regarding yesterday's pro-peril story, for any wondering, my part of the peril was installing the rope on the tree. i'm not a fan of heights and for sure know bad things can happen. but if i want my kids to leave their comfort zone and travel to new places, i reckon i should as well every now and again.

granted, being taunted by anthony while going through my trial with chants of "do you want me to climb up there and do it dad?" does not enrich the experience in any meaningful way other than, maybe, egging me on to finish the job.

and i'd never been more thankful for my failing vision because once i was at the peak of the climb and trying to manipulate the thick-as-my-wrist rope into the slip knot my super-neighbor taught me minutes earlier, i was able to slide my glasses down my nose a bit and given my severe near-sightedness, the distant world below blurred out, looking much less ominous.

i don't think folks talk nearly enough about the awesome parts of getting old.

we were gifted a trampoline a year ago. for the record, most cool things our kids have can be connected to the generosity of someone who is not their parents. the tramp is a modern-day issue with the high netting all around. for reasons i'll explain in a moment, we recently removed the saftey netting. seeing a tramp without this encasement these days is kinda like spotting a black bear in yellowst...

a few days after my fourteen year old bella was mistaken for a grown woman (ref), she and i were out running errands. i told bella that given (1) her looking older than she is and (2) me looking younger than i am since shedding 25 pounds we might start running into situations where people look at us and wonder if we're a father and daughter or a rich guy and trophy girl. after icking and hacking her way through the suggestion she explained that no sensible human could be that mis-guided. i agreed that it seemed crazy and unlikely but said she should prepare herself for the possibility.

not even twelve hours later bella and i were on an evening bike ride through our park. we pulled up in front of the art museum to adjust some gear (me giving bella my helmet because she forgot hers - again). as we were working things out a woman exited the museum and walked by us. glancing our way, she pulled up and complimented our bikes. she stood back taking them in and then said it was so great that we enjoyed the same things and got out together. she began saying "it's nice when a ... ". here she paused and looked at each of us and bella finished her sentence "father and daughter" and the woman picked it up thanking bella and saying it was hard to tell sometimes.

after we parted and got out of earshot of the lady bella turned to me, saw my broad smile and said, "don't say a word. not a word." and we biked on in silence for a bit while bella digested this new development.

a new TROYSCRIPT was posted today. you're what?

in trying to convey at point at the dinner table to anthony, i said:

TROY
haven't you ever heard the saying "as a man thinketh, so he is"?

ANTHONY (8)
uhh. no. and i know i've never heard that saying because i've never heard the word 'thinketh' before.

although after that exchange anthony will never again be able to make that claim because 'thinketh' saw tons of play after that as in "do you thinketh you could bring in the ice cream" or "i thinketh it is time for dad hours" or "i thinketh i must use the restroom."

all three kids were scheduled for haircuts. we lived through survived a time that logistically scheduling three kids for a haircut in the same visit would have proven a herculean and catastrophic endeavor. herculean given the ambitious feats of occupying the two not in the chair and catastrophic in the sense that afterwards you'd need the remainder of the day to recover. but these days with a 14, 11, and 8 year old, marty called out a ten minute warning. in seconds the boys charged by to get dressed (it was only 12:00 on a saturday). as anthony passed, marty asked him to wake his sister. and that critical thought you just had about our daughter sleeping at noon isn't judgmentalism, it's jealousy—i know because i felt it too. after getting dressed, anthony returned to marty and asked if he could say that it was her idea to wake up bella. marty chuckled and said, yes, he could say that "mom said" to wake her and then added that he should just give her a gentle nudge on the hip and say it was time to get up. and that's what was done and they were in the car at the appointed wheels-up time. AND the dearmitt-walter clan set yet another salon-record for amount of hair removed from three humans (granted, bella and alex carry the day here).

and the best news of all regarding this maturation is it totally possible for me to say to my wife that while she and kids were getting haircuts i was thinking about catching a movie. because there was most definitely a time saying those words to my wife while in arms reach could have resulted with her holding my larnyx in her balled up fist but now, instead of rending parts of my anatomy from their home, she says "yeah, that sounds great. we'll meet up after." and not in a facetious way but in a, "great—go have fun" way and there's like flower petals floating down around us and soft music playing in the background. so i got to catch a weekend matinee of ex machina, a movie i would suggest you carve out time out to see as it is a wildly excellent and thought provoking affair about not our future, but about our childrens' future (possibly our grand-childrens') but assuming we can hold this planet together long enough, it is in someone's future. curious riddles they will be. and if you can go to a guilt-free afternoon matinee i would suggest doing so, if for no other reason, just because you can.

when we pulled into the lot for the walter family easter event, before i killed the engine, anthony (8) announced that he wouldn't be hunting easter eggs. later, when an uncle pressed him on the matter he said, "what's the point. all you do is run around finding eggs. you eat the candy in them. you get fat. and then you spend the next year trying to get de-fat. just so you can do it all over again ...