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The night is long and restless. Bones grow, the body rests and all kinds of other things I've learned and long since forgotten. Tonight is different. The change in the air isn't winter fighting with spring or the rotating anthems from podiums just across the border, but something bigger and yet, much more personal. It is the gentle turn in the night from one age to the next -- a parade of years that has just started and is already moving much too fast. Memories blow on the wind like so much confetti.

This would be my scrapbook.

The sun will be up in a few hours and with it the son. He rises with the world and immediately starts to conquer it. There are a lot of fart jokes along the way.

And dimples.

He is my fearless one. He runs head first into the day only looking back to make sure we follow. He explores every nook, cranny and the musical offerings of legendary rock bands. His world is filled with games and things to throw. His creative process is fueled by equal parts curiosity and mud puddle. His imagination is only limited by my ability to comprehend it.

"I'm not a big boy," he said. "I'm your baby."

And then he went to bed a three-year-old for the last time, ever.

Zane is turning four and I'm the one getting older.



Happy birthday, Son.

I try to maintain a pretty constant flow of quality posts here at Honea Express. Constant being relative and quality being stuff my mom marks as liked on Facebook. This post isn't either of those things.

It may appear to the naked eye that I've been MIA, but that is not the case. I've been wandering the internets and dropping knowledge into whatever web will catch it. Also, non-knowledge.

If you have the time I'd love to share some of it with you. Seriously, it's either humor me or go back to work, and we all know how that will end.

At DadCentric I've been waxing poetic about stuff that is centric to dads, namely this dad and the raising of two boys. A Tale of Two Mornings is a little slice of life piece where one day sort of represents the whole pie - à la mode .

Also at DadCentric I pay my respects to J.D. Salinger in The Day was Mixed with Foul and Rye. It's funny, I always knew that Catcher in the Rye played a big part in helping me find my voice as a writer, but it wasn't until yesterday - nearly 20 years after I read the book that I realized just how much it had influenced me. Holden Caulfield is a classic unreliable narrator, something I later embraced with open arms in the Pushcart-nominated Madness and Bubblegum. I just tooted my own horn, excuse me.

Over at UpTake I've been talking about how I came to be in this country illegally and a little place down the street that may very well be the BEST. DOG. PARK. EVER.

It pays the bills passes the time.

I've also been using my children as guinea pigs by having them consume their body weight in Pom and Funky Monkey snacks. They also went to a very cool warehouse event for bloggers that changed their life forever, give or take an hour.

Pom sent me some of their wonderful 100% pomegranate juice and it was delicious. It was a bit tart for the kids so I took the liberty of making them some pomegranate lemonade - which was also pretty tart, but they loved it.

Here's why I agreed to try Pom: A) It's healthy. It was right before New Years and I thought some healthy stuff in the fridge would be a great way to get on track in 2010. B) When I was a kid my neighbor had a pomegranate tree (bush?) in her backyard and we used to pick the fruit and throw them as hard as we could against the back of her garage. They smashed against that white brick like Jackson Pollock's lunch. Or possibly his head. Yes, we were hooligans but we made up for it by staying off drugs. Occasionally. My point is that pomegranates and I have a history.

I used most of the Pom making pomegranate martinis. They were fantastic.

The Funky Monkey treats were hit and miss. I liked all of the flavors but the kids didn't care for them - not until I opened the MANGOJ (see what they did there?), which went over pretty well with the oldest. He loves him some mango.

For the record, the cat also liked them, which is kind of weird, but so are cats.

What is a Funky Monkey? It's dried fruit THAT CRUNCHES! Basically it a freeze-dried snack that manages to maintain nearly all of the flavor and nutrients found in the fresh fruit version. Again, I was going with the healthy angle. Funky Monkey is gluten free, which is cool (my neighbor has a gluten allergy and it appears to suck).

Speaking of neighbors, did I tell you that we had a huge bonfire last weekend and burned 6 Christmas trees and drank too much? Well, we did. See:


While we were standing around the fire my gluten-less neighbor, a carpenter by trade (the profession not the musical group), turned to me and said, "this should be easy to write about," to which I replied, "you know what else is easy? remodeling a fucking kitchen," which is not something I know for a fact, but it can't be any harder than writing this damn post.

Where was I?

Oh right, the warehouse event. Stacey from Because I Must Blog was kind enough to set up an event with Lance, the owner of Clowns Unlimited and Games2U. Lance invited a group of us to his warehouse outside of Seattle where he and his staff had set up a handful of inflatable slides and mazes, some cool games, an assortment of cotton candy and THE TRAILER.

What is THE TRAILER? Well, as the name implies it is a trailer, and it is filled with pure awesome - the name may not have implied that part, hence my mentioning it. The trailer is all tricked out with cool lighting, comfortable seating for 12 adults (16-18 kids), and six 52" HD flat screen televisions (4 inside, 2 on the outside). Everyone can play the same game- if the game can handle it, or each TV can have its own game from over 51 choices on the latest XBOX, Wii and PlayStation systems. They can also play actual television if that's your thing.

It's as cool as you hope it is.


The trailer will come to you. Yes, you. A very knowledgeable game coach is included. I'm thinking about getting the neighbors to chip in so we can rent it one of these weekends- after we run out of Christmas trees.

In closing, I've been doing stuff. And now it is the weekend. I hope you have a good one.


Behind the curtain:
Compensation: No
Products Received: 3 small bottles of Pom juice, 3 small bags of Funky Monkey

I had every damn light in the room on and I bought QuickTime Pro just to make it brighter, but this video is still incredibly dark and grainy - like an Everclear and Coke. However, unlike said beverage this video won't find you waking in your own sick on your ex-girlfriend's lawn. Or jail.

This is kind of a messed up intro for a cute video of my kids, isn't it? I'm not right.

Put this on loop and welcome to my world:

The Christmas lights weren't going to hang themselves. The box of lights, staples and some plastic clips designed to adhere electrical wires to the overflowing gutters had been working as a doorstop for days. It was time they earned their keep. Besides, it wasn't getting any warmer.

The overnight low had been in the single digits. The high wasn't even old enough to drink. I finished my second pot of coffee and like Griswald before me I plugged into the season.

I stood on a ladder made of ice. Visions of sugarplums breaking their necks danced in my head. I was, for a moment, glad that my children were not there to see it. But I lived and I am lit and I never even touch the stuff.

Today I woke to another sunny, frozen morning. Yellow-breasted robins appeared outside my window. A number of blue jays bounced from branch to branch and perched upon the rail in front of me - their colors vibrant and brisk.

They put the lights to shame.


If I stand on my rooftop I can see a lake and hills and then another lake and hills again. Beyond that, blocked from view, is a skyline that falls into the sea and a coast that leads south to a place where my family can't see the ocean but for the mountains between them.

It's mostly side streets from there.

The boys play loudly on a floor with the toys that they packed themselves. There are no holiday lights or signs of the season. There are no stockings or carols or television specials, just the gift that they don't know they are giving.

In the corner of the room there is a bed with their grandfather in it, watching them play and whispering their names and every new goodnight is their last goodbye.

When we left the sunrise was at our back. We drove through dark and ice and the sound of boys falling in and out of sleep. The tundra was frozen and redundant. The sky was lost and forgotten.

The airport was alive with the non-dead. Sleepy travelers boarded dreams. Weary passengers stumbled through gates like so many sheep. I stood there and tried not to count them.

My wife kissed my cheek and peeled the children from me. It took a little skin. I watched them walk away until they turned from sight and then I walked to the car and into the darkness. It was exactly like I had left it but slightly more so.

When I returned the sunrise was my horizon. I drove through twilight and ice and the sound of emptiness traveling just over the posted speed limit. The mountains glowed gold and bright. The sky stretched and yawned and rubbed sleep from its eye. I started to say something but there was no one there to hear me.

All that was left was time and an eastbound highway. I thought of a plane somewhere behind me, turned on the radio and like a moth to the flame I followed the sun until it engulfed everything but the shadows.

A lack of sleep and a bottle of something teamed up to make my morning a series of echoes and drumbeats. The drummers stood bedside and they beat their drums slowly.

"Can we play the Wii?" they asked.

"Will you make breakfast?" they hounded.

"I have to go potty," they threatened.

They were up too early, because it was Saturday. If it were a school day I would be the one standing over them as they lay warm and oblivious. But it wasn't a school day. It was the weekend and they were up early and I had been up late.

I got up. I wiped a butt. I made some breakfast. I drank some coffee. I took some aspirin.

The boys traded drumsticks for forks and beats for bites. I stood in the open doorway and felt the cold air on my face. The fog rolled off the hills and the rain splashed against my bare feet.

Behind me teams were being picked, the two of them dividing and competing and planning ways to best their opponent.

"I'm on your team," one brother said to the other.

I stood at the door as they charged the day and I pitied any foe that made its way past me.

And he found them not where they were supposed to be and doing the things they shouldn't. He had left them alone among the molehills and found them perched upon the mountains.

They were laughing and full of fun and getting away with being young. They were silent and drained of joy and by all means busted.

He was tired. There were long days behind him and long nights ahead. His back, it burned with exhausted muscle and it erupted with spasms of stress and it resorted to a door frame to keep it remotely upward.

Ropes wind and they twirl and they roll nicely off the spool and one minute you're tying knots and making swings from trees and old tires and the next your hands are empty and your metaphor is at its end.

Then they are sorry and they cry and they've said it all before, for instance, last night when he stood propped against the same tired door frame grown weak and weary beneath the burden of his weight. And the waiting still grows heavy.

Words were said louder than they needed to be. Threats were made that were never meant. Little feet scurried to where they should have been and behind them they left a trail of guilt like so many bread crumbs. Sweet, innocent, beautiful guilt, and they cried loudly as he closed the door in hopes that doing so will save them all.

The hallway is long and lonely and it only need be examined a dozen or so times before it is ingrained firmly upon his brain. Every footstep has purpose. Every crack is considered. Life is bends that do not break and behind the door there is only the sound of their heavy slumber.

Their bread crumbs are soft and smooth and shaped like plush piles of imagination. He picks them up one by one, carefully, quietly, and he carries them into the room and places them where they are supposed to be, in the arms of his affections. And his whispers are for forgiveness

I would be remiss if I didn't share our Halloween memories with you. And I do not care to be remiss. No, not at all.





The last one was a neighbor that had Muppet music blaring from his home. There was another neighbor, an attractive young mom, whose costume could best be described as SpongeBoob NoPants, but I was so appalled that I forgot to take a picture and then when I went back and banged on her door at 3am the cops said I had to go home. The nerve of some people.

And now for a few favorites from Halloweens past:






Here's hoping that you and yours had a good time and that your teeth don't rot out. Also, Merry Christmas. Apparently.

From my office I can watch the leaves fall upon the deck and melt in pools of red and yellow. They do not fight it. They have served their purpose. They have accepted their fate. Theirs is to fall beneath a constant drizzle and breaths of mist and theirs is to mock me in their peacefulness.

From my office I can see a grave sixteen years deep. My gaze tends to wander there. It lingers from time to time.

The boys have been sick and sad and they are making messes and mischief of one kind and another. Theirs is in the now. Pain and joy are deep and fleeting. Mornings are met with smiles and dreams are embraced with hugs and sugars and the seesaw tones of love and a patience lost.

Miles away my wife drifts in a pool of memories. It ebbs and it flows and it ripples from countless teardrops. She is at the bedside of her father. Hers is a distance measured in sadness.

Her father fades slowly. Her hopes come and go. His breath, it ebbs and it flows and it ripples. His is the fountain of their tears. His is the pool of memories in which they wade with pants rolled high and thick, hard skin slowly finding softness. Theirs is old wounds unhealing and new cuts soaked in salt.

Mine is to be alone, tired and slightly unkempt. Mine is to stare far too long at leaves through windows. Mine is to care for my children and give them strength when they need it and to take theirs when it is offered.

Ours is to make the most of making do.