Flashback Father's Day: The Drama of Life

(This article originally was published by The News Herald in Panama City on Father's Day, June 18, 2006.)

The drama of life

By David Angier

Most parents cringe at the drama their teenagers bring into their lives, but Tony Simmons applauds it.

Even when his son, Nathan, is engaging in drunken brawls, kissing random women and acting crazy,

Tony simply smiles and watches - at times from front-row center.

In the years before Nathan, now 17, discovered acting, the drama he brought into the Simmons' household was nothing to smile about. But next weekend, father will join son on stage for a Shakespeare in the Park production of "Othello," in an activity that has drawn them closer together.

Admittedly, Tony Simmons' part is a small one - he has a few lines that he says he's struggled to learn - while Nathan takes center stage as the too-trusting and honorable Cassio, the unwitting tool of Iago's complex scheme of treachery and murder. Director Chuck Clay said he picked "Othello" - the tale of a war-weary general who returns home after defeating his enemies abroad, only to find his greatest enemy in his own home - because it seemed relevant to the times.

"Of all of Shakespeare's plays, 'Othello' is universal," Clay said. "It's something that's going on in our lives today. It has events and themes that we identify with, that we read about every day in the papers."

Act I, Scene I

Tall, lanky Nathan Simmons steps on the 25-by-12-foot stage at Gulf Coast Community College's theater lab and stops being Nathan Simmons. He's still dressed in jeans and black Chuck Taylors. His eyes are still nearly obscured by shaggy blond hair, but his mannerisms alter noticeably. He stands taller and speaks with a force that is absent away from the spotlight.

He's Cassio.

"Reputation, reputation, reputation," Cassio exclaims. "O, I have lost my reputation! I have lost the immortal part of myself, and what remains is bestial."

The only time Nathan Simmons comes out is when he misses a line. He stumbles over his words, smiles, rephrases and exits. Off stage he jumps up and down in frustration, then darts to a chair to study the line.

Nathan Simmons entered his first theater class during his freshman year at Bay High School. Before then, he describes himself as "pretty anti-social." Nathan's entrance into the theater magnet program coincided with doctors finally determining, after years of misdiagnoses, that he had a seizure problem.

Doctors initially thought he had an attention deficit condition and put him on medication that aggravated his seizures. Doctors finally realized the problem when Nathan was in eighth grade, but the damage to his reputation was done. Nathan was an outsider.

"I didn't have a lot of friends," he said. "But theater is a big family, and as I got into it I grew closer to all those people."

In four years of theater, Nathan has performed in more than 20 plays. He's won awards, acclaim and found a goal for the rest of his life.

"When mom and dad see me on stage, they're really proud of me, and that makes me feel good," Nathan said. "Before I started high school, I had no idea what I wanted to do. Now I have a goal to shoot for. I have a plan. I would like to major in theater and go to New York and perform there. If I can't do that, I'd settle for teaching theater."

He said he enjoys sharing his latest project with his father.

"We connect a lot more," Nathan said. "Before I joined the theater program I kept to myself a lot. Since then, I've become a nicer person, a happier person. Dad and I, we get along really well. He enjoys watching me on stage. Having him do this show is great because he doesn't have to sit in the audience this time; he can see it from the inside."

Nathan said it's nice the roles have changed in this aspect of their lives. "He's come up to me a couple of times and asked me, 'What exactly am I supposed to be doing here?'" Nathan said. "I've helped him in memorizing lines, and he's said that this is a lot more difficult than it looks. Dad's been more than willing to learn, and it's nice that he's let me be the teacher for once."

Act I, Scene II

Tony Simmons, online editor for The News Herald, is having a hard time "loosening up." He has to remember where to face, what to do and, above all else, what to say - while making it all seem completely natural. At the same time, he's got to project.

Shakespeare in the Park is a physically demanding endeavor. The actors don't have walls to bounce sound out to the audience, and it's up to the actors to make their voices carry. Simmons doesn't have a problem turning to his son for advice.

"He's having to teach me how to loosen up," Tony Simmons said. "This is an alien thing to me; these other people are just letting go. There's no sense of self, or self-consciousness, I guess, and that's something I have to learn."

His only prior acting experience was his senior play in high school 24 years ago. He agreed to do "Othello" — "because they asked me to. They assured me it was a small role. I thought this is something that Nathan and I can do together."

Tony Simmons isn't the type of father who rolls his eyes or shakes his head when he thinks about his son pursuing a career in acting - a difficult profession to succeed at. He's seen too many positive changes in his son's life occur in four years of theater to be pessimistic about the future.

"He's got a lot of promise, and I'd just like to see him take it as far as he can go," Simmons said, noting that Nathan has talent as a playwright. For now, Tony Simmons is learning to loosen his control of his son's life as well.

"I have to be almost less involved than I used to be," he said. "Nathan's found a way to make his own way."

Flashback Friday: Digressions in infinite complications

(The following was first published in The News Herald on Sunday, April 29, 2001.)

She needed a spoon for her cereal, but none were clean, so she washed all of the dishes, wiped down the counter tops, swept the floor, mopped, noticed dirt on the baseboards and instead of washing them pulled them off the wall and sanded the paint off of them, refinished them, reattached them to the wall, which she suddenly realized needed a new coat of paint in a different color so she went to Wal-Mart, where she bought paint and brushes, and came back home to paint the dining room (and living room and bathroom) walls — never having paused for breakfast.

Did anybody see where that rabbit ran off to?

She wanted to re-seed bare spots in the lawn, so she bought seed, bags of top soil and cow compost, flowering bedding plants, decorative trimming bricks, and went to find a hoe in the shed, but the shed was in disarray so she pulled everything out of it and stacked boxes and junk for a trip to the dump, and stacked other items for Goodwill, then organized the shed and realized that the hoe was not in the shed at all but rather on the side of the house where our spring garden is usually planted but where pine straw was still heavy on the ground, needing to be raked, so she raked the straw into trashcans that also would be carried to the dump — never having got around to seeding the lawn.

Could someone help us catch these wild geese?

She wanted to relax before bedtime with the latest Left Behind book, but the dog had gotten hair on the bed, so she stripped the comforter and sheets and started a load of wash and folded clothes that were in the drier and went to put them away, but the drawers were full of winter clothes so she sorted the winter clothes — setting many aside for donation — and put the remainder in a tote that wouldn't fit into the closet until the closet was sorted — setting several items aside, again, for donation — and by this time the comforter and sheets had been washed and dried so she made the bed and went to sleep — never having cracked open the book.

But I digress.

Getting to the point (if there is one): The walls would not be repainted now if I had run the dishwasher the night before, as I had promised; the shed would not be cleaned if I had put away the hoe; the winter clothes and closets might not be sorted yet, if I had not played with the dog on the bed.

What would she do without me?

Childhood dreams sometimes come true — a generation later

(This is my “Undercurrents” column for The News Herald this week.)

The Offer

PANAMA CITY BEACH — If you claim you never stood in front of a mirror and played air guitar or lip-synced into a hairbrush, pen or other object, then I’m going to (generously) suggest that you might be fibbing.

If you grew up in rock ’n’ roll age, that kind of activity is a given.

Me, I’ve wanted to be a rock star since before David Cassidy had a TV series. That’s a long, long time. However, I also have the good sense to keep away from karaoke machines, because no matter how long a time has passed, my singing skills have not improved.

"Adrift"

So it comes as something of a sense of pride to say my son is a rock star. At least, that’s what I tell him, and anyone else who will listen. He’s the vocalist and co-writer of songs for “The Offer,” a band that released its second CD (this time a 5-song EP titled “Adrift”) just last weekend.

The other band members are Mike Jordan (guitar), Mikhail Cintgran (bass/vocals), Tristan Reynolds (guitar), and Chase Hopkins (drums). The band has experienced a couple of lineup changes over the past few years, but has maintained its music and style (which they tell me is rock/post hardcore), as even a casual listen shows.

Listening to the new EP, particularly a song that references Doctor Who and “writing in her journal of impossible things,” my brain took an unexpected leap: I wondered how or if my life choices had reflected my father’s childhood dreams.

It’s a reasonable question, and one I think fathers and sons (and mothers and daughters) have mulled since time began. I’m sure it’s a question that occurs regularly to people in middle age, able to look at the generations before and after them simultaneously.

Dad didn’t want me to be a writer. He wanted me to be an electrician or a chemist, get a job in manufacturing, make a living wage. When I was bringing home Ray Bradbury novels from the middle school library, he was supplying me with Radio Shack electrical kits and chemistry sets from Kmart and giving me reading assignments in science texts.

(I remember debates with my son over his choice of study in high school and college — Theatre — and whether he could make a living wage with that kind of degree.* Sometimes, “living” is less about the wage and more about the life; that’s a lesson with which I’m still coming to grips.)

And yet, much later on, after I had established what became my career and started writing novels and short stories on the side, Dad started writing a regular history column for his local paper, The Tri-City Ledger in Flomaton, Ala., and wrote or co-wrote books on local history. He liked to joke that he was going to be me when he grew up.

I can say with certainty that I am not going to be a rockstar when I grow up. Still, I wondered if Dad had ever fantasized about being a writer in his youth — typed an air typewriter in front of the mirror, or lip-synced an interview into a tape recorder.

Probably not, now that I put it that way.

Peace.

---

* And let’s not forget how upset my daughter became after a career counselor at her school noted her high scores in aptitude tests and suggested she might pursue a career in journalism. I think she still cries when she thinks about that.

The view from the back seat

(This is my Undercurrents column for The News Herald this week.)

PANAMA CITY BEACH — It has been a week of highs and lows, as life tends to be — and pretty clearly illustrated, at least in part, by the perspectives attained according to where I sat in a moving vehicle.

Buckle up.

Saturday, my wife and I drove to Tallahassee to be with our daughter for her birthday, then traveled with her and her boyfriend to Thomasville, Ga., for a daytrip. The old downtown has been revitalized with boutiques, restaurants, a theater, a bookstore, a record shop — even a cupcakery and a fudge shop. We strolled the brick and concrete walks, sampled the local flavors, admired the old architecture. We laughed a lot.

I rode in the front passenger’s seat with my teeth clenched as my daughter’s boyfriend drove like he was auditioning for “Fast & Furious 8.” At one point, a piece of brown cardboard blown into the highway from the right caused him to swerve — I had seen it coming, but he thought it was an animal.

Sunday, we attended the wedding of my son’s best friend in Jacksonville; it took place at a waterside venue, by an old Florida woodframe house under oak trees strung with white lights. Bride and groom were funny and beautiful, and the event felt like a family reunion — everyone was genuinely happy to see everyone else. Afterward came dining, dancing (yes, even me), speeches, and tears of joy all around. My son caught the garter.

I drove most of the way there, but was relegated to the back seat for the trip home, sleeping the sleep of the just, the exhausted, the old. I’m not built for snoozing in a Corolla, but I managed. Pulling back into Tallahassee near midnight was like rolling into a dream — the streets were vaguely familiar, just turned the wrong ways and strangely lit, and even my daughter had trouble recognizing them.

“I’ve never come into town from this direction at night,” she explained.

We next jaunted to Pensacola, where I visited my father in the hospital and then traveled with him to Atmore, Ala., where he was moving for physical therapy. On that trip, I took the back seat again as my wife drove and Dad perched in the front passenger seat. I joked about being the backseat driver, then tried to give my wife directions. Dad chuckled and looked out the window.

That’s when it finally struck me and the mental airbags deployed.

I thought of my own children, of their years in the back seat, looking forward and reading my temper or humor by the bulge of a grinning cheek, set of a clenched jaw, or crinkle of the skin at the corner of my eye. Watching my hairline recede from the center outward.

I couldn’t tell you how many thousands of roadtrips I’ve taken with my father over the decades, covering hundreds of thousands of miles. Short hops to the grocery store, to church, to school, to Grandma’s  house and a million other places. Longer slogs to Orlando, or Cleveland, or Stone Mountain or wherever.

And I couldn’t begin to guess how often I saw him from a similar angle as I was growing up — sitting in the back seat and watching him scan the road as he drove or rode shotgun with someone else. Yet, I had never seen him from quite this perspective ever before. Exhausted, weak, at the mercy of a body and brain suffering from brutal and random tribulation.

Memories and that moment in time collided, the weight of those intervening decades like a yoke on my back, and I wondered what it must be like for him, relegated for a time to being a backseat passenger in his own life.

My advice is to take the wheel while you can, but from time to time, be willing to occupy a back seat and view the world from that perspective. Remind yourself how it feels to follow, to have to trust another’s ability to navigate the miles of rough road ahead.

And don’t forget to buckle up.

Peace.

Throwback Thursday: Best ‘witches’ for the happy birthday ghoul

(Originally published Sunday, October 31, 2010 in The News Herald.)

She arrived squalling in the dark and early hours of a Halloween morning, an absolute treat after a frightening and tricky delivery, our own tiny gremlin. Later that day, a boy dressed as the Flash gave her a kiss — through his face mask — before zooming off to trick-or-treat.

She has worn many costumes in the 19 (all too short) years since then: baby pumpkin, fairy-tale princess, pink Power Ranger, witch, Indian princess, police officer, Dorothy Gale, gangster moll and many more. She’s even been known to create a costume and makeup out of boredom (see above).

She won a prize in a sci-fi convention costume contest one year for the Star Trek outfit we dressed her in — mostly because she was an awfully cute 4-year-old at the time. The grownups in their expensive “uniforms” were not amused.

Over the years, we developed a tradition of taking the birthday ghoul out to eat before going trick-or-treating; the whole family would wear costumes to whatever restaurant she chose. That came to an end the year I wore a Star Trek costume and everyone in the joint came by the table to make jokes.


She absolutely refused to let me wear a Mr. Fantastic outfit a couple of years back, but that might have had more to do with the way my gut stretched the fabric.

I suppose there’s only so much humiliation a young woman will endure from her father.

For the last few years, she has wandered the neighborhoods of the Hammocks in Lynn Haven with her friends and has hauled home loads of candy — so we’re a little disappointed that she has finally decided she’s “too old” for trick-or-treating. Looks like we’ll have to hit the after-Halloween sales on All Souls Day.


All this is to say that, no matter what outward outfit she wears or how many Halloweens she has seen, she’ll always be our little monster under the surface.

Happy Halloween!

Throwback Thursday: Don't wait for Godot's great pumpkin

(Originally published October 30, 2005 in The News Herald)

As you read this, it's the morning after my daughter's first-ever hosted multi-guest sleepover party.

If all went according to plan, she had youngsters traipsing through the halls in Halloween costumes, eating snacks and birthday cake, half-watching scary movies, staying up to all hours, and dancing to music at a volume that probably was turned down over and over again by weary grownups.

Pray for them.

Bad enough that I can be grouchy on the best of mornings. Worse that my daughter is even more grouchy than me. But that's not really what this is all about.

It's about The Great Pumpkin, and the girl who came to us on a Halloween morning 14 years ago,
and the lessons she teaches.

The Great Pumpkin, like Godot, never arrives. It's the anticipation of his arrival, and our loneliness in the waiting, that matters. Linus sends letters that are never answered; he waits in the patch all night and never sees a sign. He believes in things the rest of us find laughable.

For many years, despite requests from our own "peanuts" gallery, somehow we seldom had a jack-o'- lantern on the doorstep. This year, we got a great pumpkin. We chose it from the patch off State 77 in Lynn Haven and brought it home to lovingly mutilate. It wasn't huge by any means, but it had a good shape and size. And it was ours.

We went to get the pumpkin because our Hallowed Eve princess wanted it, of course, and because her mother's insistence overcame my considerable inertia. And after a few days of having the pumpkin sitting patiently unmolested by the front door, for much the same reason, we took it into the backyard to carve.

As her mother watched, I showed the spooky little girl how to trim off the top and dig out the guts — or brains, if you prefer — to stick to the gourd-as-head analogy. I skimmed seeds out of the fibrous orange mucous and put them into one bowl to be cleaned and roasted. The brains and inner meat went into another, to be made into pumpkin pie or something else Mom might decide to make.

Then daughter and I drew the face, and I helped her cut the holes. She outlined the holes with red paint to increase the daytime scariness. We have since placed the candle inside and shined the light, and it is one formidable jack-o'-lantern.

But there was a moment in between those steps, a moment when I was up to my elbows in pumpkin brains, fingers coated in goo, when I realized my place in all of this. The role I had taken, though active in these final steps, was not the role that had put the gourd on its journey to the front porch.

"This is cool," said the Halloween girl. "Thanks, Mom."

Peace.

Throwback Thursday: Some leave monuments when they go

(This column originally appeared in The News Herald on Sunday, October 23, 2005.)

Hugs all around, and smiles, and some laughs.

We compare bald spots, and aches and pains like the guys on Jaws comparing their scars. We brag about our children, their grades and accomplishments, bestow compliments and accept them.

(We live through our children, after all. We put our arms around them and hang on for dear life. The future is there. Here is the past, we say to the child as we brag to our forefathers about the living future.)

So many faces in the crowd. We don't see them any more, except at family reunions, or weddings or funerals. We don't have family reunions any more, and those of us who were once considered the kids of the family are now at that intermediate age when it seems like nobody's getting married.

I guess you know what that leaves.

I'm thinking it's a shame that it has been so long since I saw so many of these people, and I'm thinking Bobby would be glad to see so many of them gathered up in one place. He'd have something inappropriate and hilarious to say about it.

There are pictures and flowers, as there always are. And tears. But there are inordinate amounts of smiles. Bobby would have appreciated that — it's what he brought into rooms.

Later, after the service at the Flomaton Funeral Home and another one on the green hill overlooking the town, we gather at his house. We are greeted there by a wooden sculpture Roland Hockett might have conceived on a whim.

Bobby built the monument to the recent hurricanes Ivan and Dennis after they dropped trees — twice — on his house. The second time, after repairs from the first time had been significantly completed.

The freeform sculpture stands at the end of the walkway that leads from the street to the front door of the home. It's made of pieces cut from the trees as they were removed from the house, as well as various other debris.

Maybe it's a warning of what can happen if you fight the forces of nature, I thought. Maybe it's a kind of pine ju-ju meant to appease the hurricane gods. Most likely, it's just a typical joke — Bobby's way of saying he's not going to let something like a one-two punch from Mother Nature get him down.

Some people leave memories. Some leave legacies. Some leave monuments.

I snap a picture, and wonder.

Peace.

Forecast for a Blood Moon: Cloudy with a chance of snark

PANAMA CITY BEACH — I set up three lawn chairs in front of our house Sunday night and positioned them to face the glowing blotch floating overhead, where the full moon’s glow struggled to pierce the cloud cover.

We hoped to glimpse the supermoon and the “blood moon” effect of the total lunar eclipse. Clouds moving in opposing directions, depending on their altitude, worked to obscure our view — a condition made all the more frustrating by the open gaps showing black space and sparkling stars at the wrong angle from our position below to allow a view of the moon.

Occasionally, a piece of moon would peek from behind a passing veil of vapor, but only for a moment. Blue light flickered through the neighbor’s blinds and dogs yapped from somewhere beyond the surrounding trees. I listened for coyote howls, but heard none.

Strangely, I offered no howls of my own, and never once wondered about werewolves; I’d almost think I must be growing up, if I didn’t know better.

I did, however, think about the silly warnings I’d seen posted on Facebook about the “Blood Moon!” event, as well as the exhortations from various world religious leaders not to panic. Apparently, some people actually thought a full moon/eclipse augured the end of the world; I would have thought that kind of superstition had died out long ago.

But then I see the sort of things that become viral on Facebook — please stop sharing that blasted privacy notice thing! — or that become points of contention between otherwise “enlightened” and educated persons, and can’t help but accept that we, as a species, will believe almost anything.

I mean, there are some things “I want to believe,” as Special Agent Fox Mulder’s office poster used to declare. But I don’t want to be stupid about it.

Apropos of Mulder, my son tossed in the metaphorical towel early on, returning indoors to continue his binge-watching of “The X-Files” on Netflix as he anticipates the revival of the series early next year. I suspect he’s genetically predisposed to enjoy that kind of thing, and I know which of his parents is to blame.

Meanwhile, cloud-watching and eclipse-waiting, it seems, is an old-person’s game. My wife and I persisted in our quest for another half-hour or so, as she experimented with different settings on her camera and I experimented with magical cloudbursting spells.

Surely, just the right gesture and exhortation — “Expelliarmus!” perhaps, or “Rain, rain, go away!” — would pierce the veil in time to see the moon blush in humiliation over all this misdirected attention.

The wife was less amused by my silliness than I was, I suspect, but more patient than she might have been in earlier years. A lunar halo effect, perhaps, though it may be that she allowed me some leeway because our pearl anniversary was the next day and a dozen roses had mysteriously materialized on the dining table earlier in the afternoon.

But try as I might, I failed to dissolve the cloud cover with either magic or telekinesis. Whether that’s a testimony to the strength of the tropical weather pattern or an indictment of the weakness of frequency or amplitude in my brainwaves — you can decide.

Peace.

Reviewing a bombastic weekend, ‘super’ pilot

Jerry Dorsey by the rocket's red glare

PANAMA CITY BEACH — It was a low-impact July 4th at our place: We cooked a rack of ribs, grilled burgers, splashed in the neighborhood pool, and watched “Independence Day.” At dark, we carried folding chairs to view the Panama City fireworks from the beach side of St. Andrew Bay, sitting in the dark along the sand at the public access off Delwood Beach Road.

“These chairs are about worn out,” my wife said, and I told her they still had life in them. A minute later, mine collapsed and I hit the sand.

Nearby, a group of sky-watchers played the radio, listening to patriotic music synchronized to the fireworks — until the guy a little further down the beach drowned them out by cranking up his boom box to play country songs. (He also shouted profanity at invisible terrorists, who we were better than because, in his words, “we’re sending rockets into the sky.”)

When the second song began, my son said, “He’s playing the same song again,” but I corrected him: “It just sounds like the same song. Every country hit these days sounds like every other country hit. 

In a second, it’ll turn into just a list of adjectives and nouns, followed by a guitar solo.”

About the time the third song started, my wife’s cell phone chimed in, playing a YouTube video of Englebert Humperdinck singing “What’s Up, Pussycat?” — while we kvetched, she googled. Once again, it’s Debra for the win.

**

Melissa Benoist as Kara Zor-El/Danvers

Speaking of things that fly and cause explosions, I also got a chance to view the upcoming CBS “Supergirl” TV series pilot (premiering Oct. 26), and it’s both exactly what I feared and most of what a comic book fan could ever hope for.

That is, it falls prey to both superhero and romantic-comedy tropes (though it plays with them appropriately, such as the trying-out-costumes montage) and it manages to take its heroine seriously, setting up her battle against a slew of bad guys worthy of her prowess.

The central actor, Melissa Benoist as Kara Zor-El/Danvers, is delightful. At turns goofy and determined, she provides all the emotions needed to ground a crazy concept like this. Unlike the brooding heroes of “Arrow” and “Daredevil,” this young woman seems happy to have powers, and isn’t afraid to use them to help people.

The effects are well done for television (such as a crashing jetliner segment glimpsed in the teaser), and the acting is above par for genre shows. I also appreciate the nods to “Super” history, from characters pulled from the comics to the actors filling cameo roles as Kara’s adoptive human parents. 

I’m looking forward to seeing what the show runners (who are also responsible for the breakout CW hit “The Flash” as well as “Arrow” and the upcoming “DC’s Legends of Tomorrow”) can pull off on a weekly basis. So far, so good.

Up, up and away!

Reflections on a week of import

Father and Son

PANAMA CITY BEACH — My son, Nathan, turned 27 earlier this week. I don’t know about how you respond to the passage of such dates, but that day made me look back at myself at 27 and try to imagine where I thought life would take me then.

I turned 27 in 1991, just a month after Nathan’s third birthday and couple of months before my daughter was born. I was back in college after several years of working for a retail outlet — on my way to a degree in Journalism, finally, and working freelance for a couple of local publications to help cover the bills.

Two years later, I would be hired by The News Herald and move my little family to Panama City. But in ’91, we had a spitz puppy named Everest and lived in a house owned by my mother, and I had dreams of making it as a reporter and novelist.

I still do.

Looking at my 51st birthday looming now, it would be easy to say the best days are in the past and to worry what the future holds. But I have to say, we (as a family) have weathered some dark days in the interim, and we hope for some great ones still to come.

As I sit here, writing this on the day my latest novel begins its serialized release on Amazon Kindle, I know that there are still stories to tell — indeed, more than I will ever have time to write down — still milestones to reach and wonders to witness. The marriage of children and birth of grandchildren, for instance. The next laugh at a lunch table.

I have more close friends today than at any time since high school. I have great expectations for my children, and a certain assurance that they have acquired the skills and strengths they will need to flourish even when I’m gone.

At 27, things were just getting started and I was struggling to find my way. At nearly 51, though some days can make me feel my age, I still have a sense that things are just getting started. I still struggle, still have worries. But most days the path is there, if I take a moment to see it.

How about you? Are you finding your path? Can you look back and see the trajectory that brought you here?

Peace.

Check out Tony’s latest fiction by visiting Facebook.com/TheCalibanCycle for details.

Too early to tackle the tree?

PANAMA CITY BEACH — Say what you will about people who play Christmas music “too early” or put up their trees and other decorations before Thanksgiving. I’ve probably said something similar, myself, in the past.

But our Christmas tree was up last Sunday, which is early, even for us. Earlier, still, in context to the trees of my youth.

Once upon a time, my sister and I would accompany our parents to a tree farm somewhere outside of Century, Fla. , to walk rows of cedar and pick out a likely candidate. Once we got it chopped down, loaded onto the car, and lugged back home, Dad would trim low branches and prep the base for bringing it indoors.

Invariably, our cat or dog would drink from the water in the base. (These days, we only worry about a cat chewing an electric cord while climbing the metal limbs.) I remember Dad wrapped the lights, and Mom was in charge of icicles. I was in charge of dropping the fragile glass ornaments and then stepping on the slivers. It was a holiday tradition.

Once, I went with my uncle to pick up a pre-cut tree from one of many stores that had them leaning outside the entrance. On the drive home, he saw another store that had nicer trees, and stopped in to swap his out. Still trying to figure out how that worked.

These trees, already well on the way to dying by the time they came in the door, didn’t have a long window for use. At most, with a gas heater running 10 feet away, they’d last about a week. And even then, the last few days before Christmas would require wearing shoes in the living room to avoid getting prickly pine needles in your feet.

My pragmatic Grandma Simmons had an aluminum Christmas tree that she used for — I don’t know — decades? So I didn’t sneer at the advent (see what I did there?) of fake plastic trees some years later; it was just a tree of a different color.

Since establishing our own home(s), we have had several of these artificial firs over the years. We purchased our most recent tree from a friend’s garage sale. It’s about 7 feet tall and has built-in lights.

We put it together last Sunday, in part because we wanted to test the lights, but mostly because it will make our Thanksgiving Day (if we can wait that long) decorating party that much more fun — no wasting valuable decorating time having to lug the box out of the garage and putting it together when we’re ready.

Plus, we get to enjoy the lights a little longer.

Since moving into our current home, we’ve put up two Christmas trees each season. The one downstairs carries our collections of pop culture ornaments, and I have put up Grandma Simmons’ old tree in our bonus room at the top of the stairs, loading it with little handmade ornaments our kids brought home from school over the years.

This year, the upstairs will house our older fake plastic tree (the one that used to stand downstairs). We’ll decorate it with pink ornaments in memory of my sister-in-law, who died Sept. 12 of complications while under treatment for leukemia. My wife picked out the ornaments, and it was her idea to put up the second tree.

Our trees have always held objects of deep emotion and memory, from the faded plastic reindeer that Grandma Simmons gave me as a child (and that my father enjoyed as a child), to the Scarlet O’Hara ornaments we bought for Grandma Massey’s tree (and inherited upon her passing), to the “Joy” ornaments we hang in memory of our child-in-spirit, who died too young.

That’s the importance of these things, after all. Not when they go up or come down, but what you do with them while they’re here. The memories made by the light of the tree, the people recalled, the love never lost.

But then, that’s the important part of anything, isn’t it?

Peace.

Memories of haunted Halloweens gone by

1991 vintage Flash mask

PANAMA CITY — When my son was 3, I took him to a kid-friendly haunted maze at a Kmart store’s garden center. His sister was a newborn down the street at Sacred Heart Hospital in Pensacola, and our first photographs of them together show him in his Flash costume.

She turns 23 today, our little Halloween treat. But a visit to the Panama City Jaycees Haunted House under construction earlier this month set my mind on a minor event of that momentous day in 1991, and from there the Halloween memories began to tumble.

Apparently, the red-and-yellow plastic coveralls with the lightning logo conferred upon her brother the super-speed powers of the comic book hero whose adventures he had viewed on television. At least, one would think so, to see him running everywhere he went.

The mask and costume also rendered him fearless. Near the end of the haunted maze, a man in some kind of scarecrow/clown outfit squatted down and made spooky noises at the boy, who drew back his right arm and promptly punched the man in the nose of his mask.

I apologized, the man laughed, and Flash propped his fists on his hips in a heroic pose, having vanquished evil.

Jessi and Nathan

The Flash’s greatest adventure was on my mind when I walked the unfinished maze above Panama City Marine Institute, which has sheltered the Jaycees Haunted House for 11 years. (You can view a video tour through the haunted house at PanamaCity.com, and see the schedule on pages 10-11 for times and details on the event.)

Will Hancock, who has supervised the Haunted House project for the Jaycees for several years, told me last week that the event is “very alive” and doing robust business.

“I am pleased with all the hard work and dedication put in so far,” Will said. “The ‘13 Ghosts’ room and the ‘Oculus’ room have been the most consistent (frights) so far, but that can change tonight. We are adding more sound and lighting as we speak.”

The scares, while safe for adults and teens, are not appropriate for little children. I just hope no one gets punched in the nose.

No frightful creatures jumped out at me during my tour — which was lucky, since I had no hero handy to leap to my defense. But suddenly, 1991 seemed like only yesterday. When I wondered where the years had gone, I could feel them piled up like a bottleneck, heavy and thick with sweet memory.

Jessi playing with makeup.

... Sitting with the kids at a fire in a friend’s Cove area front yard, reading “The Raven” and handing out candy.

.... Wrapping the kids like toilet paper mummies during a contest at another friend’s Halloween party at Pine Log.

... Walking the sidewalks of North Shore neighborhoods to gather massive hauls of candy.

... Playing “pin the fangs on the monster” at one of Jessi’s earliest birthday parties in Century.

... Dressing in costumes to grab supper at Golden Corral on yet another Halloween.

So many autumn evenings, pumpkins carved, yards decorated, homemade costumes, movie nights with the house full of her friends, and outfits I can’t even begin to recall.

In that moment, picturing the boy in the Flash uniform holding a newborn little girl in a hospital room, I wondered if ghosts of the past truly haunt houses, or if they only haunt old men whose children have grown up.

Peace. 

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This is my Undercurrents column this week for PanamaCity.com and The News Herald.

The child who paid her respects

Tammy on her bus.

FLOMATON, Ala. — The rain had not yet begun to fall, but low clouds crossed air currents above the hillside, curling around one another, gray on gray, and threatening a downpour.

We stood beside a freshly covered grave. Colorful flower arrangements lay spread on the upturned clay or stood in pots where a headstone was yet to be placed. A train passed down the hill, heading east, its mournful wail echoing among the pines and dogwoods.

At the head of the flower grouping lay a school bus formed of yellow silk buds. Near the foot, several popsicle sticks jutted from a clutch of cut flowers, decorated with figures named for some of the children who rode her bus. She drove for the Escambia County, Fla., School District for more than 15 years.

Tammy, my wife’s older sister, died Sept. 12 of complications after more than a year of treatment for leukemia, first at Baptist Hospital in Pensacola and later at the University of Alabama-Birmingham. She left two sisters, a husband and four daughters, her mother, grandchildren, cousins — and countless others — to mourn.

She was diagnosed with acute myeloid leukemia, but an anonymous donor on the national registry was a perfect match for stem cell transplant. Thanks to that donor, her most recent biopsy showed she was 100-percent cancer-free. Tammy was looking forward to leaving the hospital soon and coming for a visit so she could dip her toes in the Gulf of Mexico on an autumn afternoon. She hoped to recover well enough to return to work someday.

Our photo albums are filled with her visits. A joint anniversary cruise on the Lady Anderson. Camping trips to St. Andrews State Park. Family portraits at the foot of the dunes and in the surf along Panama City Beach. Running the Gran Maze at Coconut Creek, miniature golfing, go-cart racing, shooting the rapids at Shipwreck Island. Most recently, a vow renewal ceremony for Tammy and her husband, Robby, at sunset on the beach.

As we stood there on the hill under threatening clouds — a small group having gathered a few hours after the services and now lost in our own thoughts — a beat-up Ford Explorer pulled over along the cemetery lane. A skinny girl in flip-flops and a black skirt climbed down from behind the wheel and crossed the lawn to join us. We didn’t know her, but she knew Tammy.

“I rode her bus when I was in third grade,” the girl explained. “If I was still in school, I’d be a senior this year. I heard this morning about what had happened, but I didn’t have any way to go to the funeral. I had to wait for my dad to get home from work so I could take his truck.”

She stood, hands folded together, studying the flowers and engulfed in memory, and I wondered how many others like her there were in the world. Children who rode a school bus —  perhaps only for a short time, many years ago — who will carry a piece of their driver’s spirit with them into the future. How many others might there have been if things had gone differently?

I wondered what Tammy had done to impress this one child, to move her nine years later to pay respects on a lonely hilltop as rain began to fall. But I didn’t ask. My curiosity didn’t matter, really.

The children mattered, and this girl’s quiet visitation was testament to how well Tammy saw to them in her time.

Peace. 

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Leukemia Awareness

What: September is National Leukemia and Lymphoma Awareness Month

Who: More than 1 million people in the United States are diagnosed with cancer each year

Details: Cancer.org

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This is my Undercurrents column for PanamaCity.com and The News Herald this week.

Off the grid, on my mind

Photo by Jessica Simmons

HALF MOON KAY — Standing in cool sea water so blue and clear it looked like a swimming pool, with soft white sand under my feet and a towering thunderhead on the horizon dropping a sheet of rain against the blue sky, I could sense how far off the grid I was.

My phone, which has become both a lifeline and a distraction in recent years, was in a stateroom on the cruise ship that had brought me to this place with my family. It had not been employed for a few days, though my daughter continued using her phone for taking photos and keeping up with the time.

For a week, I did not surf the web, update Facebook, post to Twitter, Instagram, Tumblr or any of the other social media that sucks away my moments. I didn’t send or receive a single text or a phone call. Because I’ve stopped wearing a watch (trusting my phone to carry that burden) I didn’t even know what time it was for most of the journey.

And I plopped down in the water, felt the sun drying salt on my face, and knew it was all good.

No sooner had we returned to port and “civilization,” than all of us turned our eyes to our phones and tried to catch up on all we had missed. The car ride back home was quiet as everyone (except the driver) busily reconnected with their cyber lives, myself included.

Just a few years ago, I was one of those Luddites who thought he would never need a cell phone. Then I thought I would never need one that allowed me to text messages rather than place calls (I still would rather talk to you than trade half-conversations via text). Then I thought I would never need a “smart” phone.

I was wrong about all of that. It’s a necessity in the multi-media business, and has become so in private life, where I’ve been known to work myself into a tizzy (use of that word proves I’m old) if my wife or children don’t respond to repeated attempts to reach them by call or text in the space of an hour or so. Not to mention being able to watch videos, listen to music, take HD photos, talk via Facetime and so forth.

But for a week, it didn’t matter what TV shows I missed (my DVR was saving them for me anyway), or what breaking news I caught later in the day. I wasn’t checking my phone to ensure I hadn’t missed someone’s message or email. Time was only important when dinner was approaching or to be sure we were back from an excursion before the ship sailed.

The world, as I experienced it, slowed down. It was quieter. I could take my time with something, relish a moment rather than trying to snap a selfie in the midst of it. (My daughter, however, took more than 250 photos on her phone, and my wife shot nearly as many on her camera, so the trip was still well documented. I don’t mean my comments here to devalue their effort.)

I read a book and a bunch of old comics I took on the trip. I watched the deep blue sea drift by. I spoke to strangers, helped my family/team win a trivia contest, held hands with my wife as we walked the streets of Nassau, joked with my kids. We made midnight visits to the buffet or to get ice cream.

But best of all, being off the grid gave us each other’s undivided attention, and provided me the chance to look them in the eyes and tell them how much they mean to me, and how wonderful it was to be with them on this adventure and in this life.

Peace.

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(This is my Undercurrents column for PanamaCity.com and The News Herald this week.)

Unraveling a warm Christmas mystery

Tony and Lisa, circa 1971

PANAMA CITY BEACH — I have no earthly idea where the cowboy outfits came from, except that Santa Claus must have had his reasons. Maybe it was a phase. Maybe it was a grandmother’s idea.

Whatever the origin, it’s now a personal Christmas mystery.

Back when I could still count my age and have fingers left in reserve, my family of four lived in a small woodframe house off U.S. 29 in Century, Florida. At least a couple of Christmases, part of the wonderment discovered under the Christmas tree included a full cowboy costume in the style of Gene Autry and his generation of singing cowpokes.

Now, please understand, Gene Autry’s movies were a bit before even my time. But my favorite Christmas music was an album of songs featuring Gene on the cover in all of his Hollywood-cowboy glory, standing tall as a miniature sleigh and tiny reindeer flew about his kneecaps.

Maybe that explains the costuming. Hat, boots, a shirt that would make a country music star swoon. One year, there was a fringe vest included, but I think by then I was in my Bobby Sherman phase.

My sister, as seen in a photo from about 1971 that she recently posted on Facebook, got a corresponding cowgirl outfit. We were a matched set — and pretty pleased to be so, if the picture is as accurate an indication as I believe.

I remember wearing the costume around to visit the relatives on Christmas Day. I recall wearing it to ride my bike, that trusty mount of my imagination, up and down the narrow road (not the highway!) beside the house.

What I don’t recall is actually asking Santa for the outfit. My father claims ignorance of the origins also, guessing that it’s possible “one of your grandmothers thought you’d be ‘cute’ in them — maybe Grandma Simmons.”

He’s probably right about that.

Now, Dad was a big fan of the singing cowboys in his childhood. He told me in some Facebook messages recently that he considered himself Gene Autry most of the time, and he had his third grade school portrait taken in a Roy Rogers shirt.

And Grandma Simmons often saw her youngest son (my dad) when she looked at me; she even had a habit of naming off her two boys before getting to my name, and her awareness of the mistake made any time she called after me sound like an angry exclamation at the end of the dusty trail (“Ed-Jerry-Tony!”). What I’m getting at is, I can totally understand her wanting to dress my sister and me like Dad’s cowboy heroes.

Grandma also had little gas heaters in the corners of each room back then, and in our house there was a gas heater in the living room that we would back up to on cold mornings. Christmas recollections thus come complete with sense memories of cold feet and clothing that got too hot on the back side for comfort.  

(Because of the way the heaters tried to warm the old house, Dad recalls “ceilings so high you were warm when you stood up but cold when you sat down.”)

I look at photos now of my children on Christmas mornings when they were little, and I wonder what mysteries the pictures will hold for them in the future. I hope they’re as warm as mine.

Peace.

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(My column for PanamaCity.com and The News Herald for the week of Dec. 20.)

Under the moon and the Milky Way

Photo by Andrew Wardlow

PANAMA CITY BEACH — Walking under a full moon last weekend, I listened to oak limbs creaking, the hiss of leaves shuffling in a breeze, and tried to convince myself there was more happening in the dark.

That the trees were shifting to keep an eye on me as I walked. That something lurked unseen among the limbs or in the utter blackness under the gnarled branches.

It didn’t work.

I know the woods around my house, sparse as they are, host foxes, deer, rabbits and coyotes, snakes and squirrels and other beasties. I have seen a hawk glide over the trees, and a large horned owl perched atop a pine, and I have heard the call of a lonely whippoorwill in the night.

But I have not felt the chill of fright on those empty streets, walking under the vast open dome of the Milky Way, or seeing the landscape light up in shades of blue as clouds parted for the moon. I have not feared the unseen creatures in the wild, or even the ones in my over-active imagination.

I wasn’t always so assured in the night. As a child, I hated going into my back yard after sunset. My family lived on the southern boundary of a small town, with a few acres of woodland surrounding the house. I was convinced something supernatural and predatory walked behind the fence at night; I heard it moving when I went out to feed our dog, or on evenings Mom asked me to bring in laundry from the clothesline.

It followed me on nighttime walks with my older cousins near my grandparents’ home. Or so they would tell me, weaving ghost stories and legends as the moon trailed us in the sky and noises carried from the trees lining the road.

It lurked on the corner, just outside the cone of light from the street lamp. It hid in the bushes beside the bedroom window, waiting for me to look outside so it could reveal itself. It never did, except one evening when we were moving into our home (I was 7) and my uncle (13 years old) snuck up to the window to scare me silly.

Even as an adult, I have felt my hackles rise from some unseen but nonetheless sensed danger in the dark. Because I have also learned to trust my instincts, I make it a rule not to remain in places or situations that cause me to feel uneasy.

But that hasn’t been the case of late. Maybe there are enough real-world dangers that imagined ones don’t register any more. Maybe I have put aside the childish fears of youth, or exorcised them through my writing.

But more likely, I think, I have merely recognized that I’m where I need to be for this time, and that includes a bit of walking under the light of the moon, in the narrow lane between the deep shadows, where leaves rustle and something unseen goes bump in the night.

Peace.
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(This is my Undercurrents column for PanamaCity.com and The News Herald this week.) 

Approaching a season of change

PANAMA CITY BEACH — The Monday morning breezes, cooled by rains the evening prior, carried a welcome scent and sensation of autumn. That crisp feeling of low-humidity, of cool air on your face and arms, resurrected a sensory memory of childhood back-to-school mornings at bus stops.

There was an impression of the future opening before you on a path carpeted by fallen leaves.

My friends were quick to remind me that it’s not yet the end of summer: We still aren’t through hurricane season; the last tourist stragglers haven’t left for homes in Alabama or Georgia; the first snowbirds have yet to begin winging south; the heat hasn’t broken; these are still the Dog Days.

But the weather that morning was like a promise — particularly arriving as it did, the morning after we returned from helping our daughter move out of town, to start a new life in a new city.

The air seemed to confirm a season of change in our lives, preceding the changing of the seasons.

The house had felt empty and vast the night before, and not just because some furniture and books (and cats) were somewhere else now, though I tried to pretend that was the cause. It was the sort of emptiness that could lead to melancholy, if you’re susceptible.

But we’re no strangers to this emotional state of change. We went through this once before, when our son moved off to college. (He came back, but he was out of town on a tour with his band as I wrote this, which contributed to the quiet at home.)

In the quiet you wonder, “Is this what it’s going to be like?” And the answer is yes, in the best of all possible worlds. Yes, if all goes well. Yes, if they succeed and prosper, chase dreams and catch them. Yes, if you’re secure in the knowledge that they are where they want to be.

Things change. Children grow up, choose their own clothes, like bad TV shows, move out, and whatever follows that.

My daughter is one of those now. She graduated from FSU-PC this summer, and started boxing up her life a couple of weeks ago. I held her for a long time Sunday before driving away, which was one of the more difficult things I’ve ever done.

(An aside: All the U-Haul places in Tallahassee were filled to the gills with returned trailers and trucks by Sunday afternoon, as students arriving for the start of the new school year on Monday (or their parents) dropped off their rentals. A store manager driving a U-Haul truck towing a trailer led us from his location where we were supposed to turn in our trailer (it was jam-packed) to another that had a muddy field filled with orange-and-white vehicles, like a U-Haul graveyard.)

Now the dogs stare down the hall, waiting for someone who isn’t there, and I realize I don’t have to try to walk quietly on the stairs in the early hours of the day. I won’t get up in the morning to find she left a pile of dishes in the sink after cooking in the middle of the night, or have her cat, Leeloo, talk to me over breakfast.

She won’t try to make me watch reality TV shows about brides or house hunters any more, and I won’t try to make her appreciate Syfy channel series.

On the phone with her mother the other day, she said she was headed “home,” but she meant her apartment, not our house. Imagine our confusion.

Seasons change. Addresses change. The definition of “home” changes, too.

But like seasons, everything will come back around one day.

Peace. 

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(This was my Undercurrents column for PanamaCity.com and The News Herald this week.)

Give me the usual

Robbie and Ellen at St. Andrews Coffee House

PANAMA CITY — Recently, I left my hat behind after lunch at the St. Andrews Coffee House. That afternoon, I received an email with the subject line “CAPtive.”

The message stated: “We have your hat. Instructions for its safe return to follow.” A second email said, “Report to 1006 Beck Ave. between the hours of 7 a.m. and 2 p.m. Approach the skinny blonde and say ‘the usual.’ ”

Now, sometimes it’s nice to go somewhere nobody knows you. Just to walk into a shop or café and not be met by sentences that start with “Don’t you work for…” or “Aren’t you…” Usually those beginnings result in nice talks or tips for articles, but there’s always that moment of hesitation when you wonder what’s going to happen next.

Even so, the opposite situation has even more appeal.

For instance, as a family, we’ve visited Charlie Coram’s Place on 23rd Street enough times that the waitresses ask us if we even need a menu; they know how we want our burgers, what condiments we use, and if one of the kids orders Heavenly Hash, they know what extras to put on the side. They also take for granted that a certain number of people will be in our group, so they’re surprised when one is missing or an extra face joins us.

If you’re of a certain age, then you recall the theme to the TV series “Cheers” — after all, it was a top-40 radio hit at one point — and you probably understand the feeling that sometimes you want to go where everybody knows your name.

That’s what “the usual” means to me.

You don’t get a “usual” unless you’re a creature of habit. You have to go to the same place at about the same time every week and order the same item. (A voice in my head goes, “Same Bat-time, same Bat-channel.”)

Some people like to change things up all the time. My experimentation ends when I find something I like, though I might be dangerous some weeks and have white bread instead of wheat.

Also, I don’t think you can ask to have a “usual.” It’s something that has to be bestowed. I just came in the coffee house door one morning and was asked, “You want the usual?”

And yes, I did. In fact, it was more important to me, in that moment, to know that I had “a” usual than it was to actually eat the thing.

In the past year, I had taken to eating lunch there weekly, often in the company of friends who join me to talk about books, movies, TV shows, writing projects, film making, zombies, or whatever else might come up. Our conversations must confuse and occasionally terrify people at other tables, but we’ve not yet had a complaint.

One such week, my friend Nick, hearing Ellen and Robbie ask if I wanted “the usual,” said he wanted to have a “usual” of his own. I told him it was possible, but more likely that his would be an “unusual.”

I had to say it before somebody else said it about me.

And one morning, I noticed that the ladies had set a missing place at the counter. One of the stools had been removed, and a plate was set there with specific condiments for a regular customer — who had died unexpectedly.

It was a simple gesture, and beautiful. I didn’t ask many questions, because the statement was clear: He was part of their lives, and he would be missed.

It’s comforting to know that such a connection is part of the usual around here.

Peace.

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(This was my column for PanamaCity.com and The News Herald this week.)

Finding your flock, and letting it go

TALLAHASSEE — I was standing in a milling crowd last Saturday outside the Leon County Civic Center, using a hand to shade my eyes from the high, white-hot sun and scanning the sea of faces and forms for a glimpse of my daughter.

And I began to think about flocks.

The rest of our group waited by a student busker blowing some blues and gathering bills in his saxophone case, and I wandered out to set up a second position to keep lookout for her. The crowd was so thick, the noise of voices so loud and the space so wide that I feared she would pass us by without finding us.

Minutes earlier, the civic center had been filled. Few stadium seats were left empty by family and friends that had come to observe the summer commencement exercises, and black-robed graduates had crammed the floor. Now all of those people were exiting into the noonday sun.

For a minute, I put my other hand over the back of my head and felt the burn.

Delayed on the lower level, the grads finally spread into the waiting crowd like a black stain, and I was reminded of watching flocks of birds moving in giant swirls against an autumn sky. Someone studying flocking patterns should set up outside one of these events, I thought.

Maybe it was the heat.

Black robes flapping like the wings on a murder of crows, grads found their families. The larger mass of people began breaking into tighter groups, offering hugs and flowers, trying to grab snapshots with their phones. I moved to avoid photo-bombing one group and got in the way of another.

For no apparent reason, everyone started moving toward the stairs and flowing down to the parking lot enmasse, like birds instinctively following a fellow from the flock that had only slipped off the wire.

I spotted my son, standing a head taller than the crowd between us, and he gestured for me to return to the fold. “We found her,” he said when I zigzagged to his side. “She’s coming this way.”

Reunited, we went for lunch, then returned to take photos in a courtyard and outside Doak Campbell Stadium. The flame on the Seminole statue’s lance couldn’t have burned much hotter than the pavement (and the feathers on the staff looked suspiciously like birds on a wire). We stopped for fountain drinks to refresh us, and we began the long drive back home.

She won’t remain here for long; she already has plans for relocating, and expectations that I will help her go, that I will support her absence as she takes wing on her own for the first time.

That evening, standing in the street of our quiet neighborhood, I watched the shadows of birds flying in formation, circling and diving and returning to the line heading past the trees to somewhere new. Somewhere unseen and far away.

I wondered where they were going, and if they would always return.

Peace.
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(This was my column for PanamaCity.com and The News Herald this week.)

Some perspective at 49 (and counting)

The author as a child. Not much has changed.

PANAMA CITY BEACH — I have begun my 50th year.

(I say it that way so, when the big day arrives in 2014, I’ll have become desensitized to the pain.)

Last year, my son asked me if 24 was considered “mid-20s,” and of course I said it was, since he had just turned 24 and I knew where his thoughts were going. Early 20s would be up to age 23, I told him, and late 20s would be 27-29.

He remarked that he was getting old, and I chuckled. “You can tell me you’re getting old when your child tells you he feels like he’s getting old,” I said.

For the record: I am not getting old. I refuse to. And I’m only begrudgingly willing to grow up. Maybe. Some day. Despite the evidence I see in the mirror, I don’t picture myself as “old.”

Most of the time, and I think my family would agree, I have the interests and emotional maturity of a child. I’d rather watch the latest DC Comics animated movie (ask me about “The Flashpoint Paradox” some time) over anything on any sports channel, for instance. I’ll argue the merits of “Man of Steel” vs. “The Dark Knight Rises” any time you want to meet me at the comics shop.

Also, I’m useless when it comes to “adult” subjects like planning for retirement or understanding insurance benefits. That’s probably because I spend more time in my made-up brainspace than in the “real” world.

And then … 

Earlier this week, my wife asked me if there was something special I wanted for my birthday, or if there was some place I wanted to go out to eat — and for possibly the first time ever, I didn’t have a ready answer. I can usually rattle off a dozen items on my current wish list.

It’s the perspective of the years like a sudden weight being forced upon us by recent developments in our lives, I think, that makes such considerations seem petty and difficult. Just one example: We recently returned from a trip to Pensacola, where we visited a relative who is undergoing chemotherapy to combat leukemia. She’s my age.

What do I want for my birthday? How about a miracle.

Don’t get me wrong: I’m incredibly thankful for our blessings. I’m alive and reasonably healthy seven years after bypass surgery, and my wife and kids are likewise healthy and reasonably happy. We’re employed, educated, and enjoy a middle class lifestyle, and we’re involved in creative communities of friends, family and acquaintances.

Every day should be a celebration, a gift — and it is. But sometimes, you just don’t know what to ask for.

If I take a minute to think about how I prefer to spend my free time, it’s really pretty simple. I’d like to look at some art, listen to some music, read a good story, tell a good story, draw and write, strum a guitar, see a film, have a conversation and a few laughs over a cup of coffee, hear my children sing, walk under a sky full of stars, float in the Gulf until the sun burns red through my closed eyelids.

So in the end, I guess, I still know what I want.

Peace.

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(This is my Undercurrents column for PanamaCity.com and The News Herald this week.)