Back in the day, I would have gushed about my daughter, especially on her natal day. I might have noted how cute she was, and how lovely she is now. Perhaps I would indicate how much I’ve learned from her almost every day.
Her sense of justice has always been finely tuned. At least a decade ago, when the change from my pants pocket fell onto the bed, my wife would collect it. But my daughter thought my wife was stealing from me and ratted her out to grandma. Now, she is savvy about issues of racism, sexism, and other inequities.
I’m much more aware of looking at food labels because of her allergies, especially dealing with peanuts. She and I react almost exactly the same to everything from ragweed to cigarette smoke, which is to say, badly.
To the degree that I know anything about 21st-century music, technology, changes in language, and a myriad of other things is because of her.
But…
Here’s the thing, though. 1) She’s a teenager. 2) She sometimes reads my blog, especially on the 26th of the month. A bunch of platitudes would probably make her gag. She’s doesn’t think she was cute as a child. (N.b., she’s wrong.) If I say I love her, at best she’ll roll her eyes.
So frankly, I don’t know WHAT I’m going to write that doesn’t invade her privacy too much.
I can say this. She’s applied to about eight colleges. She got into most or all of them. Currently, she’s considering a couple of them and wants to make second visits to both before deciding.
Ah, heck. I’ll write what I want. It’s my blog, and if it wasn’t for her, there would likely not BE a blog. Here’s a story I’ve told before. When I got one of those baby books where one records her first tooth or first steps, I was TERRIBLE at using it. To be fair to me, her mother was no better than I.
So when I comtemplated starting a blog, I decided that I would write about my daughter at least once a month. And always on the 26th of the month, because. I might write about her MORE often, but that was the floor.
Since May 2005, I have managed to write about her every 26th, 203 times in a row if my math is correct. I’ll try to keep this up, but it might be more difficult. We shall see.
(Don’t tell her that I wrote how much I love her. She’d REALLY will roll her eyes.)
I’ve noted that my daughter’s musical tastes include 1990s soul, developed without much input from me, though I approve.
Historically, 1) I would see lots of movies in the theater throughout the year, and 2) I’d try to see whatever movies I’d missed after the Oscars were announced. This year, though, is an off-year for the Oscars and me.
This is a follow-up post about what I’ve written about, most recently.
Bob Costas has covered a LOT of sporting events. Hockey, basketball, boxing, golf, football, just to name a few. But most people who have followed his career know that his great, first love is baseball. For years, he carried a Mickey Mantle baseball card in his wallet. Once, he hosted an interview show called Studio 42 with Bob Costas, 42 being Jackie Robinson’s number.