On our list of holidays that we all celebrate each year, I have a sneaking suspicion there might be one of them at least that was invented possibly by greeting card companies and florists. It's called Valentine's Day! Man, the valentines are flying. Of course our grandchildren when it was Valentine's Day...they were doing their part at school. Florists freak out and then they count their shekels the next day. And, of course, I even did my part by helping some struggling greeting card company. I had to; of course, get one for the woman I love.
Well, it happened three times at the Hutchcraft house. Yep, a teenager learning to drive. With all of the angst that goes with that. Not for them; for us! And three times we'd come around to that question happening again and again, "Dad, can I have the car?" I have to tell you, I had real mixed emotions about that, and I had a lot of questions about "How far are you going to go?" "How long will you be gone?" "Where are you driving?" "Who are you going with?" I was apprehensive about turning over that ton of deadly metal to a teenage son. And probably all reasons, right?
Now if you've ever been a football widow, you understand how long those games seem to take. "I want my husband back. When is this thing going to be over?" Of course the commercials help it feel a lot longer, but you might ask yourself, "Well, what about all those huddles? I mean what a waste of time! There's a game to win. These guys are stopping after every play to get their heads together." Well, of course, it's not a waste of time at all. If they try to play without that regular huddle, they're going to go off in all kinds of confusion...and so will we.
Now, if you like putting puzzles together, oh you'll love trying to piece together your family genealogy. My wife knows; she's been working on ours lately. As you start climbing your family tree, you find all kinds of holes in your information, dates and places that sometimes seem contradictory, illogical.
We were waiting in front of a restaurant with our children, and my son saw a parent trying to keep his two-year-old occupied. Now, you know, it's tough enough for the parents to wait to get into a restaurant; it's a little hard to keep a two-year-old boy busy. And there's something in a child that wants freedom. And this child was no exception, because as soon as the parent would let this little guy go, he'd start to chug the other direction as fast as he could. It almost appeared as if he thought he really was going to get away from his dad. Not a chance! Dad started after him, you know, looking like it was hard to catch him. You know it wasn't.
Well, once again the cinema's "beautiful people" were there for Hollywood's annual celebration of itself. It's all about that little gold guy they call Oscar.
Well, for some reason, the Hollywood news takes me back to a tour that our family did at Universal Studios some years ago. The tram took us through some scenes that would be familiar to veteran moviegoers - like a street in 1920s Chicago (you know, Al Capone style?), an Old West town, a World War II French village. Impressive stuff.
Tony was one of the best-liked teachers in our local school; at least he had our kids' vote. As he and I were working together on a project at our house, I was really surprised to learn about his background. I never would have guessed it. See, he grew up in a very tough neighborhood in our area that was sharply divided into these ethnic pockets. Well, actually, into ethnic gangs. And Tony, by his own admission, was a fighter. Most of the guys in his neighborhood were. And then, five of his good friends died violently in two months time - five friends in two months; one of them his very best friend. Two of his friends are now serving prison terms - two of the survivors that is.
Why is it so hard to get us guys to go to the doctor? Or especially to the dentist? Oh, wait! "Wait, I think I want to make an appointment to see my dentist. How soon can I go see him again?" Now, if you're a dentist listening, this is my problem; it is not your problem. You're doing a very valuable service, and I've paid a price for putting off those appointments. But it's amazing how we tend to avoid appointments that may be unpleasant. We'll put them off as long as we can. And in most cases you can do what I do. You can put it off, you can cancel, even meetings you don't want to have. That is in most cases.
For some reason, this drunk driver decided that he liked my side of the road better than his side. He suddenly crossed the center line and he plowed headlong into our car. Well, I had the whole family with me, and our car was totaled. But thankfully, none of us was totaled. Our injuries were miraculously minor in light of what happened to our car. Now, a friend offered to drive me to the youth retreat where I was speaking that weekend. Well, that night of the accident, the doctor put me in a neck brace for a few days, so I got a lot of sympathy at that retreat! I almost decided to wear it permanently! But I had a little whiplash, actually, from the force of the hit that we took. That's the damage to your neck when you get whipped around violently and suddenly.
My son's dream was finally coming true. He was going to play football as a freshman in high school. Now, they have a lot of scrimmages to get ready for the season, and the coach, of course, uses those scrimmages to try different players at different positions. And every guy is sitting on the bench all dressed, all bruised from those practices, hoping he'll have his chance to get into the scrimmage.
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