Let Them Eat Crab.

It’s been a great summer; best in a long time. I can think of a few reasons why, but number one on the list is an unprecedented preponderance of household harmony. The home and hearth, while fully occupied, has emanated the aromatic bouquet of tranquility.

Why? Because the kids have gotten along.

Why? Because they haven’t been around each other much.

And for the last time, why? Because the older kid’s been working! 

Gives me goosebumps to say it. All summer she’s been whacking the alarm clock and punching the time clock, packing a lunch and coming home spent like a two-for-one Applebee’s Groupon. To a skeptical parent, how soothing flow the foamy waters of the Protestant work ethic. 

By the same token, for a college sophomore who typically brims with the boundless energy of a seven-year-old, what more serendipitous summer vocation exists than an opportunity to professionally frolic with genuine seven-year-olds? None that I can think of, so let’s see how things went.

I caught up with our YMCA-camp-counselor-in-residence, codename Zebra, last weekend during a ninety-minute car ride down to Olympia. Able to nap at a moment’s notice, I felt compelled to engage her prior to her succumbing to the taunting luxury of our ’06 Hyundai. 

They call you Zebra. Why is that?

All the counselors have nicknames. It’s to keep the kids from finding us on social media. Like a little kid would actually do that.

Hey, you never know. Did you name yourself?

We all name ourselves. There’s T-Rex, Sharkzilla, Scooby, Snickerdoodle…let’s see… Razzle, Flounder, Puppy…

Sounds like a mushroom-inspired Barney episode.

Good one, Dad.

So what was it like having to wake up at 6:30? 

Really hard. I haven’t gotten up that early since eighth grade. It made naps even more crucial than they were before. I still managed to get in eight hours a night.

Yeah, that’s not true. But moving along, was there anything that surprised you about this job? 

It’s fairly unstructured. Each counselor gets a group of ten kids, and it’s up to us to find things for them to do. We go on field trips a few times a week, but the rest of the time is sort of our choice. 

How do they behave?

Overall, they’re pretty good. The worst time is when we’re lined up for the bathroom. It takes a full 25 minutes to get everyone through, so they start messing with each other. They throw rocks and pine cones at each other. They use acorns like currency. 

Sounds like a prison yard.

I still can't figure out how their faces get so dirty. Did my face get dirty?

Filthy. Just disgusting. Yes.

The other day a kid came up to me holding a little crab he found on the beach. It was still alive. He said “Zebra, can I eat this crab?” I said “Absolutely not.” He said “Well, how come Tristan gets to?” I went down to the beach and Tristan had already eaten a couple of the legs off a live crab. I said “Tristan, why are you doing that?” He said “Because people eat crabs all the time.” I said “Tristan, you have to kill the crab before you eat it.” He said “I didn’t know that, Zebra.”

What part of your job did you enjoy the most?

I always liked it when we ate our lunches. The kids were always content and liked to talk about stuff.

What kind of stuff?

This one kid, whose name is Joseph, is so cute. When he makes the “s” sound it sounds more like “sh.” The other day, he said “Zhebra, I have to tell you shomething. Well, remember when I told you one of my momsh ish dead? Well, I feel bad. That wash a lie. She’sh alive. I jusht wanted to shee what you would shay.”

They don’t care about hanging out with the opposite sex. A couple of kids even became boyfriend and girlfriend. They’re so adorable, you can tell by the looks on their faces that they really like each other. They give each other acorns.

Sounds like quite a learning experience. Do you think working with kids may be something you’d like to do for a career?

Let’s not get ahead of ourselves, Dad.

Thanks for your hard work with the little ones, Zebra. Relating to them is easy. Taking care of them isn’t.

She's back.

To honor the completion of her freshman year at Western Washington University, I've composed this tribute to my first-born and her joyous homecoming.

Sung to the tune of “Back in Black,” by AC/DC:

Zoe’s Back

Zoe’s back.

Her shit is stacked

In the hall and on the kitchen counter.

Yeah, she’s hangin’ loose.

Trying to choose:

Watch Grey’s or nap for half an hour?

She’s got a job.

I hope by God

She can stick it out for sixty days or so.

It’s for the Y.

Your little guy

Has a brain that’s just like Zo’s.

‘Cause she’s back.

Oh, my back.

Yeah, she’s back.

You know it, Jack.

Well, she’s baa haa haa haa haack.

Baa haa haa haa haack.

Zoe’s back.

Her crap is still unpacked.

Back to our shack

Comes the power pack.

Six meals a day, not including snacks.

Yeah she loves to hang

With her gang,

Instagramming selfies with the cat.

Well she watches sports

Always in her shorts,

Only gets up to pee and refill Goldfish.

This soon will end.

When we send

Our angel off to pull her weight.

‘Cause she’s back.

That’s a fact.

Yeah, she’s back.

Step on a crack.

Well, she’s baa haa haa haa haack.

Baa haa haa haa haack.

Zoe’s back.

From the land of Hacky Sack.

Please insert Angus Young solo in its entirety. 

‘Cause she’s back.

She gives us flack.

Yeah, she’s back.

She wants some slack.

Well, she’s baa haa haa haa haack.

Baa haa haa haa haack.

Zoe’s back.

Pour me a Coke and Jack.

We Both Like the Same Band from Iceland.

She’s fourteen today. 

My baby is fourteen. How did this happen? It seems like a few days ago she was asking me when she had to give her shoes back because they were “Mary Jane’s.” 

It feels like yesterday that a wigged, wacky Hannah Montana ruled the house, Billy Ray cracking wise in his soul patch and hair helmet. Did you see the one where a smoothie got spilled on his head? It stuck to his face but it was like his hair had been treated with Rainex. Rolled raught oufff.

Can my younger kid be a little mouthy? Does she provide a daily, unsolicited “state-of-Dad’s-eyebrows” briefing? Can she get a little frosty when I cop a couple of her Lindt chocolates? 

I don't know, does Bruce Jenner have a special closet for his Jimmy Choos?

Sometimes it’s like she’s the coach and we’re the refs and we’re T’ing her up continuously for insolent remarks to the officials. And in this game, the coach doesn’t get ejected after the second technical—she loses her phone. 

The rest of the time, she’s kind, funny, creative and…let’s just say she inherited her dad’s OCDNA. Most evenings, while I stand in the kitchen making dinner, she sits at the computer doing her homework and listening to music and watching videos and texting and talking to me, in that order. She’ll call out a song if she thinks I might like it. Not a lot of conversation but a nice daily appointment nonetheless.

She had a bowling party and sleep(?)over Saturday with nine of her friends and one of these satanic cakes from Costco:

They ate half at the bowling alley and the remainder sometime between one and two in the morning. I'll tell you, nothing pushes control alt delete on a party like that fudgy prince of dark chocolateness. I’m not proud to admit that the next morning I scraped clean the cardboard plate it came on, like a buzzard pecking the bleached pelvis of a wildebeest.

Anyway, I’m not going to blather on. I love this girl.

She's Thirteen Now.

Such a strange animal, indeed.

Then again, my wife says she's just like me, so does that make me a deviant curio as well?

Um, apparently yes, it does.

The thing is, being compared to a thirteen-year-old girl is a little strange when you happen to reside in the meat suit of a fifty-year-old dude. I'd like to think that any trace elements of testosterone still floundering through my varicose veins would nonetheless stand in profound contrast to the murky estrogen bloom staging in her pituitary region.

But, you know, I've been wrong before.

She turned thirteen today. Well, technically, she'll reach that age tonight around 11:46, the moment her slimy little body wriggled free and lay center stage in the doctor's nurturing palms, the stark klieg lights casting down upon my beautiful new burden.

A daughter; a second one, in fact. Holy shit.

When a man sees his baby girl for the first time, he doesn't think of all that stuff he's heard for the past nine months:

"Oh, boys are so much easier, especially as teenagers."

"Better get a membership to a rifle range. Then you'll be ready when the boys come a callin'. Heh, heh!"

"I hope she's not like I was. I had such low self esteem and, oh, did I make some bad choices."

Nope , he doesn't think of any of it—because he melts.

Every girl he's ever known...his girlfriends, his mom, his sisters and aunts and grandma...combine into a single conscious entity, delivering a singular message:

Don't screw this up, mister.

Throughout this thirteen-year odyssey, has she pissed me off? Hell, yes. I would say she's incited emotions which had previously been exclusively reserved for either Rush Limbaugh or historically inept football referees.

Have I occasionally yearned for at least one day where I wasn't challenged on even the most mundane of statements?

Absofreakinglutely. But I'm in deep, and I'll be treading water in this pool for the rest of my life.

She celebrated last night with a sleepover. Twelve girls, all of the early teenage persuasion, gathered in our smallish house for a nineteen-hour festival of giggly giddiness. Once the agreed-upon time arrived, they poured in quickly, attacking the pillow-sized bag of candy which Webster's Teen Dictionary apparently classifies as appetizers.

Oh, yeah, and my wife wasn't around. She and our older daughter had other business to address, so I stood alone among the savages, sweatily rotating one Costco pizza after another onto the smorgasbord as the prepubescent amoeba mainlined Dr. Pepper and spoke in tones barely below dog whistle pitch.

And while a nice beer or six may have smoothed out the evening's jagged edge, I needed to maintain a Lindsay Lohan defying sobriety, since I alone had to shuttle the dirty dozen to the bowling alley for the night's main event.

My bride joined the fracas soon after, tag teaming with me on cake and ice cream duty.

Incidentally, we purchased one of those foot-tall Costco chocolate cakes—you know what I'm talking about? It's got about twelve layers, any one of which could cause even Tim Tebow's virgin bloodstream to throw a lard-laced heart clot.

After bowling and sugar, we returned to our bungalow with the mob, my wife and I finally leaving them to their own devices. Dancing, according to our birthday princess, was next on the agenda, so I plugged someone's iPod into our family room stereo and retreated with bids of goodnight and sleep tight and don't be too loud or I'll be pissed as shite.

Two ear plugs and eight hours later, I arose to survey the damage. One girl lay asleep on a recliner, while the remainder formed an interlocking tangle of toxicity, occupying every inch of the floor that wasn't already covered in candy wrappers and dusty Dorito mole hills.

I asked my daughter if they'd left the heat on all night. They hadn't; all through this sleepless night, their bodies had generated every kilowatt of the room's oppressive bouquet.

Naturally, I thought. She's thirteen now.

An Unsung Bloodsport.

I walked toward the front door Thursday morning, bearing the fresh burden of the twenty-six ton man bag I'd just hurled across my shoulder. "See you tonight," I said.

"You bet you will." She stood in her bedroom doorway, looking every bit her just-woke-up teenagerness—pajama pants, one of fifty or so t-shirts emblazoned with her school's name, and the left half of her hair looking like Axle Rose's in that Welcome to the Jungle video. "March madness returns tonight," she said, betraying her non-enthusiastic appearance.

I grabbed the doorknob. "Yes, it does. Hey, good luck in your tennis match if you have one today."

"No match, just practice."

"Okay, then good luck at practice."

"No one says that, Dad," she replied, disappearing into the bathroom.

This spring is her final season of high school sports. After playing volleyball and basketball, each of which offer its own flavor of intensity, she's donning the old skort for the last time.

Ahh, tennis. It's the perfect tonic to ensure a kind and gentle ending. For the past four years, her coaches have permitted doubles teams to play together and stay together, so her partner has been her best friend the entire time.

Is it a recipe for overall team success? Probably not, but so what, they sure seem to enjoy themselves.

Sorry to get all Uncle Rico on you—again—but that ain't how things were back in my day. During the late Seventies, competition for spots on my high school tennis team was as fierce as it was moose-knuckled. We were constantly pitted against each other to determine the best combinations.

Plus, every once in a while, I had to play this guy who was so good, I seriously don't think I ever got a point off him. He had a tennis court in his backyard and his dad made the whole family play. Let's just say that kid toyed with me like a kitten nibbling a daddy long legs.

But, the weather was usually decent—by season's end you had a little bit of a tan—and our coach constantly took us out for ice cream.

However, a single overwhelming fact remains which made spring tennis the best sport of all:

It was co-ed.

Lots of cute girls.

In tennis dresses.

Sometimes they'd even show up with baked goods.

Usually ranked fifth,  I became a mixed doubles mainstay. My sixteen-year-old sensibilities were thrust into tri-weekly, ninety-minute relationships with different female temperaments. Most went well. I learned patience and how to choose my words carefully.

Even so, two ended in divorce.

About halfway through that sophomore season, I settled into a life of monogamy. The coach paired me with a freshman girl I sort of knew. We clicked immediately, mostly due to her inappropriate sense of humor and love of The Twilight Zone, but she was really interesting and smart. We became good friends and a fairly decent doubles team.

We entered the league tournament feeling pretty shaky. Neither of us had expected to compete in a varsity playoff, so we lost the first set badly, playing like our rackets were wrapped in meat. Finally, she and I settled a bit and began committing fewer unforced wood-clanking errors. We won the second set and after six games of the third and deciding set, the score was tied at three games apiece.

During the next game, as our opponents charged the net, I attempted a lob which, using tennis terminology, would be classified as weak ass. The guy on the other team rared back and slammed a laser beam—right into my partner's nose. She dropped her racket, grabbing her nose as blood dripped into her white, pleated skirt.

Her eyes welled with tears, yet her face displayed a look that wasn't one of pain as much as anger and frustration. People brought towels and ice, and then a strange adult approached us.

"You have five minutes to get back on the court or forfeit the match."

"Oh well," I thought. "We were doing great. Nothing to be ashamed of if we have to stop now..."

"I can play," she said. She moved the towel away, revealing her swollen nose and puffy eyes. "I think the bleeding is stopping."

"Really? Are you sure? " I couldn't believe it.

"Yep."

She walked back onto the court in her blood speckled clothes and settled in her previous spot, again a few feet from the net. I could tell our opponents, especially the guy, felt bad about the accident, but they also looked confident, like they'd hobbled us and intended to finish us off quickly.

Apparently, my partner had decided that since she'd committed to playing the remainder of the match with a swollen face and impressive headache, winning was the only option, since we didn't lose another game that day.

I'll bet I've told my daughter this story a million times and I'll probably repeat it a few more. That's okay. It never hurts to remember how a fifteen-year-old girl showed a sixteen-year-old boy the personification of toughness and loyalty.

So Good.

She left Tuesday morning, after five nights with us.

Over the past decade, Sealth High School in West Seattle, has been oscillating across a cultural zip line to Chongqing, Seattle's city in The People's Republic of China. Scores of teachers and students have ventured to and fro across the frothy Pacific, as have Chief Sealth's principal and Seattle's mayor.

The whole thing got a little more awesome Saturday night. For the first time, the girls' basketball team from Nankai High School in Chonqing played the Chief Sealth Ladyhawks. But I'll get to that in a second.

Last fall, our daughter brought up the idea of hosting a player sometime in January. My wife doesn't process information like this, but I thought "Okay, sounds good. Let's do it. Now I’ll forget about it and get back to this bag of Pop Chips."

And not until the Ms. burst through our front door cradling an Aerobed (which I highly recommend—Costco, $139.99. Slather on a strip of memory foam and it feels like lyin' in butta'.), did the old tickler file kick in—"Oh, yeah. That’s right. She’s coming on Thursday.” I may not be quick on the uptake, but nothing jogs the memory like a big box of inflatable mattress in the middle of your living room.

Thursday evening arrived. The two teams had already met and spent a couple of hours getting to know each other over pizza at the school. Around 6:30, our daughter's text told us she and her new friend were on their way home in our Kia Minivan, evidence that we truly are an international family.

Everyone was nervous as the girls stepped slowly into our living room from the chilly air. She stood a couple inches shorter than our daughter and ducked slightly behind her. She appeared slender in her purple and white team warm-ups and wore her black hair tightly cropped. When she smiled, I could feel a jolt of psychic energy emanating from my wife and younger daughter—"Oh, she's adorable." She was cute.

We took turns introducing ourselves and even though I'd previously told myself, "Her hearing will be fine, don’t yell. Just speak slowly," when my turn came, I barked my name out like I was trying to be heard over a blow dryer.

“Follow me,” my elder daughter said. “I’ll show you where to put your suitcase.”

She smiled and rolled her suitcase a step behind her host. “Your house is beautiful,” she slowly pronounced. Over the years, when people have initially surveyed the interior of our three-bedroom, one-bathroom rambler, I’ve heard things like, “I love the color of your walls” or “I like your wood floors,” but never those simple words, “Your house is beautiful.”

“Thank you,” replied my daughter. “Come sit down.”

The four of us sat around her, competing to ask questions, which made us talk faster and louder, which made her not understand. After a while, we calmed down a smidge and got to know her a little.

She’s seventeen. At fourteen, she moved away from home to attend Nankai. While she talks frequently with her family on the phone, she sees them only during the summer and a short winter break.

She doesn’t watch TV. Like ever. I think that one threw for a loop the two television master watchers in the room. I won’t say which daughter, but when I glanced over at her, her eyes said, “How sad. There’s a whole world you're denied.”

Springing up suddenly, our guest jogged into her room and returned, not jogging, balancing an armful of artwork, chopsticks and spicy meaty delicious things in clear little envelopes. And as a special added bonus for my co-workers, I’ve put up one of those gifts, a cool hanging thing, in my cubicle. Come on by.

Over the next few days, the two girls hung out constantly. When they weren’t atop the Space Needle or at Pike Place Market with their cohorts, they were at our house, where we plied our guest with as many Western foods as her constitution could muster. Beverage of choice? Either Coke or coffee. Dairy products, especially cheese which is a rarity in the PRC, became a favorite. We loved it when she’d remark, “So good.”

Back to Saturday, night of the big game. The festivities began with a few words from various program supporters, including Seattle’s mayor, Mike McGinn, who arrived late. At the conclusion of his speech, a group of “lion dancers” took the floor for a traditional Chinese dance in which two people occupy a lion costume, mimicking its movements while dancing to a pounding rhythm section.

But then, controversy. During the middle of the performance, with the entire audience spellbound by the show, Mayor McGinn decided it might be a good time to meet the Nankai team. Within ten seconds, he was engulfed, first by a ring of Chinese players and then by an outer ring of paparazzi, their flashes exploding in rapid succession and completely distracting everyone.

It was freaking ridiculous. Look, I voted for Mike McGinn and I may vote for him again when he seeks a second term later this year, but come on, Mike, that was a chumpish move. How rude is it to show up late and miss your photo op with the team, and then completely diss the lion dancers halfway through their show? I’m jabbing at my temple right now, mister. Think.

My daughter had been anxious about the game, since apparently, Nankai is the third ranked team in all of China. That’s not exactly like being number three in Luxembourg, you know? And they were good—fundamentally skilled and aggressive, pushing around the yanks from the getgo. Our guest was lightning quick, constantly driving into the paint and either dishing off or laying it in. After a close first half, the Chinese team pulled away in the second, winning by twenty.

Afterward, the teams embraced and assembled for an impromptu “Gangnam Style” at center court. Nothing beats the international language of obnoxious pop music that sticks to your brain for days on end.

Forty eight hours later, she sat on her last night with us. We surrounded her on the couch as usual. “I will miss you,” she said, making eye contact with each of us. Then she looked away and everything got quiet. She was crying. While my wife grabbed a box of tissues, I hurried out of the room and came back with a couple of things we thought she might like.

Seattle skyline socks:

And some adidas slides:

According to well-placed sources, these two items are crucial in displaying the off-court "baller" look. It didn’t exactly lighten the mood, however. In fact, she just peeked into the box then closed it and looked away with a pained expression.

“Do you like them?” our daughter asked.

“Of course,” she replied softly.

My wife, younger daughter and I hung out a little more, then excused ourselves, leaving the teenagers to enjoy one more night together. By now, they’d become quite adept at communicating with each other; they shared music and got themselves hooked up to a Skype-type software that will hopefully allow them to communicate in the future.

Funny how five days can change your outlook on so many things.

So good.

What Am I Going To Be Like At Her Wedding?

She's twelve-and-a-half.

I know, that whole "and-a-half" thing usually gets jettisoned before a kid's tenth birthday, but in her case, twelve and-a-half is closer to fifteen than it is twelve, know what I mean?

I don't consider my daughter a "tween" anymore; she's a bona fide, one hundred percent, USDA certified teenager. Numbers schmumbers.

We're spending the weekend together, just the two of us, mano e womano, or however the saying goes. My wife and older daughter fled to the windy brushlands of eastern Washington, touring the brick-and-ivy-encrusted campus of Central Washington University along with a friend and her daughter.

It's been a father-daughter Saturday.

If you were to enjoy slightly more than one cup of Sanka in the presence of our nuclear family, you'd understand that our younger daughter must have swum in amniotic fluid stocked with more of my characteristics than there are fat grams at Costco.

We share a love of art, food, drink and music, but not in that order. Food would probably be number one. We're a little too sensitive and we take things a bit too personally. We can sit or lie down for long periods of time, often only shuffling about after our lungs begin retaining fluid.

We like sleeping. Mmm, do we.

But since her road trip to adolescence has reached the Midwestern states, she's become like an ant beneath a magnifying glass. Each school day is a Shakespearean comedy or tragedy. The same friend on Wednesday may play the role of Portia, the plucky and insightful heroine in The Merchant of Venice, yet on Thursday, transform into the betraying Brutus from The Tragedy of Julius Caesar.

Every emotion is raw and intense, and my challenge as her father is to plow a straight line through these sine waves of sensitivity.

This morning, her soccer team lost another hard fought battle. In fact, they've lost every battle this fall; they're zero for autumn. After the game, she broke down. She waited until we had walked safely out of sight of her teammates and their parents, and then opened the floodgates.

"Dad, I'm just so tired of losing. And those girls were so rough and number sixteen played really dirty and I just want to win a game." Tears rolled down her frosty red cheeks.

My first inclination, as usual, was to solve the problem, then and there. I wanted to say, "Look, you guys have improved so much this year. You used to get blown out every week, but now you've been playing everyone so tough. Just hang in there. Good things will happen eventually."

But I didn't. For once, I just listened.

You see, she really wasn't asking Mr. Alpha Male to solve her problems. She just wanted me to shut up and hear her out.

My twelve-and-a-half-year-old vented her frustrations as the car heated up on the drive back home, and by the time we rolled into the driveway, she'd put the soccer game in the rearview mirror.

"Hey," I said, unlocking the mailbox, "how would you like to go see the new James Bond movie?"

"Yeah!"

"Okay. I'm going to do a little yard work. How about if you take a shower and then we go?"

She calls me Tim on random occasions. "Yeah, Tim. That sounds great!"

The mall parking lot was packed. As the movie time creeped up on us, we still couldn't find a parking spot. Her emotions again ran rampant.

"Dad, I don't even want to see this movie! This is just too stressful!"

"It'll be fine." I tried to reassure her. "The movie doesn't even start until the previews are done, and that's, like, fifteen minutes from now. And if it's already started, we'll just go to the next one."

"Okay."

By the time we'd parked somewhere around Iowa and traipsed into the carpeted lobby of the googolplex cinema, James Bond was one secret agent we realized we wouldn't be seeing. The lines were massive, even for the screening which wouldn't begin for another ninety minutes. We slumped against a brass railing.

"What do you think?" I asked. "How about if we take the money it would have cost to go to the movie and just shop around for something that costs twenty dollars?  Hey," I remembered, "Nordstrom is having their half yearly sale. Maybe we can find something there. We can look in BP."

"Okay, yeah," she said. "Yeah, that's even better than a movie, Tim."

And then she melted me...again. "Dad, thanks for bringing me here. I know you tried. Can I have a hug?"

This young woman is not the hugging sort, so, boy, did I hug her. She didn't even seem to care if the cool police had posted its elite mall surveillance team, but she still had to finally pry me away.

We shopped and talked and smelled stuff at the bath shop. And then, at Nordstrom, she found the prettiest dress which satisfied the twenty dollar requirement—give or take five bucks. I waited as she tried it on, and wondered if she'd actually walk out and show me how it looked, remembering her self-conscious nature.

As I sat outside the dressing room, I felt my phone vibrate and expected it to have been a message from my wife or other daughter.

I slid open my phone and read the message—"What do you think?" I pressed the "OK" button to reveal  a self-portrait of my girl, in front of a three-way mirror a few feet away, wearing the dress and the most beautiful smile I'd ever seen.

"It's fantastic," I punched in. My eyes welled ever so slightly.

 It's been a good day.

It's Her Last First Day of School.

At 7:31 this morning, she bounded out of her room and grabbed her backpack.

"Bye, Dad."

"Bye. Have a good day."

"Thanks. You, too."

She strode out of the door, her footsteps heavy and confident.

My daughter is a high school senior—and today is her last first day of school.

After she left, I sat at the dining room table and stared at the back of the door. It's the same doorway that she, her mom and I nervously exited on a similarly sun-drenched morning twelve years ago.

No stone lay unturned that day, no detail ignored. Dresses were laid out, a specific breakfast and lunch had been requested and prepared. A box for her lunch and a box for her pencils, a water bottle which nestled snugly into the webbing of her brand new backpack from Target.

The knees on her fresh white tights wouldn't stay smooth and unstained for long; her sparkly black maryjanes would soon meet the scuffing reality of the asphalt playground. She looked perfect.

Today it was a t-shirt and jeans. This morning it wasn't a Blues Clues backpack, just a blue one.

She still looked perfect.

Why didn't I hug her this morning like I did just before her kindergarten teacher kindly ushered us out of the classroom that morning in 2000?

I really wish I had.

Back then, the milestones had hit in such rapid succession—that morning in the summer of 1995 when I made a goofy face and she cackled for the first time. Her laugh was like a drug and I didn't care about conjuring up that same ridiculous face in the grocery store or the doctor's office or in the middle of a wedding.

Her beautiful little laugh trumped all.

During the spring of 1998, the sound of pee hitting water ushered in another understated, yet highly welcome, era. While neither her mother nor I believed it likely that she'd be wearing pull-ups to kindergarten, we also knew it was a domain over which she wielded absolute power.

And oh, did that girl like calling the shots.

She posed for her first team portrait in 1999—kneeling in the front row for a squad called the Yankees. Forty-one team photographs later, nothing matches the sight of her slapping that first ball off the tee and gleefully sprinting to third base instead of first.

And then it was time to start school.

After dropping her off that first morning, her mother and I walked silently back to the car. I knew she was on the verge of tears and any conversation would have released the floodgates.

It's funny. Today feels exactly the same.

Title IX Drives Painful Wedge Between Fathers and Daughters.

"Dad, just say the word...any time, any place."

Ever since she learned to dribble a Scooby Doo playground ball, she's enjoyed taking me on. "You were trying your hardest, right?"

"Absolutely," I replied, but by the time she was around fourteen, yes, I really was trying my hardest. Nonetheless, that arrogant, little Limbaugh embedded in my psyche whispered in my ear that my daughter would never defeat me in a game of one-on-one. No freaking way. As long as an iron lung wasn't part of my IKEA bedroom set, I'd handle it.

And then, a couple of months ago, right after her junior year basketball season ended, she challenged me again. "So, big guy, when are we playing?" She peered slightly down at me from her five-foot, ten-inch altitude. I gazed back, my game face betraying the anxiety that yes, the moment had arrived.

I surveyed those wiry arms and spindly legs which had formed over seventeen years of perpetual motion...and gave her my answer:

"Umm, yeah. I don't think I'm available...umm...ever."

Hey, if the Supreme Court can opt not to hear a case, I can opt not to play, right?

It's too bad she's yet to discover premium music, because she forfeited a golden opportunity slap her dad with a lyrical uppercut from Rush, one of his favorite bands:

"If you choose not to decide, you still have made a choice."

I had chosen.

This week marks the fortieth anniversary of Title IX, a federal mandate enacted to prohibit sex discrimination in education. Practically speaking, June 23, 1972 signified the beginning of equal resource allocation for male and female athletics at all academic institutions.

Prior to Title IX's ratification, girls' and women's athletics existed predominately on "club" levels. My own alma mater and bastion of progressive thought, the University of Washington, boasted fourteen varsity men's programs in 1972.

How many women's teams would you guess wore the name "Huskies" across their chests back then? Half? Nope. Okay, how about just the big ones, like basketball, softball and volleyball? Sorry.

If you had chosen the most common answer in Trivial Pursuit—zero—you would have been correct.

I suppose 1972 wasn't too far removed from an era when physical exertion was considered dangerous to fragile female constitutions. After all, thirty-six hours of excruciating labor pales in comparison to a nasty floor rash from diving after a loose ball.

Let's see...what else was going on back in '72? As I recall, girls in my fourth grade class had recently been permitted to add pantsuits as appropriate scholarly attire. Although denim hadn't yet been allowed to tightly paint their lower extremities, I vividly recollect several brightly colored polyester outfits leaving my wheezing ass in the dust on field day.

It was akin to watching the backsides of four Carol Bradys and two Shirley Partridges accelerate into the distance, their shag hairdos bouncing in perfect synchronicity to their flopping jacket flaps.

Ironically, had our class decided to form boys' and girls' varsity track teams, the boys would've been pummeled in every event yet would still enjoy the cool uniforms and free blue Gatorade to which the girls weren't entitled.

During the 1972 Munich Olympics, Mark Spitz swam to a record seven gold metals despite the considerable drag of a cumbersome yet totally sweet mustache. American women also competed in swimming events at those games, but only those fortunate enough to attend one of the handful of colleges fielding women's varsity swim teams.

Any other female Olympic hopefuls trained at the Y during the three to five PM lap swim, dodging stray noodles, water wings and octogenarian tortoise people.

Even after the law's passage, equity emerged at a snail's pace. A lot of courageous women filed a lot of unpopular lawsuits, and girls' basketball didn't hit the big time until the socks had grown considerably shorter and the shorts considerably longer.

Forty years later, most young female athletes likely hold no inkling of the dismal state of women's athletics during the reign of Tricky Dick Nixon and before. My seventeen-year-old daughter believes that trotting onto the court through a tunnel of cheerleaders as the band plays and the public address announcer calls out her name is a prima facie birthright, something which has been around since Fred Flinstone shaved with a bumblebee-filled clam shell.

It's my duty to impress upon her the impact of Title IX and the sacrifices others have made which have opened the door...

...for her to school my sorry ass in one-on-one.

OMG: My Daughter Has a Driver's License.

When was the last time you felt an entire gamut of emotions simultaneously?

When you were married?

When your children were born?

When ABC announced the cancellation of All My Children?

This morning, I had such feelings, as an emotional crockpot which had been simmering for sixteen years spilled its chunky contents all over my lap: My daughter passed her driving test.

She did quite well on it, scoring a ninety-six, but got docked for poor parallel parking prowess, which she and I had practiced enough yesterday to singlehandedly raise the price of crude oil. All day long, she and I engaged the following duet:  "DadareyousureI'llpass?Yes,you'reagooddriverandyou'rereadytotakethisthing."

I repeatedly reassured her that nothing cataclysmic would transpire...like when I failed my test after about thirty seconds and without making it out of the parking lot. Apparently, I had almost backed into a woman pushing a stroller and was ordered by the tester to stop immediately.

Anyone knows you don't take your baby for a walk by the DOL testing area. And to this day, I harbor a searing contempt for that faceless mother and her now-grown baby. Move on, Tim.

As with most humans, my kid's heart pumped with giddy anxiety for the three weeks which slowly elapsed between passing the written exam and anticipating the driving test. As we finally pulled into the testing area and joined the line outside the building, our apprehension was heightened by a guy who merged into the queue, his sizable pit bull straining against its leash.

Once the dude had established his place in line, he freed the dog from the restraint and allowed it to run freely through the parking lot while he talked on his cell phone. I guess you don't want to be encumbered by a dog when you're concentrating on using the "N", "B," and "MF" words as frequently as possible.

My daughter and I benefited from his chump behavior, however, since we and everyone else in line were thoroughly distracted. I couldn't help but wonder what the guy was doing with a pit bull at a place where people routinely stay through at least three different Van Halen lead vocalists, and what was he there to do? Get his official Washington State Douche Bag Identification Card?

Finally, testing time arrived and I watched as the dirty mini van signaled and turned right out of the parking lot, piloted by my baby. Here we go. I shifted my weight from one leg to the other as I stood in the chilly morning air, reminiscing about my first-born girl and all of the "firsts" to which I've had the privilege of bearing witness: her first words, her first steps, her first tooth, her first bike ride, her first dance and now, her first driver's license.

Nothing warms my heart like the look I saw on her face upon parking the car, glancing to her tester and looking back at me.

It was the Christmas morning face.

My face probably betrayed more of a graduation day look, if that makes sense.

So many emotions, such a rich life.

Five Days in 1978.

It really wasn’t her problem, it was mine.

It was more about me than it was her.

If only she could look at things from my perspective, I thought; if only she could observe the facts through my eyes, just for a little while.

And that’s when I got the idea.

My sixteen-year-old daughter, by most accounts, is a typical adolescent female. She values her friends far more highly than a great parking spot; she embraces technology with a far greater aptitude than being able to program a VCR.

To wit, her modus operandi is to engage in as many forms of simultaneous technology as are possible. During her evening homework, her workstation resembles an intensive care unit: Ear buds plugged into an iPod, cell phone placed on the desk at three o’clock for easy access, the trademark blue glow of Facebook reflecting off of her freshly washed forehead.

Oh, yeah. She’s also got some school books and papers scattered about.

After wrapping up the academics and disengaging from the homework ritual, my teenager often retreats to the family room for some television/ texting time, the cell phone accompanying her like an emphysema patient’s oxygen tank.

As weeks of witnessing this behavior turned into months, my wife and I had discovered that entire evenings would pass where nary a word was spoken between either of us and our woman child. We, the adults of the house and exchequers of the home entertainment and technology accounts, resolved to make a stand.

Our daughters (the other is eleven) quickly dubbed it “Amish Hour,” an electronics-free sixty minutes every weeknight from seven to eight. Although not mandated, three of the four of us would often congregate in the living room during this period. As a bonus, our younger child would frequently linger with my wife and me, while the elder fled to Cyberland at the stroke of eight.

The family dynamic improved, but not enough to make a dent in our teen’s surly attitude of entitlement, her irritation obvious whenever confronted with an actual conversation by her sister or anyone over forty-seven.

And that’s when I took it a step farther.

I thought up the idea while in a high level of discomfort aboard the elliptical trainer. It must have been some sort of pain-induced moment of clarity, and I couldn’t wait to get home to propose it that Monday morning.

I heard the shower running as I entered the house. Perfect. For whatever reason, she was always most attentive in the shower or the car.

I opened the door to the steamy bathroom and addressed the sealed shower curtain through the haze.

“Hey, Zoe, how’s it going?”

“Hi, Dad.” She answered in monotone that would put Ringo to shame.

“Hey, I’ve got an idea, and I just wanted to see what you thought of it.”

No response.

“How would you feel about, for five days, using only the technology available to me when I was sixteen? So that would mean no cell phones, digital music, computers…that kind of thing.”

“What’s in it for me?”

I knew this was coming. Since I wanted her to enter this agreement without undue influence or duress, I felt compelled to sweeten the pot.

“Fifty bucks.”

“Do I have to do this all the time or just at home?”

“Just at home. It’s nice to for us to have access to your cell phone when you’re not here.”

“Make it sixty and you’ve got a deal.”

My wife stood in silence. I could tell she wasn’t happy about the money, but if I got the kid to buy off on this, who knew how much things could permanently improve in five days?

“Okay, sixty. And we start now. This also means no ear buds; you can use our big headphones, since we had those in 1978. Oh, and you can watch TV, but only channels 4, 5, 7, 9, 11 and 13. And you can’t use the remote. You have to get up to change the station, like I had to.”

“Oh, come on. That’s ridiculous.”

“That really is ridiculous,” was my wife’s first comment.

“Okay, fine. You can use the remote, but if you use the phone, it has to be the one with the cord by the bathroom. No cordless.”

“Whatever.” I took that as a yes. “Dad, you should do it, too. You’re constantly on Facebook and doing your blog. You’re just as addicted as I am.”

My wife glanced over, giving me that rare “Your child is correct” look.

“Umm…okay.”

And just like that, for half the family, Amish Hour had turned into Seventies Week.

I returned home from work that first day to the din of hip hop music from the living room stereo. She sat at the kitchen table, her school books spread around her.

“Hi, Zoe. How’s the experiment going for you?”

“Good. When I got home, since I couldn’t get on the computer, I just turned on the radio and danced in front of the mirror. You know, what else was I gonna do?”

I could think of a few things, and none would be that.

“Good for you. I see you’re already doing your homework.”

“Actually, I’m a day ahead. This is tomorrow’s homework.”

“Great.”

This seems to be working just fine, I thought. We’ve already exchanged more words than we would in two days, and I just got here. Plus, it’s not that bad for her. At least clothing isn’t part of the 1978 agreement. I could just hear myself saying, “Young lady, you are not leaving this house until you turn around and put on something far tighter than that.”

We reminisce, we discuss the future. We talk about boys and friends and boyfriends.

I think we've reconnected, if only a little. I'm hopeful that, although this moratorium expires on Saturday, she and I can find a little time between her texting and Facebooking, between driving around with her sparkly new driver’s license and pursuing her active social schedule, to chat...about anything...or nothing at all.

It's a small chunk of time we discovered in 1978.

Trying on schools: One size doesn't fit all.

Every so often, we all get firmly spanked with the splintered paddle of mortality. And from my steadily graying perspective, the Grim Reaper's croquet mallet seems to whack me with ever greater frequency.

As I discussed in this post, my ten-year-old daughter and I have been visiting local middle schools recently. It's not like it used to be back in the day, when your elementary, junior high and high schools lay before you with greater certainty than the roof of your mouth being scraped to shreds from that second bowl of Cap'n Crunch.

We now have choices, which, I suppose, is good. My daughter already has a spot reserved in our neighborhood middle school, but we decided to perform this exercise as a backup plan, kind of like bringing two lighters with you on your way to the woods with a pack of smokes stolen from your mom's purse.

She and I had already checked out a small, private school, which we both liked a lot, but naturally would entail a sizable financial outlay.

We also had paid a visit to an alternative educational facility. Teachers and administrators were addressed on a first-name basis, the classes were quite informal and we were told that students embark on scores of camping trips and other excursions into nature. I can think of tons of kids who would love this type of program, but my little urban diva would not be one of them.

After watching a class discussion, with questions answered by children whose names were "Karma" and "Justice," we concluded that, although the building was great and the staff friendly and dedicated, it just wasn't our cup of herbal tea.

Our last school visit occurred on Wednesday, at the place she's slated to attend in the fall. After perusing the sixth grade section of the building, with stops at band, language arts and science classes, parents and students gathered in the cafeteria for a final pitch from our tour guide.

The counselor stood, surrounded by a semi-circle of visitors and listed the plethora of after-school clubs and activities available to students, including bus service afterward.

This is where the sale was closed.

"We've got so many great things for kids to do after school." He scanned the crowd to maintain eye contact. "There's steel drum band, chess club, math club, hip hop dance, hair styling..."

I felt a sharp poke to the side of my rib cage. My head reflexively jerked to the right to address the source of the irritation. She hoisted herself onto her tip toes and leaned into my ear. "Dad, I'm going to this school. I am so doing hair club," she whispered forcefully.

This wasn't a question, a suggestion or a request. "Okay," I mumbled back.

I visualized her, sometime in October, returning home around 4:30 and sporting Bo Derek corn rows or possibly a Ziggy Stardust orange mullet. Neither of us listened very intently from that point forward, since destiny had been acknowledged. We bid farewell to our host and walked silently to the minivan.

I had a moment.

Ten years ago, this girl I was walking alongside was a cackling toddler, able to insert a fistful of Cheerios, including fist, into her mouth. She was so dependent and fragile.

Ten years from now, this girl whose shoulders I placed my arm around, will be a young woman, possessing all of the rights and privileges of the full adulthood opening up before her. She'll be setting sail, and I'll be on the shore waving.

Sure, we've got some adventures ahead of us, but she'll never be a baby again.

She'll always be my baby, though.

How I fit my teenager for a GPS without her knowledge

This cool dad thing is starting to wear off.

My wife and I are always encouraging our fifteen-year-old daughter to invite her friends over to the house. It's nice to meet the people she hangs out with during these pivotal years, and if they're here, they're not somewhere else (obviously, but you know what I mean).

These kids hang out in large social clusters, quite similar to gorillas and elephants with expanded vocabulary, but only recently have these groups become co-ed. Crushes do exist within their ever-morphing amoeba, but very little pairing up actually occurs—fine with me.

A few weeks ago, a group of twelve boys and girls assembled at our house to eat frozen pizza, drink high fructose corn syrup and get ready for the high school's fall homecoming dance. The girl faction had gathered earlier, and were ready to go when the males arrived. As they entered, the aroma of "Pink Sugar" perfume, the latest incarnation of adolescent female essence, hung thickly in the air, melding with the slightly burnt odor of ten Red Baron combo pizzas.

Since I'd not met most of the dudes, I tried to kick things off on a cool note. You know, make sure they noticed my ear piercings, maybe try a nonconventional handshake on one or two of them.

"Hey, guys, I'm Zoe's dad." Obviously. What other middle-aged man would be plodding around the house in shorts, slippers and a torn UW hoody with no drawstrings.

I continued, "You can call me Tim." Okay, that was kind of stupid. Chances are very slight that they'll ever call me anything. But at least I haven't messed up too badly yet.

But I didn't stop there. "I won't make you call me Dr. Haywood, even though that's how most people refer to me, since I'm a neurosurgeon."

Sparse, uncomfortable teen chuckles sprinkled the room. as my daughter's glare tore into me.  "He's not a doctor. He's a graphic designer. Bye, Dad,"

Well, that sure went well, I thought. It used to be so much easier to win these kids over. A solid knock-knock joke, followed by their favorite flavor of frozen Gogurt and a Capri Sun, and I was golden. Now the only golden object was my silence.

I retreated into another room and didn't emerge until I could hear them preparing to head out for the evening. I re-entered their domain, planning on saying as little as possible, but lost my game plan at the sight of three shirtless sixteen-year-old boys. Apparently, they decided to change into their dance shirts just prior to leaving, and my living room looked like the Chippendale's Apprentice Academy.

It was easy to stick to my no-speaking strategy, since my mouth and the mouth's of the girls in the room stood agape at the display of muscles I haven't seen on my own body since the Carter administration.

The wardrobe change took all of two minutes and everyone was out the door before I realized that my daughter had entered a new realm in her dealings with the opposite sex. And next time everyone comes over, I'll be much more prepared.

I won't be there.

It's not just another Friday

It's just another Friday.

She comes into their bedroom at six-thirty.

Dad, it's Friday.

Yep. He yawns.

Are we doing our routine?

Uh, huh.

He gets up and showers quickly.

She gets dressed and brushes her hair and teeth.

Remember, Dad? This is the day of the week when I wear my comfy clothes. Are you done with your coffee?

Yep. Let's go.

On the three-minute trip to Safeway, they talk about karma and friends.

They walk through the sliding doors, and she takes in the aroma of flowers and produce.

Dad, I love that smell.

She leads him to the bakery, where she chooses a blueberry muffin, and then gets an orange juice (with added calcium).

Dad, this is pretty healthy, right?

I guess so.

They shuffle through the checkout area; no bag necessary.

Both Dad and daughter sit on the same side of a booth in the deli area and eat and watch and talk.

Dad, can you open my orange juice? Thanks. This muffin is really fresh, she says, unaware of a fluffy, blue crumb dangling from her mouth's corner.

Dad, thanks for bringing me here, she says, as she wraps her right arm around his midsection on the way out of Safeway.

It's not just another Friday.

We get lockers this year

In light of today being the first day of school for many of our kids, I thought it might be fitting to reflect upon some of my kids' first-day-of-school, adrenaline-fueled comments:
Kindergarten: "Dad, I'll stop crying if you will. Just pick me up in an hour if things don't work out."
First Grade: "Dad, do my Hello Kitty leggings match my Hannah Montana choker?"
Second Grade: "Dad, I don't care if it's eighty-three degrees. This coat will never look as good as it does today."
Third Grade: "Dad, do you think my teacher knows that I'll need to pee around ten?"
Fourth Grade: "Dad, look at the kindergarteners. They're so cute."
Fifth Grade: "Dad, can you just walk behind me a little bit when we get there?"
Sixth Grade: "Dad, really, it's just middle school. Stop hugging me. People are looking."
Seventh Grade: "Dad, it's just a little eye liner. You've seen a lot worse working in the fashion industry."
Eighth Grade: "Dad, just drop me off here. Thanks for the ride."
Ninth Grade: "Dad, I'm serious. If you draw on my lunch bag, I won't let you drive me to school."
I don't think my kids realize what a milestone each first day of school is. It's one of the most emotional days of the year; they feel excited and nervous, while I feel nostalgic and...well...old.
One of the day's most enduring sensations is that weathered, piney school smell that hits you the minute you walk into the building. That's usually what facilitates the lump in my throat when I look over at a daughter who has grown another year.