the chicks dig the tinger

On any typical night in our household, the four of us and trusty dog Alice can be found in our very cozy living room, fire crackling in the fireplace, post dinner redolence hanging in the air, all face down in our various handheld devices.  I have a trusty Blackberry, Steph has an Iphone, Hudson has an Ipod touch and Tasman wages Lego-based war on all Star Wars characters on his brother’s hand me down, the Nintendo DSI.

Yes I am bit embarrassed writing this.  And no this is not an everyday vignette of our lives.  Most nights are much more chaotic.  Homework pages shuffling, LMFAO blasting in the background, Alice the dog losing the war with another lost mitten, Tasman doing a dance where his penis happens to peak over the top of his pants (hilarity!) and Steph trying to ask me a question about which January date is available to have dinner out with friends.  The phone rings, the door knocks, the smoke detector goes off because of the burning toast (or is that a stroke) and suddenly the penis dancing becomes a wipeout or Hud, admittedly distracted from his spelling, slaps his brother on the back for sport.  Cue the wailing, the blaming, the disciplining, the stomping and the slamming of doors.

So, if I am to be judged for occasionally not saying a word when all of us fall into the silent techospell of personal devices, bring it on.  Sometimes that 15 minutes of silent satisfaction is worth it.

Anticipating a fairly relaxed but productive weekend.  Dinner with friends that I like tonight – should be chock full of belly laughs and instant memories.  Speaking of bellies, turns out mine is all fucked up again.  The wonderful lap band has once again tightened to the point of not letting anything over  the size of a pea pass through to my stomach, thus leaving me a bit light headed and a lot lighter (10 lbs in 20 days).

So while all the weight I gained back during the lap band draining (or I like to call it the foodcation) is pretty much gone and the nudie morning look in the mirror is looking pretty good now,the whole needing food to live is coming into play.

So after a recent defiling (yesterday) I will likely have to return next week to allow more food to sluice down the ol’ gullet.

Good times.

Anyhoo – back to Tim and Laura.

***

Laura never thought she was the type of woman that would have an affair.  She was a bit wild during her twenties, more drinks and dance floor groping than she would like to admit, but when she committed, she stayed honest and faithful.

Her first post university boyfriend was a bit of jerk, a derivatives trader with tortoise shell glasses and sharp pointy, Ferragamo shoes as shiny as his occasionally slicked back hair.   They both worked hard – she was an industrious event planner at the time – and played hard at the various trendy bars and clubs located near the district where they both worked.  He was tall; almost 6’5” and Laura loved walking into rooms with him and his elongated presence. He was attractive, as was she, and his big, occasionally loud personality would turn a simple after work drink into group shouts of tequila and sloppy bathroom stall make out sessions.  It was only after 15 months of this booze fuelled fun fest Laura received a 1:24am phone call from her tall, loud boyfriend asking her if her husband was home.  It wasn’t the question, it was the silence that followed, making Laura realize immediately that the man she so loved being with, also loved being with someone else.

Two months and many baskets of French fries later, Tim strolled into her life.  He was neither tall, nor slick and his shoes were usually flip flops.  His hound dog eyes, coke- bottle shoulders and latent grunge goatee did not match his unique ability to make people squirm with his remarkable pointed and perceptive questions.  It was these questions and social sagacity that attracted Laura, not the earthy, plush laid back character statement he was trying to make.

“Can I borrow your sugar?”  Was the first question he asked while she was reading a book, sipping a latte.

“Did you know chewing pens is a sign of sexual frustration?”  Was the second.

Then he sat down and poured sugar into his coffee, smirking, staring, begging for a response.  Laura stared back at Tim, the man she was eventually going to marry and wondered if this was a calculated pick up move or not.  Either way, she succumbed, more out of boredom than curiosity.

“I did know that actually,” she replied, placing the dog eared paperback on the table.  “Why do you think this pen is so mangled?”  Her turn to smirk.

The 20 or so seconds of silence that followed Laura’s bold comeback was when she decided to shake of the cobwebs of the douchebag who was sleeping with four other women and get back in the game.  27 years old was not a time to be wallowing over the loss of something insignificant.  There was a cute guy sitting right across from her.  A bit ruffled, a bit milquetoast, but with a great little half smile that she was already feeling in various parts of her body.

“Hi I am Tim,” he said extending his hand.  His thumb ringed hand.

“Nice to meet you Tim, I’m Laura.”

***

I occasionally feel guilty for not writing about Tasman as often as I write about Hudson.  Truth is Tasman has grown to be a five year old boy of considerable ease.  He is constantly happy, often goofy and is not at the stage where listening is optional.  He eats well, goes to bed easily and sleeps a good 9-10 hours a night.  His maladies are neither severe nor repetitive and while very much a fan of screen time, he can be easily lured into a game or a puzzle or even an educational based task of writing or reading.  He excels at school (could have skipped SK without a blip) and instantly made multiple friends at his new school.

I know what lurks around the corner.  The innocent five-year old quickly can morph into the insolent six-year old.  He watches his older brother very closely and mimics his sassiness on occasion until our smiles turn to surprised frowns and he rushes over to hug our legs and tell us he loves us.  I know about the constant un-tethering of my children, offering them more and more rope each day to allow the experiences of life to hit them without the parental armor.  To let them begin to make the decisions that will shape and affect their brain, heart and soul.  But now, during the banal hours of the work day, I close my eyes and I see Tasman’s smile.  Or watch him dance.  Or even remember the occasional temper tantrum that is so comical in its ferocity that holding a straight face is pretty much impossible.  I long for him.  I crave his radiant laughter and can’t wait for him to tackle me when I arrive home from work.  Sure it’s just a brief moment torn away from his Batman Lego Wii game, but in that moment I can feel his love burning for me and I revel in it, bask in its uncomplicated goodness.

I love them both so much and know their differences will help define who they eventually become.  Sibling love has an obvious impact and as both a participant and spectator in their lives, I am eager to see where their relationship gaps grow and where it eventually reconnects (or doesn’t, life is not perfect).

For now, I will continue wrapping myself in Tasman’s love knowing the rushes to the door soon become the nods through earphones and rolling of the eyes at my barrage of daily questions.

He is good little egg that boy.

No more fiction entries for awhile (have to write more of it!) – would love to have some feedback on it.

Please comment below.

Just so happens, during this week of riding the solo parental train the parent/teacher meetings are scheduled.  Last night was with Hud’s teacher, a very prim and organized Asian gentlemen whose reputation of educational excellence preceded him from many reliable sources.  I had the chance to meet him briefly on two separate occasions, but last night was my first chance to watch him engage with my pensive son for any extended period of time.  When asked his feelings about his teacher, Hud’s general positive response dipped in apathy was the most we could yank out of him. He brushes off questions about his school life with such speed and annoyance; it is like we are asking him to bare his arm for an impending needle.

So it was a treat to be seated in chairs with tennis ball nubs to keep them from squeaking and listen to this forthright, articulate, young teacher talk to Hudson about his strengths and where he needs improvement.  I had to back away from my natural tendency to chime in about the guiding of my son’s scholastic habits and defer to a man who I know is better trained to deal with both the how and the why Hudson should be focusing on certain learning challenges.  Initiative and collaboration are the two areas where Hud needs to step up, which literally means taking the chance of being wrong and suggesting ideas in a group or to the teacher directly.  Two things that are waning because of Hud’s lack of confidence.

Of course I stepped forward with my whole good to great speech and moving from the middle to the front of the bus metaphors before I was shot down by the steely glare of the teacher who wants Hudson to take these two attributes and place all his focus on moving these two from satisfactory to good, not the seven others from good to excellent.  Smaller focused goals instead of my holistic overwhelming objectives that Hud seems to see as daunting.  Needless to say, I kept my mouth shut until I was asked my opinion with three minutes left in the interview.  I kept it tight and just told him I was happy that he was with a teacher that cared and as parents, the three of us could act as partners to help our Hudson grow and learn.

Tomorrow it’s the interview with Tasman’s teacher.  And teachers are funny animals.

****

Tim’s work cubicle was about 10ft by 10ft with a small fichus plant in one corner, a miniature basketball net in another and all three and half walls smeared with office printer pictures of Tatum, the absolute love of his life.  His job at a mid-sized investment management company is pretty boring.  It’s not the job he works for; it’s the not too shabby pay cheque.  His comfort and ability to leave right at 5pm everyday to rush home and see his Tatum is his primary objective.  Everything else is just corporate politics, ticking clocks, middle aged women with ID badges attached to their belt loops and occasional brain numbing tedium.

The various shaped photos at various angles help him get through it all on most days.  It’s her tiny brown ringlets, thin lips, slightly upturned nose and winter sky blue eyes that make elderly women in grocery stores stop and gasp.  She wears overalls and high top Chuck Taylors.  She toots when she sneezes and thinks it’s the funniest thing in the history of funny.  She falls asleep in tucked under Tim’s arm while he watches Seinfeld reruns.  He loves her so much his chest actually throbs.

When Laura showed Tim the little white stick with pink circle (at 3am for some reason) his first thought was not that they were having a baby, but he was having a boy.  The second and third thoughts were the fast forward vignettes of playing catch, or, more aptly, shooting hoops in the driveway at various stages of rim reach-ability.  It was chips and Diet Coke watching the Superbowl, it was wrestling and video game buffoonery.  It was basically permission for Tim to remain an adolescent for at least 20 more years so he could better relate to his son – a pretty sweet deal in his opinion.

But then along came Tatum.

It was about a month into the second trimester when the ultrasound technician asked if they wanted to know the sex of our baby.  Laura was 10 minutes late for the appointment and Tim, looking very financial district in a grey suit and mauve tie, was biting his nails in the medical building waiting room.  He started his new job a month previously and was extremely anxious about being away from the office for any amount of time.  Laura was elbows deep in the renovation of the dining room for the largest (and richest) of her four clients and had been cornered by Judith (in a smart pantsuit) and her contractor (also in a pantsuit) who could not agree on which wall to knock down.  Laura kept trying to break away but Judith was having none of it, displaying militant indifference to the existence of any other problem other than her own.   Finally she let Laura leave after ensuring she was onside with her wall demolition choice.

The frenzy of Laura arriving at the doctor’s office was brief and Tim pushed aside his anger at her tardiness to get back to the wonder of the appointment.   Their technician was a middle aged Asian woman with hair so thin, dark moles poked through the black hair just to say hello.  Her English (engrish?) was tragically halted and broken but she was enthusiastic, with a laugh like a chickadee, so the room quickly moved from harried to full of excitement.

“Would you like to know sex of baby?”  She asked, ultrasound wand goopy and moving all around Laura’s belly, faint heartbeat thumping so quick, so eager.  Tim remembered looking at Laura with every intention of postponing the knowledge of the sex until the birth.  The whole ‘one of life’s rare true surprises’ angle, very much consistent with his romanticizing every nook and cranny of their lives.  Laura, already decorating the room in her mind, of course wanted to know, wanted to avoid the blue/yellow debate, the returning of wrong gender specific onesies.  So before Tim had a chance to whimper out the words, “let’s wait”, Laura looked into the wonderfully goofy buck toothed grin of their Asian technician and asked her if it was a girl.  And the technician just smiled with her eyes, mouth pressed flat, and nodded.  Tim, again pushing away the prick of anger caused by his wife, let it all sink in, the reality sluicing through his veins, blanketing his images of basement foozball fart fests to be replaced by, by what?  Barbies and doilies?  Pink chiffon boas and Laura’s oversized high heels?  He had no idea what to think.

But when Tatum arrived four months later, looking like a mole rat, wiggling in the blood and the gunk and the sweat and the relief, Tim was blown away on how strong and how instant the love for her was, how all his juvenile masculine forecasting was whisked away with the sight of his daughter, her eyes as big as the sun, staring vacantly back at him from under the Burger King like heat lamps.

****

Steph has left me.

Dramatic pause.

She left this morning at 4am in a long, black car.  We talked briefly before she left; she even cut my hair to make my mustached appearance look more like a gay cop.  She did not glance out the back of the tinted window to see my bullethead looking through our front door.  She did not see me slink back to the couch and flip on the television to watch sports highlights, brushing head hair out of chest hair.

She did text from the airport to tell me she was safely in line, embarking on her seven day journey to Cuba with her two oldest friends.  It’s the beginning of a year long celebration of her turning an age of certain distinction.  An age that I already turned and one she is grappling with, although pretty gracefully.  Naturally.

So it’s me and the boys this week.  Farts and dinks week as I affectionately call it.  And while I am envious of Steph’s Mohito 19 year old pool boy Carlos beachside moments, particularly as the weather shifts into icy gear, I do know she busts her ass as mother and professional and I recognize the value of just kickin’ it with old friends surrounded by booze and sun.  This also was paid for by a small stipend left behind by her recently passed grampy, so all the power to her for not letting the money just blend into the daily grind.

It also gives me great bank for any future boys’ events and the household dynamic shifts when mom’s not around.  Not that Steph is some drill sergeant (I play that role too), but there is something to be said about laying on the floor with every blanket and every pillow in the house and watching superhero movies until they both fall asleep under each armpit covered in Ruffles potato chips.

Of course this is also day one, a Friday with no plans other than wrestling, a totally nutritionally unbalanced meal and renting some Wii games.  Tomorrow I have mapped a day that includes a hike at Rattlesnake Point, an hour at Playdium and then an afternoon play date for all of us.  I have done these little single parent vignettes before and the key has always been keeping them active and keep them organized.  Announce the schedule, post it if you have a chalkboard, and let them follow along, through both the menial tasks and the fun ones.

I am no pro and by Tuesday I will be weeping in my bed begging for my wife to return to restore some order, offer some calm and just make our household lovelier again.

Farts and dinks indeed.

Make this entry a double!

***

“Oh fuck Tim, I’m so irritated with my husband I want to flirt with you but I am too aggravated to come up with anything interesting.”

Sarah’s e-mail reply did not arrive as quickly this time.  In fact, Tim actually became so enamoured with the writing of his press release that she managed to slip away from his mind for a brief moment.  His boss was pleased with the draft, his cherubic face smiling and his bloated knuckles tapping his desk as he read it, leaving it free of red pen edits.  This is fine my boy, just fine!

Before he could think of how to respond to Sarah, Tim went to bathroom.  After a shake and a zip, he stared at himself in the mirror.  He was greying around the temples, but he still had a pretty solid head of hair.  He kept it reasonably short and when it did get a bit long, he added a bit of product and slicked it back a little. The crow’s feet around his eyes were deeper than he liked, but for 37 years old, he was doing ok.  Better than some of his balding, moustache growing (what the fuck?) paunch carrying buddies he has known since forever.  He had a bit of a muffin top, but it was seasonal, reappearing after a summer of light jogging as winter running in Toronto is for crazy people.  He glances at the mirror for a final time and almost winks.  Another midday ego check passed.

He returns to his desk and stares at a picture of his wife, the two of them actually, laughing on a ski hill, he can see the reflection of the camera he was holding in Laura’s preying mantis sunglasses.

Tim is unsure if he could ever have an affair on Laura and it disappoints him that his fidelity is not absolute.  That if a perfect scenario, a perfect opportunity were presented, he may saunter over to the side of different desire.  He wishes the heaviness of new,earnest love was still there, embedded in his chest and his loins, so he could announce prophetically to the world that yes, YES! Indeed he would never fall into the arms or between the legs of another, that his hot blood runs true, and not because of the consequences, but because of the passion, the sincerity and the lust he still feels for his wife of eight years.  Boo ya!  But he knows that ardour is just not the same anymore. Change the channel.  Pass the chips.

***

Duncan’s bedroom is not much better than ours, Laura thought, naked, covered in a sheet somewhere between silk and rayon. He being single and just 30 was evident in his design style.  Frat boy chic mixed with affluent family hand-me-downs.  Lots of black lacquer and antique lamps, framed motivational posters and pictures of golden retrievers and sun soaked cottage docks.

“That was fun,” Duncan leaps onto the bed after returning from the washroom, his long penis flopping like a dog’s ear.  “It was a nice surprise to get a text from you this morning.”

“Thank you for being so accommodating,” Laura replied, hugging the sheet closer to her body.  “What time is your meeting?”

Duncan is an independent mortgage broker.  “An hour,” he grinned impishly.  “Why? You good to go again?”  He grins and thumbs the tussled bed.

“Save your energy for your client,” Laura discretely stands, holding the slippery sheet against her breasts.  “I have to head across town to go look at a mirror.”

“A mirror?”

Duncan pulls the top drawer of his tall, rustic dresser and pulls out black dress socks and boxers.  He exclusively wears blue pin stripe boxers. The tradition contrasts his somewhat flaky character and Laura appreciates it.

“What kind of mirror?”

Laura abandons all modesty and lets the sheet fall to the floor.  She slips on her three to a pack La Senza thong on quickly – thankfully avoiding the toe hook, naked bunny hop, in front of secret lover embarrassment.

“An antique 11 foot walnut triptych.”  She replies, hoisting her 36 C’s into her bra and staring into Duncan’s blank stare. She adds.  “The expensive kind.”

They both pass each other in the bedroom, scooping up various items of clothing and accessories that were flung across the room in various stages of time challenged embrace.

Smooch, hug, text me soon baby doll.  Sure thing love. Bye now.

52 minutes after arriving at Duncan’s condo, Laura is now sated, smoothed out, still a bit moist and driving too fast to the west end of the city to look at, and arrange delivery for a $3200 mirror.  A mirror that will hopefully not reflect how her freshly fucked guilt has ruined her make up.

***

Life is funny sometimes.  Damn it if I am not going to satisfy my 2011 resolution as the clock to year’s end ticks away.

Not much time to lament about today’s oddly confident day.  Maybe its because I picked up my new meds.  Or maybe I am getting used to the new mustache.  Either way, I am embracing it.

***

Laura thinks about her ongoing affair with Duncan all the time.  Not mooning, dreamy moments of rapture while dropping Tatum off at preschool. Her hands do not sweat gripping the wheel of her Tiguan while ignoring the impatient wails from the backseat.  Her pragmatism constantly reminds her that she is not in love with Duncan, or even the idea of him.  He knows it too and is perfectly content with their once or twice a week furious hook ups at his one bedroom condominium in the north end of Toronto.  Laura’s thoughts about the affair are mostly questions about the cheating on her husband of eight years and how she has let her life slip a little bit away, one dirty text message at a time.

“Good morning Ms. Wilkins and good morning to you Tatum!!”

Tatum’s preschool teacher greets both of them as they arrive at the painted yellow door.  She takes Tatum’s Dora backpack off of her and tucks it under her arm.  Tatum runs inside and joins her equally cute playmates all huddled around a robot dog.

“Hi Barb, how is everything?”  Barb is thin, like a talking Q-tip.  “How is Tatum doing?”

“A-mazing – one bright little cookie!”

“No problems then?”

Barb’s eyes bulge a bit, weighing down the rest of her face.  “Problems?  Of course not!  None at all, not a darn thing, she is total angel!”

Laura turns back to the classroom and lets Tatum knows she is leaving.  “Bye angel!” Winking at Barb now.

‘Bye mommy,” she responds looking up from all fours, mimicking the creepy robot dog by quirking her head and ruff ruffing.  Laura smiles and shrugs.  Barb smiles and shrugs at Laura.  Kids.  So silly, so wonderful.

Dropping off Tatum at preschool is part of Laura’s daily ritual. It’s exclusively part of her ritual only because her interior decorating job offers more flexibility than Tim’s corporate public relations job.  She has four stable clients, all housewives from Toronto’s well known affluent neighbourhood Rosedale.  They all partially know one another, all too old to screw the pool boy, all filling their spare time creating interesting Starbucks orders or squinting at Aureolin swatches. Laura kind of likes them.  She knows she will never be one of them; she doesn’t like designer track suits or plastic surgery enough.  Her ability to find rare pieces to inhabit vacant sitting rooms affords her just enough status so the women treat her almost equally. The consistent and never late payment of her invoices makes it easy to shrug off any feeling of insecurity.

Laura’s first meeting is not until lunch, so a quick text to Duncan and she is off to have sex with a man who is not her husband, a man seven years younger, a man who affectionately praises her vagina as labtastic

Had a massage today.   Only the fourth one I ever experienced.  Which is odd because in the last 20 years of my professional life, I have always had benefits that provided these services at a very minimal cost to me.

I carry a lot of tension in my neck and shoulders.  To the point where turning to my left is easier if I turn my whole body instead of my neck.  Anyway, back to the massage.  When I originally booked it yesterday, John was available at 3:30pm, I agreed and then immediately made up some bullshit excuse as the idea of John touching me for an hour was not too appealing.  So I booked the following day with Sheila at 12:30pm.  Now if this sounds immature, it’s because it is.  Due to my lack of massage experience, or my general idiocy, I equate massages with something intimate and potentially sexual.  I have no history of either happening, but when someone is rubbing warm oil over 80 per cent of my body; my immediate thought is to go for the female.

I have no expectations of anything remotely sexual happening, I am with a RMT, not Suki who works the night shift at the Blue Water Spa on Yonge Street.  Needless to say, with lights low, dolphins playing harps on the Ipod in the background, the rooms does reek of something sensual.  Sue me, as mentioned earlier, I’m an idiot.

Now no offense to Sheila, she was a perfectly attractive massage therapist in her early to mid thirties, with an affable and engaging personality, generally interested in solving my neck and shoulder tension.  Thing is, she simply was not strong enough.  I asked her to be as aggressive as she wanted and I could gauge through her grunts and groans (and constantly sniffing, cokehead or cold, either way, grab a fucking Kleenex) that she was exhausting her strength trying to grind out the kinks and knots riddled up my neck, shoulders and spine.

Massage therapy for women is a tough gig.  You probably get a lot of pervs making jokes about happy endings and random boners pup tenting the sheets and blankets they provide. Shelia was thorough, professional, caring and just a nice woman.  But, in this case, I needed someone with very strong hands to knead my shoulders, thumb my neck, and while a perfectly pleasant experience (warm oil rubbed into your skin?  Please.) I still feel the tightness in the area and wish I didn’t.

Moral of the story for me?  Stick with John at 3:30.  So what if it moves.

ooooh an actual segue!

****

During the work week, at around 3:30 in the afternoon, Tim starts to get tired.  It usually begins in his neck, thick muscles clenching as if he were balancing dictionaries on his head. He stretches his arms skyward and rubs hard with two fingers directly where the muscle in his neck becomes skull, triggering the yawns.  As if he swallowed a pride of lions, his mouth widens, teeth moisten, hot tongue hangs and dances.  His eyes water as his mouth closes and opens like a secret cave.   Back to back to back yawns as he tries to make sense of a corporate blurb he is writing.  Or at least trying to make the text sing as his boss would chirp.

He would say out of the side of his mouth. “I know we are bound by our corp speak, but let’s try and make this one sing ok pal?”

He slams the file shut, forgetting to save.  Save the three whole words he had written.

Why did he seek her out?  Of course he was a bit tired of the stale taste of eight years of marriage. Maybe it was just the offering of sharp language that was keeping his deviancy alive. He enjoyed solid writing and her instructive tone undercut by her own, much quieter longing was compelling. But he should back off. Tip toe away in place of a huffy stomp.  To make it seem like he was never there. Because, deep down, he knows he shouldn’t be.

His response came easier than he thought.

“Sarah, I don’t want to fuck you, I just wanted to fuck with you a little.”

The depressed mouse button felt hot against the tip of his finger.  It was as if his grin was doing the typing.

****

So I did not post on the weekend.  Sue me.  Sorry for being so belligerent, but seriously, I need to manage some expectations.  But Jason you protest, we are only going on what you promised.  And a promise is a promise.  Well, love means never having to say you’re sorry.

Oh hey 1,112 page views since I started, thanks.

Brief weekend summary.  Big drive to Niagara-on-the-Lake to spend the night at Fort George, a British military post that served as the backdrop for one of Canada’s defining moments in its shaping of a country during the War of 1812.  I was there with 30 six, seven, eight, nine and 10 year old boys and a handful of parents as part of Cub Scout exercise.  Was it fun?  It was interesting, re-learning some of the historical nuggets I soaked in before pushing them out with hot knives and bt’s when I was teenager.

The best part obviously was sharing the moments with the Hud, who remains as beautiful and pensive and wide-eyed as ever.  And if there is one thing you can do to truly appreciate your own child (unless that child is Damien, son of satan) is to spend 24 hours with other kids.  Connecting the dots from any current adult douche bag I know to previous child idiot is pretty easy as the narcissistic, entitled, whiny, braggarts that ran amok through the green fields of Fort George will easily evolve into (likely, sadly, successful) jerks in their adult life.  They push through lines, claim every accolade as their own, boss other, more feckless kids around, and fall asleep easily awash in their own giant sense of self.  Get the Hummers and Escalade salespeople ready.

Hudson, who sits dreamily in afternoon sunlight trying to find the perfect thick blade of grass to put between his thumbs to create a horn is mildly enamoured by these mini-DB’s.  He also does not fully understand my vehemently steering him away from them.  I stood my ground this weekend and he eventually grooved towards some of the nicer boys, with their cowlicks and Velcro shoes.  Even if there was a velour v-necked and brown corded boy playing imaginary Lego during the musket demonstration, I would have preferred Hud join him instead of the boys comparing their…..Ipods.

Sunday morning, time change, and after a night of one kid coughing brown and green phlegm on me all night and the other three kids who woke me up to take them to the bathroom (backlash from choosing the bunk closest to the head), Hud and I bolted at 6am and drove home stuffed with Tim Horton’s chocolate milk and scrambled egg and bacon wraps. We arrived at home, got out of the car, hugged and thanked each other for being exactly who we are.

The remainder of the day was spent helping Hud prepare for his first big presentation of the year.  The Wetlands project.  We had a presentation board, a diorama, a video and a salamander specimen to organize and while a little spotty, I did my best to let Hud drive the agenda without me trying to over communicate to him.  Which is a bit difficult considering what I do for a living.  S. and I vowed not to take this over as with her art direction skills and my communication background, this thing could have won awards (ok grade four awards, but still, oh shut up).   He drove the bus and did the presentation seven times, each time getting better and better.  He was nervous, but hell who doesn’t get nervous presenting presenting to 25 sneering peers? For his snack I gave him some homemade banana bread, a granola bar, a pear, some potato chips and a xanax, so he should be ok.

Ok sports fans – got some good feedback and questionable eyebrows from the last entry – so remember, this is fiction and it gets juicer so stay tuned:

******

Laura used to think it was sweet, the sound of Tim’s gold wedding band tapping the headboard in the middle of the night. It was accidental, but a lovely reminder of their marriage. Over the years, as his sleep became more inconsistent, he became a pillow flipper, a head sweater, with the occasional sighs and often grunts of a man trying to find his way back to sleep. His ring would make contact at least four times a night, never scratching as there were no real edges, mostly just a strong tap – one hard substance against one more pliant – startling her awake and intermittently jarring her from her own much needed sleep.

Asking him to remove the ring was a sentence she could not utter without some eyebrow movement, a planted seed that would jolt him aware at some random moment while driving or taking out the trash.  That bitch he would think later, carefully preparing how to confront her with the puzzle pieces now in place.  She was paranoid of course, but not an odd character trait for someone screwing around on their husband.

Looking around, waiting for the inevitable third ring tap, her eyes adjusted to the darkness of their bedroom.  It was so snide in its comfort, all billowy and welcoming, everything soft and so normal. Vanilla candle here, silver framed picture of their three-year old girl Tatum there, cover to the wicker laundry hamper askew, black sock missing its mark on the hardwood floor next to it. Dust bunnies crouched and cuddled in the corner.

Just thinking that in the pocket of his once white bathrobe – the one hanging on the back of the bedroom door – is his bloodstained dental floss, turns her tender stomach.  And she knows it’s there. She is 100 per cent sure. The tiny, coiled, pink snake of floss festering there in its terry cloth cave; gathering time, drying to dust.

Just in the nick of time as today becomes tomorrow. Spent a lovely vacation day as a stay at home dad, which coincidentally landed on a day after a big charity event piss up last night. So, with nerves frayed and pores leaking gin martinis, I dropped the kids off, had lunch at Pizza Pizza and played Wii with Tasman all afternoon. Call of Duty, Black Ops. Judge away. I don’t give a rat’s ass. It was fun.

Also helped Hud build a diorama for his biome projects. It’s the Wetlands and looks awesome. Then we ate McDonalds to celebrate. Tomorrow it’s Fort George with the high waisted pant men and the cub scouts. Hopefully I can shoot a musket and sneak some mead. May have to recap all on Sunday as I doubt I smuggle in the Mac to recap the day.

Stay tuned for more of the novel. Lots of interest so far.

So talking to my mother this morning, she noted that the characterization that I am creating of me on this blog is indeed fairly tragic and borderline depressing.  Pretty soon people are going to show up at my door with that raised eyebrow, pressed lip smile, wide eyed look saying….Are you ok Jason?  While passing me a pound cake or a square pan full of lemon squares.  Lemon squares?  I love lemon squares.  Hey look a squirrel!

So I am in a better mood due to basketball playing last night, affirming my doctor’s and the world suggestion that exercise does a body AND a mind good.  I also investigated the pharmaceutical options to help curb more the anxiety then any potential depression, although they are  supposedly linked like salt and pepper.  Or do you say pepper and salt.  Eggs and bacon or bacon and eggs?

So here is an excerpt from my new novel.  It’s not yet finished.  Only 420 pages to go.

It was a decent night for an insomniac. A 3:12am bathroom break was just a pause before Tim trudged back to his bed and quickly returned to sleep. He woke for the second time just after 7:00am, slipped into the shower and began his day. The house remained quiet other than the sports highlights he watched from the bar stool in his kitchen. Breakfast was a bagel with peanut butter and sliced banana. Popeye, an oval-eyed beagle, sat mesmerized by the smear of peanut butter tenuously clinging to the side of Tim’s cheek.  It did not fall.  It was located and licked.

At the bus stop Tim’s thoughts were with his current email flirtation but he quickly shook it off, assuming whatever chuckle of interest he had from the confines of his cubicle was now over. It was three weeks ago when they both started stringing words together to make the days more bearable. A couple of sighs were produced, a pang here, a blush there, but a lifetime and his unrequited fondness for Sarah had passed since the three dates they went on 11 years ago. Yet he still liked saying her name out loud, liked reading her effortless use of the word fuck, picturing her eyes bug out a bit as she keyed in the profanity.

An old song played on his Ipod as the bus approached. It was a longing song, a falsetto singing about low times.  It quickly turned his forced indifference about Sarah into something more romantic. All what iffy and teenage girl. Laughing at himself, he drew a heart in the steamed up bus shelter. The impatience of the bus driver thankfully stopping him just short of fingering their respective initials into a math equation.  Tim got on the bus, paid his fare and sat down.

The moment he got to work, he fired off an e-mail to Sarah to explain his recent self. There were exclamation marks he regretted, a semi colon he fell in love with, and of course the mandatory ellipsis to finish it off.

Her response came quicker than he expected. He was on the phone when he saw the e-mail preview flash on top of a release he was writing. Just her name, her breezy, alliterative name catching his eye as he tolerated the awkward charm some wire service salesman was spewing.

“Oh Tim, be careful, revel in the fact that someone loves flirting with you as much as you do with her, go home tonight feeling desired, and make your wife feel the same way.”

There was nothing to do but follow her instructions. But the response was so perfect he knew he would find a way, manufacture some tactic to prolong the surface innocence. If she backed off, he would press a bit, like a gawking, hungry face in a bakery window, until the eventual only antidote of ignoring him finally kicked in.

***

Ok – I feel better about today.  Although these peanuts are making me thirsty.