I quit. I am hip deep in laundry. There are 17 more shoes than feet in our front hall—not pairs, just single shoes. There’s a kid I don’t know sleeping on the couch. There’s a dog I don’t know drinking out of my toilet. My fridge is loaded to the gills with old Chinese food and […]
Bull Garlington
Posted inBend Nest
Death By Children
Flying & Crying
I said it. I invoked Karma as a threat, as an epithet, as a balm for my dignity, wounded by glares and stares and unsolicited advice, whispered indignantly over crossed arms as an entire airport observed my children in full fury. As newbie parents we’d made a critical error. Thinking our family vacation flight would be […]
Posted inBend Nest
The Pencident
When I married my wife, I married her friends, too. In an instant, I became their mover, their lifter, and their Starbucks butler. Shortly after my son was born, my wife’s friend asked if WE would watch her children and her house while she and her husband jetted to the Caribbean to create another baby […]
Posted inBend Nest
Death by Children
Airport Santa is real
This is a true story. Normally, wild exaggeration is part of my job description. But not now. I’ve been sitting on this story since my daughter was 7, and now I’m finally comfortable telling the embarrassing, ridonculous, stupid truth: I believe in Santa Claus. We were headed out for the holidays. A young family, huddled […]
Posted inBend Nest
Death by Children
Itsy bitsy all consuming fear of spiders
My son is sasquatchian. His shoes are collections of remarkable biodiversity. Our doorways all have an arch worn into the lintel where his head knocks the wood away. When he was a baby, we called him bam bam for his chimp-like strength, which hasn’t waned in the least. He can palm a watermelon. He’s strong. […]
Posted inBend Nest
Humor: Death by Children
Birth of a Dadface
I want to talk to the fathers today. Especially the new guys. Hi. Welcome. I’m not a new guy. I’m an old guy. I come from a generation who saw the installation of colored teevees. Our morning cartoons were interrupted by Watergate. We’re grizzled and haggard and worn and we’re here to tell you something: you’re […]
