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. 

Sham Shopping Shenanigans

We don't buy things like new bed linens in a simple, straightforward manner.

To begin with, we have a tendency to wait until the condition of any item needing to be replaced is so critical as to suggest the only reason we haven't replaced it is because we suffer from a diagnosable attachment disorder. Such was the condition of the bed linens in Our Daughter's room. The bedskirt was irreparably torn in several places and a corner of the fitted sheet had slowly been unravelling for years. It didn't help they were made of the kind of material that clings to your skin like plastic wrap, sticks to your hair with a death grip, and stores enough static electricity to cause a power surge.

If you've purchased bed linens at any point in your life you must be aware it's significantly more complicated than a quick jaunt to the store to buy a spread. A properly dressed mattress involves the layering of patterns and colors to accentuate the decor of the bedroom. You'll need accent pillows, throw pillows, blankets, throw blankets, duvets, quilts and coverlets. And don't forget the sheets (to include the flat sheet, fitted sheet, pillow cases and shams, just in case shams don't come with your comforter set, or if you have an unsatiable desire to load your bed with pillows stuffed in decorative covers intended never to be used for resting your head on, ever).

Step one in buying new bed linens is to photograph the most colorful object in the room with your smartphone. This object -- in our case a painting inherited from my in-laws that hangs above Our Daughter's bed -- gives you the option of moving in a variety of color directions while limiting you to select hues, values and intensities. For the women in our family, the photograph serves as a color guide. For me it is a tool applied only every fifth time I randomly ask the question: "How about this one?"

Once you've scoured the store and located a few decent comforter sets that come complete with bedskirt and shams, and that are on sale for under $100, or were marked clearance (but not if the store doesn't accept returns on clearance items), you can now begin the hunt for twenty more decent comforter sets at all the other stores to expand your options. In our vicinity there are several places to go for reasonably-priced beddings -- Bed Bath & Beyond, Tuesday Morning, Ross's, Kohl's, Steinmart, Walmart, Belk and TJ Maxx, just to name a few. Only when it appears to strangers you might illegally be selling stolen comforter sets from the back of your minivan are you ready to shop for sheets.

Shopping for sheets is a very similar process, except you you might find yourself carrying comforter sets into the store like a directionally challenged shoplifter in order to match colors. Also, I ask "How about this one?" much less frequently because even I know color basics, like how boysenberry purple is NOT a match for Tuscan Sun yellow. Before too long, you're home putting freshly washed new sheets on the bed and arranging shams ever so carefully behind accented throw pillows.

The final step comes the following day when you revisit all the stores to return all the shams, sheets and comforters that didn't pass muster. Of course, I could always just park the minivan in the mall parking lot and hawk my wares:

"Pssst... Hey, buddy! C'mere. You lookin' to score a sham?"




© 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

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

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

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

Please Stop...

We had a great vacation last week.

Pennsylvania is lovely and the countryside surrounding the city of Lancaster particularly so. Over the course of seven days, we managed to visit historic Philadelphia, HersheyPark, the Julius Sturgiss Pretzel Factory, Luray Caverns, and we even found time one morning for breakfast at IHOP. Incidentally, blueberry cannoli pancakes should be permanently emblazoned on every IHOP menu from now through the end of eternity. If you haven’t tried them yet, what the hell are you waiting for?

For some reason, the soundtrack to our family “Road” movie included quite a bit of Journey. 

Turn on the radio and there’s “Lovin’, Touchin’, Squeezin’.” Pull into a gas station and get greeted by “Wheel in the Sky” from overhead speakers. Sit down in a restaurant booth and you’re tapping along to “Any Way You Want It” before you consciously acknowledge the song is even playing.

Now, if Journey had never formed as a rock band and later devolved into a lightweight video power ballad band my life wouldn’t be any the lesser for it, but I am not a Journey hater. I don’t hold a grudge against Carlos Santana for suggesting to Neal Schon that he start his own group, and I don’t harbor ill will toward MTV for the thousands of times it replayed the horrifically horrible video for “Separate Ways.” 

I freely admit to enjoying the group’s music. Show me any person in his or her forties who claims to never have attempted to match Steve Perry’s wailing voice in “Faithfully” while sitting alone in a car and I’ll show you a big fat liar.

Regardless of my enjoyment of the bands numerous hits, there was one Journey song that kept popping up round every corner during our trip, most especially during our two days at HersheyPark. You couldn’t hide from it, shut your ears to it, or put it out of your mind because the song, continuing its rise up from the ashes of clichéd eighties pop culture, refuses to die.

“Don’t Stop Believin’” -- apart from being one of several song titles that suggest Journey had a passionate distrust of the letter “G” -- is one of the more commercially successful covers by the cast of Glee, a show single-handedly responsible for convincing teens around the globe that all high schools have the budgets and technical ability to stage professionally choreographed karaoke competitions. This has led to all cover bands everywhere, even Death Metal cover bands, adding the song to their portfolios of musical butchery.

There was the Dueling Pianos show at HersheyPark that featured the song. Three talented pianists in bright suits who worked it into their 30-minute performance of piano-based pop tunes. Passable.

Fifty feet away was the all-girl cover band, Patty and the Peppermints, that featured the song. Six or seven young women in dire need of a properly functioning sound board and at least one band member with the ability to tune an instrument. Mildly annoying.

Then there was the roaming street trio that attempted the song. Three aspiringly disengaging waifs with instruments on loan from the Toys ‘R Us throwback collection. Intolerable.

At this point, I’m just happy to be home where I have more direct control over the soundtrack of my life. Until, of course, Our Daughter hops in the shower and cranks up the teenage tunage. What are the chances that’s actually Journey singing "Don't Stop Believin'?"

© 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

A Pool of Tears

We are quickly approaching a milestone. Our Daughter will graduate from high school in 2015 and head off to college.

That sounds like we still have plenty of time, and from her perspective 16 months might seem like an eternity, but to her parents it will seem like the blink of an eye. I know this because the past 16 years seem to have gone by just as quickly.

Ever the advance planner, earlier this week My Lovely Wife took Our Daughter with our twin sons in tow on her second official college tour. The four of them spent the better part of the afternoon roaming the grounds of UNC Greensboro in an effort to determine whether the campus is suitable for a determined student who wants to accomplish a concentration in pre-dental studies. The tour went well and UNCG now ranks high on the list of possibilities.

As we discuss different schools, comparing and contrasting their highs and lows, I think I am spotting a peculiar trend beginning to take root.

For those who believe they know My Lovely Wife well, they might be surprised to find she is much more emotional than she appears on the surface. More often than not she is a model of obsessive-compulsive efficiency. Yet beneath that uber-organized exterior is a mushy, squishy core that melts easily under the right circumstances. Turns out that preparing to send your first-born to college is one of those circumstances.

Her lower lip trembled several times during the recap of their tour of UNCG. This morning at the breakfast table the lip started again and conversation paused twice while she fought back the urge to weep openly in her Cheerios. Even a passing conversation during a laundry-folding session about the benefits of the college's study abroad program culminated in the need for a reassuring hug.

Need I remind you the child is only halfway through her junior year of high school? What this means is that I am looking ahead to more than a year of separation anxiety bubbling to the surface without notice during the most mundane activities.

Gassing up her car?
We're going to gas up her car only fifty-seven more times before she leaves for college... (Sniffle, sniffle.)

Setting out breakfast?
We're going to set out breakfast only five-hundred-and-forty more times before she leaves for college... (Whimper, snort.)

Folding socks?
We're going to fold her socks only one-thousand-two-hundred-and-twenty-seven more times before she leaves for college... (Uncontrolled sobbing.)

Not that I'm immune to this condition. I'm just as mushy and squishy, if not more so. Besides, all it takes to make me cry is to place me in close proximity to someone else who's already crying.

Between the two of us, My Lovely Wife and I better stock up on discount tissues at Aldi.



© 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

Forever Young

Today, my little girl broke my heart. Multiple times. Intentionally.

To start with, somebody told her it was acceptable for her to turn sixteen. I don't care what anyone says. I don't care what year it is versus what year she was born. I really don't care how many birthday cards she received, nor do I care how many people came to her Sweet 16 party, she is not sixteen.

She looks like this:

Or, like this:

But that's as far as I'm willing to take it. Just barely out of diapers, but not in high school, not studying a level of calculus that makes me dizzy, and not, most definitely not, driving.

Nope! Stop it! Not even looking. (Fingers in ears, chanting "La, la, la, la, la, la, la...) Who gave this rotten kid permission to grow up?

Okay, so maybe she isn't a full-fledged adult, yet, but she has her driver's license and we were stupid enough to buy her her own car. You know what she did today after dinner? She drove herself to dance. By herself. Without so much as an apology for not needing us to bring her anymore. How am I supposed to accept the reality of her being allowed to roam the roads unsupervised when it seems like only yesterday I was bathing her in the kitchen sink and buttoning her onesies?

Let her grow up. See if I care. Let her turn into a little old lady, if that's where she's heading. No matter what happens, or how old she gets, or whatever she accomplishes in her life, in my mind's eye she will always look like this:

© 2013 Mark Feggeler

A Brief Update from a Busy Life

The Pale Rambler, my mainstay blogging alter ego, must be scratching his pink and balding scalp and wondering what has become of me.

After all, he was created for the sole purpose of providing a creative outlet for the wanna-be writer trapped deep inside of me. He hasn't always had profound things to say, but he had been posting fairly consistently up until recent months.

Truth be told, time has been scarce. What little spare time I've managed to get my hands on has been devoted to writing the second book in the "Psi Squad" series. I've never written a series before, and to date I've only completed two books, but I take seriously the challenge of completing the nine-book series as originally outlined. That leaves little time for pale ramblings or other online shenanigans.

Some day in the distant future, when I smell like my Grandfather and worry more about the regularity of my bowel movements than the earning of a paycheck, I might find the time to sit and write all the day long. Rather than scratching down errant sentences or paragraphs here and there on scraps of paper in the hopes of tying them together into a collective whole, my energies can be focused from dawn to dusk when the mood strikes and the ideas are flowing.

It's a pleasant dream, just not one to be realized today. Today is meant for more important things.

Today was spent bringing a meaningful wage into our household. Today was spent calling the school (and being called by the school) to straighten out our twin sons' schedules on their first day of middle school. Today was spent talking with our daughter over breakfast as she prepared for her first day of eleventh grade. Today was spent sitting at the dining room table as our entire family of five attempted (and failed) to solve a sixth-grade math problem. Today was spent enjoying a quiet lunch in a noisy restaurant with my best friend.

As time continues to pluck hairs from my head only to plant them in my ears, I realize how fleeting are the opportunities to carpe the remaining diem of my children's childhoods. The memories of walking Sara through the hallways of middle school for the first time have hardly faded, yet here we are entering her critical college-planning year. Two years might sound like a long time, but for a parent looking at the prospect of sending a first-born to college it might as well be two weeks.

And so, the Pale Rambler waits patiently, as do the "Psi Squad" characters. They'll be there when I need them. They'll come running when I call them out to play.

In the meantime I will cling tightly to every hug, capture the essence of every laugh, collect kisses and wipe away tears. Those are the things that make up a life, and they are far more tangible, valuable and meaningful than any silly dream.


© 2013 Mark Feggeler

What's In a Name?

Our Daughter is a singer in a band. Six kids, all roughly the same age, singing and plucking and drumming and tickling the ivories together, with an interest in playing local gigs and making a few bucks.

So far, they've gone under the name Dogwood Knoll, which was sufficient to provide an early identity, but is now in a state of flux as all six band members weigh in on what they should call their capriccioso collective.

Although no strong contenders have been presented, there has been some focus on bits and pieces that should be included in the new band name. Like using the word "six" since there are six band members, or the suffix "hurst" since we are in Pinehurst. The only problem with hurst is it sounds too much like "hearse"depending on your elocution, which seems more suitable to a death-metal band than preppie teens covering pop tunes.

However, some quick searches using an online band name generator and the suggested words have yielded interesting, if not entertaining, results. One of my early favorites was "Quick Fix Six," but it doesn't appear to have much appeal to the group. Then there are "Rocking Six," "About Six," "The Sixtones," "Deep Six," and "Pick Six."

Somehow, even though I had asked for random names with the word "six" in them, the generator offered a few wildcards. They might not be appropriate, but you'd be hard-pressed to find band names more memorable than "Nasal of the Brazen," "Indecent Viking and the Shimmering Treat," or "Placenta Boathouse." Just imagine the varied directions a band with any of those names could steer its musical journey.

Hurst has also resulted in fun names such as "Hurst Skillet and Adolescent Payday," which strangely sounds almost fitting. "Hurst Voices" also isn't bad, but I doubt "Hurst Rejection of the Wasting Truck" will make the cut. Nor will "Groovy Hurst," "Hurst Gumbo," "The Incredible Hurst," or My Lovely Wife's favorite "Trousers of the Disappointed." My vote for a hurst-inclusive name is "Nitro Hurst and the Misfits."

Of course, given the number of chocolate cookies the band has eaten the past two nights of rehearsals, it's only appropriate to search for names with "cookie" in the title, such as "Trouser Cookies" (too potentially perverted), "Putrid Cookie" (best for a neo-punk band), "Cookie Acid and the Asian Rider" (too... I have no idea), and the best one: "Cookie Venom."

Something tells me Dogwood Knoll will stick around a little while longer.




© 2013 Mark Feggeler ("Rusting Feggeler and the Fisting Logic")

Breakdown in Communication

We've been pretty lucky, as parents of a teenage daughter go.

Here we are, almost sixteen years into this parenting experiment, and we all appear to love each other and get along fairly well. Our Daughter is sweet-natured, doesn't like foul language, dotes on her younger brothers (whether or not they want her to -- although they usually want her to), earns excellent grades at school, stays active in music and dance, doesn't talk back to her parents, and still laughs at my fart jokes.

What more could a parent ask for?

Okay, maybe the ability to communicate and share information utilizing complex sentence structures and multisyllabic words when texting. And also the ability to read simple text messages and fully understand them before responding. For example, here is a brief conversation from April:

    Me: "I can pick you up at 3:45 from school or from the rink later."

    Our Daughter: "I get out of school at 3:45."

    Me: "Okay. I will pick you up at 3:45."

    Our Daughter: "Um why?"

    Me: "I though you were asking me to. Just let me know when you want me to pick you up."

    Our Daughter: We will be at the rink around 5:45."

    Me: "Okay. Now. Do you want me to pick you up from the rink at 5:45?"

    Our Daughter: "Yes!!!!!"

For the record, adding seventeen exclamation points does not convey any more meaning to me than one exclamation point. I'm also not a huge fan of emoticons -- those little smily, winky faces that are supposed to let me know how you feel at any given moment in time. That's what words are for. Long ago, by which I mean the early 1990s, people knew how to express disappointment without book-ending the word "sad" with matching frowny-face emoticons.

At least we have moved beyond the days of the one-letter answer. Having graduated from college with a Bachelor's degree in English, I'm always thrilled when my children respond to a lengthy, multiple choice question with the moronically simple, unhelpful, uncapitalized and unpunctuated response: "k." If I'm planning dinner and I send a text to ask if you prefer corn on the cob or broccoli with your grilled chicken, "k" is not a valid response. If I ask whether your boyfriend is eating dinner with us or going home to eat with his parents, "k" is a relatively answer-free return message.

Some day soon, when I find myself babysitting my grandchildren and Our Daughter texts from some fancy dinner across town to ask if her offspring have been fed and bathed and put to bed on time, I will wait a full thirty minutes to respond with a simple "k!!!!!!!!!"



© 2013 Mark Feggeler

The Chocolate Deficit

Stop the presses!

Call nine-one-one!!

Get FEMA on the phone and tell them to alert the nation about the most distressing national disaster of all time!!!

Worse than a tornado! More terrifying than an earthquake! As devastating, if not more so, than the impending zombie apocalypse (scary fast-moving zombies, not the slow "I can't believe I can't outrun them" zombies). What's the dilemma, you ask? The chocolate in our kids' leftover Easter candy bags is disappearing!

Every Easter, when that stupid rabbit breaks-and-enters our house with his paganistic eggs and candy and fills our kids' baskets to the point of bursting, you'll find me lurking in a corner, rubbing my hands together and snickering like Snidely Whiplash. For the next few weeks, I lay in wait, plotting and planning and scheming endless ways to separate foil-wrapped chocolates from their respective rightful owners.

Our Daughter never used to eat any of her candy. Out of sight, out of mind seemed to be her modus operandi. That made her candy easier pickings than a pocket-protector nerd in a dodgeball game.

The Italian never liked peanut butter chocolate eggs, so those were the first to go from his bag, one by one, wrapper by empty wrapper hidden in the kitchen trash can. Like magic the peanut butter chocolate eggs vanished. The German never liked those crunchy chocolate bars with the puffed rice inside of them, so those were next on the hit list. Unwrap it, sweep it through the five-pound container of peanut butter in the pantry, and down they go.

When it comes to chocolate, to call my craving a sweet tooth does not do it justice. Too limiting. Mine is more like a sweet limb, or even an entire quadrant of the body. The fact our kids hardly ever ate their holiday candy simply meant more for me.

Christmas? Stocking candy!

Halloween? Random sampler stranger candy!!

Easter? Holy crap it's time to buy a girdle candy!!!

But this year, something strange happened. I'm suddenly living in some bizarro alternate universe in which children eat candy. And not just the good candy, either. Not only are the Snickers and Milky Ways and Hershey's solid milk chocolate bunnies wrapped to look like Star Wars stormtroopers being eaten, even the jelly beans and faux marshmallows in the shape of cartoon foods that typically spend their days collecting lint and wrapper shrapnel at the bottom of the bag are disappearing. What does that leave for me? Nothing.

I know what you're thinking. You're thinking, "Dude, you're forty-five years old and can go buy all the chocolate and candy you could ever want, eat it 'til you puke, and go back for more."

That's true. I can, and I probably have, but it isn't the same. The expression "easy as taking candy from a baby" came about not only because it satisfactorily expresses the ease of accomplishing a task, but also because taking candy from babies is fun and gratifying, especially when those babies are yours and they don't even realize they're missing out on a good thing when you take their candy.

Maybe, if I'm lucky, this trend will reverse itself before Halloween.



© 2013 Mark Feggeler

Vomit: Greatest Hits

Children ought to arrive with a manual that dedicates at least three lengthy chapters to vomit.

If the site of vomit, the smell of vomit, or even the mere mention of the word "vomit" makes your stomach queasy, then I've got some bad news for expectant parents. For the first couple of months, babies are little more than adorably cute containers of drool, poop and vomit. Squeeze them too tightly or bounce them on your knee a minute too long and you'll see how quickly all that drool, poop and vomit can magically overflow, sometimes simultaneously.

And if your wife is anything like mine, you won't even have to wait for the baby to arrive before you become proficient at handling vomit. At first, I carried her morning sickness bucket like it was filled with radioactive waste. I walked it to a remote section of the neighboring wooded lot and dumped it, then stood a good distance away and sprayed it with the hose. By the time Our Daughter arrived, all the bucket got was a quick swish of water from the spigot and a spritz of Lysol. If any got on my shoes, pants, or in my hair, I no longer cared. Vomit and I had made our peace with each other. Ours was a live-and-let-live relationship.

But that tiny bit of morning sickness vomit is nothing compared to the mass quantities produced by a late-night-breast-milk-binging baby with the upset stomach and an inability to walk to the bathroom toilet. Ever try cleaning vomit from the intricate spindles of a baby crib? Don't worry, you will.

Or how about toddler vomit? When Our Daughter was two years old, she spent much of one visit with relatives circling a coffee table slowly devouring almost an entire bowl of gold fish crackers. A couple hours later, she stood in the crib provided to us and projectile vomited a direct hit at her mother's chest from a distance of five feet. Let me assure you, you know it's a quality vomit when one parent spends two hours cleaning undigested gold fish crackers out of a shag rug and the other has to bathe the baby, take a shower and run a load of laundry.

Or how about the first time they get sick on their bedroom floor? My mother used to tell us to throw up on our beds if we were going to get sick. "I can put your sheets in the wash," she'd say. "I can't put the carpet in the wash."

But there's something counter-intuitive to vomiting on your bed and, in effect, all over yourself. Your body understands vomit is a thing to be shared, so it makes every attempt to spread it out as far and wide as possible.

For instance, were we to go back and visit the house we lived in when our children were born, I would not be surprised to find a barely discernible pink stain on the floor of the back bedroom where, one evening, Our Daughter released a torrent of Raviolio-tinged vomit. It was a monumental achievement, really, and proved too tough a match for any chemicals and carpet cleaning machines money could rent. We were somehow spared the joy of finding out what happens when a boy sleeping on the top bunk throws up in the middle of the night, but that doesn't mean our sons haven't had their share of incidents.

The German once decimated our van with a wave of nausea, again possibly inspired by gold fish crackers. I missed that one and have always felt a bit left out. By all accounts, it was mighty impressive and required some extreme detailing of the leather seats.

And the Italian, well it's been only a few days since his last performance. You would think by age twelve he would have figured out where vomit belongs. Only minutes after he agreed it would be a good idea for us to get him a bucket, but before we were able to get it to him, he sat up on his bed, hurriedly proclaimed "I think I'm going to need that bucket," and immediately proceeded to puke all over the floor. Also hit in the onslaught were his bed, his brother's bed, a bookshelf, three Lego sets, and the storage bins under both their beds. Best of all, I had just given him bubble gum flavored Ibuprofen and the only food he'd eaten in the previous hours were Twizzlers.

Some day I'm going to find out who the genius is who decided it would be a good idea to pack the medicine parents administer to sick children with enough red dye to stain clear through to the floorboards and give him a good, swift kick in the pants.



© 2013 Mark Feggeler

A King on His Throne

The hall bathroom toilet, and all territory immediately surrounding it, has been claimed by the Italian.

Every now and then it might be possible for the German and Our Daughter to sneak in for a few minutes to shower or brush their teeth, but ninety-nine-point-nine percent of the time if the door is closed and light is peeking out from under it, it means the Italian is holding court.

The strangest thing about this new behavior is that I never expected it from the Italian. This is the same kid who, only a few years back, took great delight in running around the house naked and smacking his bare ass to some improvised musical number, often themed around the words "hiney" or "bahookie." I never expected an exhibitionist of his caliber to withdraw to the windowless environs of the bathroom.

If you're leaving for church and the Italian cannot be found, knock on the bathroom door. If you're running late for inline hockey practice and the Italian isn't in the van, knock on the bathroom door. If it's homework time and the Italian's books are sitting abandoned on the kitchen table, knock on the bathroom door. If he's been in the bathroom for twenty-seven minutes and you've yet to hear the shower running, knock on the bathroom door.

Had the German been the one to sit on the toilet for hours at a time, playing Minecraft until the restricted bloodflow to his extremeties had turned his toes a deep shade of blue, I would not have been surprised. The German has always been something of an island unto himself. He hugs less, is less needy throughout the course of the day, and tends to exist in a state of remote awareness of his surroundings. A moderately introverted boy seeking seclusion is not much of a stretch, yet he is the one who does not find it necessary to retreat to the quiet solace of the loo.

Fortunately for our plumbing, the purpose of the Italian's newfound respect for privacy has nothing to do with dysentary, diarrhea, dropping the kids at the pool, or any other bodily functions beginning with the letter "d." It's all about Minecraft, or whatever other game he's playing on his iPod when he disappears, because he knows at some point My Lovely Wife or I will tell him to log off and interact with an actual human being rather than a virtual one. Out of sight, out of mind is the policy he has instituted.

But, as this blog post serves to show, he has been found out. Gone are the days of attempting to FaceTime with relatives and friends with his pants around his ankles. Few are the remaining days of talking to a white door that sounds like the Italian instead of talking directly to him. Preparations are being made for a coup d'etat to oust the king from his throne.

Besides, if we don't put an end to his Occupy the Bathroom movement, where am I supposed to go to check Facebook and play Angry Birds?


© 2013 Mark Feggeler

Bun of Steel

We're planning a trip to Hilton Head for the summer. We've been there before and found it to be a relaxing place to visit for a week of swimming and generally behaving like obnoxious tourists.

In addition to flashing way too much pale skin on the beach and not traveling anywhere without a tremendous rolling cooler stocked with enough beverages, sandwiches and goodies to make the loaves and the fishes seem like a mere snack, one of the requirements of tourists at a resort location like Hilton Head is to rent bikes.

Non-sexy resort bike.

These bikes -- like rental bikes at all resorts across the world -- are not cool. They are not flashy, or stylish, or built for speed. You will never see supermodels riding bikes like these during a photo shoot. And, if you're lucky, no one will photograph you while you are riding one around the resort. No, these bikes are built for three things only: (1) durability, (2) comfort, and (3) being so unattractive as to dissuade potential thieves from stealing them for fear they will never find anyone desperate enough to want to own such an unattractive bike.

The first time we went to Hilton Head, our boys were still young enough to require our bringing their bikes with us. Our Daughter, however, has never liked bikes. You see, when learning to ride, some children, like our sons, fall off their bikes and get right back on until they figure out how to balance and pedal and brake. Other children, like Our Daughter, fall off their bikes and live in fear of them for the next ten years.

Until recently, Our Daughter preferred her scooter to her bike. As every other kid in the neighborhood raced down the block faster than the posted speed limit, she kept pace pushing with one foot. That trip to Hilton Head four years ago was no exception. While the rest of us pedaled the four miles from our rented condo to the shopping district, she shoved herself along and often led the pack.

Our niece, whose family had vacationed with us that week, observed that Our Daughter would develop a "bun of steel" from her scootering efforts. I kept waiting for her to pass out from all the extra work, but she soldiered through and never complained.

This time around the scooter is not an option. An 11-year-old on a scooter is one thing, but a 15-year-old on a scooter reaches a whole new level of weirdness, like a 4-year-old still carrying around a baby bottle, or amateur party clowns. Anyway, in the past year or two Our Daughter has learned to enjoy her bike. She's no natural at it, but at least she no longer treats it like some wild beast bent on killing her.



© 2013 Mark Feggeler

Pete's Parm

You'd think, having a healthy dose of Italian heritage infused into her genes, Our Daughter would know where and when to order an Italian entree.

Not that I'm any connoisseur of world cuisine -- and there's absolutely no Italian blood in my veins -- but I did grow up on Long Island not far from Manhattan. You couldn't spit in our neighborhood without hitting a pizza parlor or an Italian restaurant run by someone who looked like an extra from one of the "Godfather" movies. Add a few hundred randomly placed delicatessans, each serving a meatball sub more delicious than the other, and it's almost impossible not to develop a keen appreciation for properly prepared Italian food.

Twenty-three years ago, when I moved from the Empire State to the Tar Heel State, the lack of diversification among restaurants was the most difficult change to tolerate. We were lucky to have a McDonald's, let alone a great place to get pizza.

My Mother-in-Law used to have little sympathy for my complaints. She had moved to North Carolina in the early 1970s and one of her favorite stories to tell was about the time she went to the local supermarket and asked for help locating bread crumbs. She would roll out her best Yankee impersonation of Southern drawl when she mimicked the confused store clerk: "You want cruuuuuumbs? Of bray-uhd?"

Her story always reminded me of the time back in the early 90s when I made a sales trip to Charlottesville, VA. Not knowing the area, I asked the front desk attendant at the hotel if there were any good ethnic restaurants nearby. The poor girl stared at me like I had asked her to provide detailed instructions for nuclear fusion. After a moment's reflection, she offered this nugget: "There's a Shoney's down the street if you like country." If nothing else, I was glad to know someone had developed a work-placement program for ex-Hee Haw Honeys.

Over the years, our community has been blessed with the addition of a handful of eateries that understand tomato sauce and ketchup are very different things. And they have names that lead you to suspect they might know what they're doing -- Vito's, Valenti's, Fratello's. Let's face it, if an Italian restaurant has a single-word name ending in a pronounced vowel followed by a possessive apostrophe, it's already halfway along the road to success. This is a fact Our Daughter should have learned by now.

So, when her boyfriend's parents took her to dinner not long ago to a restaurant in a metal building on the side of a semi-rural highway, she should have known better than to order chicken parm at a placed called Pete's. You don't order chicken parm at a restaurant called Pete's. You order chicken fried steak, or country fried steak, or fried shrimp. Heck, order just about anything fried you care to from Pete and he'll probably do it extremely well. Like hushpuppies! Pete probably has perfect hushpuppies, but I promise you parmesan was not a staple product in his parent's pantry.

And even though Pete's name ends in a vowel, it's a silent vowel. Had the restaurant's name been Pietro's, then you could have made an argument for ordering chicken parm, or saltimbocca, or even a linguini appetizer. But it isn't, so you can't.

When Pete attempts chicken parm, you get country fried chicken and a red-colored sauce topped with a cheese bearing little resemblance to parmesan. And when that plate is dropped in front of you, you're getting exactly what you deserve for ordering it from a guy named Pete.

Clearly, we have failed to properly educate Our Daughter.



© 2013 Mark Feggeler

Knife-Wielding Children

It was declared the other night by My Lovely Wife while dining at Vito's that the boys could cut their own food from here on out.

To be fair, it isn't as though the boys squawk like baby birds for us to cut up their food into bite-size portions, and we're not intentionally trying to pamper them. It comes down to a matter of efficiency. We are efficient cutters of food, they are not. We have the ability to cut hot pizza with a knife without sending bits of it flying across a restaurant and blinding fellow diners with scalding tomato sauce. Their level of proficiency at this same task is questionable.

I suppose history will show one of our great failings as parents is not having taught our children to properly use knives. When I see the boys attempting to cut anything from steak to potatoes, I can't help thinking they'd experience greater success bashing their food with sticks and rocks in order to break off easily digestible pieces. Even Our Daughter, who recently started driving, looks as though her hand-eye coordination suffers a seven-second delay whenever she tries to use a knife.

When the children were very young, it made perfect sense not to place serated steak knives next to their plates. After all, when your diet consists primarily of fish sticks, chicken tenders, applesauce and string cheese, there really isn't much call for cutlery. But, as they have grown and their diets become slightly more sophisticated (no more fish sticks), we find we can't leave them weaponless and have them lifting large chunks of grilled meat to their mouths and tearing at it with their teeth. They need the right tools and the training to apply them correctly to the task at hand.

The Italian will welcome this change, I expect. He is passively-aggressively independent and always eager to prove his self-sufficiency. I believe the German, however, secretly enjoys our taking the reins and managing the food-cutting, if for no other reason than it allows him to keep his hands clean. He is a fastidious little bugger at the best of times. One night, several years ago, we were dining at Olive Garden when he decided to survey the table.

"Who had a breadstick?" the German asked.

We each raised a greasy-fingered hand in the air.

"Then you all need to wash your hands," he ordered.

So, now begins a new chapter of our lives as parents, a chapter in which we move away from plastic knives and safety scissors, pack away the Disney character plates and bowls, and treat our children as dining equals capable of cutting their own food.

Maybe we should plan on serving soup for the next few months...



© 2012 Mark Feggeler