Shining, Gleaming, Streaming, Flaxen, Waxen

A long time ago, on a scalp far, far away, there once grew a dense forest of straight blonde hair.

When I was a little kid, the poofed mass of yellow on my head turned near white in the New York summer sunshine. My Mother always would comment how easy it was to spot me if I wandered away from her in a store, or was sitting on stage under the bright lights of a public school band concert. Not long after, the quintessential 1980s hair helmet formed like a protective biosphere when I entered the hygienically self-aware stage of my teen years. Cans of AquaNet and bottles of hair gel fell like spent soldiers as each long, blonde strand was carefully lacquered in place.

I got a bad rap in college for growing a mullet, which really wasn't a mullet, but rather a failed subversive attempt to grow my hair long, like some kind of neo-hippie, proto-grunge granola-age-punk. A lack of commitment to the experiment resulted in an unfortunate hairstyle equaled in unsightly aesthetics only by my inability to match clothing colors and patterns. Who says a gray and purple button-up sweater vest doesn't go with acid-washed, parachute cargo jeans and a pink dress shirt? Pretty much every member of the sighted world.

As we tumbled through early adulthood, marriagehood and parenthood, developing technologies made it easy to avoid hair envy. Nothing quells concerns over a receding hairline better than shared social media pictures of your high school friends sporting scalps more barren and devastated than a clear-cut rain forest. This guy was bald in his twenties, that one in his thirties. By the time I reached forty, I felt like the lone survivor of some horrific folicular pandemic.

Not anymore.

The turn of the century brought with it a desire for streamlined simplicity that included My Lovely Wife buzzing my hair to within a centimeter of its life. (Somehow, I still manage to achieve righteous bedhead.) Every once in a blue moon I get the notion lodged in my brain to try growing my hair out a bit. By "a bit," I mean more than an inch. Right around the time the next buzzing is due, I'll catch myself grabbing the mousse to direct my hair along its long-abandoned part. It looks pretty good, too, if I do say so myself. Then two things happen.

The first is when my hair reaches a certain length and suffers what I call the Bozo Effect. The listless and lazy hair on the very top of my head collapses under its own weight while the hair on either side of my head sticks straight out as far as it can possibly go without leaving the scalp -- an unintentional and pathetically sad Flock of Seagulls impersonation, without the benefit of futuristic music video lighting and underrated guitar playing.

The second thing that happens is I catch an occasional glimpse of what my hair really looks like to others. You see, each morning when coiffing my golden locks in the mirror I'm staring blindly at an optical illusion. Where I see a reasonably handsome head of hair, others see glistening scalp gleaming at them from under a few delicate, wispy strands. One photograph of the top of my head is all it takes to bring me back to reality.

Twenty years ago I told My Lovely Wife if my hair started abandoning me then I would buzz it off. Better fire up the trimmers.

© 2016 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

The Meaning of Youth Hockey

It's hockey season again for the village recreation youth league, which means strapping on pads, tying up those inline skate laces, and giggling about the idea of two twelve-year-old boys wearing athletic supporters.

It means hauling some of the foulest smelling bags of rancid equipment ever created by man or God to and from the outdoor rink in the hopes that no rain falls (or in the case of this year, no snow) to cancel practice.

It means praying someone from the village Parks & Rec office has finally gotten the lights under control so the kids don't end up in blackout conditions before their hour is up.

It means freezing your butt off sitting on ice-cold bleachers and craning your neck to see around all those people who like to stand at the glass completely oblivious to the fact that they themselves are not transparent.

It means hollering when you see the other team getting away with what you think is a clearly visible infraction and cheering when your kids' team gets away with an infraction that you prefer to think of as a high-quality aggressive play, even though in reality you barely understand the rules of the game.

It means yelling at some kid on your sons' team for standing still as a statue while the puck slips away only to realize he's one of your sons.

It means keeping an eye on your dog on those occasions you happen to bring her to the rink to keep her from eating all the loose strips of fat tape and discarded mouth guards she finds under the bleachers.

It means shifting in an instant from casual banter with your friends to screaming like a crazed psychopath when your kid scores, drives down the rink with the puck, makes an amazing pass, blocks an attempt on goal with a swat of his lightening fast reflexes, or robs the other team of a scoring opportunity by smothering the puck with his body.

It means celebrating when your kids' team ties that one team in the league that's stacked with taller, faster kids and led by an aggressive coach who's more interested in winning than teaching sportsmanship.

It means hearing through long-distance phone conversations about how one of your sons scored in the very first game of the season and your other son held the opposing team to a tie with amazing saves through three periods of play.

It means fighting back the tears when you're sitting in a hotel room three-hundred miles from home and your son says "I wish you could have been there, Dad" after their first game of the season.


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

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

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

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

Skinny Pants

Pants are tricky things.

You can't even purchase identically marked pairs from the same manufacturer with any assurance each will fit you as well as the other. Hanging in my closet at this very moment are two pairs of Levi's, both marked thirty-six (shut up) by thirty-two and aquired on the very same day at the very same store, yet one pair fits perfectly and the other pair causes any of a variety of medical conditions, including diminished circulation, acid reflux, diarrhea, loss of appetite, and depression.

My prime time for wearing skin tight jeans was a brief window that lasted from 9:57am to 3:42pm on March 12, 1986. When that window closed, and increasingly so as the years have progressed, it became morally irresponsible of me to don tight-fitting pants. The more my natural form is left to the imagination, the better a place the world becomes. Therefore, the slimmer of the supposedly identical pants remains hidden away in the closet to be saved for those days on which I can button them without experiencing light-headedness.

The Italian does not subscribe to this theory when it comes to his own form. After all, being in the fifth grade, he has the luxury of existing primarily in a world of oblivious 11-year-olds. The girls have not yet transformed into the style-conscious butterflies middle school will make of them, and the boys are more focused on ultra cool things like dirt and origami ninja stars than they are on what clothes their friends are wearing. This creates an awareness vacuum in which children are able to wear their favorite clothes, regardless of how bizarre or poorly fitting they are, with little fear of mockery.

Which is why the Italian frequently must be rescued, against his will, from certain articles of clothing in his wardrobe. Being a typical American child, his closet is stocked with far too many choices for him to wear, even if he decided to wear a different outfit each day of the year. Despite the expansive selection available to him, he regularly chooses the same shirts over and over again. One shirt, in particular, has survived several recent purges led by My Lovely Wife. It is a gray t-shirt with a screenprint image of a drum set. If he could, he would glue the shirt to his body.

One recent wardrobe casualty was a pair of jeans that had hung around a few months longer than necessary. To label them "flood pants" would be an insult to flood pants, but showing off his ankles was not their biggest failing.

The Italian, you must understand, is a bone-skinny kid. He's so skinny, zombies wouldn't waste time trying to eat him if they ran him down during the apocalypse. If anything, they'd probably offer him a spare limb to eat. Because he is so darned skinny, not only do we need to buy slim-cut pants for his emaciated frame, the pants also need to have elastic built into the waistline so he can draw them to fit his five-and-a-half-inch circumference.

But skinny pants are not outgrown gradually. One day they fit perfectly, the next day the Italian looks like he's been shrink-wrapped in too little denim.

He vocally protested the expulsion of the skinny pants and made several futile efforts to model them for us in the hope we would change our minds and agree they did not make him look like a disco-era reject or a Christmas ornament with blue pipe cleaners for legs. His argument fell on deaf ears and the pants were added to the donation pile in the basement.

On a positive note, it does seem like his appetite has improved now that he's wearing pants that allow food to settle into his digestive system.



© 2012 Mark Feggeler

Old Man Shoes, Part II

I wanted to buy standard white sneakers, the kind I've worn most of my life. I wanted simple, unadorned white sneakers that support my arches and allow my feet to serve their intended purpose without necessarily calling undue attention to them.

They are, after all, just feet. I do not need my feet to make a statement about me. I need them to walk, to pedal the RPM bike at the gym, and occasionally to run from point A to point B without tripping over themselves and sending me into a face-plant on a hard surface.

Shoes should assist the feet in meeting this fairly limited set of responsibilities. I require only comfort and function from my shoes, whether they be for business, or sport, or casual use. My concern over shoes has never relied heavily on the opinions of others. Be sure, I would not wear sneakers with a three-piece suite, or clown shoes to a funeral, but I do not typically spend an exorbitant amount of time pondering my choice of footwear when making the purchase. The only questions that cross my mind at the shoe store are:

1. Do they fit?

2. Are they comfortable?

3. Are they reasonably priced?

4. Are they suitable for their intended purpose?

For some inexplicable reason, the last time I purchased sneakers I caved to the unreasonable whim of peer pressure. The peers in question were My Lovely Wife and Our Daughter. The two have been critical in the past for  mybuying sneakers that are, in their words, "old man shoes." Old man shoes are an insult to their stylistic sensibilities. My old man shoes are a source of embarrassment, based solely on their proximity to them whenever and wherever I am wearing them. The kind of shoe not objectionable to them is gray sneakers with touches of neon green and partially made of some mesh-like material, so that is what I purchased.

The gray and neon green mesh-like sneakers fit (check one), are comfortable (check two), and were reasonably priced (check three). In most ways they are suitable for their intended purpose, except for the inescapable and unavoidable fact my feet sound as though I am walking with whoopee cushions strapped to them.

With every step I take, a barely audible (but audible all the same) pooting gust of air escapes around my ankle. No matter how I place my foot upon the ground as I move, the sound is there, mocking me for not sticking to my guns and buying my old man shoes. Wherever I go, if those gray and green mesh-like sneakers are on my feet, I sound like Fozzy Bear testing out his new fart shoes. All that's missing is a spinning bow tie and me holding my hands out and shouting "Wocka, Wocka!"

I suspect it won't be long before I am once again wearing proper old man shoes. They might not be sexy, or stylish, or contemporary, but I'd rather have people thinking I have old man shoes instead of old man incontinence issues.


© 2012 Mark Feggeler

Sexy Green Car

I dropped Our Daughter off at school today for driver's ed.

BEWARE!
This kid will be
driving soon.

It's difficult to comprehend she's almost old enough to get her license. I'm not the kind of guy who panics much about the aging process, but that doesn't mean I don't get smacked between the eyes every now and then by the realization I'm fewer years away from being a first time grandfather than I am to being a first time father. Well, at least halfway there, maybe. We'll have to see what the future holds.

Seems like yesterday I was sitting in an auditorium at East Meadow High School on Long Island listening to our two instructors drone on about traffic safety and hoping desperately not to be assigned to the tremendously obese instructor for the actual driving portion of the class. I don't recall his name, but I've never forgotten how he hiked his pants up under his moobs in an attempt to cover his belly. Sure enough, I ended up assigned to his group. Because of his girth, the front bench seat of the driver's ed vehicle had to be rolled all the way back, making it nearly impossible for me to reach the pedals. I have no idea how the short kids in the group even managed to get the car in gear.

That was twenty-eight years ago, and now it's Our Daughter's turn.

She must already be dreaming about that perfect first car. A fashion statement to match her nails and cell phone cover, a status symbol to declare her position in the "Lord of the Flies" pecking order of high school, the purchase of her first car could require countless hours of online research, test drives and color matching. Luckily for her, no such investment of time and energy need be made. The solution to her problem sits safely in our garage.

For years, I've joked with Our Daughter that when the time came for her to drive she would inherit my Toyota Echo. Her response, even when the reality of driving was a far off distant dream?

"No way!"

Admittedly, the Echo is not a sexy car. It's small, stick, and has that odd centered dash that took some getting used too but which I now really enjoy. It didn't come with power steering, a cd player, or even a clock. It could never be a roadtrip party vehicle because there are only two doors, meaning back seat passengers have to climb in and out like clowns at the circus. There are no leather seats, no electric windows or mirror controls. The air-conditioning system is barely more potent than hanging ice cubes from the rearview mirror. And last week it clocked its 190,000th mile. Oh, I almost forgot, the dark green paint job is marred by a decade of attacks by bikes, balls, bats and a battery of assorted childhood weaponry.

But it's been paid off for six years and gets forty miles to the gallon -- city driving! And if she abuses it, forgets to change the oil (as I frequently did with my first car), or chooses to blanket the poor thing with bumper stickers, what's the loss? It's not like the car is a hot classic with collectors clamoring to outbid each other for it. Even Toyota stopped manufacturing it after only a few years and replaced it with the Yaris. The Yaris!!!

And so, Our Daughter has a hard reality to face. Sometimes the liberties of a free society come at a cost. In this case, that cost might very well be a pound of pride paid each morning she pulls that uncontestedly unsexy green car into the high school parking lot.



© 2012 Mark Feggeler

Making Mistakes

I'm big on learning from mistakes. After all, if I couldn't learn from my mistakes, then a good two-thirds of my life would serve little to no purpose.

Parenting is a wonderful testing ground for learning how many mistakes you can make in a single day, especially when the kids are very young. Like those days you're rushing out the door. Did I remember to pack diapers, bottles, pacies, thawed breast milk, wipes (the homemade kind that don't make the baby's skin prickle and bleed), bibs, spoons, cereal, fruit puree, extra onesies, and the changing blanket? And if I did remember all that paraphernalia, did I remember to bring the kid?

As they get bigger and develop that persistently annoying skill of communication, the potential for mistakes in all new areas of life becomes a reality. For instance, setting rules and holding kids accountable to them.

First of all, I'm the last person who should be setting rules and expecting anyone to follow them. I am a consummate non-conformist when it comes to following rules, not because I'm purposefully disobedient, but because I have a bad memory. If people around me insist upon setting schedules and routines they expect me to follow without having to remind me about them, they are only setting themselves up for disappointment, and no quantity of gingko biloba is going to change that sad fact.

And discipline, that's a whole 'nother bag of worms! Like most parents, I tend to pride myself on the delusional belief that I am fair. I'll be the first to tell you I am not partial to any of my three children. Each was born with equal capacity for endearment and irritation.

But we all know which one was more likely to hit the other first, and which one talked snotty to the others or wouldn't kiss them goodnight, and which one took something that belonged to the other or wouldn't share, and which one...

You get the point. More than once I've caught myself coming down heavy on an innocent party because I made a false assumption and blamed the wrong kid. In those situations, I've found it important to be the first to recognize my mistake and apologize for it. Yes, the kid I yelled at probably deserved to be yelled at for twenty things I didn't see him do, but he didn't deserve it this time and he requires an apology.

See? That's that "learning from mistakes" thing I was talking about.

And don't think the kids themselves aren't capable of helping you out when you slip up. When she was very young, Our Daughter helped my Father, a self-professed curmudgeon at times, address his behavior when she recognized his temper was shorter than it needed to be. Taking a cue from Blue's Clues, she told him: "Opa, when you're angry, you have to stop, breath, and think."

Perhaps the best advice I've received lately came from the mouth of the German. He was talking about an art class project -- a lovely drawing of a frog sitting on fallen leaves -- and how other kids in the class were growing frustrated when they couldn't get their drawings to come out the way they wanted. He said he pointed out to them how he had drawn his frog too big, so he fixed it by adding another leaf.

"I told them," he said, "when you make a mistake, try to use it to your advantage."

Excellent advice, to be sure, but I'm still trying to figure out how to apply it to my expense report. It was due yesterday and I've only just remembered it.



© 2012 Mark Feggeler

Señor Awesome

So the recent development of a boyfriend for Our Daughter has been an interesting experience.

All these years, people have tried to warn me against the slew of mouth breathers who might come calling after our sweet little girl. But as I do with many potential problems, I decided my best option was to ignore it until I had no other choice than to deal with it. As the saying goes, "Worrying is interest paid on trouble long before it's due."

We had a minor experiment with a boyfriend last year, but that fizzled out before it became anything that required my sitting in a darkened corner sharpening a hunting knife while sneering maliciously at the boy.

The best thing about this latest experience was the slow, and I mean glacial, pace at which those two young'uns meandered their way into their relationship. At first they texted occasionally. My Lovely Wife shrewdly paid attention to the increased quantity of texts between the two and upped our plan to unlimited texting the very month we would have been hit with a $300 bill. (I married a smart lady.) Then they hung out, by which I mean one's shadow never fell without the other being in close enough proximity to keep it from hitting the ground. For two people who officially refuted being in a relationship, they sure liked holding hands and spending every last spare minute together.

By the time they actually acknowledged their boyfriend/girlfriend status to each other, the rest of the civilized world had already begun treating them as such. Their friends, their siblings, their parents, nomadic tribes wandering the African plains -- everyone breathed a sigh of relief at the prospect of no longer having to tiptoe around the subject. They were, at long last, a couple.

But now what to do with them?

Fortunately for us, Our Daughter's choice has left us little, if no, room for quibbling. He's musically talented, which does not reveal much about the quality of his character, but I don't know many people who can easily springboard from guitar, to piano, to clarinet, to saxophone, to harmonica, and back around to mandolin within the span of a week and be more comfortable with each than I am with simple tasks like walking and not wetting myself. It's an impressive gift that somehow doesn't seem to have gone to his head. He's also an excellent student, active in his church, and is exceedingly thoughtful to Our Daughter (probably more so than she deserves!).

Perhaps the greatest impact he's having on our family, other than being the apple of Our Daughter's eye, is his influence on our sons' interest in sports. We've already been to see several of his roller hockey games and the twins are mightily impressed.

How do we know? Because the Italian has spent the past several months honing his roller blading skills, and the German on several occasions has willingly strapped roller blades to his feet and stalked around the driveway like Frankenstein on wheels. The boyfriend even took them out to the local rink this past weekend to help them work on their game in preparation for their first local hockey clinic session later this week. When the German scored a goal, the boyfriend rolled up and hugged him. Think that isn't a big deal? Try getting a decent hug from the German the next time you see him.

The biggest problem I've encountered with the boyfriend so far has been figuring out how to refer to him in this blog. As you might know, I can't simply refer to him by name. That would go against everything this blog stands for, which isn't much, but one must at the very least maintain minimal standards. Then the Italian helped me out.

My Lovely Wife had picked up the boys from school and the Italian asked if the boyfriend would be coming over to visit that afternoon. Apparently, the Italian believes the boyfriend comes to our house just as much to hang out with two ten-year-old boys as he does to spend time with his teenage girlfriend.

"He's awesome," the Italian told his Mother. "I'm going to call him Señor Awesome."

So, to the few of you who regularly peruse this silly little blog, I would like to officially introduce a new character to the cast. Please help me welcome Señor Awesome!



© 2011 Mark Feggeler

Creepy Kid

Our Daughter was only a little thing at the time, maybe two years old at most.

I had picked her up from daycare and brought her home to start the evening routine of bath and dinner before My Lovely Wife returned from her long day at work. Picking her up out of our four-door sedan, I balanced Our Daughter in the crook of one arm and grabbed her dirty daycare clothes with my right hand. Our Dalmation, Pepper, barked happily in the backyard.

"Pepper," Our Daughter said in a sing-song voice.

"Is that Pepper? Do you hear Pepper?" I asked.

"Pepper," she said. "Pepper, Pepper, Pepper, Pepper, Pepper..."

As dusk turned slowly to night, the interior of our small home was cast in shadows not thick enough to leave one groping for the walls but just enough to obscure details in hazy darkness. I passed through the garage, through the kitchen, and into the center of the house where I could unload the dirty clothes in the laundry closet without switching on any lights for fear of losing my grip on the little girl who continued to sing the name of her much adored dog as we advanced.

"Pepper, Pepper, Pepper, Pepper, Pepper," she chimed.

Somewhere in the kitchen, as the ambient light diminished, Our Daughter's soft tones began to morph into something cartoonishly frog-like. A croakiness crept into her throat and her voice dropped an octave. She continued to repeat "Pepper, Pepper, Pepper." By the time we reached the dark, windowless hallway that housed our laundry closet, she no longer sounded anything like my sweet little girl. It sounded instead as if I were carrying a thing possessed, a demon child maniacally calling out for its pet hellhound.

Many thoughts went through my head at that moment -- like how much does an exorcism cost and who do you call to book one. The hair on the back of my neck stood stick straight out over my collar, a tingling sense of panic crept up my spine, and I half expected to see Our Daughter levitate out of my arms with her eyes glowing red. All the while she continued to croak for her dog, "Pepper, Pepper, Pepper..."

I did the only thing any rational adult would do under the circumstances. I dropped the laundry on the floor where I stood, walked through the house turning on every light I could find, and brought Our Daughter into the kitchen to feed her dinner. Thankfully, whatever demon had temporarily possessed her vanished under the glare of the bright lights. That, or demons don't like rice cereal mixed with pureed apples.



© 2011 Mark Feggeler

An Inconvenient Fish

It was a big deal when we brought the twins home from the hospital. Having already survived the first years of parenting a single child, we knew we were in for double trouble and tried our best to be prepared.

First and foremost was ensuring that our 3-year-old daughter did not feel overlooked or pushed aside in all the excitement. After all, she was going from center stage spotlight in a one-woman show to equal billing with two relative unknowns in a loosely scripted performance. We began the assimilation process in the hospital with the sharing of gifts. She gave the boys their very first rattle toys and they each gave her a doll. I'm still astonished at the quality of shopping that can be accomplished from within the womb. For my wife's sake, I hope they were internet purchases.

As we had hoped, Our Daughter instantly became a second mother to her little brothers. Upon their arrival home she desperately wanted to introduce them to their new surroundings and dazzle their two-day-old eyes with the magnificence of her prized possessions. That's when things started to slip sideways.

Months earlier, at the North Carolina State Fair, Our Daughter won a goldfish. I don't have anything against state fair goldfish, unless, of course, they choose to come home with me.

The state fair goldfish is not the most robust creature on God's green earth. Its lifespan is anywhere from a few months on the outside, to a few seconds after the crack-skinny carnie fishes him out of the barrel and ties him up in that little plastic bag. Also, they smell, and not like fish. A fish smelling like fish makes sense to me, regardless of the unpleasantness. But somehow a goldfish creates an odor like no other swimming thing. It hovers in place all day long, eating orange mystery flecks, and trailing impressively long strings of excrement that somehow make an entire room smell like a rotting squirrel in a stagnant pond.

Our Daughter was proud of that smelly state fair goldfish. She named her Dorothy and fed her every day. Dorothy was the very first thing she wanted to share with her new brothers. Unfortunately, even though Dorothy had managed to survive all the way from October 2000 to May 2001, it was the very day we brought the boys home from the hospital that Our Daughter found Dorothy floating belly up in her bowl with bulging eyes and a ghostly white pallor.

Stupid, smelly state fair goldfish.

After consoling her over the loss of Dorothy, we were happy to see Our Daughter regain her composure and focus instead on the greater meaning of the day. Okay, so the fish was dead. There remained an entire house full of wondrous baubles and bangles with which to dazzle her baby brothers, like that bottle of sand art. Perfect! It was shiny and colorful and sparkly and just the kind of treasure any 3-year-old girl adores.

She plucked the bottle off its low shelf, enthusiasm spreading in a wide smile that drew upwards through the tracks of her tears of mourning, and headed down the hallway to show off her prize. Seconds later, our sweet sniffling daughter burst out in peals of ear-shattering cries. The top of the bottle had broken off in her hands, cutting her finger and sending a rainbow shower of fake sand all over the beige hallway carpet.

Sometimes fate seems determined to spoil a special moment.

You might be tempted to think the experiences of that day served as a looming omen of the quality of their future relationships, but young children are far more resilient -- and forgetful -- than most adults. Our Daughter and her brothers are sweetly loving to each other, marred only by brief requisite eruptions of female teenage hormones and tweenage little brother obnoxiousness.




© 2011 Mark Feggeler

The Italian Butt-Slapping Dance

When your kids are little, nudity really isn't anything that concerns you much.

From the time our children were born until the ages of eight or nine, it was nothing to see their bare butts streaking through the house. The fear of being seen by visitors or spotted through the windows by neighbors or passing strangers on the street did not exist. Humility and shame were emotions to be saved for another day.

These tendencies toward random nakedness worried me for a while. It isn't like My Lovely Wife and I are nudists, after all. Speaking for myself, the world is a much better place in which to live for every additional article of clothing I wear. There would be nothing gained from my public nakedness, other than a good chuckle and the possible uptick in sales of sunglasses.

At first, you try not to make a big deal out of their prolific nakedness. You pinch their cheeks when they scoot past you and laugh as they scurry away. But like every other aspect of growing up, there comes a time when something that once was cute begins to get, well, a little creepy.

Our Daughter, being the eldest, reached that point a few years ago. One day she's fluttering like a jaybird through the living room at night with the blinds up and all the lights on, the next day she's holed up in her bedroom with the shades down and the door locked because she's "only" in her underwear. It took us all a little time to adjust to this newfound need for privacy, but I embraced it as a welcome change.

The German never was much of a streaker. Not to say he didn't do his share of running around naked, but it never was for him the same kind of performance art the Italian turned it into. I'm embarrassed to admit how many times our family members were treated to the Italian butt-slapping dance.

As if you needed the mental image, just try to picture a skeletally skinny six-year-old boy jumping out into your living room, pointing his boney little butt in your direction, waving it from side to side and smacking it in rhythym to whatever tune he might be humming. When he was three, it was funny. When he was six, it was mildly distressing. When he was nine, it was time to start wondering whether we needed to prepare for his future by registering the web address "smack my ass dot com."

Somewhere over the last year, however, the performances have disappeared from our daily routine. Only its fluke reappearance the other night called to my attention the fact I hadn't seen it in quite some time. I suppose that should be reasonable assurance he won't end up on YouTube demonstrating the dance to his college fraternity brothers, but I'm reluctant to raise my hopes too high.



© 2011 Mark Feggeler

Drawers For Their Drawers

Our twins are different from each other in almost every way. Hair color, eye color, height, body shape, facial features, personality, favorite foods. You name it, they don't share it.

Even their clothing is unique. The Italian wears mostly blue and the German mostly green. I can't recall exactly why those colors, but it very likely has something to do with the way green goes so beautifully with the German's red hair and green eyes. Blue for the Italian? Well, blue is a good color for boys and green was already taken.

We've never subscribed to the notion of purposefully dressing the boys in matching outfits. Not that it hasn't happened. It has. We simply don't go out of our way to treat our children like life-size dress up dolls. As they age, their tastes in clothing are gradually diverging. For instance, the Italian loves tattered clothes -- the holier the better -- while the German would surely throw away all his torn jeans if we didn't force him to keep a pair for knocking around in.

Several years ago, my Lovely Wife read (or heard, or saw) an interview with older twins who said the one thing that bothered them when they were children was having to share a birthday cake. That year, I made two identical Spider Man birthday cakes. For one pirate-themed party, one cake was a pirate ship and the other a pirate hat. This year we had one big ice cream cake with the Mythbusters logo on it. Hey, nobody's perfect...

Despite our best efforts to ensure each boy is afforded every opportunity to develop his own distinct personality, we have failed miserably in one critically important area. In their closet is a dresser that has a drawer full of community underwear.

There has been no "left side mine/right side yours" practice put in place in the underwear drawer. Britches get pulled willy nilly each day from a single stack, potentially alternating wearers on a regular basis.

As a normally responsible parent, I can justify to myself that it's all in the family, so what's the big deal? But when I consider it from the perspective of someone whose brain has not been warped by years of parenting twins, the skeeve factor of sharing underwear is undeniable. As the youngest of three brothers, I honestly cannot recall being handed a stack of my brothers' old Fruit of the Looms in all the years of hand-me-downs I had to endure. Bell bottom corduroys maybe, but never underwear.

So, what do we do? Do we initiate a discussion about the sanctity of the individual's right to sole ownership of undergarments, or do we let the issue alone until one of them (probably the German) complains?

And if we do separate their drawers into separate drawers, I might go into laundry meltdown. I already can't tell the difference between my wife's and daughter's clothes. How in the heck would I tell the difference between one ten year-old boy's underwear and another's? Check for racing stripes?

I'm open to suggestions, but I wouldn't mind waiting a little while, like until they go to college, to get this issue sorted out.



© 2011 Mark Feggeler