Daddy.

I knew from the beginning that I wanted to have a family. Wanting such a thing is like wanting to get married. All you know is what you see other people doing and you want what they have. You don't know how hard it can be even thought they tell you it's hard. You don't understand how great it can be, even though you can see it in their faces.

When we got married, I felt like I was coming alive all over again. It was like something that had been missing so long I'd forgotten about it was suddenly back. When we had our first born, the feeling returned. Something I didn't even realize was gone had returned to me.

Since then we've rounded out the fold to four children, wild and wonderful. Each of them is so different, but so intricately connected to each other. I wonder if I'll ever really know them or if I only just see the things they show me. A few days ago, that first born, the one that changed my life forever, lost a tooth. I came home from work and that tiny bit of sharp enamel was sitting on the desk. This one is the benchmark, the child by whom I mark my years as a father, and now he smiles with a gap in his lower row. I think, my God, it's going too fast. Mommy says it out loud so I don't have to, so I can just be strong and proud of him for being older.

He smiles a lot now, too. There was time when he didn't. Families are organic.They grow and change, usually for the better. It's hard sometimes, changing. Sometimes it's too hard. Maybe we were just being selfish, but I couldn't let them go. I decided to teach them myself rather than let them leave me for a faculty of strangers every day. We learn together, reading books, learning about science and history and everything. We go to the park. We go to the library. We build, laugh, learn and love. And I'm there. I can see it all. If they figure something out for the first time, I don't have to wait for them to tell me or to bring home a test paper a week later. I saw the moment they understood.

I play with them. Not as much as I should, but as much as I can. They delight in play. I am a hero. I have the golden touch of play. Whatever I want to play with them becomes the best game in the world. Frisbee, Catch, Lego, it doesn't matter. If nobody wants to color with the little one, I can. If I do, they all will. Suddenly coloring in a coloring book becomes great entertainment. They all show me what they've colored. I look and laugh and notice all the right details and they swell with pride. They won't remember this as an adult, but they'll remember I always loved them.

I got called a lot of names as a kid. Most slid off without hurting but not all. But now I get called something that is as commanding as it is respectful. It is a higher calling that's common as dirt. From the lips of my children it can be the most endearing term of affection. They call me Daddy.

I fixed the comment settings so anyone can comment now. Sorry for the trouble. Thanks Ash for letting me know I had a problem.

Long Ago and Yesterday...

I was leaving a comment for a post on  Derek's blog when I sort of got carried away. What resulted was a short paragraph that caricatured the names we have for the days of the weeks. The idea got me thinking, though, so I wanted to write a full post about it.

It's no shock that Christianity has permeated the culture for the last fifteen-hundred years. Our laws, our holidays and our history are sealed and stamped with the influence of Christ and Judaism. Jesus isn't the only name we throw around so casually. His might be the name by which we must be saved, but we needed a few more names to fill out the calendar. I'm curious what exactly it was about each day that made the ancients think, hmm, we'll name this day such-and-such.

Do a little research (read Wikipedia) and you'll find some interesting characteristics attributed to our weekly routines. Are people more likely to drop their pants on Monday? Do we all feel a little more confrontational on Tuesday? Are eye injuries or shrewd bargains more likely on Wednesday? What about lightening strikes? Do big storms usually come on Thursdays? Of course, we've all had dates on Friday night. After a long Saturday with the children, a father just might feel like eating them all up, only to be overthrown by them later. And Sunday? Um. Actually, that one doesn't make much sense.

Cronus and the Delicious Baby by RYE BREAD of DeviantART

Well, if you didn't look it up on Wiki and you have no clue what I'm ranting about, I'll fill you in. Every day of the week is named for a heavenly body or a god or goddess. Moon-day, Tyr's-day (Norse equivalent of Mars), Odin's-day, Thor's-day, Frige's-day (Norse equivalent of Venus), Saturn's-day and Sun-day. The months of the year work the same way. Think Julius Caesar for July and Caesar Augustus for August, two deified emperors of Rome. After August, their creativity kind of ran out because September, October, November and December are named according to the Latin numbers for seven, eight, nine, and ten respectively. Oh well. Being creative wasn't really what Rome was good at anyway.

Nike. American Shoe of Victory

Nike. Roman Goddess of Victory

I like to find old names in new places and I love it when I 'get' the reference. If you think about it, you probably could name a ton of things we see everyday named after some old king or god or something. It's as common as Nike shoes.

Gone Campin'...

Gone Campin'. Be back next week. Have a great week and enjoy the beautiful weather.

If a Five-Year-Old can do it...

A friend of mine recommended a web comic to check out. I like new ideas and I'm always in the market for something I can share with the kids. Comics are fun and kids love 'em, but a lot of the stuff that's mainstream now is written to teens and adults and the themes and artwork are over the heads of my elementary-age brood. This new site seemed to fit the bill for us. It's called Axe Cop and it's written by a five-year-old boy. Really!

See, Malachai Nicolle (who is now 6) comes up with all the ideas and situations for Axe Cop and friends and his big brother, Ethan (28), draws the panels. There are 70, one page episodes of Axe Cop and over 40 Ask Axe Cop episodes as well. If you just roll with the idea that this is a six-year-old's unfettered imagination, it's pretty cool. Actually it's very cool! It's random and funny and you can't wait to find out what happens next. And the great thing is, since it's written by a first-grader, I don't have anything to worry about. My kids could read this thing all day and not run into an inappropriate image or concept.

So, whether your five or ninety-five, give Axe Cop a try and see if you don't get hooked. As for me, looks like I'm out of excuses as a writer. After all, if a five-year-old can do it, why can't I?

God is like...

Sophie sits at the foot of the front stairs. Her mother has been watching her play in the front yard all morning. Her sidewalk chalk is gripped in one small hand and working over the pavement to create a portrait of Dolly the Doll. Dolly sits patiently in a child-sized chair. She's a good sitter for portraits and has been represented in crayon, finger-paint, and even dry macaroni once.

Sophie looks up when the phone rings, but she's not distracted long. Her mother steps inside for a moment to see if it's the call she's been expecting. The wind blows. A few early fall leaves swirl out of the red maple.

A big dark shadow falls across the little girl. She turns to see what has blocked the sunshine. A tall, hard-faced man is looking down at her. Mirrored sun-glasses hide his eyes. His thick arms are crossed across his chest. He's dressed in black from the toes of his jack-boots to the collar of his crew shirt. He hunkers down and moves a hand toward Sophie. "Hello, little girl..." He says.

 If you're thinking the man in black is someone to be afraid of, you're right. His training is in combat. He's a skilled fighter and what he fights he means to kill. He's not trained, like a police man, to hesitate and consider his actions. If he's involved, someone higher up has already decided killing is okay. Are you scared for the little girl in the hands of such a man? Why? Has he threatened her? Would it help if you knew he was a Navy Seal?

Maybe a couple more line from the scene would help.

The girl turns and shades her eyes against the sun. Her face breaks into a toothy grin. "Daddy!" She shrieks, and throws chalky hands around his neck.

 Does it help? My point is this. A lot of the time, we Christians turn God into some cosmic teddy bear that wouldn't hurt a fly. It is true that God is not wanton in his destruction. After all, why would you be quick to destroy what you so carefully created. But, I think we are remiss to portray God as someone you don't have to be afraid of. Solomon said the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom. Why is that the starting point? Because you have put something very important in its proper perspective. He is the creator, we the creation. He is the forgiver, we the forgiven. And there is an offense to forgive. I've tossed many a failed project into the trash bin. I'm eternally grateful God is not so cavalier about his own work.

As for the little girl, that the man is her father does nothing to change what he is capable of. Imagine the fate of someone who raised a hand against this girl in his presence. He is dangerous. As for Sophie, all she knows is those hands bathed her as an infant, tuck her in every night, comfort her when she's upset. Those hand might be lethal weapons, but as far as she knows, they were made for love.

No more naked toys...

 In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth...
Then God said, "Let us make man in our image..."

Sunday morning, my wife decided to cook up some new duds for Boomer, my  youngest son's stuffed bear. He was playing outside with the rest of the kiddos when she presented the bear, who normally turns out in army fatigues, in a checked button-down and blue jeans. The boy loved it. He grabbed Boomer and showed him off to his siblings with total delight. The next thing she knew, my wife was sitting behind the sewing machine with a queue of stuffed animals to dress.

As I watched the kids, waiting for their chance to receive some custom clothes, I got this idea of how we are like God. We imitate him without even trying. These kids, as soon as they saw the possibility, wanted their toys covered and cared for. I've seen the tenderness they use in putting a toy to bed and the anguish of losing one. Kids really will leave the ninety-nine action figures and seek out the lost one.

Being made in God's image has more to do with our actions and our character than it does the arrangement of our arms and legs. A kid's ego and desire can run wild, making him rude, insensitive, or selfish. But, his spirit is still innocent Not that he is sinless but he is yet ignorant of most of his sin. In that innocence, kids reveal the character of God without meaning to. All children are naturally creative. They care for and defend 'their own'. They can be eerie in their intuitions and are not deceived by mere social conventions. If a kid sees a grown-up acting bad, they say so. They don't make an excuse or try to explain why it was right in that circumstance. (Usually those tactics are saved for themselves when they've been acting bad.)

So, the simple act of asking for clothes for their dolls, of asking for what they need from the one who can provide it, inspires me this week. I hope I can be so upfront with God in asking for what I need.

Rhombus Boy vs. The Irregular Polygon

I have to laugh sometimes when people ask the question. It's almost always in the midst of some social setting that would be perfectly normal for adults, although there are places people aren't used to seeing kids. But, as I mentioned before, I don't really believe in children being held back from learning the ins and outs of the adult world. I don't mean letting kids be exposed to the seedy, disgusting parts of being an adult. I don't really want to be exposed to that.


What I mean is, I think it does a child good to see what he will be doing when he grows up. Weekly shopping, banking, trips to the hardware store, you name it. The whole mundane adult world should be a familiar routine to the growing child. Why let it be a mystery?


Anyway, none of that is really the point. What the comic strip points out is that most of the people we meet have one question on their mind when they find out we homeschool. What about socialization? Presumably what they mean is, will Little Bernard make any friends shut up in the house all day? Some of the places this question is asked are: the Walmart, the library, museums, the laundromat, church, at yard sales, at family reunions or holiday gatherings. Most people that do school at home have a hard time actually staying home. During the school year we are constantly going from one project or activity to another and attending to real life in between. During the summer, when we have no scheduled classes, we are twice as busy. Why? Because for us homeschool is lifeschool.


Ask any tradesman. If you want to learn how to do something, classroom learning won't hurt, but it doesn't even begin to cover it. It's in the actual doing that real learning begins. It's no different for children. If you show them a poster of a butterfly's life-cycle, they will admire the pretty pictures. If you show them a butterfly coming out of it's chrysalis, they will wonder at it and will forever after know where butterflies come from. In the mean time, they will also know where money comes from (Dad's job), food comes from (the grocery store), clean clothes come from (laundry), clean dishes, fixed toys, newspapers, books, and so on. Everything they see every day is real. It is not just a safe, self-contained example, but real life.


The prevailing theory seems to be that children in a tradition school environment will forge long-lasting friendships that will continue and mature as the child grows into an adult. The fear is that homeschooled children will somehow be excluded from that. The truth is, only some of those school kids will have those kinds of friends. Most families move at least once during their children's education. Also, kids in school are under constant pressure to perform both from teachers and peers. This makes it a cut-throat kind of experience for many kids that impedes those friendships. Even so, it's true that most kids do have some friends after school and some of those friendships last.


Now, homeschool kids are usually very close to their siblings and families in general. Yes, that's a little weird, but is it really a bad thing for bothers and sisters to be tight? In addition to that, because of co-op groups and the like, most homeschoolers make friends across age groups as opposed to only being friends with kids their own age. I've seen my own kids playing with 'cool' teenagers and 'baby' three and four-year-olds all in the same day. And since a person wouldn't even consider homeschool if they weren't a get-involved type, these kids have the irreplaceable advantage of parents who are active and interested in their education and their life.


Parents can provide all these benefits and advantages within a traditional education, but will they be there the moment their six-year-old regales a grandmotherly stranger in the laundromat with the Butter Battle Book by Dr. Seuss. At least from where I'm sitting, the kids aren't having any trouble functioning in society. For the record, different isn't always bad. Isn't that what they tried to teach us in school?

Vivid Technicolor Life

I have come that they may have life, and have it to the full.
--Jesus of Nazareth, circa 30AD

When I was a kid, I loved to color in coloring books. For school you only had to have a box of eight or sixteen colors. Sixteen colors just didn't seem adequate. It didn't come close to capturing the  spectrum of possibilities a blank page presented. What if a sky was Slate or Periwinkle? What if a superhero had a Carrot-colored costume instead of the usual Orange? What I needed was one of those huge boxes with the crayon sharpener in the back. You know the one. It had metallic colors like Copper and Gold. It took two hands to lift and an hour to clean up if you dumped them out. If you had one of these bad boys on the shelf you were cool. People wanted to color at your house. You had options.

Kids get it. They want their pictures to be vibrant, vivid, vivacious. They want their picture to be noticed. By everyone. They ever met. Including that total stranger in the grocery store who desperately wants to pay for his milk and frozen waffles and go home.

We can learn something here. Do we, as adults, still want our pictures to get noticed? Don't we sometimes paint with a blander brush in the hope that no one will stop and look and maybe ask questions about our picture? Don't we limit our life to a box of eight crayons?

I think so. I think in this age of moral gray areas and religious blending, all the colors are starting to look alike. Spin the dial on your radio. Even the music starts to sound the same. Country sounds like rock sounds like jazz sounds like... You get the point. In art class, they taught me that when you mix two primary colors together, you get another color. If you mix all the colors together, you get a muddy brown that doesn't really look like any color at all. We're getting there.

I don't really want that. I don't want to be washed-out, muddy and inconspicuous. I want the big box of crayons. I want that vivid, technicolor life. Remember technicolor? When Dorothy stepped into Oz she saw a place painted in bright colors populated by equally, colorful characters. In the movie, Oz is in bold contrast to the drab Kansas (shown in black and white) from which she comes.

Our world isn't the paradise it was created to be anymore. There are things out there to be afraid of. But God doesn't really want us to be afraid. He really wants us to come to his house and draw a few pictures. After all, he does have the big box with all the colors and the sharpener in the back. And he'd like to share them with you.

Do you hear what I hear?

It's about seven-thirty. I'm mostly awake, still getting there. I can hear my wife breathing. I can actually hear her drawing a breath in, letting it out, soft and rhythmic, peaceful in her sleep. I hear the A/C in the window. Its guttural hum is a constant in the background but sometimes the sound comes forward to have its own say. I can hear the dog begin to yip. She's awake and ready to be let out of her pen. The children are awake, too. I can hear them talking, maybe laughing. It's another thirty minutes before anyone should be out of bed. Oh, well.

The sounds of the day gather, like factory workers lining up before the start of their shift. The noise grumbles and has its coffee then gets down to the hard work of filling our house. The toilet flushes and water runs. Hard heels drum across the hardwood floor. I go down the creaking, squeaking staircase and start the coffee-maker making its own hissing speech.

Our home is not quiet. The hard-surfaced acoustics make that nearly impossible. Besides, kids are never quiet and we have four. They shout when they mean to speak and speak when they mean to whisper and they whisper when they don't mean to talk at all. They fill their space completely with a symphony of sounds, big and little, that go on continuously throughout the day. They live out loud.

This is how it is supposed to be, I think. Life is noisy. It is a sensory experience meant to fill us completely. The music we hear on the radio or in a concert hall is only a pale imitation of the harmony we hear all day, every day. It is like a painter trying to capture what he sees with a handful of man-made colors and a flat canvas. Real music really moves you. When I hear my son cry out in fear, I run. My heart pounds and I race to the rescue. No song can do that. It is the sound of his peril that drives me. It doesn't matter what the cause is or whether he's really in danger.

For me, sound is like a prophet, testifying to the unseen. It speaks of what has been, what is, and what will be soon. Sometimes I can hear the beginnings of disaster while it is still in the planning stage and I can intercede. Sometimes I don't hear until it is too late and the atonal chimes of breaking glass are my only warning. Even so, my life is filled with the soundtrack of reality, the music of children, the bedlam of domestic life. And I wouldn't have it any other way. I, like most parents, am uneasy to get what I ask for. The most frightening sound of all is silence.

My Old Flame...

When I was a kid, a company in Japan invented this new game console. The idea of a home video game machine had been around for over a decade, but I had only played Atari a few times. This new console was something different. It was an entertainment system; the Nintendo Entertainment System. And it came with a game. It was a funny little game about a plumber (and his brother if you wanted to take turns in two-player mode) who is inexplicably on a quest to rescue a princess from an army of sentient fungi and assorted turtle-like adversaries.

At the head of this army is your arch nemesis, Bowser. Is he a dragon? A lizard? A dinosaur? We're not told and we don't care. Why a plumber and not a knight or other more traditional hero? Who knows. Perhaps they were going for a protagonist more approachable, more working class.

Whatever the reason, this strange little game from the Land of the Rising Sun has grown into an entire subculture and Mario, the princess-rescuing plumber, has become synonymous with Nintendo Entertainment.

Twenty years later there may be as many as a hundred game titles feature the mustachioed hero. An exact count is difficult because he has appeared cameo-style in many more games than he has titled himself. As a kid  I loved playing all of the Super Mario titles, including the first three for the NES and the sequels that appeared on the Super Nintendo. Even today I spent an hour plugging away at Luigi's Mansion in which Mario's brother must rescue him from a haunted house. Mario RPG, Mario Kart, Paper Mario, and now that masterpiece (in my humble opinion) New Super Mario Bros. Wii.

The last thing I want to point out is that Nintendo's signature character, who has had blockbuster release after blockbuster release, who has sold titles that were downright awful based on his name alone, who has entertained generations of children and adults alike, often side by side, carries no gun, sheds no blood and advocates fair play, mercy, generosity and kindness toward others. Those who think I'm being sappy or exaggerating need to go back and replay some of those old titles. They're still available for download for the Wii, the latest Nintendo console. I've heard kids and adults alike complain that there are no quality games out there (quality meaning actually fun to play) that don't have at least some blood and violence or other questionable content. As a life-long Super Mario fan I protest that this simply isn't true.

I gave up my PS2 because I was spending too much time playing it and the titles were increasingly too 'adult'
for me to comfortable sharing with my kids. Now, I'm as excited as they are to play the Wii and my mom has to call and ask for her copy of Super Mario Bros. back when I borrow it. Talk about habit-forming.

(By the way, if you clicked on the 'awful' link up above, I have to confess I learned how to type on that program. And I was in high school. Guess it wasn't so awful.)

I think I have the comment thing figured out. You should be able to leave comments on the blog site now.

New name, same bat-content...

In the next week, my blog's name and web address with be changing. Man vs. Child will become Vivid Technicolor Life. I want to get it out there so interested parties can update their links or whatever. I'm not really sure how this stuff works. Anyway, the new address with be www.vividtechnicolorlife.blogspot.com

The change will take place sometime this coming weekend.

So, who do you call...?

I have this theory. I've discussed it with a few people and I think I have a good point, but not everyone may agree with me. Still, hear me out.

Young children can be trained with the same techniques as dogs.

The best way to train a dog is with positive reinforcement, lots of praise, lots of treats, and above all, clear and simple directions. Dogs respond to consistency and routine. Sound familiar? That's because many child-rearing books teach the same techniques. Young children are concrete thinkers. That means that if a thing does not directly affect them (and probably in a physical way) then it is mostly meaningless to them.


I've read that even the smartest of dogs has the mentality of human toddler. They are pleasers that seek affection and are clever and persistent in the reaching of goals. Likewise, children are scary in their ability to devise plans to get what they want but ultimately they desire to be loved and approved of.

We treat kids to privileges when they behave and enforce punishments when they don't. When they don't understand what's expected of them they get nervous and act out. Changes in routine make them uncertain. The more you think about it t he more you'll see. Maybe a good dog training manual out to sit on the shelf next to Sal Severe and Kevin Leman. I recommend The Loved Dog by Tamar Geller. Part of the book is her personal story and why she likes dogs so much. It might be a really good story. I don't know. I skipped to the training part. Geller believes in non-aggressive training that build dogs up rather than bullying them into behavior. Good for dogs and kids if you ask me.

So, now you just have one question you have to answer. If you think I'm way off base and have no business rearing children with this kind of whacko philosophy, who do you call?

DCFS or PETA?

I don't get it...

humor - n. wit, a message whose ingenuity or verbal skill or incongruity has the power to evoke laughter

How many psychologists
does it take to change
a light bulb?

One, but it has to really
want to change.

Where, exactly, did this whole sense-of-humor thing come from? Is it something that's absolute or is it strictly objective? It seems to be the latter. At least as far as I can tell with my kids. My wife and I tell jokes and make witty banter throughout the day. (Perhaps we laugh only to keep from crying?) Anyway, the kids have quickly discovered that humor is well received and are constantly trying to participate as well.

Now here's the problem, at least from my perspective. While my own wit goes sailing over their heads like a weather balloon they return fire with a volley of knock-knock jokes that leave me waiting for the punchline. And I look like the goon when I don't laugh at the right time.


Don't get me wrong, I love a good knock-knock joke.

'Knock knock.'
'Who's there?'
'Interrupting cow.'
'Interrupting c-'
'Moo.'

It's funny, right? What I struggle with is jokes with a punchline like 'Flying-chicken vegetable-head.' I know, kids are learning, in this case they are learning the concept of a joke. They grasp the format, but they have a hard time understanding why one thing is funny and not another. We're working on improving the content so we get to more real laughing and less weak 'Ha-ha. That's a good one, son.'

The second issue is the vast chasm that exists between what a kid thinks is funny and what an adult with a more, uh, 'sophisticated' sense of humor thinks is funny. I'm reluctant to use that word, sophisticated, because I know fathers and sons have been sharing the working of Mel Brooks and The Three Stooges for generations now.  All the same, the subtly of satire or parody is lost on children who think in such concrete terms. To be fair, the comedy of bodily functions is mostly lost on me.

Perhaps it's possible to close this gap, to bridge the chasm and find common humor. After all, I'm a huge fan of animated movies including Shrek, Ice Age, Over the Hedge and more. Yet I'm not always sure we're laughing at the same things. I love Donkey's quick and wordy sarcasm while the kids seem to think the gross humor of an Ogre lifestyle is the height of comedy.

Whatever the solution, I encourage everyone to share laughter with your kids, help them learn the joy of finding humor in life's difficult situations. Teach them to look for irony. And for crying out loud, teach them so decent jokes so they don't get that confused deadpan at the jr. talent show.