I don't know how we made it through the weekend without any life-changing events occurring, but it was a "Home Show" weekend, so I can see how you might have gotten your hopes up.

The weather happened like there was a sudden rift in the season, with hot air bursting out of a vent from the winter's cold, cracked earth. I wanted to spend it all getting the garden up and going, but I knew the rift would close up by weekend's end, and there are too many other tasks around here that need attending to.

I did get outside for a bit. (Since it was 77 degrees, how could you not?) I took an hour and clipped up the overgrown Cabernet vine, cutting them into asparagus lengths and bundling the twigs for some grapewood smoking later next summer. (Let me know if you have any tips.) And I pulled out the dusty old stroller. Not the sleek, ultra-modern greased-up Jogger stroller, mind you, but the old reliable perambulator. The pram. The one we've hauled from the ends of the earth to its opposing corners, slapping babies in it and pushing it over gravel paths to astonishing view points and trailheads. So the thing was a bit dusty, and I gave it a good hosing off, ready for round three.

It was also January 29th, the day the Girl Scout Cookies are released. We dressed up the wagon and dragged it around the cul-de-sac on a practice run. Stopped at neighbors who'd already purchased some and gave the Little Ditchman a lesson in salesmanship: speak up confidently, look people in the eye, and know your product. I'm the worst salesman in the world -so I admit to being more focused on the wagon decorating- but sales are what we have Mrs. Ditchman for, who, unfortunately for the day's cookie disbursement quota, was at the Home Show, doing actual sales. Or so we hoped. Anyway, kid, let's hope you have your mom's genes. Unless there's a contest for creative marketing, as I could have a hand in that.

It was also my Big Sis' birthday, who turned 50. She lives a hundred miles away, so going to the big celebratory bash put us outside of the safe zone in case we suddenly needed our midwife. But I gave them a call and enjoyed the glory of being on Speakerphone with her family, some visitors, and another sister, who was also on Speakerphone, patched in from Hawaii, via L.A. -I could hear her perfectly, if you're wondering. Funny. Here we are, old, and living in the future, and we're all still stuck in Speakerphone technology. But, hey, it works.

My older sister turned 50. FIFTY! Not that she looks it. Quite the contrary, actually, she looks younger than me at nine (okay, 7-and-three-quarters) years her younger. I mention it because it was pointed out to me and I suddenly felt old. My sister is 50?! I remember when my mom turned 40, and I thought that was old, and here we are up to fifty. That's life. You're as old as you feel. What possessed me to have another kid at this old age, is a question that will transcend the ages, and by some could be construed as child abuse.

And there's nothing like the commensurability of having children to make you feel simultaneously young again and older than Zeus. I spent a good portion of the weekend making fairy pop-up books, eating Girl Scout cookies, and having lightsaber battles, but in the end found it all exhausting, with me yearning for work. Not that I have energy for work. I'm holding out hope that when my youngest son is old enough to enjoy and appreciate good beer, I'll still be able to hold my own in the video games. There, the twain shall meet. Zeus willing.

~

Standing near the START banner in the cold and dark last Sunday morning, it occurred to me just how embattled a pursuit it all was. There we were, all 1,193 of us, stretching nervously, sipping water, bending over to tighten the laces on our shoes, tinkering with our gear and adjusting the many parts of our uniforms. No one had dared yet approach the actual start line, for some reason, and there was a good hundred feet of empty asphalt between the crowd and the beginning marker of the race. I got a photo of it, and in the frame the banner hangs there in the dark with no one under it. In the picture it appears no one had arrived for the race, and that, in all of its austerity, participants had spontaneously declined the event. The sun hadn't made itself known yet, and we quieted when a local marine sergeant began to sing the national anthem. A man behind me was holding a full-size American flag, and I presume he carried it with him for the duration of the race, as some are moved to do. The sergeant kept singing, echoing out of the public address, while the generators hummed along in the background, and when he finished a cheer went out, and the group of us solemnly moved up to the mark.

It seemed serious. We tossed aside our water bottles and put in our headphones. We high-fived each other and wished "Good luck", not really believing that it would come, exactly, but saying it to one another in place of everything else we wanted to say, everything we couldn't say, everything we didn't have time for: You and I have made it! And here we are together, about to embark on this great challenge! We are all kith and kin, and swear to spare our blood for one another this morning!

Or something heavy like that. There is no current war in this peaceful country, but this was a moment intense enough to remind you of it, and rouse emotion and anxiety enough to want to defeat any unseen foe. Then we heard the man shout, "Runners! On your marks!"and my body went into a lockdown that barred out all fear. And then... a gun shot.

There was a big cheer, a prolonged cry, and we all charged forward into the eerie darkness. The first mile took us along the banks of a mist-covered lagoon, but few noticed its beauty as we hustled to find our comfortable mojo. For the first several minutes, no one is running at their proper pace. You hear some beeping of electronic tracking devices being set and calibrated, you hear the pulling of straps and zippers, and you hear a few quiet apologies of everyone tripping over one another. And then finally, alone in our thoughts there in the pre-dawn hours, we spread out. I looked back and the START banner had disappeared around the trees in the distance, and the horizon was slowly becoming visible in the cerulean twilight. Soon, all that was exchanged with one another was the sound of a thousand footsteps, pressing forward into the marathon.

It's five miles or so before your heart is beating in time with your breathing and your footsteps, and your comfortable pace comes out. You recall all those miles you beat out in the training, and where it was once an accomplishment just to make it five miles, now it takes five miles to get in the rhythm of things. Here you look around and take it all in. At this early hour there are paltry few spectators, and the city is just unrolling the sidewalks. Storefronts are closed, but shadows move behind the counters, behind the locked glass. Coffee shops are firing up the cappuccino machines, and early risers are out with their dogs, surprised at the streetwise hubub. A few police officers have just finished coning off the main thoroughfare, and are leaning up against their squad cars with a cup of joe, and a sideways glance. Another thing you take in is a few deep breaths, and you realize the truth of the circumstance: that you are running. And you don't feel a thing.

At seven miles we're about an hour into it, out of the cityscape, and sunlight is dressing the clouds about a mile up. The day is somewhere, and it's above you. I knew that on this course, seven miles is where the big hill begins and I braced myself for the slog upwards, but it was early enough in the race that I felt confident about it -so confident that I stopped to take a picture of the sunrise. Everyone on the course was equally awed, staring up at the clouds, so my stopping in the middle of the street created the inevitable hazard and I had to shuffle out of the way before people began tumbling over me.

Something similar happens inside of you, when you stop suddenly after an hour of running. It's as if all your faculties are running in a line, with your legs out in front, and when they stop, all else -unprepared for the move- go piling over like a gag in a silent film: your heart keeps beating fast, nothing stops the sweat glands from opening full bore, and blood in every limb surges to the extremities. You get a rush to the head, and when you stare up at the clouds, you swear you see the Face of God.

But there's no time for that. Forward, keep forward, you tell yourself. It's an "out-and-back" up the hill, which means that runners go up on one side of the street and return on the other side, so you can see the leaders on their return down, running at full speed and using the power of gravity and inertia to propel them into the second half of the race.

One can't help but simultaneously be impressed by their speed and yet be somewhat mocked by it, since they are using the downhill to gain some ground and here you are still trudging up, with each step closer to the soul than the last. At some point you don't want to think about it anymore until you see a hand-drawn sign that says "USE THE FORCE". I was thinking, What force? The force of gravity? The force of inertia? The force of will? and I rounded a corner to see two Darth Vaders standing side by side at a water stop. Oh. That Force.

Volunteers at the water stops were in a friendly competition for the most spirited display, and I had found myself at the "Star Wars" themed stop -easily in the running for securing the cash prize offered by the race organizers. What possesses people to come out for stuff like this? Dressing up as a Tusken Raider at the crack of dawn to go down and pass out Power Gel and hydration fluid to air-headed runners in the local event seems as crazy to me as actually running the race, but I was appreciative of it nonetheless. I'm a Star Wars fan, and when Boba Fett gave me a high five at the tenth mile, it was just the escapism I needed to take my mind off the consuming task at hand, which was to keep running.

I rounded the corner and nearly tripped over my own support crew, friends and family who rose early and braved the elements, swearing to arrive rain-or-shine, to cheer you on in your crazy obsession. They don't exactly understand it -why you would attempt something so difficult, so painful, so ultimately juvenile and irrelevant, but they see how it's important to you, and how it's made you stronger, somehow. It's what we all want: strong friends, strong spouses, strong fathers, and if this crazy  footrace is the thing that is going to get you there, then you have our unequivocal support. But you're still crazy.

I tossed them my hat and gloves, since I was beginning to feel the heat at a mere 50 degrees, and got kisses from the family. I took a moment and let the head rush and sweat wash over me, and admired the inspirational poster my five-year-old had drawn the day before. She'd spent a proud portion of the afternoon on it, hiding it with her arms and body when I entered the room, so I wouldn't see it until race day. It was an impassioned multi-colored penwork of curlicues and flowers, hearts and fireworks, and there in the middle of it was our smiling stick-figure family, with me running, and her holding the poster she had drawn, as if in some curious multi-dimensional introspection. And also, in large letters above us, the words: GO DAD GO.

I made it to the top of the big hill soon after that, and the crew had been no small assistance. To see the smiles and cheers of your loved ones in the midst of the race is like a cocktail of fresh feathers and warm clean air. It buoys you in no comparable way, like a love letter at the battlefront. And it is impossible to respond with any due appreciation, and yet no love is lost. They have made their way through crowds and street closures, and waited patiently as a stream of strangers hastens past, just to see you for an instant, a few seconds really, looking tired and worn, and far from your wedding day best. But you get a bit of a glow out of it, and it lasts for a mile or so. It's a warm noticeable glow, and it's what they came to see.

The downhill. I knew this was when I was going to use the gravity-assist and put each foot forward a little quicker, so I gave it a little gas. You hope that the laws of physics act as some other-worldly propulsion, the way spaceships slingshot around the earth on their way to Mars, but it doesn't quite work that way. Runners in front and behind you are thinking the same thing, and though you might feel a bit heavier in the heel and knee, you gain ground on no one.

Keeping an eye on the warriors coming uphill to my left, I moved to the center divider on the lookout for my running buddy, who I knew was a minute or two behind me. We caught each other's eye and shouted out, slapping palms as we ran past each other, and it felt good to have a brother out there in the battlefield. There is no greater help than the spectator, but a shout of encouragement from a mate in the race is something different. It's the shared knowledge of comrades-in-arms. Though of different speed, we are runners nonetheless, and we know what non-runners do not, the way presidents, despite their party, share a singular experience, unknown to their constituents. But he is gone before I can absorb the passing, and as he approached his turnaround at the summit, I continued down to the base of the hill, the sight of the ocean in the distance, and the halfway point at 13 miles.

I feel good at 13 miles. So good, in fact, that I feel I can take on another 13 in no more time than it took to arrive here. But I have to remind myself of this fatal flaw of human pride. I have run enough races to know that it gets rough after the next few miles, that I am in good shape enough to smile and run painlessly a race into the teens, but that from there the real battle begins.

It's not long before the gain in speed from the downhill peters out, and I begin to feel a gradual diminishing of my pace. It's not just that. Over the next ten miles, pieces of my body are beginning to swell and hurt. Small parts of my knees have stretched thin, and cartilage between bones feels as if it is wearing through. My back is sore from holding my arms in that pulled-punch running position, and I find myself periodically dropping and dangling them to loosen myself up. I feel my toes sliding against the asphalt, which means I'm not lifting my feet as high as I was an hour back. More running like this and I will, at best, trip over the smallest crack, and, at worst, tumble over a painted line. I have to consciously remind myself to lift my legs now, which hurt from the endless repetition of it.

The old sweat on the back of my neck and on my temples has dried to a salty grit, and when I wipe my face I feel something like fine sand scrape and then dissolve into the fresh, wet sweat. I feel a slight sunburn on my nose and forehead. I feel some parts of my body rubbing raw from the chafing against the clothes: my armpits, my nipples, my groin. Volunteers hold tongue depressors with Vaseline smeared on them, and there's no shame for a runner to grab a stick, reach into their shorts, and wipe it betwixt their intimate areas.

I have blisters on my toes.

Near the twenty mile mark I see my family again. I am smiling, but less so. My wife sees it in my gait, that I am seriously tiring. She tries to encourage me as I press past, slightly embarrassed. I'm shaking my head at this point. I have about an hour to go, and I don't think I can keep it up.

Somewhere in the next mile, it happens.

I don't know exactly what triggers it, but it comes on long runs, when you are just about at your limit. You see another runner, struggling. And you see one doing well, striding by at an easy tempo. You see the faces of bystanders and you look into their eyes. Some clearly admire you, and others are shaking their heads in a forlorn jealous contempt. You see a child, facing the other way, distracted by something else entirely, and bored with it all. And you think of your own children, and how you saw them back there, so happy. Their life flashes before your eyes, back to them as babies, their births. And then, your life. Your marriage, your work, your passion. All the things you've done wrong before this, and all the joys, and the beauty of the grace you've been inordinately blessed with, in this life. And suddenly you are so proud, so happy, so filled with wonder that your throat begins to constrict and your eyes well up with tears. Emotion floods in and you can barely catch your breath to take another step, and you find yourself on the outside of your body, in the moment, and feeling everything at once.

And a heartbeat later you have collected back to the street, with the noisemakers and the clapping, the cheering and yelling, the paper cups half-filled with water that you need, desperately. You are passing some runners and others are passing you, a thousand dry leaves in a river, moving and swirling downstream, hitting rocks and rapids, spinning out of control all at once, but all swept in the same direction, in similar, senseless purpose.

I see the ground moving beneath me and I keep looking up, searching for the next mile marker. It seems to take so much longer to come, and when it does it's "Mile 22", and not Mile 23 -you swore you already passed Mile 22. So it's four more miles. Four more miles, you tell yourself. Almost a 5K, which is just over three miles. Which you run nearly every day, and which only takes 25 minutes or so. A 5K. Mile 23 should be coming up somewhere... Mile 23... Where the hell is Mile 23? Just gotta make it to Mile 23...

When you get past it, you insist to yourself that these last few miles are at least doable. That the finish is within your grasp, and if you had not been keeping pace for a personal record time, then simply finishing is all that matters anymore. Finishing. Head held high, if you can hold it up at all.

But your legs cramp up. The muscles above the knees, the big ones called the quadriceps, are pushing back. They are knotting up and fighting you, refusing to go on. Even at a walking pace they stab with pain, and I find myself kneeling down at the curb and stretching them out. I stretch them flat out, until they are wringed clean of all bad elements, and then I stand back up, order myself and all attentive muscles, back into the race. Just a few more minutes.

There is no longer mile than the Mile 25, which also stretches out, as you look up. It is an interminable mile, one that goes on as if it intended to outlive you and laugh with your descendants. And then, after that, no longer quarter mile than the torturous .2 that is lobbed onto the end of the race for a full, denaturing effect. But in that last .2 of a mile is a thoroughfare with barriers on either sides. A throng, piled high up against the rail, cheering and screaming. Yelling, if not for you, then for the whole event and the overwhelming spirit of the scene. You feel for a few minutes in your life that all those youthful dreams of being center stage in the packed arena are finally coming to light. Whatever pain you've felt in the past hours, whatever cruel torture you've brought on yourself, whatever wild endeavor you've lobbed at your ego, it all quietly falls away. You take those last few steps toward the FINISH banner, and you swell up like a giant god. A friendly, noble god who has fulfilled Olympian dreams without malice or destruction, and performed good deeds unto himself. And then, looking around at all the other qualified and commendable finishers, you feel to be a more smallish god, with no purpose outside of the fulfillment of his own simple pride. But you feel a god, nonetheless.

You glance up at the large, digital finish clock which ticks off the time without care, and it doesn't really matter what it says, at least for a few minutes. You made it. And you stagger into the finishers' corral lunging for water, or a pretzel. A banana. A coke. Anything to fix yourself, since you are finished, to be sure.

Eventually, I find my family and friends, my running mates, and they seem as alive and animated as they've ever been, where it's a taxing chore for me to do anything; walk, speak, lift my head... In time, I recoup my faculties and make my way across the parking lot to the car. Traffic waits as I stumble in front of it, and I'm surprised at my newfangled handicap and physical ineptitude. In the shuffle to get out of the way, I feel the thud of metal on my chest. The medal. The traditional award for every finisher in the marathon, placed around your neck in that staggering moment of such exhaustion, that it's almost an afterthought, that you are almost annoyed by the tradition. But the medal is draped there, on you.

And you own it.

~

Mrs. Ditchman told me that it's time I teach him to pee standing up, and to that I have no argument, as I can imagine what a challenge and a struggle it would be for her to impart this manly knowledge on her own. A dad's gotta do what a dad's gotta do, I guess, so there's no way out of it. I have to give her credit for mentioning it, though, because in the end she will be the one most likely wiping up the overspray for the next fifteen years. One would think a mother would just keep the concept to herself, as part of the vast female conspiracy to keep men from eternally leaving the toilet seat up and soaking the toilet's perimeter, but I guess they need another thing to nag the dad about. He pees all over the bathroom! You never taught him properly! He's just like you!

Of course, I'm the man for the job, as I can pee through the bathroom door keyhole while standing in the shower stall. But I've brought him in before, showed him how it goes, and he seems genuinely impressed with the act, and yet the potties were still a wee bit too high. Since I didn't think he was ready to master arcing the stream up and over the rim at such an early age, I figured we'd wait a few more inches.

But the mommy is tired of the whole time-consuming pants-down thing in public restrooms, and the nastiness of those steel public park comodes -and who can blame her? So we brought it up with the lad, gently, and told him that it's high time he learned how to go to the bathroom standing up "like the big boys do." It was met with a certain unmentionable, reserved consternation. After some discussion, it was revealed that he has some reservations about going to the bathroom standing up, at which point we realized that he thought we also meant pooping, so we had to backpedal a bit. Pooping standing up is not something I've mastered, personally, and I refuse to teach the act in any case. Gotta draw the line on the limits of Dad's wisdom somewhere.

So I anonymously looked up "education on urination", or some permutation of the phrase, on the Internet and found the suggestion to try using Cheerios as targets. Sounds fun. I'll get back to you on this.

I suspect this is among those child-rearing acts that just come up in due time and take care of themselves, but I understand that there are some cultures in the world where men don't pee standing up, so who knows? That the wall urinal is a sign of civilized society is questionable, considering that we still generally refuse to have them in our homes. (But they are available, if you want one.) And I have witnessed countless men at marathons throw decorum to the wind, aim the other way, and pee mob-like in public streets. Do a google image search on "outdoor urinal" and you will regret having exposed yourself to the depravity of man.

I guess peeing standing up is a convenience for everyone, except when it's not.

~

Today: not as cold as previous days. Perhaps we've turned, and are now slogging back to summer, no? Well, perhaps. But somehow I doubt it.

Got out and ran again this morning, the last few miles before the race on Sunday. I'd intended to take it easy and not push myself, but I found myself going fast again, against the cold. I don't notice the increase in speed when it's cold like this, but I notice the the slow burning pain in my shins, which is my legs telling me they don't normally run this way. Eventually I'll get tired and reel myself in, slowing to my more average speed, and then the shin pain will quietly go away. Right there in the middle of the run: Leg pain? Gone. It's odd. Then I just tire out and slow down, like everyone else.

Now I will reveal my race day strategy, so that all of blogdom can hold me accountable to it, since I never stick to a strategy, and just blow it all out at the starter's gun.

My strategy for Sunday is an 8:00 minute pace to the ten mile mark at the top of that hill, and then speed down at about a 7:30 mile, and then try and hold at 7:40, or so, for as long as I can. The only thing unrealistic about the strategy is that I've never intentionally gone out so slow. I can't pace myself. I can't pace myself! I've been running 7:00 minute miles all week, and can do it without too much trouble, but running 7:00 minute miles after you've already run fifteen miles is really the trick.

So you go out slow, gradually pick up the pace, perhaps, and not wear yourself out. It's simple, of course. But when you get faster you get over-confident, and the whole idea of going slower is counter-intuitive. I have to remind myself constantly: We're not going faster. We're going longer. I say "we" because that's me lecturing all of my faculties, who refuse to work in concert. I use my inside voice, but have been known to shout out loud at myself after 17 miles or so.

Did not write or run yesterday, as I was overwhelmed with work tasks and seemed to have fallen behind. It's hard trying to do everything. I have no strategy! I can't pace myself! With all these lessons, there is crossover, so it's good to diversify.

~

Colder today than yesterday. I can tell this by the ice on the roofs, on the grass, on the cars, and by the way the front door regretfully unsticks when I open it. The house does not want to let anything warm go out.

Wore the gloves this morning. And the taller socks, longer sleeves, boxer briefs, and, of course, the ear warmers. Ran fast again and didn't even notice it. Might've had another record day, if I hadn't wasted all that time waiting at the traffic signal.

People complain because it's easy to complain, and I'm no different. Complaining is the lesser path of life, as opposed to being cheerful, which is for many an uphill climb in the face of it all. But if you get up pre-dawn on a frigid January morning to go out and run three miles before your day of jackhammering at work, you deserve to do a bit of complaining. It's exercise, after all, and not exactly the "lesser path." So if you take on a decent challenge in life, I say a bit of complaining is your reward. Just try and be funny about it. It's the unfunny complainers who opt for the easy everything in life, that I can't stand.

Which is one of the reasons I love my wife, who seemed a trifle impressed that I was out the door running this morning. And later, when we spoke of the rainy race-day plans, she said half-kiddingly, "Sounds fun!" She was half-kidding. I won't explain it.

"Why do you do it?" people ask incredulously, after a long run. And they are incredulous because it sounds crazy to them, because you've been complaining, and because just a little bit of contempt might bring you down off your high horse for being so proud of yourself. But I run because it's there, because it's a challenge, and because it's healthy. I actually want to live longer, and I want to see this whole life through to the end. I had children later in life than I wish I had, and now I want to make up for it.

And I run because I can. Because it's the only sport I know. Because I have this good body that I can make better. And by "better" I mean that post-run feeling of optimism and accomplishment that lasts me six hours or so. Yes, only about six hours, but optimism that lasts six hours changes my world.

And I run because having that blood rush through my body and up to my brain helps me think better, arouses my senses, and charges my memory. Because I'm getting old, and these things are more important than ever. I got up early and missed out on some sleep, but I will sleep better tonight as a result. This morning I saw the good work of my lungs with every exhalation, and I saw the sun coming up through my breath. I felt powerful and alive, and I felt the earth spinning on its axis beneath my feet, as if I was working some cosmic treadmill. I spent thirty minutes out there, wearing the rubber off the soles of my feet, and every few minutes I'd pass another runner or walker and we would nod and smile, as we always do. Smiling at the beauty of it all, and nodding at the truth: Yes, it is. You know, and I know.

Exercise is not easy. Running is not easy. And nothing that makes you better is easy. It all takes guts -because you're gonna look stupid, hurt yourself, and eventually and inevitably fail doing it. But I feel better for being brave, at least in some small way. At least a little stronger every day.

I thought I'd deleted all the Christmas songs from my iPod but Winter Wonderland came on this morning, which made me laugh out there on the cold, icy, Oceanside streets. It's actually not a "Christmas" song, per se. If you listen to the words, Christmas is not even mentioned. I guess it's more of a happy little winter song, for what it's worth. Anyway, I like that line toward the end, there:

Later on, we'll conspire,

As we dream by the fire,

To face unafraid,

All the plans that we made.

~

The cold is almost gone. That is to say, the bug. The cold remains. The biting, frigid breath of the Ice Gods that strikes most Californians with fear and panic, that cold is still with us. It comes up the hinge pins on the front door, and slides in through the cracks in the windows. It permeates the house, slips between the sheets in the dark of night, and frosts the door knobs and toilet seats. Even the cats shudder depressedly under the bed, noses beneath paws, tails wrapped around their hindquarters, quietly meowing for the sun to come up.

Okay, so maybe it's not that cold. The rest of the country mocks forty degrees, and for anything north of the 48th parallel, that's a summer morning. But we here in San Diego are soft, and don't start sweating until the triple digits. Ahh! The triple digits! Dreams of summer...

Went out and ran in it anyway, before the sun hit the horizon. I actually put my ear warmers on this morning, for a fun change. I normally just run in the cold, as I usually heat up in the first eight minutes or so, but I'm getting old and tired of it all, and thought I'd give it a shot. It had the nice effect of keeping the sweat off my brow and, yes, my ears stayed warm. My hands, though, my hands were cold. Icy knuckles. On cold days I grab my thumbs with my fingers and hold them tight when I run, like little handlebars, and some days I hold them so tight it feels like they're going to break off like little Otter Pops. When I get back to the house I press the backs of my hands up against the kids' thighs and they run screaming. Maybe tomorrow I'll take gloves.

The cold makes you run faster. Not sure why this is, exactly, but the desire to get the run over with is certainly a contributing factor. And perhaps the body is more efficient, not having to waste a lot of energy cooling you down, as you're pretty much already there. But I ran fast this morning, and I think I may have run my local route in record time. I would know for sure, were it not for the dependably recurring failure of my exercise tracking device. All the technology in the world in a little handheld phone, and yet it can't keep the stopwatch from tripping off. Pathetic. Probably failed due to low ambient temps.

I am confused this morning about how to tackle this week's outstanding problems. And by "outstanding" I do not mean "excellent" and "marvelous" but rather "unfinished" and "incomplete". Getting up early solved nothing, and no epiphany manifested in the quiet dark over a pleasant cup of warm coffee, as was the hope. Yesterday afternoon I found another small note written by the Little Ditchman that read succintly, "No, Dad. No." And when I asked her about it, she refused to divulge her reasoning. So I must be failing around here, somewhere, somehow. Days like this I just press on like an old tractor, accomplishing minor tasks with brute force, and total disregard for... what's the word... aplomb? sophistication? No, can't think of it. Can't even think of it.

The words aren't coming to me. Earlier I used the word "depressedly" and my machine has informed me that this is not a word. "Depressedly" is not a word? I was sure it was a word. I think we all know what it means. (It's the way a cat acts when it's freezing under the bed, awaiting daybreak.)

Anyway, I should get on with things, however depressedly. It's Tuesday, after all.


UPDATE:  "finesse".

~

The phrase "Mommy! I can breathe air through my nose!" was the portent, and my drinking an excess of beer outside in the balmy weather, and then getting up at 5AM this morning, was the foolhardy response. Never dismiss the heralds! Even if they come in the guise of an animated kindergartner with recently cleared nasal passages.

So I've got the cold my children had last week. They insist on kissing me on the face with reckless, careless affection, so it was just a matter of time, I guess. And I insisted on waking pre-dawn this morning to try and get my body clock adjusted to the 6AM gun time of the local marathon I'll be running on Sunday. CalTrans does not appreciate the Pacific Coast Highway to be shut down unnecessarily, so they insist on getting the race over with as quickly as possible. And the gods have insisted on SHOWERS for Sunday's forecast, so I'm a little miffed about it all. All this insisting is gonna get some pushback.

It was a lovely weekend all the same. Got a little bit of this done and a little bit of that done, but not a lot of anything, which is fine for the stress level. Still, I could use a list. I'd call it: TOP TEN THINGS THAT NEED TO BE DONE AROUND HERE BEFORE THE LOCAL POPULATION INCREASES, or something like that, but I doubt it would help. Things get added to the list before they get scratched off, and it all becomes too demoralizing. Then you start adding things like "Go to work", "Use toilet", "Have fun", and then no one takes the list seriously anymore, and you briefly consider writing "Ditch list" before you realize that no one will have time to appreciate the humor as you scratch that one off.

It's showering right now, so that answers the question of whether I was going to stay in the office and place that burdensome order or go out and rent that jackhammer. No, jackhammering in the rain with a clogged nostril does not sound fun. Nor does running 26.2 miles with the same, and here I signed up and paid for that one. Looking forward to crossing that off the list.

Cross the blog off the list, here too. That was a nice break. Back to work.

~

I was thoroughly relieved to see that the weekend had, in fact, arrived this morning, and on schedule. I worry sometimes. Just set the calendar to *default* and those two work-free days usually appear on their own, but I don't know... sometimes they don't.

I still have piles of it on my desk, and the only reason I wouldn't put it off to Monday is to make next week a little less stressful. Given the looming pressures we have hanging over the household currently, it's probably a good idea to get every little thing done, while we can. "One less worry always makes a difference," is a decent motto. For suburban pirates.

Which, I suppose, is why Mrs. Ditchman took both kids out and had their hairs cut yesterday. I guess she thought if it didn't happen now, it wasn't going to happen for another 6 months, and then that house at the end of the cul-de-sac, the one with the long grass and the long hair and the long faces, yeah, did you hear? Those hippies had another kid!

I will be kegging the beer today. I will decant it out of the fermenter, set it to carbonate with a little bit more sugar, lubricate the o-rings, seal it off, and then roll the thing into the cellar (garage) for some real-time aging. It will not be tapped until that new baby arrives. Baby Celebrator! I'm calling it. It's a bold, west coast ale, infused with all the sentiment and decorum of the traditional English grains used by my forefathers. A bit darker, a bit higher in overall alcohol content, but full-bodied (I hope.) Just the thing for fathers with a newborn. Come by and try it! Kiss the baby and lift a glass in his/her honor. Pat us on the back and tell us we'll survive.

Well, what would you do? Drink up, for we can always make more! Beer, that is -we can always make more beer, not babies. Though I suppose we could try. We could always try! Cheers!

What we really need to be making more of is work, however. We need it piled high on my desk, here, stealing away every weekend, and forevermore. (Or at least until the bills are paid up.) It was a long December, as it always is, and we are paying for it now, literally. All intentions are to catch up with our creditors swiftly and completely, so that we can get back to living. I've got big plans for the year. Big plans to eliminate all extraneous, pressing obligations, so I can focus on my family, and maybe actually join them at the zoo or the theme parks this time around, before we all grow out of it. Try to be more than half a dad.

I have been feeling lately that it's all been passing by much too quickly, and I suspect that it's something men feel, at this period in their lives. I don't exactly mean it in the they-grow-up-so-fast! sense, which is what parents always say, but rings wrong in every literal sense. They don't grow up fast. They don't, in fact, grow up any faster or slower than anything. What's happening is you're getting busier. You're maturing into your work, and making better use of your time. You're setting some things in motion and allowing other things to happen in the background. You must. There's too much to do now, people depend on you to get it done, and those long days of slumbering in the sun with an unfinished bottle of beer warming on the little table next to you are over and gone. The days of make-believe and travel beyond the horizon are behind you. We're there now. And it's all very real, and you've got to pay the mortgage on the castle and put food on the table. No one else will do it for you. Or for them.

And yet, the little ones are downstairs with their lightsabers, in their Saturday morning pajamas and crying out in their play-voices: "We need to pull up the drawbridge, NOW! THEY'RE COMING!" And so the old dreams of make-believe are in them and around you, and have never gone anywhere. I get too busy to notice, too pre-occupied to join in the battle, too intent on paperwork and email and phone calls where I must slam the office door on their loud fairytale demands. They're not growing up too fast, they're just growing up without you noticing, and you're growing tired -and desperate- from the wrong play. They're growing up too fast! Blame some pagan, supernatural laws of physics, if you must.

I had a dream the other night. I was in the street with the Little Digger and it was raining heavily. He was running from me and he slipped and hit his head on the curb, where a torrent of water washed him away and down into the sewer, and I woke up with a start, feeling helpless and horrified. It's a simple nightmare and I don't need an interpreter. But I reflected on it later and recognized the street in the dream. It was Redwillow Lane, in La Canada -the town where I grew up. It was the street on which I walked home every day, when I was in elementary school, thirty-five long years ago.

You have children and then you remember being a child, and you see yourself in your children and you think all those things that you were never sure your parents thought: I want them to have what I didn't have, I want them to feel safer than I did, I want to give them good reason to trust me... And the only way to do all that is through self-sacrifice, which is the one thing through the ages that has been consistently misinterpreted. In every religion, and in every family. And that's the sacrifice: that they'll never get it.

So you go to work, and you try and shut up about it, and you hope that they're happy to see you when you get home. And, if you're even a little bit wise, come weekends you pull up the drawbridge and get in on the real action and slay the dragons with the kids.

You get home. And if you get home, you get to keep it.

~

Had the distinct feeling today that I CAN'T DO IT ALL, and then had a beer and promptly took a nap. It happens sometimes, though rarely. (Not the beer-drinking. The naps.) I am not a napper, and prefer to waste my time as a busybody; ever-working, accomplishing nothing. Somehow it all intersects with why I have never mastered a trade, or stored up money in the bank. Perhaps if I napped more, the world would make fresh sense, and novel words and ideas would stream out of me.

Like it does with the Little Ditchman, who is working on her third book at age 5-and-three-quarters. She followed up her debut masterpiece, My Dinosaur Journal with the delightful and informative My Scientific Fairy Research, both wonderfully thought-out and masterfully executed. She does it in her off-kindergarten hours, but it should be noted that she gave up the afternoon naps several years ago, and seems to be able to muster the creative wherewithal to pull these things off without the extra sleep, so I guess I can't use that as an excuse.

She is learning how to write, and hasn't exactly mastered it, but doesn't let that stop her from writing books. She tells me what she wants to write, and then I spell it back to her, word by word, in a sort of eccentric reverse-dictation. It is a tedious act for the both of us, but that's writing.

As with my own writing, I can only go a page or so before I lose all interest, unfortunately, so she fills the time illustrating the dead space. When she gets done with a page, she'll wander around looking for me, calling me to spell out "hand" or "then" or "ankylosaurus". She's getting smart about it, too. Recently, when she noticed me becoming annoyed by the exercise, she just went back and read what she'd written so far and then used those words as a guide. Seems simple enough. I should try it.

Mrs. Ditchman has read to her at bedtime just about every night of her little life, and that tiresome end-of-the-day anchor we've been dragging seems to have finally made purchase. After just a few months of Kindergarten, she was able to read her first sentence in a book on her own. I was there when it happened. She read it out loud, she heard herself say it, and then her eyes lit up and she began to laugh. It was like the sun had come out in the middle of the night, and sang to her.

Reading and writing has liberated her, as it does all nascent civilizations. Pretty soon we were reverse-dictating very precise letters to Santa about her innermost desires. As well, it so happens that Mommy recently found a note that the kid had scrawled out one morning and stuffed in her backpack. It read sweetly: Joey is my best friend. From Serena. And it had a nice hand-drawn picture of her, a little heart, and, I presume, this Joey. I don't know this Joey from Adam, but according to the illustration he wears glasses. So I guess she likes the smart boys.

Oh, the heartbreak! How I thought she was mine, mine alone and mine forever! But such is life. If I felt I was finally losing her, I was not alone. Mrs. Ditchman found another note the other day. Evoking Hemingway, it read pointedly and succinctly: No Boys. No Mom. I laughed, but the mom was displeased. We believe she had intended to tape it to her door, because, hey, kindergarteners need their solitude to conduct their genius. When I asked the kid about the note, she didn't deny it. Yes, she needed her privacy, she said, and I wasn't going to fight her on something like an artist's need for privacy. But she added, "It doesn't mean you, Dad... I would have written that."

You see, we writers are very specific. And we understand each other.

~

Toured the local hospital yesterday, since we have never birthed there -being old hounds at this stuff (!) It was not an in-depth tour, as I saw no machine more dynamic and complex than the two-floor elevator, but it was a tour all the same, covering a few minor hallways, a lobby, and the parking lot, which we traversed on our own. Twice.

Valet parking is available. Valet parking! If you have never rushed your expectant wife to the hospital and arrived between contractions, you don't know how helpful valet parking can be, as dropping your laboring spouse at the front door of the largest superstructure in town and telling her you'll catch up with her after you park the sedan is just not going to fly, I'm here to tell you. Typically, you would ditch the vehicle and wheel her in to the maternity ward -all huffing and poofing, and panging and yelling- and it'll be hours before you realize that you left the car at a right angle to the thoroughfare, halfway up the curb and into the hedge, engine running, doors wide open, ambient birthing music streaming from the sound system... (Don't worry, happens all the time. Security had it safely towed.)

It is good for the husband to take the hospital tour. Scratch that -he doesn't need the tour- he just needs to see the hospital, maybe even learn which building of the hospital to aim for. The last thing a woman needs when she goes into labor is her husband swearing he knows where the hell he's going and refusing to ask directions.

We met in a conference room where an impressive layout of food was beheld. Why so much food? Not sure, but everyone who was 8 months pregnant appreciated it. We watched a video. We took a bathroom break. We met the lactation consultant. We took another bathroom break. Then we walked down the hall to the elevator and took it up one floor. Then we exited the elevator and walked down the hall where the guide pointed at a desk and indicated a door and said, "Check in at the desk, and go through there. If there's no one at the desk, just go through there."

This was going to be easy.

But, Lord knows, when the time comes I will hit every red light and make a wrong turn onto the freeway at that spot where the next exit is 50 MILES AWAY and there is no good turnaround. And then when we finally make it to the hospital, everyone at every desk will be on break, including the valet guy. And the midwives will all be out that night, and we will be stuck with the mid-maidens or alt-wives, or some such thing.

We were informed that we could have no more than four people, plus siblings, in the birthing room at the time of labor. FOUR! That's practically a cheer leading squad. So, if you're thinking of having your Mother and your Dad and your sister and your Aunt all in the room with you, arguing over whether you should breathe or push, and who has "coach" seniority, I know a hospital I can recommend. (In any case, I will deny this hospital rule later. Oh, look: it seems they just changed the rule, and only the father is allowed in. Sorry, team.)

This is not my mother's hospital. Formula is frowned upon, but happily accepted as a last resort. Dads, I gathered, are expected to be there, but Dads are generally not expected. There was only one other Dad on the tour with us, and, it seemed, one pregnant teenager and her mom. (Incidentally, the other Dad had a lot more tattoos than me, but that's neither here, nor there.)

Also, if you don't know the sex of your unborn child, you are a strange pair. Hippies. I mean, what are you even doing here in the hospital when you could be birthing in the comfort of a pile of hay in your own backyard? I've heard stories of babies coming out and then being whisked away to be washed and swaddled without an announcement of the sex ever having been uttered, and the mom left there, legs up in stirrups, wondering what just happened. Strikes me as odd, this knowing ahead of time, but so am I, I guess. Anyway, the class held a drawing for a boy gift basket and a girl gift basket and they didn't know into which lot our tickets should be cast. There was a moment of confusion. Seemed funny having a random drawing over something that is basically a random drawing to being with, but here we are. So we said "boy," to move things along, and then we didn't win. (In hindsight, we should have said "girl", as there was only one other girl being had in the class. They didn't even bother with the drawing, and just handed the mom her gift basket. No surprises.)

No, we don't know if it's a boy or a girl. And, no, there is no C-section scheduled, so we don't know when the baby will come. Fun, huh? Well, we think so! The best surprise of your life is life itself. We appreciate the surprise.

The best surprise of your life is life itself. Most profound thought I've had all day.

~

Picked yesterday to DO IT ALL. (Well, except the important things like write, and go to church.) After hammering some serious mileage on my knees and ankles, I went home and showered up before I dove in to the beer-making and barbecuing. 

The run was was easy enough, and the last long one before race day in two weeks. I ran from my house down to the 13 mile mark of the marathon -which I consider a sweeping accomplishment given that the start line is ten miles from my doorstep. We taper now, and that means that the hard part is over. (Yes, you heard that right, the marathon itself is FUN!) The weather has been perfect for running, as far as I'm concerned. Cool temps in the morning, and clear, sunny, blue skies. I'm not like those "serious" runners who prefer a cold, cloudy morning to optimize their peak performance. No, I like the outdoors. I like the sunshine. I like seeing all the pretty ladies and the surfers. There's a beach out there, and it's awesome to behold.

There were other runners, a lot of them, and I suspect that they were all getting their final long run in for the big local race coming up. You can tell the distance runners by the little bottles of hydration fluid strapped to their belts, by their sleek leggings, aerodynamic sunglasses, and deft ability to move fast down the highway with short steps and little-to-no bounce in their shoulders. They run like lithe, featherweight, soft-metal cyborgs, attuned only to forward motion; focused, and not easily distracted.

I, on the other hand, run like a sweaty, scoliotic giraffe in swim fins. I'm always slouched forward, neck bent, twisting my head around and up and down to take it all in, while my feet kick out to the sides like loose oars on an ugly canoe. I don't carry water (I plan my runs around local drinking fountains) and kick down the street with little more than my cell phone and headset. I don't wear a watch, and I buy the "twice-worn"shoes at the running outlet. I almost always go out the door with a plan, and I almost always ditch the plan about 400 yards into the run.

There are days when I'll just turn down streets because the song I was listening to told me to, somehow. And there are days when I just go out straight, run until I get tired, and then turn around and head home. I see all the other runners out there, and they all look so strong and bright, so good. But I feel like a happy, escaped orangutan disguised in mismatched running clothes -always an old, pit-stained race-day t-shirt that belies my carriage. And yesterday, on more than one occasion, I passed some joggers, stopped at the drinking fountain, and then passed them again as they shook their heads at me. Whatever. I was on my nineteenth mile and no one could tell. That's marathon-training: no respect would be given. It's all head-shaking.

So I went home and made beer. Mrs. Ditchman had picked this day to make barbecue sauce, and the Little Digger has been in the habit of doing jigsaw puzzles on the kitchen floor recently, (and he's good at it!) so it made for a (literally) hopping-busy kitchen, and one full of powerful, delectable smells. We all worked together masterfully. The sauce was excellent, the puzzles finished off with a little 3-year-old fist pump, and this Sunday's concoction of brew, the first of the year and my twelfth batch since I reinstated the old hobby last January, is one of my own creation, so it remains to be seen. I had found myself at the supply store recently with no recipe in hand, so I just picked out my favorite hops, a reliable yeast strain, and then worked the grain scale and mill like some local, hermit scientist. And then, yesterday afternoon, I whipped it all up in a big stainless steel pot, right next to the homemade barbecue sauce. The sauce is fantastic. The beer... we'll see. 

I guess it's how I roll. I'm not inclined to be proud of the accomplishments, though I get enough compliments. I "friended" an old high school acquaintance on Facebook recently, through some Internet running chums. He's finished a couple marathons in the 3:10 range (which I consider to be fast) and I complimented him on it, but he was surprised when he found out that I was running my 18th marathon in a couple weeks. An "experienced marathoner," he called me. Not fast, mind you, but experienced. Anyway, I'd run a lot more than he had. I suspect he considered all that running without improvement to be somewhat sad, and perhaps, worthless.

And my beer hasn't changed the world, either. Neither will it profoundly inspire the renowned master brewmakers of the region. But it sure tastes wonderful after a nice, long run.

So here's a thousand words about it. I'm not an accomplished writer, but I'm learning my way around the hops. Or, should I say, I'm hopping my way around the learning.

~

"We did it, honey. It's 9:00. Waddaya say we sit in front of the TV and nod off in twelve minutes?" to which she replied that that sounds fine, since it's what we basically do every night anyway.

It's a battle, it is. And tonight wasn't even a bath night! I think it's the constant negotiating that wears me out. The eat-this-and-you-get-dessert, and the if-you-watch-this-you-don't-get-a-story diplomatic posturing that takes place so often that no conduct, in the end, can be taken seriously, and it all builds up to a crisis in a foreign court ("I want daddy! I want granny!" etc.) So thank God there's nothing on, as sleep will come quickly and easily in five... four... three...

And so it went. I woke up at 2AM and got a glass of water, used the toilet, and made the decision to just give up and go back to sleep on the couch, since upstairs seemed such a household hinterland at the moment, and the couch was right there. There are several things that are pathetic about this. Shall I waste time exploring them all? I shall.

Oh, forget it. It's all too disgusting to relay. But I woke again, and then again, and then again at six AM to coffee dripping into the carafe, still wearing my Thursday clothes, severely unshaven, and with a strange pasty frosting on my teeth. Suburban tartar. It happens sometimes. And the sunrise, as seen from my workstation, was other-worldly. It was all very encouraging.

Mrs. Ditchman makes a pillow nest, nowadays, and there's not a lot of room for me on the bed. She tosses, turns, every few minutes or so, and it sends me into a minor launch that leaves me cold and sheetless, disturbed from slumber. So the couch ain't so bad. Plus, I have that marathon in a couple weeks. With its start time at 6AM, I figure a little sleep schedule adjustment couldn't hurt.

Anyway, I was really craving a run this morning to shake it all off. A night on the couch makes today feel like yesterday, when you so want yesterday to be dead and gone, and a good hard run and a shower is an excellent transition, but I hadn't the time for the run and just went for the shower. And a shave. And a serious nail-trimming. And clean clothes. Okay: Friday.

But felt guilty all day about not posting yesterday, having written only the two paragraphs. The Other Sean, the Good Sean, the one who deftly builds aluminum patio covers, improves his PR with every race, and is also a published novelist, politely asked me over beers if I had planned on posting to the blog Monday through Friday, like I did in 2008 and 2009. I hemmed and hawwed. Demurred, I did. Truth is, I wasn't sure I'd be able to write the next one, much less, every day of the awful week. This ain't easy. I'm not even sure if it's necessary, productive, or important. 


It is, of course. As exercise. Which, I've learned in my 41-year-old wisdomness, is a very necessary part of life. So I'll just press on, I guess. "Show up" as best I can. Just showing up has often been extolled as the key to success.

This is me clocking in. I was here. I was here and I did this thing.

~

Met with the mid-wife today, an appointment I'd almost forgot. Yes, we have a mid-wife. (Don't ask me to explain it. And, no, the benefits are not what you think, you dirty dog, you.) She is an enthusiastic sort, excited at the prospect of a new life. Happy. Warm. Welcoming. She greeted the two of us, and then the unborn baby, like we were old friends and our 37-week-old, hiding in the belly fetus was the cutest thing! Our mid-wife is the kind of person who enters the room and lights it up with her smile, throws back the blinds on our dark world and cranks up the color saturation. It's a baby! It's a new life! It's what all of everything is all about! She was there when Keaton was born.

So we relaxed. Listened to the heartbeat. Happy midwife turned the volume up on the device to ear-splitting, near distortion levels and it sounded like a fireman's boot in an industrial washing machine broadcast on an old CB radio: sshhhwuh-boomkk, sshhhwuh-boomkk, sshhhwuh-boomkk, and her eyebrows went up and she smiled some more. "Healthy little guy! Or girl!" So I guess that's what it's supposed to sound like.

So we relaxed some more. Ever since the first Little Ditchman came out looking perfect, and then the doctor came in the next day, put on the stethoscope and thoughtfully looked askew, listened, and then frowned at her squeaky little heart, I've been on edge about our fragile newborns. In and out of the Children's Hospital is no fun thing, but we came out healthy in the long run. And today with the new one, more healthy. Thank God Almighty. For now.

Though I am not exactly prepared for the big marathon of baby-rearing, bearing down on us in a few weeks. I know that with the first child, the Mom tells you how it's gonna go down, so a man can defer, and get back to work. With the second one, you come home tired from work to a woman who is tired from work, and you switch off duties like taking over for the boss during the night shift. (It's easy enough. The phone doesn't ring that much.)But with Baby #3, as I have heard from those in the know, THERE IS NO ESCAPE. You suddenly preside over the better half of a small country, not quite yours, and the livelihood of unknown cultures look to you for leadership, while Emperor Mommy is away governing the new world. But she has not disappeared below the horizon, and reserves her long arm of wrath for when you deserve it good and hard, and she doesn't care how hard you worked today. So, meh. I've got all that to look forward to. A good man can take it. I'll give it my best shot. I don't think I've forgotten how to father an infant. I don't think.

I know a guy who has four kids, and has completely lost it. He appears to have suffered the fate of some 2nd-world, middle class powerless figurehead. One who wafts in and out of the home on a reliable 40-hour work week schedule, passing his children in the hallway and wondering if puberty set in that fast when he was a kid, and, hey, how come no one hears a word I say around here? He works all week and has no idea where the money goes, but is grateful that he gets out of the house for the week. Me, I'm one of six, and I watched my dad deal with the whole transition in an I-WILL-NOT-BE-IGNORED-NOR-WILL-I-TOLERATE-DISSENT manner, which, I guess, worked for him. I don't think he came back down to pre-1965 levels until after we left the house and the grandchildren started being born, at which point I finally began to understand him.

Beating hearts. At my dad's funeral service my mom got up behind the podium -which I'd never seen her do before- to say one thing: that she remembered the happiest days of her husband's life very well. They were at the births of his six children, and then she named us by name. And then I lost it.

So, you lose it. You lose it as a father, you lose it with family. You lose it all, everything, including power and control. You are steering an aircraft carrier into the wind, and one wrong move and it takes forever to get the thing back on course. Sure, I'm nervous.

On her way out, the mid-wife noticed my shirt, which read "Honolulu Marathon" on it, and she asked me if I'd run it. "Yeah, a few years back." And then she cheerily told us about when she had ran it, a decade ago, and the running she's been doing since. The triathlons. (With kids!) She mentioned she's running the local half marathon in a few weeks and Mrs. Ditchman pointed out that I'd be running the full, that is, if we weren't all chillin' and birthin' in the maternity ward.

A full marathon. In a few weeks. I'd almost forgotten.

~

Mrs. Ditchman came upstairs last night and found me sitting in the dark, staring at the screen, but it didn't phase her. Rather, she just said plainly, "It looks like we're moving."

Which I thought was a rather optimistic turn for 2012! It was just the kind of keen, late-night/early-January metaphor of insight that only my hard-working, ever-disciplined, eight-months-pregnant spouse could make. She's right, I thought, as we have been in a mire, of sorts, these past 12 or 24 months -but we are moving now. And even a little bit of forward motion, a clap and release of potential energy becoming kinetic, is a welcome feeling.

But I wasn't sure. So I said, "Huh?" To which she said again, "It looks like we're moving." She gestured downstairs. "The boxes." And then I knew she was referring to the packed away holidays, and the twelve or so crates that parade out of the living room this time of year, calling it a wrap. Or should. I hadn't got to it.

It really must be twelve boxes. Like the song! And we could write a song, too: In the first box of Christmas we brought out for the tree... etc., etc. And then we could sing the song, and unpack the holidays all though the advent season, a day at a time, and all the while sipping wassail and merrily donning gay apparel! But there is no spirit in packing the holidays all away. It drains you. You're glad December's over, guiltily, and you find the strength to box it up. But hauling the boxes up to the attic was the final act of closure, and I hadn't brought myself to do it.

Spent a dry New Year's Eve dryly staring at the dry Christmas tree in the living room, waiting for it to ignite. I mean I was rather dry myself, completely sober for the day, and similarly waiting to ignite. We were weathering a stomach bug, as a family, and it brought us together for the final holiday to wipe each other's hindquarters and tolerate together the accompanying fetor. (Nothing quite says "Happy New Year!" like the sound of damp flatulence coming from your 3-year-old, followed by an exhaustive description of recent toilet contents from your loquacious kindergartner.) So I guess, in some ways, New Year's Eve wasn't entirely dry, and in other ways, it was outright explosive.

And then got up New Year's Day to watch the traditional rose parade, only to find that it was put off a day, with their never-on-Sunday tradition. Well, that was it then: CHRISTMAS COMES DOWN! And by the end of the day it was just glitter and pine needles and the Twelve Crates of Christmas and the tree on the curb.

So it looks like we're moving, but it just looks that way. They say a true test of friendship is who shows up to help you on moving day, but no one ever shows up to help you strike the Christmas set, and then move the boxes to the attic -such are the friendships of legend. No matter. I'll get to it. And by February, this time. I promise.

Truth is, I was thinking of moving the X-mess boxes to the garage, but there's no room in the garage, which has bothered me of late, so I was thinking of making room. It would be easier if everything was in the garage, and nothing was in the attic, and then it wouldn't concern the fire inspectors when they come by on false alarms (which has been known to happen at my house.) And, you see, I was thinking of installing a skylight in the master bathroom. But that involved re-routing some large ventilation ducting, and that meant clearing out the attic. But I can't move stuff into the garage until I move the large, expensive sheet of oak-veneer plywood out of there, which I need for that living room shelving I never built -and I can't get to that project until I go through the rest of my deceased parents' belongings, which are boxed up in front of that. So you see, there is an Order to things. It may be a long year. And then Christmas rolls around again.

Now I know why some old folks just leave their lights on the house and their trees up all year-round. Throw a sheet over it for the summer, and then whip it off like a magician come November 1st -start Christmas early and brag about it!

Then again, maybe we should move, after all. I know twelve boxes that are already packed.

~

Ah, the old blank page and blinking cursor. The little patient saints are always there, friendly enough, uncritical, yet responsive, and perennially withholding comment...

Word count was up to about a thousand yesterday, which means I'm about a thousandth finished with the new blog. Already thinking about the title of the next one, of course. Plenty of time, though. Such is The Act. Creative ideas are a dime a dozen, and I could think about them all day. And I do, actually. But it's the execution that matters, and the double-meaning of that word isn't lost on me. 

Because, with writing, one is always simultaneously "implementing a plan" and "carrying out a death sentence." It's impossible to understand, I think, if you've never written something. The implementation part is simple enough, as a concept, but the death sentence (sentence!) extends to anything that would otherwise demand your attention; other easier tasks, chores, work calls, the news cycle, your children. You can't get any writing done unless they all go off and expire somewhere, which they don't. It's you who has to kill yourself from everything, most especially the words in your head that tell you you've done it wrong. Again. And then, just the concept that one has at least a quarter of a million words to choose from, in the English language. Choose a thousand of them to live, and 249,000 of them to die down in the creative abyss, alone, unimagined.

Achh. I could list them all dutifully, and still be only a quarter of the way though to the goal I've set for myself. Even the Holy Bible is not quite a million words, at about three quarters of a million, depending on the translation. And the complete works of Shakespeare: 884,647. Not that this blog will become a holy work, or some lasting contribution to world literature. Hardly. No, it's just a goal. To say I did, and with some minor benefits. Like last year's 1,000 miles. 

I ran 1,000 miles last year. Maybe a few more, given RunKeeper's proclivity to underestimate my performance, and my not counting the 1/4 mile walk-offs I do at the end of every run. What did I get out of all those miles? Good health, sanity, the ability to finish a few marathons at a speedy clip without killing myself. Not bad for this 41-year-old. You have to run about 3 miles a day, every day, to make that goal. That sounds a lot harder to me than running the 178 out of 365 I did. Most days were about 3 miles, but many were twice that, and more. The rest days were essential.

So I expect this blog will be similar. Long-winded on some days, empty on others. And, as with the running, some days you have a good run, and others not so much. But it all matters, in the end. I believe we have a finite amount of bad writing in each of us. Best to pile forward and get it written, so we can then move on to more important matters.

I suppose we have a large amount of bad anything in us, that we must inexorably exorcise in order to succeed. All successful people have one thing in common with quitters, and that is that they all failed at one point, somewhere, and on multiple occasions. Unfortunately for life, not all failures have success in common. But all failures inevitably come to that point of decision: when to quit. The solution is simple.

Don't.

~

It's not that I didn't have anything to say -why I stopped blogging two years back, that is. No, it was a million other things. And I suppose I should get all that out of the way, before I really get back into it, so that may take a month or two.

Or I could re-start by answering the question, "Why re-start?" Or I could go into what one can expect to read on this blog. Who I am, and how I've changed, and what I see and how I see it.

But all that sounds so B O R I N G, but which, now that I think of it, was a lot of what I meant by 'The Most Significant Thing'. That all the ordinary-ness of life, all the mundane dark matter that makes up the bulk of our existence, really is significant. That the meaning is found in there, in each getting-out-of-bed and getting-to-work experience. Each person you meet, each place you go. Every small, daily act of faith that encounters every doubter's utterance calling it into question. Work. Family. Country. God... You know... The Most Significant Things.

But that's The Old And Busted. Welcome to this, The New Hotness. "The Million Word Blog," in all its depraved construct, right here on the old Blogspot.

It looks different, the Blogspot, since I last visited. And I am hoping that it's all not just a mere button re-arrangement and font-and-pixel change, but rather a sincere re-imagining of the site. Something internet-y that is dedicated to more than a 140-character profun-ditty. Because, Lord knows, if this world needs anything right now, it's more characters. Anyway, I'm going to try not to get my hopes up. And if you're reading this, I beg you to extend the same courtesy to these million words.

So, why a million words?

Because I couldn't think of anything else. Because it sounds like a nice round number. Because it sounds a bit crazy, and maybe impossible. Because a million words "of crap" is what Raymond Chandler said you had to get out of your system before you learned to write anything publishable. Not that I'm trying to get published. But I would like to get good at something. Something significant. Like, perhaps, simple literacy.

And if you've got an online journal with no clear subject matter except your own amusing/petulant observations, how do you end the thing when you get bored of it all? I figure, after a million words. I hope to do it in under 5 years. Seems plausible. Err, possible. Plausibly potentially possible, to add a few more words. I claim not that the words make sense or ever will.

WORD COUNT is the only ground rule. And "no quotes" -even though I just quoted Raymond Chandler a few sentences ago. But that was in the construct of what I'm talking about, and not just some thoughtful, daily platitude that you may be compelled to agree with only because someone famous said it once. No. These have to be my words, in order for the thing to be legitimate. And, since I'm the one making the rules, I am going to grant myself a free three-fer every day, by including the date. Hey, writing is hard. If you do it every day, you deserve a threefer.

I remember in a creative writing class in college my teacher saying that, "Well of course you must write every day! If you want to be a writer, you will write every day! Every day and all the time! You don't have a choice!" And I remember my immediate thought, which was: Shit. If that's true, I will never be a writer. Because I knew I was an undisciplined free spirit, and lamely proud of it.

That was twenty years ago. She was right. I still remember her attitude and her enthusiasm and her encouragement. And her name: Dyza Sauers. It's a good name. I don't know what happened to her, but by the end of the course I had thought, maybe I can do this...

And no cussing. Not to be confused with cursing. Cursing, it seems, is a necessary part of experiencing the indifference of life. Cussing, on the other hand, is little more than evidence of a poor vocabulary, and runs contrary to the million word objective. So I will not be using the Seven Forbidden Words on this blog.

Even though I said "shit" a few sentences ago.

But that was in reference to the old me. The new me is happily married in the suburbs with two kids, two cats, and another one on the way. (Kid, not cat. We have enough cats.) I have a picket fence and an SUV. I have chores, hobbies, a job, a mortgage, and high-speed Internet. I don't want to be a cusser anymore. And certainly not in front of the kids.

Who, by the way, have no idea of the cussing, undisciplined failure I once was. It is one of the grand blessings of life that when your children are born, you have a golden opportunity to re-invent yourself. I know nothing of my parents and who they were before I was born, and that my older siblings know a little more of my mom and dad than I do seems to detach them from me, somehow. But here we are. If I start writing now, and if I do it every day, my kids will say, "My Dad? Oh, he's a writer." And, because I am a proud and tortured and insecure soul, that is a preferable thing to: "My Dad? Oh, he builds aluminum patio covers." At which point, they embarrassedly change the subject.

So, a million words. It'll be a good start. You don't have to read them all. They might not even make sense all the time. But I do have the few minor ground rules. And the word count. In any case, I expect a million words will change a man, whether he writes them, reads them, or is brainwashed by them, so choosing significant words would be preferable, if not altogether wise.

But a million significant words? Let’s be serious.

~