Now my heart is full

It doesn't matter if you're unfamiliar with this song by Morrissey. You only need to know the feeling it evokes.

It's the feeling every parent gets when their kids are with them and happy and all is right. You get it on the day they're born. You get it when they're little and in their jammies and you're snuggled up watching Disney movies together. You get it when they're a little older and you start having conversations together about important things. Adult things.

And you get it when they're mostly grown-up and it's Thanksgiving and they're all home and that never happens.

My driveway is as full as my heart today because all of the kids are home at the same time. This, you begin to realize in the teenage years, is an increasingly rare occurrence. It is the way of life that they're going to start spending more time away from home than in it, and that's a good thing. That's the way it should be.

But you miss the jammie-wearing, Disney-watching days. And while you'll never get them back, having them clogging up the driveway, sitting in the kitchen and laughing while they eat pizza together as young adults is the next best thing.

Suddnely you understand a gratitude you hadn't known before. It brings a deeper meaning to Thanksgiving.

And now my heart is full. I hope yours is, too.

An October roller coaster of emotions

This is a long post. Absurdly long. You don't have to read it. Really, you don't. I just had a lot to say, is all. If you want to read it, go ahead. I just felt I should warn you...


Bill Cosby began what is, for my money, one of his funniest stand-up comedy routines many years ago by saying, "I must tell you about my problems driving around San Francisco..."

Of course, there was nothing "must" about it. He wanted to tell you about those problems, and you wanted to listen because you knew it was going to be funny. Or at least you wanted to be nice to Bill, back when he seemed like a person to whom you should be nice.

In the same way, I must tell you about the emotionally exhausting ordeal that has been my October 2016 to this point. I don't "have" to tell you about it, but I want to tell you about it, and I thank you so much for listening. Or reading, I guess.

Sports, kids, and painful nutshots

If you're someone who indulges me on Facebook, you know that most of my posts these days have something to do with my kids' sports activities. The youngest three are all in the latter stages of their soccer seasons, and of course Jared, my 18-year-old, is also serving as the kicker for my beloved Wickliffe Blue Devils football team.

There are highs and lows when you're the parent of an athlete. You rejoice when they succeed, you agonize when they fall a little short, and you cry inside when they have a difficult time or seem to be losing their enjoyment of the sport, for whatever reason.

Jack, who is 10, is playing his first season of travel soccer. He's a defender, and his team is very good. Very, very good, actually. Jack has had periods when he plays every minute of every game, and other times when he sits the bench. This level of soccer is new to him, and while he has mostly adapted well, there are still things for him to learn. His coach, Arturo, is tough but fair. You earn your spot and you work to keep it. That's the way life goes, and I don't think 10 years old is too early to learn the lesson.

Melanie is a sophomore in high school, and statistically she has had a tougher time this year than she did as a freshman. She's a forward, so Mel measures herself by statistical output: Goals and assists. As of this writing she has one of each. Last season she had something like seven goals and two assists. The fact is, the talent level on her team has risen noticeably this year, and playing time is harder to come by. Again, you get it by earning it.

Virtually no soccer player I've coached or watched over the past 15 years works harder than Melanie. She's the soccer equivalent of a hockey grinder: Someone who goes out there and fights for loose balls, bangs bodies and plays physically when needed, and consistently puts her head down and does the dirty work in front of the goal. Those are the types of things that help teams win, even if they don't always show up on the stat sheet.

Mel is going through a crisis of faith these days. She's a bit disillusioned by her position in the team hierarchy, and she doesn't see much room for upward movement in the next two seasons. My advice to her is simple: Keep doing what you're doing. Work on every facet of your game: Ball control, first touches, decision making, speed, conditioning, etc. Be the hardest working player on the field. The rest will take care of itself.

Not a bad lesson there, eh?

And then there's my boy, Jared. He's one of two boys I have, of course, but for a long time before Jack came along, I simply referred to him as The Boy. And let me tell you, that boy is one busy dude these days.

He's a starting forward on the boys high school soccer team, and the team's second-leading scorer. He does the kicking thing in football, of course, and he also puts on his saxophone and plays (while still in his football uniform) at halftime on Friday nights. Every day is another practice or game, or a combination of all of the above.

He is nearing the end of a football career that began three years ago, but more importantly, of a soccer career that began when he was a fuzzy-headed, six-year-old kindergartner. That's how it is when you're a senior in high school: You do something for years and years and work so hard to get better at it, and then suddenly it's over. Unless you're one of the handful of people who go on to play at the collegiate level, you're done. Just like that. Done.

This realization is coming quickly for Jared. It will all hit him in 3-4 weeks when his fall activities end without the promise of a next year. Part of him will be relieved, I'm sure, as the grind of fall sports and band starts to wear on him noticeably after a while. But part of him will grieve, no doubt in that silent, I've-got-this, keep-it-to-yourself manner of Jared.

And if I'm being honest, I will grieve right along with him. I love watching him play. Just love it. I love watching all of my kids play, but you only get the Senior Experience once, and it has been wonderful. He plays some sort of key role in everything he does, and I couldn't be more proud of him.

But the rest of Jared's life is calling to him, urging him to move on from where he is now and to experience new adventures. I'm excited for him, but I'm going to be so sad when this all comes to a screeching halt in November.

Oh, but you know what I won't miss? Jared taking hard-hit soccer balls to his testicles. Seriously, this happens to him at least once a season. He'll be going about his business playing the game, and someone on the other team will inadvertently launch a rocket shot that will absolutely destroy his Man Region. Jared goes down, he gets tended to by a snickering coach or trainer, both teams on the field laugh while trying to seem like they're not, Jared gets up and hobbles off, and he comes back later in more or less decent shape.

This has happened so many times that I can't imagine watching him go through it again. Maybe it's just as well this soccer thing is about to end.

As for football? Well, Jared has settled into a nice routine every game of executing a series of pooch kickoffs and converting extra points. He had some trouble on the extra points earlier this season, but now he has rounded into form, and the team itself is 6-2 and on its way to its best record in 15+ years. And there may be playoff football in our future, which is stunning.

So I start thinking about whether Jared will be called on to decide one of those playoff games. He hasn't kicked a single field goal in three years of varsity football. Not one. Twice he has lined up to attempt field goal kicks, and both times they were blocked.

What if they send him out there to decide a game with a 35-yard field goal in the final seconds of the fourth quarter? Physically I know he can do it (easily, actually), but mentally, how will he handle it? How will I handle it, for crying out loud?

I'll tell you how I'll handle it: by fainting. Seriously, I'll just pass out on the spot. I'll never see whether the kick is successful or not, because I'll be laid out flat on the bleachers while everyone else is watching nervously.

I'm tough that way.

Saint Terry: The Savior of Our Lives

I am married, as it turns out, to one of the most amazing people on the planet. I've said this before, and if you know her then you know the truth of my words. She is a whirlwind of ability, empathy, laughter and grit. She keeps six of us going every day while maintaining a house that has somehow not fallen down around us in the 13 years we've lived there.

She is, in short, the most remarkable person I've ever met. By a longshot. No disrespect to you or me or anything, but we simply don't come close to her on the Awesomeness Scale.

Which is why her recent emotional struggles have come as a bit of a shock.

When I say "emotional struggles," I don't mean she's going nuts or anything. I just mean that even the mighty Terry has reached the limits of her endurance at a time of year when she is constantly being called on to drive a kid to practice, mend a band uniform, clean up a mess someone else has made, or tend to a very sick cat (more on that in a bit).

Some people can handle more than others. Terry's threshold for work and responsibility is high, but it is not infinite. And over the past several weeks, we've finally reached it.

Which is why I've been on the kids and on myself to step up our games. It never should have gotten to this point in the first place. The family, as a whole, allowed itself to grow entirely too dependent on Mom. That's not good for her, and it's certainly not good for them. You raise independent, resourceful adults by forcing them to be independent and resourceful kids.

We're working on it. Some are better than others, but I'm confident we'll all get there.

In the meantime, Mom has applied for a job for the first time in nearly 20 years. I won't get into the details here, but suffice it to say that she has an interview in a few days, and I know she'll do great. Because that's who she is. If and when she gets the position, even though it's only part time, we're all going to have to adjust and fend for ourselves a little bit more.

This is, by all accounts, a good thing.

Yeah, he was just a cat, but...

A few hours ago, before I had the chance sit down and eat my lunch as I type out this post, I took our cat Bert to the vet and had him euthanized.

That's the medical term they use for it, of course: "euthanized."

What it means, in reality, is that I allowed the doctor to inject a lethal substance into his veins that almost instantly ended the life of the beautiful mess that was Bert.

That phrase "beautiful mess" came from our friend Kelly Gabriel, and I love it. They are the two words that best encapsulate the Bert ethos.

My oldest daughter, Elissa, found Bert sick, cold and alone on Eddy Road one winter evening a few years ago. She called Terry, and they took this smelly, bedraggled creature home. A long bath, a warm bed and several bowls of cat food later, he joined our household as Cat #4 (there would later be five).

We don't know where Bert came from, but it was always clear that his ordeal had left him permanently shy of 100% health. He was fat, he walked with a limping waddle, and one eye appeared to be semi-functional, at best. But he was so, so lovable. He enjoyed being petted. He enjoyed being fed. He enjoyed sleeping in sunbeams.

And best of all, he seemed to enjoy being part of our family.

Not long ago, it became clear that something was wrong. First it was an infection in his mouth. Then it was clear he wasn't eating or drinking much. We quickly discovered that he couldn't eat or drink much, because something was wrong with his tongue. It stuck out sideways, and he couldn't coordinate it with his mouth and jaw to draw in needed food and water.

There was something neurological going on with Bert, though we honestly never paid the vast sums it would have taken to determine exactly what. A brain tumor? A stroke? Something else? Who knows? What was obvious was that Saint Terry, who made it her personal mission to care for Bert every day despite the fact that he couldn't clean himself and quickly became repulsive and smelly, couldn't hand feed this increasingly emaciated feline every day for the rest of his life.

And so the decision was made to put him down. I took him in because there was no way Terry should have had to do that herself. She had already done more than her fair share. The vet, Dr. Richman, was so incredibly kind and empathetic. It was almost as if it pained him more to put Bert to sleep than it did for us to agree to let it happen.

The process itself, if you haven't been through it, is quick and almost painless for the animal. Bert was gone before they even finished fully injecting him with whatever it is they use for this sort of thing. His eyes didn't close. They were just kind of half open. But the life that had been in them moments earlier was obviously gone. It was his body, but it wasn't Bert.

I teared up a little, and not just for Bert. My heart hurts for him, but it hurts even more for the people in my house who loved him. They're dealing with this in different ways, so if you're a praying person, I would appreciate it if you said a few words for them this week.

Which I know sounds silly to those who don't own pets. I realize he was just a cat, but to say that is to deny the reality that Bert was also a presence in our house. He was a personality with whom all of us dealt, just as surely as we deal with each other every day.

And now he's gone. And he's never coming back. The dynamic in our home changes just a little. Among the remaining four cats, it changes a lot.

Ginny, our little semi-kitten, loved Bert. She slept virtually on top of him, helped him clean himself, tagged along sometimes when he walked around the house, and clearly preferred spending time with him more than any of us. It was cute.

Then Bert got sick. And Ginny's tune changed quickly. She avoided Bert. Even hissed at him. A few times in the last week or two, I would see her sneak up on Bert to sniff him. She would get close and take in a good whiff, and quickly recoil.

But you can't blame her. This was nature at work. Pure instinct. Bert had the smell of death about him, and animals avoid death. It's how they're programmed. What had been a loving relationship, at least the way we saw it, quickly became avoidance. Fickle little Ginny moved on to Charlie as her cat buddy. Together I'm sure they'll continue terrorizing the white cats, brothers Fred and George.

And they'll do it without the help of Bert. I don't know how cats' memories work, but I wonder if there will always be a little bit of him in Ginny's mind. I wonder if she'll miss him. Maybe not.

We sure will.

In the end, an October to remember

I have a meeting to get to, so I need to finish lunch and stop typing. But I can't leave without mentioning my Cleveland Indians, who in a few hours will play for the right to advance to the World Series for the first time since 1997.

The year 2016 has been a magical ride for those of us who call ourselves Cleveland sports fans. We endured a comically long period of athletic ineptitude in this town that ended abruptly in one 10-day stretch this past June when the Lake Erie Monsters won the American Hockey League's Calder Cup, and their Quicken Loans Arena roommates the Cleveland Cavaliers captured their first NBA title shortly thereafter.

I had seen so much losing in my lifetime that you would think I would still be on Cloud Nine over these championships.

But in a very real way, I'm not.

And I'll be the first to admit the reason is silly and childish. I never fully embraced or celebrated either title because I wasn't here to see them. I was in Europe for both. When the Monsters won the Cup with a dramatic 1-0 Game 4 victory over Hershey, it was Terry and Jared who sat in our season ticket seats and rejoiced. I was in a hotel room in London on a business trip.

And when the Cavs completed their incredible comeback series win over the Golden State Warriors, I woke up to the news in Barcelona.

That wasn't how it was supposed to happen. It just wasn't. I was supposed to be there with Jared when the Monsters won, and I was supposed to be watching with Jared in our living room when the Cavs finished off the Warriors.

But I wasn't. Best laid plans and all that sort of thing, I suppose.

Again, I know this is stupid, and that I really should be happy for Terry and Jared that they got to witness what they did. I just struggle with it. My dumb little cross to bear.

Enter the 2016 Cleveland Indians.

The Indians were the first sports team with which I fell in love (a statement I realize makes almost no sense to someone who isn't a sports fan). Specifically, it was the 1979 Cleveland Indians. They were a mediocre team that won as much as they lost, finishing in their customary sixth place in the American League's East Division.

But they were my team. The first time I had ever had a "my team." I followed those guys every day in in the paper and on TV. Toby Harrah, Duane Kuiper, Andre Thornton, Bobby Bonds, Mike Hargrove, Wayne Garland. Names that mean almost nothing to most people now, but that meant a lot to me as a 10-year-old fan.

The Tribe has been to the World Series twice in my lifetime, losing in 1995 to the Atlanta Braves and (painfully, unbelievably) in 1997 to the Florida Marlins.

And now they're almost back. One more win and they play for the title, preferably against the Chicago Cubs because that sort of perennial loser vs. perennial loser story is too good for the journalist in me to pass up.

I've been staying up late to watch the Indians games with Jared and paying the price the next day in the form of bloodshot eyes and a stuffy nose. I need more rest, but I won't get it until the playoffs are over.

Hopefully they end with the Indians celebrating yet another Cleveland sports championship. As the guy said on TNT the moment the Cavs won their title, "Cleveland is a city of champions once again!" Unreal.

I want the Indians to win because I want the Indians to win, of course. But selfishly again, I want them to win so I can jump up and down with Jared and hug him and think of my dad and probably start crying.

I cry easily these days. I cry thinking about people who are gone (my dad, my sister), pets we've loved, my kids, my sports teams, etc. Only some of those things are truly worthy of tears, but there you have it.

I am, in the end, a nearly-47-year-old suburban father of five doing my best. And I realize my dad was much the same before me.

So it goes. So it has always gone. So it always will be.

A man's got to know his limitations

Harry Callahan was right. Here are mine:

• If you're giving me directions, do not refer to points on the compass unless I'm traveling on a well-marked interstate. Otherwise, you're better off telling me something like, "Now when you get to the Dairy Queen that kind of looks like the Mos Eisley spaceport in 'Star Wars,' you're gonna want to take a left. You'll know you've gone too far if you come to the billboard for Swanson TV dinners." Those reference points I can relate to much better than north, south, east or west.
  
• Does the job involve hammering and/or basic operation of a screwdriver? Fine, I can do it. Are power tools and/or measuring in the mix? In that case, please see my wife.
  
• Cutting the grass? Yes, I'm a virtuoso. Landscaping of any sort? Yeahhhh, let's call a professional.
  
• I can sing the melody. I cannot sing harmony. I long ago accepted this fact.
  
• Athletically speaking, I'm all about running and jumping. Once you start throwing hand-eye coordination into the mix, you're going to want to pick someone else for your team...unless we're talking about hitting a slow-pitched softball, in which case I'm probably your guy.
  
• Writing? Yes. Editing? Absolutely. Grammar question? Most likely. Drawing and/or general design? Next, please.
  
• Would you like me to dance? Fine, but the music must be limited to an 80s power ballad for which homecoming-type, rock-back-and-forth slow dancing is acceptable. There is no foxtrotting and/or Lambada-ing coming from this guy, let me tell you.
  
• I'm very good at tedious, long-distance car trips. I can be in that driver's seat for 12 hours and still be raring to go. But if at the end of the trip you ask me to parallel park on a busy street, I will melt right before your eyes. Really, my body will turn to liquid and I will enter another state of being that prevents me from even attempting to wedge the vehicle into that tiny space. A similar phenomenon occurs if you ask me to drive a stick-shift.
  
• I will sit spellbound for an hour listening to Mahler. I will not do the same for Merle Haggard. I'm also ready on a moment's notice for an all-day session of M*A*S*H* binge-watching, but I cannot abide more than seven consecutive minutes of almost any CBS sitcom, "The Big Bang Theory" excepted.
  
• Roller coaster? Sure, I'll come along if you'd like. Spinny ride? Sure, I'll puke on you if that's what you're looking for.
  
• I max out at roughly one beer or one glass of wine. Beyond that there's trouble. As for hard liquor, my preferred maximum there would be zero.

I like hearing my kids' names announced over public address systems

We've entered the fall sports season, which in my house means a whole lotta soccer and a weekly dose of high school football.

It also means driving hither and yon – though I continue to have no idea where "Yon" is – to various schools and parks, sitting on the sidelines and cheering my offspring on, sometimes to victory, sometimes not.

When you're in the middle of it, it seems like the season will never end. There's always another game on the schedule, sometimes two at once, in which case Terry and I will oftentimes employ a divide-and-conquer strategy.

But then comes late October and suddenly it does end. The air gets colder, the leaves go away, and you realize how fast it really went.

Which is why I'm trying to enjoy every second of the season that has just begun.

It started out in a bit of a rocky fashion this past week for my three middle kids, all of whom injured themselves in their first soccer games of the season. For Melanie it was a broken wrist that resulted in a cast, though she'll be off the field for far less time than we originally thought. For Jack it was an injured toe – a toe he had already injured once or twice before. And for Jared it was a ball to the face that resulted in cuts to his mouth and a momentary loss of consciousness.

Soccer is not for the faint of heart, no matter what anybody tells you.

I love soccer. I coached it for more than a decade, and all five of my children have played it to one degree or another. Our house has been full of shin guards and soccer socks and deflated soccer balls for several years now. I'll be so sad when our time with the sport finally comes to an end.

Honestly, though, it's football that excites me most. As I've chronicled here before, Jared serves as the kicker for my beloved Wickliffe High School Blue Devils. He's entering his third and final season in that role, and his second as the full-time placekicker (as a sophomore he was a kickoff specialist, which honestly isn't something you see a whole lot of on a Division V football team).

As is now common at the high school level, Jared is not a full-time football player. His "day job" is soccer, and he plays that at the varsity level for Wickliffe. But on Friday nights he puts on the shoulder pads and kicks the oblong spheroid.

He's not on the field most of the time, but when he is, he tends to be the center of attention. Not because he's a superstar or anything, but because the kicker figures prominently in special teams play.

As such, Jared's name is announced several times over the course of a game, whether he's setting up for a kickoff or stepping onto the field to attempt an extra point. That's just the way it is. Kickers, even part-timers, get mentioned by the PA guy every time they're in the game.

And I love it. I'm not going to lie to you, I love it. We're only in Week #1 of the 2016 football season, and already I know how much I'm going to miss hearing, "Teeing up the ball for Wickliffe, number 19 Jared Tennant."

Most people in the stands don't even notice it, but I do. Because that's my boy. That's my son. I realize he's only the kicker, and the guys who are out there play after play work far harder than he does. But that's my boy, and there is only this little sliver of time when he's going to play on the same field I played on, and his name is going to be announced for anyone who cares to hear it.

He's a senior now, which means that come November, those days will end. I hear it from parents of former high school running backs and quarterbacks all the time. They dearly miss hearing the PA announcer intone, "<INSERT NAME HERE> the ball carrier."

So I'm trying to enjoy every minute of it that remains. And I'm doing the same in soccer, where I get to hear Jared's and Melanie's names announced all the time, whether they're starting the game or coming in as substitutes. I particularly like how Wickliffe teacher and alumnus Jim Fatica, who announces our girls soccer games, says, "For Wickliffe...Number 7....Melanie Tennant."

Anyway, yeah, I should be telling you how much I love the thrill of competition and the lessons my kids are learning from sports. And I do. But I wouldn't be honest with you if I didn't admit how much I enjoy hearing Jared's name announced for another kick.

By the way, the Blue Devils begin the 2016 football season this Friday, August 26, at home against the Longhorns of Lutheran West High School. Kickoff – potentially off the foot of my 18-year-old – is at 7 p.m. at Wickliffe Memorial Stadium.

Number 19, Jared Tennant, and all of the other seniors on the roster begin their farewell tour. And I don't plan to miss a second of it.

On grad school, blogging and Cleveland sports championships

Hello. It's nice to see you again. It hasn't really been that long (a little more than three months), but I feel like we haven't talked in forever.

The following things have happened since March 25th, the date of this blog's last post:

• I started school and completed classes in public relations theory & ethics, and public relations management.
• I decided to quit school.
• I went to Europe, and over the 10 days I was there, two of the sports teams that I support passionately won championships. (NOTE: I puzzled a bit over how to construct that sentence. In the event, it almost seems as if "passionately" describes the way those teams won their championships. And I'm sure they were passionate. What I meant, though, is that those are teams I passionately support.)
• I came back from Europe, and now I'm on vacation in Delaware.

To that last point, I'm sitting with my laptop on the patio of our rental condo in Bethany Beach, Delaware. It's nearly 80 degrees at 9 in the morning and very humid, but I love being outside, drinking my coffee, and doing a little writing.

That is, after all, the point of vacation, right? You do things you love, and maybe do them with people you love. I get to do both this week.

We'll be going to the beach, of course, and there's a nice pool right outside of our condo. I am not, it has been documented, much of a water sports guy. But I'm going to be in my bathing suit every day because I think in recent years I've somehow gotten away from being Fun Dad.

When the kids were little, I think I was Fun Dad. I did all sorts of Fun Dad things, from swimming with them to playing kickball with them to riding bikes and whatever.

Then, for reasons I can't quite identify, I got away from being Fun Dad. I became Serious Stressed Dad. Not good. Yeah, work got more intense, and I stupidly added the graduate school thing, but there really are no excuses. I feel like I have lost time to make up for. Maybe this vacation is a start.

As for the grad school thing, what can I say? I tried it, and I loved it. Or at least, I loved the material. And the writing. And even the heavy academic journal reading. But the time it took? I hated that. I hated that with a passion.

So I weighed my options, and on balance it seemed best to just walk away. And I have. Yesterday I completed my final class assignment, and I have no plans to return to the program any time soon.

Everyone tells you, "Oh, don't worry, you'll find time for it someday." And maybe I will. But for now I'm at peace with the decision to hang it up.

Because I really just need to live life, you know? I need to spend time with my family. I need to sit and think. Sit and read. Sit and...do nothing sometimes, I guess. I hardly ever do any of those things, but now is the time to get back to them.

I am one of those people who always feels the need to fill up any Time Vacuum that exists in my life. I quit doing this? Great! I can start doing that! Only recently has it occurred to me that you don't have to do "that." You're allowed to have stretches of free time in which you just live and breathe and grow and be.

So that's what I promise to start doing. Which is why I'm not going to bring this blog back on any regular basis. I'll occasionally dash off a post or two, but I'm not doing the three-days-a-week thing or whatever. I hope you'll still come back to read my very sporadic missives, because I so appreciate it when you do.

Finally, the sports championships...I don't know what to say, because this is entirely new territory for me and for every person over the last 50-plus years who has supported a Cleveland-based professional athletic team. With the exception of the old indoor soccer Cleveland Crunch, none of those teams had won a title since 1964 until my beloved Lake Erie Monsters and Cleveland Cavaliers did it a week or so apart recently.

And I was on another continent for both title-clinching games. The Monsters won the American Hockey League's Calder Cup while I slept peacefully in a London hotel, while the Cavs miraculously came back from a 3-1 series deficit to beat the vaunted Golden State Warriors while Elissa, Chloe and I were snoozing in Barcelona.

As a Cleveland sports fan of my generation, you defined yourself by resiliency. That's all we had was next year. We came back again and again, and usually the reward was just more misery. And now...we won. My teams are the best. I would write more about this, but I can't even grasp what it means. Maybe there's another post in me at some point in the future once I come to terms with the whole thing. It's just stunning.

Suffice it to say, this is a weird and delightfully wacky time in my life, and in the life of the whole Tennant family. We're on summer break, vacation is starting out wonderfully (other than the bedbugs Jared found in his bed last night...really), and the chaos that is normally July for us won't start in earnest for another week or so.

I am blessed. And so are you in some way, I'm guessing.

That's all we can ask for. And so it goes.

This blog is going on hiatus until Spring 2018 (though we'll occasionally post between now and then)

NOTE: I wrote the following post in early February 2016. And now, sitting in a hotel lobby in Southern California on March 13, 2016, it seems a bit...I don't know, abrupt? This particular blog has been in existence less than a year and a half, so it's not like I'm bringing some long-running institution to an end. I'm not bringing anything to an end, actually. This is just an extended break, and it's absolutely the right decision.

But I've been blogging on and off for more than five years, and I feel like I should say something that expresses some degree of the appreciation I feel for everyone who regularly reads these little missives. Many readers have come and gone, especially back in the days when the blog was titled "They Still Call Me Daddy" and drew a wider audience thanks to The News-Herald's now-defunct Community Media Lab. But there's a core of you who regularly read and react to my posts, and I'm so happy you've always taken the time to do both. Thank you for your efforts, because you make the whole thing worth it. You know who you are.

Anyway, here's the original post, which as you might have guessed by now (and certainly from the headline) is announcing the suspension of the blog, for the most part, for a couple of years. I just wanted to make sure you knew how much I appreciate the fact that you ever visited this little site in the first place...
_____________________________________________________________

Every couple of years, I start up a blog that ends 12-18 months later because I don't have time to maintain it.

Guess what I'm going to say next, kids!

Actually, this isn't an "end" so much as an extended pause. I told you a couple of weeks ago that I'm now going to grad school online, and that's unavoidably time-consuming. So I'm not even going to try and fight that fight.

Instead, I'm going to take a planned break of about 24 months. That's when I should be graduating with my master's degree, at which point I'll presumably be able to come back and do the blogging thing again. And presumably I'll have something to say that you want to read.

In the interim, I'll very occasionally throw up a post if I feel the itch, which I'm sure I will. I'll post links to those pieces on Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn, or you can just visit www.5kids1wife.com directly and take a peek every once in awhile to see if I've put something up.

I'll maintain this domain name in the meantime, which is something I didn't do last time I gave up www.theystillcallmedaddy.com and some Japanese person snatched it up. Really, that happened. I don't know why.

This particular blogging stint has been going regularly since December 2014, which is pretty good for me. I appreciate the fact that you take time to read this stuff. I honestly do. And I hope you'll come back once I do.

So for now, it's so long and thanks for all the fish. Please keep in touch via the social media platform of your choice. Take care, stay healthy, and tell people you love them. That's all I've got for you.

We'll talk again.

At what point do your birthdays suddenly become a lot less exciting?

I think it's when you turn 23. And I'll tell you why:

Every birthday you have from 1 to 20 is exciting because you're a kid, and kids get excited about their birthdays for various reasons (even 20-year-old kids). That's a given.

Then you turn 21 and that's cool because ADULTHOOD. Self-explanatory.

Twenty-two is also pretty good, especially for college kids, because it's generally the age when you graduate with your bachelor's degree. Life is about to begin in earnest and you can feel it.

And then you turn 23 and...well, nothing. You're either in grad school or out working. And 23 is just a really, really nondescript age. There's nothing vaguely interesting or special about it. It's even a prime number, for gosh sakes.

Twenty-three just kind of sits there. And I think for many people, it's the first nearly meaningless birthday they experience.

All of which is to mention that my daughter Elissa turns 22 tomorrow, and she's on track to graduate from college sometime this year, so there's that. It is perhaps her last exciting birthday, and I don't even know if she's excited about it because I don't see her very much. I'll have to ask her.

Every Elissa birthday makes me reflect on the passage of time because she's our oldest and therefore is always the first among our kids to turn a given age. I suppose the next time her birthday will really, really affect me will be when she turns 30 because...well, by then, there will be no denying the fact that we her parents are old. You can't have a 30-year-old and be a true young'un.

So until then, I'm going to hold on for dear life to her 20-something birthdays. Even the boring ones.

BLOG RERUN: To my children - Just pick up the blanket

(NOTE: Hey, it's Blog Rerun time again! Let's go back into the musty blog archives and resurrect a post from the past that I happen to have liked, for whatever reason. This particular one first ran on July 31, 2013. And for the record, in the three years since this was posted, not a single person in my house apart from Terry has yet picked up the #@%^! blanket...)


I was down in the basement a few minutes ago, and I was disheartened to find that one of you has, yet again, left a blanket on the floor.

You know the blanket I'm talking about. It's the one that has a green and blue plaid design on one side and white fleece on the other. I won it in a work raffle, I think, 15 or 20 years ago.

At least three times a week, I will come downstairs and find this blanket in a heap on the floor. And I know how it happens: One of you wraps it around yourself as you sit on the couch and watch TV (which I totally understand, given that it's a perpetual 27 degrees down there).

Then, when you're finished watching TV, you simply fling the blanket onto the floor, get off the couch, and go upstairs to attend to other things.

And there sits the blanket, which you got out of the storage cabinet in the entertainment center.

My plea to you is simple: Pick up the blanket.

It's not hard. When you're finished using the blanket, just fold it up and put it back where it belongs in the cabinet.

Heck, you don't even have to fold it if you don't want to. You can just crumple it into a big ball and throw it in there. But the important thing is that you pick it up and put it away.

Got that? Just pick it up and put it away. I've asked you to do this before and you have repeatedly failed to comply. All you have to do is pick it up and put it away. That's it. That's all I ask.

If I go around and ask who left the blanket out on the floor, chances are that all five of you will say it wasn't you. And since I know it wasn't me, and I'm 99.9% sure it wasn't your mother, then one of you either has a very bad memory or is outright lying.

Speaking of your mother, you need to think about her when you leave the blanket on the basement floor. She spends her days cleaning up messes you created, and she is now at her absolute limit. If you leave the blanket on the basement floor again and fail to pick it up and put it away (which, you'll recall, are the simple instructions I gave you earlier), she may snap.

I'm not kidding. She may lose it. And by "lose it," I don't mean that she might yell at you or anything. I mean she may literally murder one of you.

Again, you think I'm joking. I'm not. If she walks down into that basement and finds the blanket on the floor one more time, just one more time, I think it will be enough to push her over the edge. It won't surprise me in the least if she grabs a screwdriver and plunges it into one of your skulls.

I'm not condoning this behavior, mind you, but I'm also extremely sympathetic to her frustration. And when she goes on trial for this crime, I promise I'll be testifying on her behalf.

Because there's not much you're required to do here. This is maybe a 12-second job. When you're finished using the blanket, you just need to put it back into the cabinet. Don't leave it on the floor. Pick it up, then put it away. The folding part, as I mentioned before, is completely optional. Just put the blanket away.

I'm not home as often as your mother, seeing as I spend my days working so as to earn enough money to buy products for you to leave on the floor. You don't only do this with the blanket. You leave everything from cups and plates to toys and chip bags on the floor. Where did we go wrong with you?

Seriously, at what point did we convey the idea that using something then leaving it on the floor and walking away is OK? When was that even implied? Because it's not acceptable. Not in the least. Pick up the blanket. After you use it, pick it up and put it away. OK?

The temptation, of course, is to just put the blanket away myself when I see it. But all this does is perpetuate the problem. You'll just keep doing it unless we point it out to you and make you go back downstairs to put it away. Experience suggests you'll keep on doing it even then.

Which I don't understand, because I fail to see any complicating factors here that would prevent you from performing this small task for us. I will break it down into three steps, in case that helps:

Step 1: Pick the blanket up off the floor
Step 2: Fold the blanket (AGAIN, OPTIONAL)
Step 3: Put the blanket into the cabinet in the lower left corner of the entertainment center

Aaaaaaand, you're done. Finished. Nothing more to see or do here. Just put away the blanket. Please, when you're finished with it, just put away the blanket.

Put away the blanket.

My wife turns...a new age today

We don't need to get into the specific number, do we? Of course not.

Actually, Terry is pretty chill about the whole age thing and probably wouldn't mind if I told you that she turns XX years old today. But I'm not going to take even the small chance of getting into trouble by filling in those X's with an actual age.

Although it should be said, she looks awesome for that age. She has always looked awesome. This, you see, is what attracted me to her when I was 16. It's not like I was looking at her back in high school and thinking, "I'll bet that girl will be an excellent mother to my children."

No, I was thinking, "She's hot. I'm going after that." For that is the full extent of the 16-year-old male's thought process.

Now of course I've come to appreciate the full range of her attributes, not just her beauty. But I ain't gonna lie: It's not a bad thing that she never lost the hotness.

And so another year passes by and we have entered Birthday Season in my family. It starts with my mother-in-law a couple of weeks ago and stretches through April. For whatever reason, we have a lot of late-winter/early-spring birthdays among the Tennants and associated clans. (Insert your joke here that there's something about the summer that just put our parents and grandparents into a certain mood...)

Anyway, happy birthday to my wonderful wife, though no amount of attention and presents can account for everything she does for me and the kids. She is selfless, strong, honest and resourceful. She is the most admirable person I know. And somehow I hit the Pick 6 in the Life Lottery and ended up married to her. Talk about dumb luck.

Oh, and she's hot, too. Did I mention that?

I'm just smart enough to know how dumb I am

That, I think, is the crowning achievement of my 46-plus years on earth: I have finally figured out how much I don't know, and it's a lot. And more importantly, I'm OK with it.

There was a time when I guess I just assumed I would eventually learn most of what there is to know. Which I realize is incredibly naive, but I learned so much early on in life that I figured I would continue to learn at the same pace.

But that's not the way it works, is it? You get out of college and your attention turns away from knowledge gathering – which is where it has been since you were in kindergarten – to simple survival. You have bills to pay and things to do, and if you're like me, you have only so much mental capacity to handle it all. Learning new stuff quickly takes a back seat.

Or at least that's how I think it is for most people. Only the most dedicated among us are true "lifelong learners," and I envy them. They are far smarter and more insightful than I'll ever be.

Which is another thing I've come to realize: MOST people are smarter and more insightful than me. And I don't say that out of false modesty or anything. It just appears to be true, based on my experience to date.

I used to think of myself as a smart person because I got good grades. And I somehow got voted Most Likely to Succeed when I was a senior in high school, though I personally voted for Brian Fabo (he was our very deserving class valedictorian and, true to form, has turned out to be very successful).

But none of that really means anything. As I've often said, knowing facts and spouting them back on command is not intelligence. It's a bar trick. And I'm pretty good at it.

But taking information, processing it, and coming back with a workable solution to a problem or having a truly original insight? I'm not so good at that. Or at least not nearly as good as I thought I would be.

Because again, I figured I would keep getting smarter and smarter as I got older, and it didn't happen. I'm lucky to get myself dressed and out the door every morning, if I'm being honest with you.

And that's OK. It really is. I live an enjoyable, highly fulfilling life. I don't know that anyone could ask for anything more than that. The truth is that I'm blessed beyond words, and even if there WERE words to express it, I would probably forget them anyway.

So there you go. The best thing about me? I've accepted my limitations. I think that's a pretty cool thing to come to terms with.

I'm comin' home...

The title of this post? It's the name of a song by Skylar Grey that my daughter Melanie always, always sings when someone takes her to Wendy's (her favorite fast food restaurant). In fact, she records herself singing it each time she pulls into a Wendy's and then sends the recording to everyone in her family via Snapchat. True story. Terry's kids are so weird.

Anyway, I didn't mean to make reference to the song. I really am literally comin' home today after nine days on the road for business travel. I started off in Chicago two Saturdays ago and then flew out to Anaheim, California, the middle of last week. Both trips were for trade shows. Terry and our daughter Elissa joined me in Anaheim, and now we're all flying back to Cleveland today.

I used to semi-like business travel. And when I say "semi-like," I mean just that. I've never loved it. In fact, I've written before about the hassles that are involved in seemingly each and every business trip I've ever taken.

So I try my best to avoid it. I've been to most of the U.S. and several countries, and now I'm really only attracted to travel opportunities that are 100% fun and 0% business. As those are few and far between for me these days, I tend to stay away from airports and airplanes to the greatest degree possible.

I was trying to think what I dislike most about business travel and I had trouble settling on just one thing. It always feels good coming back to your own bed, of course, but most hotels I visit have nice, comfortable beds, so it's not that.

Some people don't like the food choices when they travel, but I'm essentially a goat and will eat anything, so it's not that, either.

I think it's just the disruption of my routine. Yes, I have five children and thus am subject to varying levels of chaos each and every day, so you would think I don't even have a routine. But roughly speaking, I do. And the older I get, the more I like to just stick to that routine: Getting up at roughly the same time in the same place, doing the same things, enjoying the company of the same small group of people.

That may sound boring to you, but it's heaven to me. What an old guy I am.

Anyway, nine days is more than long enough to be away, so I'm anxious to get back to the sunny(?) North Coast of America. I like Chicago and I like California, but I love Wickliffe. Always have, always will.

Comin' home, comin' home. Tell the world I'm comin' home...

Six things I don't get the popularity of

(1) Professional wrestling: Look, I know this is probably just me because a lot of smart people love wrestling and have fond memories of watching it when they were kids. I just...I don't get it. I try and try to find some entertainment value in it and I come up blank. But then again, there are a lot of things I personally like that others don't get, either, so I guess it's all good.

(2) KISS: The band, not the physical act (I like that). Again, I know they're talented. I know people just love their music. I'm pretty sure there's something I'm just not understanding about their appeal that, if it would just click for me, I would become a fan.

(3) Gardening: Lots of people love gardening. They love growing food and flowers. They love being outside on their hands and knees and digging into the soil. Good for them. I in no way share their passion, though maybe I will in a few years when I become an official Old Person. After all, I never thought I would like coffee and wine, and I love both now. We'll see.

(4) Almost any given binge-watched TV series: You know the ones I'm talking about – Breaking Bad, The Wire, Walking Dead, Boardwalk Empire, Sons of Anarchy, etc. The only one I've ever gotten into (and I'm not quite sure how it happened) was House of Cards. I like House of Cards. Then again, I would probably like those other shows, too, if I had the time to watch any of them. But I don't.

(5) Tattoos: Understand something, militant tattoo people: I don't care if you have a tattoo. I don't judge you because you have a tattoo. If you're a good person, you're a good person whether or not you choose to get some ink. I don't have any problem at all with tattoos or the people who have them. It's just that I personally don't want one, and I can't identify with the desire to have one. That's all. Nothing more than that. You people get really sensitive when you think others are criticizing you.

(6) Camping: I really, really WANT to like camping. And I hate to say it, but I think I would like camping if I were doing it myself. This isn't anything against my family or anyone else with whom I'm likely to find myself sleeping in a tent. It's just that I think I would enjoy the experience much more if there was no one else, you know, there with me. Which is why the idea of a multi-person two-week camping trip to Yellowstone does nothing for me, but the idea of walking the entire Appalachian Trail and sleeping outside every night seems awesome. But as always, that's just me.

I don't get the man flu because no one would take care of me

And I don't say that as a knock on Terry. She simply has too much going on in her life to nurse me back to health when I have a cold or something.

So I either choose not to acknowledge when I'm sick, or else I just take care of myself without much help from anyone else. And it's fine. Seriously, I've very rarely in my life been so sick that I couldn't get up and get myself a glass of water or some food or whatever.

If I happen to miss a day or two of work, I inevitably go back too early and delay my recovery.

Why? For one simple reason: I cannot stand being sick. Not from an oh-it-makes-me-feel-so-bad perspective but from an it-makes-me-extremely-angry perspective. I hate, hate, hate being sick. And I'm so anxious to get back to my routine that it probably keeps me from getting better.

Just as Terry doesn't have time to take care of me, I don't have time to be sick. I have stuff to do. Getting the flu is not part of the plan. Therefore, when it does come, it makes me mad because it disrupts my carefully crafted daily schedule.

I simply cannot tolerate being sick, and honestly, I don't like the idea of someone else having to take time out of their day to take care of me. So I avoid sickness – or at least I avoid admitting I'm sick – at all costs.

I realize this doesn't play into stereotypes about men, and that giving others the chance to serve you is actually a good thing to do, especially if they really, really WANT to serve you.

Too bad. Scotty ain't got time for that. That tickle in my throat? It's nothing. Those stomach pains? Just gas. The blood pouring out of my nose? Only a flesh wound.

I AM NOT SICK, DO YOU HEAR ME? I AM NOT SICK!

When you're 46 years old and going back to school

I think I've mentioned here the fact that I always wanted a graduate degree but never got around to earning one. Against the advice of my dad, after I earned my B.A. from John Carroll University in May 1992, I got as far away from classrooms as I could. After nearly a year as a full-time sports journalist and a full-time student, I was burned out both mentally and physically.

I figured, "Why bother? I'm going to be a sports writer for the rest of my life."

Which of course did not happen, because long-term plans rarely work out the way you assume they will.

Over the course of time I came to the conclusion that I needed a "real" 9-to-5 job, and eventually I got into PR and marketing. It's a very rewarding career and one that has paid the bills for my family for several years now.

In the back of my mind, though, I feel I should have gotten that master's degree. I've come close to starting a few times, but the whole not-enough-hours-in-the-day syndrome has gotten in the way every time and I shut it down.

But not anymore. Beginning next week, I will officially return to the ranks of the matriculated as I begin online coursework toward that elusive advanced diploma. It's a mouthful to say, but I'll be pursuing a Master of Arts in Journalism and Mass Communication with a concentration in Public Relations from Kent State University.

If people ask, I just say I'm going for "a master's in PR from Kent State."

As I said, it's an online program. The whole thing. Welcome to the 21st century.

As I understand it, each week the professor teaching whatever class I'm taking (I only have room in my schedule to take one class at a time) will post the material for that week and required reading online. Then, by Thursday I'll be expected to engage in some sort of virtual class discussion. Each week ends with a paper or other assignment due on Sunday.

Then the whole thing starts again on Monday.

Each course is seven weeks long, and I have to take 12 of them to earn the degree. With breaks and everything, that means I should get the master's in the spring of 2018.

IF everything goes as planned, of course, which as we've seen above very often doesn't happen.

But that's the idea.

I'm intrigued by this concept of asynchronous online learning. I don't have to "attend" class at any set time; rather, I can adapt the reading and other coursework to my family and work schedules. I won't be getting much sleep either way, of course, but the flexibility of the whole thing appealed to me.

Now let's see whether I actually learn anything. This will be an interesting experiment in teaching that old dog those new tricks.

My loyalty will always lie with John Carroll, but for the next couple of years I guess I get to be a Kent State Golden Flash, too. Which my daughter Chloe, a University of Akron student, will not like. Akron and Kent are fierce rivals.

In the real world, that is. In the virtual world, everyone gets along and sings Kumbaya.

At least that's what I'll tell Chloe.

I don't want to harp on this losing weight thing, but if you're someone who needs to do it, here's one hugely important thing you should know

I feel like I've mined Weight Watchers, weight loss and general health topics for all they're worth when it comes to blog material over the last few years. And I honestly wasn't looking to write about it anymore, but something occurred to me that I think is important for people to know.

First off, please know the last thing I want to do is to discourage anyone. Weight loss and maintenance is NOT an impossible dream. You can absolutely do it, and I don't mean that in a fake inspirational way. You really can.

But there's a cold truth that has to be faced.

If you're going to put your body into pound-shedding mode, you of course have to eat less than you are now and likely move more than you do now.

You already knew that.

What you may not know, if you've never done the weight loss thing successfully, is what that means in practicality. It means you're going to want to eat something that you used to eat all the time, and you're going to have to say no.

Then you're going to have to do that again, probably an hour or two later.

Then you're going to have to do it again the next day. And the next. And the next.

For the rest of your life. Or until you give up and decide you didn't mind being overweight.

Because for most people, those are your only two choices.

Again, I'm not here to discourage you. You will be amazed at the capacity you have to make the correct food choices, and to do it again and again. I don't care who you are, you can do it.

But it takes a willingness to change your thinking, both about food and about yourself. And about the things that make you feel good and get you through the day.

It takes the ability to understand the worth of health, and of feeling and looking good, over the momentary pleasure of that chocolate cake. You can and should still have that cake on occasion, but in reasonable portions. And sometimes not eating the cake at all is easier than trying to confine yourself to a single small slice.

The point is, you will face a hard reality, and you will face it continuously. How you react to that reality and the choices you make in those moments will define whether or not your weight loss and weight maintenance will be successful.

If you acknowledge now the difficulty of doing the right thing, and you still make up your mind to say "It doesn't matter how tough it may seem, I'm going to lose the weight once and for all," you will be successful. I guarantee it.

It's a mental game, and one you can win.

So go do it. Seriously, go do it. I finally did, and it has changed the game for me in many ways. The same will happen to you, too.

I just thought you should know.

Let's do the iPod Shuffle again because it really is fun

My good buddy John Bryndal (who, as you can tell from his name, lives in Japan) suggested we resurrect the blog's periodic iPod Shuffle game because it's always interesting to see what people have in their music libraries.

The rules are simple: Just put your iPod or other music-playing device into its respective random/shuffle mode and report back on the first five songs that come up. You must be 100% honest as to the five songs that play, no matter what they are. In no way should you be ashamed of the fact that the first three tunes in your queue are by Wham!, Vanilla Ice and Spandau Ballet.

You are encouraged to respond either in the comments here on the blog itself or, if you access the blog this way, on Facebook. Either is fine.

I'll go first. Here's what randomly comes up on my iPhone:

(1) "All Will Be Well" - Gabe Dixon Band
One of the things I love about Spotify is the automatically generated "Discover Weekly" playlist, which every Monday presents you with a new list of songs you might like based on your previous listening. That's how I discovered this tune, which I can't stop listening to. I'm glad it came up first.

(2) "I Ran" - A Flock of Seagulls
Did you ever see that show that used to air on VH1 called "Bands Reunited?" They would run around trying to get old 80s bands back together to play a one-off concert after years of being apart. Some sounded better than others. The Flock sounded...OK in their reunion concert. They definitely didn't have the same hair. Anyway, this is such a great tune. My friend Mel loved, loved, loved A Flock of Seagulls.

(3) "New Mexico" - Billy Joel
I have always been a big Billy Joel fan. Back in the 70s and early 80s when he had hair, he looked strangely like a less muscular version of Sylvester Stallone. Not that that has anything to do with anything, but I always thought it was funny. Anyway, this is a never-released demo tune of his that I greatly enjoy.

(4) "Talkin'" - Najee
Very cool, early 90s funk/jazz. I wish I could play tenor saxophone like Najee does on this song.

(5) "Dear Prudence" - The Beatles
This song will forever make me think of my daughter Elissa. My little Prudence.

Things you may not have known about Leap Day

Happy February 29th! It only comes every four years, folks, so enjoy it.

Well, it usually comes every four years. Turns out there are exceptions, and I'm not sure I knew about them.

I give full credit to the folks over at TimeAndDate.com, which is the place from which I stole the following material. I just thought it was too good not to share:

Why do we have Leap Years?

Leap years are needed to keep our modern day Gregorian Calendar in alignment with the Earth's revolutions around the sun. It takes the Earth approximately 365.242199 days – or 365 days, 5 hours, 48 minutes, and 46 seconds – to circle once around the Sun. This is called a tropical year.However, the Gregorian calendar has only 365 days in a year, so if we didn't add a day on February 29 nearly every four years, we would lose almost six hours off our calendar every year. After only 100 years, our calendar would be off by approximately 24 days.

Which Years are Leap Years?

In the Gregorian calendar, three criteria must be taken into account to identify leap years:

• The year is evenly divisible by 4;

• If the year can be evenly divided by 100, it is NOT a leap year, unless;

• The year is also evenly divisible by 400. Then it is a leap year.

This means that 2000 and 2400 are leap years, while 1800, 1900, 2100, 2200, 2300 and 2500 are NOT leap years.

The year 2000 was somewhat special as it was the first instance when the third criterion was used in most parts of the world since the transition from the Julian to the Gregorian Calendar.

Who invented Leap Years?

Julius Caesar introduced Leap Years in the Roman Empire more than 2000 years ago, but the Julian Calendar had only one rule: any year evenly divisible by 4 would be a leap year. This led to way too many leap years, but it didn't get corrected until the introduction of the Gregorian Calendar more than 1500 years later.

Thirty years is at once a long time and not such a long time

I remember 30 years ago tomorrow like it just happened yesterday.

Why? Because 30 years ago tomorrow, I asked my wife Terry out on our first date. And she said yes. Total relief. I wrote about the experience (the asking and the actual date) here a few years ago.

As with all anniversaries, getting a feel for the events they mark is a matter of perspective. For me, 30 years is a heck of a long time. But for someone who has been married for 60 years, 30 isn't such a huge stretch.

Terry and I have been through a lot in those three decades, not the least of which has been marriage and five kids. And a couple of houses. And several jobs for me. Along with a multitude of pets, Christmas celebrations, movies watched, meals eaten, etc.

Those are the types of things by which we mark the cadence of life. It's not the years that matter so much as the things that fill those years, right? I know that's pretty cliche and all, but it's true.

While I revel in all of the major events in our lives, I derive the most satisfaction from my everyday existence with Terry. We fight the same battles and struggle through the same issues. The fact that we often make the wrong choices is helped greatly by the fact that we do it together. I am blessed beyond words.

Anyway, I just thought it was interesting how you can look at a major chunk of your life (say, 30 years) and simultaneously see it as being a long time AND as having flown by. Because both are true. 1986 doesn't seem like ancient history to me, but in retrospect, the intervening years have been absolutely filled with stuff. That's a lot of days crossed off the calendar, a lot of water under the bridge.

Occasionally it occurs to me that each passing day gets us a tad closer to the inevitable end of things. Not in a morbid way so much as a wistful, reflective way.

Thirty years. That's a "fur piece," as my Pennsylvania-born dad used to say, but it's also the blink of an eye. Pretty cool.

At what point does food in your refrigerator become public domain?

There is an ongoing issue in my house whereby certain members of our family are very reluctant to leave their personal leftovers in the refrigerator, for fear that other members of the family to whom those leftovers do not belong will consume them.

To be fair here, I should mention that the first group consists mainly of my daughters, while the second group comprises mainly my son Jared and occasionally me.

Or at least it used to comprise me. I don't eat other people's refrigerator food anymore. But I used to.

Well, I didn't "eat" it in the sense of "entirely consume" it. But I would take a few bites. Sometimes more than a few bites. All while perfectly aware that the food was not mine to be eating.

This is theft. You can try and dress it up, but in the end, it's theft. It's taking something that belongs to someone else for yourself.

For whatever reason, it took some time before I came to this realization. But now that I'm aware of what I was doing, I don't do it any more.

The same cannot be said for Jared. Jared is a food thief, pure and simple.

I think he's better than he used to be, but my girls are right to be wary of Jared's food-stealing tendencies. If they bring home a styrofoam container of Olive Garden leftovers, for example, there's no doubt that Jared will target those leftovers for personal consumption.

At least now he asks. But his "asking" is more like he's building a legal case. "This food has been in the refrigerator for three days," he'll say. "That means you don't want it. Can I have it?"

And when the food owner in question refuses his request, he will ask again. And again. And again. All in the hopes that his annoying persistence will eventually wear the person down and she will relent.

Which I suppose raises an important question of international household food law: Is there a point at which untouched leftovers, even those that are clearly marked with someone's name, have been neglected for so long that they should be made available to whomever wants them on a first-come, first-served basis?

Most people would probably argue that, no, there is no such statute of limitations. My food is mine now and will still be mine five days from now.

But Jared is one to explore the boundaries of household food rules and regulations. He wants that food. He craves that food, no matter what it is. And if he can get away with having that food, with or without your permission, he's going to take it.

I claim no responsibility for his inevitable death, which will come at the hands of one of his sisters whose Applebee's chicken parm has been raided once too often. When I find Jared lying dead in front of the refrigerator with a plastic fork jammed into the side of his head, I'll know exactly why.

Four things I remember vividly about elementary school

(1) The Smell
It wasn't a bad smell. It was just a smell that you can only experience inside a school. And for whatever reason, it generally can only be found inside an elementary school. Whenever I happen to be inside a school and I get a whiff of that whatever-it-is smell, I am instantly transported back in time to Mapledale Elementary School in the late 70s.

(2) The Chairs
As near as I can tell, all three elementary schools in Wickliffe at that time were stocked with the same hard chairs for students. They were different colors, but it was the same basic, functional 70s design. The grown-ups, meanwhile, got different chairs that were all this pinkish color. And their chairs were bigger because, you know, the adults were bigger.

(3) The Layout
Mapledale no longer exists. The building became a senior center the year after I "graduated" from sixth grade, and a few years ago it was torn down entirely to make way for new houses (or maybe they're condos?) But I can remember every nook and cranny of that school, because I experienced them all at one point or another. Are you like that with your old schools? I spent seven years there from kindergarten through sixth grade, so I guess it stands to reason that I got to know the place pretty well.

(4) The Teachers
In elementary school, you are of course assigned to one teacher. In the early grades, you are with that teacher virtually the entire day, with the exception of special classes like art, gym, music, etc. That teacher becomes a major influence in your life, which is why I will always hold a special place in my heart for Mrs. Janes, Mrs. Lucci, Mrs. Schwarzenberg, Mr. Blough and Mrs. Grabner. Two of them (Schwarzenberg and Grabner) I had twice. They taught me more than they could possibly know, and they whipped me into shape when they needed to. What a great and awesome responsibility you teachers have.

BLOG RERUN: Why crushing your kids in Junior Monopoly is OK

(NOTE: Here's our monthly Blog Rerun, in which we bring back a post from somewhere in the distant and not-so-distant history of this blog. This one originally ran on June 4, 2012.)

Here's the thing with little kids and board games (or card games or sports or any sort of competition): Sooner or later, they're going to have to learn how to lose. And you as a parent are the one who has to teach them.

This isn't as easy as it sounds. Most of us with children have, at one point or another, let our kids win at something without them realizing it. You know what I'm talking about. You reshuffle the cards in Candyland and surreptitiously arrange the deck so that, hey look at that! Junior just drew Queen Frostine and is now 157 spaces ahead of me and thank the Lord this game will finally be over soon!

(NOTE: If you're going to take that particular approach to Candyland, also remember to scan ahead in the deck to make sure there are no impending disasters awaiting Junior. Like two cards later, he picks Mr. Mint and suddenly is way back at the start of the board and you realize the game will never, ever end because you messed with Board Game Karma.)

I've done this a time or two myself over the years. It makes the game a little more enjoyable for the kid and gives them some confidence. I don't know that I have a lot of theories about parenting, but if I do, one of them is the importance of instilling confidence in a child. It does wonders for them simply to know they can succeed at something.

But of course you can only do this so many times. Just as important as gaining confidence is for them to learn the life lesson that we don't always win. Queen Frostine isn't always going to come up on your turn. The other baseball team is sometimes going to be better than yours. We all strike out, fumble, put the cue ball in the corner pocket, or simply fall short at Go Fish from time to time.

Some kids get this right away, and they're totally fine with it. Others don't deal with losing so well. Like, say for instance, my son Jack.

Jack is a very bright little kid, which is both a blessing and a curse. At school, he picks up on things pretty quickly...98% of the time. When he doesn't get something right away, he gets frustrated and sometimes doesn't want to make the effort to learn it.

I will freely admit that he gets this particular trait from his father. When I was in kindergarten, they actually had me see the school psychologist because I would get so mad when I got even a single math problem wrong. They thought my parents were putting pressure on me to be perfect, but the psychologist quickly discovered that my mom and dad were pretty laid back and I was just a neurotic little freak who had to get every single thing right or else I would slash my wrists.

And so I've passed on the perfectionist gene to my little boy, and he's slowly but surely dealing with it. There's no doubt he really likes winning, though, and I imagine that quality will stay with him forever. Which isn't entirely bad. Once Jack learns the value of applying himself to a problem rather than walking away in frustration, he'll have acquired a valuable skill.

A lot of people complain about today's culture of everyone's-a-winner, particularly when it comes to youth sports. They say we're raising a generation of wimps who don't know how to lose when we give everyone a trophy or a ribbon, no matter how unskilled they are.

I guess I come down somewhere in the middle on this. I have no problem keeping score even at the youngest levels of competition, but I also don't think it's a bad thing for a 6-year-old to walk away with a ribbon at the end of the season as an acknowledgment of his/her hard work and participation.

I think I've mentioned before that I do this with my U8 soccer teams, which are made up of kids in kindergarten, first and second grades. At the end of the season, everyone gets some sort of award reflecting their performance, whether it's Most Valuable Offensive Player or simply the Most Improved. The kids like it and, again, it gives them a little confidence and hopefully encourages them to continue playing.

But in the end, relatively few of them will stick with the sport through high school. And obviously, even fewer (if any) will go on to play in college or at the professional level. Which is why they need to learn to handle the disappointment of losing now. And so Coach Scott instills this by scrimmaging against them and absolutely dominating them.

I like to think of it as my little bit of life teaching for the kids...and feeding my lifelong perfectionist competitive ego at the same time. Everybody wins.

Someone you love dies once, but you miss them forever

I feel compelled to say something today about my sister Judi. She would have turned 63 years old yesterday, had she not passed away on May 12, 2009.

That's what happens when someone you love very much dies: You remember the date. It sticks with you. You will never be entirely happy on that day ever again.

Yesterday wasn't all that easy, either. I think of Judi a lot, but more so on her birthday, she and my brother-in-law Jess' wedding anniversary, every May 12th, etc.

It's interesting to me that people still post on Judi's Facebook page, usually on one of the above dates. It's not weird or creepy or anything; as a matter of fact, I think it's beautiful. It's a nice tribute to one of the nicest people you would ever in your life like to meet.

More than anything, I think it's therapeutic. When someone to whom you're very close passes away, the one thing you want more than anything else is one last chance to talk with them. Tell them things you should have told them as a matter of course when they were still around. Just 5 minutes. That's all you ask for, just a few minutes to wrap things up, I guess.

In Judi's case, we didn't get that. Her death was sudden, shocking, and life-altering. Just so tough on everyone involved, from Jess to her daughter Jessica to my mom.

Oh, my poor mom. As she herself said at the time, no parent should ever have to experience the death of a child, but she did. And she's still going strong at 83 years old. God bless her.

Anyway, I'm not sure I have much of a point to make today, other than to acknowledge for you that I used to have a sister named Judi and now she's gone. Life goes on, but it's not the same.

It's never the same.

We're halfway through February, my fellow Northerners. Hang in there!

These are the dark times for those of us who live in cold climates. We are almost uniformly sick of winter, yet it still has several more weeks to go.

But there is light. There is hope. There is something to hang onto.

After today, we are firmly into the second half of February.

Yes! It's a leap year, of course, which means February has one extra excruciating day tacked onto it. But March is in sight. Which means spring is in sight.

Sort of.

I live in Northeast Ohio, where March does not always necessarily equal spring. Some of the worst snowstorms I remember have happened in March.

Regardless, if March is in sight, that means April is also on the horizon. And even in the worst of years, April is when you start to see the temperatures (slowly) rise and the snow fade away.

So this is my rallying cry to all those who are enduring the cold grayness of February: Stay strong. Be positive. There will be an end to this.

And then? This...

No, not bird attacks. Summer! I'm talking about summer! Geez...