Aggravating

Elizabeth gave me the game of Aggravation tonight as a very, very early birthday gift. It's a game we played as kids, but that I haven't been able to find for sale here locally. We found this on E-bay and laughed about it, and then she surprised me with it. The box lid is taped together, and the dice are yellowed, and this might be the exact game we once played.

As kids we also played backgammon, Battleship, Mastermind, checkers, chess, Stratego and a plethora of card games.

Lately I've been playing some of these games with The Quartet. It's been a way for me to reminisce, and a chance for me to set them up for the board game beating of their lives.

Or so I thought.

Read more about how this all went down in the latest installment of my column "Because I Said So" in The Commercial Appeal.

Mothersville

In January of 2003, my wife created Mothersville, a retail shop and safehaven for expecting women.

In February 2005, her friend Andria graciously and ably took that store over so she could go back to teaching.

Mothersville will close this Saturday.

For just over five years, the shop, and the women who have run it, have seen many soon-to-be, and brand new moms, and have assisted them through the ups and downs of motherhood. They’ve helped them, and the community, tremendously and I couldn’t be more proud of them and what they’ve accomplished.

Running a small business doesn’t stop at five o’clock. You take the worry home with you, you sleep on it and you wake up with the stress. At the time Kristy opened Mothersville, we had three children and I had a business, and I would joke that we had five kids when you took those businesses into account.

Kristy came up with the concept and got it rolling (with a newborn in her sling); Andria has carried through with it, expanding on it and growing it as much as was possible (with a newborn in her sling). She kept it alive against amazing odds for as long as the market would bear. And maybe just a bit beyond that.

We owe these women our admiration, our thanks and, possibly for many of you, your very sanity.

In the face of closing, Andria is running a sale all week. Many of you may be thinking you’d like to take advantage of that sale, yet are worried you’ll appear as a vulture picking at the carcass for doing so. I’m telling you to forget that line of thought. The best thing you could do to support her right now is to go in there and buy up as much stuff as you can carry.

And then, on your way out, be sure to give her a hug and thank her for everything she's done.

Mothersville
800 So. Cooper
mothersville.com
901-272-0081

4958

Back in January I wrote that my boyhood home was for sale and that, if the trends in that neighborhood were any indication, it would probably be torn down.

It was.

My sister drove by the other day and took this photo. That's where I lived as a boy, except there was a house there.



My own kids have lived all of their lives in one house, but hopefully they won't live their entire life in this house. When we do, eventually, move, I hope to have lots of photos and memories of our time in this little box.

And now you can join us in these visual memories by visiting Urftography , where I hope to put up a picture a day a la Click(Daily), or clicking on that little Flickr link over there to your right. Enjoy!

It's Hot, Hot, Hot

Big Mama and I are going 'round and 'round. It isn't about the kids or finances or anything like that.

It's the air conditioner.

She will run that thing 24 hours a day trying to get the temperature inside the house down to 72, even when it's 97 degrees outside. We live in a 1,200 square foot box that's been wrapped in metal since sometime in the 1950s when aluminum siding seemed like a good idea. We have no trees. It's like spending a night in the box, except it's all. summer. long.

There are things that make cooling the house even more difficult, like using the oven and the fact that we're poorly insulated and the windows are for crap. But mainly, it's the kids. Isn't it always the kids?

They use the front and back doors like ... well, doors. But not doors to the inside of our house or the backyard. They use them like they're doors to a time machine or Candy Land or Narnia or someplace much more exciting.

They go out, they come right back in.

And, sometimes, they just stand there with it open as though it's the refrigerator door. And they may very well be that confused.

I threaten them with locking the door, whether they're on the outside or the inside. This generally evokes laughter or rolling eyes or the occasional obscene gesture. But I'll do it! I'll lock these kids out of my house in a heartbeat. Sure, it's hot here. It's very hot. But there's a hose out there and they know how to use it. There are shady areas in the neighborhood.

Meanwhile, I'll be in the cool house where it's 77 degrees at best, but trying so hard to get down to 72, when Kristy will then ask the AC to go down to a reasonable 68.

Storybook Finish?

I'm at work watching the playoff of the U.S. Open. I hope The Quartet is at home watching, too, because when it's two names like Tiger vs. Rocco, it's like playing golf in the Hundred Acre Wood.

A Day in Review

Yesterday, Father's Day, was just as it should be. Breakfast was prepared by Kristy and consisted of Cafe Francisco's Francisco bagel and Brother Juniper's scrambled eggs with salmon. I think she made them both better than the respective restaurants.

I ate breakfast in bed while watching CBS Sunday Morning and was given homemade cards. First, S came in and kind of tossed her card in my direction. Then the boys followed; C's had little flaps for me to open and read some nice messages inside and JP's had a little cartoon of one guy punching another guy's lights out and the caption "Nerd Buster's!" written underneath. I don't know if he sees us as a nerd-busting duo, or if this was some sort of veiled threat, but it was a handsome card, nonetheless.

From breakfast, it was all an even keel. I spent the morning lounging around reading the newspaper and doing The New York Times crossword puzzle. The Quartet taught me how to play a game called Mancala, and then proceeded to soundly beat me at that game again and again throughout the day. I watched the U.S. Open and we all took a trip to the park.

Back at home, I watched the kids play in the backyard while I grilled steak and enjoyed a cigar. These kids may be able to beat me at African games of skill and chance, but I'm still the only one allowed to make a fire in the backyard. Dinner was delicious and the perfect way to wrap up a day with my kids.

I'm already looking forward to next June. Thank you, Kristy, C, JP, S & GK.

Father's Day 2008

I have run two 5ks in the last week. That's 10k.

That is not 10,000 miles.

I've traveled 10,000 miles over the past 10 years, all in the space of a front porch, the length of a family sofa, the distance from home to school. My traveling companions: a wife, four children who look like me, others who don't. Friends. Good Friends. Very good friends. Family.

There have been good times and bad. I've alternately felt like a wise old sage and a failure, a leader or a child myself. I am the most fortunate man alive.

There are days when I sing for my kids, when I put on funny hats to make them laugh, and times when I need some time away from their voices. I tell myself this is normal and hope I'm not mistaken.

It's a difficult thing, to not focus on mistakes made, both real and perceived, to not hone in on the tension. To wonder if you're doing more harm than good with the disciplining, the food, the television and teaching. There is too much good in all of this, though. These are good kids, a great family.

I am the luckiest of fathers today.

The Water Horse

There are hugs and birthdays, ice cream covered smiles and big eyes. All of these make having children worthwhile. Each of them reminds us daily of how our kids fulfill us.

Then there's the simple fact of being the supreme commander, the boss, le grand fromage. Even if it is over a bunch of people less than half your size, it is still good to be king and helps keep things in perspective. That perspective being: I am the king. They call me Big Daddy.

I was able to relish this the other night when I decided, because I am a benevolent dictator, to get The Quartet a treat on the way home from work. A customer had told me that day that his grandson enjoyed The Water Horse: Legend of the Deep picture, which I'd seen a preview for and thought my kids might like. So I stopped and got it, but told them when I got home only that I might have a treat for them if they could behave for the evening.

They spent the evening mostly being good and a lot of time asking what the treat was and when they could have it. I spent most of the night saying things like, "Well, I'm not sure you're being so good tonight" and "Are you being good? Really? You think so, huh?" They squirmed and they pleaded and they showed a modicum of restraint when it came to whining and hitting each other. And it was good. I was firmly in charge.

I bestowed The Water Horse on them when it was a good time for them to settle in and watch a movie. They were delighted; I thought JP's head was going to explode when he realized he was holding a brand new DVD in his filthy paws.

The irony is that The King hasn't had control of his television since. I have yet to watch the film, though there have been 343 viewings of it on the family TV. The thank yous have run out, but the movie plays on.

The kids are happy, Daddy's a hero, and that's all that's really important.

Because I Said So

I sneaked another column past the editors.

Up Your Nose

C and I have taken a couple of four- and five-mile bike rides lately. Not all that far for me, but it must seem like quite a trek for him. After the first one, I thought to myself, He should probably be wearing a helmet. And then I said out loud to him, "Your mom is going to say you should have a helmet on."

Then we went on our second ride and he didn't wear a helmet. I felt guilty. My feelings of guilt were mostly prompted by his new haircut. I don't know what Sam was thinking, but this is anything but Fantastic. He should have had a helmet on if only to protect the rest of us from witnessing his "style."

I never wore a helmet as a kid. And that certainly wasn't neglect or poor parenting, we just didn't wear helmets back then. All I was doing was riding a bicycle, nothing dangerous.

At some point, though, it became important for children to be safer and I'm wondering about the statistics of death and serious injury back then versus now. I'm sure they're out there on the Google somewhere. Maybe I'll look later.

Things couldn't be that much more dangerous now. I'm not that old, I was born in 1970. Could it have been so bad in the '70s?

You know what was bad in the '70s? Welcome Back, Kotter was bad. Last week, WGN, one of the channels on our 4-channel package from Comcast, was showing several Kotters back to back, including the pilot. In my mind, this show was hilarious, and I can remember watching it as a kid with my mom when we lived on Central Avenue. I watched it again the other night thinking that if it was as funny, and wholesome, as I remember, then I'd NetFlix the DVDs for The Quartet.

Good thing I previewed that show. It's fairly tame compared to prime-time today, but boy is it bad. Had I been aware of the lame jokes and canned laughter as a child, I'm sure I would've gone out, jumped on my bike and ridden out into Central. With no helmet, of course.

Wolfie's

For our honeymoon, Kristy and I were given two trips as gifts. We took the train to New Orleans, where we spent a few days and nights, and then flew out of there to South Beach in Miami, where we spent the better part of a week.

Because we were young and knew squat about saving money, we blew most of the wedding cash we received in New Orleans. That's easy to do there.

So we found ourselves in South Beach with very little money, and we found quickly that it's not the place to be with very little money. What we also found was a diner called Wolfie's, which had been around, seemingly unchanged, since the late 1940s. It was a place we could eat relatively cheaply while filling up on rolls and such, so we ate there at least once a day, sometimes twice, for the entire time we were there.

We were by far the youngest patrons. By about 60 years we were the youngest. While we were there eating lunch, I think, most of the diners were having their dinner.

Kristy and I were married 14 years ago today and we still know squat about saving money. We still scrimp and forage to feed ourselves and The Quartet; it's something we learned in 1994 at a quaint diner called Wolfie's in one of the most expensive cities in the country.

Google just told me that Wolfie's closed in 2002, yet Kristy and I are still going strong, and I look forward to every day with her and our future together, when we'll be having dinner together at three in the afternoon.





Happy anniversary, Kristy. I love you.

GK Critic

I took the opportunity, with the running of my fourth column, to interrupt 2-year-old GK's morning espresso and newspaper to ask what she thinks of it.

Me: Well?
GK (from behind the newspaper): What?
Me: What do you think?
GK: I think you people better figure out this mortgage situation before I get ready to sell my starter home.
Me: Not that, sweetie. My column. What do you think about it?
GK (folding paper down): Column?
Me: There, on the cover of the 'M' section. It's called "Because I Said So."
GK: Look at that, aren't you adorable with your little picture?
Me: It's the fourth one I've done. What do you think so far?
GK: Oh. Here, let me skim it.
Here she very quickly reads the column
GK: Your ... spelling is topnotch. Good use of punctuation, too.
Me: Thank you.
GK: How did this come about? Did you win a contest? Do they have Amateur Day over there?
Me: Well, some people called "editors" decided they wanted this column done and, I guess, some of them were familiar with my blog, so ...
GK: Whoa, whoa, whoa. Back up there, Winchell. Familiar with your what?
Me: My blog.
GK: The hell is a blog?
Me: A web log. It's a website that makes it simple for the user to add content ...
GK: Look, let me explain something to you. I'm two. I'm trying to learn this insane language and it doesn't help when you people just make up new words to amuse yourselves and your internet friends.
She picks up and continues reading the Business section
GK: So what is this web log of yours called?
Me: Urf!.
GK: (audible sigh)
Me: What? It's something S used to say when she was about your age!
GK: I just saw S trying to eat a popsicle stick-end first.
Me: Yeah, she kind of worries me.
GK: You all worry me.

Happy Birthday

Because sometimes Mama says it best.

Happy Birthday, GK.

Le Petit Tour

My most memorable bicycle rides:

• As a boy, my mom and her cousin, Joe Jr., rode bikes with my sister and me on the backs of their bikes in the rickety, metal-and-foam child seats of the day, to Aunt Jeannie's house. That was a trip from Central Ave. and Tanglewood to Stonewall, just north of North Parkway. It felt like we traveled across the city; it was four miles.

• Uncle Johnny and I once rode from our old house on Newhaven to our new house just behind Kirby High School when I was about 14. Now, this was a pretty long haul, about eight miles or so. It was thrilling to bike so far.

• My friend Jim and I, well into our 20s, once planned to ride from his house in Midtown to Downtown. We thought this ride would take most of the day and planned for such. It took us about 20 minutes.

Yesterday, C and I rode bikes from the Castilo to Elizabeth's house, which is about two miles. It was nothing for me; I knew the distance beforehand, I knew the course we'd take and about how long it would take. But it must have felt to C like we rode across the city.

It was his longest ride to date and he handled it famously. He turned where I told him, he stopped when instructed and changed gears as advised. When we arrived at our destination, he was red-faced hot, but seemed pretty proud of himself.

The bicycle, at his age, is a means to escape. It's his freedom. When he needs some space from his siblings, the confines of the home and even his parents, I want him to know he can jump on his bike and go. And I want him to know how to do that safely.

He will have many more treks, but hopefully he'll remember this one. And, hopefully, I'll be a part of some of his others.

Can I Get a Ride?

I like the Jon & Kate Plus 8 show on TLC because it's fun to watch people with more kids than us to see how they handle all that, and because I kind of have a thing for Kate, but mostly because I get excited when they show their van.

I don't know what kind of van it is, but there appears to be room enough to move their family of 10 around comfortably. Easy in and easy out, plenty of headroom. It's a dream.

I went on the Dodge website and built my own 2008 Dodge Sprinter 2500 passenger van, which looks like Jon & Kate's anyway. This beauty is 170-inches long with an extra-high roof, and seats 10 comfortably. It has a 5-speed automatic transmission, 3.0-litre V6 turbo diesel engine, automatic sliding right door and towing hitch for my eventual sailboat. And I chose hibiscus red with gray interior.

Total cost: $48,290.

To that end, I've bitten the bullet, sold out just a bit, and added some Google AdSense onto this blog. Not a lot, I don't like sites that are overrun with advertising. It's somewhat integrated over there on the right and down a bit. Doesn't cost you a thing to click, but it adds up for me the more you click on it. In fact, in the past seven days, I've taken in a total of $4.24, so I'm well on my way.

Soon enough, I'm confident, I'll be tooling around town in this behemoth. Or, maybe, I'll just be sitting in it out in my driveway, a quiet place to escape from the cacophony in our house.

A Visitor

Knock. Knock.

My kids didn’t even know who he was.

“He looked like the mailman,” JP said.

It was my uncle Johnny, I’d know his voice anywhere. I hadn’t heard it for far too long, yet here he was, in Memphis and on my front porch. There was a time when we talked every other day, at least. Movies, books, sports, jokes -we discussed everything. But then something happened, and it happened on my end of the phone line, on my end of the In-Box.

I’m not sure if I’ve become too busy or if I just think I’m too busy. At some point, though, excuses became easier than actually blocking out 15 minutes of my day to call and say hello, and that’s wrong.

If we can’t take time out of our days to get in touch with those we know and love, then why are we doing what we do? Why work six days a week if on that seventh you can’t take a few minutes to say hello and ask someone what they’ve been up to? There is no point.

My family scattered from Memphis years ago, but I’ve always managed to stay in touch, until this last year, and I have no explanation for that. But I can, and will, correct it.

The Quartet needs to get to know their extended passel of kin. They need to know when a stranger comes to the door, whether that stranger is family or foe.

You Know Who I Am

I've never been able to get a finger hold in this ephemeral notion of fame. Never tasted the sweet nectar of celebrity.

Until now.

For two years I've written this blog with some degree of anonymity. Sure, it wouldn't take Scotland Yard to find out who I am, but I didn't see the need to put myself out there. My name couldn't be found here, no full-face photos of me, no kids' names. But that all changed about a month ago when I started writing the small, bi-weekly column for The Commercial Appeal, "Because I Said So."

Now I'm out there. I'm out of my safe, dark closet and in the 40-watt glare of stardom. My name is Richard Alley. I have a blog.

My fame, however, is not limitless. I've been approached about the column by regulars to my shop and my kids seem to enjoy the smug, goofy grin in the paper every couple of weeks when I force them to acknowledge it.

So, essentially, I'm now recognized more in my home and for about two blocks downtown. It's a start.

I still wait on line, unable to gain entry past the velvet ropes that other local columnists, like Tim Sampson and Wendi Thomas, no doubt glide past. But I did get a personal invitation to Mr. Chuck's birthday party from Bard Cole of WKNO. It was a very nice gesture, though I, unfortunately, couldn't make it. Kristy and The Quartet went in my stead and had a lovely time.

Incidentally, I was looking forward to going because in his E-mail, Mr. Cole told me that Clifford, The Big Red Dog and Raggs would be there, and then was kind enough to explain parenthetically that these would be "people in cartoon character suits," which is good because real, giant red dogs scare hell out of me.

Then there was the old-timer who called me at work after my first column ran to let me know that my definition of a "baby boomer" - the collective name given to all those kids born at the same time because they made so much noise - was wrong. He asked that I correct it in a future column. Consider this the correction. And thanks, Patton, for making that call.

I still write for fun and to keep you all informed of what's going on with us. And, although being famous for writing a blog is like being known as the first to scale the shortest mountain alone, the money makes it so much more fun.

So if you see me in public then please say hello and I'll try to acknowledge you on the way to the VIP room at Schnuck's, the post office or Cafe Eclectic, or wherever it is the extremely high-profile people of my ilk hang out.

Bravo

You remember that Marx Brothers picture where Chico plays the piano?

Doesn't matter which movie, they were all like that. At some point Chico would come across a piano and sit down to pound out a raucous tune, sometimes utilizing a prop, like an orange, and often using only his index finger to target a specific note.

Well, JP's piano playing is nothing at all like that. Last night at the recital, he fell fourth in line to play a song. That song was "What Can We Do?" He took the stage, bowed, played his song for about 15 seconds, his anemic fingers doing all they could to push the ivories down, stood for another bow and left the stage. It was all very quick, very professional and very good.

He's proud of himself as he has every right to be. He got a trophy for his work on the piano all year and he walked out of the building saying, "It's my first trophy!"

I have no doubt there will be many, many more.

Piano Keys

Herbie Hancock performed on piano with the Chicago symphony at age 11, Buddy Rich began playing drums at 18-months and was a bandleader by age 11, Harry Connick Jr. recorded with a local jazz band at age 10 and Stevie Wonder signed with Motown at 11.

Six-year-old JP has a piano recital tonight at school. I don't think I'm ready for this; he says he is. I've asked him a dozen times if he's ready to play the piano in front of people and he assures me he's all set. But I'm not sure I'm prepared to watch my little boy trying to do his best in front of a crowd.

Truth is, I have no idea if he can play. He's been taking lessons this school year, but I don't even know if he can perform a whole song or not. He plays at home sometimes, but it's on an out-of-tune instrument I inherited from my grandmother. I don't know if it's him that sounds awful or the piano itself.

Last night, though, I was sitting outside with a cocktail after coming home from work and Kristy came out to tell me that JP was inside composing music. I went in to find him sitting at the piano, which was closed up, and writing notes on a piece of paper.

I watched him as he began furiously erasing a line of letters with his nub of a pencil and sliver of eraser. I know squat about the making of music, so the only thing I could offer him was a decent, well-sharpened pencil.

I asked why he was erasing those notes. "They'll be better on the right side," he said.

"Playing it with your right hand?"

"Yeah, it'll sound better."

He never did play it. Whatever he had going on was in his own little head. Hopefully it was good. And, hopefully, he'll do well tonight and the mistakes he'll make and embarrassment he'll feel are only in my head.

The Doctor is In

I was exhausted yesterday. I have no idea why, but I had to take a minute in the middle of the day to rest my eyes and then I was asleep earlier than normal last night.

But before I fell asleep, I was lying in bed reading a book and GK was crawling all over me like a spider monkey. I said to her, "Where is my thyroid?" (My family has half the functioning thyroids they were born with). She pointed immediately to my elbow.

"Is there anything wrong with it?" I said.

Without missing a beat, she answered, "Yes."

Now, she's not a doctor. In fact, she's only just begun studying for her MCATs. But I have a bit of the hypochondria and so when she answered so quickly and so confidently that yes, in fact, the thyroid in my elbow is deficient, I panicked a bit. I'll admit that.

GK is one smart, well-read two-year-old. And it is true that I'm feeling somewhat rundown and there is a history of hypo- and hyper-thyroidism in the genes.

And now that I think about it, my elbow does hurt a bit.

Mother's Day

One of my favorite family photographs is a little square one taken back in the mid-1970s. In the picture, a young, long-haired mom sits at a kitchen table, flanked by her two children who lean in to the center, smiling.

The woman is beautiful and the kids, a son and daughter, are obviously happy.

She went on to have three more children. She grew stronger and wiser, just as those kids did. She set in motion who these five people would become, she helped make me who I am, the husband and parent I'm trying to be.

Thank you, Mom, for all you've done and all you continue to do. And Happy Mother's Day to all of the strong and beautiful women who are a part of my life, from the farthest tip of Florida, to Georgia, all the way up to Naperville, Ill., and back to Memphis, where I'm surrounded by a family and love bigger than I ever could have imagined.

She Was Running

I went running with GK the other night. Well, I was running; she sat her lazy, diapered butt in the stroller, demanding I push.

I've never really done this before and it was a great workout. GK enjoyed it, too, just sitting there pointing at neighborhood cats and squirrels and the blooming flowers in all the yards, and talking away the whole time about what she saw.

At least, I guess that's what she was talking about. I had the iPod in my ears so I couldn't hear her at all.

It was a great bonding moment for father and daughter, though. I got a good cardiovascular workout and she got to ... do nothing, really. Just sit. Lazy.

Prime Time Dreams

On the way to school this morning, C told me he had a dream last night that white people were being enslaved. Kenneth, from 30 Rock was in it.

In the dream, C asked around and found that the only place where white people weren't being forced to be slaves was Detroit. So he asked Homer Simpson to take him there.

Because I Said So

Two weeks ago I had a column in The Commercial Appeal. The powers-that-be either didn't read that column closely, or yesterday was just an extraordinarily slow news day, because they put another one in there today!

Read the latest Because I Said So right here.

Heads Up!

We hear about the dangers in school every day on the news. There are gangs and kids with guns. There are bullies, both real and virtual. There was recently some tainted meat.

I learned today of another hazard. I got a call from Downtown Elementary this afternoon telling me that that S, who was on a field trip with her school (as was every other school in the city, it seemed) at a Memphis Redbirds baseball game, had been struck by a foul ball. A zinger right down the first base line.

"Can you go up there and see her?" I was asked.

Can I go see her? I've got to see this, I thought. I mean, S's head isn't much bigger than a baseball.

When I got there, her teacher, Mrs. Porter, and the school's principal, Mrs. Wunderlich, were both with her in the first aid office. I'm grateful to both of them for taking care of her and staying with her until I could get there.

She's fine, just a big knot on her melon. The good people of the first aid station gave her a Rockey the Redbird stuffed animal and she got to keep the ball.

Of all the dangers in schools these days, I never saw the lead-off batter in the bottom of the 8th coming. And, apparently, neither did S.

[Final score: Memphis 5, Salt Lake 10]

Say 5:45 One More Time!

Okay.

Yes, I know.

Yes, C, I know.

You told me that.

I. Know.

These are the various ways, in increasingly agitated tones, that I responded to C letting me know, numerous times for the last couple of weeks, that he had to be at school at 5:45 this morning for a field trip to ... Arkansas? Not sure where, really, but possibly the dog track.

However, at 5:30 this morning, after having slept through the alarm for 15 minutes, I was a bit more whispery-loud, and urgent, asking Kristy to wake up and help get C's lunch together and wake him up.

Oops.

But I got him there on time to meet the bus that will take him to wherever it is he's going, and we all learned that it is very irritating when your kid repeats himself 50 times, but it is necessary. And may not be enough.

The Quartet's Aunt at Material

Look what my sister has done for our entertainment this Friday night!



From ZURCO:

Material is pleased to present its fifth exhibition of 2008: Elizabeth Alley: Class of ’88. The exhibition will open with a reception for the artist on Friday, May 2 from 6-8 pm.

The exhibition will run from May 2 through May 31st.

Elizabeth Alley has shown her work regularly in the region since receiving her BFA from the University of Memphis in 1998. She has shown at a number of the area’s art spaces including Delta Axis at Marshall Arts, Lantana Projects, Memphis College of Art’s On the Street here in Memphis as well as the Renaissance Center in Dickson, Tennessee, the Nashville Airport, and the Southside Gallery in Oxford, Mississippi. She is represented locally by Perry Nicole Fine Art Gallery. She lives and works here in Memphis.

About the show the artist writes:

“In 1988 my big brother and all of his friends graduated from high school. I was simultaneously in awe of their milestone and bummed that all of the cool people were gone, leaving the school feeling leaderless.

“This series of acrylic paintings on paper takes a look back at the Class of ’88, though, which school isn’t important. The images show a true slice of life of the American teenager in 1988. It is a time that could never be duplicated. The images look like our memories – faded, and with a few details missing.”

Additional information and images of the artist’s work can be found at her website: http://www.elizabethalley.com/.

Material is located at 2553 Broad Avenue. Parking is available on both the north and south sides of Broad Avenue.

C in Charge

Who do I think I am? What am I doing here? As it turns out, I don’t know the first thing about being a parent, so it’s time to hand these kids over to the only person – other than their mother, mind you – who is qualified.

C, they’re all yours.

It’s already been documented just how helpful, at 10-years-old, he can be when his parents are out all night at a rock-n-roll show.

Last Friday night we had friends over for our weekly Cocktail Hour. We were all sitting outside and at some point GK required a Band-Aid. She … fell down, or something. I don’t know. Anyway, C went inside and came back with the bandage and a tube of Neosporin. As Kristy was quick to point out to him, “Daddy wouldn’t even know where the Neosporin was.” And she’s right!

Then, this morning, I put the kids in the car, had to reposition the car seats after yesterday’s Sam’s Club run, and then dart back in the house for something. Halfway downtown, C informed me that GK wasn’t buckled into her seat [this is the first Big Mama has heard of this]. I had JP buckle her in as I slowed to 20 mph or so.

What good am I as a parent? I can reach the upper kitchen cabinets and I hold a valid Tennessee driver’s license. Outside of those assets, my 10-year-old can handle whatever may come up. It’s humbling to know that 10 years of fatherhood can be replaced by a stepladder and $1.25 in bus fare.

Fed Up

I was born at St. Joseph’s Hospital in downtown Memphis in 1970. In my lifetime, I’ve lived in Midtown, East and Southeast Memphis, and for most of that time I listened as my father put this city down day in and day out. It was with this attitude that I grew up, not even knowing what other cities might have to offer over ours, just as he didn’t.

Kristy and I had the opportunity to move away for a bit just after we were married 14 years ago, and when we moved back it was with a new outlook. My time away made me realize what I liked and missed about Memphis. I was positive, forward-looking and ready to begin the next phase of our life. We had a son, bought a house and a business, and were willing to show our kids the good side of their hometown.

But I’m finished with all of that now.

The Quartet has seen the river and they’ve heard the blues. I’ve driven them down Belvedere in the spring and then again in the fall. We’ve been to the zoo and Soulsville and eaten barbecue until our bellies hurt. I can point out where I lived as a child or went to elementary school. I can tell them of their history here, about International Harvester where their great-grandfather worked for so long, or the butcher shop on Main St. owned by their great-great-grandfather in the 1940s and ‘50s.

But what I can’t tell them about is how, just over a year ago, a man walked into our good friend’s shop, threatened her with a gun, and took her money. Or how only eight months later a man walked into that same shop in Cooper-Young and forced her partner to the register, with her baby in her arms, for all of their money. Just two months ago that store was broken into, the door kicked in and the front counter ransacked.

I certainly can’t tell The Quartet that last month a man met their uncle on his front porch with a gun to take his wallet and watch, and that my sister was there to see it all happen. I’ve even tried to hide from them the five times my own store has been burglarized over the last nine years.

It’s all just too much. This city has broken my heart.

We’ve chosen the Midtown-area of Memphis to live because of its sense of community. But increasingly the only sense of community is felt when the college basketball team advances in the NCAA Tournament, and on garbage collection day when neighbors wave to each other at the curb while performing their civic duty.

What can we do? How can we save a city that, it seems, has nothing to count among its assets other than a good pulled pork sandwich, a handful of dead recording artists and the home base of an international shipping company which can’t be that great a company to work for after all if they force their upper echelon of executives to relocate and raise their families in this shithole.

We can vote. You can vote for the mayor, city council or school board member who you think can turn all of this around. And your vote will be counted along with all the other poor, uneducated voters who continue to elect legislators willing to sell their city, and its people, for a few thousand dollars; a mayor who has lost all focus and, apparently, any grip on reality; and a city council and school board that can’t see their civic responsibility past their own egos.

But first, I think, you have to decide that this city is worth saving. And I did. For a long time, I did. But I’m not sure how much longer I can go on wondering when – not if – another friend or loved one, or one of my very own children, will become a victim.

Kristy gets off work every day, picks up the kids and takes them home. If my phone rings at any point after that, my heart stops a little bit with fear. And I don’t believe that fear is at all unfounded.

There are no definite plans in place for how I, or my family, will deal with all of this. There is a lot of talk going on, a lot of best-case scenarios being bandied about. I’ll let you know whatever decisions are made right here when the time is nigh.

Until then, though, we’ll continue to peek out the door before leaving the house, we’ll stay aware of our surroundings before exiting the car and we’ll try to assure The Quartet that there are friendly and safe(r) places out there.

PowerPointer

On the way to school the other morning, C told me that each student in his class is supposed to pick an animal and then come up with a PowerPoint presentation for that animal. I'm not sure if they're trying to sell these animals or market them, or what a PowerPoint even is, really. In fact, I just had to ask my sister how to write PowerPoint (Powerpoint? Power Point?).

I work alone, for myself, and therefore have no one I have to convince of anything other than customers, and I don't presume that they have the kind of time required to sit and look at a PowerPoint, whatever that is.

Maybe I should have my customers come in and watch a PowerPoint of different animals. Or maybe I should have a bunch of third-graders head up my marketing department. Couldn't hurt.

The Bedlam of Declan

What? I'm sorry, What?!

The Elvis Costello show was very loud last night. Very good, but so very loud. I can't hear anything over the ringing in my ears, which I must say is a nice change from the complaining of The Quartet that is usually in my ears.

Can I just take a moment to ask you people a favor? I don't go to many concerts, but when I do go, can I ask that you not spend the whole show with your phone or your tiny little camera held over your head to take a picture of what's going on on stage? Enjoy the concert in the moment, watch it life-size and not through the view finder on your Canon.

I was surprised to find last night that I knew about half of the songs Costello played. I own over 20 of his albums, many with their bonus discs of extended and obscure tracks. It was nice to hear stuff I didn't know by heart already. The songs he left out surprised me; no "Allison," no "Pump it Up," no "Just About Glad." But he did a version of "Everyday I Write the Book" that just about knocked me over.

At the end of the show, for one of the encores, he brought out ... The Allman Brothers, I think it was. Three young, long-haired dudes, featuring Catch Me If You Can-French prison scene-Leonardo DiCaprio on guitar, came out to play with him. It was loud. Yet it was fun to watch because you could tell that Costello was thinking, "Pay attention boys, this is how you get to do this for 30 years."

For a very final encore, Elvis Costello and The Impostors, featuring Lynyrd Skynyrd, featuring Appetite for Destruction era-Axl Rose on guitar, came back out for a rousing version of "(What's So Funny 'Bout) Peace, Love & Understanding," but not before the sound man apparently turned everything up except the lead vocals and then went home.

There's so much more to tell, but I have to go because GK may be crying in the other room. Maybe. I can't really hear so well.

[A very special Thank You to Aunt Elizabeth who watched The Quartet for us so we could go out last night.]

Sometimes I Wish That I Could Stop You From Talking

Big Mama and I are going out tonight to see Elvis Costello at the New Daisy. I can't even remember the last concert I went to. Do they start at 6:00 now, so I can get home and to sleep at a decent hour?

I asked The Quartet this morning what their favorite Costello song is and they said they don't know any of the song names. They're a bunch of liars. C asked if he sings "Muhammad Ali" and I said no. He asked if he sings "The Prettiest Waitress" and I said no. That boy breaks my heart.

So they asked me to play a CD on the way to school this morning, which I did because nobody ever asks me to play Elvis Costello. I put in My Aim Is True and we rocked out, as much as you can in a 17-year-old Volvo station wagon, anyway.

I'm looking forward to a night away from the kids and their lying ways, when I'll rock out with friends on Beale Street. As much as a 37-year-old can, anyway.

JPee

I walked out in the front yard yesterday, just in front of where the van was parked, and found JP standing in the driveway, shirtless, shorts down and peeing one of the most impressive arcs I've ever seen while grinning ear to ear.

He was clearly pleased with what he'd accomplished.

I should've stopped him, lectured him on the appropriateness of outdoor urination. But it really was quite impressive.

And, truth is, I was a little jealous. Not of the arc, mind you, I could have peed over him and the van. I was envious of the opportunity, and of the naivete that the front yard might not be the best place to relieve himself.

So I let him finish, which he did in due time, and when he looked over and caught me nearby, instead of a lecture, all I gave him was a thumbs up.

Four is the New Seven

If you've ever wanted to have your thumbs and fingers ink-smudged while reading something I've written about The Quartet, then you should pick up a copy of today's The Commercial Appeal and read my debut with the column "Because I Said So."

The buzz around The Castilo this morning:

Big Mama: Go steal a neighbor's paper so we can see it! (I did not do this.)

S (upon seeing my mug in the column): Who is that?!

JP: It's good they spelled our last name right.

C (after reading): It's good.

GK: That Daddy! That Daddy!

You can see for yourself HERE.

Common Sense and Laserbeams

I don't have a high horse when it comes to the environment, I leave that to the professionals. I just don't believe that humans could ever destroy Mother Nature, she's too tough a broad to succumb to the likes of a flock of animals who count opposable thumbs as their super power. And if we could, I don't believe that plastic bags from the grocery store is how we would kill her. I would hope that we'd be more creative than that, like maybe develop a mad scientist-type laser beam hidden deep in an island fortress somewhere. All the evil humans there would wear coverall uniforms in drab gray, or something, except the evil women who would wear something shorter and more colorful. Some of the drones may need to have their opposable thumbs removed to keep them in line.

But I digress.

I recently purchased some of the re-usable grocery bags from Kroger simply because they hold more and are easier to carry. I stopped by the Kroger at Cleveland and Poplar this morning to get some goods for work and took those bags in. At checkout, I stood there watching as, first, the sacker put the blue bags into a plastic bag. I explained to him that I'd already bought them and that the groceries speeding down the belt at him should be put into those re-usable bags. Please. I always say please, it's how I was raised. I then stood and watched as he and a supervisor put the groceries into plastic bags and then put those bags into the blue re-usable bags.

I should have explained it to them, and maybe the girl checking me out. And possibly to anyone I could gather around for an audience. But I spend my days and nights attempting to instill common sense into my four children and I just don't have the energy to try to persuade adults to think before they act. If it were a matter of life and death, then of course I would have made my wishes clear, but as I've said already, I just don't think it is.

We're trying to raise The Quartet to be productive and intelligent members of society. I try to make them see that all of their actions have consequences and that they should always think and consider the outcome before they act or speak. I'm trying to get them to think hard about that laser, about what island chain we should hide it in, about whether or not I'll be high up in the chain of command and, hopefully, get to keep my thumbs. Please?

Illogical

Back in the very late 1980s, very early '90s, I went to Memphis State University for a minute. One of my favorite courses that I took was a logic class. Elementary Logic, I believe it was called. It was soothing to me, like sinking back into a comfortable chair, to see how these letters and symbols fit together to form the foundation of all the more complex decisions we make every day in this insane society. The basic theory that A=B, B=C, therefore A=C sounded like Sinatra to me at that time.

S needed money today for a field trip at school. Among the three older kids, there is a field trip about once a week, all requiring $5 or $10 or $4 or, once, $40. I'm still not sure about that one, but soon after C was seen wearing some new sneakers. Today the fee was $9, which I put on top of her homework folder last night, and then at some point she came up to me at my desk to get an envelope for Kristy to put that money safely into.

On the way to school this morning, I asked S if she'd gotten her money for the field trip, which is to the zoo, by the way. "No," she said.

"Did your mother put the money in an envelope last night?" I asked.

"Yes."

"What happened to that envelope?"

"She put it in my folder."

"Do you have the folder?"

"Yes."

"Hey, S, do you have the money for your field trip?"

Silence.

Money = Envelope
Envelope = Folder
Therefore, Money = Folder

She had failed to grasp the simplest tenet of logic. Not only failed to understand, but was actually stymied by it all when I tried to explain it to her. Maybe her tiny 5-year-old brain hasn't fully developed enough, or perhaps it was just too early in the morning for Dad's smart-ass point-making. Or, maybe, I expect too much from my kids, for them to see that A=C, when they can't even grasp that Daddy is always right, the simplest axiom in our family.

Because They Said So

For those of you who rushed out this morning and bought a The Commercial Appeal, or woke up while it was still dark out to get on your computer, glowing screen bathing your matted, bed-head hair, to read my column Because I Said So ... sorry. It got pushed back to next Thursday because they ran a giant piece on Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. today.

Please tune in next week, but until then, go back and read Stacey Greenberg's excellent column under the same title from last week.

The Fanatical Four

The Quartet was as excited as everyone else in the city about the University of Memphis Tigers’ shot at the national championship last night. JP even made a diorama for the night, an image of a tiger dunking a basketball inside a little box. He whooped and cheered for the Tigers until they fell behind and he became discouraged, lying on the couch and burying his face in the pillows, eventually drifting into sleep. All before halftime.

It was a scene played out across the country yesterday, though possibly without the narcolepsy, but it was especially unusual for us because we don’t have a sports-minded household. Oh, sure, there are sports moments; there was the run through the Sweet Sixteen, Elite Eight and Final Four for our hometown boys, and just last week I took The Quartet to Uncle Toby's house to witness Liverpool FC beat down Everton FC in the Merseyside Derby. And, like most households, we follow Le Tour de France every year and the World Cup every four.

But we don't follow the week-to-week progression of the NFL or the day-to-day baseball scores and stats. This is mainly because I don't have time what with working six days a week. And Kristy loathes sports. We don’t follow NASCAR because it’s a bunch of cars driving around an oval and I fall asleep and there’s yard work to do. Yet professional sports (and I lump college sports in with this, but that's a discussion for another time) have a place in our society and in growing up American.

Are my kids growing up with the full American childhood experience? With summer days on the ball field and Sunday afternoons cheering their favorite team? My son made a diorama for a college basketball game, for the love of all that is holy. Should I correct this? Probably. They should know that in this house we’re loyal to the Cubs. They should be encouraged, I suppose, to root for the hometown Grizzlies until that team moves and I have to explain money and television revenue sharing and what professional sports is really all about. They should realize, if they don’t already, that what those young men did last night in San Antonio was more than play a basketball game that would realize big money for the two universities and help to propel some of those athletes into the big leagues. They should know that that team, and that game, brought a city together, a city that is torn apart every day by the people running it, by the lowlifes on the street and by the news media. And they need to know that, at its core, it’s just a game. None of it, from the most casual soccer match in any third world country, to the most prestigious win of Tiger Woods’s career, none of it really matters in the end.

It’s all diversion, and that if you want to paint your face blue, then go ahead. If you want to dress your kids in team colors for the weekend, then by all means do so. And if you want to make yourself a diorama, well, that’d be just fine, too.

Gobble

Downtown Elementary lost power yesterday morning so I got a call that the kids needed to be picked up, that they were closing early. Again. These kids have gotten out of school early for rain and for loss of electricity. When I was a kid we were lucky if school closed for snow.

On the walk back to my shop, C told us he had gotten his letter from his pen pal in Turkey. His class recently began a program of writing letters to strangers. "He doesn't speak English so good, but I don't blame him because he's on the other side of the world." Ahhh, the cultural tolerance. I told him, "Mmm, turkey."

Happy Morning

Anyone who is a parent remembers that moment when their child or their children came into this world. I mean that very instant when their baby sprung forth, unleashing that wonderful scream and a torrent of emotion. Many of you probably cried; I know I did.

I'm finding that it's not the same emotion when your baby wakes up earlier than expected in the mornings and springs forth from her room, all snot-encrusted, wild haired, and spewing forth anger and ear-splitting, "Mommy!s." Unlike birth, I just wish I could put her back in; I don't want to see you or hear you until you're ready to be seen and heard. And if that's nine months from now, then so be it.

Trash Collecting

S always brings her empty Zip-Loc lunch bags home from school. In camping parlance, she packs out what she packed in. We’ve never camped. I know that some people will want to believe that S is interested in recycling. That she’d like to see these plastic baggies re-used again and again, never adding to the non-biodegradable detritus clogging up Mother Nature’s arteries.

S does not care.

She puts those empty bags back in her lunchbox because 1) she doesn’t want to walk to the garbage can at school, and 2) she’s afraid the universe may come to a screeching halt and we will run out of garbage at home.

We will not.

I throw these empty Zip-Locs in the garbage because the idea of putting a new meat sandwich into what once held an older meat sandwich makes me want to throw up. The question is what to do with all the garbage? Or rather, with the recyclables. Such a nice word, recyclable. It’s not trash, it’s recyclable. And we do recycle, we have a curbside bin provided by the city and I fill it up every week. The problem is that there is still trash, er, recyclables, to be put in there because The Quartet ingests copious amounts of milk, gingerale and Chef Boyardee. So the left-over trash – I’ve just now decided to call it what it is, trash – piles up. In my home.

I know we can call the city and request an extra curbside bin. We had two at one time, but the extra … disappeared. It was recycled, I imagine. I hope. I have to believe that at some point the trash collector assumes that two bins is a mistake, and an egregious paperwork error has occurred somewhere in the chain of command, and liberates one of them. And I’m left, again, with a pile of trash in my house.

Kristy and I disagree on immediate solutions. She says we should take our neighbor’s bin since he just moved out of town and the house is vacant; let recycling logistics be the home buyer’s dilemma. I say fill up the recycle bin with the appropriate garbage and dump the rest in the big, green can.

We are at an impasse. But, I’m the one taking the garbage out.

Ryatting

From 1945 until 1970, my grandfather, Cal Alley, was editorial cartoonist for The Commercial Appeal here in Memphis. In addition to his editorial duties, he wrote and illustrated a nationally syndicated comic strip called "The Ryatts." The Ryatts was a strip celebrating the day-to-day life of a family with five children, gleaned from Cal's own family life. I like to think that Urf! is my own little Ryatts, though I don't claim to have a quarter of my grandfather's talent.

What I do have now is my own space in The Commercial Appeal to highlight my family. I, along with the multi-talented Stacey Greenberg, will be penning a column about our adventures as parents called "Because I Said So." It is to run every Thursday on the cover of the M section and, apparenlty, the day before on the internet. Stacey's can be found here; mine will appear next week.

What can you hope to learn from Because I Said So that you haven't from this blog? Well, you'll find out who I really am, you'll learn the actual names of The Quartet and, together, we'll find out whether or not you can use the term "public flatulence" in a daily newspaper with circulation over 100,000. Please read.

Changing Channels

Dinnertime at the Castilo has matured somewhat. I'm afraid to say that for years we have been one those typical American families that would eat in front of the television, if not all of us, then at least most of us. Recently, however, in my infinite wisdom and out of true paternal devotion, I've put an end to that and we've been eating around the massive dining table that Big Mama bought for me several Father's Days ago.

And it's been fun. Mostly. The kids look forward to the dinner hour when we will all sit together to eat and talk. But like so many other things, they've taken it to its most irritating extreme. They talk and talk and talk, and touch, and stand and sit and stand and sit and stand and sit. They need more milk. Now. JP won't leave C alone, and S only wants to eat three or four more bites. C is still telling us how his day was.

Perhaps this is how supper has always been, though drowned out by The Simpsons or 60 Minutes. Or maybe The Quartet was so mesmerized by the predicament Earl had gotten himself into this week that they'd forgotten to pick at each other. Whatever it was, I think I might want it back. It was quieter, less kinetic, and all happened an appreciable distance away from me. Kristy and I could sit at the table, if we chose, to talk quietly, read a magazine or book, or work the day's crossword.

The silence wasn't total, but the interruptions seemed fewer. Messes were still made, but they were out of sight.

This could be seen as parental regression, I know, taking the kids from the family table and putting them back in front of the TV. It's the lazy way out, sure. But who knew that without the inane chatter and hyperactive jump cuts of dinnertime television, that these kids would simply create their own?

Two

It was two years ago today that I latched onto the teat of the internet. Today is Urf!'s birthday and I feel I've nurtured it into the drooling, babbling, fit-throwing, high-maintenance toddler you know and love. I hope you'll continue to read and be a part of my family; there are a lot of exciting things happening, some of which you'll hear about in the next week or so.

Urf! by the numbers:

Years: 2
Posts: 410
Hits: 40,399
Children: 4
Bathrooms: 1

Flight of the C

I've heard friends talk about it for a while now, I've read bloggers' writings on it, yet I never understood just what it was. It was hilarious, though, friends and bloggers alike agree on that. So last night Elizabeth brought season one of Flight of the Conchords over for us to borrow. And ... it's funny, with the one guy and his Jagger-like mouth and the other guy and his hair helmet. But you know who really enjoyed it? C. Perhaps it's geared to a 10-year-old's sense of humor with its songs of robots and the one about crying. I'm assuming this show is kid-friendly. I know it's HBO, but I didn't see or hear too much that's offensive, other than the New Zealand accent. However, I did fall asleep during the last half of the second episode, so if there was any gratuitous sex or violence, then please let me know, because I don't think C would, such is his new-found love for Flight of the Chonchords.

Upon Returning Home From Work Yesterday Evening ...

GK: Mayor Herenton announced his resignation today, effective July 31.

Me: Wow. I guess the celebration has begun already.

GK: What's to celebrate? He wasn't defeated, he wasn't scandalized like John Ford, he's going out on his own terms after a 16-year run as mayor. He's imposed his will and his cronies on this city and, as a result, Memphis is a crime-ridden, downtrodden village. We're more racially and economically divided than ever and Herenton is just walking away from it. It makes me sad, it makes me sick every morning when I sit down with my espresso and bagel, trying to stomach the newspaper. What is there, really, that's worth celebrating?

Me: You make a good point for a 26-month-old.

GK: 21-month-old.

Me: Whatever. So who's the next mayor?

GK: I believe it will come down to a special election this November.

Me: Hey, maybe I'll run for mayor!

GK: Your fly is open.

Close Call

Let me tell you what almost happened.

Today marks the start of The Quartet's and Big Mama's spring break, which is why you saw me drive directly to work from home this morning without making all sorts of turns and stops to drop these kids off at their various destinations. I was talking to my Mom on the phone last night and she reminded me that Favorite Aunt Carol is flying down to the swamps of southern Florida today for a visit. When I told Kristy of this after I got off the phone she said, "You and GK should go down there." Yes! We should! It is spring break and GK does love her Jello shooters. Just for laughs I Googled up some airline flights and found that the flight to Ft. Lauderdale today or tomorrow is surprisingly affordable. But it's awfully soon. It all seemed too spontaneous, especially with work and various other responsibilities.

So we're still in Memphis, where it's not 85 degrees. Taking the trip was still on my mind this morning as I lay in bed thinking, and I started wondering if I could even do that. I've never been alone with GK for that length of time. Would I know how to take care of her? It would also be the longest she's gone without the possibility of nursing. Would South Florida be ready for Hurricane GK? What entertains a 21-month-old? I work six days a week and on the seventh I'm usually doing chores around the house or running errands (I know, I know, it's for the Parent of the Year panel to decide now ... or Harry Chapin to sing about ). Then I began thinking more specifically of the flight. She'd be on my lap for two hours, though she wouldn't want to stay there. She'd want to walk this way and that, possibly see what happens when you pull this latch. She's not at the age where I can read to her and she'll sit and listen, or sit quietly and color or play with a doll. She likes to go, go, go. When she's not nursing, that is, which is just out of the question. And what about the bathroom? What if I had to go? Those bathrooms are literal water closets and wouldn't fit both of us. Can I ask the stewardess to watch her? And, possibly, nurse her? And then I thought about sleeping. I get pretty tired after my second airplane bottle of scotch. Would that same stewardess be willing to watch GK during my nap? I'd slip her $10, of course, I don't expect her to take on that extra responsibility for free. I wonder just how friendly the skies would be after two hours of a cranky little, cooped-up girl?

I suppose it's good I didn't spontaneously book that flight because I really need to sit and stew on the idea for a while. By the time GK is eight or nine I should be ready to travel alone with her. By then she'll be able to sit quietly and read or color (I hope), and she'll be able to potty on her own (I hope), though it will be difficult to pass her off as under-two so I don't have to pay for an extra seat. But it will be nice to have someone so small to travel with whose tiny little hands can get the caps off those tiny little bottles for me.

Pick a Card

The school-age kids are involved in something called Accelerated Reader, or AR, at school. They read books at home, or get help reading books, and then amass points for each book read. They then use these points to redeem cash and prizes ... or something, I don't really know all the ins and outs of AR and its convoluted system of words and numbers.

The other night S brought home one of the Clifford books (one of the Clifford books that involves guns, surprisingly) and I was going to help her read it. Turns out she can't read a lick. Not a sentence. But then last night she picked up a card that was lying about and said, "Is this a one-eyed Jack?" And it was. So at least she's gaining some sort of education, somewhere. Although later she said, "What are those little green things that hide treasure at the end of rainbows called?" So I guess her education level fluctuates.

Pete

Kristy and I moved into our house almost 11 years ago; she was pregnant with C at the time. The neighbor to the north of us was Pete, and he's been there ever since. However, he's talked since the first day we met him about selling his house and moving out of town. Every time we'd run across each other outside, working in the yard, taking out the trash or passing each other on our way to or from work, he would mention thinking about selling his house and moving out of town. And now he is. He leaves today for Denver, a new job, and endless hours of trail riding and running.

The Quartet has grown up knowing Pete and they have come to think of his front yard as their own (sorry about all the Big Wheels, balls and various toys, Pete!). He's been a good neighbor and he'll be missed on our street.

Good luck, neighbor!

Big Help

The funniest thing to me going on in our house right now is GK helping me to put the clean silverware away when I'm doing dishes. She can barely reach the drawer, so she just throws them in haphazardly. I don't correct her or tell her she's doing it wrong, I just clap and then, when she's finished, we both jump around the kitchen as a kind of victory dance.

The second funniest thing to me going on in our house right now is Big Mama opening that same silverware drawer and seeing the pile of utensils. Because, see, I don't go back and straighten the mess, either, and it drives Kristy crazy.

[This is where the photo of the silverware
drawer would go if I had a camera.]

What's Broken Wednesday?

You know what, you guys guess what it is this time. What is it around Castilo Urf! that is broken this time? And, since things break in threes for me, you get bonus points if you guess the next two items to break, in order of course. For an extra bonus, if anyone would like to replace what broke tonight, then I will rename this blog after you.



[Happy Birthday, Papa Steve!]

Clap, Stomp, Beep, Chew ... Chew ... Chew ...

As both of you know, I don't like to speak ill of my children in print. Or on the interweb. However, there are three things on the list of things that are beginning to annoy the hell out of me that I just can't ignore any longer.

The first is JP and the incessant beat he seems to have going on in his head. He claps his hands and stomps his foot to a rhythm only he can hear. It's like living with an overgrown Chick Webb or a STOMP understudy, or like driving around town with Shane B. and a Big Gulp. I've actually let this go for a while because the boy obviously has the music in him, and I don't want to discourage his natural ability. So I would just ask him to stop at the dinner table, but allow him to drum and clap at will the rest of the time. But I just can't take it any more because he's also got the OCD in him and I think now that this is what's driving his patter.

The second is the chewing. I can't seem to get these kids to chew their food with their mouths closed. It's like eating dinner with someone treading water in a vat of macaroni & cheese right next to me. In the 1950s, NASA taught a monkey to pilot a rocket into space, but I can't teach three humans to masticate quietly.

The last one is C and this calculator/calendar contraption he got from school last week. He carries this thing around and shows it more affection than Kristy and I have shown any of our offspring. I don't know what else this thing does, but he flips it open and stares at it for hours on end. Occasionally it beeps at him and he laughs. I'm not so sure this is as much annoyance as it is fear. I worry that he may be planning something, or he may feel responsible for punching in a sequence of numbers every so often.

I suppose all I can do is try to maintain patience as The Quartet grows and learns. I can nudge them in the direction I think they need to go in order to become productive and caring citizens one day. And I can talk to them, talk until I'm blue in the face and then just sit back and shake my head as JP claps his hands twice, stomps his foot once, and then heads into the kitchen to chew a Pop-Tart.

The Best?

While flipping through the 11 channels of our substandard cable package last night, I passed - and then paused on - a reality game show crap program called My Dad is Better Than Your Dad. The Quartet was immediately entranced by the old men running and huffing around a soundstage while their offspring screamed encouragement at them, so I asked them all whose dad is best. "Who's the best dad?" I said, "WHO IS THE BEST DAD?!" Until finally they each relented and answered that I am, in fact, the best dad.

And then I changed the channel.

The Quartet complained and bellowed, as they were by now wrapped up in the competition. But I was having none of it, so they all left the room, leaving the Best Dad in the House in blissful peace.

This peace lasted about seven minutes before S came back into the room to tell me everything I'd missed on the show in the last seven minutes, and that it wasn't on now because there was a news break. The special news bulletin was to inform everyone of the six people, including two kids, found shot in Binghamton, not too terribly far from us.

The Best Dad tried to shield his kids from horrible television, yet failed to shield them from the horribleness of life.

The Tell-Tale Pants

I picked my second born, JP, up from piano practice at school this afternoon and was greeted in the hallway by a guttersnipe in khaki pants with both knees ripped out. I asked him what happened and he told me nothing, that they were like that when he put them on this morning. I stopped him and said (for my sisters, they should imagine Mom saying this because I could sense her presence talking to me 30 years ago), "You mean to tell me I took those pants out of the laundry this morning, folded them, and set them out for you with the holes in them." And he said, "Yes." I asked if he was sticking to that story and he said, "Yes."

As we waited the 15 minutes or so for C to finish play practice, I made a point of staring at his knees so that he would catch me, and then he would cover them with his hands and look away. I plan to leave those pants out here at home where he will consistently see them and he will consistently be reminded of the story he told me until one day he just can't take it anymore and he'll crack and tell me what really happened. And by then I'll probably yell at him that I don't know what he's talking about but he'd better get his pants out from the magnets on the refrigerator.

CD

This is the 400th post on Urf!.

I don't really have much more to say about it. I'd like to say that there are 100 posts for each of my four kids, but that's not completely true. There are a lot of posts just about me, some about movies or music, television or school, and a few are simply photos. But all 400 posts have one central theme: me! Not really, it's all about family - the silliness, the poignant, the profane and, of course, the good times and frustrations.

I hope you've enjoyed reading these first 400 as much as I've enjoyed writing them. And if you haven't lately, you really should go back to the beginning and re-read all of them. Go ahead, I'll wait ...

RJA and Kristy Plus Four

Occasionally I find myself in front of the television flipping through all 11 channels of our substandard cable package. If The Simpsons isn't on, then the TV usually lands on TLC. I find one of their shows fascinating. It isn't the one about the midgets or the tattoos or the house renovations. This is the show about a couple with eight children, six of whom are the same age.

I don't watch this family to feel bad for them or to laugh at them. I watch it because I envy them. These 10 people are always going places! They're traveling in their cool, large-capacity van, and they're traveling on airplanes. I was thinking tonight of all the places Kristy and I have traveled with half as many kids. We've been to Greensboro, GA, to visit Mimi & Pop; Statesboro, GA; and the Gulf coast a few times. And that's it. We've never even driven to Naperville, IL, to visit Favorite Aunts Carol and Lauren, for some reason. Never been four hours away to Murfreesboro to see Johnny and his girls. And we've certainly never been on an airplane together. I once looked into flying us all to the swamps of Southern Florida to visit my mother and the cheapest flight was close to $2,000 for us to drive to Nashville and fly out of there.

I watch the TLC program, and here is this family jetting around the country, so what I figure the Urf! contingent needs is a producer. We need a producer to put these trips together and wrangle some advertising money. I'll dress my kids in Nike or Coca-Cola or NASCAR or whatever you need to get us all out of town on your dime. We know we aren't reality TV worthy with our measly four, un-inked, average-height kids, and we're okay with that. We don't need to be on TV, we just need to get out from in front of the TV. And the farther from our television the better.

The Religion of Cute

I was raised in a Catholic family and in a Catholic school. One thing I always remember from my childhood is that my mother would make the Sign of the Cross any time we passed a Catholic church. It was never anything I learned specifically to do at school, though I was only 14-years-old when I left for public school, so I guess I assumed crossing yourself was something the Apostles had done whenever they drove past a church. No matter where in town we were, when we passed a Saint-anyone, Mom would make the Sign, it was the most reckless act of driving I would witness until cell phones came on the scene. Yet it was also somehow comforting to know that she was always thinking of where she was and, I suppose, where she’d come from.

I always counted on that simple motion just as I’ve come to count on something else as a parent. When out in public with my youngest child, GK, I expect strangers to stop when they pass and comment on her remarkable cuteness. It happens everywhere we go, people stopping to cross themselves with her beauty. I’ve even witnessed a genuflection here and there.

Another lesson learned from my mother was respect and tolerance for other religions. And I am both respectful and tolerant in my adulthood. But something happened today that I’m having a difficult time holding in high regard. GK and I were at the Home Depot (she’s thinking of repairing the leaky bathtub faucet herself and wanted to browse their selection of diverter stems) and people were stopping as they do to comment on her winsomeness to each other or to try to engage her or even just to smile at her. But then she walked in front of a middle-aged couple that didn’t stop or look away from their shopping to admire her. They ignored her! What kind of beauty atheists were these people? GK was even walking, and if you’ve ever seen her toddle then you know that it’s impossible not to adore it. I almost went back to these people to ask them what their problem was. Ask them if they even saw my daughter, or if Lucifer had pitchforked all aesthetic sense out of them.

I usually give people with their own kids a pass. I have four kids and I certainly never stop to ooh and ahh over some stranger’s snot-nosed urchin. But, again, that’s because I have my own. These Godless people looked to be two of that breed that have no children of their own by choice. They probably hate children. Or beauty. I have no idea what they were buying at the Home Depot, but I’m sure whatever they’re renovating or constructing will be ugly, pointy and dangerous, and probably best left ignored altogether.

One Through Six

Kids today. The Quartet and I have already reached a communications barrier, but it's not over the rock-n-roll or the new math or the designated hitter. No, it's over Star Wars. They've been watching the series over the past few nights, and they insist on calling Star Wars, the first Star Wars where we're introduced to Luke Skywalker, Obi Wan and R2-D2, "Number Four." And the third one, with the Ewoks, is somehow now known as "Number Six." There's no talking to these kids, they act like I was born in another century or something when I try to explain it to them.

Will I ever be able to talk to my children about the truly important things? About drugs and sex and relationships. About how in 1977 the computer technology just wasn't there to make Mark Hamill even a decent actor?

I'm Starving!

You've read about their food abhorrences. You've learned what foods will not be tolerated by

Sassy Molassy
Steph Chockleyblog
SAM
Listwork
Mrs. Katherine

And here is my own list. This is my list of things that aren't even food! You shouldn't eat these things even if you wanted to. Non bon apetite.

this calculator
this cigar cutter
that chair
my shoe
your shoe
recyclable water bottles
the remote
$1.25 in nickels
fleece
this ink pen
JP
the Sunday New York Times crossword puzzle
squash
the front rotors and brake pads I just had replaced on the Volvo 740
erasers
this losing lottery ticket
a 40-watt light bulb
tiny little golf pencils
the Apple iBook G4
plutonium

Politics and Poop

Sunday politico program conversation:

Me: What are you doing my little snookum-wookum?

GK: Senators Obama and Clinton's campaign managers are making the rounds of the news programs and I'm considering both. Obama makes a strong case and has a good base with a large war chest to carry him forward to November.

Me: GK, dear, let me try to explain some things to you that you may not, in your 20 months, have comprehended yet. In this day and age, in this post-9/11 world we live in, we need a leader who can protect our country. We need someone who isn't scared to do and say what needs doing and saying. And there's only one person for that in this race, only one clear choice. It was a rallying point, a great day for America, when he rescued all of those hostages from what he thought was a gang of terrorists at Nakatomi Plaza. And that man single-handedly saved every soul on those airplanes that needed to land in Washington, D.C. Not to mention the passengers on the New York subway and the guy from the Apple commercial. How can you even think liberal in this time of war and strife? In this house, we vote one way and I expect you to remember that in 17 years.

GK: McCain, doofus. Senator John McCain of Arizona. M. C. C. A. I. N.

Me: Ohhh, I see. Nevermind.

GK: Hey, Russert, what say you change me now? I've been sitting in my own filth through your entire speech.

He Seems To Know Me

C has been cast in the role of "Peasant" in the production of The King in the Kitchen that the 4th Grade is putting on. (Spoiler alert!) The Peasant wins the princess.

I picked up my little Bobby De Niro after his first practice yesterday and he talked and talked and talked about the play like he does. He told me they were working on two plays that day. I said, "There are two plays?" And quick as he could, he said, "Yeah. But you only have to go to one." I think we understand each other.

Numbers, Words and Fire

I always had trouble with word problems in math class in school. I was good in math and I could read well, but when you put the two together it's like I was dyslexic. Whatever was being searched for in those riddles was beyond me. So I felt especially helpless tonight when C was trying to tackle a problem for school and asked me for assistance. Here's the problem:

Kate is 4 years older than Margaret. In 7 years, the sum of their ages will be 70. How old are they now? How do you find Kate's age using Margaret's?

I came up with the right answer, but I can't figure out how to explain how I got it, and the instructions ask for a table to show your work.

Parenting is hard enough with having to teach your kids right from wrong, to stay away from strangers, and which is their right foot and which is their left. But then you throw word problems in and it makes it only that much more difficult. It makes it about x times more difficult.

This evening I was also unable to teach GK how to use a Zippo. I blame this on her weak thumbs, which is going to be something she'll have to deal with her whole life. She gets weak thumbs from her mother.

Tears Among The Backpacks

As we pulled up to school this morning, JP said, "See that kid with the green backpack? That's Harold. Every morning he goes to the backpacks and cries and I go over to the backpacks and look at him." I suggested he should be nice to the boy and he said he is. "He's always okay by the afternoon."

JP is curious, but he has a big heart.

Par For The Course

On this fine, sunny Sunday morning I found myself out in the front yard with GK, mug of coffee in hand, watching her toddle around, ride the myriad tricycles and big wheels, and laughing at her as she implored me to ride the child-sized scooter. I knew that on the other side of the front door, the other three were wasting food, spreading debris around the living room, arguing, possibly crying and losing the remote. Again.

I leaned against the Volvo and watched as the three college-age guys who live three houses down stood around their upright golf bags and open trunk, no doubt discussing their plans for the day or remembering the highlights of their night before, whatever that might have entailed. They looked at me, I looked at them, they looked at me, I looked at them. I'm pretty sure they were envying my life.

At their leisure, they loaded those bags into the trunk, adjusted their windbreakers and ball caps and climbed in, heading off for a day at the course. I took my daughter up in my arms and headed inside.

Mud Angels

I can remember being a kid in February and holding out hope against hope that it might snow so that we would get the day off from school. Some days, though, it was only bitterly cold in the mornings, yet dry. But then, miracle of miracles, the sky would open up sometime during the morning and enough snow would begin falling to whip Memphis into a frenzy. All school work stopped and pandemonium would ensue with kids running around, looking out the windows and waiting on their parents to come and release us from the clutches of our teachers. Those were exciting times indeed.

I just got back from picking up my kids from school early. It's 75 degrees here now on the 5th of February, and there are some potential thunderstorms on the way which could hit here anytime between now and 10 p.m. I'll say that again: The powers that be closed Memphis schools early because it might rain. I think it's great that the schools now have computers in them and it's really wonderful that somebody at the top has weather.com bookmarked, but having parents leave work early to rush around and pick up their kids, who then may have no place to stay, because of a thunderstorm seems a bit over the top.

And right now weather.com is telling me that there is a wind advisory for the area. So it seems schools closed early for wind. Breaking wind, which may reach 25 mph. My brother, down in the swamps of southern Florida, gets out of school for the threat of wind sometimes, but their wind is generally guaranteed, and it's usually 74 mph or more.

The Quartet is at home now with Big Mama, who is a teacher in the city schools, and I have this Rockwellian image of them drinking hot chocolate, bundling up until they can hardly move, and then walking outside to be blown over into the mud in the front yard.

Dennis

My family is large enough that we have a calendar put out each year with everyone's birthday listed. All of the little squares for each month are almost filled up now with names. We're very prolific in our baby havin'.

When you look at today's date, February 3, you see that it is my cousin Dennis's birthday. But this square also tells us the year of his death, 2002. Dennis would have been 27 today. When I think of Dennis, I can't help but think of a day when a few of us were getting together at Aunt Jeannie's house. Dennis's young body, at that point, was already ravaged by MS; he was on steroids and swollen, and he walked with a cane. But he came in and the first thing he did was to ask me how I was feeling. I'd had some stupid sinus infection or something and he'd heard about it. And he asked me how I was feeling. But that was Dennis. He was always interested in how everyone else was doing. He was a good kid, loyal to his friends, he loved his mama and sister, and adored his nephew and niece.

Dennis left our lives like a landslide and he is dearly missed, because no matter how full that calendar gets, the gaps are just too big to be filled.