It was one of those surprising and special moments, and it came on the night of Novalie’s kindergarten graduation. And it wasn’t the presentation of Novalie’s graduation certificate. Although it means that she has exactly the same number of graduation certificates that I do, it wasn’t that.

It wasn’t the catching of her first fish, either, which is recounted in Doré’s blog. That’s more a moment of pride for Grandpas Jolley and Vernier in any case. My dad tried, but I never quite became a fishing enthusiast. So it wasn’t that either.

This special moment came during the drive home. We were all fairly hungry, having eaten very little of the strange assortment of foods at the kindergarten potluck dinner, so we stopped at McDonald’s so that Doré and I could get crispy chicken Snack Wraps®.

“Are you hungry, Novalie? Do you want something?”

It was then that Novalie ordered, and ate, her first Big Mac®.

I just received some ITTF professional table tennis DVDs from a Canadian on eBay who must have found a way to legally distribute these homemade DVDs pieced together from German and Chinese TV broadcasts. Or maybe they’re not legal, but at only $9.99 each, I’m not asking too many questions.

So I’m in a good mood, watching Germany’s Timo Boll do battle with top players from around Asia, including China’s highly rated Ma Long, to reach the final. This got me thinking back to my early days as a fan of professional table tennis.

I’d say that last summer was when I “got back in” to table tennis, but really, I’ve never been in it like I am now. The world of professional table tennis was still new and exciting to me, and I looked for it wherever I could find it. On Youtube, I did find it. One user in particular would post full matches – in the requisite ten-minute segments – on Youtube. This user is now gone, probably banned for posting without permission, but it’s thanks to those videos that I learned the names and personalities of the world’s top players – including my favorite player, Denmark’s Michael Maze.

I spent many nights last summer watching table tennis videos late into the night, then, when it was very late, I would leave comments on the videos. Something strange happens to me when I write late at night to early in the morning. I’m not sure why table tennis and early morning brought out the “gangsta” in me, but it did.

Kevin (10 months ago)
I hate to see Mikey Maze lose, ’cause he’s my dogg, yo. But I have to give props to the Samsonov, the matchwinnah, for the control and consistency he be puttin’ on display for tha fanzz, yo.

Maze is tha man, doggies, but Samsonov r0×0rs in this match.

Izraphel (10 months ago)
did u just mix black ghetto talk with 1337 speak?

Kevin (10 months ago)
My good man, I can assure you that only proper English is being spoken at this forum. I can’t be expected to know what you are talking about.

xiangyik (5 months ago)
You’re very funny–in a good way.

It didn’t stop there, either. In fact, it seemed to get worse the longer it continued.

Kevin (9 months ago)
My dawg Mikey Maze be keepin’ it real an’ bringin’ dat street-pong style to da world stage, yo.

Sandcat87 (4 months ago) Rofl! Maze is ma homie too, G.

I can laugh at those now, even if I am a little confused at myself.

I’m afraid I have no explanation whatsoever for the next (and thankfully last) comment that I left for a video in which Vladmir Samsonov of Belarus defeated Korea’s Ryu:

Kevin (9 months ago)
Samsonov be thinkin’ he tha Einstein PhD of table tennis while the rest of us special pingpongers be ridin’ the short bus to the local tournaments.

I am very thankful that it went no further.

I was at AirDisaster.com checking for any new technical details of the recent Air France disaster.  There wasn’t much new information, and I don’t expect there will be until the FDR (Flight Data Recorder – the black box that tells what happened) and/or the CVR (Cockpit Voice Recorder – the black box that tells why it happened) are recovered.

With no new information, I started browsing.  The site at AirDisaster.com has accidents listed by date and by airline.  I knew I shouldn’t, but I clicked on 1985 – long known as the deadliest year in commercial aviation.  Scrolling down the page, the rightmost column lists the number of fatalities for each crash.  I felt a knot forming in my stomach as I scrolled past the numbers.  70 . . . 148 . . . 94 . . . 329 . . . 200 . . . and then I hesitated, because I knew what was coming.  One more flick of the mouse wheel, and then I felt a chill.  520.  JAL 123.  What a horrible story.

Looking away quickly, I went to another infamous 1985 accident.  Delta Airlines in Dallas Ft. Worth, in which 134 died when the Lockheed L-1011 was pushed into the ground by a microburst. The name “Delta Airlines” was colored blue and underlined, so I went to click on it, assuming it to be a link to all accident listings for that carrier.

Up popped an advertisement for “BookingBuddy.com,” offering “great rates for Delta Airlines flights!”

I don’t like to tell people how to do their jobs, but I will say this.  If you’re in the marketing department for an airline or a travel agent, do not, I mean really do not advertise or link from AirDisaster.com.

We drove the Albion highway toward home under the pale sun of the frigid Palouse hills as Novalie sat strapped to her booster seat in the back of the Taurus and “Fix You” by Coldplay played on the speakers.

You may have heard “Fix You” by accident if you watched the “Arsenal: The Beautiful Game” Youtube video from the April 17 post The Beautiful Game.

Anyway, the song winds down to the line “Lights will guide you home . . . ” which seemed to bother Novalie.

“No, lights won’t guide you home, Dad.  Jesus will.”

Fun in the tub with Froggy

It was time to let Froggy go.  Tiger Stripe Jolley, the little tree frog found in our yard several weeks ago, had served as Novalie’s pet, and Novalie has a big heart with a lot of love for her pets.

Unfortunately, the little frog had spent too much time just sitting in his plastic container.  Doré and I were starting to feel bad for him.  We kept him supplied with water, tree branches, and bugs, but we knew that he needed to be back outside.  For at least a week, Novalie rejected the idea of releasing Froggy.  Although the frog spent much of its time locked up and ignored, Novalie has shared some fun times with Froggy.

Several times we put an inch or two of water in the tub and let the little frog jump and swim.  Novalie surprised me when she was able to pick him up and hold him.  “A lot of little girls would be scared to hold a frog,” I said.  Then she would let him swim for a few feet, after which she would reach into the water and Froggy would climb into her hand.  “I think he really likes me,” she said.

Three days ago, Novalie finally agreed that Froggy should be let go down by the little river.  I was proud of her for making the decision, but I also knew how hard it would be for her.

I helped Novalie down the rocky slope to the river’s edge as she kept Froggy safely cupped in her hands.  When she reached the water, she placed the frog in a relatively calm section of water.  Froggy swam to the nearest rock and climbed on top.  Novalie did not consider this to be “job done.”  I think I know what she might have been thinking.

“Froggy, you’re going to have to swim away, because I can’t just turn around and leave you sitting there.”

She picked him up, and on the second try, she managed to get him into the current, and Tiger Stripe Jolley quickly disappeared down the river and out of sight.  And then the tears came.

Novalie and Tiger Stripe during playtime in the bath.

When we got back up the slope to the grass of the park, Novalie was crying.  Doré worried that Novalie had been hurt on the rocks, but it was just the broken heart of a little girl who had to say goodbye to her pet.  “I’ll miss him.”

“Maybe we’ll see him again when we come to the park,” I tried to console her.  “Maybe he’ll visit us every summer.”  But Novalie knew better.

“Dad, we’re never going to see Froggy again,” she spoke through the tears.

I guess you’re all the same as me.  The last post about growing up got a lot of face-to-face comments, even if there weren’t any left on this Web site.  The message is generally the same:  “don’t change who you are.”  This is roughly the same message that was written in my high school yearbook by most who signed it:  “You’re weird (in a good way).  Don’t ever change.  Have a good summer.  Stay cool.”

I’m pretty sure I haven’t matured beyond age 17, but I’m not going to fight it.  It’s important to know how and when to fake it, and I’m getting better at that.

“Man is most nearly himself when he achieves the seriousness of a child at play.”
- Heraclitus

I realize now that my visions for my adult life were quite ambitious.  The life I had pictured would be quite expensive, as it turns out.  A home with rooms for every interest.  A separate computer and gaming room. A separate home theater room with two levels of seating and full surround-sound.  A large garage to house the two family cars – a hyperactive all-wheel-drive Mitsubishi Lancer Evolution rally racer (four doors means it counts as a family car, and trips to Grandma’s house would only take 30 minutes instead of the usual three hours) along with an all-wheel drive Saab or Audi station wagon.  Of course there would need to be a room with enough space for a full-size table tennis competition as well as a yard large and flat enough for one or more soccer goals.

It was easy to imagine myself in this dream-house when I was a kid.  When you become an adult, you earn enough money to buy a house.  I was just going to make my house more interesting.  Now, of course, there are two obvious problems.  First is the simple fact that this is all prohibitively expensive.  I’ve made a depressing realization recently;  the people who own the big, beautiful homes are also the type of people who are rarely found in those homes.  If they were able to spend time in them, they wouldn’t be able to afford them.

The second problem is that I haven’t grown up yet.  I look around at people the same age as me.  I don’t understand them at all.  There’s something that they all know that I don’t.  They underwent some transformation that I never did.

All these “grown-ups” my age are busy filling out forms, walking up and down hallways, carrying important documents, running errands, driving to important locations, making and receiving important calls, standing in groups and having vital conversations, attending and hosting functions, scoffing authoritatively at retail store employees, eating health food, along with anything else that guarantees that they are not available, not home, and certainly not spending time in any obviously enjoyable way.

I missed something along the way, because I’m not like any of them.  I assumed the transformation would happen automatically.  When I was a kid making sure I came in from playing at 8 PM on Thursday to watch Greatest American Hero, I knew my parents were upstairs doing “grown-up” work.  Briefcases, phone calls, Sunday lesson preparation, and a lot of mysterious walking up and down the hallway, from one room to another.  They were only rarely seen down in front of the television with the kids.  They had grown-up stuff to do at all times.  I figured that one day I would be the same.  As a child, my whole life was about my hobbies and interests (airplanes and super heroes).  I’m not sure I knew what my parents’ hobbies or interests might have been.  It seemed obvious to me that I would grow up, change, and become the busy person that an adult should be.

Somewhere, something went wrong; an important step was missed.  I’m married to an adult, so I’ve tried to find out what she’s up to every evening when I’m reading a novel or watching a carefully selected television broadcast.  To heighten the mystery, she will sometimes come to sit on the couch for a few minutes, and then suddenly stand up again and go to another room where there is ostensibly some important grown-up work to be done.  Sometimes there’s laundry, but I know that isn’t the whole story.  There’s more to all this weird adult activity than just laundry.  There just aren’t enough clothes to explain all of it.  Forms are filled out.  Binders are opened, papers shuffled, and then binders are snapped shut again.

A few nights ago, I decided it was time for me to figure out what adults are up to.  When Dore’ sat down on the couch for a few minutes during a comedy broadcast, I decided to follow her when she hopped right back up to go to the next room. Dore’ doesn’t like being followed.  I was unable to gain any information.  That was just my first attempt.  Soon, I’ll figure out what it is that you adults are all up to.

I’m going to grow up if it kills me.

During rare lucid visions I see myself as a responsible adult.  I’m wearing pressed slacks (no pleats), shiny but uncomfortable shoes, and a fitted button-up shirt (with tie if it’s Sunday, or if I happen to be working for the government).  I’m keeping appointments, arriving to important places in a nice car that I can’t spare the time to enjoy or maintain myself.  I’m standing in groups of other adults at church, having important conversations which will require me to walk late into Sunday school, if I make it at all.  I’m berating grocery store employees for not handling my order to my satisfaction.  I’m certainly not sitting with Novalie after work and laughing at a cartoon with her.  I’ll be snug in my evening jacket, in my sitting parlor, shuffling through papers and filling out critical and time-sensitive forms.  I’ll keep doing it every day, because all those crucial things don’t just happen on their own.

When I feel my soul eroding, my joy fading, and comfort at the thought of the blissful sleep of death, I know it’s time to stop daydreaming about joining the grown-up world.  I can put it off a little longer.  There are enough souls out there calloused and hollowed from lives of errand-running, clock-punching, and line-waiting without adding mine to their number.  For now.

“All around me are familiar faces, worn-out places
worn-out faces
Bright and early for the daily races, going nowhere
going nowhere
And their tears are filling up their glasses, no expression
no expression
Hide my head I want to drown my sorrow, no tomorrow
no tomorrow
. . .
I find it hard to tell you, I find it hard to take
When people run in circles it a very very mad world”
- Mad World
(The Michael Andrews and Gary Jules version – easily the saddest song ever recorded)

“Live as though you will die tomorrow.
Learn as though you will live forever.”
- Ghandi

Thanks in part to The Simpsons, I no longer think that “living each day like it’s my last” is the missing ingredient in my life that would propel me to the future success that I imagine for myself.  When Homer decided to follow some self-help steps to becoming successful, he took the step to “live each day like it’s your last” quite literally.  He spent the day sitting and crying.

My morning moods are wildly varied, but somehow this morning during my drive to work, I was feeling pretty good.  It was during that 11-minute commute that the phrase “live every day as though it were your first” popped into my head.  This made perfect sense to me.  More sense than dying tomorrow.  Near-life experiences instead of near-death experiences, as Tyler Durden would say.

I’m going to challenge the wisdom of the ages and say “live tomorrow as though it is your first day to live.”  Live like you’ve just been released from your prison cell.  Live like your cage has been unlocked, like all the barriers are suddenly gone.

I can already tell that this will be a challenge.  Don’t be disappointed if I haven’t exactly put this into practice by the time you see me next.  I’m just saying it’s a philosophy that makes sense to me, I’m not saying that I’m capable of it.

But I’d like to try it sometime.

It wasn’t easy for Novalie to wait to ride her new bike.  She received it as a gift from “Old Grandma” (Celia Vernier) on Saturday night, and had to wait all the way until Sunday afternoon to take it out for the first real drive.

Albion doesn’t have terrain suitable to biking (dirt roads and hills), and I didn’t want Novalie to be restricted to the small cement basketball court down at the park.  We loaded up the new bike, all the safety gear, and Bolt, her stuffed-animal mascot.  We drove out near where I work.  I went up the hill a little to a large, empty, and mostly flat parking lot.  After Novalie geared-up and Bolt took his spot in the front basket, she took her seat behind the handlebars.  She was nervous.  I don’t know if it was the larger bike, or that she worried about going too fast in all this open space, but she was very uncertain.

“Don’t let go of me, Dad!” she said.  “It’s okay, Novalie, you know how to do this.  Just ride.”  Like parents do, I let go without Novalie ever realizing it, and she was free.

I watched as she rode away against the blinding light of the blue and white sky.  She rode in wide circles, talking and singing to herself, lost in another world of bicycle and imagination, the way a little child should be.  She has many important bike rides ahead of her.  Rides to clear the mind, rides into imagination.

As an American man who follows sports not traditionally considered to be American, I find myself answering a lot of questions and doing a lot of explaining.  Especially when it comes to soccer (football, mate!).

“There’s no action.  They never score.”  Is something I hear often.  The people who say that are not watching the same soccer that I am.  I saw two Champion’s League matches earlier this week, with a total of 11 goals scored between them (Chelsea 4-4 Liverpool, and Arsenal 3-0 Villareal).  Still, I understand that the people who complain of “no goals” are usually the people who only watch soccer when it’s World Cup time.  The World Cup is a very tense, defensive tournament.

Those of you who only watch the World Cup don’t get to see the back-and-forth attacking that I see when I’m watching a good clash between two professional clubs.  You couldn’t be blamed for thinking that the sport is boring if that’s all you got to see.

Thanks to Youtube, I believe I can answer for you two questions at once:  “why do you like soccer?” and “how did you become an Arsenal fan?”  When you see this, your questions will be answered.

Don’t be embarrassed to weep at the beauty.