Cookie Czar

At the grocery store when the jolly cashier holds out an animal sticker, Lyla glances up with head slightly lowered, making her eyes look like they got stuck mid-roll. "No thank you," she says, barely audible with a dash of attitude.

I love the way she remains basically polite without compromising her standards of good taste. Animal stickers are, like, so first grade.

Nevertheless, one could argue that it's important to learn how to be socially adept with strangers. I'm speaking theoretically, of course, not from any personal knowledge or skill set. Barely audible with a dash of attitude is fine when you're 8 and rejecting a dopey sticker, but it won't get you a job.

Enter the Girl Scouts and their cookie cult.

It was Lyla's idea to fill up the bike trailer and drag it around the neighborhood like the cutest mule on Earth. Pretty good business plan, if you ask me; most people took one look at her and just grabbed their wallets. For the others, I believe her spiel went something like this: "Ahem, do you want cookies?" For a kid who does not love mindless pleasantries with random people, being the neighborhood cookie czar was excellent practice.

Controlled by the Logans

Last night, Rowan decided he will bequeath this shirt to his younger cousin, Cam.

"Too small for you?"

"No."

"You just think Cam will like it?" When Rowan gave Cam his old backpack, Cam wore it for approximately 172 consecutive hours. Cam is like Rowan's Dobby the House Elf.

"I don't know." He looked down and kicked at the floor with his big toe.

"What are you thinking about, buddy?"

"I just don't want it anymore. It's...embarrassing."

"It's embarrassing? Like, you're embarrassed to tell me?"

"No. The shirt is embarrassing. Because it says 'Daddy' on it."

A single trombone played a dirge in a far desolate corner of my brain, but I played it cool.

"'Daddy,' huh? Not what the kids are saying in kindergarten these days?"

"Everybody says 'Dad,' and when I said 'Daddy,' Logan laughed at me."

"Ah."

Now didn't seem the time for a pep talk on being one's own person. Nor did it seem the time to address inconsistencies in his feelings of embarrassment, such as his literally wide open attitude toward bathroom doors. And it definitely wasn't the time to remind him that sometimes he still calls me Da-da.

"Rowan, Cam's going to love that shirt."

"Never mind, Daddy." Okay, he did NOT actually say, "Never mind, Daddy." But in a more cinematic version of this story, that's what he said. And in that version, I held out my hand, but instead he came in for the hug, and the credits rolled. In the real version, the perfectly imperfect version, he just nodded and ran off, and I started (and continue) to think about how to teach him not to be controlled by the Logans of the world.

Dog person

I'm not a dog person. They smell, they invade my personal space, and they don't appreciate sentence structure. I realize I've also just described babies, who I love without exception. Lend me a baby and I am a cooing, burbling idiot. Not so much with dogs; I do appreciate your love for your dog and its objective worth as a living thing, but it will not send me into spasms of affection. This is one reason you're a nicer person than me and have more friends.

My two dog-exceptions (besides your dog, who is lovely) are Daisy and Tulip.

Tulip is the little blurry blob in the lower-left, eating feces. Daisy is the big thoughtful sentinel, gazing fearlessly at the horizon and the promise it represents.

In December, Daisy died. She was old, and she had cancer. After strong medications gave her a couple more acceptable weeks, she stopped having good days, and we made the hard decision.

How do you euthanize a pet when you have children who are small? What's the proper way to go about it? Probably there's not a wrong way as long as your intentions are loving and sensitive and thoughtful. For us, that meant bringing a veterinarian to our house and saying goodbye as a family.

It was hard. I don't really want to go into it. Hopefully the kids learned what it means to be humane and what it means to say goodbye. They handled it more matter-of-factly than I imagined they would. But people's reactions in difficult times aren't always predictable. While Julie and the kids sat in quiet, solemn reflection, I doubled over and sobbed.

The Test

At Rowan's last checkup, the doctor told us he is in the 40th percentile for height and 14th for weight. We only give him helium balloons indoors. Looking ahead to middle school, when ordinary children become Lord-of-the-Flies savages, he might need more than a conch shell to survive. Hence Kung Fu.

I wish I could say I decided on Kung Fu after careful analysis of all the martial arts, but it's just the one I happened to see on the community education website. It's like when I was 10 and my family moved down the street from a Lutheran church, instantly rendering us Lutherans.

Yesterday, with the verve and defiance of a young Martin Luther nailing his 95 theses to the door, Rowan passed his white belt test.

And sure, that behemoth in front of him blocked him off to half the Jedi council judging panel, but it didn't matter. His skills were apparent whether you could see him or not.

Afterward at Culver's, Rowan didn't eat his cone; he five-point-palm-exploding-heart-techniqued it into oblivion. Many napkins perished.

Kung Fu Master

Rowan is on the path to becoming a Kung Fu master. It's a slow path. The previous eight weeks of Friday evening classes have all led up to today's big test, held at a middle school in a neighboring town, after which Rowan will add to his curriculum vitae the title of "Kung Fu White Belt."

I thought he'd get the white belt on the first day, like they'd just hand them out and then work on the first real belt. You're alive and your dad paid the $79? Here, kid, tie this around your waist.

In actuality, white belt means you've mastered a series of blocks and punches that'll allow you to survive an attack by another white belt. The infinitely patient instructors would demonstrate a move with perfect form, and then they'd shower praise while their charges flailed around like little flamingos. Then they'd do it again. And again. Week after week. And the kids got better at it.

Last night, I told Rowan not to stuff his uniform in the hamper; he'd need it today for the test.

He's ready. He's in the zone. It's ON. Jackie Chan, you've been warned.

Luck o' the not-very-Irish

Julie texted me a warning: Both kids left their bedroom doors open this morning so that a leprechaun would have no problem sneaking in to leave magical treats and surprises.

Previous St. Patrick's Days have yielded zero leprechaun visits to our house. I am 1/8-Irish, and Julie is 1/4. That makes our kids (carry the 2, square root the whatever) 3/16-Irish, in other words unlikely to attract the attention of anybody named Seamus, let alone a leprechaun. I explained this to them in the car.

"But a leprechaun left candy in Hannah's room and also turned her toilet water green," Lyla pointed out.
 
"We'll check our rooms just in case," added Rowan.

"Yeah," said Lyla.

"Yeah," said Rowan.

"Yeah," said Lyla again.

"Okay, but seriously, you're not going to find anything from a leprechaun. There are childhoods that involve leprechaun visits and elves on shelves, but those are not your childhoods. I'm sorry."

It was silent as we drove up the hill and turned onto the street before the street before the street we live on. Then Lyla asked if we could order pizza and Rowan asked if they could have an Ice Breaker mint. I said sure, and fine cheer was restored.

As I type this, Rowan is turning an empty Kleenix box into a leprechaun trap. Just in case.

New Material, Girl

The book Lyla picked for me to read to her and Rowan at bedtime was something by Madonna.  I hadn't seen it before, but I suspect it came from last Saturday's gift opening marathon with Julie's side of the family.  A children's book written by the singer of "Like a Virgin" will be a perfect gift for a kindergartner, someone thought.

Spoiler alert in case you plan to read this book yourself, but it's about a group of girls who shun another girl because they're jealous of how she's perfect in every way.  Then there's an Ebeneezer Scrooge-like dream in which a fairy godmother shows the four of them--simultaneously, because they're all, like, having the same dream at the same time--that the shunned girl's life really isn't so perfect after all.  Among other things, the girl's mother is--oh boy.  I closed the book.

"Uh, I'll be right back."  I headed downstairs with the book and found Julie.

"Julie!  This Madonna book is about a girl whose mother is dead.  What do I do!?  I'm halfway through the book and the kids are waiting."

"I think it's fine."

"Seriously?  I don't think it's fine."

"Well, then you're going to deal with the kids' wrath."

Back upstairs, I told the kids I didn't want to finish the book because of something sad in it.  They could pick any other book as a replacement.

"WAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!" they replied in unison.

Earlier this year, my friend, a mother of two who blogged here, died of cancer.  I admit that perhaps I overreacted to this children's book due to the rawness I still feel about her.  But I wasn't prepared for what Lyla said next.

"Daddy!  We know the sad thing is that her mom is dead!  We know!  Can you please just finish the book?"

Rowan chimed in, "Yeah, Daddy.  We know she's dead."

So I finished the book.  Lyla and Rowan listened intently, and then they went to bed.  And of course I came to the simple realization that by trying to protect them, I was really just protecting myself.

Thanks a lot, Madonna.