I Used To Sneak Out

Let me start this post by noting that my mother reads my blog. She occasionally leaves me little messages on my personal Facebook page putting me in my place after reading posts like the one about her chasing my brother and me around the house with wooden spoons.

I’m a bit lucky that so far she hasn’t sent me a gift from this website www.BoxOfShit.com.

But, I think after this post my luck will run out. So, mom…get up and just walk away from the computer. Go on….leave woman!!

Is she gone? OK, let’s do this.

So, I used to sneak out of my house with such regularity as a kid you’d think I was practicing for an Olympic gold medal in it.

I knew my parents nightly routine like the back of my hand.

9:10 – 10:36 p.m. – Fight like cats & dogs

10:36 – 11:21 p.m. – Father takes his drunk ass upstairs to watch HBO late night softcore porn

11:22 – 11:48 p.m. – Father passes out, mother follows suit.

12 p.m. – The house falls silent and the countdown is on till the coast is clear.

Waiting till the coast is clear for sneaking out is the hardest and longest time of your lives. I can’t tell you how many times I’d wake up to my alarm going off at 6 a.m. and screaming, “SHIT!!!!”

But one day I was digging through an old dresser in our guest bedroom and found this old-school clock that had an alarm only a mouse could appreciate. I set the alarm, put all my faith in it, and at 1:01 a.m. it went off.

I quickly snapped the alarm off and sat straight-up in bed listening.

My father was in his regular deep deep slumber which sounds like a mix between a 1920s broke-ass sawmill and two constipated virgin elephants trying to make sweet love.

My mother, she always slept like a rock. I can’t tell you how many times as a kid I’d run into her room frantically trying to wake her up  to impart upon her the very exciting news that I was about to throw-up all over this lovely house of ours. By the time she woke up to my childish nudging and whispering, “mommy… I think I’m going to...” I would inevitably puke all over the floor and bed beside her.

A smile crept across my face as I knew I had found a way to get in sleep while also being able to escape for a while in the middle of the night.

The next piece was huge. Putting together the elaborate mental puzzle I’d created that when put together, revealed the exact locations to step when walking down the carpeted L-shaped stairs to freedom.

The key to it all…banisters. After three steps I could place my hands on both banisters and swing my anti-gymnastic-skilled-ass passed five steps and a half-landing.

The last three steps always squeaked the loudest so I had to turn around and take those them backwards so I could steady myself with my hands.  

At that point…it’s game-on and I was out of there.

I never really had a purpose to sneak out at night. Very rarely would I meet-up with a friend. When I did it usually ended with them saying, “why in the hell are we doing this? I’m tired dude!!!”

My brother used to make the journey from time to time with me. But again, why? We get to hang out all day every day. Why waste sleep and risk getting caught to do it under moonlight?

So, I’d just walk or ride my bike. I’d go to the lake nearby and throw rocks from an old decrepit concrete pier. I’d occasionally leave a tennis ball in my girlfriend’s mailbox so she’d find it and think I was a badass rebel.

I experimented with smoking and alcohol.

But most importantly I was living that very moment of my life exactly how I wanted to live it. There were no rules. No parents. No one was watching.

Parents weren’t fighting. My father wasn’t asking me to make him drinks.

The escape I’d created in my room with music, my piano, writing poems, and reading lyrics had gotten so much larger. It was now filled with fresh air, endless roads and no boundaries.

But despite all the freedom and time alone with my brain, there was a tiny little piece of me that found motivation to sneak out of the house from the idea that I might get caught.

I figured, if I was caught, it would show my father that I was in control of me and capable of leaving his tiny kingdom whenever I wanted. I could defy him. I could break the chains whenever I felt like it.

And like that the night would be over. It was time to head home.

There was always this one corner that was six houses away. As soon as I turned that corner I’d have a clear shot of my parents’ bedroom windows.

Light on – I’m screwed.

Light off – Home free. Just make it through the front door and the rest can be explained by sleep walking.

In all the times I ventured into the night, I never came home to find a light on.

I never came home to find my mother and father sitting downstairs holding the letter I left on my pillow every time I snuck out that read:

Dear Mom:

I am OK. Nothing bad has happened to me. I snuck out of the house to just go for a walk and be alone. I know it’s very dangerous for me to do and I’m sorry.

I love you and will be home very shortly. I hope you will not be too mad and if you found this before dad woke up all I ask is that you don’t wake him or tell him until we talk.

Love,

Justin

A few times a year when I can’t sleep in the middle of the night I’ll get up, toss on the running gear and go out for a short three-miler. As my feet pound pavement I look at all the rows of houses dark and filled with slumber and I feel free again.

Free like a 14-year-old boy gliding through the streets of his neighborhood at 1:30 a.m. without a care in the world and nothing to lose.



The Age of Not Listening

It’s starting to happen.

The boy is getting the taste of the tragic disease which doctors call the “I’M NOT LISTENING” syndrome. What does it stand for?

The horrific I’M NOT LISTENING syndrome is an acronym for “I May Not Open These Listening Instruments So Try Elling Nomeone Ielse Noure Guff!” (screw you!!! I tried to come up with an explanation for the acronym but damn all those n’s and ending with a g!!! Think you can do better?  Leave it in the comments!!!)

Anyway, the I’M NOT LISTENING syndrome is basically where a kid, usually a teenager, completely, totally and blatantly ignores and defies your commands whilst in a public arena.

As with most kids these days, the syndrome seems to be hitting kids at a younger age. And…well, our boy has been infected.

It first starts out with him ignoring your first request while looking at the other adults for approval remarks that tell him "yes…yes I am being a bad-ass."

All it takes is one misread gesture and it all goes downhill from there.

You want examples don’t you?

Example #1

Standing with a group of neighbors enjoying the afternoon, a few beers and riveting conversation when all of a sudden the boy decides it would be genius to show the world his razor like precision of a soccer ball kick in our direction.

Me: “Grayson! Please don’t kick the ball in our…”

*The ball goes flying and I stop it mere inches from destroying the face of a neighbor.

Me: “Seriously Grayson!!! Really!!?! Come on, you know better.”

*As he launches ball #2 towards the group nailing the wife in the butt.

Me: “Grayson!!! Do you hear the words that are coming out of my mouth, son!!?!”

The Boy: “Can I have the balls back? I want to kick them again?”

Me: “You must be insane!!!”

The Boy: “What? It’s just soccer.”

Me: “I told you twice to not kick them at us and you didn’t listen and kicked them anyway.”

*Two minutes later ball #3 slams into my back causing me to drop my beer. I turn with “that look” and the boy takes off in a sprint that would make Hussein Bolt look like a chump.

Example #2

 Me: “Grayson, go brush your teeth.”

*The boy plays with the dog.

Me: “Grayson…seriously man! Go brush your teeth for bed!”

*The boy glances at dinner guests in the next room sipping their wine, then continues to play with the dog.

Me: “You know I know where you sleep right? You know that there’s no way you could possibly stay awake longer than me EVER! Right!!?!”

*The boy talks over me calling for the dog to do a trick.

Me: “You know you’ve told me the girl you think is cute in your class and I could rat you out with one simple little Facebook posting right?”

The Boy: “Love you dad! Goodnight! I’m off to go brush my teeth!”

And that’s my new weapon against the syndrome. “Humiliation.”

I didn’t just spend eight years of my life wiping his butt, picking his boogers, and cleaning his puke just to raise a delightful well-rounded boy.

No, I did it so I could have a life-time of memories which could be used against him at the right moment to get what I want!! In this case…it’s to get him to do what I say the first time.

So stand back Grayson, daddy’s going to win this public war.

Go ahead, ignore me when I ask if you to brush your teeth or go put your shoes on. I just might have a picture of you reading a book while sitting on the baby shitter in the playroom.

Bring it on buddy!!



Passing Notes With The Boy

Recently I was making the boy’s lunch when I thought about the picture I’d drawn with him which now lives on the back of his bedroom door.

He’d tossed a piece of paper in front of me while saying “daddy, just draw whatever and I’ll draw it next!”

So, I drew. And this is what I came up with.

From that point on, “puffy leaf floaty guy” became a staple in the house.

I’d draw him on their arms cause “I want a tattoo like yours daddy.”

I’d draw him on pieces of paper and randomly leave leaf the puffy dude somewhere for the kids to find.

Then, it hit me one fine coffee-aroma-filled morning.

“Golly gee gosh darn-it! I should totally draw the boy a picture for his lunch box!”

So, I did.

And, he did something completely unexpected…the little bastard wrote back.

So, like a tiny puppy given his treat for the first time I started wagging my tail obliviously knocking things off tables and the next morning, I did it again!

And he wrote back!

The third time I drew the cat from this awesome animated shorts called “Simon’s Cat” which my kids love.

And he wrote back!

Then, the boy schooled the hell out of me.

Yesterday I sketched out this quick little motivating message as a small pat on the boy’s back in the middle of his day.

And what does he do? He out-draws me with his version of himself "rocking."

It’s my first experience being one-upped by the boy. He “out-creativelyed” me. (Yeah, I just made that word up.)

And I guess I’m cool with it, but it kinda stings a little.

I’m the creative, out-of-the-box, shock-value funny one in the family damn it!!

But, then I realize what an awesome thing a sense of humor is in life. And, if he’s going to have a sense of humor I would want it to be unique and creative.

So, bring it on my man. I’m ready to up-my-game in the note passing arena!

Let’s do this!



Spank Me Baby!

Spanking… Some do it, some don’t.

But at some point in your parental lives you’ll be forced to make that decision. And even after you make that decision those little bastards will push you so far that you might just re-think it.

Now, I’m not even about to stand proud on my soap box, pound my chest and make a public stance on this issue.

Instead, I’m going to guide you on a little jaunt back-in-time to my childhood to discuss wooden spoon, hair brushes, and belts – oh my!

Why? Because my parents were huge believers of spanking.

My mother was a wooden spoon kind of lady. It was her weapon of choice.

Originally my brother and I thought she mistakenly grabbed one while reaching for a knife, but now we’re pretty confident the stealth speed of the spoon as it sliced through the air, landing effortlessly on our young butt’s just milliseconds before we dodged her thrashing arm was what sold our mother on the dreaded spoon of wood.

Regardless, she was a ninja master with it.

And no matter what room in the house we were in, there was always a wooden spoon hidden somewhere:

• Bathroom spraying water on my brother as he brushed his teeth – WHAP! a wooden spoon across the ass.
• Watching cartoons with my brother and accidentally saying “shit” loud enough for my mother to hear – WHAP! a wooden spoon across the legs and bar of Lava soap in the mouth.
• Mumbling under my breath “I hate you and wish you were dead” after my mother spanked me with a wooden spoon – (sound effect of spoon flying through the air like a throwing star) WHAP! a wooden spoon on the back.

She had skills.

Every now and then my brother (@ibeenorm on Twitter) and I would push her to the point where we’d turn and find her frazzled, raging, and holding a single wooden spoon in hand donning a “let’s dance motherfuckers!” look on her face.

Our reaction was always to put our hands behind our butts and scatter in opposite directions. It was our impulse.

And like a true lioness she always went after the weaker, slower one. But looking back, the smart move would have been to let her hit me first every time because once the initial hunt was over, she would then call the other kid who got away and he’d have to stand there and take it.

Afterward, we’d inevitably end up in the bathroom, bent over comparing black-and-blue wooden spoon marks on each other’s asses to see who would be declared the gold in Olympic Wooden Spoon Dodging.

My father? His weapon of choice was the blue hair brush or a belt. And to make matters worse, he was a lazy spanker.

He was a do-it-yourself vicious spanking machine. All that was required was a crying, shaking child and a weapon.

Many-a-time he’d come home, look at my report card, scream and yell, then say the words we always dreaded to hear: “go get the hairbrush.”

There was no need to argue, no need to negotiate…you were about to get your ass beat.

So you make the long walk up the stairs, sniffling, kicking yourself for being in this situation, and making last minute pleas with any god who will listen that he “please slam our house with a massive meteorite stat!!”

I’d slowly walk back in, hand him the brush and then wait for the second most-hated phrase to be uttered: “take down your pants and underwear.”

The humility of having to drape yourself over your father’s knee, bare-ass sticking in the air, waiting for all hell to break loose was enough to make you want to become a saint for the rest of your life.

But we never learned our lessons. Despite the knowledge of our mother hoarding at least three-dozen wooden spoons sporadically around the house, and our father’s keenness to play our bare-asses like a snare drum with his hairbrush, my brother and I continued to raise holy hell.

We continued to take lashings over the years for some of the dumbest things we had under our control to just simply not do. We were like moths to a flame.

Even today when I’m walking through a store and see a wooden spoon on display I have the sudden urge to pop my brother on the back of the head and call him a “punk.”



The Lego Incident

OK…let’s do this. Let’s take a trip back into the lovely childhood of Why Is Daddy Crying.

According to my brother (twitter name @ibeenorm) it’s about 1985ish. My father, an alcoholic Realtor at the time, was on his way home from wherever he was.

Our stay at home mom, well, she was stuck in hell trying to raise two out-of-control boys.

Looking back, if it were me, I’d have tossed myself off the tallest bridge just after stapling a note to the kids’ chest warning the next possible parent.

But she endured, doing what she did best…kicking our asses with wooden spoons and threatening us with “when your father gets home…”

On this particular day, our rooms had breached the limit of absolute horror and our mother had asked us politely clean to them.

Clothes, shit-stained underwear, and god knows what else were thrown around our rooms.

My brother, well, he had a slight Lego obsession. He’s just over two years older than me and the boy could build the hell out of anything with Legos.

And, he also didn’t give a rat’s ass about keeping his room clean.

Me, being the second child, I got to watch and learn from his mistakes.

So, when he didn’t clean his room, I did…very quickly.

As a result, my room got cleaned while next door my brother had gone ahead and adopted the “go fuck yourself” strategy and enjoyed a few hours of reading and relaxing.

Once Days of Our Lives was over, my brother got sternly reminded by our mother that “you’d better clean your room. Your father’s gonna be home soon!!!”

Me: “Dad’s gonna kick your ass. You should seriously start cleaning.”

Brother: “Lick my balls dip-shit.”

We loved each other dearly.

The sun began to set. The house was filled with the smoke of my mother sucking down one Lark cigarette after another. I gave my room a quick once-over, then slowly peeked into my brother’s room only to find him fast asleep still surrounded in his dungeon of disgust.

Then, the dreaded sound of my father’s wood-paneled station wagon pulling into the garage brought the house to stand still. My back straightened, my mom started preparing his rum and Mr. Pibb drink to hand him at the door, and my brother…slept.

I could hear a muffled conversation taking place downstairs. Then, the footsteps began.

My 6-foot, 6-inch tall, overweight father could drop his feet in a way that would even make Winston Churchill shit himself a little.

I hurdled my bed, poked my head in my brother’s room quickly and loudly whispered “get up asshole, he’s coming!!!”

I then threw myself back in my room in front of neatly arranged books as though I were studying.

Bypassing my room he headed directly to my brother’s .

Dad: “One hour!!! ONE HOUR!!!! That’s how long you have to pick-up everything in this room! Do you hear me?!!! Anything left on the floor gets thrown out the goddamn window!! NOW CLEAN!!”

I’m pretty sure every child within the two-block radius of our house suddenly felt compelled to clean their rooms without knowing fully why.

My brother? Nothing. Nada. Zip.

It was times like this during our childhood that I contemplated whether my brother had a death-wish.

Like clockwork, an hour passes and my father stands. The sound of the chair sliding across the floor, the loud thuds of his steps...I can remember it all like yesterday.

I do a quick check of my brother’s room and still no change. Our eyes meet quickly and I try to form the words “I’ll try to come visit you in the hospital” but they just won’t come out.

I watch my father steam past my room angrily chewing on the filter of his Lark cigarette and fueled by rum. And then all hell breaks loose.

At the top of his lungs he begins screaming at my brother. I hear the window slam open and a loud BANG as his screen goes crashing two stories down to the ground.

For a minute I wonder if my father used my brother to aid in the removal of the screen, but he didn’t, because that would have been too kind of a punishment.

Then it begins to happen. My father takes arm full upon arm full of Legos and tosses them out the window.

“I told you and I meant it goddamn it! EVERYTHING’S going out the damn window and then you’re going to clean it ALL up!!” he yelled as little plastic multi-colored pieces took flight into the crisp night air.

I could only imagine what it looked like from the street. A part of me wondered if there weren’t children standing below holding out large pillowcases catching pounds upon pounds of Legos as they floated gently from the sky above while singing carols and sucking on lollipops.

A quick glance out of my window revealed that clearly wasn’t the case. They were going everywhere on the lawn, in the bushes, under piles of leaves, into the neighbor’s yard…everywhere.

Then, it ended.

My father threw a few more choice phrases at my brother, then steamed out and back down the stairs to keep sucking on his half-gallon of rum.

After making sure the coast was clear I slowly tip-toed towards my brother’s room. My jaw dropped further and further as more and more of my brother’s room revealed itself to me. Finally, I was standing in the doorway looking at a bed, desk, shelves and nothing else. A breeze blew through the open window and my brother was just standing there completely defeated.

His room was spotless.

Me: “Well, he did a pretty good job.”

Brother: “Shut-up dick.”

Over the next few days and weeks my brother recovered a good portion of his Legos. His room stayed relatively clean for a couple days. Then, slowly, it returned to its natural chaotic state.

And, for the next few years before we both headed off to college, never to return home again, we would occasionally come across a lone Lego piece. It would be lying in the grass, hidden in the bushes, or one would shoot out from the side of the lawn mower.

I’d always pick it up, pocket-it, and take time later that day to leave it on my brother’s pillow.

A reminder of one of many glorious days in-which our father made a special memory with his boys.