Observations

Discount Breading

To clarify up front, this posting is not about the cheapest possible bread or cracker crumbs to introduce into or onto your food. Although that is one possible interpretation of the title, today, I am singing mostly the praises of “day old” (or longer) bread stores.

We have purchased all of these items at pretty good discounts in the past:

Doughnuts: we enjoyed the donuts at the Hostess store more than the Mrs. Baird’s store, but when Hostess closed, we some how found we could eat the Mrs. Baird’s offerings…occasionally.
Bread: Many varieties and many sizes. When you have kids packing sandwiches, you always have to have some in stock. Although you give up a few days on how long the bread can dwell on your counter when it is bought “day old”, 5 lunch-packers does not make this a huge concern. The cinnamon swirl bread is especially good for french toast.
Bagels: Many flavors and a few new ones. They have had french toast and apple bagels. The pumpkins ones are also kind of fun in the fall. The bad thing is during the summer the bagels may only last a few days (or 2 days) before the “mold” moves in. The bread/bagels ride around in a truck for a few hours before being brought to the discount store. The summer heat makes the preservatives retire more quickly than cooler temperatures would.
Buns: Lots of saving here, and in some cases the price is 1/2 to 1/4 what it is at the store. (Although the Aldi’s up the road is pretty cheap.) Most of the time it is still significantly below store brand prices. So, if you need a bun for every hamburger, hot dog, or brat that goes into your body, it might as well be a cheap one!
Tortillas: Yeah, they have these, too. A couple different flavors and a couple different sizes. Saving is good!
Pizza crust: They sell Boboli pizza crust. A couple different sizes and thicknesses. If you look carefully, they have had football shaped crust during the appropriate season. (Baseball & basketball fans can make a regular crust resemble their sport at any time. Apparently football players just need a little inspiration to make their pizzas more popular for tailgating.)

It may not take much effort to work a register or to sort bread. Maybe it is the lack of stress in the employees of the discount bread store that makes them so open to conversation. The two employees I see the most are very likely to ask about my kids or even our exchange students. They will recommend new products, and/or ask (as an example), “If you make french toast, you might want to consider the cinnamon swirl bread. You won’t believe how great it will taste.” I truly appreciate their willingness to help me stretch my “breading” dollar as much as possible! I assume they do this for every customer who walks in the door, but maybe asking questions about their lives makes them care about me a little more. (Allow me to assign some value to my existence–please?)

The one gal has a few tattoos and a few kids. Her father works in a union job, and he has had a heart attack. I don’t know her politics, but a few factors make the first guess “Democrat”. I am not sure if she is married or not. (The title of “customer” does impose some limits on what questions are asked. Of course, I would listen to anything that was volunteered.) She has a very positive attitude. She smiles easily, and she greeted me with a quick smile when I walked in the door today. One day I greeted her and barely got a blank stare–the other employee let me know her grandfather had died. The next time I saw her, she was her old self. She felt horrible she was in such a daze that one day–such a good heart!

The other gal is probably closer to my age. She is the one who recommended the french toast w/ cinnamon swirl. She gives me a quick smile and thinks nothing of calling me “hon” when I am shopping. She has a daughter who has gone a couple of short term missions trips with her church to work with girls involved with sex trafficking. Her daughter now lives in New York where she works with those involved w/ sex trafficking. I believe she said her daughter has had great success using art therapy to reach these sometimes forgotten members of society. Unfortunately, she no longer works there. She was a great person to visit with. Likely, the salary she received failed to reach the level of headaches the job generated.

Despite a sometimes uneventful day, I like to have some weekly errands to anchor me into life. A slowing internet business and kids who seem to be unable to do anything buy grow make these predictable encounters something I happily put on my schedule. Their are too many employees at Walmart to have much hope of building a relationship with an employee. I sometimes fail to think of those small businesses out there who provide more than a receipt and a bag of supplies. (groceries, hardware, etc) They provide a smile and a acquaintance-ship. (Discussions on more than weather, but less than politics) Did small town, pre-internet businesses all used to be this way?

Asian Destruction Crew

AKA: My introduction to Window blind repair

It started with our exchange students not understanding the complexities of working a US generic window blind. I will admit to a part of this being conjecture, but here is how it goes…. For some reason, the blind would not go level for them. They may or may not have known how to operate the blind and how to “unlock” the blind so it could be lowered. Whatever did occur on our blinds (they are wood blinds, so “generic” is probably not a completely accurate description), three plastic clip on the bottom of the blinds has been removed. Underneath the clip, was a knot that ran the whole length of the blind–it allowed the blind to move up and down the window. It is our guess the locking function (the hand motion where you take the height adjustment string to the left or right at a high angle and lock the blind height in place) was not working to their expectations. They were trying to solve the problem without getting us involved. (All of this information was news to me UNTIL I started trying to fix the blind today. Prior to me really looking at the blind, I thought the blind “chose” to take some time off RATHER than being giving an unexpected vacation due to receiving some inappropriate therapy.)

As I went into the room today to begin my task, I grabbed a very similar blind from the other room. Although the strings were not in the identical position, I felt its presence would give me a visual aid if I ever got stumped. As I followed the strings and tried to figure out where they were and where they needed to be, I started to see I was not dealing with an accident. When the window blinds first received their “therapy”, I am sure the goal was just to make the blind function better. As I saw parts removed and knots undone, it began to look more like sabotage than saving. (If I would have been entrusting my life to this window blind just after the knots were removed, I would not be writing this now.) Their therapeutic adjustment may only have been minor ones, but they did eventually go very bad.

And, after over 2 hours, help from my spouse (some parts are hard to do by yourself while balancing) and a couple redos because I did not realize how the “locking” mechanism for the blinds worked, I had blinds that functioned again. (Note the “cheat” they implemented to keep the blinds from dragging on the window seal. It didn’t work perfectly, but it did keep me from having to drop everything and try and figure the problem out.)

Fixing the blind was easy when compared to what we tried to do so we don’t have to do this repair again. (I am glad I am a self proclaimed window blind repairman. I am very content to NEVER use my skills again.) Before our exchange students went up to their room after school, we asked them to not try to fix their blinds by themselves again. (We got push back–“I do not think we broke them.” [please see above]) After they had a little time to settle in their rooms, my wife went up to their rooms and asked them to show her they knew how to operate the blinds. (It took a few tries, but they did.) Now, it is our hope our window blinds will work just as well as they did after we moved in.

If you don’t know how to use something, trying to fix it yourself might be just fine. But, when knots are untied and parts are removed, you have probably moved into an area where you are at risk of breaking something. Regardless of age or perceived smarts or urgency, it is probably better to ask “how does it work?” than “can you please fix it?”.

Road Humps or Speed Bumps

Beware of the Road Humps…

Now, that I am becoming accustomed to my new walking route, (our city just put some great walking paths in our neighborhood that tie us into other paths and other neighborhoods) I am getting past the new things…the variety of houses, the barking dogs, the whole new set of bike riders and other pseudo-athletes, and, of course, the road signs.

One of the road signs is an electronic sign that provides the speed of the approaching vehicles. I am not a vehicle or able to walk at a pace to be registered by this device, so it has minimal impact on me.
“No Motorized Vehicles”: It seems this sign is not fully heeded…yet. As the paths are being completed and as vehicles claim access (or they find it a really neat short cut to the park for a place to hide and take an extended lunch) I have had to dodge a few vehicles and yield to them. I could do some “planking”, but I am not sure they would realize I was just laying in the road. Since many of the drivers may not be English speakers, they might take it as their responsibility to fulfill my wishes.
The one that gives me the most pause is “Road Humps”. The irony is this name is it sounds like it is a naturally occurring phenomenon. “We can’t help it. The road just has humps. We fix them and they just go back that way. Depending on temperature, time of day, or weather conditions, the humps may vary. It is more like a rash really. The humps are not worthy of being called “speed bumps”, but it they were, we would change the signage to reflect that fact.”

For me, I see “speed” in the title, and I assume what the sign is warning me against will soon impact my speed in some way. The “humps” in the other name makes we wonder if the road has somehow developed some “camel-envy”. It is trying to mimic a bactrian or dromedary?

I am grateful to be getting more familiar with my walking path. Now, as I walk, my mind can wander and not worry about the next right or left turn. Not always does my mind have a thought that spawns many a random thought. But, when it does, I relish the journey and try not to limit its direction. If growing old allows more freedom in what you can think about , I will look forward to what the next decade of my life will look like!

Salty Frog Sympathy

As the pool pump made a couple of those sounds that could not escape my well trained ears, I had to take a peek into the pool skimmer. The skimmer was full of leaves, so it appears the telltale noises could not escape the surprise-adverse ears I have been wearing for a few years.

When I returned the skimmer basket from the leaf burial ground, a little frog was sitting along side the pool. I could only guess he had fallen into the pool and been sucked into the skimmer overnight. (Now that the pool is winterized, this is not likely to happen again this year. A couple of wind storms have given the pool skimmer and the vacuum more than they could clean up in a couple of days. Now, that the temperatures are dropping, the pool blanket has come out to keep the pool warm as far into fall as possible AND the leaf netting has come out to provide a more manageable way to remove all of the leaves once they start dropping from the well placed tree right beside the pool…) I yelled at my daughters to show them my little friend. He did not seem to be doing so well. It was my believe he took a big drink of a liquid (salt water). As the liquid worked its way through his system, his outlook was not good.

My daughters, however, were not going to give up easily. They tried to give him a big drink of tap water. They tried to scrounge up a bug or two so he could have an easy snack. They really loved on him beyond his ability to appreciate it. His movements were present, but very slow when I found him. And, as he spent time with my daughters, it appeared his reflexes continued to slow—so slow in fact, he expired before they had time to implement all of their revival plans. (The final part of their plan was to take him to school to let their favorite science teacher prove she was capable of saving the life of an amphibian….she had already saved a reptile (turtle) and a few fish this school year.)

Despite his brief time as a Gruenbaum, I was so glad to see how his life was not dismissed by my girls. They dove in despite the high probability of failure. They likely accepted the worst case scenario from the moment they met “froggie”. Despite the downside, they chose to be optimistic and move forward with a plan. I enjoyed watching their ultimate fruitless efforts and commitment to extending his life.

I couldn’t help but think of the difficulty they had accepting the death of their hamster a couple of years ago. (They also lost a guinea pig that was very small and very lonely; he just seemed like he didn’t want to live w/o a roommate.) They cried and asked “why?” so many times. As painful as it was for me to see them so upset, they emerged from this pain with a greater understanding of how life can be so fleeting. And, it was likely some of those lessons that were helpful to them as they threw their hearts into trying to solve the frog’s dilemma. As I admired their efforts, I couldn’t help but ask, “Where did my little girls go?” As a frog begins as a tadpole and grow into adulthood, I see my girls swimming/hopping along life’s path gradually becoming the young ladies they were born to become.

Armadillos In The Bed

No, we didn’t get our flower beds aerated. No my wife and daughters didn’t put on their heels and tramp through the flower beds. We suspect, based on previous observations of early morning armadillo activity, we had some visitors who were looking for a meal. Whatever it may be about our beds, they either presently have some grubs or some grandpa armadillo struck grub gold in the past in our beds.

We don’t have anything valuable enough in the beds to worry about it. Wednesday morning, I noticed a couple holes around the yucca. And, this morning, their were more holes and they had spread out over a wider area. If I go out tomorrow and find they have plugged something into the outside outlet and set up equipment to harvest the grubs, I may take a greater interest in their plans. Otherwise, it is just a story to tell and something to distract us from all of the darn squirrels!!

Bye, Bye Flintstones

My daughter is nearing the end of her first year on the High School cross country team. She has PRed (Personal Record) a few times and continues to show improvement nearly every week. Even though she has had to get up terribly early almost every day since school started, she is still committed to doing her best. “Best” includes doing a 4 mile run on her day off of school when no practice was scheduled. (Columbus Day)

During track season in the spring, the coach noticed she had a breathing issue. We went to the pediatrician and got an inhaler for her to use before she runs. (Their was cross fit training or running nearly every weekday this summer.) When cross country started, she was given the advice to use the inhaler twice within a couple of minutes. This was to be done 30 minutes before the beginning of her race. As the season wore on, this seemed to address most of the breathing issues she was having. Unfortunately, during a couple of windy days, the coach became convinced that her breathing problems were more allergy related than asthma. We thought getting her tested could wait until after the season.

As I went to pick my daughter up on Thursday afternoon after she completed a 3 mile run, the coach had some additional advice for me. “The State meets are in just over two weeks. If the weather is really windy, I don’t know if the inhaler will be enough. She should start taking a Claratin every day until after the state meet.” This brings us to today. It took us a couple of days to get the Claratin picked up. And, it was not chewable, so we would have to do a swallowing tutorial….

Right after dinner the past couple of nights, we have played a “game”. We had purchased a big bag of bulk, mini, peanut butter cups at Sprouts. Last night and again tonight, I threw a number of pb cups into the air near my kids heads where many were caught in the mouth and quickly swallowed. Most of them arched pretty well, and many (not all) of the pb cups were caught. Cheeks, noses, and tongues got in the way of some of the catches. (There is an art to throwing well arced food items [M&Ms, peanuts, popcorn, etc], but it will have to wait for a later time.) Sometimes the pb cup nearly went straight down the throat without chewing or anything. I mentioned to my daughter, “Maybe, you can try to catch the Claratin in your mouth so you won’t have to think about swallowing.” (My wife has always been a little softer when it came to the art of swallowing. My near adult son still has trouble swallowing, so she will give him liquids whenever she can. I come from the other school that says, “Grow up! It needs swallowed, so swallow it!”) Of course, dads are more likely to be soft on their daughters (I did check when buying the Claratin. There did not appear to be a chewable variety….) Since the “catching” of pb cups by my daughter was a little sketchy at times AND because she needed to learn to swallow anyway, we filled a glass of water, and I tried to go to work!

I have been a member of the “Good Swallower” club for a number of years. I take a few vitamins daily. They are stored in plastic container with the days of the week on it. The days of the week don’t matter to me–it is the same mix every day. (Yes, these are identical to what is used by our senior citizens.) Usually, I dump the contents of the “Monday” (or whichever) compartment in my mouth; I carefully arrange them on my tongue; I drink the water slowly; I let the pills float up into the water (maybe swishing the water in my mouth a little) and try to get them to all be approximately in the center of my mouth, and then I swallow. Usually they (Okay, their are 8 total–I am getting old) are gone in one swallowing, and at most two. This is the technique (if technique can be accurately applied to the sketchy details provided) I tried to convey to my daughter. She decided to practice on something small. She suggested peanuts. I suggested something a little smaller. Since the Claratin is really only about the size of a baby aspirin, I was very hopeful the “lesson” would be a short one. After swallowing a small piece of granola a couple of times, she was ready to take her pill. I watched her center the pill on her tongue, and practically before the water was in her mouth, the pill was swallowed. She enjoyed it so much she cleared out the box and took all 30 of the Claratin in one evening. (not really, but she did enjoy the accomplishment)

I think she realized what swallowing the pill would mean. Another part of her childhood was slipping away. No longer could she eagerly look forward to another morning of chomping on the Flintstones (or other chewable) vitamin. (Chewable in my youth was a chalky like thing–it wasn’t a gummy bear!) She had to accept the bottle of vitamins in the cupboard was the end of an era in her life. No more “candy” with the vitamin chaser. She was going to have to take her vitamins the (almost) old fashion way–by water. (The real old fashion way was just eating well–she does that pretty well, too.)

I know some kids achieve this “milestone” earlier in life. I know my kids are not perfect, and are not “100th” percentile on everything. I know we probably could have found a solution that involved the preservation of her “no swallow” policy. And, I also know she didn’t do something she didn’t really want to do because it was the only option presented to her. I am pretty sure it is okay to “secretly” celebrate a milestone if it means your child is daily winning the war against their negative thoughts and the “I can’ts”. I know she is going to be a great adult–I am just hoping she doesn’t figure it out before I am willing to tell her!

Relighting The Pilot

Each time the pilot goes out on the water heater, it falls upon the oldest male (me) to get it relit. And, tonight was no exception. If the people who showered earlier in the day would have mentioned the water was not that warm for their showers, I might have been able to avoid the unavoidable “near” shower experience. Unfortunately, I was well along the path to jumping into the shower before I realized my predicament–get an uncomfortable shower over with or have a warm shower and enjoy it? I opted for warm.

When the pilot goes out, I say a silent prayer that I will not blow our house or any of its occupants into a million pieces. It seems relighting the pilot light is so traumatic for me that I need to relearn how to light it every time. With a “grill lighter”, flashlight, and screwdriver in hand, I approach the water heater with all due respect. I reread the directions attached to the side–hanging on every word. I allow the words to fully marinate my brain as I disconnect the necessary water heater pieces so I can have the best possible access to the pilot. I look at the hardware–fully capable of releasing the natural gas that could blow me and my fellow house occupants up if not completely respected–and seek any memory of our previous interactions. As I reread the directions, our past entanglements become slightly less distant memories. I commit to holding the lighter in the “presumed” pilot area. (without the grill lighter I would be dead. When the directions say use a “match”, I go into a semi-panic. I think certainly the spot I have the lighter is wrong. It must be closer to the edge than I am trying to light. Certainly I am going to blow myself up. I shift my prayer to “Please at least protect the downstairs and my family from anything stupid I may do within the next few minutes”….) I push the red button down and watch to see what havoc my lighter creates. Even after my finger cramps, I still find a way to hold the button down. When my lighter finger cramps, I hope the 60 seconds have passed. After releasing the lighter flame, the pilot remains lit; my body remains intact within our attic, and I shift my prayer to “Please keep the pilot lit. Please, please, please!”

Past “lightings” have involved ripped pants, stretching of patience beyond any previously stretched amounts, and hugging of the water heater as I was certain my last moments were upon me. The lighting ritual seems to be an annual occurrence. Sometimes it is the natural gas line freezing shut (pretty rare–when it gets cold, I now wrap the gas meter to discourage this outcome), or as it apparently was today, it was an overly mischievous breeze. I do not ever want to take this relighting for granted, but my muscle memory seems to be much better than the trauma-wiped actual memory. A bit of self-hypnosis before again approaching this task might be a good option. Or, maybe the better option is the gift of a hot water heater blanket to my under-appreciated and only occasional foe.

My Semi-Lucid Camera

No this is NOT a selfie!

As I continue to explore the new paths in our neighborhood, I like to have my camera on my hip. I don’t have a fancy camera, but I have had it for over 4 years. I have used this camera for SO many things:

I have taken pictures of the kids at so many different sporting events, fairs, and other activities.
It has gone on many vacations with the family. It was fastened to my hip for most of our trip to China last year.
I have taken lots of videos of the kids blowing out candles, cooking food, doing quirky human tricks, and a variety of other oddball things that only I would consider entertaining.
I have taken work pictures for eBay, blogs, and whatever other place I needed. I probably through in quite a few videos as well!

As my camera has aged, our affection (I like to think it is shared, but I know he just thinks of me as the annoying guy who pushes his buttons and yanks out his guts [the SD card and the rechargeable battery]) has grown. I have relied on him for all of those special moments that words just would not be able to do justice to. This was how our relationship went for the past few years until last week. He started letting me down more often then not. I missed a few key shots:

The chickens wandering in the front yard along my walk route. There was no fence or anything. Even telling you now, you are going, “Really? There were chickens wandering without a fence. If you had a picture, I might believe you!”
At the cross country meet, I went to snap a few pictures, but the camera still needed to take a nap or something….

Well, I am not stupid. I thought to myself, “I have never bought a new battery for this camera. Certainly that is the problem.” Two days later, I was able to test this theory when the new battery arrived. Initially, I thought it was more than the battery. After I charged the battery, I popped it into the camera and grew to expect this type of result when I wanted to take a picture:

I turned the camera on and prepared to take my picture.
After waiting for the camera to come to life, I aimed it at my intended target.
I was usually greeted by the lense being sucked back into the camera with no desire to help me capture any memories.

Starting this morning (the day after I bought a new camera online w/ an expected delivery tomorrow), the camera seemed to be embarrassed by its recent behavior. It was cooperating about 50% of the time. (As an example, it only took 3 tries to take my first picture.) By the time I got to my 2nd and 3rd desired picture, the camera was “almost” reliable. At my 4th picture, it did make me try twice, but it took the picture without complaining again and it seemed to be ready for more. (It was not easy, but I kind of pictured a dog who was trying to please—his tongue was hanging out and all of his body language was saying, “Let me help. I want to play.”)

At this point, this camera, at best, will be my backup. I am not sure if it is rethinking the whole “death” idea, or if the internal battery needed extra time to recharge off of the newly acquired battery. Whatever the problem was or is, now that the camera has broken my trust, this camera will….soon be in the trash heap. (I completed the last few words after the recent adventure at the state fair.)

At the Texas State Fair, the camera was on my hip, but the camera was barely lucid. He acted like he just left a sanitarium and had no idea what he was supposed to do. He would stick his tongue out at me, and quickly pull it back in. (The lense would quickly suck back in as I tried to take the pictures.) He would pretend to take pictures and leave me disappointed later when I could not find the pictures I was certain he had committed to memory. He was not reliable, and without a good camera, I am better enjoying the moment then fooling around with an electronic device that has made different career plans.

The camera, when acting according to its DNA, takes pictures. Not being an artist, my brain needs a good image to remember all of the subtle details of the camera captured event. A good picture can add color to an otherwise boring description provided by a somewhat overburdened brain. While my active memories only seem available in black and white images, a camera captured image from MY camera can provide my brain the adrenaline boost it needs to propel my descriptions into a color palette that make the events seem like it just occurred.

Fortunately, the new camera awaited me on the front porch when I got home from the fair. It is a little bulkier, and it only came with a manual in Japanese. In its first outing (daughter’s cross country meet), it appears to know what it was designed to do. If it gives me a few years of mostly lucid service, I am eager to trust it with helping me preserve some amount of the past…regardless of how lucid I am when the pictures are reviewed.

Monster Mashed Potatoes

As we were sitting around the table Sunday night enjoying my daughters birthday meal, one of our guest commented to our Korean exchange student, “Have you ever done the “mashed potato” dance?”

After looking at him rather strangely due to our inability to make a connections with where his brain got that one from, the only thing we could puzzle out is he was thinking of “The Monster Mash”. (The meal did in fact consist of mashed potatoes, so we did figure that part of it out.)

Although a “monster mashed potato” dance does not exist, I could not help but wonder what it WOULD look like. Just a couple of thoughts on the subject…

Is the potato so huge it would be called a monster potato OR is it a monster smashing the potatoes? The answer to this question would greatly influence the dance. Is it a monster smashing to potatoes or is it an all out scramble to smash this many-eyed, starch laden wonder into digestible form?
What appendages are available? The “monster” option is either the hands smashing with a madness or the feet being used to stomp with reckless abandon. If an imaginary massive tuber is a part of the dance, it would seem teamwork might be an effective way to reduce the potato to a smooth, semi-creamy consistency.

The older I get, the more memories I seem to have available for all of the random paths a dinner conversation may take. I love it when some comment, noise, or random thought can serve as a catalyst for a completely different trajectory to an otherwise “normal” communication. I love it that I don’t have to take full responsibility for providing these catalyst. My kids (and exchange kids) are confident enough in themselves and comfortable enough in their environment that they can be willing to throw out the obscure quote/fact/observation. If it takes the conversation no where today, it may reappear in a future conversation.

Some of our best standing jokes have been over dinner conversations. And, some of our best laughs have been while eating dinner. Whatever mistakes we have made as parents, one of them was not failing to eat and dine around the table on a very regular basis. The quality of the food has improved over the years and the dialogue has matured. The kids have brought various friends to the the table to share meals with us. When they left/leave the table, we hope their hunger is an ancient memory and their only real thought is “Did we eat dinner, too?”

My Daughters Embarrassing Parents

At this Saturday’s cross country meet, it was one of those “close” meets. It was less than 15 minutes from the house, so we got to sleep a little more than most Saturdays. And, this may have been part of the problem with our excessive energy levels and the need to “share” it with the unsuspecting masses. (The above picture is of both my daughters at the sidewalk running the perimeter of the course. It appears someone with limited mental capacities took two big steps through the wet concrete while nobody was looking. And, nobody looked again until after it dried. The secondary theory is some super hero living among us stepped on the sidewalk without “turning down” his super powers. He inadvertently burnt a “hole” into the concrete before he realized what he had done. As you can see from my daughters footwork, the steps weren’t baby steps…)

Having sat in the intermittent sun for over 2 hours, having endured nearly 3-4 races already of primarily 2 miles each (The HS boys run 3 miles) and with it getting on toward lunch time even though our commute home was short, we were excited to have my youngest daughter run her race. As all of the girls lined up on one end of the field, there is always some narrowing of the course that takes place by design. They know not all of the kids will maintain that line for very long as they work their way down the course. So, by the time the course goes a couple of hundred yards, the width of the course is probably 1/2 the width it was originally. On Saturday’s run, my wife hops out to take pictures of the runners (specifically my daughter and teammates as they line up). As she looked to the left and saw all of the parents encroaching on the course, she could not help but put her I-want-to-help-people hat on. Even though she did not have any event related paraphernalia on, she started pushing and/or strongly requesting the crowd back up so the cross country runners would have a little more space to jockey for position before the course “officially” narrowed. Her words did not fall on deaf ears. They people backed up without much hesitation. She acted like she had authority, and I suppose most of them pulled out the GPSes on their phones and realized the course went right through where they were standing. Regardless, the athletes got a little more space to shuffle into the position where they would run/walk the better part of their race.

I used the term athletes above somewhat loosely. I am truly confident some of the girls found out the day before they were running a race the next day. I believe many of them were walking before they were 100 yards into the race. One whole team of girls provided the entire tail for this beast that weaved its way through the course. After my daughter and her teammates worked their way through the course, my opportunity to embarrass “my ladies” presented itself.

The last 100 yards of the course was a straight away right behind the teams tent. I was impressed by many of the girls who hit this last stretch. They seemed to be able to pour it on and pass 3 or 5 or 10 people in that last stretch. It made me wonder how many of these “2 Milers” were really sprinters masquerading as 2 milers. When the sprinters stopped appearing, we had a huge quantity of the “participant” class. I started walking down the line yelling out words of “encouragement” to the runners. Things like, “You aren’t allowed to walk once you turn the corner.”, “Don’t be last. I can walk faster than you are running.”, “I don’t tolerate any walkers back here–get moving!”, “You can rest all weekend. Right now, you need to finish your race strong.”, and “You may have walked most of the rest of the race. Right now, you need to finish for yourself and your team.” I probably did get a little more colorful at times. If I said anything else, it was quotes like these that provided my inspiration. Although my lips may not have always obeyed my self-imposed rule, sometimes, in the moment, the creative “encouraging” phrases just can’t be held in! 😉

I was mostly relieved of my duties as the last few girls struggled in. Faster fellow teammates were running/jogging alongside their slower counterparts in matching jerseys. Everyone at the race-participants and parents-realizes someone has to be last. If done correctly, you can be in last place with class. I am not a proponent of the the fluffy, “Everyone is a winner.” Everyone who tries and tries to always be there best, is a winner in my book. Bad days excluded, not all girls who ran this race were winners. (More accurately stated, they probably don’t have a winner’s attitude. Without the proper foundation, they don’t have anything to build on.) I am not blaming coaches or any of the other parents who were there this weekend. If parents make kids their priority, maybe kids will find the inner winner. As middle schoolers or older who don’t already have a winning attitude, there is likely to be lots of losing in life before they find their inner winner–if they ever do.

Now, back to those embarrassing parents….it is our job to take pictures when they don’t want to pose. It is our job to give hugs and tell them we love them and are proud of them no matter who is around. And, if the coach says something inappropriate to them and makes them want to be done with cross country forever, it is our job to tell them not to quit and to get up on Monday at 5:00 AM so they can go through another week of fun. Behind every “winner” is a parent (or an adopted “parent”) who is willing to be whatever needs done to best prepare their kids for life….or the next meet. I love my winners!

Walking Down Life's Road With Andy