I usually head out for a quick run in the mornings. I tend to make this a pensive, insular, entirely solitary experience. The last thing I want to do is make small talk with somebody while I can barely breathe. So, on the morning in question, I started out early. I ventured over to the [...]
"I'm so scared all the time. Before kids, I was never scared. Ever." In fact, this mom tells me she was a real risk-taker "back in the day," a true daredevil. She climbed mountains. She bungee-jumped. She rode a motorcycle. She ran "extreme" races. She loved this about herself. Made her feel alive. She smiles [...]
What were you told you were incapable of as a kid? Math? Singing? Running? Basketball? How many times did you have to hear it before you believed it, before you owned it entirely? Today I received, once again, a link to an inspiring amateur video of the final moments of a high school basketball game. [...]
As his parent, you provide all of the context for the life of your young child. You are his life. You decide what he does, and when. Every person and situation he is exposed to falls within your purview. Everything that comes through his senses to his mind – every bit of it is provided [...]
"What do I do if I can't stand my kid?" This question was posed to me by the father of a teenage boy recently. His son is all "punked-out", as this dad put it. He doesn't really try very hard in school. There's the skateboarding and the earrings. His clothes are too big. And for [...]
Frank is a cabbie. His large frame fits awkwardly in the well-worn driver's seat of the old Caprice. My guess is they've both seen better days. Frank tells me he's forty-five. Yet he seems more than a decade older, world-weary, worn and tired. You can see it in his hands, hear it in his voice. [...]
As the first verses of "Lovers in Japan" give way to the chorus, Coldplay launches thousands of colorful paper butterflies into the audience. And I mean thousands, tens, maybe hundreds of thousands. And the butterfly cannons are re-loaded for the second chorus. Then the third. More butterflies each time. If I hadn't attended a recent [...]
I travel with my family, a lot. Travel, or adventure, really, has become a priority to us. Cash flow can slow to a drip. The car rusts, pings, gently begging fiscal attention. Our home awaits rehab, updates, perhaps a luxurious addition, for years on end. But our priority is clear. Whenever we can, we always [...]
I have just crossed the Mississippi, heading west into Iowa this third of July. Night is gently falling here, and it is gorgeous, the setting sun, the seemingly endless rolling fields. This is America, the heartland, and it is gorgeous. I’m listening to the hopeful, plaintive sounds of The Rising. My eye is drawn toward [...]
The Columbine massacre took place ten years ago this week. In the wake of that tragedy, many in my field went to work trying to determine the root causes. Gun control was an issue. Where were the parents? What preventive role should the school have played? When the dust settled, though, most of us concluded [...]