The First Weekend

The weekend’s hockey adventures turned out pretty well. The boys were on the ice, and despite a few penalties and the obligatory complaints about “the worst referees ever,” they came away with two wins. We also moved our seats about three spaces to the left from last year. We still have a blind spot on the ice, but our new position is virtually puck-proof. I consider that a successful relocation. So, after the first weekend, what do I want to remember?

As we were walking in from the parking lot, we bumped into a “hockey friend” who sat near us last season. I don’t think his tickets were actually near us, but he seems to share my appreciation for a good puck-proof seating arrangement. He had his four-year-old son with him. He had also grown out his hair and gotten a perm. I usually turn off my biometric identification skills on the weekend, so it took me a couple of minutes to figure out who he was and remember his name. His son had come to a few games last season, too, but he wasn’t talking then. Our friend brought him up to our seats, and he sat next to Judy. After we talked for a while, Judy decided I should move over so I wouldn’t have to talk through her. We continued talking, but his son kept asking, “Can I sit by your mom again?” That got a chuckle. Not a big laugh. Just enough to acknowledge that I had somehow become Judy’s child.

The breakfast club from Friday morning also had some success on the ice. I know the bacon had nothing to do with it, but maybe the pancakes with mini chocolate chips did. Of the seven players who attended breakfast, seven of the team’s nine goals over the weekend came from those who were there. With that kind of statistical evidence, I suspect the superstitious players will not allow me to discontinue the breakfast tradition. I may have accidentally created a responsibility for myself.

There was also a little confusion through text when we were trying to meet our new hockey boy’s parents. Eventually, we connected with them during the intermission between the first and second periods. Because we’re trying to be careful with pork products, they told us about a local restaurant that wasn’t quite as careful. They had ordered him calamari and cannoli. The calamari had been fried in the same oil as some pork products, and the cannoli contained gelatin with some pig-derived ingredients. Fortunately, everything worked out. The lesson Judy and I took away was simple: when it comes to feeding this one, err on the side of caution. His parents attend a lot of his games, so we’ll be seeing them throughout the season. I’m sure we’ll eventually get the food thing figured out, preferably before I accidentally serve him something that requires a family meeting.

While we were talking with them, the “official residents” of the seats to my right decided they were feeling crowded. They either shoved or gently pushed our seat cushions to the left. There was plenty of room, so it wasn’t really a problem. The problem was that I am a rule follower. My ticket tells me where my seat is. I like sitting where my ticket tells me to sit. There is a certain comfort in knowing that the seat cushion beneath me has been legally assigned to me. Judy reminded me that this was a small issue and one I could afford to “let go.” In theory, that is what I did. I moved the cushion and continued watching the game. I said nothing. I caused no scene. Internally, however, I may have opened a small investigation.

Hockey games qualify for the national anthem, and sometimes we get Jimi Hendrix’s version. Sometimes we get local “talent” singing it. Both games this weekend were just music. Judy and I did our best to provide a low-volume duet for the people around us. I don’t believe I heard any other supporting voices, so I’m assuming our contribution was appreciated. I suppose pulling off that hat was more effort than I realized. At least everyone stood quietly and put their phones down while the music played. At this point, that’s practically worshiping an object in our culture.

The babies are due Monday. Since they seem committed to baking as long as possible, they didn’t interfere with our first hockey weekend. If they had, Judy would have stayed home with our granddaughter, and I would have gone to support our boys. With a trip to a NAHL tournament later this week and no home games until early October, we may actually have a little time to spend with the new babies without hockey intervention. Of course, there’s another side to that equation. Our daughter may have her own ideas about how much she wants to share the babies while she tries to figure out how to fit two new people into the life she was already living. I remember what it was like when our kids were little. You can love them more than you can explain and still occasionally wonder when you’re going to get to finish a cup of coffee. So we’ll see how that goes.

The referees this weekend were about the normal level of “bad.” The ice had its own problems, too, which made things more difficult for the guys. Penalties happen. Referees call what they think they see. Sometimes they’re right. Sometimes they aren’t. When they see something incorrectly and the boys know it, the boys occasionally do a little self-correction of their own. They use blind spots and obstacles on the ice to disguise their interventions. I’m not a fan of the fights. They’re too obvious. I don’t like dirty play, either. I’d much rather see the boys play clean and let the game take care of itself. But I understand the temptation to provide a little behavioral correction when the people assigned to enforce the rules seem to have misplaced their glasses.

The first weekend went well. It wasn’t perfect, but both of our boys got assists. The team swept the other team, which is a pretty good way to start a season. There’s a long way to go. Will the rest of the season go this well? Will the coach tinker with things too much and accidentally complicate some of the chemistry that might otherwise develop? There’s plenty of time for things to get messy and get fixed again. That’s part of what makes the beginning of a season fun. Nobody knows exactly where it’s going yet.

For now, the boys are playing well, we have our puck-proof seats, breakfast appears to be producing goals, and I have been promoted to hockey breakfast coordinator. There are worse jobs. We’ll keep showing up, keep encouraging them, and keep enjoying the conversations along the way.

The hockey season will eventually become a collection of scores, standings, injuries, wins, losses, and things I’ve forgotten. I suspect the things I’ll remember most will be much smaller than that: a four-year-old asking to sit by Judy, pancakes with mini chocolate chips, a seat cushion moved three inches to the left that I definitely let go, and two boys getting assists. Mostly, I’ll remember a lot of weekends spent watching these guys become a little more like the people they’re going to be.

The Unofficial Billet Parent Oath

This feels like it could be called the “Billet Parent Oath,” although I don’t think there’s an official version. If there is, I assume it includes something about feeding teenagers, providing a place to sleep, respecting the rules of junior hockey, and accepting that you may suddenly become responsible for things you never considered when you agreed to let a stranger move into your house.

The hockey boys all come with their own backgrounds, personalities, habits, and varying abilities to interact with adults in a conversational manner. Since they aren’t our kids, they arrive as something of a box of chocolates. There is far more good in there than the initial uncertainty might suggest, but you never know exactly what you’re going to get. If we approached billet life expecting everything to go smoothly, we’d be crazy. We do it despite the unexpected. My wife thrives on it because she likes having problems to fix. I thrive on it because a hockey boy who can carry on a good conversation is worth a surprising number of challenges.

One of those challenges showed up this week at breakfast. We were preparing food for seven boys when I was reminded that one of our newest additions is allergic to pork. The biggest inconvenience that morning was remembering not to use bacon grease when we cooked the eggs. That sounds minor until you start thinking about how many meals in our house involve pork. Sausage in spaghetti sauce. Carnitas. Bacon. Various meals where pork isn’t exactly a garnish that can be politely removed after the fact. If he had simply told us, “I don’t like corn,” life would have been considerably easier. But an allergy is an allergy, and once a kid is living in our house, we’re going to work around it. We’ll figure out how to keep him fed, healthy, and on the ice.

The same thing applies to sleep. Hockey boys seem to have developed a remarkable ability to bank sleep. One of our boys this season takes a nap after our team breakfast, and I suspect he could sleep through a minor earthquake if it happened during his designated recovery period. Their schedules make it understandable. Some of their 10-plus-hour road trips have sleeping bunks, and after a sweep weekend they may spend the night at a teammate’s house to celebrate. Sometimes, apparently, the sweep is optional. Maybe they want to hang out. Maybe their teammate’s billet house has different rules. Maybe they simply want to sleep somewhere they aren’t expected to get up and do anything. Whatever the reason, we’ve learned that sleep is serious business. When the boys leave for a hot-day practice or game, I’ll bump the thermostat up a few degrees. When they come home and head upstairs to sleep away the afternoon, I’ll turn it back down. I don’t want to hear about inadequate sleeping conditions. Between the sleeping, feeding, and thermostat management, I’m running a very small hockey-themed hotel.

Then there are the things that have nothing to do with food or sleep. We become a sounding board when they’re trying to figure out whether a coach’s words match his actions. We can give them an opinion that isn’t completely saturated in the junior hockey world, although we’re careful to remind them that our opinions are still just our opinions. If they’re considering doing something that could have consequences, especially talking to a coach, we tell them to talk to their advisor first. They may call them “agents” in other sports, but junior hockey seems to prefer “advisor,” which sounds considerably less like someone who might show up wearing a shiny suit.

We also buy things. If they want spring water instead of filtered water, fine. If they want mozzarella sticks, we can make sure there’s a stash in the freezer with their name on it. If they want something very specific from Trader Joe’s, I’ll explain that Aldi has something that looks suspiciously similar for considerably less money. OLIPOP, however, is apparently where my billet-fee generosity ends. At some point, the boy needs to understand that I am providing room and board, not opening a beverage distribution company.

The fundamentals of our Billet B&B are actually pretty simple. We’re happy to make as much food as you will eat, and we want you to have a good sleeping experience. We don’t fluff your pillows or change your sheets for you. When you’re old enough to drive a car across the country to play hockey, you’re probably old enough to put your own clothes in a hamper. But as much as reasonably depends on us, we want your junior hockey experience to be a good one. Tipping isn’t required, although gift cards are always accepted.

We don’t do any of it for the accolades, but sincere “thank yous” from parents are always welcome. I know how nosey I would be about my own kids if someone else were taking care of them, which is why it amazes me how little involvement some parents have with the people living with their sons. The boys we enjoy the most tend to have parents who care enough to encourage the people taking care of them. It doesn’t take much. A text. A thank-you. A little acknowledgment that they know we’re trying to help their kid have a good year. Sometimes a few words from the parent of a particularly challenging hockey boy can recharge our patience just enough to keep us from declaring, “That is the last straw!” for another couple of days.

We may be the feet-on-the-ground parents while these boys are away from home, but it’s still a team. When they come into our house, we let them know our rules. If they stick around long enough, we usually find some middle ground that allows them to live under our roof without feeling like they’ve abandoned everything they learned from their biological family. Just because they aren’t your kids doesn’t mean they can’t learn something from you. And if they ask, I’m willing to be completely honest with strangers. With hockey boys, I can be honest, pretend I’m teaching them an important life lesson, and throw in enough self-deprecation to keep them uncertain whether I actually meant everything I said.

I am, after all, a sage.

A sage who freely distributes extra-thick bacon for breakfast on the Fridays of home-game weekends.

If anything can make your opinions seem more important, it will smell like bacon.

Waiting for the Next Brick

I have struggled to string together a series of events that have a solid thread. I think the thread is there, but as I’ve been bombarded with updates and nuances to my original telling, I’ve found it difficult to hold the passion and focus until the end. It’s not a slump in writing ideas. It’s a slump in knowing what to do with them once I have them. So today’s tale will start with no particular destination—unless you consider completion a worthy target.

My daughter’s twins are nearly fully cooked. Thursday was another weekly ultrasound in the parade of ultrasounds she has endured over the past few weeks. I get to play Grandpa for a little while and spoil her as she waits to hear the words she really wants to hear: “Today is the day.” She knows Monday is the day for sure, but she wouldn’t complain if the twins decided to move the schedule up a little.

If I were pregnant with twins and had endured 45 days and counting of 100-plus-degree temperatures, I’m not sure I’d be displaying the same level of calm she has. She has endured the support socks, the poor nights of sleep, the extra parenting duties while her husband starts the second year of his doctorate, and the minor inconvenience of carrying around two additional human beings in a space that was clearly designed for one.

I’m glad she didn’t watch me too closely when she was growing up. If she had, she probably wouldn’t be able to summon a fraction of this calmness. Yes, another great trait she got from her mother.

Meanwhile, my son and his wife have been planning a trip to India for nearly a year. They sincerely want to go, but immigration issues have complicated things. Now that they’re married and my son is considering a job change, they have an opportunity to carve out a month and check a pretty significant box that has been sitting on their list for a while.

There’s just one little problem.

The immigration issue is still haunting them.

Their trip is supposed to begin next week, and as I write this, they’re waiting for an appointment with an immigration officer. They need to make their case that they can travel and feel confident there won’t be problems when they return. Could they have done a better job crossing all their T’s and dotting all their I’s? Yes. Probably. My son is good at figuring things out, but he admitted he didn’t realize how complicated marriage could be when your wife isn’t a U.S. citizen.

Apparently, marriage comes with more paperwork than the greeting card industry lets on.

I’m still hopeful they can pull the trip together. But once again, I’m in the wonderful position of watching something important unfold without having much ability to do anything about it.

Then there’s hockey.

The guillotine blade came down on one of our billet boys again this week. The blade cut deep. We thought this kid was going to stick. Selfishly, he was a really good fit with our family, too. But it wasn’t to be.

Within a few hours, I was being offered the opportunity to take in some boys from the lower-skilled team. That would have meant having boys from two teams, which would have meant we would almost never have a weekend off. So that wasn’t particularly appealing.

The next day, before our chopped hockey boy even had his flight information, the billet coordinator called about another player. This one had already committed to a college to play hockey and has considerably more hockey experience than our other boy.

With the coach bringing in so many players and teasing the limit of the import rule, we’re hopeful it will be a good season. The new boy will take some adjusting, but we’re hopeful we won’t have another player cut for a few months.

Which, in hockey terms, apparently qualifies as stability.

So here I am, watching my daughter wait for two babies to decide when they’re ready, my son wait for a government official to decide whether he can leave the country, and our hockey players wait to see whether they get to stay in ours.

And somewhere in the middle of all this, I watched two guys laying bricks in our neighborhood.

The guy on top was standing on scaffolding, laying bricks on the front of a house. The guy below was stacking three bricks and tossing them up to him. The top guy’s feet were about level with the other guy’s head, and the bricks came up at just the right angle for him to grab them. The three bricks stayed together, making the whole process look almost ridiculously simple.

Toss. Catch. Lay.

Repeat.

I thought, “That has to be a pretty nice balance between speed and efficiency.”

And then I stood there watching them for a while and wondered why the rest of life couldn’t work that way.

Someone knows what needs to happen. Someone else puts exactly what they need in their hands. Nobody has to guess what the other person wants. Nobody needs an immigration appointment. Nobody needs an ultrasound. Nobody gets cut from the hockey team.

Toss. Catch. Lay.

Of course, life doesn’t work that way.

There are emotions. Guilt. Dread. Uncertainty. There are conversations where everyone knows what needs to happen, but nobody wants to be the first person to say it. There are situations where the most direct path would probably be the easiest, yet we somehow choose the scenic route through a forest of hints, assumptions, second-guessing, and paperwork.

I suppose that’s why I’ve struggled with this post. I’ve been trying to find the cleanest way to connect several stories that don’t have clean endings yet.

Maybe there isn’t one.

The twins will arrive when they arrive. My son and his wife will either make their trip or they won’t. Our new hockey boy will eventually become either another member of the family or another name in the long list of boys who passed through our house.

For now, I’m just standing around watching.

Waiting for the next brick.

The Policy Has Been Revised

After an evening watching a disappointing football game, we went to bed at 10:30. To keep our commitment to our hockey boys, we turned the front porch light on so they could find their way home without taking out my roses along the front walkway. We have been doing this quite often lately. Friday night, they needed to watch the team they share the rink with play before heading out for food. Last night was also about food, but with a little more wardrobe involved.

Both of the junior hockey teams we have billeted for have a tradition of rookies dressing up as girls for a team dinner. The reason for putting considerable effort into shoes, dresses, wigs, and whatever else they can find is simple: the rookie who looks the best avoids paying his portion of the ridiculous food bill the veterans have intentionally inflated by ordering food they have no intention of eating. Our Alaska boy won this year. His $50 investment in a dress, shoes, and wig probably saved him about $300. The worst-dressed rookie pays double. The guys with beards apparently start the competition about three goals down.

Back to my pre-bed routine. For some reason, my nose decided to start bleeding. This wasn’t one of those casual little nosebleeds where you grab a tissue, wipe your nose, and get on with your life. This one earned the coveted two-tissue award. I asked Judy which towel I should use so I wouldn’t bloody up my hand towel. My white hot tub robe also received some unexpected splatter. Apparently, my nose had decided that bedtime was a good time to redecorate.

Judy’s response was very casual. I know why they call her “Dr. Mom” and not “Dr. Wife.” There was no frantic call for medical assistance, no dramatic assessment of my condition, and certainly no attempt to save my life. She basically let me bleed. To minimize any overnight leakage, I suggested grabbing an old towel to put over my pillow. She fully supported that plan. The usual “goodnight kiss” was answered with, “I don’t want to kiss you tonight.”

Nothing says “in sickness and in health” quite like your wife deciding that, for the moment, you are a communicable disease.

The next morning, with a strong desire to get my walk in before church and another 100-degree day waiting for us, I got up to find the towel on my pillow completely unblemished. Apparently, my nose had called it a night. I made the coffee and toasted some of Judy’s day-old, home-baked whole wheat bread, one of her evolving hobbies. There are worse ways to start the day, although I was beginning to wonder whether I was living with a doctor, a baker, or someone who was simply waiting for me to bleed out.

After my walk, I told Judy my nose seemed to be on the mend. I also expressed some concern about what had caused such an enthusiastic nosebleed. Her nosebleeds have all but stopped 5 years ago, so I was hoping mine would follow the same path. Maybe it was simply the heat, the low humidity, or some other weather-related nonsense that our bodies apparently feel obligated to complain about.

Of course, I couldn’t resist mentioning the possibility that my blood pressure was raging and that perhaps I was headed toward a stroke or some other exciting cardiovascular event. In the past, when I have brought up the possibility of dying from high blood pressure, Judy’s response has been, “If you go before me, I won’t remarry.”

It has always been one of those reassuring little marriage statements that somehow manages to be both loving and insulting. Apparently, though, the policy has been revised.

Knowing I was still fragile from the previous night’s trauma, Judy looked at me and said, “I have changed my mind. I think I will remarry.”

I’m pretty sure you’re not supposed to discuss your replacement while the current model is still standing in front of you. But apparently, there is a grace period for these things.

The good news is that my nose seems to have returned to normal, and I have no reason to believe I’m about to fall over dead. I plan to be around for many more years. There is even a decent chance I will outlive Judy. After hearing her revised position on remarriage, I’m beginning to think that may not be the news she was hoping to hear.

But I was reminded of something this weekend: if you’re going to spend a lifetime dishing it out, you have to be willing to take it when the tables turn.

Even if the tables turn while you’re wearing a blood-speckled hot tub robe, sleeping with a towel over your pillow, and wondering whether your wife has already started browsing for your replacement.

Marriage is a beautiful thing.

Something Was Clearly Going On

With less than two weeks before my daughter finds out what it is like to have a normal human body again, we decided it was a good zoo day. Yesterday’s temperatures were below 90 degrees, and this morning was in the high 60s. Perfect? No. But compared to what Oklahoma has been handing us lately, it was practically sweater weather. With the clock ticking and the opportunity to see some animals actually moving around, we figured we should take advantage of it.

We were rewarded with a great view of the baby elephant born in late June. My daughter kept saying, “Dad, look at the little one.” I saw three elephant posteriors and assumed she was referring to the smallest rear in the crowd. Once I got up and looked around the post that had been blocking my view, I finally understood what she meant. The baby elephant was considerably cuter than the collection of backsides I had been studying. Apparently, I was not the only one impressed. The photographers were out in force, carrying camera lenses large enough to require their own parking spaces. The rest of the animals may not have been particularly active, but they had apparently agreed that the best place to spend the morning was directly in front of the prime viewing areas. The bears, lions, chimps, and gorillas all seemed willing to lean against the glass or accidentally pose for whatever picture the photographers wanted. At one of the chimp viewing areas, we watched a chimp picking up Cheerios scattered on his side of the glass. Even without opposable thumbs, he was doing a pretty good job. On our side of the glass, Ellie was sitting in her stroller with as many Cheerios as she needed to remain happy. It was a strangely appropriate moment. Sometimes it is the little things that make life worth living. Apparently, for both chimps and toddlers, those little things may be Cheerios.

The expected highlight of the trip was the water jets in the Asia area. When we arrived, Ellie seemed a little hesitant. Grandpa performed a variety of highly sophisticated demonstrations designed to make the water look like a good idea without actually getting wet himself. Either Ellie’s curiosity eventually won out, or my performance was more convincing than I realized. Her mom decided to put her in her swimsuit, just in case. A couple of well-timed geysers caught Ellie in the face, apparently giving her all the evidence she needed to reconsider the entire concept. Her attention quickly shifted to a “dead” water spout that she was determined to convince to come back to life. It refused to cooperate. She also discovered that there were many directions she could wander that did not involve water at all. Grandpa did what he could to turn this into a game, because apparently that is part of the job description.

Then came the more concerning behavior. As we passed other strollers and wagons filled with items brought by parents and grandparents to cool down their kids, Ellie began displaying some impressive foraging instincts. She would walk up to a stroller, inspect the contents, and determine what might be available. She grabbed a couple of water bottles, and I refused her multiple attempts to acquire snacks that did not belong to us. Yes, it was cute. It was also a little concerning to watch my granddaughter casually inventory the belongings of strangers. My daughter, meanwhile, stayed close to our stroller, apparently determined to defend our property from the same behavior. We eventually agreed that the “cooling off Ellie” portion of the zoo experience had been something of a bust.

It was after we got Ellie changed back into her clothes that my daughter told me the real story. Ellie had lost her bunny while they were running errands the day before. This was not some random stuffed animal that had been forgotten in the bottom of a toy box. This was Bunny. Her sleeping bunny. Her snuggle bunny. The little guy who apparently doesn’t mind being dragged around by his ears, dropped on his head, or subjected to whatever other indignities come with being a toddler’s favorite stuffed animal. He is her guy. And, based on the report of a difficult night of sleep the evening before, his absence was being noticed.

Suddenly, I had a theory about the zoo. Maybe Ellie’s stroller shopping wasn’t really about snacks or water bottles. Maybe it was a toddler’s attempt to find something—or someone—to fill the Bunny-shaped hole in her life. Her vocabulary is expanding, but it is still not quite advanced enough to explain the deep emotional trauma of losing a favorite stuffed animal. So instead of saying, “Grandpa, I am experiencing significant distress because my primary emotional support rabbit has disappeared,” she may have simply decided to check the nearest stroller for snacks. This particular practice apparently started in the church nursery and has now expanded to random strangers. We may have inadvertently raised a tiny, toddling, food critic with questionable boundaries.

When I told Judy about Bunny, she immediately said, “That poor thing. She loves Bunny.” And she is right. There will probably be a replacement Bunny before the weekend is over. If my memory is correct, the original may have been the generic light-pink variety from Walmart, which means we should be able to resolve this crisis without involving Interpol. This time, though, we may want to make a few improvements. Perhaps Bunny needs a leash. Maybe some Velcro. At the very least, an Apple AirTag. I am not prepared to spend another zoo day explaining to strangers why my granddaughter is conducting a personal inventory of their strollers.

Ellie is about to be promoted to big sister, which is wonderful, but she is also about to experience a fairly dramatic reduction in the amount of attention available to her when those twins arrive. Losing Bunny right before that transition probably isn’t helping. So, yes, she needs a new Bunny. She needs something familiar to sleep with, drag around, drop on his head, and generally subject to the same treatment the original Bunny endured. She also apparently needs Grandpa to stop her from stealing bottled water from strangers, but we can work on that one later.

For now, the priority is getting Bunny back—or finding his replacement. Because if losing one stuffed rabbit has already turned Ellie into a roaming toddler forager, I would prefer not to discover what happens when the twins arrive and she realizes there are now two additional people competing for her snacks, attention, and Cheerios. We may be raising a future criminal mastermind, and frankly, I would rather catch her in the stuffed-animal phase. A new Bunny, a tracking device, and a little extra attention seem like a small price to pay for keeping the family out of court.

Apparently, We Had Plans

As a rule, my wife and I don’t plan to be gone every evening, with every day of the week becoming progressively more exciting and culminating in a series of weekend events worthy of numerous pictures and social media postings. We are more the “What series do you want to watch tonight?” people. So when the hockey boys had a “meet and greet” at a local restaurant where all the season ticket holders, billets (us), and boys were invited, we decided to sit this one out. I am not always looking for that particular hockey vibe. Fortunately, a couple from church had been talking about having us over for dinner for several weeks, after an earlier invitation was canceled because of illness. So, without actually thinking, “Let’s use this night to kill two birds with one stone,” that is pretty much what happened. We could have a pleasant evening with another couple, have conversations about things other than hockey, and do it in a house where, when my conversation meter reached capacity, I could theoretically just stare at something on the wall. Our boys knew what we were doing and had already decided whether they would grab their warmups at our house or at the restaurant. That cleared our dinner-prep schedule, so we made the ten-minute drive and arrived at 6:00.

Our hosts live on an acre, which immediately made the evening more interesting than anything I could have found on television. I went out back and talked with the husband while Judy and his wife had a good conversation inside. The highlight for me was the buffalo hide hanging in the garage that their daughter was tanning herself. It is eventually destined to become a rug in the middle of the living room, assuming it survives the tanning process. Before it gets there, however, it needs one more step that involves something called “smoking the hide.” I am not sure exactly what that entails, but I know enough about home projects to recognize the beginning of a sentence that ends with, “Well, that didn’t go quite as planned.” The husband seemed happy to support his daughter’s project, although he was less enthusiastic about his workshop being temporarily converted into a buffalo-processing facility. The deer hides they had done previously were apparently much easier. A buffalo, it turns out, brings considerably more hair and considerably more buffalo to the project. She had already been warned that Dad’s shop was no longer in the tanning business.

Dinner was chicken thighs with the bone in, risotto, and roasted broccoli, and it was really good. The hostess did mention, “It might be a little salty.” My immediate response was, “I’ve never had it before. It tastes fine.” The part of my brain that occasionally insists on honesty eventually agreed with her. The chicken gravy poured over the risotto did not exactly move us in the opposite direction, either. Still, it was a good meal with good color balance, and I ate two chicken thighs, so apparently I was not suffering. Had my mother-in-law cooked it, I probably would have been a little more honest. The hostess also reminded me of something I had apparently said when she asked at church how I would feel if she invited us to dinner. According to her, my response was, “Well, can you cook?” Apparently, she saw through my crusty exterior and decided to take the risk. She was rewarded with an enthusiastic second helping and only moderate criticism of the sodium content.

It was not the kind of meal we would normally make for the hockey boys, but that has less to do with the food than with the fact that I am already tired of eating the extra warmups they refuse to eat. The husband did his part by scraping everyone’s plates as he carried them toward the sink and eventually the dishwasher. I apologized for not being a chicken-skin eater. There was no obvious penalty, so I assume I remain welcome. Their fictional “upstairs maid” is the husband. In our house, the frequently vacationing “dish fairy” is Judy.

At some point during dinner, the conversation turned to marriage, and the hostess told us about the first thirteen years of theirs. They had made themselves crazy trying to come up with gifts for every minor and major holiday. She wanted good gifts, and he apparently had trouble determining what qualified as a good gift. By their thirteenth anniversary, they had reached the point where the whole thing had become more work than celebration. So they lived their thirteenth anniversary like any other day. They went about their business and didn’t even realize what day it was until they heard a “Congratulations” on their answering machine as the day was winding down. That was apparently the moment they realized they had spent thirteen years creating a tremendous amount of busyness for very little return. From that day forward, their marriage became a little saner. There is probably a lesson in there somewhere, although after thirty-five years of marriage, I am still suspicious of any lesson that involves buying fewer gifts.

Eventually, it was time to deal with the peach pie that had been sitting there staring at us from the dining area. The peach was good, and the ice cream was an excellent supporting actor. My only suggestion for future guests would be to ask how large a piece they want before cutting it. One-eighth of a large pie is not a serving. It is a commitment. Both Judy and I are good guests, so we cleaned our plates. That does not mean we were grateful for being made quite that full, but we did our part to maintain the illusion of good manners.

The most contentious portion of the evening came when we started talking about books and television shows. I mentioned that I thought the character of Reacher on Amazon was basically a shallow gorilla. The hostess did not take that particularly well. I also mentioned that Lee Child, the author of the Reacher books, has talked publicly about smoking marijuana while writing. Judging by the reaction from our hosts, this was apparently not information I needed to bring to the table. I felt the elbow from Judy even though she wasn’t sitting next to me. I explained that I thought the characters often make a poor transition from books to television, which did not improve my standing. Eventually, I agreed to read the first two Reacher books and report back. Judy did not identify any other major problems with my performance that evening, so apparently the invisible elbows were doing their job.

Just as the Reacher impasse appeared to be settling down, we got a text from the hockey boys. Two of their teammates were coming over to use the hot tub. Since it was almost 9:00 and four hockey players plus a hot tub creates a mathematical equation I did not want to solve, we decided it was time to say our goodbyes. It had been a good evening. Our first “date” with this couple had been a hockey game in late winter, and the follow-up was much more relaxed and insightful. Between their camping schedule and the arrival of the twins, it may be 2027 before we manage another one. At least we now know where we stand on buffalo hides, pie portions, and Reacher.

When we got home, the four hockey boys settled into our back porch area between the hot tub and the fire pit and proceeded to hang out for another hour and a half. At one point, I had to tease the boy from Michigan. “So, if I go to Michigan, do I need to set the clock back an hour and a second?” He seemed a little frustrated with the question and, more importantly, with the fact that this was even a topic of conversation. I eventually left him with this: “We can squabble about Ohio State and Michigan, but have no doubt I will be cheering for you when you have your Warriors jersey on.” Apparently, there are limits to my loyalty, but they are not quite as narrow as my opinions on college football.

As Judy and I did our pre-sleep reading, the boys continued their animated conversation on the patio. With our bedroom right next door, sleep and four late-teenage hockey players were never going to coexist peacefully. A little after 10:30, Judy turned off her light and commented, “It is about time they end the party.” And it did. Somehow, her womanly will continues to force us males to submit to her wishes, even when she is lying in bed and the males in question are several feet away on a patio. I am not sure how this works. I just know it does.

For a night that was supposed to be our low-end-of-the-excitement-spectrum evening, it turned out to be a pretty busy one. We had dinner with friends, learned about buffalo tanning, debated the proper amount of pie, offended someone over Reacher, argued about Michigan, and hosted four hockey boys late into the evening. And somewhere in all of that, there was a reminder that adults and late teenagers (i.e. young adults) who are not related to each other can actually live together, laugh together, jab at each other, and occasionally even learn something from one another.

The boys will keep playing hockey, eating breakfast with us on the Fridays of home weekends, arguing about sports, and figuring out how to live with a bunch of other guys. They will eventually move on to different teams, different cities, different jobs, and whatever comes next in their lives. The friendships they are forming now may end up being more important than anything happening on the ice. Learning how to share a house, give each other space, work through differences, and still enjoy being together is part of growing up that doesn’t show up on a hockey schedule.

For Judy and me, there is something pretty special about getting to watch that happen up close. We didn’t set out to become the parents of a bunch of unrelated teenage hockey players, and I’m still not entirely sure how we ended up with four of them on our back porch at 10:30 on a Thursday night. But these are the kinds of evenings that tend to become memories long after the hot tub has been drained, the breakfast dishes have been put away, and the boys have moved on to whatever comes next. Maybe that’s the real benefit of having a house that occasionally feels a little too full. Sometimes the best parts of life are the things you never planned for.

The Unofficial Billet Boy Survival Guide

We have had hockey boys from all over the United States and even a couple of international locations. None of them have been perfect, although some have certainly worked harder at perfection than others.

With one of our boys leaving our household yesterday, it seemed like a good time to put down a few pointers for the hockey players who find themselves living in someone else’s house for a season. These won’t guarantee universal success, but they should increase your chances of becoming a favorite billet in our house.

Remember that your billet parents are responsible for you. If you want to spend the night at your girlfriend’s house, we are probably not the right billet house for you. We actually had one boy “move” to another billet house because the billet mom there didn’t care if he stayed at his girlfriend’s house instead of coming home.

If you choose to go down that road, I recommend buttering up your current billets first. Ask if they would mind making pizza for dinner. Maybe compliment the cooking. Make everyone feel like you are really connecting with them. Then, when the billet coordinator calls the next day to say you want to move, the whole puzzle will come together beautifully.

If you are under 21, there isn’t much wiggle room on alcohol in our house. My theory is pretty simple: you are here to play hockey. If you have other priorities, we probably aren’t going to be a great fit.

And if you decide to drink anyway and think you are being sneaky, remember that you are dealing with someone who has raised four children. I have seen things. I am also sneakier than you are.

We make a pretty serious effort to cook dinner every night. And if we fail at that, we usually beg you to indulge us on the occasional “warm-up” night where dinner might be less ambitious.

So if your mother decides to send a two- or three-pound bag of chicken nuggets to our front door without warning, there are only so many complimentary ways I can interpret that.

And if you don’t eat the dinner because you claim your ADHD medication makes you not hungry, but then order a meal from Uber Eats later that evening, I am going to notice. I may not say anything immediately, but I will notice. I have been doing this for a while.

We are happy to provide your water. And if you insist on spring water instead of filtered water, you are probably going to win that argument. No matter how many times I see the people at Sam’s Club peddling those five-gallon jugs, I will continue to walk past them.

I know you like your 16.9-ounce plastic bottles. You like being able to count them so you know exactly how much water you have consumed. That’s fine. But I do think you need to finish the bottle before taking credit for drinking it.

Turn off the lights.

This one varies by boy, but I have walked into the guys’ rooms and found as many as five lights on at one time. I am not judging. I am simply suggesting that if you can flick the switch on, you can flick the switch off.

Electricity is not free, despite what your bedroom may be telling you.

Technically, you can walk around the house shirtless. But out of respect for the women in the house, please wear a shirt.

The hot tub is an exemption.

I am not unreasonable.

We used to assign jobs. One boy would load or unload the dishwasher. Another would set the table. This worked beautifully right up until the boy with the job was taking a nap, out golfing, or otherwise unavailable for reasons that were apparently very important to him.

Hockey boys do a lot of napping.

So, to simplify things for the adults in the household, we have boiled our expectations down to two rules:

  1. Help clean off the table after dinner.
  2. If you make a mess or see something that needs to be done, take care of it.

This won’t get everyone on the same page, but at least it gets everyone pointed in the same direction.

Game-day breakfasts are a little different. We know the rules are going to slip sometimes, but as much as it depends on you, refrain from using inappropriate language.

There are younger fans around, and you are in a position to be a role model to them. There are plenty of role models in the world who curse without hesitation. Be willing to stand out and be different.

Besides, if you are going to spend the season in our house, I need to believe I have at least a little influence over you.

We know you like to shower.

I am not entirely sure why you need to shower before your nap, after your nap, and again before getting back on the ice, but apparently this is important to you.

Do what you have to do. Just don’t overdo it.

Hot water is not free, and I have yet to discover a hockey scholarship that includes unlimited water usage.

If it is here, it is yours to eat. That is typically what I tell the boys.

However, if you develop a particular affinity for something in the pantry or freezer, it might be helpful to let your billet parents know about it.

If you and your billet parent both develop a hankering for the same sweet or salty item on the same night, somebody may be disappointed. If I know what you like, I can at least keep an eye on it and try to keep it stocked.

This is one of the less complicated ways to keep the peace in a house full of hockey players.

Your parents and your billet parents are on the same team.

The best boys typically had parents who understood that. We are both trying to get their son through the season safely and successfully.

If there is an injury or a bout with the flu, we try to work together. I might say to one of our players, “Does your mom know about that injury? If you don’t tell her, I will text her tomorrow.”

We aren’t there to get involved in how they parent their son. We are there to provide some on-the-ground accountability.

Sometimes a hockey player’s enthusiasm can make him think that playing through something is more important than dealing with the thing he is playing through. That is where we can help.

I can’t guarantee that I have an infinite supply of wise words, but the next hockey boy I talk to will be far from my first.

Whether we are discussing a coach’s decision, a hockey situation, or whether he should eat more vegetables, I will probably have an opinion.

On the hockey stuff, I will defer to his parents and hockey adviser.

On the vegetables, he is going to have to develop a pretty strong resolve because we are not going to stop presenting them as an option.

Eventually, he may even eat one.

If you have your own vehicle, you may not always get a spot in the driveway.

And if your billet parents’ daughter is pregnant with twins and already has a toddler running around, be a gentleman. You may have to park somewhere else and walk a little farther.

This is not a complicated concept. You are young. Your legs work.

Pay your billet fees on time.

With the Warriors organization, billet parents pay the fees directly. When we first started with the Brahmas, billet parents paid the Brahmas, who then sent us a check. Now, we are paid directly by the parents, and we fill out a form online letting the organization know we have been paid.

A failure to pay on time comes with a warning. Multiple warnings come with penalties to the player.

But please don’t do what one parent did.

Her son had wanted to be traded for several weeks. We barely knew he had actually been traded before she sent us a Venmo request to refund the unused portion of that month’s billet fees.

Not surprisingly, this was not a hockey boy we were a particularly good match for.

It is unlikely that we would ever ask for a boy to be moved from our home. But it is also unlikely that we will shed many tears when some of them move on.

And that may be the strangest part of being a billet parent.

If you are going to live in our house for any length of time, you are going to spend some time marinating in our version of right and wrong. Where we think we can have an influence, we will. If we find ourselves pushing our ideals too far, we will back off.

It was our home before it was yours.

It will still be our home after you leave.

Even if every one of our boys gets cut, we aren’t going to lower our standards just to make sure we have hockey players sitting around the dinner table. Just like with our own children, the rules can flex. Some can be partially ignored. Every boy and every situation is a little different.

But the basic expectations remain.

Be respectful. Be responsible. Be considerate. Help out. Tell the truth. And, when somebody is trying to take care of you, recognize that they are actually trying to take care of you.

We wouldn’t be worthy of the title “billet parent” if we weren’t willing to roll up our sleeves, adjust the rules when necessary, and occasionally remind a hockey player that there is a world outside the rink.

And, despite all the lights left on, showers taken, chicken nuggets delivered, vegetables rejected, and questionable decisions made along the way, we really are glad to have them.

They come into our house as hockey players.

If we do it right, they leave having been part of our family for a little while.

When Hockey Boys Get Fired

Yesterday was the expected day when we might lose one, two, or, remotely, all three of our boys. The last scenario was so unlikely that I barely gave it a thought. Yet, in junior hockey, nothing is impossible. We do our part and let the hockey people do theirs. We keep food on the table, water chilled in the fridge, and a reasonably comfortable place for the boys to sleep. Sometimes, the rest is completely out of our hands. And sometimes, completely unrelated events have a strange way of tying the day together.

Per my commitment to myself, I stayed in bed until the boys had left. I took my walk, ran some errands, and still heard nothing that gave me any clarity about whether one of our boys had been cut. I was beginning to hope we might somehow avoid this particular round of cuts, but then the call from the billet coordinator came. We made a feeble attempt at small talk before she cut through it with, “When people see a call from me, they know it isn’t good news.” She was right. The most recent addition to our household was no longer a member of the team and would be leaving us soon.

Before the call, I had started cutting up vegetables for dinner. I was planning on cubed and roasted sweet potatoes with rosemary and broccoli when I realized I also had two and a half heads of cauliflower. Apparently, I had been preparing for a cauliflower shortage that never materialized. The cauliflower went into the oven after being made a little more roasting-friendly and sprinkled with paprika. It wasn’t likely to be wildly popular with the hockey boys, but our son and daughter-in-law would probably find it tasty.

Everything was somewhere in the roasting process when the call came about our player being cut. We let him know how sorry we were and were grateful that the coach was already working to help find him another team. Meanwhile, the vegetables were consuming most of our available roasting pans, so my wife improvised. She covered a round pizza pan with foil for the salmon. Since the other vegetables were still hogging the oven space, she put the salmon in at a slight angle. This seemed like a perfectly reasonable solution at the time.

It was not.

The angle turned out to be the catalyst for a great deal of excitement. Oil and grease from the salmon and its marinade leaked down into the bottom of the oven. My wife barely had time to notice that the oven was smoking before the situation graduated to a full-blown fire. Somewhere between the smoke and the flames, the vegetables were removed from the oven. Somewhere between the fire being doused with salt and the contents of a fire extinguisher, all of the interconnected smoke alarms started chirping together.

All of them except the one in our bedroom, which had been removed a few months earlier after deciding that replacing its battery was merely a suggestion and that chirping indefinitely was its true calling.

At this point, it didn’t matter that it was 100 degrees outside and somewhere in the mid-70s inside. We needed to get the smoke out. The front of the house was opened up to the elements, and the windows at the back of the house were opened to give the smoke a clear path to the great outdoors. Unfortunately, some flies apparently found our new ventilation system irresistible and decided to move in.

After a few minutes, the hockey boys finally emerged from their second-floor cave to see what the smoke alarms were singing about. The smell of smoke was not lost on them. I thought, “Stick to cornhole, boys. You don’t seem like firemen material.” One of the boys was making an airport run, so he missed all of the excitement. He may still have a future in firefighting.

As we worked our way through dinner, I gradually closed windows and doors, hoping I could get the house back down to an acceptable temperature by bedtime. Dinner itself was uneventful. Frankly, after seeing flames somewhere other than the grill, nothing else about the meal was going to seem particularly dramatic.

Our daughter and granddaughter left right after dinner. We wanted to make sure they were gone before we opened the oven. If there was going to be another round of smoke, we preferred to deal with it without a toddler in the middle of the operation. Fortunately, there wasn’t any more smoke. My wife, however, was not convinced. She went from room to room, convinced the entire house was still a disaster area. I suspected her clothes or hair might have been carrying the smell around, but my wife thinks what she thinks. Her nose had completely lost the scent by the next morning, so apparently the house survived its inspection.

My wife eventually ended the adventure by posting a picture on Facebook. Her initial comment didn’t seem to take responsibility for the fire, but in the replies, she owned the circumstances that created it. I have made enough mistakes in my life without having people assume this was another episode of Andy screwing something up.

Our hockey boy, meanwhile, had no one to blame for being cut from the team. The coach was working with his advisor to try to find a team willing to trade for him. Would he stay with us for a couple of days? Would he be in limbo until another team became available? We didn’t know. His problem didn’t have nearly as simple a resolution as our oven problem.

Once the fire was out, we could clean up the mess. We could remove the burned material, wipe down the oven, and eventually get things back to normal. We had some control over the variables. Once our hockey boy was essentially “fired” from the team, he had far less control over what came next. He had to depend on another team being willing to take a chance on him and find a place for his skill level. And through all of that, he would need to maintain a positive attitude while dealing with whatever other hiccups the season decided to throw at him.

That is where the two stories really came together for me.

We may have lost the use of our oven until my wife gets around to cleaning out the sins of yesterday. But when you are a hockey boy in our house, you are here as long as you need to be while you figure out what the next steps are going to look like. Our oven may have had a fire, and the team may have fired our hockey boy, but we aren’t going to burn our relationship with him while he figures out where he goes from here.

With no oven, our last meal with him may not be pizza.

But we’ll make sure it is a good one.

The Strategic Value of Corn Hole

After dinner and a dessert consisting of homemade ice cream and baked goods last night, Judy and I stared at each other at 6:30. I could feel myself moving toward a conversation about how unexciting we old people are. Then it happened. My daughter suggested, “We could play some corn hole.” This is what we had done last year, and it was the perfect solution to the boredom that was threatening to take possession of our home.

The corn hole paraphernalia was right outside our back patio door. With such easy access, it was hard to believe it had probably only been moved once since last Labor Day, when I did a sweep of the back porch. A quick inspection of the bean bags was concerning. Apparently, they had not been designed to sail 20-plus feet in a light Oklahoma wind. Fortunately, the remaining bag in the corn-hole corner contained four red and four blue bags of appropriate weight. We were in business.

Last year, the primary competition had been Judy and me against the two hockey boys we were hosting at the time. Judy and I didn’t exactly dominate, but apparently those boys had not yet discovered their full bag-tossing potential. This year, our two new hockey boys arrived with a considerably more polished game. At least, that was the story they told us about all those graduation parties.

Frankly, I was just glad my daughter had suggested doing “something.” Saturday and Sunday, our hockey boys had scrimmages against the team we used to host hockey boys for in Texas. There were moments of potential, but they lost both games. The wins and losses weren’t really important—focus on the word “scrimmage.” What mattered was what the coach saw during their limited playing time. Our returning player played in both games. The other two are still working to earn their spots, so each had an opportunity to catch the coach’s attention.

Tuesday, the day after Labor Day, is expected to bring more cuts. The boys got a little surprise last night when the group chat told them when to arrive and reminded them to bring their suits. During the regular season, the boys are shown on the big screen wearing their suits and announcing where they are from while “Enter Sandman” plays somewhere during the pregame festivities. Apparently, junior hockey has decided that announcing a teenager’s hometown while he stands in a suit to the soundtrack of a heavy-metal song is the appropriate way to introduce players. With the possibility of cuts hanging over the house, playing a few rounds of “toss the bean bag into the little hole” seemed like a pretty good way to avoid thinking about what surprises Tuesday might bring.

Our two new hockey boys proved to be formidable competitors. Both had developed a near-frisbee approach to throwing the bags—one left-handed and one right-handed. The rest of us relied primarily on an arced approach to reaching the Ohio State-flavored boards. For the first match, I was paired with our returning player, who was also an arcer. Having been told the proper distance was 27 feet, I took nine steps between the boards. Whether nine of my steps actually equaled 27 feet is questionable. What was not questionable was that arcing a bean bag that far made me look like a very weak corn hole player. Or perhaps my muscle memory was simply more familiar with corn hole boards that were much closer together.

The frisbee throwers quickly became the favorites and showed no signs of giving up their advantage until they beat us. The next game, Judy teamed up with my daughter-in-law. Judy insisted the boards be moved closer together, which allowed them to hang around considerably longer than we had. The frisbee boys continued making a compelling case for their technique. We played about six matches over roughly 90 minutes, and honestly, it was some of the best time we have spent with our hockey boys so far. For an hour and a half, nobody was thinking about who might get cut, wondering what the coach was thinking, or worrying about who might be coming back to take someone’s spot. We were just throwing bean bags, arguing about distance, and discovering that two teenagers apparently know how to play corn hole better than the people who own the corn hole set.

Once we put everything away, we filed back into the house. Our kids had already left while Judy and I attempted to put a final hurting on the frisbee boys. The hockey boys headed upstairs to shower, while the old people headed for the first-floor shower facilities. While we watched some TV, the one boy who doesn’t have a vehicle came downstairs looking for a snack. He settled on Oreos. Judy had a full tray of brownies sitting there that we would have loved for him to eat, but knowing he had to face the coach the next morning, we decided not to make him responsible for any of the adult problems in the house.

I casually told him, “If you have any reason to get picked up early tomorrow, just let me know. I’ll be around. Ideally, you can forget about this whole conversation.” He gave me a big smile with just a little stress around the edges. He understood.

Both Judy and I have mixed emotions when cuts are imminent. We hate to lose any of our boys—at least this year, we like all of them enough to genuinely hope they stick around. But there is another side to it. If a player is going to spend the entire season on the bubble, knowing the coach doesn’t expect to play him much, sometimes the kinder solution is to cut him and let him move on to whatever comes next.

Every other day, the boys come home from practice with another example. “This guy from last year got cut from his USHL team. He’s coming back.” Or, “This guy wants to leave his Canadian team and come back to the Warriors.” If the coach has a choice between keeping a bubble player or bringing back someone who has already proven himself, it isn’t difficult to imagine which direction he is likely to go.

Our boys will always be welcome in our house. But that doesn’t mean we have to believe staying here is always the best thing for them. If the better opportunity is somewhere they can develop, play meaningful minutes, and avoid spending an entire season picking splinters out of their seats, then that gets my vote. Fortunately, I don’t get a vote. I get to be the appreciative dad—the guy who gets to watch these boys chase something they care about, provide a little food and a place to sleep, and remind them that regardless of what happens in a coach’s office, they have a home here. And, occasionally, I get to throw bean bags at them.

I am grateful I didn’t begin a hockey journey a few decades ago, when I might have had to live with old people who were this competitive about corn hole. This morning, I also decided there was no reason for me to get out of bed before 7:00. Part of that was simply because I could. The other part was that I didn’t want to risk running into the boys too early and having to say, “Good luck,” again. There are only so many times you can say “good luck” before it starts sounding less like encouragement and more like a funeral director wishing you well on your way out, so I stayed in bed. Sometimes being supportive means making yourself available when someone needs you. And sometimes it means strategically avoiding the kitchen until after 7:00.

Talk To The Team

As my daughter gets closer to becoming the mother of three, I could not be more excited for her. Or more aware that I personally will do none of the work involved.

She has spent this entire Oklahoma summer—certainly the hottest one since we moved here—getting kicked from the inside by two little people who do not yet have names and somehow already outrank her in the house. Yes, I was gone for a few weeks of the summer. That does not mean I wasn’t sympathetic. I was rooting for her from wherever I was.

Of course, when your daughter has three kids, that means you have at least three grandkids. I would like credit for that arithmetic.

A friend sent me a video last week of his grandson getting ready to have a sibling. Since my friend already has other grandchildren, something ugly woke up in me. Not sadness. Something closer to a scoreboard.

I would love to tell you I am above comparing my family’s headcount to another man’s family’s headcount. I am not going to tell you that because it isn’t true.

The frustrating part is that there is nothing productive I can do about it. New kids don’t get born because Grandpa felt competitive on a Tuesday. If I want to add players to the roster, the actual work has to come from somewhere else entirely, and I am, at best, in a spoiling and snack-providing capacity.

I brought this up to my daughter while she was complaining about getting her ribs kicked from the inside and having trouble putting socks on her swollen legs. She listened to my grandchild-count predicament with the patience of a woman who has significantly bigger problems and said, “You need to talk to the other members of the team.”

The team.

Currently, the team has one active member, my daughter, and three others on the bench. Of those, only one of them are currently qualified to help me pad the stats, by my own arbitrary rule that I would prefer marriage happen first. I would welcome any grandkids, of course, but please forgive me for preferring that my kids get married before they start producing them. I don’t think that’s asking too much.

So, let’s talk about how I got here, competitive about something I have absolutely no control over.

I didn’t become a father until my thirties, which means I spent a good portion of my life watching other men become grandfathers while I was still working my way through the fatherhood portion of the program. My wife and I always assumed we’d be the kind of grandparents who leaked enthusiasm out of every pore the second a grandchild showed up.

Apparently, our other kids—the ones older than our pregnant daughter—either never noticed that enthusiasm or noticed it and decided it wasn’t worth compromising on a spouse to make it a reality.

Their loss, frankly.

Their siblings’ children are going to get the toys, the outfits, and the opportunity to have us visit more. There is a reason I didn’t lead with the visits.

More grandkids would obviously help my case when talking to my peers. It would also give me even less free time than I have now, especially since the odds of getting the other two kids’ grandkids within the ten-minute driving radius their siblings enjoy are pretty close to zero.

Realistically, it would mean my wife and I doing a lot more driving or flying to keep tabs on whatever new pieces of our extended DNA show up somewhere else. I’m willing to make that sacrifice, although I reserve the right to complain about the mileage.

So, to the rest of the team, if you’re reading this, I have no deceptive motives in mind.

We’ve already proven ourselves to be pretty good grandparents. We are soon to triple our grandchildren, which sounds much more impressive when you don’t mention that we started with one. Tripling again—or more—is something your sister is not going to be able to do on her own.

So, do everyone a favor.

Spare her body the record attempt. Go ahead and get married, have some kids, and give your sister a little competition of her own. She has set some lofty goals, but we have faith in every one of you.

And to the hockey boys: you have also been added to the team, although I realize your membership is temporary. We are only your parents for the season, which means in a few months you are going to leave, start your own lives, and—if everything goes according to plan—eventually contribute to your own parents’ scoreboards.

Just to be clear, I am not counting any future children you might have on my scoreboard. Those are your parents’ points. I have my own scoreboard to worry about.

We aren’t trying to rush you. You’ve got plenty of hockey, growing up, and other things to figure out first. We are glad to have you guys around, and we will be sorry when the season ends and you head off to whatever comes next.

But when the time comes, remember that your billet parents are going to be looking for ways to keep the family roster growing.

As much as we enjoy having you guys around, our focus has to be on boosting the score in Grandpa’s selfish little game.

So, if the Gruenbaums can’t cook and provide a bed for you next season, we hope you understand.

After all, there is a team to build.