the settings on my camera got jacked up and i was trying to get things back to where they should be. to help with the focus settings i called bella and alex up and asked told them i needed to take a couple of pictures and could they stand there for me. this was the result.

this was the third thing i heard in my house yesterday morning. and it wasn't said by, to, or about me.

yesterday was marty's birthday. she turned 38. the first words said in our home on the day of marty's 38th birthday was, "dad, i think i'm going to vomit." it was said by alex who was at the time of his utterance laid out next to me. we had both been cast from our usual sleeping spots and were sleeping on the futon in the ping pong room. i was displaced by anthony (who has been very camped out in my spot as of late) and alex by a rogue spider we're having problems locating.

after alex said he felt like he was going to puke i threw the sheets back and stumble-tripped downstairs pushing on the walls with my hands to keep me vertical. marty's brother taught me something about parenting. he said that when you hear the words THINK coupled with PUKE or VOMIT you should run. you should run very fast. and get a bowl. and put it in front of the complaining child as quickly as possible. the last time he heard those words and didn't run fast, he spent the next twenty minutes of his life spooning gelatinous chunks of mostly digested food out of the many creases and folds of his child's bed.

and for the more superstitious folks out there, this initial comment of the day did not dictate the day's mood. fortunately. and i think i did good on presents. there may be some she actually doesn't return.

bella told marty that a boy in her class said she (bella) was hot. marty asked bella what she thought that meant. bella thought for a moment before saying she thought it meant he liked the way she looked. marty agreed that that was probably what it meant but the problem is that it didn't take into account her spirit and there are lots of folks who look good, great even, that lie and cheat and are mean to those around them so how they look is irrelevant and what matters is how beautiful their spirit is.

bella came home from school the next day and reported that the boy liked her spirit too.

our house is bad at checking messages. the last time i checked them their were nine, the earliest of which was from five days prior. as i saved and deleted my way through them, one in the middle went like this: i mentioned this to marty. she casually said that when she checked the other day there were nineteen messages, six of which were from bella inviting herself over to play.

to bed ...

to bed alex wears the clothes he wore to school that day.

to bed bella wears the clothes she is going to wear to school the next day.

to bed anthony wears whatever we can fight him into.

to bed marty wears christmas pajamas a surprising number of times throughout the year.

to bed i wear, well, they're all nuts so i wear nothing at all.

p.s. the first time i saw bella getting dressed for school the night before so she could sleep ten extra minutes, my heart burst with pride. she may as well have sat down at a piano and banged out a bach concerto.

p.s.s. for adults, wearing clothes/pajamas/underwear to bed is like, if i may again use my movies to sleeping comparison, is like wearing a tuxedo to watch an installment of american pie at your local cine.

marty went to a play with her mother last night thus putting me in the box with the kids. dinner (custard french toast) went well. immediately after dinner alex and anthony played trains while bella snuck in some computer time. a neighbor girl called asking if she and her brother could come over to play. whispering into the phone, i told her i didn't think it would be a good idea tonight. i whispered my response because i didn't want the natives to know i was nixing a play date. but it was getting late. and i was alone and greatly outnumbered already. i had reasons. to my whisper, the girl whined out a long 'pahhhlleeeezz' and added that they'd be no trouble at all. going against my better judgment i greenlit the visit.

i could picture the groan in bella's face when the knock rung through the house. computer time is sacred to child with no television. after being let in, the visiting girl immediately came upstairs and found me. she asked, "will you play ogre?" this time my face groaned. i said no. she asked why. i said because i didn't want to get everyone worked up just before bed. another whiny pahhhlleeeezz rolled out of her saggy-shouldered body. no trouble my ass.

after a short while of non-ogre play time the girl's mum called and the kids went home for bed. i ushered my kids to the bathroom for peeing, pooping, brushing and the hearing of the petitions to sleep in the clothes they'd been wearing all day. then anthony, alex and i moved to the upper bunk for reading. bella was below reading her own books. even though no one is listening to her story she reads out loud. i've asked her if she can read in her head when i'm reading to the boys because her reading when i'm reading is distracting. she argues that if i get to read out loud she shouldn't have to read in her brain (her words) and she doesn't care if her reading out loud is distracting when i'm reading out loud because my reading out loud is distracting to her trying to read in her brain. this girl could twist a physicist in knots in minutes.

alex starts fading first. i'm about three minutes behind him. staying awake at this moment is the hardest thing i've done all day. i always fall asleep after reading to alex. sometimes he goes first. sometimes i go first. but we both go and we usually do so within minutes of one another. i usually sleep for twenty minutes to an hour. it's my pre-night power nap that allows me to work until 2am. but tonight, tonight i can't fall asleep because i do have anthony and i don't have marty. but i do fall asleep. anthony, bored, leaves. i sense him leaving but can't open my eyes. i groggily hear bella call out "it's ok dad. i got him." more sleep. i hear anthony call out. it's been just minutes. not hours. i force myself up and down the bunk ladder. i walk to my bedroom where i hear voices. bella and anthony are snuggled, sitting up on the pillows with the covers pulled up over their laps. a mess of books are spread out before them, but they aren't reading. bella is holding anthony's fist out in front of him and is modeling his fingers in different poses. she's saying: i know it's possible to get through life without a village, but i gotta say life's much more pleasant with one.

why i work

my sunday began sometime after 8am but before 9am. marty had already been up for hours. i was taking the three kids on an errand to the hardware store to buy L-brackets to fix our living room's coffee table that had finally succumbed to having multiple children dance on it for more than three years. this was the only item i was buying at the hardware store because i know trips ...

the first thing bella said to me monday morning. while bella does have a knack for dramatic portrayals of everyday things, she is spot on in this particular assessment.

ALEX
is today a school day?

TROY
yes it is.

ALEX
ah dammit.

from his tone and the easy way it rolled from his five year old mouth, you'd think he had to take an obnoxious client to lunch or deliver bad news to a subordinate on this day.

and these are still coming from marty's camp. when i become the source of their swears i'm confident calls home from school with threats of detention will be part of the discussion.

in dating you have something called hand. the notion of hand was probably best handled and described by seinfeld and team. if you haven't heard the term it pertains to the battle for influence between a dating couple. i believe it is an abbreviated phrase for 'having the upper hand'.

in the world of parenting, hand is replaced by something called currency. as a parent it is always your job to know what your child's currency is. currency in this context refers to any object or event your child especially loves. with this knowledge, the theory goes, you're able to influence your child's behavior instead of beating them with a switch.

but, children also have their own currency. a child's currency is what they can do to sway the behavior of their parent. such currencies for children include looking cute, acting sad, throwing a tantrum, making lofty promises, embarrassing their parent or saying they hate the parent. these are all antics done in the hopes of causing a parent to buckle. as an aside, all child-currency has an inflated value in public. and the more public, the greater its rate. children who understand this principle of micro-macro-economics can often be a handful and are known as children who wield their currency with great expertise, getting the absolute most for their money.

the other night alex and i got into a row at bedtime. i wanted him to go to sleep. he wanted to invent things to delay his going to sleep. after threatening his currency he stood for a few moments and then turned to me and shouted, "FINE. THEN I WILL GO TO BED WITH NO STRAWBERRIES AND NO BOOKS!" after this outburst he scaled his ladder and threw himself into his bed and was asleep moments later. this would be an example of me using my currency with greater alacrity than he used his. while one may be inclined to gloat, i suggest your do not because we all have the occasional weak outing. like the time i threatened to take bella's play horses from her for a week. without a hint of emotion she suggested i take them for two weeks and offered to throw in all of her dolls for added measure. that was a solid counter-move on bella's part and easily trumped my dated notion of her currency. then there was this time when alex got me all twisted up:

TROY
alex if you don't put that stuff away like i've asked i'm going to take away your transformers toy.

ALEX
i have a transformers toy?

TROY
uhhm. well yes. i mean, i thought you did?

ALEX
can i see it?

TROY
i don't know. i'm not sure where it is right now.

ALEX
what does it look like?

TROY
i don't think i know that either. maybe we should pick another toy.

ALEX
ok. but if you see my transformers toy, can you show it to me?

TROY
uhhm. yeah. sure.

in reproduction, there are two kinds of impotence. there's the physical kind that doesn't allow you to have children and then there's the emotional kind that happens after you have children. the research isn't entirely conclusive as to which of the two is more psychologically crippling to the male esteem.

anthony has transformed from a stout toddler to a crotchety geriatric in just weeks. the way he swaggers about the house, the way he pushes away things he dislikes, the way he scoffs at certain foods, the way he furrows his brow if you misinterpret his grunts and growls, you'd swear this guy is going on 80 instead of six months from three.

the other night a sound stirred from sleep, i lifted myself onto an elbow to look into the hall for the disturbance. as i squinted at the poorly lit corridor anthony came strolling by eating a banana like he was walking through the park on a midday lunch break. i looked at the clock. it was 3:27am.

for a bit his nocturnal movements perplexed me. i knew he could get out of his crib but i did not understand how he was getting back in. to clarify, anthony sleeps in a pack and play. for those that know what one is, it may seem like a cruel accommodation, but please remember that he started out on top of a ping pong table. for those not familiar with what a pack and play is, it is a portable playpen and nothing more than a mesh-walled box with a thin plywood base covered with a padded mattress. since the playpen is slightly elevated anthony can easily get out by swinging a leg up on the side and rolling over the top bar. but this same elevation makes getting back in much trickier because the bar is too high for him to pull his body up and over when standing on the outside. one night seeing him head that way, i got out of bed and quietly followed him back to his room. from a distance i watched him. with great confidence and routine he climbed onto a wooden chest which sits a few feet from his crib. once on the top he stood fully upright and after just a flutter of hesitation jumped towards the edge of the crib. his initial grasp was uncertain but he fought his way up and over dropping to the inside and then dropping flat similar to how you or i might fall into bed.

i recently described anthony to someone as being very much like bella but a male version of our determined girl. they put a hand on my shoulder and said, "sorry dude." a more serious and heartfelt condolence could not have been given by this particular person. and i accepted it with an equally serious and wordless grace.

during the holiday break i was neck deep in multiple deadlines and working nights and weekends with marty managing the home and children. the unexpected death of her father brought a swift role reversal sending her from the home to handle business matters and leaving me in charge of our house and children.

at 5am after my first night alone, anthony came to the side of my bed pushed me in...

a new TROYSCRIPT was posted today. schooled

the passing of marty's father represents the closest person to our children to have died since they've been old enough to absorb things. fact of the matter, ken is the closest person to me that i have known to die. for this reason there was a lot of processing going on in our house over the last few days.

minutes after breaking the news, i sent marty to be with her mother and siblings as this unexpected event fell on their family. this for the most part made me a single, stay at home dad. in between the gatherings and ceremonies i've talked to both bella and alex about what is happening and their thoughts on it all. alex asked about how we would see grandpa again. he asked if grandpa was in heaven. he asked if grandpa was sad. he asked why people were crying. essentially, he asked a bunch of normal and legitimate questions, many of which we talked through together because i didn't know the answers any better than he did.

as for bella, she didn't ask a thing. to a direct question asking her about her questions, she said she had none. while at the wake i asked her if she wanted to go up and say goodbye to grandpa. she said she didn't. when marty later asked her about it, bella said she already did say goodbye. i wasn't really sure how to interpret bella's reticence to talk about it but i gave her space because she didn't seem upset or withdrawn and just kept telling her that if she had questions she could come talk to me. she said she knew this but never asked a single one. the morning of the burial, bella drew this picture while eating breakfast.



after looking at it, i asked her about the third item in the legend. she said that she would have used that mark next to grandpa if he had been murdered but since he wasn't she didn't have to. still curious, i stood for a moment studying the picture in my hand feeling there was a follow-up question i was missing. my eyes focused on her perception of grandpa's face and i saw that he was smiling. i thanked bella for making the picture, told her i thought it was special and walked away. how bella portrayed her grandfather in her drawing tells me she has, like her mother, a healthy understanding of what transpired in this last week. in fact, i think she reached this point far sooner than i had. i would typically say i'm pretty good at not over-thinking a problem but perhaps i'm not as good at it as i like to think i am.

a new TROYSCRIPT was posted today. stand-off

from the moment he thrust the envelope into my hands alex was bristling for me to open his birthday card. as soon as the card unfolded he burst into an excited explanation about his colorful composition. he pointed to the figure on the right and said it was me. he then pointed to the figure to the left and said that was him. he then said that i was being super freaked out by all the smart things he knew, which was represented by the blizzard of chaos swirling around us.

the reason my child would say i'm freaked out by his intelligence stems from a game i play in the house. i, on occasion, will act mad when they do things like learn something new or laugh extra big or outgrow clothing or say something smart. i cite house rules like 'there will be no laughter in this home! i forbid it!' or 'that's it, you can't go to school anymore!' or 'no more exercise for you. you're getting too strong!' to these outburst the children titter and coo and threaten to learn two things at school tomorrow or to eat more fruit the following day to which i act more irritated and refer to the unspeakable punishments they'll receive if they choose to defy me and become smarter, stronger or happier than their father. i'd be lying if i said i wasn't a little hopeful that i can milk this tactic through their college years.

marty had the boys up to the library. she was flipping through some dvd's searching for our next movie night candidate. she spotted alex eyeing a rack of video tapes thoughtfully. anthony was next to him watching him stare at the tapes. after a moment alex turned to anthony, motioned to the rack of videos and said ruefully, "i watched these in the old times when we had a BCR."

over the weekend, we watched a movie from my youth, savanah smiles (Brer Rabbit, Brer Fox, Brer Bear). it is one of those comic and heartfelt products of the 80's and leaves most normal humans welling up at the end. we watched it late on sunday afternoon at the tail-end of the multi-day thanksgiving break. a fire was warming the room and several neighbor girls were over. when marty announced the matinee was beginning, everyone raced to the living room and crowded onto the futon.

with less than ten minutes left in the film, and about two minutes from the tear-jerking climax the writers and directors had spent the last hour and a half working towards, one of the girls announced she had to go pee. the movie was paused and the girl ran with heavy and hurried feet up the stairs (i do think she tried to wait it out but nature prevailed). a moment after she was gone bella announced she had to go to and jetted up the stairs. then anthony fearing he was missing something, charged after both of them. some five minutes later muffled cries were heard from upstairs.

i went up. when i passed the kids room anthony was sitting on the floor playing with a puzzle. the muffled cries were coming from the bathroom. it seems anthony had swung the door closed on the girls locking them in (the door has no handle ... a victim of one of our three children). through the door i instructed bella on how to get the door open. after getting the door open bella loudly announced that the excitement caused the first girl to pee on her pants, the floor and herself. with this the girl stepped forward wearing the wet pants and looking sullen. she asked if she could go home to change. i said of course. she asked if we would wait to start the movie until she came back. i said of course. twenty minutes later we were all back on the futon ready to finish the movie. the heart-wrenching moment came two minutes later and surprisingly still hit its mark with marty and i. as for the kids, all of them were just curious why the characters in the film and the two adults in the room were teary. i told them it was because of the puddle of urine on the bathroom floor upstairs, an answer they accepted more easily than if i had told them the truth.

if you hear bella or alex say the words - "anthony come here, i have a really great idea" - eight times in ten anthony will be crying inside of ninety seconds.

marty showed stress before the new week even began. sensing this i offered to take the kids to my folks on saturday giving the house to marty from one in the afternoon to eight in the evening. hours after penning the deal she remembered a meeting she had to attend from 9am to noon that same day.

having gone to bed early friday night in preparation of my day, i woke up at 4am. anthony fol...

when i put anthony to bed it is obviously without the numma-numma's he gets from his mother. i understand his thirst because i share his adoration of numma-numma time with his mother. but sporting a lactation-free body, putting anthony down requires me to get creative, because as soon as anthony realizes i'm there to end his day, he balks. in protest he wriggles, contorts and folds awkwardly in my arms. if i try to put him down before he's ready, his body acts like an opposing magnet to the crib.

one night, testing reason, i pulled the shade of his window back. i pointed to the darkness outside and said the sun had gone to bed and so must he. he looked out the window, blinked a few times and uttered a soft and convinced 'oh'. seconds later, he voluntarily leaned towards his crib. i lowered him in positioning his body in the only corner of the crib he's ever slept in. he slid one of his legs under the mattress sheet (one of his nightly rituals), and pulled his blankets into his chest like they were a teddy bear or future spouse. the battle was done and won.

little humans are odd folk. what makes them odd is they have no powers of logic. logic is what separates little humans from full grown ones. and how much logic they are able to acquire in youth separates the odd grown ones from the not so odd grown ones. so work hard early. it's a temporary gig and pays the best dividends you'll ever see.