I Got By With a Little Help From a Friend...

Now that the summer is finally upon us here in the North East my wife and I made the decision to buy a pool. We have a small yard and a small child so we decided to go with one of those blue "Easy Set" pools. It is only 3 ft high and 10 ft around but that is perfect for what we need.

Our yard slants down and to the left so the word Easy in the pool description is slightly misleading. There was a hole to be dug and leveling to be done, and my 4-year-old Evan was stoked to help. My initial thought was that this would be a pain in the a$$. The thought of digging and leveling a 10 ft round circle, in 90+ degrees with a 4 year old running around chased me to the fridge for a beer.

When the time finally came to get this project going I had an instantaneous change of heart and mind. While standing over the future spot of our pool I took a look over at Evan and noticed something amazing. He was looking at me and adjusting his stance to match mine. I would put my hand on my chin and he followed suit. Hands on hips, check. Hands in the air, check. Balancing on one foot to see if this was really happening, check.

I realized that he honestly just wanted to help his Dad, to be involved in something with me, just to be around me and there was no way I was going to turn that down! I grabbed an extra tape measure, piece of wood, and shovel and let him go to town. As I measured he measured. When I took a drink, of water not beer, so did he. If I wiped sweat from my brow so did he.

When the ground was finally ready and the pool was filling I could see a sense of pride in his eyes. He set the pool up. In reality he measured an unused piece of wood and barely put a hole in the ground; but in his eyes without his hard work that pool would not have water in it. And in this Dad's eyes, it never would have happened without my construction buddy

It made me sad as I began wondering how many times I had impatiently swatted he or his siblings away in a similar situation. How often do we as parents look at these moments for what they truly are, bonding time? Too often we are so on the go that all we are concerned with is the finish line and not the journey to get there. 

Sure this extra set of hands may have added thirty minutes to the total time to get the pool ready but in the end, who cares? What else was I going to do with that thirty minutes? Sit on the couch and watch a TV show? I am sure nothing as productive as creating a life long memory for two people.

Since the advent of VPN's and smart phones we are not only slaves to work, but now status updates, check-ins, and photo sharing as well. What will these people who we barely know anymore post about their day? What are they doing with their kids? 

The real question that should be asked is what am I doing with my kids? What have I missed that has been going on just over the top of my cell phone?

Please be sure to search Facebook for What I Didn't Expect While She was Expecting, look for me on Twitter @erush520, and check out my podcast www.ericrushpodcast.com

Also, check out some great Dad related articles and much more at www.brucesallan.com, follow him on Twitter @BruceSallan and search #DadChat for great tweets and articles.  Also be sure to join him every Thursday from 9-10pm (Est) for #DadChat live!

High school graduations are not for the faint of heart

Hey there everyone!  I am going to take a different approach to this post and move away from the antics of my youngest and move on to the antics of my two oldest.  For those who don't know, I have two daughters that will be graduating High School in a little over two weeks, Justine is 18 and Tami is 17.  They couldn't have taken any more different paths through their senior year to get to this point either.

Justine took a more laid back approach to scheduling to sort of "coast" through this year and be able to enjoy and soak up the last few months of her high school career with classes like, Everyday cooking, Just Desserts, consumer math, study hall, study hall, study hall, forensics, marine biology.  While I admit the last two are not necessarily classes you can sleep through, they are classes that she is extremely interested in rather than being forced into.  This kid watches Law & Order type shows every day and is going to be getting her Bacehlor's in Marine Biology so these classes definitely peaked her interest more than say, Algebra 2 would have and her grades proved it.  She has had the ability to take the foot off of the gas the last few weeks and coast to the finish line, with stops at senior skip day and a day at the beach with many of her classmates.

Tami on the other hand made a decision at some point to make this the most stressful few months (until very recently) I have dealt with in a long time.  Tami's schedule looked like this, Algebra 2, Economics & Financial literacy, Introduction to Business, English, and a couple of gimme classes like pottery and guitar.  Now I am not saying she had an all AP level schedule but for her she was about as booked as she could be.  Couple that with a bunch of visits to the nurse and trying to stay home from not feeling well (will get to that another post) and her lack of handing things in on time / at all in English she was placed on the "Danger" list for seniors.  This is basically a list of students in their Senior year that are in danger of not graduating for either academic or attendance issues.

"What the fuck!!!!" I yelled in my head (Is that possible?  I feel like I "yell" inside my head a lot to keep from yelling out of my mouth).  "How the hell is this possible???"  Turns out she had been doing the assignments and not handing them in on time or at all and missing class for various reasons (nurse, counselor, bathroom?!?!?!?), along with a dip in her grade.  I think that she really took this senioritis thing a bit too far and began slamming (not pumping) the breaks in the middle of the 2nd marking period.

Needless to say this had lead to numerous phone calls with the counselors and emails back and forth with the teacher and grade checking for a few weeks but it finally seems like she has kicked it back into overdrive.  As long as the grades stay where they are and she does not miss another class all will work out fine in the end.  So at least all the stress is gone now.... right?.... WRONG!

Now we have PROM dresses to buy, a graduation party to plan and pay for (Did you know that One, Uno, Un, Single, Individual Port-a-Potty can cost up to $300 F$$$$$G!?!?!?)  Thankfully a good GREAT family friend knows someone who can get one for $85 but still, HOLY CRAP!  Food for 100 people, chairs, a tent, music, plates, cups, plasticware, food, food, food and more food, decorations, gifts (for the girls).  Then there is the party prep at my in-laws - cutting down trees and helping prep the yard, figuring out how we are getting everything up there and back, where the tables are coming from, the chairs, where are we going to sleep, do we get this or that, do we bring enough for all the invites even though they didn't RSVP? (apparently that answer is YES).  AAAAAAHHHHHHHH (my head is spinning!!!!)

In all honesty it got so overwhelming I started to feel a little sick, I even had a day where my brain was so screwy I started dropping things (eggs at home, drinks at shop rite).  It's non-sense!  I honestly can't wait for the party to be over so I can drink to my success at helping to raise two beautiful and intelligent women.  After all, while the graduation is your child's success first, it is part yours as well.  You play a huge role in this.  Don't forget, it was you who sat and helped them learn to read, write, do math problems, tie their shoe, pack their lunch, it was you who took them to their dances and early morning field trips.  You organized the birthday parties and drove them everywhere they needed to go.

It is going to be an emotional few days, they graduate on a Thursday night and their party is the following Saturday but it is going to be oh so sweet.  I can't sit here and say I will be 100% glad their school careers are over (k12 that is), I will still miss the days of being involved with everything, as much as we were able to be anyway.  I just think back to their little faces before school started, back to the excitement for middle school and sheer terror before High School.  The sense of accomplishment in the band recitals, sporting events and dance competitions.  My heart is melting now as I type this.  I can see these things like they were yesterday.

Check out my website - www.ericrushpodcast.com