Anthony starts his senior year of high school this week. For college, presently, it is looking like he might be attending Mizzou to study Journalism. Given this interest Marty, Anfer and I visited the school on their summer visit day. It was a fun day that began at day-break when we had to set out on the two hour drive to the school. We enjoyed seeing the campus and hearing the various schools and...

a new TROYSCRIPT was posted today. Mystery Solved

Marta declared it the best summer ever. It was a pretty good one. Noting a few of the highlights for our records. 

Anfer 
Tony attended something called Boys State. It is an eight day experience where a few kids from just about every high school in the state attend. During the week they establish a complete community and government system (I think). Attendees are recommended via teacher referrals so it was a pretty high-caliber collection of young people. Anthony had a lot of fun. What he did not have was a lot of sleep. His first day back, he dropped his bags in the foyer, walked to his bedroom, and slept for fourteen hours. 

Aleo 
Alex was invited to help teach at a weeklong summer program at his university. There were two students from his Film School recommended by faculty. The experience ended up being significantly more challenging than he, or anyone else, expected it to be. Marty and I were both stunned at some some of the situations he found himself in. We were equally surprised by the grace in which he responded to each of them. This poise under duress is an ability he has repeatedly demonstrated in his young life.

Baya 
Bella is working on starting a non-profit (more on that later). While getting things organized, she has been doing a lot of social media work so when she's ready to open the doors, she has a ready group of people to invite inside. The other day, while shopping, someone yelled at her from across a store, “Hey! Yo! Kindness girl!”. She got recognized in the wild! AND she got called Kindness-Girl! It is hard to know which of those two milestones made her beam more.

Marta 
Marty and I took our first trip together without kids since having kids. And it was kinda great. The only bad thing to come of it was when I called my best friend, Bookpimp, to ask if it was ok for Marty to join me on this year’s visit, he replied, “The question is if Marty’s coming, why would we need you?”. In our travels, in addition to doing a record amount of kayaking (in her origami kayak), she did a few new things, namely trail bike riding (through a Michigan forest on dirt pack) and taking up tennis (she has even gotten a coach).

Troy
I’ve been going tent-camping in Michigan every July for the last ten years. Every year, I seemingly go a bit longer. For the last few years, I’ve gone for a month. This year was supposed to be five weeks, but an unexpected Secret Cajun Band concert caused me to delay my departure. When in Michigan I do a good bit of reading, play a lot of tennis, bike a lot of miles, and paddleboard just about every day (that's where I get my baths). Next year I will be adding snorkeling and open water swimming to the list of activities. This year I concluded my Michigan Julys are the summer camps I never got as a kid. I’ve been going to this same place for so long, I now know more people there (other summertime regulars as well as locals) than I do in my home’s neighborhood.

Those are the tippy-top highlights from the Marty-branded best summer ever.

For most of their lives my children didn’t know a website existed that chronicled a great number of the things they did and said. Upon learning of it, their...

There's a growing block of people who think I'm a sociopath. How do I know? Because they tell me. Well, they don't tell me, they tell Marty. It typically comes in the form of saying they think something is wrong with me. When Marty asks them why they think that, they say it's because there's no way someone is as happy as Troy appears to be. Marty, with the slightest show of exasperation, will tell ...

a new TROYSCRIPT was posted today. Don't do that

The last few years I have spent the month of July tent-camping in Michigan. Parts of the family will join me for much of this but I usually spend a week or two alone. Every morning of this month begins with a 3-4 hour reading and writing session on the beach. As for what I’m reading, each year I choose a different topic to research and I will have a few books on that subject and will spend my mo...

In 2016, I left my job to start a company. I still vividly remember an exchange with an older guy shortly thereafter.

OLD GUY
Oh. So you started your own company?

TROY
Yeah. I’m a little nervous but more excited.

OLD GUY
Sure. Fun stuff. Being your own boss is great. Want to know the best thing about having your own company?

TROY
Sure. What ...

Last year I shared that Bella was graduating college and that she was throwing herself a party and that there would be speeches.

For those who might not have been invited or who were invited but could not attend, above are the speeches that happened at Baya’s self-thrown graduation party.

We all have Aleo to thank for the excelle...

MARTY
This is Marty's tenth year back in the classroom, after taking a nine year hiatus to stay home with our kids. This year she returned to peak form. She would have gotten there sooner, but the covid-disruption set everyone's plans back. She is a marvel in the classroom and is someone who connects with young people far better than most. I see this every time we go to a school event in the w...

Anthony walks into the kitchen to find me running the last serving from a box of Raisin Bran through a kitchen strainer.

ANTHONY (15)
Are you washing your cereal?

TROY
No, just sifting all the tiny broke pieces out. I don't like those.

ANTHONY
That's quite a process.

TROY
Not really. I've learned you just gotta be smarter than your problems. ...

Out of nowhere, Bella asked if I would walk a marathon with her. Now this was not an organized event. It was just a leave your house and walk 26 random miles event. Without giving it a whole lot of thought, I said sure. Honestly, a large part of me didn't really expect it to happen so it felt like one of the safer shows of support I had ever given one of my children.

Then a few weeks later Bella started asking if this day might work for our marathon-walk. Oh. Uhh. Yeah. Sure.

Then the day before the day, Bella told me that Anthony (age 13) would be joining us. His participation may have surprised me more than the fact that this walk seemed to be happening.

And when the day came, Bella and Anthony were out of bed and lacing up shoes and Marty was loading up the Camelback. Within the hour we were out the door and logging our first mile.

I originally considered mapping a walk but realized there was little point to that. We just needed to walk. It didn't really matter where we went. We each had a tracker. Bella used her phone. I used my vivofit 2 (wearable pedometer), and I gave anthony my bike computer (which works for walking as well). We are fortunate that we have all sorts of beautiful cityscape and neighborhoods and one of the largest city parks in America surrounding our home so we just sort of wended our way around our community.

I spent the first part of the walk trying to understand Anthony's interest in this. It didn't take me long to find my answer. In my mind I understood that this would be an all-day march. I learned neither Bella or Anthony fully did the math on it. After the first hour, we saw a neat little bench and decided to take a quick break. Then we stumbled upon this adorable public garden and decided to sit in there for a bit and enjoy the view. Then an hour after that, we came upon a park and took another break. When Anthony looked at our distance and saw that two hours' effort bought us five miles, the unasked question was asked--So, just how long is this going to take?

After I broke the news he confessed that he thought we would be done by noon. Feeling sympathetic for this miscalculation I designed a route that would take us by home at the midway point for lunch and bathroom breaks. In addition to being kind to our bladders, I thought this provided Anthony an easy out for the second leg given he misunderstood what he signed up for (though I never told him that is why I took us back home). After we ate and rested for a bit, Bella and I (and Leta) started prepping to head back out and when we met in the foyer, Anthony was there too. I expressed surprise that he was going back out. He said he had come this far, he might as well finish it. Proud, proud, proud.

During the walk, Bella made these phone updates after every mile. I didn't fully understand what was happening with them and I thought it might get annoying. But it proved to be a nice way to tick the miles off and show our progress. When she shared the finished product with me, I thought it was super cool. Anytime I re-watch it, I'm totally transported back to the day and I have all sorts of memories surrounding the short clips. Fun, fun stuff.

This happened in June of 2020. Bella and I have since talked about doing another marathon walk. Anytime the subject has been raised, Anthony has always raised a hand to say that once was enough for him. Though, just a few nights ago at dinner, he might have been heard to say that he would be open to doing a half-marathon. So, perhaps in another six months, he might be good for the full-boat again. And next time, I think we might get Marta to join us.

we were driving home from our michigan camping trip. marty had bella and anthony in the van and alex was with me in my car. alex and i had just eaten dinner and were about 60 miles west of indianapolis.

as we were driving and talking i noticed a car had pulled up on my left and was driving steady with me. after a few moments, i looked their way. there was a college-aged guy in the passen...

recently i wrote about my obsession with living the perfect day (ref). a few weeks after that a friend of mine called bullshit on this pursuit. he didn't say it was greedy of me, he said it was irrational, and in truth not possible. he, and his wife, argued that you can't have multiple perfect things. it defied the point of perfection. you ju...

PART 5 - the one that almost didn't get away
shortly after getting keisha and baker's paperwork finalized, the rescue lady said, "so, are you ready for your next challenge?". before she finished her sentence my hands were in the air crying uncle. i confessed after fourteen months with keisha, i needed a break. a long one. she said ok but assured me this one would be super fast...

at the end of every week, i write two journal entries--one for my business and one for my personal affairs. i do this with several things in mind. i like to reflect on the happenings of the prior seven days. this is both to celebrate any progress and achievements as well as help set the tone and priorities for the week ahead. last week's personal entry, shared below, felt a little more potent than most.

there's more than a little truth in that closing sentiment.

in case my level of joy at how things played out wasn't clear enough yesterday (ref), allow me to submit the following. i think bella's emotion is a bit more fear-based in that she is less than ninety minutes from her first college class. mine is pure elation that i get to see my girl off for another first day of school from the same spot i have for the last fifteen years.

do good baya as you always have and you always will.

bella does a lot of house and pet sitting these days. this summer she spent more nights sleeping in other people's homes than she did in ours. and their homes have pools, multimedia systems and lavish bathrooms which is a bit of a bonus, particularly when you are being paid to be there. through this work and her other pursuits, she has become a competent manager of her time and juggling multiple r...

on christmas day 2018 i did something i've never done in my more than fifty years of life -- i went to the gym.

being someone who is reasonably active and tries to be fit, it is kinda impressive that i have never-ever-ever been in a proper gym. there are a number of reasons for this, my concave chest probably topping the list, but if we picked at them, which i did that christmas afternoon, none of my reasons could be described as pride-inducing or even defendable (my 'friends' would tell you the same could be said of many of my convictions). and now i had a daughter that not only regularly worked-out at our neighborhood gym but also WORKED at that same gym and it was easily her favorite job of all to date. she had asked me join her numerous times and i always said the same thing in response, "thanks bay but i'm not a gym guy".

then here on christmas day, a day of family and togetherness, well after the morning mayhem and a few hours of lazing about, bella stood up amidst all the gift chaos and said she had to get ready to go to the gym. after she left the room i thought of her walking there alone, working out alone, walking home alone and it made me a bit sad. then i thought it might be nice if i joined her. this reaction came partly out of concern for her safety but also out of sympathy too - spending christmas day alone at a gym did not seem like the kind of christmas any parent wishes for a child. AND as a bonus i could see where she worked. AND i could experience a gym on what should be a pretty quiet day. AND spend some alone time with my girl (something that gets harder to do with every passing month). AND since she knew what she was doing, she could teach me what to do. benefits abound.

so i went to bella and asked if i could join her. after realizing i was serious, her face lit up. elated would be too strong of a description but not by a whole lot. she seemed very happy i would be joining her. i told her i'd go get dressed. after i turned she called after me.

BELLA
do you know what you're going to wear?

TROY
i guess my biking bibs because we'll do some cardio on the bikes right?

BELLA
uhh, well, people don't really wear biking bibs to the gym.

TROY
really? don't they ride the bikes?

BELLA
well yes, but they're doing lots of other stuff to -- not biking-bib stuff.

TROY
hmmm. well if we're going to bike at all i feel like i need my bibs.

BELLA
uh. ok. well, you gotta do you.

in the end i didn't wear my biking bibs and thankfully so. as bella told me, there weren't a whole lot of people at the gym in padded biking shorts with overall straps. funny that. but how big of a rock star is bella being willing to show up to HER gym and HER workplace with HER father wearing nothing but biking shorts. she is SUCH a BETTER person than i was at her age. and yes i know that if we spent three minutes picking at it, we'd all learn that she is a better person than i was yesterday. moving on.

so we went to the gym and i stepped through bella's workout with her. she had the double-duty of doing her own workout while also serving as my teacher. something i think she would be very good at (vid evidence below). i will say having someone that knows what they are doing is pretty helpful. and having that person be your daughter, is pretty awesome. you will likely not be surprised to know bella is like a full-on celebrity at this place as all the yoked-out, meat-backed regulars absolutely love her. so any self-consciousness i might have felt at being a gym newbie was dashed given the protection i got from bella's celebrity halo. though bella's status could not spare me the discomfort i felt personally during our workout when we had to pull the weights off after bella's reps so i could lift just the bar (and in some cases wish they had thinner, lighter bars).

as for my thoughts about it, i joined the gym the next day and asked bella to share her workout schedule with me. short version is anytime she is going to the gym and i am not working, i will go with her and do whatever workout she is doing (e.g. legs, chest, etc).

what people were saying about the bella-dad workout:

a neighbor and obvious gym-regular pulled me aside one day at the gym to say, "i gotta tell you troy, you and bella are absolutely adorable working out together."

on christmas day anthony asked marty where dad and bella were. when she told him they were at the gym, he said, "well, that doesn't feel very special." this was in response to us going out on christmas day, a day where none of us are usually more than fifteen feet from the fireplace.

and later in the day when i asked alex what he thought of me and bella going to the gym he said, "oh, you were gone?"

lastly, my personal trainer even takes video of your work so she can point out issues with your form. one sucky thing about it, aside from seeing i have to straighten my back more, is it also exposes that any adorability points i earned for working out with my daughter were lost each time we had to pull all the weights off after bella's turn so i could just use the bar.

50 (a 2-part essay)
PART 1: On Becoming 50

twenty years ago i had a breakdown of sorts. it kinda came out of nowhere. it was right around my 30th birthday. a year earlier my mom had given me the name and phone number of my biological mother saying she thought i was old enough to have it now. fact is, she thought i was old enough for a good while but kept waiting for me to ask about ...

in addition to the box of awesomeness (yesterday's family gallery), the weekend/week of my 50th was delightfully decadent and had multiple exceptional moments that blew me away.

BLOWN AWAY I
my celebration began officially at 3:30 on friday, or birthday-eve if you prefer, with a massage. the masseuse asked if i needed something specific worked on. i said not really. she asked why i was there. i told her that i always get a massage on the last day of the decade of my life so i was there to close out my forties. she said fair enough and we got underway. at the very end she said something really cool but i was so comatose i can't remember precisely what she said but it was something like "i hope this marks the end of one great decade and the beginning of an even better one". i loved the touch and thought she gave to the moment (pun for anthony).

i left there and went to one of my favorite meals in the country, stuffed atlantic salmon from mccormick and schmick's (originally Jake's Seafood in portland Oregon and still #2 on this list).

then i headed home to meet up with the family for an a cappella holiday concert. we have been going to this event, run by a friend, for almost two decades and it has always been conveniently scheduled near my birthday. on this day, due to the massage and dinner, i was running late. because of this marty went out to pick up some other people who were going with us, friends of the kids, and said she'd swing by the house to get me after getting them. i got home and knowing we were now pinched for time, watched for the car. when marty pulled up, i trotted towards the car. as i approached alex, through a cracked window, said i would have to drive. so i ran around to the driver's side. i opened the door ready to apologize to marty for being late but instead of seeing marty in the passenger seat i found one my best friends, bookpimp, from north carolina. *

i should add, our being late did not derail the evening as our friend had roped off a section of seats for us. so our party of eight was able to arrive at a packed auditorium minutes before showtime and slide into a protected run of third row seats. thanks e-lo!

BLOWN AWAY II
the weekend was a lock after that and we enjoyed the concert and then some lion's choice and capped the night off with some ted drewes custard.

the next morning bookpimp and i went to southwest diner for some mexican breakfast burritos and then spent the rest of the december day in front of a fire trading stories and one-liners. for dinner we went to my favorite eatery in all the land and where i spend every birthday dinner, cafe natasha (still #1 on this list). they were totally full up and i failed to make a reservation (we rarely go on uber-busy saturday nights). the hostess was about to shuttle us out when the owner saw us. she came over and gave hugs and the situation was explained. she told us to wait while she checked things out. she returned and said if we could wait ten minutes she would take care of us. so i got my syrian kabobs after-all. there were two other birthday groups there, one of which was a table of about twenty people who turned out to be some sort of choir because when they sang happy birthday to their person they lit the room up with a rendition of happy birthday fit for a royal. later when the owner surprised our table with a piece of candled-birthday pie and started singing happy birthday, the twenty person choral group joined in and it was a most lavish moment.

BLOWN AWAY III
we then went home, re-stoked the fire and gathered round for presents. anthony got me a mug that said essentially that i only urinate glitter and defecate gold, something i may have been known to say around the house a time or two--anthony felt it only right to commemorate my personal position in ceramic form. aleo made a video for me where he modified the opening credits to calliou (pronounced kigh-you) to instead say troy-you as i had always told the kids that show was about me but i wouldn't give them the rights to my name which is why they had to call it calliou but it was originally named troy-you and every time the song played i would replace the word accordingly, much to my childrens' agitation (i also may have told a very young bella that high school musical was about my life--that time i let them use my name because it was cooler than some whiney cartoon kid with a perfectly round head). bella gave me a "missing-bella" kit to help me after she leaves for college (it included a generous quantity of her hair which she had cut a few weeks prior in support of this gift).



then marty closed the affair with her mic-drop box of cards (discussed yesterday).

BLOWN AWAY IV
then on sunday bookpimp and i drove to central illinois for a horseshoe at d'arcy's pint and then on to the video game museum in mclean illinois for some 80's arcade ambiance. after a good number of quarters we made the two hour drive home. the four hours we spent in the car magically felt like twenty minutes which bookpimp astutely called amazing and terrible at the same time (amazing how time magically passes and tragic that it seems to end so soon). we returned home for sunday dinner and some more fire time.

in the morning i drove him to the airport and he was off. for the record bookpimp made a surprise visit twenty years earlier for my thirtieth birthday.

BLOWN AWAY V
two days later i drove back to the airport to pick up my other best friend, bookguy, also from north carolina, who flew in for a quick visit and we shared a lovely day together. that i have two friends of this caliber at this point in my life (three if you count marta) is not something lost on me.

marty, my children and my closest friends went to great lengths to make me feel special and valued by them. at the end of my birthday, in front of a warming fire i told the people circled around me that they would never know what their love and support meant to an only, adopted child who lost his mother eight years earlier. short of having my mother as part of that circle, i can't imagine a better way to greet one's half-century mark.

* when i say "one of my best friends from north carolina" i'm not saying that that is my, like, best north carolina friend and i also have a best pennsylvania friend and a best ohio friend in some bubba-gump shrimp sorta way. i was simply saying this is one of my best friends and he lives in north carolina. i see that it reads a bit funny. though to be comprehensive here, it is equally curious that my other best friend also lives in north carolina. so my two best friends in the world both live in north carolina a few hours apart, for reasons that are in no way connected (neither grew up there). and for further curiosity my mother's best friend also lives in north carolina and is situated perfectly between my two best friends. so on my road trip east every summer, sometimes referred to as the best friends tour, i visit my first best friend, then my mom's best friend and then my other best friend. that they all clustered themselves so conveniently close just ups their best-friend stock all the more.

i turned fifty earlier this month. as this mile-marker grew closer, i found myself imagining what i should do here in this space to acknowledge the moment. coming into the weekend i thought i'd ask alex to to hook me up with a pitcture, like he did in utah when i started my new adventure as a business owner. he did such an exceptional job then ( View in Family Scrapbook >>>

"but you don't count."

that's my daughter's response, at times, to advice i give her. you know, life advice, the fatherly kind. i ask her what that means, why i don't count. she says my advice doesn't count because i love life too much, i love my job too much, i love my wife and marriage too much, i love every waking morning too much. because you like everything you're doing, nothing is w...

there was a three-week span late last year when i thought i was about to die. like i was seriously fearful. suddenly i was in these kind of fugue states. some mornings they were so bad, when walking anthony to school i had these bouts of vertigo and started actually veering like i was about to fall. and through this, admittedly terrifying time, i did what most men do when confronted with scary hea...