Cafe Leone

You may not have noticed, but I haven’t been “around” the internets for a while; I certainly haven’t been blogging about it. Other than a few random tweets on Twitter (I would be honored if you would follow me here), there really hasn’t been much happening to the Virtual Dan.

You see, the 3D Dan has usurped time and energy from the Virtual Dan. Therein lies my biggest problem: Life gets in the way of living.

I am not so selfish as to assume my life is any more stressful than yours. But I am bold enough to tell you that I am not doing a good job of managing that stress. I have always prided myself on how well I can handle stress. I was an EMT for a while and I even took the Air Traffic Controllers exam ( a million years ago) when I realized that being a pilot would take a LOT of money. I loved stress and crisises crisiums crises.

Things are different now. The stress is no longer an adrenaline rush. This stress is a pervasive thread that weaves itself into each cell in my body. This stress has now been so internalized that I know there is a physiological price to pay.

Here is a brief rundown of some of the things on my plate.

My health: My leg has healed leaving yet another scar the size of a saucer on my thigh.  I need to receive Remicade infusions every 6 weeks. Each infusion takes at least 5 hours. Very draining.  Everything is fine but I fear a flare up at any time.  One result of my previous flare-up is that I stopped running as it is completely impossible to run with this disease. Starting back up again has been a challenge. I did go for a 3.1 mile run the other day though….now it is all about consistency (for those who follow my blog, I bet you can see how challenging “consistency” is for me).

My Baby Goats: Insanity is the rule at the Leone Estates. Each baby goat brings their own set of challenges to the table. I’ll stop here, before saying something I might regret.

My Dad: ALS (Amyotropic Lateral Sclerosis) is a shitty disease. I am watching day by day as my dad progresses through the symptoms. He is virtually unable to speak now and his swallowing is severely affected. We all know what is happening to him and what will happen, but he prefers to work through this one day at a time. This is completely opposite of the “big picture” approach I would take if faced with the same prognosis, but I totally respect his perspective.

My parents live upstairs from me and we bear witness to the merciless, tomorrow-will-be-worse-than- today, progression of this disease. This puts an intense amount of pressure on the kids and I feel this leads to some of the problems that I alluded too above.

I know my dad is suffering and will suffer and that kills me.

Last Sunday was my niece’s First Communion in the Catholic Church. My parents have always considered themselves Christians but I have never in my life seen them practice it.  Last Sunday, we were all sitting in the same row and at one point, I looked over and saw my father on his knees praying. I may be an atheist, but this tore at my heart and I had to leave the church weeping like a child.

My work: INSANE! A pending deadline on a major, highly-visible project is stressful enough without the added stress of my normal day-to-day duties. But, truly, I love my job.

So, that is it in a nutshell…utterly uninteresting. The only purpose for blogging about it is to give me something to blog about.

Thanks to both of you for listening!

my father, parenting, uncategorized | 7 Comments »

Today I came to the painful conclusion that I simply suck as a dad.

parenting | 13 Comments »

Daddy: How was your day at school, Coco (my 4 year old daughter; aka Coca Cola, CooCoo for Cocoa Puffs, Cocarena Nicoco, Coconut, Satana)?

Coco: Samuel kissed me.

Daddy: What?!

Coco: He kissed me on the lips.

Daddy: What?!

Coco:  He’s my boyfriend.

Daddy: What?!

Coco: We are going to get married.

Daddy: What?!

Coco: He kissed my lunch box and I kissed his.

Daddy: What?!

I am on my way to Samuel’s house so I can punch him in the neck. Film at 11.

funny, parenting | 11 Comments »

When I was in the 8th grade, I worked for an electronics manufacturer, cleaning the floors and taking out the trash. I worked a few nights per week from 6-10. During this time, the engineers had already left for the day. I remember going over to their drafting tables and staring in awe at their blueprints, which were really blue for reasons I never understood. I drooled over their T-Squares, 30-60-90 triangles, compasses, gum erasers, French curves and pencil leads. But the item I coveted the most, was a fancy slide rule that was tucked into the top drawer of one table. It came complete with a leather box case and a manual. I opened that drawer every day and practiced adding and subtracting with this most amazing device. Their was no way I was going to master the logarithms and trig functions as I did not even know what logs and sines were. In my mind, there can be no more beautiful work of art in the world.

Once in high school, I fully expected to purchase one of these for Mr Manos’ physics class. But when we showed up on the first day, he wrote on the board “Texas Instruments TI-30.” He told us that was the name of the calculator we were expected to purchase. Apparently, this was one of the first years that calculators would be allowed. I remember going home and telling my father that we needed to buy one. Imagine the look on his face when I told him that! He just assumed that a calculator was a form of cheating.

We went to the department store; I wish I could remember which one, and purchased the TI-30 calculator. I brought it home and opened the box and there was a 100 page manual, a blue plastic zippered case and the calculator. What a beautiful thing this was in all its LED goodness. The buttons held an electronic world of numbers, not unlike the slide rule. I can remember the square root and cubed functions as well as parenthesis and memory recall. But what I remember the most was the button that had a solitary symbol on it, pi.

I had no idea what pi stood for, but I remember being fascinated by the symbol, the Greek letter pi. All I knew is that when I pushed the button, the same numbers appeared; 3.14159267. I was so fascinated by this number, that I actually remember going to the library to research what it meant. The librarian happily helped. She soon left me amidst a stack of geometry books. I read with fervor as much as I could and remember being dumbfounded when I found out that the number pi never ends. To this day, I still don’t understand how a number never ends.

Over the years, this number never left my brain. I could recite pi to 8 decimal places since 1978. In the big cosmic picture, so effing what?!

But fast forward this story to 6 months ago. Despite the fact that my oldest is in an advanced work program because of his academic abilities, he was struggling in the fifth grade. Every single night was a disaster of tantrums (his), rage (mine) and even some not-so-nice words (ours). I was completely disgusted at Michael’s apparent lack of enthusiasm or even his inability to simply get his homework over with as quickly as possible. Various techniques to motivate him failed miserably. I even (stupidly) said to Michael: “hey, buddy, if you finish this homework in the next hour, I will give you 5 dollars.” He looked me in the eyes and said: “No thanks.”

Then I had a brainstorm  I just wanted to see if ANYTHING would motivate him. So this is what I did: I wanted to offer him a challenge that was an academic challenge, but not tied to any of his current schoolwork. So, what I took out a dry erase marker and began writing out the first 30 digits to the number pi. I the copied it onto index cards and stuck them everywhere; from his school bag, to the bathroom wall.  I told him that he would have 2 weeks from that day to learn those 30 digits. Simply memorize them. He could try as many times as he wanted. If he made a mistake, just try again later. The reward at the end of this exercise would be the Nintendo Wii (this was before I realized that these consoles were something like a million dollars and impossible to find). The reality was that all I wanted him to do was get close enough and to just show a sincere effort. I actually PLANNED on buying the Wii anyway.

Two weeks to the day and I went to Michael and asked if he wanted to take a shot at it. His answer: “I didn’t memorize ALL of it.” I told him that was OK and asked him what he had already memorized. He said: “3 point something?”

I know full well that bribery really does not have a lot of staying power, but I would have thought if I simply presented this as challenge outside of school, he would look at it the right way. BUT HE MADE NO EFFORT WHATSOEVER! Why is that?

parenting | 7 Comments »

Christmas Card Attempt - FINAL

This was the best picture of the bunch!

Rule 1: Don’t have kids!

Rule 2: If you ever find yourself thinking that YOUR kids will be different than everyone else’s, then refer to Rule 1.

Rule 3: If you have to have kids, then don’t have 3!

Rule 4: If you have to have kids, then DON’T have a 10 year old!

funny, parenting | 12 Comments »

I am not proud. My behavior the other night was not one which I would want my kids to emulate. I should be disqualified from the whole parenting game full stop. My license to parent should be revoked (I say with a glimmer of hope in my eyes).

Let me preface this story by telling you that we live in a shoe box. We are on top of each other when we sleep; literally due to the fact that we are ALL IN THE SAME EFFING BED! OK, maybe it is not that bad. But it is bad. Another important point to remember is that I am not a drunk! I enjoy a drink here and there but nights out are far and few between.

So, when I got home last night around midnight after a dinner party with some coworkers at a local sushi restaurant, I needed to tip-toe. My Baby Goats will manage to wake up at a blink so it is important to be quiet. I was also just a little bit inebriated, and I definitely did wantwant them to see me stumbling in. The Goats are still young enough to believe that I am a hero. They will learn soon enough that I am merely a mortal who fails more often than I suceed at this parenting thing.

I showered the night’s events off my body and sat at the laptop to type some wonderful Japanese sake-induced account of my evening to share with Both of My Readers (BoMR).

But before my fingers hit the keyboard, my head hit the pillow.

Imagine the dreams I had. Imagine the wasabi-based dreams that floated prettily in an out of my head. Now imagine the sound of Winnie the Pooh emanating from the Goats’ toybox at 2AM. As parents, we are way too familiar with toys that talk only in the middle of the night. We all know that the only people that would ever buy a toy without an OFF button are our single, childless friends.

Now imagine, my sashimi-induced rage as I launched myself from the couch and proceeded to disassemble the toy box all the while Winnie laughing maniacally; taunting me with his honey pot sweetness.

I finally found the sucker and removed him from the box, leaving the remaining toys on the floor. The Baby Goats hardly stirred. It was a Winnie the Pooh key chain that somehow managed to escape my cleaning rampage when we no longer had 6 month olds in the house. I flipped this Winnie key chain around in my hand trying to find an OFF/ON switch. Nothing. I then looked for the battery and proceeded to stick a steak knife into the miniature screw that so securely holds the 400 AAA batteries. The knife tip broke. Meanwhile, Winnie seemed to be getting louder and my eardrums felt like they were going to bleed.

I pride myself on having good judgment and remaining calm. Apparently, Calm Dan went out the window, which is where Winnie should have gone and left for the raccoons to tear into him. Instead I decided… on second thought, it actually wasn’t all that logical, it was more like I “reacted”, by filling the bucket in the sink with water and throwing Pooh into it. I told you I wasn’t being rational! At 2AM, this made a whole lot of sense to me! I thought the best thing to do to stop the blaring was to drown Pooh!

I almost felt sorry for this bear as the gurgling sounds diminished. Except for the fact that the gurgling sounds never ended! Pooh was caught in a loop of final agonal breaths and all I could do was my best to ignore it. This was my digitized version of the Tell Tale Heart, written by Edgar Allen Pooh!

Ignore it, I did; until my 6 year old woke up at 5:00 and heard the sound coming from the bucket. He looked inside and you can imagine what went through this kid’s brain. He began wailing. I woke up and I tried to comfort him as he held the waterlogged key chain in his hands. I told him that this was an infant’s toy and we had no infants in the house. He said this was his “FAVORITE” infant’s toy. I then told him it was an accident, despite the CSI-inspired crime scene sans the blood and yellow tape. He keeps looking at me like I am the very definition of evil..perhaps I am.

Clearly, the rule of thumb here, is stay away from Sushi Night Out with coworkers!

Baby Goats, funny, parenting | 13 Comments »

I was sitting here with my 10 year old son as he worked on his homework. Don’t let me fool you, what this usually means is that I hover over him and tell him when to blink, because it seems this kid is sometimes incapable of accomplishing two consecutive steps without being cattle prodded.

It usually goes something like this:

• Dad: “Will you stop picking your nose and just write your name on the effing piece of paper?!”
• Michael: “YOU HATE ME!”

He storms out in tears. Welcome to my every day.

This homework is actually make-up homework from the night before. He had a list of words related to early explorers. Each word was on a separate sheet of paper with the following questions to fill out:

• Word:
• Definition:
• Where did you learn this definition:
• Synonym:
• Antonym:

Because the pages were sort of generic, we didn’t worry when it asked for antonyms for some of the words. “Just tell the teacher that there isn’t one.” I told Michael.

It turned out that he was marked incorrect by his teacher and he needs to complete it tonight. I just threw my hands in the air and said something like: “How am I ever going to do your homework for you, when the teacher (all of 21 years old) is asking you for the impossible.” Now my son hates me because his VERY short-lived dream that his father is a genius is shattered in a second and none of the pleading I do is changing his opinion…actually making it worse as I tell him “I am not an idiot son. There really is no way to do this homework. Trust me!”

“Sure Dad, whatever you say.” As he hangs his head in shame.

So, with my tail between my legs, I turn to you, BoMR, to guide me. You have helped me get through some pretty tough times and turn to you once again.

Question for BoMR (Both of My Readers):

Can you tell me a synonym and antonym for these words?

Compass

Age of Exploration

Explorer

Astrolabe

Here is what I have come up with:

Compass:

• synonym = That directional device that really doesn’t do anything especially when they put one in your car (”Everyone in the car, we are driving NNE today!).
• antonym = The biological gene that allows me to get lost…and NOT ask for directions (Yes, I went there, ladies and gentlemen. I am edgy like that! Pushing-the-envelope Leone, at your service. Stay tuned for my White Guys Can’t Dance routine!)

Age of Exploration:

• synonym = Age of Self-Stimulation
• antonym = Age of Having Your Mother Walk In While Self-Stimulating And The Subsequent Years Of Therapy

Explorer:

• synonym = “2nd Base” when the world is your oyster
• antonym = Marriage when you can’t even get up to bat

Astrolabe:

• synonym = Whattheeffisanastrolabe
• antonym = shoelace

I am turning to both of you now. You are my only hope.

Baby Goats, funny, parenting | 14 Comments »

My 10 year old is on the phone with his school buddy. I know I am getting old and out of touch with “the kids these days.” I am actually ecstatic about that. But considering the fact that my 5th grader just spent 3 hours doing his math homework while I hovered over him to let him know when to blink, I would have thought they would be comparing notes on the homework, or asking each other for help or setting up time to study together or try to get a jump start on tomorrow’s homework or work on the science project that is due next week. Nope! My 10 year old is pacing the floor right now and this is a literal transcription of what he just said 3 minutes ago (I had him stop and tell me what he said as I wrote this down):

I traded my level 1 Charmander, caught in a Pokeball, for a Garchomp, caught in a Master Ball. It was awesome! Now I have all of the evolutions: Gibble, Gabite and Garchomp. It knew strength, hyperbeam and whilrwind attack.

When did this boy learn a new language? What the hell is a Charmander? But since my head latched on to some of the words so I thought perhaps this was a version of Esperanto that only 10 year olds understand…Pre-teeneranto?

So to help with the translation, I had a little fun and “babel-ized” it. I took the original quote and plugged it into here. From here, the text is translated from English to French then back to English, then to another language and so on for 5 different languages and finally ending up at English again. This can be funny because after each translation it gets imperfecter and imperfecter. The end result was this:

I interested my level 1 Charmander, intercepted in Pokeball, for Garchomp, intercepted in an arsenal of the sphere. It was impressive! Hour I has all the progresses: Gibble, Gabite and Garchomp.It had known the attack of the resistance, of them hyperbeam he and whilrwind.

“Arsenal of the Sphere.” I have no idea what that is, but I want to have one.

funny, parenting | 7 Comments »

The books all smelled the same, but I knew they each had something different to offer. The main branch of the public library was a half mile from my house. When I was young, this half-mile was considered the farthest I could travel on my own, without a car, without my parents. This freedom, typical for a child in the 1970’s, was a ticket for me; a ticket to anywhere and everywhere outside of this half-mile radius.

I will never know what drew me to this particular musty corner of the third floor of the library. Math was not my forte in school and I was struggling to manage algebra. This row of shelves was tucked between the sheet music section with its giant books filled with music notations and the social science section with its books about aborigines and anthropology. But I do know that I was DRAWN to this section. I was too young to understand most of what I looked at, but I knew that I was in a world entirely different than anything I had ever experienced.

I pulled a random calculus book off the shelf; one that clearly hadn’t been opened in years or ever. I did not even know what calculus was at the time. The jacketless cover cracked as I opened it. Inside was the magic world of numbers and symbols that instantly swept me away from my world of comfort and familiarity into a universe of possibilities. Inside these pages, I was swimming within a pool of reason and logic. I saw illustrations that showed ladders resting against walls and water flowing out of a basin. I saw graphs of beautiful symmetry that extended forever but finitely.

I read, without understanding, concepts such as limits and rates of change. I devoured words such as integration and derivatives and chewed on on summations.

I became lost in a world of Greek letters and squiggles. These symbols were more beautiful to me than the world’s greatest art. Though this sentence is not necessarily true, I saw art as something that showed us the world and these symbols were art that explained the world.

I felt alive in this corner of the library. I returned often and immersed myself in the ancient texts like some archaeologist staring at hieroglyphics; knowing that he is looking at something important even if not entirely understanding it.

At this point, I dreamed of being a mathematician, even though I struggled with trigonometry. But as is often the case with education, that dream was squelched by rote memorizations and struggling for grades. It was not about nurturing a passion but about passing a class and moving on, robotically to the next.

I have since lost that battle, now 43 and not a mathematician. I have lost many of those battles in my life. Mathematics was replaced by biology which was replaced by physics and cosmology. At each turn, I was faced with self-doubt fostered by continuous force-feeding of facts without contexts and judgment without consideration.

I have always been interested in these fields; my bookshelf filled with more Aczel and Hawking than Grisham and Patterson. Just last week, I uncovered an old calculus book in the attic. I remember throwing this book out of the window at the library into the bushes three stories below. I NEVER actually borrowed any books. I stole them until I was done with them. But I had this one in the attic. I brought it down to show my 10 year old. He is a little younger than I was when I first came across it, but I took a chance. I opened it and just showed him the myriad graphs and symbols. I spoke romantically and with melancholy. He did his due diligence and listened. After about 15 minutes of talking about numbers as if they were made of gold, he looked me in the eyes and asked, “Are you done Dad?”

No, son, I am not.

Baby Goats, parenting, writing | 6 Comments »

I take great pride in the fact that I have shielded my children from the violence that is so prevalent on TV and the movies. The adults in the house avoid watching the news when the Baby Goats are around and I believe the best invention is the ability to pause live TV. Of course, I understand that they are still exposed to violence when I am not around, but I try so hard to create a safe place for them in this house. I also know that as they get older, I will have less control over that and perhaps that is how it should be. There has to be an age where knowing that there is good and evil in the world is appropriate.

Yesterday, all I wanted to do was watch the New England Patriots defeat the Cleveland Browns with my 10 year old son. How great is it when five of us, each with a bowl of popcorn in our laps, sit down in front of the TV, all set to watch football? Well the Leone Family Funtime was short-lived. Every single commercial break had a preview for some violent TV program or movie. I frantically searched for the remote in order to skip some of the images, but at some point, my oldest saw CSI commercials where a man shoots a woman and it appears he throws her into the ocean. He also saw previews for that vampire movie that is due out.

This was a 1:00 game!

It is amazing that I see some parents get all up in arms about sex on TV, but accept without question the graphic violence. I would prefer my son see a semi-exposed breast than a shot of a decomposed body

So the solution was to take advantage of the technology. We paused the live TV for 30 minutes and then we would watch the game as I fast forwarded through the commercials. This would have worked, except by the time this happened, all three goats finished their popcorn and began having light-saber battles in their room….completely uninterested in the game.

parenting | 7 Comments »

I am sitting here, with laptop literally on my lap trying to get through today’s NY Times crossword puzzle. My 6 year old comes up to me, eyes barely open and asks: “Daddy, is there such a thing as a three cent coin?” I said no. He processes this for a minute and says “How about a twenty-two cent coin?” No Marc, there is no such thing as a 22 cent coin. He considers this response, clearly concerned and then asks, “How about a fifty-five cent coin?”

When is he going to stop? We can do this all day!

So, being the Father of the Year, I decided to turn this into an opportunity for learning, so I pull out some coins in order to discuss it. I tell him that in America, we really only use about 4 coins and that there are a couple of others that we rarely see. We then discuss the stupid system we use here with pennies, nickles, dimes and quarters.

He looks at me in the eyes and asks “Daddy, is there a seventy-two cent coin?”

IT IS 6 IN THE MORNING! I quit.

Baby Goats, funny, parenting | 3 Comments »

This is going to be a rant; a rant about my Baby Goats. But please don’t get me wrong. My kids are each brilliant in their own special way. My 10 year old can beat me in a game of chess. My 6 year old is funnier than any comedian in Vegas. My 4 year old can disarm you with her eyes.

But this is where the benediction ends.

This weekend I realized that there are a whole bunch of basic things that ALL kids should know by now. Or there are things that I knew when I was growing up.

1. My goats can barely ride their bikes - When I was their age, I rode my bike as a form of transportation. It was how I got around. Living in the city and with all the risks of leaving kids alone, has made this virtually impossible nowadays. The two oldest are able to ride, but have not a stitch of common sense. They might as well be riding blind-folded.

2. The goats have no idea how to tie their own shoes…in a way that they stay tied. In an age of velcro shoes, it has become too easy for parents to merely buy velcro and  forgo the hassles of bending down to tie a knot. Not to mention that when the kids do have tie shoes, the shoe laces these days stupidly and frustratingly refuse to stay tied. I must have told Michael 16 times to tie his shoes at his cousin’s birthday party over the weekend.

3. My 10 year old does not know long division or how to carry in subtraction. In fact, we as parents, were told to not teach those things to him by his teachers. We were told that would undermine the school’s attempt to teach. WTF?

4. How to respect their parents….I won’t even go there except to say when I was a baby goat, I NEVER EVER talked back to my parents!

5. How to play in the snow for more than 10 minutes without dying of frostbite. Each of the kids has North Face hats, Thinsulate gloves, L.L. Bean boots and Patagonia fleece-lined jackets, but after spending an hour getting them dressed, they walk outside and instantly complain that they are cold. All they want is to go back into the house, have some hot cocoa and play on the Game Cube. Whereas, when I was a baby goat, I had to wear those knit mittens that instantly soaked up water and froze to your skin and a pair of galoshes (by the way, my spell check does not even know what to do with the word “galoshes”!).

6. How to lose! In the days of “everyone is a winner,” we have bred a generation of kids completely ill-prepared to compete in the real world.

7. “Cursive” writing - Michael does not even know what that means!

Don’t get me wrong, there are a million things that they do better than I could ever do…even as an adult:

1. They can find an image of the Rosetta Stone on Google, copy it and then paste it into a Power Point presentation, include some transition effects and some animation…all in 20 seconds.

2. They know what the middle mouse button does.

3. Use chopsticks

4. Negotiate to the point of utter exhaustion and eventual capitulation.

5. Can locate every Family Guy video on YouTube

6. Use the Picture-in-picture feature on the TV

7. When faced with a coffee table filled with 4 remote controls, they don’t hesitate to reach for the one that will find the “Main Menu” for the DVD player.

8. Make fart sounds with at least 4 different body parts that are NOT their butts.

funny, parenting | 6 Comments »

I was thinking this today as I pushed my daughter on the swing-set at a local park:

How hard would I have to push my daughter on the swings so that she goes completely around in a circle?

Is it a function of her mass or is it simply the force of the push? Is Conservation of Angular Momentum at play here? I never really understood that chapter in physics way back in the days when I was smart (remember my motto: The older I get, the better I used to be). Of course, I didn’t try to push her so hard that she flew around in a circle….well, I was pushing the envelope by pushing her until the chains slacked. It was then that I wondered if I could push hard enough to give her the ride of her life.

Technorati : imponderable
Del.icio.us : imponderable

Powered by Zoundry

funny, parenting | 3 Comments »

As both of you know, I used to be an EMT. If you stick around long enough, you realize that I begin many conversations with that exact sentence. I tend to use that card when I am at a party because it inevitably results in “what’s the grossest thing you ever saw” conversations. For a brief, shining moment, I am the center of the universe as I relate story after story in the “The Older I Get, The Better I Used To Be” saga that is my life.

The point of this pointless post is that I have seen a lot of stuff. By “a lot”, I mean “A LOT!” Lots of capital letters and exclamation points. Blood, guts, pieces and parts. I have been puked on, shat upon, beaten up and even managed to save a life or two.

So, when my 6 year old came up to me and showed me his loose tooth, wiggling it furiously and bending it so that it was horizontal, I must have said “That is fantastic, Marc! You are getting to be a BIG boy now. Can I wiggle it too?”

WRONG! What I said instead was: “Holy crap! That is gross! Get that away from me! YUCK! ICKY!” and almost had my knees give out on me.

Luckily it fell out when I wasn’t near it.

From tough guy to p*ssy! Remember my motto: The older I get, the better I used to be. 

blogging, funny, parenting | 5 Comments »

I went tonight to the airport to pick up my mom and dad. They spent 5 weeks in my father’s village in Italy. I arrived on time which meant, in Alitalia terms, that I was 3 hours early. I waited at the International Arrivals doors and watched people. I believe there are very few things I enjoy doing more than being in an airport watching the world go places. I really am not being facetious. I love watching people in cafes, parks and even the airport.

The way too beautiful woman waiting for her way too beautiful husband had no inhibitions about public displays of affection as they kissed and he gave her a romantic dip designed for all to see. Clearly he was away far too long and clearly they will enjoy their evening. The elderly couple returning from whatever corner of the planet they visited rolled out in wheelchairs as their 5 or 6 grandchildren stood with balloons and flowers. I saw an exchange student meeting her host family for the first time. It was a tad awkward as the mom held out her hand for a rather formal handshake and the young teen hugged and kissed her multiple times. Americans are weird like that. You would not have to be too alert to see the two nuns greeting a third as she came out of customs. She was carrying a hand-crafted toy guitar that she obviously carried all the way from Rome without breaking it or bending the paper towel tube neck. It was fun watching them giggle as she recalled how hard it was to get through customs. How do you strip search a nun (Don’t answer that People in the Sun!)? I love this mini red carpet walk people take at the airport. I love the fact that no matter how comfortable we become with technology, people still treat an international flight as if they were Charles Lindbergh himself. We are still awestruck at the thought that we are flying over the ocean and that we somehow arrive in one piece.

The times, they are a changin’ though. I saw Massachusetts State Police everywhere. As some of the 9/11 terrorists used Logan Airport as a jumping off point for their cowardly act, I am comforted by the extra police presence.

Of course, I was not there to look at people. I was waiting for my parents. Most of the crowd had dissipated and spread out to their respective corners of the City. Finally, they emerged from customs. I knew something was wrong but it was only intuition. I greeted my parents as usual with a kiss to both of them. In my 42 year history with my father, the only time I have kissed him is when we are seeing the other off at the airport and maybe when I got married.

As I loaded their luggage into the van, I was struck by how cautious my mom was with my father. “Donato, do not lift those. Let Danny do that.” Yes, I am still called Danny! Leave me alone. When we arrived home, the same thing. He was warned not to lift anything heavy by my mom. This is to a man that is stronger than I we have said will outlive us all. He is the very picture of health.

When we came upstairs to their house, my mom immediately listened to their messages. The first, second and third message was from my father’s doctors office confirming an appointment tomorrow morning. Tomorrow morning! Why so soon?, I asked my mom. She didn’t get a word out of her mouth because she began sobbing. It appears that when my father was in Italy, he had an incident where his speech was getting slurred and he was becoming increasingly frustrated. They called a local doctor and was told to either come into the hospital immediately or to take the next flight back to Boston to be seen by his own doctor. Apparently, he made that appointment with his own doctor but not until they arrived home. He did not see the doctor in Italy either.

As my father was telling me about the wine in Italy and how it was inferior to our own home-made wine and I looked at his face, when eye contact is so hard sometimes. Then it was very apparent to me. My father had suffered a small stroke while in Italy. The right side of his mouth drooped and he slurred his words as he relayed his wine story. I assume the damage is permanent, but what is killing me right now is I am faced, yet again, with a reminder that my parents are mortal.

Thanks for listening.

Technorati : dad, stroke
Del.icio.us : dad, stroke

Powered by Zoundry

parenting, writing | 9 Comments »

Powered by Zoundry

funny, parenting | 3 Comments »

Exactly one minute ago, my 5 year old randomly said to no one: I caca farted last night.

I have no idea if “caca” is a universal term, but I bet it is universal to parents.

I didn’t ask questions, investigate the truth or poke my nose where it doesn’t belong. I just threw him into the shower. He is singing “Rain, rain, go away…” as I type this.

Happy Birthday America!

Del.icio.us : funny, parenting

Powered by Zoundry

funny, parenting | 4 Comments »

My two sons and I had the most lovely day bonding on Monday at the Museum of Science. In Boston, Monday was some holiday that I knew nothing about. The MoS was a place my older son and I have ejoyed on many occasions and it was so wonderful to include my almost 6 year old too. We had wonderful science-y related discussions and life was good. Now clearly, the primary purpose of going to the Museum was the prospect of the promised visit to the gift shop after the exhibits. They were given 5 dollars each so 25 dollars each later, we had a bag of rocks, a stuffed baby robin (complete with authentic baby robin sounds), something slimy that will only serve as a hair and dust magnet once it enters our house, and, the prized item, an authentic sharks tooth about 3 inches long in its own case. This set me back a billion dollars.

Now, I am not so delusional to believe that we will still be able to locate the tooth in the next 30 days. We live in a shoebox, but items seem to magically disappear without notice. But, imagine my eyeballs rolling into the back of my head when I hear my son screech “Where’s my sharks tooth?” not even one hour after returning home. We went on a frantic shark hunt turning over pillows and feeling between the couch cushions (we found food there! YUCK!). Finally, I noticed my daughter with that satanic look on her face she gets when she ate the canary. “Honey…do you know where the tooth is?” “I took it.” So now I lost my mind and began lecturing about property and how I will leave her outside for the raccoon if she touches anything in this house again. She got the message and slowly climbed the ladder to my son’s bunk bed and reached under his pillow.  “I left it here so the Tooth Fairy could give Marc money.”

[insert collective AWWWWWWWWW here]

funny, parenting | 3 Comments »

My 5 and a half year old just came up to me and said:

“Dad, I know 3 things that are made of gas”

Now, most dads live vicariously through their boys when it comes to sports. But science is my thing so imagine how excited I was that my son wanted to share some science facts. “Tell me,” I said:

” Well, there is air and gravity and god”

I guess that would depend on your definition of gas.

funny, parenting | 3 Comments »

Since the birth of the Baby Goats, there are foods that I used to love that I no longer can get near:

• Cheerios
• Cheez-Its
• Goldfish
• Apple Juice
• Peanut Butter and Jelly Sandwiches
• Those little trays of cheese and crackers with that red stick thing used to schmear the cheese.

After nearly 10 years of finding cheerios in the holes of the car seat, wiping peanut butter off my knuckles because I need to buy the giant 5 gallon drum of peanut butter and smelling Cheeze-It breath, I will never consider these food items.

Are there things that you used to eat that you can no longer stand (either using the kids as an excuse or not)?

funny, parenting | 3 Comments »

Living in the city, trees are as rare as….um, well…trees in the city. So, I took the boys to a park in a suburb of Boston that has a nice little trail to walk around and explore some of the stuff we call nature. There were a couple of soccer fields filled with 8 year old girls in knee-high socks playing a game and surrounded by the proverbial soccer moms with their portable chairs and not-watching-the-game-because-we-are-too-busy-
talking-about-soccer-mom-stuff attitudes.

Surrounding the field was a small row of trees with low, very-climbable trees. I decided to let the boys experience tree climbing and turned to tell them…but they were already scaling the branches. At some point, I heard my youngest son, Marc, scream out “I want to eat sack, Dad!” I pretended not to hear, but the soccer moms all turned to look. “I want to eat sack,” he screamed louder. Flabbergasted, the moms looked at me to see what I was going to do about this outrage that the city dragged into their idyllic “suburbian” landscape.

I knew that Marc was not saying anything filthy and he certainly would have no idea what “eating sack” means…I am not sure I even know what it means. But it sounded dirty. I turned to Marc for clarification and I could feel all eyes drilling holes into the back of my head. “What did you say, Marc?!”, I said in feigned interest.

Marc looked at his hand and showed me the sticky mess on his hands. “Is it OK to eat the sack off my hands?” I started laughing as I realized he meant to say “SAP”, not “SACK!” I was relieved that the moms overheard this and went about their pedicured conversations.

I need to take the baby goats out more often.

funny, parenting | 1 Comment »

I was reading the above book to my baby goats last night as one of the 50 I had to read for their bedtime. Everyone was interested in the book, but surprisingly remained silent but at the same time, I could tell their brains were chewing on something. Then when I got to the end of the story, my 5 year old said what that sound CLICK, CLACK was supposed to mean? I said it was the sound that a typewriter makes. You can guess what the next question was: “Dad, what is a typewriter!”

After wanting to jump out the window (we live on the first floor…it figures), my genius 9 year old said:

“A typewriter is a devise ancient people used before computers were invented. I know, because I think I saw one in a museum once.”

I told him that archaeologists have recently dug up the remains of television sets that did not come with a remote control.

funny, parenting | 5 Comments »

My 5 year old, the eternal philosopher, said this at 5AM this morning:

“Dad, what is the biggest thing on the Earth?”

“Probably the ocean, Marc.”

“Oh, I thought it was our house.”

First of all, how profound is that question? Secondly, we live in a shoe box.

Ciao for now.

funny, parenting | 2 Comments »

My 5 year old said this morning:

“Dad, I am thinking of something pink and gray and squishy. Do you know what it is?”

No son, I don’t.

“I am thinking about my brain. Isn’t that funny. I think with my brain AND I am thinking about my brain.”

This might be more profound than it seems. It sort of reminds me of the mental gymnastics I went through while reading one of my favorite books: Godel, Escher, Bach: An Eternal Golden Braid.

Meanwhile, I am thinking about my coffee.

Ciao for now.

funny, parenting | 1 Comment »

….between 7:19 AM and 7:32 AM, this morning, my 3 year old daughter said the lines, “I want” or “I need” EXACTLY 26 times! That is nearly 2 every minute…one every 30 seconds!

What does a 3 year old need?, you may ask. Apparently, she needs the Barney spoon, jelly schmeared on the Pillsbury Crescent Rolls AFTER the roll is cut into bite-sized pieces, the chair that my son was sitting in, the red plate, the princess cup (but not the one with the “ugly princess” on it, to eat in the living room, some candy (WHAT?!), the bread cut into diagonal slices, not the closed cup and a myriad other things.

What have we created?! Is this the beginning of the end? Will it get worse? Can it get worse? Do kids nowadays have too many choices? Are we raising a family of ingrates? Will she ever be happy?

I hate to become 70 in one sentence, but when I was here age, I would be happy to have the crust from some stale bread and some watered down tea ( I just made that part up, but it sounded funny in my head ).

Ciao nor now.

funny, parenting | 3 Comments »

IMG_2955

Originally uploaded by danleone.

The baby goats ready for a frigid Easter.

parenting | 1 Comment »

My 5 year old, going through a mini calendar fetish, came up to me and said

Daddy, the first day I knew was October 31st. I remember it because I didn’t know any days before that.

powered by performancing firefox

funny, parenting, quote | No Comments »

My 5 year old said:

I like waking up at seven o’clock, because then I only have two more o’clocks left before going to school.”

This is a much better situation than his normal routine, which is to wake up when there are four o’clocks left!

powered by performancing firefox

funny, parenting | No Comments »

Children’s toys should now have a “Some Disassembly Required” warning label on them. I came to this conclusion after spending most of Christmas furiously trying to detach toys from their twist-tied prison. The pressure was intensified as my baby goats were hovering over me as if`the gift I had in my hand was the last gift on the planet. On one stupid Spiderman car I must have removed 15 of those damned things! One of my daughter’s dolls came with a foot long twisty that wove its way in and around the dolls ankles as if the person packing the doll had a night job as a dominatrix. I was surprised I didn’t see a red ball gag in the doll’s mouth. I guess I didn’t know the “safe word” because I almost told my daughter that the cardboard backing was part of the doll and should not be removed.

Give me assembly instructions written in Japanese any day!

funny, parenting | 3 Comments »

The other day I asked my 5 year old son what he wanted to be when he grew up. Typical conversation all parents have. Clearly he would say something like an astronaut, or a fireman or in my dream world, “just like you Daddy.” Nope, not my son. He thought for not even a second and with a straight face said…..”a caterpillar.”

WHAT?!

funny, parenting | 1 Comment »