Family

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.

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.

The Eve of Controlled Chaos

Friday was an errand day—well, at least the morning was. With the hockey boys arriving this weekend, I had to finish up the grocery shopping. Earlier in the morning, Judy and I had discussed what the menu might look like for the first week. After that, we would have time to pick their brains and figure out what foods we could slide into the rotation without causing anyone to thumb their nose too high.

Our returning boy told us, “I like to eat everything.” So naturally, the first night he was here last season, we made a tomato pasta dish. (The things he liked was hence modified to be “everything except tomatoes.”) Our two Alaska brothers have already informed us that they dislike tomatoes and onions, and one of them dislikes peppers. The next few meals should help us get into the finer points of these dislikes. Is it the size? How they’re cooked? Or is it the flavor? Apparently, we are not simply cooking dinner. We are conducting a culinary research project.

The first night this year is tacos. Our carnitas have a few jalapeños beaten into a pulp, so we’ll get to test where the pepper line is. If the problem is flavor, they can fall back on brisket tacos. There is always a backup plan when you are responsible for feeding three teenage hockey players. It just happens to involve another kind of meat.

With my daughter within a month of her C-section—we are all rooting for the natural birth—I picked her and my granddaughter up so she could get out of the house and run some errands. It never hurts to have another adult available when a toddler decides to spontaneously melt down. This particular outing also resulted in one of my rare visits to Hobby Lobby.

I don’t shop at Hobby Lobby. Judy will buy craft items there, and on this day my daughter was shopping for birthday gifts for a church friend’s daughter. My granddaughter had her own opinions about what should be purchased, naturally. My daughter worked within her $25 budget and found a couple of things that seemed like they would actually feel like “her.” Ruth, my granddaughter’s code name for purposes of this blog, allowed Grandpa to push the cart while Mom did the math and performed increasingly sophisticated guesstimations about each gift’s position on the enjoyment spectrum.

As we checked out, we passed the inevitable temptation along the checkout aisle: Horehound lozenges. My daughter didn’t seem particularly excited to see them. I did. Not because I wanted any, but because they reminded me of my dad and the stash of horehound he kept tucked away in the kitchen cabinets of the house where I grew up.

Apparently, even a trip to Hobby Lobby can turn into a brief visit with your past.

The trip to Sam’s was more of a refrigerator “topping off” than a major shopping expedition. We’ll see which boys are still in our house next weekend. They started with 51, and we are told they will cut that number to 34 next weekend. Three of those 51 are staying with us, and there is also a boy trying out who happens to be the brother of a hockey player we had when we lived in Texas.

He is a goalie, so we are hopeful he makes the team. If he does, the billet coordinator has already promised that he will be “ours.” We really enjoyed his family when his older brother was ours. Most billet parents are fine. His parents were exceptional. When they came down for one of their son’s games, they were great fans and made it obvious how much they appreciated what we were doing.

That is part of the answer when people ask why we let young men stay with us when we could just eat out every night and avoid the whole cooking-and-parenting-adjacent experience.

First, we would cook anyway. We just throw a few more pieces of chicken on the grill. Second, most of the boys are genuinely appreciative. Yes, we’ve had a few entitled players enter our home. We tolerated them. And, regardless of whatever antics a kid might attempt, having parents we really liked tended to raise our tolerance level considerably.

There is a little chaos involved, but the boys also bring something we probably wouldn’t get otherwise. They are chasing a dream. Watching them work toward it gives us a reminder of what it looks like when something matters enough to work for. And when that dream takes a detour, we get a chance to help them figure out how to handle it.

The only truly “new” thing on this set of errands was voting early in a runoff primary. There were a series of tables I had to graduate through before I could finally get my ballot. At the first table, I signed an affidavit saying I wouldn’t vote again at another location during the remainder of the voting period. At the next table, I presented my driver’s license again, along with the affidavit. I believe they attached a label to it before sending me on to get my ballot.

At the previous table, I heard someone mention that about 120 people had voted. My ballot number was R103. I’m not entirely sure what the numbering system meant, but it made me wonder if the Republican ballots were winning the early-voting popularity contest. Then I remembered there apparently weren’t any Democratic runoffs, so that probably wasn’t much of a contest. The rules of the runoff simply meant the people participating were concentrated on one side.

There were only two state issues on the ballot, so I filled in the little rectangular boxes the old-fashioned way. No electronic ballot for me. I was told the ballot could be scanned with either side up. In my case, the scanner apparently preferred that I maintain my privacy and scan it face down.

I usually don’t take the “I Voted” sticker, but I thought it might entertain my granddaughter, who was already fighting a cranky mood brought on by incoming teeth or whatever other battle toddlers wage in their ongoing effort to preserve a good mood.

It did not entertain her at all.

Aldi’s was our final stop. We needed a few taco supplies—vegetable toppings for those who eat them and plenty of cheese because meat and tortillas need cheese to graduate to official taco status in all parts of the country. Tomatoes are optional.

By the time the errands were finished, I realized the day had been more than a grocery run and a few stops around town. It was the eve of another transition for our family. The boys arrive Saturday, and with them comes an eight-ish-month commitment.

We “get” to be parents again, but with some significant upgrades. They are mostly self-sufficient, although we may need to help with transportation from time to time. And if they screw up, we don’t have to blame ourselves for whatever parenting mistake supposedly caused it. We can help them navigate the challenge without taking their indiscretions personally.

If they have a great year and grow into better players and better young men, we get to watch that happen, too. Their parents deserve the largest share of the credit, without question. Our job is mostly to provide a home, feed them, encourage them, and occasionally nudge them back toward the idea that their priority right now is supposed to be hockey.

And if I ever need a reminder of just how good I can be at the nudging part, I can always ask my wife.

Yes, dear. You’re welcome.

Return to Sender

The house to the north of us is full of kids. Not all of them play soccer, but the ones who do have made it their life’s mission to kick a ball against our shared fence as often as humanly possible.

We have the pretty side of that fence. They have the ugly side. This works out great for them, because you cannot make ugly any uglier. Kick that ball as hard as you want, guys, that side was already at rock bottom before you got here.

Now, when I say these kids kick the ball against the fence, I don’t mean a gentle little dribble bumps into it now and then. These are high schoolers. The ball doesn’t roll into the fence, it arrives. Full windup, full commitment, like the fence owes them money.

One kick doesn’t do much. Kick after kick after kick, though, and the nails start screaming uncle. Or if they’re not quite screaming yet, they’ve at least developed an attitude about it. Not all boards are created equal, and apparently some nails just got handed inferior wood and told to make it work.

Eventually the boards give up, and my fence loses its smooth look on the pretty side. I wouldn’t call it “unsmooth,” exactly. I’d call it “those darn kids are kicking their soccer ball again, and would you look at that, the fence is not enduring this assault unscathed.” I like making things more dramatic than they need to be. We all have our flaws.

So every other month or so, I grab a hammer and go pound the boards back into shape. My carpentry skills are rudimentary at best. I know what the hammer is for in a theoretical sense. Hitting the actual nail head, dead center, on purpose, is a separate and much rarer skill that I have not acquired. The fence has three coats of HOA-approved stain on it, and around every nail that keeps losing its argument with a soccer ball, that stain is losing its luster right along with it.

The fence itself, though, is a manageable problem. I deal with it every couple of months and move on with my life. The real issue is the balls that end up in our yard, because now I have to decide what to do with them.

The neighbors directly to the north are a married couple, and they’re both police officers on two different local departments. I have decided this is not the household to walk up to and complain about a soccer ball situation. So when I’m out in the yard, or when I spot a ball sitting there the next morning, I chuck it back over the fence like a good neighbor. Sometimes, if they’re still out there playing, I even get a “thank you” for my trouble.

While my wife and I were traveling recently, my daughter-in-law took over plant-watering duty. I told her that if she found any balls in the yard, just toss them back over. She sent me a video of five balls sitting in our grass. Four soccer balls, and one mystery ball that apparently volunteered for the mission because they’d run out of actual soccer balls to sacrifice.

This past weekend, with the temperature sitting comfortably in the 90s, my wife and I were trying to enjoy the hot tub, which is its own kind of ambitious. While we were out there, I looked over toward the house on the other side of ours. Up until that moment I’d been fairly confident that every single ball that ever landed in our yard came from the police house. But a little doubt crept in.

The house catty-corner to us, the one with the slightly annoying weather station poking into our yard that we get zero access to the data from, had a soccer ball up on their roof, and they were making a whole game out of throwing it up there. I genuinely cannot think of a single scenario where a ball comes off that roof and lands in our yard. But knowing there’s now an active second source of soccer balls in the neighborhood does change the math a little. Not enough to unseat the police house as prime suspect. But it’s there now, quietly present, every time I pause before lobbing a ball back over a fence.

Bottom line: I’m glad the kids are active. I’m glad they’re outside doing something instead of staring at a screen. And honestly, for their sake, I’m glad they have so many soccer balls that launching one over the fence doesn’t mean the game’s over, they just grab another. I just wish the balls came with a mute button and a low-impact setting, so my fence boards could stop taking the brunt of teenage enthusiasm. But I know, I know. Another one of my first world problems, and I really should be grateful for it.

Date Night, Retirement Style

Family visits start Saturday in Columbus, and our daughter’s crew is off doing their own pre-twins celebration, which meant Judy and I had the house and no real plan for dinner. Last week’s Sam’s Club haul was gone — cooked, eaten, or handed off to kids. Nobody wanted warm-ups. So we went out.

In our defense, we barely tried to stock the fridge for these ten days between trips. We split a Costco pizza across three meals with a couple of bag salads propping it up. We got a burrito bowl from Chipotle and ate our own chips with it, which I’ve decided counts as cooking out. I also grilled some chicken. That’s real. I marinated it and everything.

We’re also deep in our post-cruise phase, which means yogurt and protein shakes for lunch, because apparently the responsible move after a week of unlimited soft serve and buffets is to eat like we’re training for something.

Before picking a restaurant, we did what any financially disciplined household does: dug through the gift card drawer. This particular card came from our hockey boy, who totaled his car on the way to practice — a gift for “going above and beyond,” which is a generous way of describing talking to a police officer before 9:00 outside a charter school. It didn’t have much left on it, but Bricktown Brewery had a happy hour hamburger special and an all-day pizza deal if we got seated before 6:00. That was all the motivation we needed to get out the door.

I tried to be an aggressive driver. Someone else tried to be an aggressive driver at me. I missed the entrance to the restaurant entirely, had to loop around at the light, and dropped Judy off to fight for our spot on the waitlist before anyone else could sneak their name in ahead of ours. Ten to fifteen minute wait, she reported. A good number. Enough to stretch the gift card to its full potential while doing penance for the opulence of our European trip.

We were seated by 5:45 and already knew our order before the menus hit the table. When the waiter asked about drinks, we let him know we’d be getting the free ones that came with the ten-dollar hamburger deal. Lemonade for both of us. I asked Judy if I was worth the extra dollar fifty for sweet potato fries. She said yes, which, if you’ve been married a couple dozen years, is code for “I love you” and also “please stop asking me this.”

I should mention that settling into the gap between trips does not bring out my best self. Judy knows this and indulges me anyway, more than she probably should.

Pizzas kept coming out of the kitchen while we sipped our lemonade, and half-priced wood-fired pizza is a genuinely hard thing to say no to. But the foil in our toaster oven was still greasy from the Costco pizza’s reign of terror, so we held the line. Barely.

The hamburgers arrived just before 6:00. Same basket, different colored fries. Ketchup was not my choice of condiment for sweet potato fries, but they were never the main event anyway. The burger was the star. Judy cut hers in half to create the illusion of restraint, then barely paused before starting on the second half. Her fries had come cold. We considered asking for new ones, but since she had no intention of eating them regardless, sending them back felt like theater. I’ve been a jerk before. Usually to family. I know my limits.

She tossed me a few of her fries before we noticed our baskets were mostly empty and flagged down the check.

Turns out the gift card only had $6.50 left on it. Judy handled payment, which has been her job ever since I developed a reputation for being stingy on tips. She’s better at that kind of math than I am — more aware, more generous. Every so often she asks me to bump it up a couple of dollars, and I don’t put up much of a fight. We both like the total to land on a round number, so a dollar or two of rounding doesn’t bother me.

By the time we got back in the car, only forty minutes had passed since we put our names down. The restaurant probably would’ve preferred we lingered over a beer or two, but they held up their end of the deal, and so did we. Judy didn’t plan on getting home in time for Wheel of Fortune, but with the food coming out that fast, it was hard to avoid.

Her word for the whole night was “efficient.” We’re both home all day — she’s working remotely, I’m on babysitting duty when it’s offered — so by dinner we’ve already said everything we need to say to each other. No chit-chat required. We’re deep into overlap territory on our list of conversation topics, and with more travel ahead, we’ll be leaning on our European stories for a while. We tell them well. People seem to think we’re funny. Really, we’re just two people who’ve rehearsed the same bits on each other enough times to have the timing down.

Efficient eaters, happiest in our own recliners. You will not find a more thrilling dinner date than us.

Vacation Eve

With my last full day in the neighborhood before disappearing for a few weeks, I found myself running through a list of “please the people” tasks. The kind of chores that keep things stable enough that no one files a complaint while I’m gone. Some were easy, some were sweaty, and some were just annoying enough to remind me I’m still useful. But this is what a man does to keep the peace and avoid hearing that tone when he returns.

My wife has been gone a couple of days, which meant the dishes from our 4th of July celebration had reached a level of multiplication normally reserved for bacteria cultures. She was off getting her nails done, a choice I tease her about, mostly because I’d prefer spending that money on a seat with legroom instead of practicing yoga in economy. Given my historic financial sins, my debating privileges on discretionary spending are on a very short leash.

The dishes were the big one. Sure, “clean the bathrooms” and “scrub the floors” were probably on her internal list too, but the dishes were the item she’d notice first. If I hadn’t done them, her opening line when we returned would’ve been, “Oh, you didn’t get those done.” I could practically hear it. So I did them.

This morning, I took my daughter and granddaughter to the zoo for what I’m calling an early bake. With twins on the way, our zoo days are numbered, and I’m trying to squeeze in the last few before my daughter’s life becomes a blur of diapers and double feedings.

Despite the heat, we lucked out. One of the elephants was swimming, holding his breath like a showoff while debris bobbed around him like a questionable soup. The meerkats were doing their meerkat thing, which my granddaughter has loved ever since she saw them at the Fort Worth zoo. I don’t think there are too many surprises left at our zoo, but we’re narrowing down her favorites.

The splash pad was the real story. A month ago, she was afraid of it. Today, she received multiple direct hits. She walked across the water exit points while the jets were off, caught a blast directly to the diaper, and the face shot ended things with the decisiveness of a referee whistle.

And of course, the flamingos. She’s obsessed. Maybe it’s the legs. Maybe it’s the color. Either way, they’re now a mandatory stop on every visit.

My daughter didn’t insist I come along, but this is exactly the kind of thing a semi-retired (or fully retired? still unclear) dad can do to help a pregnant daughter survive a summer in Oklahoma.

The rest of my list isn’t strictly necessary, but these are the tasks that somehow convince my wife I still have a unique talent for over-complicating simple things.

Oklahoma hail season never really ends, so I’ll be hoisting my wife’s bike onto the wall rack and then creating a fat man’s squeeze to get both cars into a garage already shared with a storage rack and a storm shelter. Whether an off-season tornado shows up or not, it won’t matter to us. The puzzle will be solved.

The refrigerator has been accumulating pickles, hummus, and corn salsa that have aged past food and into a philosophical question. Tomorrow is execution day. Unless one of my local kids files a stay, nothing in there is making it to the weekend. Trash day is Friday, so if no one is willing to commit to using it, I don’t care if the flies unionize and take over the trash can—their celebration will be short-lived.

Speaking of flies, I refuse to leave the house infested. The kids will be dropping off mail and celebrating our departure the entire time we’re gone, so I can’t guarantee long-term results, but I can at least demoralize the current population before I leave. I’ve already racked up kills over the 4th, bare-handed, as is my way. My son-in-law was amazed the first time he saw it. My daughter wasn’t. She grew up assuming every family had a designated fly assassin. We’ve got the blue-light zapper running in the kitchen, and I’ll be on patrol until wheels-up.

That pretty much does it. I need to grab my swimsuit and the fingernail clippers. My AI buddy assures me they’re fine in a carry-on if they’re standard clippers and not some experimental weaponized grooming device. After a night in Texas where I won’t eat any salads or anything capable of gifting me parasites, my wife and I head out Friday afternoon.

I’m practically in Germany already with zero jet lag. A bold lie I’m telling myself.

I’m ready to hand my wife the reins. Let her steer this wagon for a few weeks while I enjoy the trip she planned for us. She does this sort of thing really well, and I’ve gotten smart enough to just show up, carry the bags, and let her run the show.

When I get back, life will snap right back into its rhythm. Babysitting two days a week, spot-sitting whenever needed, early coffee with peanut butter toast, morning walks, cooking for the hockey boys, and the daily tug-of-war between my to-do list and whatever my kids need. This is my first cruise as a grandpa, and when I return, I’ll reattach myself to all of it with gratitude. I’ll have a few Facebook posts to prove I left my zip code, and I’ll settle back into the boring, predictable life I’ve built around the people I love most.

Vacations are great. But home is where they need me. And that’s enough.

Fireworks, Vacuum Bags, and the Woman Keeping Me Semi‑Functional

I asked my son if I could borrow his vacuum packing bags, and for about ten minutes I actually believed I’d been handed a personal black hole. Suck the air out, and my “will it be cold or warm in the Baltics?” wardrobe folds down into something almost manageable. The clothes really do take up less room. What the bags also do is create a small mystery, because somewhere in there is a version of me who decided a swimsuit and a fleece belonged in the same airtight tomb, and I have zero memory of making that call. Judy gets to unpack the evidence on the cruise and reverse-engineer my packing logic like a forensic scientist of poor decisions. The answer to what I was thinking is, frankly, none of my business.

The morning after the 4th, our trash cans and the neighborhood port-a-potties were all flat on their sides, and none of them were drunk. They just lost a fight with the wind, the same wind that knocked out some power for good measure. One of our cans apparently sacrificed itself against the downspout to keep one of my roses standing, and I’ve been considering a small ceremony for it. Standing in the yard afterward, looking at the mess, I remember thinking this seemed like exactly the right week to leave the country.

Somewhere in the last week I also had to have an honest conversation with myself about cake. I’m a cookie and brownie guy, through and through. Some of the women in my life still like to bake cake, and it’s good cake, thoughtful cake, and I will eat exactly one piece and never come back for seconds. I haven’t found a way to say this out loud without sounding ungrateful, so for now the plan is something like, “This is delicious, but I’m staying loyal to my first love.” If that doesn’t land, I may just start cutting brownies into circles and calling it diplomacy.

Then there’s the cookout math. Hosting a vegetarian and not ending up with a fridge full of regret takes a real system. Don’t make excess to begin with. Freeze what’s left if you do. And if the day after you leave happens to be trash day, empty the fridge like you’re turning in a rental car, no evidence left behind. With Judy already gone a few days ahead of me and my own appetite in no hurry to expand, I’ve been running rules two and three on a case by case basis, like a one-man Supreme Court of Leftovers.

We also got the house ready for a couple staying with us one of the weekends we’re gone. We’re not running an Airbnb, so nobody’s expecting turndown service. Make sure the AC works, keep something cold and non-alcoholic in the fridge, and accept that the only bed built for two people in this house is staying off limits, no exceptions. The two downstairs beds, formerly belonging to our kids who’ve moved on to careers and bigger things, will do fine. My only real hope is that they remember to turn the thermostat back up when they leave — there’s a whole system of checks and balances built around that one, and I’ll probably forget most of it until the electric bill shows up and I gasp in three languages.

The rain and wind ganged up on the mulched trees too, undoing more of that “mulch glue” project than I want to think about. I had plans, actual plans, curved edges and everything. Then the weather rolled through and turned it into a lumpy suggestion of landscaping, and at some point there’s nothing left to do beyond the effort already spent. I said “uncle,” out loud, to nobody, and decided the mulch’s rebellion isn’t allowed to bother me again until mid-August.

Without an irrigation system, we’ve been watering constantly, and while we’re gone the job falls to the kids (my son and his wife) who live a street over. The instructions I gave them sound less like a plan and more like a riddle: if it rains plenty you can ease off, unless it’s also been brutally hot, in which case trust the ground to sort itself out anyway. Keep everything alive, don’t drown it, good luck. Explaining this out loud, I realized my only real qualification for any of it is owning a shovel.

All of that was just warm-up for the fireworks. Judy had come off a disappointing, rain-delayed show at Scissortail Park and wanted her real finale, so after watching as much of a delayed soccer game as we could stand, we went hunting for the one spot that might deliver it, fireworks pilgrims in search of the promised land. A packed grocery store parking lot looked promising, though it made no promises. We moved our sitting towel exactly once and settled for the best angle available. A drone show with patriotic shapes went first, then the fireworks started, framed nicely between two guys in lawn chairs who’d claimed the spot ahead of us. Fifteen minutes in, Judy turned and said, “This is the finale I wanted Friday night, but I got a dud instead.” Two separate fires had apparently thrown off the whole schedule that first night. When this show kept going past what felt like the ending, we took it as a gift, got up, and cleared the lot just as the real finale wrapped up behind us — no gridlock, no extended parking lot purgatory.

My relationship with fireworks comes down to one rule: if the drive home takes longer than the show, it counts against the whole evening. This time we got out early, Judy was next to me, and I called it “fine.” From me, that’s basically a standing ovation, and she knew it.

With fireworks behind us, the countdown to vacation officially starts. There are still the fake fears and the vague what-ifs that show up before every trip and never mean anything once we’re actually there. But somewhere past all that noise, there’s a good vacation waiting. Judy’s the one who keeps turning this pile of wind-flattened trash cans and rebellious mulch and questionable packing decisions into a story instead of a crisis. I just need to get out of my own way and let it happen. If I can’t manage that for myself, I’ll manage it for her.

Babysitting, Humidity, and a Balanced Ledger

I want to go on record that I volunteered for this. Nobody made me do anything. That will matter later.

My wife had been excited about the 4th of July Eve plans ever since she heard the OKC Philharmonic was playing a free concert at Scissortail Park with fireworks after. She heard “free concert and fireworks” and I heard “several thousand of your closest strangers, downtown parking, and a heat index designed by someone who hates you.”

The concert started at 8:30 and the fireworks at 9:30, which is great timing unless you live near a small human whose bedtime is 8:00ish. So I made an offer I considered safely hypothetical. I told Judy that since Ellie’s parents wouldn’t be able to enjoy the concert anyway, I could stay home with the baby.

I assumed this offer would be admired and declined, the way all noble offers are supposed to work. Instead, my daughter texted me that Mom said I’d watch Ellie if they went. My generosity had been converted into a signed contract before I’d even finished congratulating myself on it, and I wasn’t even consulted on the press release.

But my wife does what she does.

Here’s my honest accounting of what I skipped. It was going to be mid-90s during the day. The event was free, which is a polite way of saying the whole metro was invited. Parking downtown is always an adventure, and the dinner plan involved either hauling food in like pack mules or standing in a food truck line long enough to qualify for residency.

We’d done the orchestra-on-the-lawn thing plenty of times in Ohio, listening to the Columbus Symphony at Chemical Abstracts, and I knew that routine cold. I knew where to park, where to sit, and when to leave. This event offered me zero known variables and a forecast that guaranteed everyone around me would be operating at about 90% of their normal patience, myself included.

So while the family went downtown, I fed Ellie dinner and followed her around the house for less than an hour. Her exhaustion and her bedtime arrived at the same moment, which is the babysitting equivalent of hitting the lottery. Grandpa did not have to endure the big sad eyes, and I consider that the real fireworks show.

Then I watched soccer and debated whether I’d made a wise decision or simply confirmed my status as the family hermit. The jury stayed out overnight.

The next morning I got my redemption arc. I attended the parade in Edmond as the only male in our entire family delegation. My son passed, and my son-in-law passed. I alone carried the banner of masculine parade attendance, and I did it on one of the hottest mornings of the year, when my bed was right there offering a very compelling counterargument.

My daughter came along and admitted she couldn’t remember the last time she’d been to a parade. I understand that completely. It takes a certain amount of pride in your country to get out of bed on a morning you could sleep in, and I don’t count the 4th as a political event anyway. It’s a celebration every American should want to attend regardless of whatever Washington is currently doing to itself.

We arrived half an hour early, which earned us a seat that was worse than the canopy people’s and better than the stragglers’. In parade seating, as in life, you mostly aim for the middle of the pack and call it a win.

Some observations from the curb. Even at 9:00 in the morning, the sun means business, breezes should never be undersold, and humidity is a monster that needs to be slurped up by a cloud and relocated to a part of the country where I don’t live.

An hour is the correct length for a parade. Anything past that and the babies get restless, and I’m not going to pretend the old people weren’t doing the same math about beating the traffic.

You cannot have horses in a parade without a cleanup vehicle following them, which reminded me of a horse parade we attended near Delaware, Ohio, one of the biggest east of the Mississippi. People there drew chalk boxes on the street hoping a horse would leave its contribution inside their square. After a hundred horses go by, watching one do a #2 becomes genuine entertainment, and somewhere out there, a lucky winner was thrilled about manure.

The Shriners apparently brought every vehicle they own. Every float and car said “India Shriners,” which is the OKC chapter, and I did confirm that a Shriner is a Mason but a Mason isn’t necessarily a Shriner. I now know this permanently, whether I wanted to or not.

They did doughnuts in tiny cars and drove motorcycles in circles that slowly migrated up the route. They weren’t amazing, but they were entertaining, and this being our second year, they were exactly as entertaining as I remembered, which is its own kind of reliability.

An early highlight was a plumbing company float featuring Uncle Sam in a bathtub, either grateful to them for fixing his pipes or too lazy to walk the route. Based on what we could see, our Uncle was fully committed to the appearance of actually bathing, and I respect an actor who stays in character.

The expected inventory was all present. Three high school bands, fire trucks, police vehicles, a couple banks, politicians, beauty queens, and past grand marshals all baked in their own convertibles, waving hard enough to count as cardio.

My wife pointed out that the jazzercisers really had some energy. Their float came early in the route, and I suspect their jazziness declined as the temperature climbed, but they were giving us everything they had as they passed.

On the way home Judy wanted to stop at Sonic for a drink, an idea that was good in theory and then met parade traffic and a short-staffed Sonic that was losing its battle with the drive-thru. Fortunately, air conditioning can repair an attitude in about four minutes flat.

So that’s the ledger for the weekend. I skipped the concert on purpose, and I showed up for the parade on purpose, and I think the books balanced.

The truth underneath all of it is that Judy and I are getting closer to full retirement, which means a whole lot of years ahead of just the two of us deciding what we do with our days. I don’t want her dreading the thought of hanging with me every day, and I definitely don’t want her starting our upcoming trip wondering what kind of a boring guy she married.

Staying home with Ellie so her parents could have a night out was worth something. Standing in the heat while the Purple Heart veterans passed and the chairs emptied was worth more. The kids came over later for a cookout and homemade ice cream, and I’ll be there being adequately social, which for me is the sweet spot.

Judy knows what kind of guy she married. He complains about the humidity, skips the crowds when he can, and still gets out of bed for the parade, because some things deserve the sweat.

The Chaos Doesn’t Care That I’m Getting Better

After my Monday rebound on the health meter, I briefly believed I was proving my wife wrong. She’d been quietly predicting a longer recovery than I wanted to admit, and I was walking around like I’d just won the argument without actually saying, “I told you so.” She enjoys being right the way some people enjoy pickleball: casually, competitively, and with a suspicious amount of strategy. Fortunately, she decided a healthy husband was more valuable than a correct one, so she put on her “supportive spouse” face. If you ever meet her, please don’t let her know you know this. I need plausible deniability.

Feeling better meant I got to do normal‑human things again: I took my walk, hopped on a couple of Zoom calls, and tagged along with my daughter and granddaughter to the zoo. Six miles on a body that had been dragging for weeks. It felt like the comeback tour. I might have been insufferable for a few hours.

Tuesday had notes.

The good news was I slept through the night. The bad news was my energy evaporated before I could even decide what to do with it. Babysitting duty was coming later, so I chose the no‑walk option and pretended it was “strategic pacing” instead of “I can’t move.” I’d love to say I used the time wisely, but all I really accomplished was navigating the administrative obstacle course required to host hockey boys again in the fall. Background checks? Done. “USA Hockey Safe Sport” training? Also done—most of it aimed at people who actually see the boys in locker rooms. Apparently, I’m part of the extended safety net: the guy who hands out snacks and, if necessary, phone numbers for people who fix bigger problems.

Ellie arrived and we slid into our usual routine: constant snacking, nap avoidance, and me conserving enough energy for the playground run. On the walk there, she demanded frequent sips from my water bottle. I could refuse—I’ve been sick for weeks—but her parents aren’t particularly germ‑shy, and she’s been marinating in my personal germ broth for the same amount of time. Also, I’m terrible at telling her “no.” I know that’s a bad grandpa move. My current self‑diagnosis is long COVID, so odds are she already has better antibodies than I do.

At the park, a potential playmate was waiting. Her grandmother, Malinda—same name as my own grandmother, which earned me instant points—was already mid‑conversation with a woman walking her dog while her granddaughter tried to pet it. Once the dog walker escaped, Malinda turned her attention to me. Her grandma instincts were strong; she stayed half a step ahead of me to catch Ellie if she tripped. With my germ‑rattled brain and slow‑motion reflexes, I welcomed the backup.

Her granddaughter loved the slide, which meant Ellie needed to love the slide too. I lifted Ellie past the first giant step and let her instincts take over. The playground’s first landing was not designed for Andy‑sized humans, so I performed a sort of hunched shuffle that was heroic in spirit if not in appearance. Malinda warned me to keep my feet wide, so I wouldn’t go too fast. She claimed she once landed on her fanny. I’m not entirely sure I have a fanny, but I took her advice. She went first and absorbed most of the water on the slide, so I only got the “lightly damp and mildly undignified” version. Ellie and I survived two runs. The second one just required a deeper stoop and a quiet prayer.

Back home, we tackled lunch—the official one, not the Cheerios she treats as an emotional support snack—and then I followed her as she dismantled tissues and anything resembling organization. After a very dirty diaper where she “helped” spread the diaper cream, she finally went down for a nap. My wife suggested I do the same. Earplugs in, thunder shaking the house, I accepted the challenge.

An hour later I woke up thinking, “Why is it freezing in here?” The thermostat app swore nothing had changed, but the air said otherwise. I had that first quiet suspicion that the HVAC system had gone rogue. I did what any reasonable person does: ran through my standard “If I were an HVAC system trying to hide my misbehavior, how would I do it?” test. My final move was simple—cut the power. A rascal can’t rebel without electricity.

Not wanting to sleep in a house slowly turning into a meat locker, I called an HVAC company. I picked one with good ratings and an “& Sons” in the name. Maybe it’s marketing, but something in me trusts people who sound like they also attend each other’s Thanksgivings. The tech on the phone walked me through a few steps that matched my diagnosis, then added phrases like “lightning can do wonky things” and “sounds like a motherboard problem.” If it were a grandmother‑board problem, my wife would’ve solved it instantly—or at least acted like she could.

The technician came out the next morning. After an hour and a half of poking around, he had mixed news. He could rewire around the problem and get us running, and the part itself should be under warranty. He started on the workaround while I called the original installer to schedule the warranty visit. Their answer: “Sometime Monday, if we can fit you in, thirty‑minute notice.”

Vacation is in two weeks.

By the time I added up the labor for two technicians, we were approaching 75% of the cost of just replacing the motherboard outright and being done with it. So we went with the sure thing. Yes, it cost more. But I don’t have to spend the next two weeks playing thermostat man while the temperatures climb and the warranty visit exists in the mystical realm of “sometime Monday.”

My wife thought it was the right call. She was right.

She usually is.

Somewhere in there is the theme of this whole stretch of life: my health finally creeping in the right direction, while the rest of the universe keeps throwing toddlers, lightning, and circuit boards at me just to see what I’ll do. Apparently “feeling better” doesn’t come with less chaos. It just means I’m well enough to show up for it.