Shared Experiences

Though I’ve been denied one-on-one relationships with my own children for the last five years, I still maintain good relationships with kids as young as five and as old as 23. I can rock an infant calm, play a game with a 6-month old, and challenge a toddler to try something new. Eight days or eighteen years, every child deserves the best I have. Through all this, I see the smiles of my own kids, everyday in every face of every kid who is not mine. I treat them with as much respect as I would (as I did and as I will) my own. A Dad’s love may be denied to his own, but the love of a Dad cannot be quenched. It’s mine to share and the world does know the truth. If only I could tell my kids.

To all Dad’s who see a child and glimpses the future in their eyes–we are a dime a dozen and cast aside as often as a carton with one bad egg–I hope there’s never any shortage.

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Full Swing

Two thousand and eleven: 2011. The number 11 has always been special to me. 10 ends with nothing. 11 promises another one for every one. In the chronological sequence, eleven follows the definitive emptiness of ten. Every hour and every minute of the day proceeds from null into one-thing.

Elevensies are fresh and new in every decadal sequence. They are the flourish of the fullness of each and every moment and, at the same time, they are the hope and the dreams of every moment that follows. Between me and that nothing are the number nine.

Should I live for the next nine seconds, I can be sure. Should I live for the next nine minutes, there’s time to love and I love you. Should I live for the next nine hours, I will believe in tomorrow. Should I live for the next nine days, I would like to thank everyone for everything. Should I live for the next nine months, I hope to see another life born. Should I live for the next nine years, as I expect I will, the depth of love, itself, may come to me. Should I live to see the number 9 in any year greater than this, I trust in my own hope that you all wish me well.

Any decade or age that ends in zero, ends with little more than closure. And any time that zero ends our cycle of being, happiness, and nurturing, the timely end confers a renewable hope, brighter than any closure in the number that follows.

One is the beginning. One is the Omega. I’ll see you there!

Happy New Year to All

My favorite song of all time has to be Auld Lang Syne. Whether it’s meaning, lost in the cloud of ages that it has been sung, is “for old time’s sake” or “once upon a time,” there is an end of things old and a beginning of thing’s new in every note, verse and chorus. The world would be a better place if we lived this way each and every day!

To my kids:
Should old acquaintance be forgot and never brought to mind,
The fire of love I bear for thee shall not go out with time,
For all the love in my life’s cup, each dawn does shine
We’ll talk a cup of kindness yet. There’ll be a time.

For auld lang syne, my child,
for auld lang syne,
we’ll talk a cup of kindness yet,
for auld lang syne.