After nine long months, our family has emerged unscathed from the kindergarten experience. Well, I shouldn’t say unscathed because one bad thing has happened. Bridget learned how to read. I know that is not a bad thing on its face. It’s a great thing, actually. We’re very happy with her teachers and how far she has come since September.
But we have to be careful now.
We can’t spell things out. This is a devastating development in our house.
We hit a very important milestone this week. Maria and I moved into a new and exciting economic strata. No, we don’t have a chauffeur. And I didn’t get the golf cart I have always wanted to tool around in. We didn’t even get a high-definition TV.
We have someone who will mow our lawn for us.
I fear for my sanity. Can anyone tell me what I have gotten myself into? I signed up to coach my daughter’s soccer team.
I entered into this fray willingly. I actually ticked off several boxes for volunteer options when I signed Bridget up to play a month or so ago. But it all hit me as I stood at the front of the room with the other coaches earlier this week.
We don’t always get a chance to confront our childhood fears. Thanks to two of my crazy sisters, I will get that opportunity later this year. I’m going to Disney World.
Well, all of us are as part of a small-scale Shea invasion. This is nothing new for my siblings, some of whom go once or twice a year and have planned this particular family jaunt.
I haven’t been to Disney since one summer in the early 1970s when I celebrated a birthday – I either turned 5 or 6, I forget – at the happiest place on earth. My memories are far from happy.
I came home from work the other night and found Maria in the kitchen fixing dinner. Like most nights, I asked her what she was making. This time, she gave me an answer that scared me. “It’s a surprise.”
Uh oh.
Like anyone who has lost a parent, I have gone through all the stages of grief. When we celebrated Christmas recently, I learned how hard the anger stage can really be. I’m not mad at my mother or her doctors or anything like that. I’m just mad at the world.
For the first time in my life, I will have to buy my own Sports Illustrated.
Twas the night before Christmas
And on the driveway
Cornhole players were fueled
By beer and chardonnay
Something happened a couple of weeks ago that made me dance and sing for joy. Unfortunately, it didn’t involve the purchase of a big-screen TV or a certain combination of numbers on a lottery ticket. Still, this was pretty special.
We said goodbye to sippy cups in our house.
When my wife told me 10 days ago that the goldfish had died, things went much differently than the other times we had to deal with this situation. She broke the news to me almost as an afterthought.
“Oh, do you want to tell Dad about the fish?” she said to Bridget one night after dinner.
“No, thanks.” Even in her grief, our little girl never forgot her manners.
My wife asked me a silly question a few weeks ago. A question that bothered me. A question that made me wonder if she had spent the day nipping at the cooking sherry. She asked me what I wanted for Christmas.
I had to look at the calendar to see if I had pulled a Rip van Winkle and slept through all of November. We hadn’t even started to think about Thanksgiving and she wanted me to decide what I wanted for Christmas.
What I really want for Christmas is for people to wait until after Thanksgiving to talk about Christmas presents.