Run Sheet
01/03/12
I came home from work today and my oldest boy (9 years) said "Hey dad, look at this"
Max is an energetic, intelligent boy who is adventurous and funny as hell. Eli (8 years) is the same only wayyy less cautious. Being raised by a firefighter can't be easy for a couple of interested, energetic and inquisitive boys. Dad is always worried about serious injuries.
don't get me wrong, I'm all for them having a rough-and-tumble time out in the woods that are their playground. I firmly believe in the axiom "Bones heal, skin grows back, chicks dig scars and glory lasts forever" However, unfortunately, I also know that kids die.
I encourage them to have adventures, have fun, and try things. I also try to instill in them a knowledge of their own mortality and the knowledge that things aren't like TV, things don't always work out in the end.
He explained that he had been ice skating with his school, and had fallen. I make my kids wear helmets when riding bicycles, ice skating, In-lining, skateboarding or using a scooter. I guess that qualifies me as a worrywart. I know that there are many parents out there who say "I didn't wear one when I was a kid, and I did fine" and they're right. But then, how many are able to say "I didn't wear one, and now I'm dead"
Anyway, so maybe I'm a worrywart, and maybe I'm turning my kids into geeks. I'll take the chance.
I stood there in my living room, Max held up his bicycle helmet and grinned. It had hit the ice hard enough to put a crack up the back that I could put my finger in.
***
Friday night we had some serious fun. The boys had gone to a birthday party not long ago, and it had been held in a bowling alley. They had never been bowling before. I guess I've been bowling perhaps a dozen times in my life. My wife a few less. We're not your typical bowlers.
The boys asked if we could go bowling on Friday. I had no objection and neither did Mary so we headed off to the bowling alley. As we entered I espied that they had some infd of automatic scorekeeper. There was a TV screen set above the team area with the names of the bowlers and a representation of the score sheet. when i payed for the lane the lady had me fill out a little sheet with all our names.
now I confess that forms that require names are the most tempting things in the world to me. I rarely fill out my own name at the best of times If it's something like a table reservation at a restaurant where they'll call out the name in a crowd I always go by "Phillipe VonDucklips"
I guess it all started in High school when i went to the first day of grade 12 wearing a T-shirt with "Fred" emblazoned on the front. The teachers were having a hard time dealing with all the new names, and when they'd address me as "Fred" I'd ignore them. I left a trail of really frustrated teachers behind me that day and I was firmly hooked on the fake name game. Later in the year three of us rugby players invented a fellow named "Hubert Farnsworth" He ordered many a pizza, he ran for student president, he even wrote books that appeared in the bibliographies of our research projects. When the Rugby team got team jackets, three of them had "Hubert" on name patch. His crowning achievement was giving blood. There was a blood donor clinic set up at the school one afternoon, and many of us senior went down and gave a pint for the first time. At the time no ID was required so I was Hubert. Over the next ten years Hubert gave blood nearly forty times. Unfortunately he had to quit when the red cross started insisting on two pieces of ID.
But I digress.
The boys scampered down to wait for the lane to be ready, Max was the first to look up at the scoreboard and break up laughing. It didn't take long to decide who was who, of the choices that I had put up, Eli was "Ace" Max was "Spanky", and Mary was "Slash". They've been calling each other by those names all weekend.
Hubert still bowls poorly, but
he has a fair amount of fun with Ace, slash, and Spanky.