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Friday Evening

Friday 26 March 2021

The Boy has decided he needs to do more conditioning to improve his soccer game. Tonight, he ran a series of interval training exercises that we kind of made up as we went along. Then he decided he wanted to make up his own.

He struggles a bit this year in soccer. He’s one of the youngest on the team, and as a result, he’s less aggressive/experienced than others and a bit slower than many of them. To his credit, he’s not giving up, though he wanted to at first. The thing is, he actually likes playing soccer, and that makes all the difference.

In the evening, I took the dog for a walk and discovered our neighbor had started his weekend backyard fires. Perhaps I’ll go over for a visit tomorrow night.

Games

Saturday 20 March 2021

The Boy had two soccer games today. His team won them both, but the second game was a real bruiser. The kids on the other team were much more aggressive than any other kids we’ve encountered. Fouls don’t occur in eight-year-old soccer, but these kids fouled. They pushed and shoved, getting very physical in almost all aspects of the game. Still, our boys managed to pull out a 3-1 win.

E didn’t play for most of the game, though. He went in for about the last three minutes of the second half. My understanding was that the coach let the bench decide: leave the kids in who were doing well or get subbed in. They decided to let the kids who were already doing so well continue doing so.

The Girl is with K outside of Atlanta for a volleyball tournament. Their team won the first two matches they played but lost the final match. They took one set, though, so that’s always some little bit of compensation.

Finally, the Boy played a little guitar tonight. He’s decided it’s time to get serious about his playing, so I printed him out a simple chord chart, and off we went.

First Spring Sunday 2021

Sunday 14 March 2021

We are creatures of habit and ritual, and I am a blogger of habit and ritual for constantly pointing that out. But sometimes rituals fall away, replaced by others as we outgrow them or simply lose interest in them.

Exploring up the creek, trying to catch minnows, talking about snakes and snapping turtles — these used to be nearly daily events in the spring and summer. Last year, though, the Boy and I didn’t go out to the creek all that often.

But once we establish rituals, they seem to bubble up again from seemingly nowhere. Today, with his friend N over for a visit, the Boy regained his interest in the creek.

They caught minnows and crawdads, talked about the possibility of seeing a snake, discussed where the snapping turtles might be.

And spent a lot of time looking into the net to see what they’d scooped up.

 

A lot of time looking into the net.

Soccer

Saturday 6 March 2021

Today I got to watch E play soccer for CESA (Carolina Elite Soccer Academy) for the first time. His first game was a couple of weeks ago, but L and I were in Knoxville for a volleyball tournament. Last week’s game got rained out, so this was the first time I got to watch him play.

In the first half, he played for about half the time as a defensive player. He was a little less aggressive than some of the other boys, but he soon gained some confidence and went after the ball.

In the second half, the coach put him in as an offensive player. He had one break and pulled back for some odd reason, turning to look (or so it seemed to me) to see if he had any backup. But he was alone, and ahead of all the defenders.

I meant to talk to him about what happened, but we never did.

Forbidden Island

Saturday 28 November 2020

Out of the blue this evening, the kids decided they wanted to play Forbidden Island. At least that’s how I understood it by the time they made it down to the livingroom with the game. I’d wager it was more L’s initiative than the Boy’s, but they were both excited about it when they came down.

I was less excited. About playing the game, that is. I don’t understand the game. It just seems to be a bunch of randomness pawned off as a prize-winning game. “How many drugs did they do before coming up with the arbitrary rules that make up that game?” I laughed with K once the Boy was in bed and the Girl had retreated to her friends on Facetime.

But none of that really mattered — here we were spending time together without any fussing, without any arguments. The kids are at a tough age: E is young enough to derive joy from irritating people and the Girl is not quite old enough to be patient with it all. These moments, while increasing in frequency as the kids grow up, still feel relatively rare some days. So we make the most of them when they are here.

Family Game

Murder Mystery

Sunday 22 November 2020

E and I were heading back down the driveway Wednesday night after taking the garbage cans out to the side of the room for morning pickup when we heard the most awful screaming coming from the woods behind our neighbor’s house. We thought it might be a cat fight, but it quickly became clear that it was only one animal screeching. I remembered when Clover encountered a raccoon on the other side of the fence this summer and the sounds it was making, and I told E, “It’s most likely a raccoon.”

Clearing out the leaves to improve water flow

Today, we decided to go out for a little adventuring in the creek behind our house. We hadn’t been for quite some time. I guess we just overdid it this summer, and the Boy was just tired of it. Still, today I talked him into it. We didn’t get very far before we found out what happened to the raccoon:

“There’s a dead raccoon in the creek!” E exclaimed with a mix of fascination and disgust in his voice. We talked about what could have killed it. “We’ve seen blue herons in the creek, but I don’t think one of them would attack a raccoon,” he reasoned.

“No, they’re not going to do anything like that, especially at night,” I confirmed.

“Perhaps it was a … ” His voice trailed off. He really didn’t know what to think. “It’s the second one we’ve found,” he recalled, and then remembered what we’d reasoned about that raccoon: “Maybe it was a copperhead! Or maybe a snapping turtle.”

“I don’t think it would be either of them,” I explained. “They’re both cold-blooded, and it’s cold these days. They’ll be tucked away somewhere hibernating.”

“But Dad, we’re wearing shorts today — it’s not that cold.”

Warship

Monday 16 November 2020

I was reading The Power Worshippers: Inside the Dangerous Rise of Religious Nationalism this evening, a frightening look at some Evangelicals’ attempt (and often more than just an attempt) to inject religion into government; K was working on documents for a listing she’s preparing; L was Facetiming a friend; E was drawing and writing a story about clowns. I realized it was seven already and I hadn’t done much of anything with the kids other than talk to them at dinner. I headed to E’s room and suggested we play with Legos.

“Yes!”

We’ve built a number of things with blocks over the years. A church. A school. A prison. Multiple boats. Countless wheeled vehicles. A bridge. A few houses.

Today, we took the remnants of the bridge, destroyed part of a prison watchtower, and broke apart the remains of some cars and other nonsense to create a battleship. The ultimate battleship. Complete with gigantic booms coming off the side that can smash any vessel that comes too close, a number of guns, fore and aft, that could take out a small armada, and a newly-invented weapon:

The head canon — a forward-leaning Lego man whose head can be launched at will toward any enemy.

Sunday in the Fall

Sunday 8 November 2020

A perfect Sunday.

We had a lovely morning breakfast.

The Boy got a new bike.

A couple of friends came over for a bonfire.

Election 2020

Tuesday 3 November 2020

Our first task of the day: voting. We didn’t want to head out and wait in the lines like everyone else in the morning, but would there even be lines? The last election, K was there before seven and waited over an hour.

“We’ll wait until about 10 and then check the lines.”

At ten, the Boy decided we should make a fire, so K went to check on the situation and came back a little over a half an hour later saying she’d voted.

“There’s a line outside,” she said, “and a bit of a line inside, but it looks longer than it is because of social distancing.”

So I went ahead and drove up to the Methodist church that is our polling location and was done within a few minutes.

I voted for Biden, knowing very well that my vote wouldn’t count in the grand scheme of things because South Carolina is solidly Evangelical, which these days means solidly behind Trump. Noah Lugeons said a few months ago that the right and the religious right have become one and the same, and that’s particularly true here in South Carolina. It makes me wonder, though: how many people don’t go out and vote for the Democratic candidate they want in office because they know they live in a solidly red state? Isn’t that some sort of not-so-subtle mental voter disenfranchisement?

Still, my disgust with the Republican party at this point is so complete that I’ve joked I would vote for Satan himself if he were running against the GOP. In the eyes of my neighbors and some friends, I did indeed vote for Satan, but since I don’t believe in him anyway, it’s just a rhetorical flourish.

The afternoon includes a game of Monopoly. I really dislike that game, but I really like spending time with our kids, so I agree to play it. (Isn’t that the case with most adults? Who over the age of fourteen or fifteen really likes this game?)

For the Boy, it can be an up-and-down experience, this game. At the beginning, he’s so very excited about playing. When I agreed to play, he was literally bouncing around the kitchen in joy.

And it’s great fun for everyone for a while. And then we start getting property, and E, with his own little quirky tactical sense, refuses to buy anything other than the utilities and the railroads, so fairly quickly, he’s behind in development. So when he lands on my property and has to pay $650 because I’ve built it up quickly, it creates a breakdown.

And when he lands on free parking, he can hardly stand it. In the end, I surrendered like I always do: just when it’s clear that I’m going to be wiped out if I keep playing, I give all my property and money to the Boy, who is usually quite low on cash as well, and hope for the best. L, though, has good strategic sense, and she quickly dominates the board and the Boy.

The rest of the day is filled with trampoline jumping, a bike ride, and games of Sorry and Candyland. And the election? As far from our thoughts as possible.

Together

Sunday 27 September 2020

It used to happen more often: the kids and I would play something together and for a while, everything else disappeared. It’s been a long time since that’s happened. This afternoon, we had a little reminder of what that was like.

As the Girl gets older, she’s less and less interested in the things the Boy loves. He can’t handle the ever-decreasing attention and resorts to the old tried-and-true method of getting attention: he pesters her.

“That just makes her want to spend even less time with you, buddy,” I’ve explained more times than I can recall.

“Okay,” he grudgingly admits. And then heads off to pester her again.

Today, though, we went down to the trampoline/swing/hammock area and managed to play like we were all five years old again. There was laugher. There was silliness.

And then we came up to get dinner ready, and it all disappeared.

“E!” cried L, stretching his name into a three-second yell. “Leave me alone!” He was at it again.

Tuesday Playing

Tuesday 15 September 2020

K and the Boy spent some time rolling around the neighborhood this evening after dinner. One of the countless things I love about K is her own love of childhood joys.

She was on E’s scooter, having the time of her life it appeared.

Afterward, we played a bit of soccer.

The Girl was at volleyball practice, so we had to do something to entertain ourselves.

And of course, we had to have a little down time once it was all said and done.

Rainy Monday

Monday 14 September 2020

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Family Sports

Thursday 13 August 2020

“Can we play some family sports tonight?” the Boy asked during dinner. He’s always interested in doing something as a family: a family bike ride, a family film, a game of family soccer. But our busy lives (busy even in this time of pandemic) being what they are, it’s rare that we get to play together. Tonight, for example, K had to write an offer on a house for one of her clients, and that takes a fair amount of time. So I went out with the kids and the dog and played some soccer and volleyball with them.

Tonight, the Boy learned a lesson during the game. He’d been bragging to L, insisting that he was a much better soccer player than she. Had the Boy developed fully the critical thinking skills a thirteen-year-old has, he would have looked at relative size, relative experience, and relative speed and thought, “It’s unlikely I’m much better than she.”

Then again, I’ve had plenty of thirteen-year-olds challenge me to chess, swear their going to beat me badly, and then ask as soon as the board is set up, “So, how do you play?” that a thirteen-year-old’s critical thinking skills can be less than ideal.

So they played. E lost. E fussed. I encouraged. And in the end, instead of giving up, he kept trying, kept attacking, and made some really good plays in the end.

More Hearts

Monday 3 August 2020

Papa won, hence the “heart attack.”

Hearts

Sunday 2 August 2020

K and I played a three-handed game of hearts with the Girl tonight. We wanted to watch a movie, but L was not in the mood. “She’ll play a card game,” I thought, and bounded up to her room to suggest it.

I like throwing down the queen of spades on unsuspecting players, and I usually keep her in my hand. L did poorly on the first hand, and so for the second hand, I wanted to make sure she didn’t get the queen. I almost ended up with it myself as a result.

But I did manage to do something that has crossed my mind a few times, but I never did: announce to everyone I had the queen. I began the hand with 7 spades; K gave me the ace, king, and queen of spades. But I had not a single diamond. At one point, I even lead with spades to get the hand to someone else, waiting for the first person to lead with diamonds. It was K. I laid it on her.

In the end, I gave her the queen probably four or five times. When we finished, she said, “Well, pack up your stuff to sleep on the couch.”

L thought it was uproariously amusing. And I think that was what it was all about. Next time, I’ll have to fall on the sword a number of times — it should amuse L even more, and K, too.