It started raining down here about an hour ago. Looks like the transition to the Great Northwest will be easier than anticipated. Looking outside, I am struck by how positively homesick I’ve become. Just another 27 and a half hours until I arrive in the Land of my Birth.

In about sixteen and a half hours, we’ll be getting on a train and heading up to Seattle for the holidays. My wife is on vacation, and we’re pulling David out of school a couple of days early. I can’t really ever sleep before traveling, so today is going to drag on a bit..

My laptop is packed already, so I won’t be able to do a proper post until about 11pm tonight. To make up for this, I’ll try and post a series of bite-sized morsels leading up to the beginning of our journey.

I, of course, am fully packed. My two companions have yet to do likewise. Probably it has more to do with exhaustion than a dearth of excitement. David is getting over his fever, and Flor had been working herself to death, trying to get everything perfect for our grandson’s 2nd Birthday Extravaganza (although, to be fair, compared to last year, his party is almost entirely reasonable).

I have to run out and do a couple things that I’ve been putting off, as I won’t be back until 2015. Still, I’m pretty sure I can take a nap, both at home this afternoon, and once again this evening after we change trains.

-Tex

…and the only prescription is a couple of aspirin and bed rest.

We were called by the school today to go get the Monkey because he wasn’t feeling well. When we got there, we was curled up in the Nurse’s Office, peeking toward the door, waiting for us to arrive. He was just a little ball of feelin’ icky: Fever, sore throat, nausea. We brought him home, and laid him down in bed to watch Phineas and Ferb as he drifted off to sleep, cuddling up and telling him that he would be okay. Of course, this evening, my wife and I are feeling just about the same, so now it’s about trying to get better before visiting my grandparents.

So we’ll be taking a couple sick days, here at The Vaults.

-Tex

Good morning, everybody!

I’m still working on something that I think is topical, possibly worth reading, and considering the subject matter, I’m trying to get it right. My hope is to have it up mid-week, which will allow me to finish writing it, and discuss it with my editor.

Today the Seattle Seahawks host the San Francisco 49ers for what promises to be an exciting match of Sportsball at 1:25 this afternoon (Pacific). If you are into that sort of thing, I recommend tuning into the broadcast, as it’s likely to be a prime example of sports-like things.

In other news: The Vaults Of Uncle Walt will be travelling to Seattle soon, so expect a clever travelogue as we make our way Up North. I can never sleep before I travel, so my ramblings will most likely be disjointed and sarcastic. So, you know, my usual stuff.

Have a great Sunday, and I’ll see all of you back here tomorrow!

-Tex

And now, the conclusion:

We got back into the apartment with just seconds to spare. David ran straight for the bathroom, tossing his backpack off on the sofa by the door,and leaving a trail of fluttering papers and falling laundry behind him. The bathroom door slammed shut, and I winced as I then heard my wife’s half-wakened grumblings from within the bedroom. It also appeared that the door slamming shut had awakened my grandson, as a plaintive wailing rose above the garbled Spanish cursing. I sighed and retrieved the backpack, walking gingerly toward the bedroom door to see what manner of creature we had roused. As I peeked my head in through the doorway, I breathed a sigh of relief, as Flor had somehow fallen back asleep, the cursing gently dying down to be swallowed by her snores.

Upon exiting the restroom, my son inquired once again about his chances to play Xbox. Running all the options through my head, and considering the volume implications of each one, I decided that letting him play Xbox was the lesser of the evils available to him. He powered on the console, surprisingly subdued in his excitement, and scrolled through the games until he got to Ducktales. I’d gotten the remastered game as an inexpensive birthday gift for myself, but saw how much his face lit up, and told him it was a Christmas present that he could play with early.

A year and a half ago, he wouldn’t even pick up a controller. He just demanded that I play LEGO Star Wars or LEGO Batman as soon as I got home from work. I kept trying to get him to play, but he would shove the controller back into my hand, and said that he just wanted to see me play. It wasn’t until I was almost done beating LEGO Star Wars 3, that I finally got the chance to include him in the game. It was a pretty easy part, and by that, I mean that it was almost inconceivable that he could find a way to screw it up. There were many tears shed, but we finally got to the bottom of his reluctance to take up the mediocre gaming mantle from his old man: he was terrified of doing something wrong. He would rather give up an opportunity to explore the artfully rendered world of Star Wars or Batman in glorious LEGO detail than to possibly not do everything perfectly. Sweet Jesus, the boy is truly mine own son.

It took him a while to get the hang of gaming, and for the most part, I still have to do the hard stuff for him, like manage his in-game finances and beat the Bosses. but he actually wants to play now. Of course, that’s opened up another can of worms entirely, but his hand-eye coordination is improving, as well as his problem solving abilities. Now if I could only find a way to make books as interesting for him, I think I’d be all set.

Together, we powered through most of the levels, with David doing most of each map, and Daddy jumping in at dead end situations and Boss confrontations. I finally called it a day for Xbox when he began getting whiny and frustrated when we couldn’t get past the Final Boss (at least I think it’s the Final Boss. Like I said, we haven’t gotten past it). His shrieks of displeasure finally woke his mother, but it was within a half an hour of when she had to get up anyway, so I’m going to say that Operation: Oh Look, Shiny! was a resounding success. Flor seemed more relaxed at having gotten any sleep, and got ready for her third-to-last shift before taking her vacation. As she was getting ready, I made us a quick dinner, and got the Blu-Ray player set up so that we could watch The Giver. My son and I said our goodbyes as she was walking out the door, and turned away and strode inside and back into the bedroom.

It was only just past 7 when we put the movie on. I’d wrangled David into his jammies, and made the bed, and dimmed the lights. We curled up under the covers, and with a forehead smooch, I began the movie.

“Why is it in black and white?”

“Because Jonas hasn’t learned to see colors yet.”

“Can we watch something else?”

“Dude, you liked the book. What’s wrong?”

“Black and white is for old movies! I don’t wanna watch an old movie!”

“Dude, this just came out. And there’s nothing wrong with black and white movies. Just hang tight, man.”

“Okay, but if I don’t like it, can we watch another movie?”

“I’m watching this one, so if you don’t want to watch, you can go to sleep.”

My son harrumphed, but decided to keep watching. Every few minutes or so, he would ask me what was happening, or what was going to happen. To this I would inevitably respond, that not only had we read the book together, but if he would simply close his mouth and pay attention, he would have a better idea of what was going on. His curiosity mostly satisfied, he cuddled back into my arms and actually watched the movie. A short while later, during Jonas’ training, he got upset at the hunting of an elephant. “It isn’t fair,” he said, “and it really wasn’t nice at all.” I agreed with him, and said that was kind of the point.

Now that he was actually engaged with the movie, he sat up slightly, paying just a bit more attention to what was on the screen. And then, before I knew it, Jeff Bridges was flashing back to Vietnam, and I paused the movie so my son and I could have a little talk about war. He said it scared him, and he didn’t like it when people were shooting other people. He thought they shouldn’t kill anybody. He said he didn’t know what happened when we died, but if there isn’t Heaven, then when those people died, it was just really unfair because then they couldn’t be alive any more.

As the movie passed into its final act, David was alert, but tightly snuggled into me. He was tense as our protagonist raced towards the final moments, and hoped that he would get there before it was too late. The movie ended (in a far more Hollywood inspired climax), and I asked him what he thought. He didn’t think there should be Receivers of Memory. He thought that people needed to be able to love the little babies (he usually finds a way to connect a concept to feelings toward his nephew). and that people shouldn’t hurt each other. And mid-sentence, just as he was going to define for me his unified theory of everything, he just passed out. And it was only slightly past 8:30.

I never have any problems getting him to sleep on Friday nights, and he never has any issues waking up on Saturday mornings. I feel like I should lie to him, and tell him that he doesn’t have to go to school tomorrow (for every tomorrow that’s applicable), and in the morning tell him that they changed their minds, and he’s got to get ready for the day. I feel like such a Parental Unit.

Thanks for enjoying this adventure in three parts. I’ll see you all tomorrow with something a little less Peter Jackson.

-Tex

And now, the continuation:

On the return trip, he began sipping from his sports drink, and I advised him to take it easy, as we wouldn’t be in bathroom range for quite while to go. Amazingly, he didn’t argue. He just screwed the cap back on the bottle and, I swear I’m not making this up, he actually behaved himself all the way to Walgreens! But as we entered the automatic doorway of our local apothecary, I knew it had been too good to last. Almost immediately began the demands to look at toys and to be given candy. And when I picked out my deodorant, the primary reason for our visit (Christmas came early for my wife this year!), he began asking why I needed it. Luckily, before I would have had to improvise an edited version of The Birds and Stinky Bees, he asked if we were getting anything else from that section of the store, like nighttime diapers or… toys. Again, I told him that we weren’t getting toys or chocolates, and reminded him that if he couldn’t pull himself together, he would find himself without a snack. He led the way at a steady pace, head hung in resignation, toward the beverages and snack aisle.

I grabbed a couple snack wraps and bottle of Code Red, while David chose a Lunchable. He tried to convince me that he should get a soda too, since I was getting one, and then caught himself, and said, “You know what, Dad? You’re right. This comes with a Wild Cherry juice. Do you know why they call it ‘Wild Cherry’?”

Before I could respond, he blurted out, “Because the cherries are so Wild!” I stared blankly down at him, as the maniacal giggling had begun, and simply shook my head. I placed my hand upon his back, and did the best I could to guide him the the register before he had the chance to ask for anything else, or worse: attempt another “joke.” I glanced over at the Redbox kiosk on my right, but needed both my hands for what they were doing, and after paying for our stuff, I could use David’s backpack to free them up to browse. So we entered into the line, three back from the cashier. The photo department called out for the next in line, and we were left behind a woman trying to scrounge enough change out of the bottom of her purse to buy a bouquet of drugstore roses. Five minutes (no exaggeration), and a constant stream of my son schilling for the candy companies, later, we were finally able to buy our five items and be on our way. It took just under a minute (including packing everything into his backpack), and we were walking to the rental machine.

Like I said in Part One, Guardians of the Galaxy was Out of Stock (with prejudice) and I began scrolling through the options to find some cinematic delight acceptable to both my son and to myself. His eyes lit up at How To Train Your Dragon 2, but I’ve already purchased it for him as a Christmas present, and have, therefore, become on willing to spend any more money upon it. Most of the other films they had on display seemed wildly inappropriate for him, but then I saw that The Giver was in stock, and remembered just how proud I’d been when we actually got through that book together.

On a side note: From when I first read that book, many years ago, I could only remember the messages of the dangers of conformity and that adults are stupid and not to be trusted. I wasn’t prepared for how Old Man and The Massage it was. I guess if you’ve never experienced anything other than your childhood innocence, then everything is filtered through that lens. My son seemed only to be interested in the parts where Jonas discovers color and the meaning of life, skipping over, in its entirety, the mentions of implied pederasty and having children sponge-bathe senior citizens. Also, I realized that the Divergent series seemed to be nothing more than an expansion on the notions first put forth in The Giver (which I’m sure probably robbed from Dr. Seuss), but somehow made it sexier, and aimed primarily at teenaged girls. Rant concluded.

Redbox then offered me the chance to save fifty cents (OMG! Half a dollar!) if I rented a second movie. I figured, What the heck! and began scrolling through again. David felt this was his best chance to snag the film he wanted, but I decided on the new X-Men flick because who doesn’t enjoy watching stories about time travel, mutations, and Peter Dinklage. My son was, of course, disappointed in the films which I’d selected, but I reminded him of who was paying, and he backed down, just a little.

In all our walking and our haggling over the things which I would buy, we’d only managed to kill just under ninety minutes since the end of school. I allowed my son to talk me into heading to our cool, secluded lunch spot (just behind the Not-Quite-Richmond City Hall). We ate our prepackaged “meals” and talked about the weather. And squirrels. And whether or not he would be allowed to play the Xbox later, since it wasn’t a school night, and he’d been such a good boy that entire day. I told him that we’d see, and stole a cookie from his snack platter while he wasn’t looking.

We finished up and headed home, taking the back roads to heighten the sense of adventure. We played that we were elven scouts on the run from some bedeviled goblin army, and that we had to make it to our castle without being seen by their patrols. This game stretched out what would have been a ten minute walk into something closer to about twenty. I’d managed to buy my wife another couple hours of uninterrupted sleep, and could do no more, as the time had come that David had to use the restroom.

TO BE CONCLUDED…

I had a decent day today. I think I’ve caught up on all the sleep that I’d been missing, trying to transition into a more nocturnal rhythm, and balancing that against having to be awake at certain times throughout the day, because apparently it’s frowned upon to let your child wait an extra hour at his school after classes finish for the day. I have nothing but the utmost respect for my wife, who has been walking this tightrope for the past two years, in addition to entertaining our grandson, and doing laundry, and grocery shopping, and never quite getting around to actually sleeping more than just a couple hours in the predawn morning, and again after she brings the Minkey home from school. I thought that everything was going swimmingly, heading into Wednesday, and that I could keep up with the pace I’d set myself, but when my wife returned to work that evening, my writing couldn’t start until almost 10pm, and by then I was exhausted, having spent almost three hours trying to convince my son that it was bedtime. Yesterday was a complete wash, as I couldn’t even think straight, and everything I tried to write just withered on the page after about 300 words.

So to celebrate a good night’s sleep, I went to Redbox and picked us up a couple movies. Of course, Guardians of the Galaxy was out of stock (and will probably remain so for at least a little while), so I settled for X-Men: Days of Future Past (primarily because of the hilarious send-up Honest Movie Trailers did a while ago), and The Giver, which was my reward to David for letting me get through that entire book when I was trying to read it to him. I was curious to see his reaction to the way movies usually butcher the source material, and see if he would prove himself a true reader with the utterance, “The book was better.”

It was still fairly early in the afternoon, and I could only imagine how little sleep my wife had managed, as she was still awake when I finally had passed out, and yet never woke me up this morning when it was time to take David to school. I knew he actually went to school due to a noticeable peace and quiet in the room, save from the saw mill horizontally splayed upon the bed beside me, when I finally acquiesced to my bladder’s demands for action around 1:30 this afternoon. Knowing that she normally gets roped into volunteering at the school, or volunteering here at home, I figured she’d probably only just laid down to bed, and decided to just go get David, and then take him with me as I ran my errands, so as to buy my beloved at least a couple of hours more to dream.

His class is most often the last class to appear after the final bell has rung (although it’s really more of an automated buzzer that can be heard half a mile away with clarity), unless either we are somehow running a little late, in which case we are chastised for for having not been there since final dismissal, with no acknowledgement of early arrivals almost every other day. And so it goes. I told him we were going on an adventure, so if he had to use the potty, five minutes ago was really the ideal time. He said he was fine, so off we went upon our epic journey through the very heart of Not-Quite-Richmond, CA.

“Where are we going? he asked at least a half a dozen times. “Are we going to McDonald’s?”

“I told you already, David.” I explained for now, the seventh time, “We’re dropping something off at the Post Office, walking up to just past the Subway, and then coming back to get some beverages at Walgreens.”

“But then can we go to McDonald’s?”

I let him put the envelope in the collection box, noting that the final pickup was at 5 o’clock. One errand down and two to go. “Okay,” I said, “we’re going to my store now.”

“Is it far?”

“Just up past Subway, almost to your doctor’s office.”

“But I don’t have to go to the doctor today.”

“Didn’t you have an appointment this morning? Hey, how’d it go anyway?”

“Oh, no… they called Mommy and cancelled.”

“Um… okay, so then…” I paused, not really wanting to ask him any more about it, as his answers most likely wouldn’t get me any closer to the truth than my own imagination. “Well, you know we’re not actually going there. I’m letting you know roundabouts where we’re headed.”

“Okay, Daddy.”

We chatted about how his test in school went, and some of the trouble I got into when I was still in school. We agreed that math is easy, and that it probably wouldn’t hurt him to put a little bit more effort into his attempts at pen(cil)smanship. “So Mommy said that I’m going to get a computer for my birthday.” He said, out of the blue.

“Okay,” I replied, “You know that’s, like, half a year away, right?”

“Well, I was thinking that maybe I could have it for Christmas…”

“If it’s going to be a birthday present, why would you think that you could get it for Christmas?”

“Because I want it.”

“Well, okay then.”

“I also want LEGO Batman 3.”

“I know, honey, me too. But it’s still really expensive.”

“You said I’d get it for Christmas…”

“No, I said that you might get it for Christmas. But I really can’t afford it right now.”

“Maybe Santa can bring it for me!”

“You know he doesn’t do electronics or software, right?”

“What about a robot?”

“Is it a toy, or a real robot?”

“A real robot.”

“Then no, David, he can’t get that made for you.”

“Okay, it’s a toy robot.”

“I think Santa might be able to swing that.”

We arrived at our secondary destination, where I stocked up on cigarettes for my trip up to Seattle, as I’m not going to pay $3 more a pack for nicotine. I got him a Gatorade for going above and beyond the call of childhood, and not needing to use the bathroom even once in the past half hour since I had gotten him from school. Our second errand run, we turned around and headed home, with a pit stop at Walgreens along the way.

TO BE CONTINUED…

So I’ve been working on a few things today, and nothing really seems to be coming together. I’ve written at least one column’s worth, but sadly, that’s the word count from about three stalled projects combined. I’m taking my time on my “Very Special report on Inequality” which I’ll be posting tomorrow, in addition to at least one other counterpoint, which I’m also polishing in preparation. Depending on when I get all my errands done today, I may have something to share in time for an Evening Edition.

I want to thank you all so much for giving me part of your day, and I hope that I’ve entertained or enlightened you, in return. As this Blog moves forward, I’ll try to include more timely responses to events transpiring around me, and even attempt a humor piece or two.

I look forward to your company again, and have a wonderful conclusion to your week!

-Tex

I’ve touched upon it couple times, but never really got into any kind of detail about why it was that I decided at the age of seven that I wanted to be a writer. And, as I sit here, countless notions for a column flying through my mind, refusing to touch down, I thought I might remind myself just why, exactly, I fell in love with the written word and chose this life when I might have had any number of alternatives; to put forth what I feel it means to be a wordsmith, and why I think that it’s important. I’ve danced around the wherefores and the fallout resulting from my… my chosen euphemism of tenacity, but I’ve left untouched the genesis of this entire foolhardy affair.

I’ve been a reader since before I can remember. In every home in which I’ve lived, an overflowing bookcase was a sign of pride. Not a statement of elitism (hardly possible with all of the Star Trek novels upon the shelves), nor a trophied ostentation, but as a testament to love, a memorial to the lives we’d spent in the company of the protagonists within. During my grade school years, I always sought out books at least a year or two ahead, relishing not only the challenge of assimilating new vocabulary, but the exposure to more mature concepts and richer presentations of nuance. Around the time I fell in love with writing, I was reading Madeleine L’Engle’s classic “A Wrinkle In Time”. I read “Dracula” (Unabridged) for the first time when I was ten, and discovered Tolkien when I was eleven. Tom Robbins, George Orwell, and Douglas Adams ruled my High School years. I lived and died more purely and intensely with every tale than with anything which crossed my path in life, and I was a Bi-Polar Poet in search of Love, so…

I used to have that paper. I kept it close and treasured, like my Declaration of Independence and Constitution combined. That piece of paper stayed with me for fourteen years, and was the foundation upon which I laid down all my hopes and dreams, until one evening in December of 2000, when, in Port Orchard on the way to see my girlfriend who was locked up in the county jail, I managed to have it all taken from me in the space of about thirty seconds. I’d gathered everything I’d ever written, the original Vaults of Uncle Walt, and taken them with us to drop off somewhere safe sometime after we’d rendezvoused with [redacted]. It had sprinkled earlier that day, and the roads were just slick enough to counteract any friction that might have come to our aid as the brakes locked up on our descent toward the valley floor and the back of a rusted red pickup truck. The driver honked her horn, and I mashed my feet into the imaginary pedals before me on the passenger side. We were only going 35 when our vehicles collided, but as ours was a Mary Kay Pink Dodge who’d already seen far better days before today, and his was an American Pickup, fully stopped and protected by a cushion of rust, it was really no contest. A tow truck was called, and I grabbed what I could from the back of the car, assured that we’d go out to get the rest within a couple weeks. And there I was, stranded miles from home, having failed to even find the jail in which [redacted] was housed, and suddenly bereft of my life’s work.

My girlfriend was released, and, after a particularly trying patch of time living homeless in the Great Northwest in the prime of winter, we found a basement apartment which we could almost afford on the job I managed to acquire. It was a chance for redemption for the both of us, but by the end of January, the lifestyle I’d been so desperate to get us away from had returned. Turns out living on the straight and narrow was too hard a task to manage. Knowing things were coming to a head, but terrified at losing almost four years of love I’d lived with [redacted], we bumbled through until that day in mid-March when I announced to sanity that I’d rather like to start seeing other states of being. We’d gotten the information (after three months of curious reluctance from the driver), and driven out to the towing yard where every poem, story, photographic negative and drawing (save what I’d salvaged from the car that night) rested safely in the back of that wrecked automobile. Or would have been, if we’d arrived with $200 no later than the first week of January. Every ounce of passion I had focused into a single goal had been crushed and incinerated. Three days later, in the aftermath of a nervous breakdown, I checked myself into the mental ward of the nearest hospital.

It was a single-page assignment, twenty-five lines long, with the figures printed in the margins colored in with purple and yellow. My handwriting was nothing spectacular, but at the very least, years later, it remained legible to myself and others, something which cannot be said of the atrocities which could not be even generously compared to chicken scratch (without mortally offending scores of poultry), that I commit to paper regularly these days. At the top, in capital lettering, read “THE ADVENTURES OF MIND MAN”. On this page began a labor of love which would remain for twenty-eight years, returning and renewing with commitment and clarity every time I allowed myself to falter. Within these words, so awkwardly arranged, so hurriedly scribbled as not to do injustice to the ideas with which I could not, then, keep pace, within these words remain the faintly flick’ring flame of inspiration wakened within me by the simple instructions: If you could be a Superhero, what would your powers be? What would you call yourself?

I remember the revelation (if not the actual moment) that I didn’t have to wait for someone else to write the stories that I so desperately wished to read; that I could, myself put pencil to paper and allow my dreams to flow with the same force and validity as anyone who’d ever told a tale. I created a boy hero whose abilities were of imagination. And then I copied that idea onto the page as a Grown-up who would use the power of his mind to reshape reality in the face of evil. To be fair, that synopsis is far superior to anything I wrote before the age of seventeen, and I most certainly was not thinking about it in those terms. I had a feeling when I was little, that I wouldn’t be the biggest, nor the strongest. I didn’t know about the smartest, but I knew I was smarter than some, so that was where my fantasy was directed. An extraordinary man who didn’t need guns or gadgets, bulging muscles or super-speed. but used his ability to out-think his opponent.

Some of the highlights from the following years were “Who Killed Babyface Barbra, Jr.?” (a title I cringe at to this very day, as I have never met a woman with the suffix of Junior), “Nightmare on Oak Street” (a tale of horror written with a nod to movies I had never seen), and the Unicorn of my prepubescent writing career: “Mission: Titan”, a story which I would try to resurrect on at least three occasions over the coming years. Later I would develop a stronger style, oft times writing merely to show off or prove someone else inferior, but I lacked the gift to power through my apathy and found my salvation in Outraged Love, or The Poetry of Despair. And then the Dark Days came, and then the mere banality of life. But here I am, come through the other side, focused on the first lesson that I ever learned: I get to do this. No matter what may happen, I get to do this if I want to. Maybe not for money, and maybe not for fame, but something so simple even a kid could have it figured out: I write because I can, and because there are stories within me which I’d like to see now come to life.

I wish I had that paper still, but not for me. The irony of my life’s work (and I hope, my legacy) being the written word, is that my son is not too keen on reading, and his writing is, from a mechanical point of view, unreadable. I wish that I could show him a piece of who I was when I was his age, so that… you know what? I had a whole thing I was going to launch into about the magic of writing and the adventures hidden in the written word, but then I realized: I just wish he could see me as someone who was once his age, someone capable of understanding what he was going through, someone more relatable than the grumpy old man who drones on and on about homework and bedtime.

But beyond inspiring filial devotion, I’d to think I might have been able to encourage him toward his own moment of clarity. I have no idea what notion will eventually fill his head, crowding out the lesser calls to action, and leading him with unwavering certainty to the path in life upon which he decides his destiny has placed him, but I hope that I will see it. I’ve witnessed far too many people wander through their lives without any clue as to what they hope to accomplish within their fleeting time among us, chasing money, highs, or power, yet never knowing why they do it, beyond a vague assumption that something has been missing. Modern man is missing a clear purpose in the world, a sense that he’s important, a sense that he belongs.

Despite the years of their Participation Ribbons and Mommy’s Little Snowflake snuggles, children are reminded day in and day out they are not important, that they are best barely seen and never heard, that their goal should be to learn how to blend into the background, camouflage themselves in mediocrity. When they grow up, these children will have all but faded, and despite their protestations that they will change the world, they won’t have even the slightest idea why they should. I want something better for my son, though it might not be something that I understand. I want him to ne able to find some happiness of inner purpose, to find his place both in his heart, and out there in the world.

-Tex

Though it was the siren song of “Dude, there’s palm trees” which enticed me to move down to the San Francisco Bay Area, my heart longs every year to witness an honest Northwest winter. My friend, and fellow contributor to The Vaults, Dave Banuelos, would mock the very notion of an “honest” Northwest winter as anything other than an adorable attempt at best. And please don’t get him started about his feelings regarding the “weather” here in the Lower Kneecap of California. I’ve been here for almost a dozen years, and while my body may confuse 50 degrees with chilly, my soul longs to feel the invigorating pain of the not-quite-freezing temperatures and ever-present tease of snow my hometown has to offer. But not that Billings stuff. That’s just ridiculous.

When he was just a little baby, we brought my son up to the Puget Sound so my mother could see him baptized. I’d been living in the Bay for half a decade, and all I wanted for my birthday was to have the chance to see it snow. Despite the forecast downplaying the odds of crystallized precipitation in favor of particularly chilling rain, I got my wish, and stood beneath the falling snow once more. My son wasn’t terribly impressed, but he was only just five months old, the only thing which truly impressed him was drinking milk straight from the tap. My wife, however, having spent all but a few years living down in Mexico, had only seen it snow within a television’s glow from the safety of her living room. Like a child who’s realized school’s been cancelled for tomorrow, she jumped right in and started making snowballs. The battle began shortly thereafter, and I honestly believe she enjoyed getting hit by exploding snow just as much as targeting my growing bald spot.

We returned back a few days later to our home in Berkeley, CA to temperate weather and the daily grind of working life. My son, of course, has no recollection of that visit, but I know it is a memory my wife will cherish always.

A few years later, shortly before I took the reins at the pizzeria where I’d been working for some time, I sent the two of them back up to my hometown to spend Christmas with my family. I’d planned to meet them shortly after the new year, but managed to swing an earlier departure, and surprised my wife in time toast her on her birthday, just hours before the end of 2011. Again, she’d fallen in love with the place where I’d grown up, and to sweeten the deal for her, it had snowed once more, shortly after her arrival. There was nothing left for me, of course, by the time that I arrived, the snow having been washed away once more by the incessant drizzle of the Pacific Northwest. But the two weeks she’d spent free of work, and in the care of family, had done wonders for my wife: a miracle more valuable than even Birthday Snow. Of course, trying to corral our son while on their 22 hour train ride home washed most of that tranquility away, and it was decided shortly thereafter that on any future visits to Seattle, our son would fly with me.

In about a week and a half, the three of us will be heading back up to the place of my birth to spend the holidays with my family (something that I, personally, have not done since I moved down here). Part of the reason that I left my job when I did, was to make sure that I could go this time, though I’m sure my wife would have enjoyed a small vacation without me. But like I mentioned a couple days ago in El Que No Podia Aguantar, I’ve come to understand the value of family, and the continuity which it represents. This may be my final opportunity to spend a Christmas with my grandparents, and I didn’t want to miss it because I had to put work first. That had been my reason for all these years I’ve spent away, but time and health are conspiring against me, and I dare not miss out on these treasured moments.

But there is another reason as well. It wasn’t only the promise of nice weather and exotic flora which convinced me to move on down the coast. The previous summer, my great-grandmother had passed away. For years, my mother nagged at me to go and see her, or at the very least, give her a call. But I was too busy trying to figure out my life, and was ashamed at all the countless ways in which I’d failed. I’d assumed she would be disappointed in me, and didn’t think that I could bear to see that reflected in her face. So I avoided Gram, telling myself that I still had time in which to make things right, to give her a reason to hope I’d wind up as something other than an abject failure. The news came out of the blue, at least to me. I’m sure that somewhere in-between the lines of my mother’s incessant call to familial obligation, there was a warning of Gram’s failing health. But it was so easy to put off, I mean, what twenty-two year old truly considers his mortality, or the fleeting flames of others’?

At the annual family reunion just a short while later, her absence was unbearable. All of her children (who’d given up tobacco years before) hovered around me, breathing in my second-hand smoke to calm the rising anxiety at the loss of their mother. For years, I’d been desperate to be regarded by the world as an adult, and now, seeing what could await me, I chose the quick and easy way out. I made my decision to go to California toward the end of November ’02, and that year, for Christmas, we were all doing our best to avoid discussing the tangible emptiness of the holidays without my great-grandmother. My entire life, until that point, we’d always spent at least half the day at her house. We’d listen to the same old stories (“So I says to this guy, I says…”), play musical couches as more and more family arrived, and I’d pop handfuls of candy corn into my mouth, just waiting for the moment when I could open all my presents, and then head home to wait for Santa.

I missed the entire point of it.

I’m not religious, and for me it’s not Judeo-Christian mythology that marks the day as special. That day is Holy, and has always been, because of who we share it with: those moments spent together, finding the rhythms forged in DNA and honed like use in forest trails, those moments remind us of who we are, and from whence we came, and why that’s so important.

It’s taken me far too long to finally figure out what’s actually important, and that money truly can’t buy you happiness. This year I choose to make life count, to suffer painlessly through the tales of my embarrassments, knowing that the foolishness of youth can’t hurt me if I am surrounded by those who love me. My gift to David is a chance to make a memory or two of his great-grandparents that he might actually be able to recall in the years to come. And with my wife I share the template of our matrimonial success: The example of a daily love which has withstood the decades of excitement and banality, the deep and playful which both my grandparents still share with one another.

-Tex

Note: all photographs are used with the permission of Tex Batmart