• Life,  Studying,  Writing

    Another Trip Around the Sun

    by I’m 51 today. If you’re keeping track, that means I was born in 1970. It also means I’ve spent the last few years growing more conscious of my age and the ages of the important people around me, particularly the ones who are significantly older. Strange how we grow more aware of our mortality in middle age. To go along with that, there’s the idea with deep roots in my head that I need to make the rest of my time in the universe as productive and meaningful as I can. In the neighbourhood of my 50th birthday last year, I significantly overestimated how productive I’d be on the…

  • Life,  Parenting

    My Youngest Child is Now a Legal Adult

    by So the 50th birthday is supposed to make you feel old in some ways, yes? It does that for most of us at least a little, I think. At age 50, you look around at your friends and see how old they’re getting and you look at your parents if they’re still with you, and you’re forcibly reminded of your own mortality. You’re getting older. But you know what’s worse? Having your youngest child experience the birthday that makes them a legal adult, and that’s today. Wow. Yeah, now I feel old. Today, I’m letting my mind roll back over all those moments, good and bad. First words, first…

  • Life

    Happy Birthday To Me

    by Well, it seems to work that if you survive enough orbits around the sun, you start to hit some larger numbers. Some of those are considered milestones. I hit one of those today. 50. I don’t, at least for myself, have a particularly strong connection to birthdays. Yesterday I was 49. Today, I’m 50. While I’d planned to have a big party for my 50th, that was more for other people than for me. We all need reasons to celebrate, especially lately. But COVID goes on and continues putting everything on hold. Maybe next year. Or whenever. We’d planned something big for our 25th anniversary this past May and…

  • Life,  Parenting

    Oldest’s Birthday

    by Under the heading of, “Today I feel old”, my oldest child turned 22 today. Twenty-two years ago today at 0142 in the morning, my son joined our family. It was a good day, COVID notwithstanding. Sushi, cake, presents, bad movies, and he won a League of Legends tournament. Twenty-two years after that dark winter night. 8,036 days later. So many events, so many memories, so many years. Happy birthday, my son. by

  • Life

    A Daughter’s Birthday

    by In the ongoing saga of, “When did I get so old?”, today is my oldest daughter’s th birthday. In every way marked by our society, she’s now a legal adult. I try not to blog about my kids’ major life events too often, at least partly for privacy concerns, but there are certain milestones that are a big deal, and nineteen is one of them. Strictly speaking, nineteen is absolutely one of them as it takes away the last handful of things that our society puts a legal age minimum on, mainly: Buy/consume alcohol, cigarettes, or cannabis products Buy lottery tickets or go to a casino Adopt a pet…

  • Life,  Parenting

    My Youngest Turns 16

    by Holy crap, my youngest child is old enough to drive. She elected not to go write the test today, already having enough on her plate, but could have. Maybe on the weekend. But my youngest child is old enough to drive. It’s crystal in my memory holding her for the first time, her holding my finger for the first time, the sheer amount of hair (with blonde highlights) she was born with, bringing her home from the hospital, and on. It’s not so easy for me to wrap my head around the idea that it’s been sixteen years since that day she finally came into our lives. It should…

  • Life

    Happy Birthday To Me

    by Happy birthday to me. When this posts, my 48th birthday will be very close to being over. I’ll have completed 48 full orbits around the sun and be just starting my 49th. Seems like a lot, but at same time it seems like very little. I don’t mean in terms of geologic time, obviously, but somehow it’s just a little bit hard for me to wrap my head around the fact that I’m closing in on being a half-century old. That’s a debate for another time, with the current point being that I’ve still got way too much I want to accomplish, I suppose. I have typically reserved my…

  • Life

    They Say It’s Your Birthday…

    by Congratulations to me, I’ve completed another trip around the sun. That’s forty-five now, if you’re interested in counting. There are traditionally three questions I ask myself on my birthday. Well, there are traditionally two, but I added one last year. Was this the best year of my life? 2015 Answer: No. I got blindsided by several things this year, family members with various health issues that blew my stress level way up. Plus work stuff – we’re being taken over early in January – and a general feeling of burnout that’s probably just a net result of everything. And I’m beginning to think I may have a couple of…

  • Life

    Three Teenagers?

    by So today is my youngest child’s birthday. She’s turning 12. I’m not sure if you can count 12 as a teen year or not, but if you can, that means I now have three teenagers. When I was a teenager, that would’ve been the furthest thing from my mind. In my 20s, especially before we got married, kids were a distant thing on the horizon, at least until we decided we wanted them. In my 30s, when I had those kids, when they were small, the teenage years still seemed comfortably far away. Now, not so much. 16, closing in on 14, and just turned 12. Two-teen, right? Okay,…