrollable weeping and giddy laughter. There are days when the horizon doesn't stretch out as far ahead of me as that field of vomit did on Sunday morning.

God bless him, the boy tried to make it to the bathroom once he realized what was coming. He jumped out of bed and ran to the door, but never got it open before Vesuvius erupted. It hit the carpet with such force that the door and nearby wall were splattered more than a foot high. Knowing there was more to come, he pulled open the door, stepped into the small hallway, and let loose with another ricochet trick shot on the hardwood floor. It took me fifteen minutes just to make a safe path -- not clean, mind you -- to his bedroom closet.

For more than three hours, I wiped up the hardwoods, wiped down the walls and baseboards, depukified the doors, and scrubbed the carpet. Amazingly, the only other person awake in the house was the Italian, and only because he threw up five or six more times, albeit under controlled conditions. Even the German remained unconscious, despite the fact I was scrubbing for over an hour just feet from his bed. After the sun came up and all eyes were open, we broke out the carpet cleaner and attempted a proper deep clean.

The end result is yet another permanent stain, although perhaps not as noticeable as some others. Years from now, if we try selling the house, I might have to come up with a new name for the carpet color. How about "Nutty Brown," or "Dark Chocolate?"

Would you believe they have a carpet color called "Outback Rib Sauce and Chunky Mashed Potatoe?"




© 2014 Mark Feggeler

Dehockefication

Dehockefication: [dee•hok•i•fi•kay•shun] verb, The act of washing sports equipment in the hope of making them smell slightly less like fermented squirrel urine.


I've created some noxious aromas in my day, many of which I unashamedly claim. As others scatter for fresh air, I proudly breathe in deep the fruits of my labor, as so many others have done before.

Certain smells, however, no matter how noble or rewarding the events leading to their creation, are little more than caustic attacks on the senses -- affronts to sensible beings with functional olfactory organs.

Dance shoes are such an affront. While Our Daughter's dance bag, and all its contents, develops an unholy funk by the time each dance season ends, the pointe shoes are the most egregious offenders. When they first arrive, pristine and pink in their pretty little boxes, you think only of how dazzlingly graceful your child will appear as she pliés and pirouettes from one side of the stage to the other during her fifty-seventh performance of Swan Lake.

But when you dig through her things the next morning to find the dirty leotard she forgot to put in the laundry, you find yourself wondering how big was the animal that snuck into her closet during the night and crapped in her bag. Sifting through the carnage you find the source of the stink. For as raucously virulent a stench as those two shoes have rendered, you might as well have thrown a couple of wet skunks in the bag and shaken it violently for an hour or two. You wonder what could possibly smell worse.

You stop wondering once the boys are old enough to play hockey. No other mephitic monstrosity I have ever had the misfortune to experience has come close to the wafting aroma of an open hockey bag, save for one.

Ages ago, I worked at a public library after school to make a few bucks. In the dead of winter and high heat of summer, the local homeless folks would find their way to the library to take shelter from the elements. This is by no means intended as a commentary on the homeless, but those poor souls we experienced back then carried around with them an odor powerful enough to drive away the most ravenous bookworm. You knew you were within twenty feet of the aisle they were nestled into when your eyes began to water.

Now, imagine carrying that kind of potency around in the car with you twice a week. I love my sons, but there are times I've seriously considered making them walk home from the park after hockey practice. If they wouldn't have to cross two busy highways along the way, I probably would have by now.

After every practice and game, we strip them down and load their dripping gear into two big black bags. The foul, locker room odor of sports and foot fungus lingers around them, but it isn't until the beginning of the next practice or game that you realize how big a mistake it was not to burn the bag and its contents. As the zipper pulls back and the bag cracks open, a vinegary hell escapes like cursed air from a pharaoh's tomb. It's a good thing you're already on the ground to help the boys tie their skates because the stench would drop you to your knees.

And each piece of equipment smells worse than the last.

• Skates?  Smelly. 
• Elbow pads?  Remarkably odorous. 
• Knee pads?  Knees can't possibly create a stink like that! 
• Helmet?  Dear God, you put that on your head?!
• Gloves?  I'm sorry... Did I just pass out?

Regardless of my being someone who never embraced the idea of physical exertion as something from which one might draw pleasure, I am capable of comprehending how others might. Sports done correctly build character, and a truckload of laundry. I just wish all that character didn't have to smell so bad.


© 2013 Mark Feggeler

Fast Poop, Slow Poop; New Poop, Old Poop

Gravity. That's the entire basis of modern plumbing as it has existed since the time of Christ.

Water from a higher level runs down through a series of ever narrowing channels and pipes, increasing the force of the flow as it goes, until it bursts from your faucet, or your hose, or your toilet. The toilet even gives it a bit of a boost by providing a reservoir meant to deliver a rushing flush of water to carry your unmentionables along to the sewage treatment plant. Plumbing is a simple, yet somehow perplexingly complex, field to which only the truly talented should apply themselves.

For example, the plumbing in our house is okay. It is plumb enough to carry waste materials to the waste material netherworld approximately ninety-seven percent of the time. Flushing the toilet is mostly a thought-free, worry-free practice that results in the removal from our house of all the things we would not want to have hanging around our house for several days, or even several more minutes than is truly necessary.

But mostly isn't the same as all the time. And ninety-seven percent, while a considerable portion, is not the same as one-hundred percent.

There are those times when -- dare I hazard to guess caused by the attempted flushing of an inordinate quantity of Angel Soft by a member of our household under the legal voting age -- our plumbing proves itself to perhaps not be quite as plumbed as it should be. The water simply cannot manage to force the biodegradable barge downstream to the municipal sewer pipes. A second flush, while tempting, yields no benefit. In fact, you'll likely discover how quickly you can pirouette over the poodle, shove aside the magazine rack, and turn off the water to the tank without killing yourself or permanently damaging the poodle.

A plunger in these circumstances is the second tool you need to resolve the clog. The first tool you need is a detective's keen sense of observation.

Is the clog at the farthest end of the house from the sewer lines? Is it at the nearest end of the house to the sewer lines? Is it between the house and the street? Are all the pipes in the house clogged with Angel Soft and poop to breaking point and the slightest plunge of a plunger will cause them to rupture?

Where does the gurgling of a trickle of escaping water sound loudest? In the kids' bathroom toilet? In their shower? At the kitchen sink? In the master bathroom?

Which appliance has the greatest potential to cause every toilet and sink and shower and bathtub in the house to gurgle and bubble like a witches' brew? The dishwasher? The washing machine? The pump in the basement?

Still and all, for every three challenging flushes there are ninety-seven that go off without a hitch. Considering how many people in this world poop al fresco and wipe with the nearest squirrel, the occasional clogged pipe really isn't so much a thing to complain about. Is it?

Perhaps some day, when the kids understand they don't need to flush an entire roll of toilet paper in a single go, we will be able to properly gauge the faculties of our facilities. Until then, if you see me stalking through the house clutching a plunger and listening intently for the sounds of gurgling water, give me a wide berth. The plunger might be dirty.


© 2013 Mark Feggeler