Happy birthday, j

Dear Js,

So… I finally have something to start this letter with, because I almost killed you again. Let me tell you what happened. I’ll describe it almost exactly as I told mama after we made it back home, covered with mud and stinky with pond water. As I was telling mama the story in the kitchen, you watched me with big eyes and giggled as you relived the moment we almost got into deep trouble. Literally.

It started when mama suggested we go on a bike trail that you guys went on a few days ago. You guys went with Aunty L and her baby, so how bad could it be? Cool, you were restless and looking forward to riding your bike that day, so off we went. I borrowed your scooter because I wasn’t going to run that far. The streets were annoying but once we got to the bike trail it was smooth sailing right along a creek.

Then we got to the end, where we were supposed to turn right to go home. You said, “Come dad this way.” But I said hang on there little squirt. Daddy’s here now. How about we keep going. “But I don’t know where this goes.” That’s okay, I’m a grownup, and I have a phone. If we go too far, we can just turn around. And if we get lost, I have my phone to call mama or find our way back. You said, “Okay.”

So we kept going… under bridges and through tunnels. Then back up and under bridges and back up again. The first downhill into the tunnel was scary, because I was almost sure you were going to wipe. Sure you had your helmet, but it didn’t cover your face, elbows or knees. I yelled, “Keep your wheel straight! Hold on tight to your handlebars!” Because not doing those things was exactly how I got a couple stitches on my chin when I went downhill for the first time. I think you learned how to use your brakes a day or two ago so you were okay.

You didn’t fall. And then I was sure we were okay. In the 2nd or 3rd tunnels, you were trying to race as fast as you could down the slope so you could climb back up the hill on the other side. You never quite made it all the way, so I always pushed you the rest of the way up the slow. But as soon as you got near the flats, you’d say, “DADDY Stop! I can do it by myself!”

Eventually the bike trail ended. You were ready to turn around. But I said look here… there’s a rocky trail. And there are 2 people walking on it. And look over there, a pond. Let’s check it out. I’ll carry your bike so you can walk. We hopped off the trail toward the pond.

As we got closer to the water, the ground got squishier. “Daddy is this ice? Why is the ground squishy?” I said maybe because there’s water under the ground. In hindsight, that was probably a good reason to turn back.

So as we kept going, my feet started to sink deeper. Hmm. I looked at my hands. I thought maybe it wasn’t such a good idea to be carrying this bicycle and scooter. So I looked for a hard place to set them down. I was trying hard to find a clean place, because you had your toy dog Hydrant in the front basket. I kept trying to lay the bike down in a way that Hydrant wouldn’t get dirty, when…

“HELP HELP HELP DADDY HELP HELP HELP DADDY HELP HELP HELP HELP!!!!”

I looked behind me and you had walked toward the water. You were in a half-split and up to your ankles in mud. I dropped the bike and scooter and shouted, “DON’T MOVE. I’m coming.” I ran to you. The closer I got, the deeper my feet sank. By the time I reached you I was down to my knees and you were crying. “DADDY CARRY! HUG! HUG!” I couldn’t do that or we’d both sink deeper. At least I was still thinking clearly enough to be logical. So I tried to calm you down and explain it to you. You didn’t stop crying but you stopped asking me to carry you. I said don’t worry, I’m here, I’m going to get you out.

Is this quicksand? At first my mind flashed to the worst-case scenario where we’d all get real dirty trying to get out. But I re-evaluated and I thought I’d try to give the obvious way a shot first. I stopped about 3 feet from you because I didn’t want to sink deeper. I grabbed you and lifted you up. I tried to do it slowly at first, so you didn’t lose your shoe or sink me in deeper. But it wasn’t working. So I just yanked you out with a SCHLOP and I sank deeper with a SQISH and I put you behind me on firmer ground. You were still crying and looked at me for a hug. I pointed and said “I can’t hug you right now, we’ll both sink. Don’t worry, I’ll hug you soon. Walk back there, I’m going to get your shoe.” I reached for your shoe and it slipped. The mud sucked it down deeper and the mud bubbled. I thought “Shit, this could have been very very bad. We gotta get out of here.” I pulled again less gently and it came out looking like a ball of black goo. Then I waded very gently back through the warm mud and hoped my shoes stayed on. Thank god I was wearing my Altra Adams (which were strapped on) and not my Sanuks, which I thought of wearing first.

I shooed you back to the grass where I left the bike and scooter. I looked at you and you looked at me. My legs were black up to my knee and we stank like swamp. As far as I could tell we were out of danger. So next on my to-do list was getting clean enough to give you a hug and get back home. You calmed down a little but you were still crying. “DADDY! YOU TOOK ME TO THE WRONG PLACE! Please don’t take me here next time!” Screw being clean, I gave you a hug. We got muddy. Then I said come over here, follow me, let’s try to get cleaned up a little. I took you across the grass to a smaller pond, where the weeds grew to the water so the ground was firmer.

I said I’m going to wash my legs. You said, “But the water is dirty.” I said I know, but I’m dirtier. I tried to make you feel better and said, Look at me, my legs are all black! You laughed. I squeezed the mud off my legs and into the pond and said, “See, I’m so dirty I even made the dirty water dirty.” It turned black. I rinsed your shoe off as best I could and tossed it on the grass. You said, “Daddy, I forgot to tell you something. If my shoes get wet, the lights will not blink anymore.” Geez. OK. It’s a little late for that now. When I got the black off my hands I said come, lean over the water so we can rinse the mud off your hands. You weren’t too sure about trusting my idea, considering recent events. But you were happy to get the mud off. I said make sure not to touch your mouth or your face — your hands have no mud but they’re still dirty. “Okay,” you said, “Daddy, I want a snack.”

Oh well, I guess this place is as good as any. We won’t get clean anytime soon and it’d take a while to get back out of here. So I gave you a crispy rice roll. It was something you could eat from the bag without touching it with your hands. Thank goodness I brought a backpack and for mama for packing us water and snacks. After our snack, we drank water and I rinsed your hands a little with clean water. I asked if you felt better. You thought about it for a while and then said, “Ya…”

I wasn’t sure how we were going to get back. We were 20-30 minutes from home. I was expecting the worst: I thought you were gonna throw a tantrum and ask me to carry you all the way back. But the opposite happened. It was as if since you got so dirty, you knew you coudln’t possibly get dirtier so nothing bothered you anymore. I said your shoe was wet but you said “I want to put it back on.” You stomped on the thick grass and you smashed through the tall woody branches. You were a trooper. Out of nowhere you shouted, “That was a nice adventure!” I said yup, we’ll have a nice story to tell mama. Then you started wondering things like “If j was here, would she sink too?” I said I don’t know. You sank to your ankles. I was heavier than you, and I sank to my knees. Since j is lighter than you, maybe she wouldn’t sink at all. “What about mama?” you asked.

We kept cruising back and we started talking about other things. “Daddy, if I had a son, I will tell him what happened to us. If he gets stuck I will help him.” Then we moved onto a discussion where I believe you had to resolve your first dilemma. Here’s what I mean. With all your decisions in your life up to that point, it’s either A or B. And most of the time, both A and B are either something you like or is good for you. But, you’ve never had to make a choice that first gets you in a bad position, in order to reach a good position. I mean even kids’ medicine tastes like candy.

It came up when I said, “J, this time I was there, so I could help you.” “Why?” “Because I’m your dad, and I will always take care of you.” “If I have a son, I will take care of him too. I- I- I- will show him how what happened to me.” “OK, that’s great. But J, I’m trying to tell you something important. Next time, if you ever get stuck like that again and I am not there to help you, this is how you get out: You flop your body on top of the mud like an alligator, and you slide and scoot along the surface. If you stand with your feet, you will sink. But if you are flat on the top, you will not sink.”

“But daddy, then I will be dirty.” OK look, when you called for me to help, I was on the side and I was clean. After I came to you, did you see my legs were black with mud? I had to get dirty to help you get out. Would you like it if I didn’t want to get dirty? “No.” OK, SO… sometimes, if you are stuck, you have to make a decision. You can be clean and stuck, or you can get dirty and get out and go home. You can always get clean later. “I will get dirty and go home.”

Then you said, “This is the last tunnel!” I wasn’t sure it was, but apparently you counted all the bridges we passed.

When we got home mama was happy to see us. But that was until the swamp stench hit her and she screamed and carried you all the way from the door to the bathtub. She said she had to scrub you many times because the black and stink were soaked into your skin. Meanwhile I stayed outside, washing and rewashing and washing and rewashing our shoes to get the swamp out of them. Then I hung them and hoped that your shoes still blinked after it got dry.

Copywriting style tip. I just learned this from Drayton Bird, when he was reading and commenting through John Caples’s Tested Advertising Methods (The best advertising book I’ve bought, along with Scientific Advertising. Get only the 4th edition. All editions after are garbage.) Anyway, the tip is to write to the reader as if it’s happening right now. Not future tense or past tense. Write as if it’s actually happening right now. E.g. instead of saying “Try a sip of Magic Tea after a long day. You will instantly feel more relaxed”… say… “After a long day, you sip some Magic Tea. You instantly feel more relaxed.”

I know my example is baloney. But I’m trying to help you get a sense of how differently the two versions feel, just by the difference in style. In the first case, it hasn’t happened yet, and you’re not even sure if you want it to happen to you. We hate change, so asking someone to imagine a different scenario is hard work. But in second version, you just toss the reader in there. Whether you like it or not, you have already drunk the Magic Tea and goddammnit you are relaxed. You might resist the Magic Tea, but you might start to like the idea of feeling relaxed. And then loss aversion kicks in. By forcing the reader to feel the results, he/she now has to face the decision of giving up the happy feelings. Or to save from the anguish, your dear reader can buy the product and never have to give up the happy feelings.

It’s a subtle style I never noticed before. But now that I’ve discovered it, I’ll be trying to work this into all my writing. Man, the business of copywriting is a science, but creating it is quite an art… in a sense that it’s a fuzzy craft you can spend a lifetime learning and honing.

And now that I’m conscious of it, I’m starting to see it in some ads I study. Here’s an example of a real ad that uses this style. The intro reads:

Faster, faster, the years speed by — yet your work drags and your goal seems still so distant that despair grips your heart.
You ask yourself — “Will I ever get there? Or will I get there too late?” And you see yourself finally winning success, an old man trying to enjoy the rewards which only the younger man can fully appreciate.
You know what the next ten years are likely to be — barren years — drugery years, wrongly called experience years!
Business demands — and pays — trained men. But business leaves it to you whether you prepare yourself through long routine, or short cut with specialized training.

And another:

“Surely this could never happen to me,” you say — “that I should be sitting at the same desk — be doing the same work — for ten straight years!”
But wait a minute–
Exactly that same thing has happened to thousands upon thousands of men. It has probably happened to men right in the company you now are working for. And — unless you fit yourself for a better job — there is a very good chance that it may happen to you!
Unthinkable? That’s what J. N. Dixon of Columbus, Ohio, said to himself. Yet lack of training kept him slaving away at low wages for a long time.

Speaking of working on my craft, you know another important thing I forgot about recently? Story! People buy stories, not things. You gotta find the story in everything you sell. Ads without stories feel flat but the ones with a good story suck you in. And once you have the story, the Hook comes naturally. You know, maybe that’s why there’s so much for me to learn — I forget many things I learn, like a leaky bucket.

OK, last copywriting tip for today. It’s from John Carlton. I like that each of the top copywriters has his own style. They approach the craft differently, see things differently and therefore have different perspectives to teach and share. Here’s a shortcut formula he gave, that you can use to open your ad or hone an “elevator pitch”:

We help [specific_description_of_your_perfect_prospect]
achieve [some_kind_of_benefit] faster/cheaper/easier/better
even if [worst_case_scenario].

E.g.,
We help stay-at-home moms with an engineering bachelors/masters degree
re-enter the tech workforce or build a part-time income,
even if you don’t know how to code or have been away for up to 10 years.

What I’m working on. Trying to sell the damn thing. Now that Secret Campfire’s backend is mostly built — in a sense that I’m finally comfortable that the goods match the “hype” — I need to switch back to selling the damn thing.

One interesting thing I discovered: I’m so used to working from within my “coding” setup, that I found out it makes for a bad place to write. E.g., trying to write copy from a monospaced text editor makes me write logically. Great for efficiency but bad for creativity. It seizes up my writing muscles and turns off my emotions. Things went much smoother once I went back to good ol’ pen and paper. I could rage and rant and scratch the paper with satisfying fury. I gotta do something about my writing though. It hurts to write, I think faster than I can write and I can’t read what I wrote.

Anyway, here’s a comparison between the old landing page and the new one (from the notes above.) They’re initial drafts, so I know they look terrible. But I wanted to share with you how I fleshed out the “Magic vs Reality” hook, as well as my process. See how I also tried to throw in a “Demonstration” or “show the mechanism”.

I’m still trying to figure out how to inject more Flattery in there though. Good ads make you feel good.

My most satisfying purchase (of any kind) in a long long long time. Cold Steel Mini Tuff Lite. It’s a brilliant over-engineered blade at an affordable price. You usually can’t find good craftmanship at budget prices, especially in this age of outsourced manufacturing and cutting corners and things not made to last. But with this thing… it’s bulletproof quality and well-though-out in every area. I haven’t bought anything at ANY price range that gave me the same feeling — simple but ingenious design and indestructible. There’s a lot to like about this little thing. I love it as a knife, but it means so much more to me than that. Just carrying it around makes me feel good because it’s a reminder that there are still people who can get it “right”, and there are still people passionate and obsessed enough to make it right.
It’s rare when I use something that I have no gripes or things I wish could be done better. But with this product, everywhere I look for a flaw, I discover, “Nope, they got that covered too” and that gives me yet another reason to be impressed. Then it got me thinking… this could be a great product to sell by direct mail. There’s so much to rave about, that if I transcribed my ravings into a letter, I bet it could sell.

Children are surprisingly OK with death. For example, not too long ago, I warned you about crossing the street. I asked you, “Do you know what would happen?” You said, “I know I know I know… a car could hit me and there will be no more J.” Very matter-of-factly. I guess it makes sense. At your age, you’re still forming your view of the world, and if we tell you that’s how the world is, you learn it as if it’s just how things are. You get hit by a car, you die. What’s the big deal? So when did we grownups get so uncomfortable with the idea of death? I think it might because we all eventually discover that we live for quite a while. We live long enough to make memories, love people enough to miss them and learn that you might actually like this life enough to not want to say goodbye.” Time is what makes people and things precious.

Speaking of death… if everything goes well, the first one in our family to die will be Kimi. One night when she was under the covers with us, I realized that that’s probably how we’ll find her one morning — curled up in a ball of fur and dead next to our legs. I’ve had many dogs but I was never around when any of them got old so I don’t know how dogs die. But that reminded me of that time we came back from a vacation and Kimi wasn’t home because a friend was looking after her. We got used to her jumping and barking and clawing us. That as much of a pain in the ass she was, we actually felt sad to find a quiet house, and reminders of her scattered across the house like her hedgehog, her tiny tennis ball, her doggie bed, her bowls. So it made me think of our crazy hectic daily routine with you kids. All the annoying shouting and screaming and peeing. Sometimes you don’t realize how much something means to you until it’s not there anymore. Feelings come when routines stop. Like how one day I won’t have to walk a dog anymore. Or how one day you won’t want us to give you guys baths anymore. Or hugs. Or kisses.

The rewards of not being a lemming. I wondered why have my commutes gotten longer? Why is there a jam? At first I thought it was the weather or daylight savings time. But after a few years of this, it was clear that it wasn’t going to get better. Somehow the population must have increased in the last few years, because half my commute back home became congested and 15 minutes longer. So for a week or so, I made it a point to pay more attention to what could be causing the jam. Instead of getting mad or zoning out, I looked around. I looked at license plates to guess the age of the cars, I peeked at the drivers to see if I could get a sense of their age, education or occupation. Kind of like a poor man’s demographic sampling. What I could gather was that these people were middle class. And the route that was jammed up was going south and east, toward San Jose. As soon as I turned to 101N, the highway was free and clear. Not only that, the cars were newer and more expensive. Anything going North and West to affluent zip codes were jam-free. Anything going South and West was jammed up. My guess was that there must’ve been a huge population swell in the South San Jose or Eastish cities, maybe pushed there by the hike in housing prices in the peninsula.

The next day, I wanted to test my hypothesis. I picked a route that would not be used by anyone going to the South or East. I tried to pick routes that went north, toward the more expensive neighborhoods. It worked, and my commute was cut from 30-40 minutes down to 25 minutes. And it would be consistent even 5 years from now, because the more expensive neighborhoods are saturated and would not see much population increase. On the other hand, there was still lots of room for development in the south and east, and my guess is traffic would only get worse feeding those areas.

In the end, I’m glad I snapped out of my lemming trance after suffering in the jam for the last 2 years, and found a detour around the lemmings jam route. It just goes to show that it pays to go against the grain.

Religion is easy-mode parenting. I realized one day how much easier it would be to answer your questions if we were religious:
“Why?”
Because God is wonderful.
“Why?”
Because God is angry.
With religion, especially when you’re exhausted and annoyed, you can get tempted by the choice of using God to answer all the difficult questions. But thankfullly we are not religious. Because it’s hard when you have a choice. With us, we have no choice. We don’t have the luxury of explaining away anything using God. We have to give the difficult answers. The answers that could lead to more questions. The answers that we might later discover are wrong. Like how Pluto is now a planet again and how Brontosaurus is a dinosaur after all.

You almost drowned your sister. The shower door was misty so mama couldn’t see. Then she heard j choking. She ran to the tub and you were pouring water down her mouth. j gasped, “He was pouring water down my mouth!” Mama got so mad. She tossed you out. Anytime I see either of you hurt the other it hurts me so much. One because you’re hurt, two because I see you doing something hurtful, and three because I can’t kill you for hurting my children.

Mama thinks you might be bullied in school. Victims of bullying end up being bullies themselves after all. She says you’re kind of awkward sometimes. I say you sometimes shut down when you’re hurt. You don’t talk or react. Mama told me you got pushed at school. I wondered if I should be doing more with you, J, since you have so much pent-up energy. But you don’t often get to release it. I said to mama I think j’s an anchor, you’re ready for many things but she’s not. E.g., riding bike, martial arts. Mama got worked up and replied, maybe we need to split up then. Maybe every now and then I should take you J and do some father-son stuff and mama do some mama-daughter stuff. (Which, by the way, is how we got into trouble in the opening story.)

Bullies & self-defense. I have struggled to think of how to introduce self-defense to you two. It’s tricky because I don’t want to teach violence or destruction. And at the same time it has to be simple enough that you can use it without thinking. I asked you about the boy who pushed you. You said you didn’t know what to do and you didn’t tell your teachers. So I tried to work it out with you.
Me: “Can you show me how he did it? Try to push me.”
You looked down and kept your hands to your side.
Me: “Did you push you from the front or back?”
J: “Back.”
Me: “Did you see it?”
J: “I kind of knew he was coming but I didn’t see it.”

Mama’s suggestion was:
1. Use your words and try to talk to him. Tell him you don’t like it and tell him to stop.
2. If that doesn’t work, talk to a grownup.
3. If that doesn’t work, push him back.

I said I know, let’s look at how animals protect themselves. How about a turtle? It has a hard shell. Can you pretend you’re a turtle?
J: “Like this?”
Me: Yes, that’s good, but try doing it without lying down. If you lie down you can’t move. You don’t have to lie down to make a hard shell. Here do like this.
I tucked my chin, shrugged my shoulders, rounded my back and put my hands in front of me. Then I said, “See. Now Show me your turtle shell!”
You smiled and flexed. I said now if you hear someone coming, or if you know someone will push you, make your turtle shell.

Then I said you can also run like a rabbit. If you hear someone coming or about to push you, you can move to the side, or run away. Mama roleplayed with me and pretended to push me and I sidestepped. You got excited and said, “I can also climb up the play structure!”

So we’ll see if they stick. Turtle shell and Rabbit. I didn’t want you to freeze and just take it. So I kept trying to drill into your head: “Always protect yourself.”

The next day, you said, “Andrew didn’t push me anymore.”
Me: “OK. But remember, if anyone…”
J: “I know dad! Turtle shell and rabbit!”

Mother’s Day glue. You guys tried to make gift in the morning. But you put glue all over your sister instead. Mama was mad because you put it on her face near her eyes, in her hands, feet and hair. She had to give her a shower.

Interesting developments

We were out playing in the courtyard when Aunty L said, “WHY IS HER FACE SWOLLEN?” We rushed to urgent care just in case. Doctor suspected infected lymph nodes. We gave you some antibiotics. Later at night, mama looked it up and it seems you could have mumps instead. You did get your MMR vaccine 10 days ago and one of the Ms stands for Mumps. Also, 10 days fits the incubation period. We’re going to our pediatrician tomorrow for a second opinion. OK update from pediatrician. We don’t know what it is but based on all the data, she doesn’t suspect mumps or lymph node infection. All we know is it’s getting better.

j: you’re starting to memorize books. J did this when he was starting to read. What you’d do is you’d pick books you like, usually with a predictable and simple rhythm and simple words. You’d make me read the book. Then “Again.” And “Again.” Then you’d skip to “That page.” Or “The page with the ___”. And after a few more “Agains”, you’d push it away and be done with it. Mama said that another thing you two have been doing is read books together without the book. Like at potty time, J will “read” one page, j will say another, and finish a whole story like that with no book.

New pets. Their names are Hydrant the firedog dalmatian and Hello Kitty the cat. You take Hydrant everywhere and you do everything with him. You walk him like Kimi and ride with him in your bike and sleep with him. You even took him to the potty with you and peed on him.

Update from Mama: “Achievements unlocked:
“1. Riding his bike home from the park!
2. Smashing his balls on the bike because he was trying to use it as a balance bike while not sitting on the seat and thought hitting me on the back of my feet was a good idea….
He was sitting on the bar. Like he does some times on the balance bike. With the difference that the balance bike’s bar is at a steeper angle so it doesn’t really reach his bits. Once he crashed into me (on purpose mind you, I had already warned him against it) his balls hit the bar. He started crying and holding himself. Telling me that I hurt him *smh*. I held him, explained what happened and he slowly calmed down. We talked, he mounted back up and pedaled a long way home since he purposely went around an extra block :).”

j: One night you cried, “ME VULVA ITCHY.” For days mama didn’t believe her but that night you said, “Mosquito bit my vulva!” Took you to the doctor and it turned out to be vulvovaginitis, like mama suspected. Dr suggested baking soda baths and watch for symptoms of UTI. We were surprised you could tell us that at 1 year old.

When you turned two, we took you to the zoo for your birthday. You got in for free because we pretended you weren’t two yet.

J in the backseat of car: “Why can you not turn z upside down?”
Z has no upside down.

Swim class progress: j you’re now swimming with a pool noodle. You bend it into a u and rest on it with your arms. You even put your face in the water. Mama heard you say, “I’m swimming to daddy. I swim away to daddy” before you swam away.

One day, coming back home from school, j shouted, “SCORPION! MAMA SCORPION IN MY CAR SEAT! I DON’T LIKE IT! GET IT OUT!” You were freaking out in the middle of 101 and mama had to cross 3 lanes to pull over. Mama texted me later: “I took an exit, got out at the first chance. It was a scorpion sticker FML! On the way to pick food up because I can’t even…”

Passing notes through the school mailbox
Zoe letter.
Me: Now I wonder what he’s been writing her
Mama: I know!! Love letter?? Most likely drawings of anomalocaris lol.

1st novel “He finally took a break after reading through 4 chapters. We stopped at 61/220 pages. j is still napping :)”

Curious convos

Mama took you bra shopping
j: When I get older, I will buy them too.
Mama: Er… I don’t think you’ll need them for a while.
j: I will ask Daddy to take me!
Mama: I don’t think Daddy will be much help there
j: I will go by myself!
All the other ladies in the changing room had a good laugh.
Mama: Do you like this color or this color?
j: That one.
Mama: How about this one?
j: Uh… I dunnoooooooooo.
You went from hating shopping to loving it. You girls had a great time.

J: Sometimes when I’m in my dreams I see things floating away but I cannot get them because I’m in my dreams!

Mama: Kimi, I’ll kill you!
J looked up at mama with tears bubbling under his eyes: “But… mama… but… but… I LoVEe KiMi!”

Walking at park with you js while mama was at group:
j: “What he wearing?”
Me: “He’s wearing shorts”
j: “Like me wearing longs. These are my longs.”

Mama emailed me this:
Mama to j: “j I love you!”
j: * whispers* “I love daddy!”
j: “I was loving daddy!”
Mama: …….

J: Mama, you know… you’re not as fat as you used to be.
Mama: Gee… thanks.
J (later): Mama, I like you because you’re squishy like a pillow.

j impressed Mama with correct use of the word “protect”
j: “There sand I need to protect my eyes.”

j: “Mama, go to the store, do some squats and buy me cheesy bunnies!”
Mama: ????

A text from Mama at the school fair. She was there early and I was to meet up with you guys later.
Mama: “j peed on me lol”
A teacher later let her borrow her shirt, which wasn’t long enough to cover mama’s belly. Mama said “I’m too old to be wearing this style.” Fortunately she had a sweater which she kept zipped up.

j at auntie L’s house, all of a sudden, very loudly: “I will send you to Purco Rita EVER! Me send meself to Purco Rita EVER!”

j: “I will send you to Puerto Rico forever”
J: “No I will send you to daddy’s car!”
j: “Yaaaaaay! I will sit in the back. Daddy will sit in the front. Daddy will belt me so I’m safe…”

This week in pictures

We’ve been going to the park while mama goes to group every other Tuesday morning.

I let you take us new places each time. This is a new adventure we found.

With the sun setting later, we’ve been biking/scootering almost every evening before dinner

Bike crash because you were trying to show off to the camera

Kids: sweet can turn sour quickly

You made up after

Orbiting bicycle

Ploop

Happy Hollow bridge

Hans Zimmer

A day in Santa Cruz

You didn’t want to make the plane go up/down at first but then curiosity got the better of you.

Balance bike. Learning takes time when everything is interesting.

Bonus: end of school year pix.. Your teachers sent us your progress pictures for the year. There were too many of them so I’m just going to link you the best ones. Weaving threads. Solving a puzzle. Practicing writing. Painting. Cutting. Painting in dino hat. More painting. Your crew. Your favorite activity. In the rope structure. Tractor. Paper airplane. Your crew again. Some of them are older so we don’t know how you’ll take it when they leave before you do. They invited you to join their game and you did. You love it whenever they bring out this ball run. Top of the rope structure. j loves the bubble beaters. Trains. Sharing with your class. Another game with your crew. You drew our family. Abu says you think mama’s the parent because she’s the biggest. But somehow I’m the same size as you and j so you don’t think of me as a parent. Hmm. Your self-portrait. Abu says it’s good that you filled the whole page. Your Anomalocaris craze. Before/after cutting skill improvement. Brother and sister.

Interesting things

Since John D. MacDonald mentioned Herb Caen in his San Francisco rant, I looked up and found his essays. He received a special Pulitzer prize for “extraordinary and continuing contribution as a voice and conscience of San Francisco.”

Kung Fury – an indie movie that got $600K funding on Kickstarter, a music video with David HasselHoff, 8 million views on Youtube less than a week after release, a couple of movie offers and, consequently, a full-length film in the works.

Cheeky gibbon.
Treasure hunters who used probability theory to make their treasure map.

Everything is a remix. Market match is the key. No one knows or cares about you until they feel this is “just for me.”

Abe Lincoln is in the wrestling hall of fame, and is the only president with a patent.

I’m learning jazz. It’s so much easier today than back when I tried, now that we have YouTube.

What I’m reading

I’ve jumped back into John D. MacDonald’s Travis McGee series. The book I’m reading now is The Quick Red Fox. He never ceases to amaze me with how unintimidating and seductive his style is. Every now and then, I think, “Damn, that was good.” But his style is so easy-going that within a few seconds, I’ve forgotten about his writing again and I’m sucked back into the story. I think that’s the mark of a great writer, or actor, or artist. Good artists are invisible — they don’t call attention to themselves — they suck you into their work.

Here’s an example from the first chapter:

Into the resonant blare of the music came the frail overpowered bing-bong of my bell. I have a button board affixed to a dock post, and a chain across the dock end of my small gangplank.
I got up and went and took a look. It was a tall girl out there, a tall girl in a severe dark suit, with a purse that managed to give the same impression as a brief case. She stood erect, pretending there was no wind at all. She looked as if she might be going around enrolling people in a business school. As I peered out at her, she punched the button again. There was no hesitancy about her.

(Emphasis mine — highlighting a very clever use of weather to paint contrast. This was a technique used by great directors like Akira Kurosawa.)

Another example:

Within another three steps, Miss Holtzer had tucked the escaping loose ends of personality back into her executive secretary shell. I had a memory of how pleasure in the mouse had brought her alive, younger and surprisingly more vivid. But it was not in her manner or habit to give anything away. She would do her job, reserved, armored, efficient. She was not being paid to react to people, nor to show her own reactions, if any.

(Again, I bolded to show how he used picture words to build a concrete picture of her personality. “Escaping, loose ends.”)

It’s not refined prose, but it’s sure easy to read and entertaining.

Update: I’m done! Good book and I liked the way he closed the story, especially with the relationships. I also liked his comments about how San Francisco has changed throughout the years…

San Francisco is the most depressing city in America. The come-latelys might not think so. They may be enchanted by the steep streets up Nob and Russian and Telegraph, by the sea mystery of the Bridge over to redwood country on a foggy night, by the urban compartmentalization of Chinese, Spanish, Greek, Japanese, by the smartness of the women and the city’s iron clutch on culture. It might look just fine to the new ones.
But there are too many of us who used to love her. She was like a wild classy kook of a gal, one of those rain-walkers, laughing gray eyes, tousle of dark hair — sea misty, a lithe and lively lady, who could laugh at you or with you, and at herself when needs be. A sayer of strange and lovely things. A girl to be in love with, with love like a heady magic.
But she had lost it, boy. She used to give it away, and now she sells it to the tourists. She imitates herself. Her figure has thickened. The things she says now are mechanical and memorized. She overcharges for cynical services.
Maybe if you are from Dayton or Amarillo or Wheeling or Scranton or Camden she can look like magic to you because you have not had a chance to see what a city can be. This one had her chance to go straight and she lost it somehow, and it has been downhill for her ever since. That’s why she is so depressing to those of us who knew her when. We all know what she could have been, and we all know the lousy choice she made. She has driven away the ones who loved her best. A few keep trying. Herb Caen. A few others. But the love words have a hollow tone these days.

Body update
I’m feeling much better after doing the Maxercist regularly, and doing more stretches. My hips and back are slowly opening up. One of your friends’ dad invited me to play squash. I said let me get back in shape first. So one day just for fun, while mama was pushing you two in the stroller, I followed behind, doing squash movement. Split steps, lunges, hops and steps. I was stiff at first, but what was surprising is that my knee greased up and my back and spine clicked back. I was like wow. Maybe all I need is to play squash again. Or at least do some sort of sport. I’m feeling stronger than I have all year, just because my body found a way to apply power again. Every now and then I’d notice it “fall out of alignment” but I can tease it back into proper form. I looked at myself in the mirror and the arch of my lumbar is back, my lungs are free and I can swivel my chest over my hips. It’s weird. I’m going to keep experimenting and I’ll report back next time.

Last thoughts

I am ashamed to admit this. But I’m gonna share it anyway because you might find this idea helpful for breaking bad habits. I recently discovered the name of a bad habit I have: dermatophagia. I bite the skin around my thumb when I’m thinking. It’s a negative feedback loop because after biting it the skin grows back hard and rough. So when I feel it I get the urge to bite the hard bits off again. What’s been helping me break the cycle is some micropore medical tape. It feels smooth so the trigger is gone and tape isn’t nice to bite. Just a few days and my thumb looks better, and surprisingly the urge has faded too!

Finally, always be careful whenever you start caring for what you don’t have more than what you do. That was just the thought I had when I was late for work one way, because you wanted to sit with me. We sat in the rocking chair because you were afraid of the vacuum cleaner. We rocked until mama was done. I was late but it was okay.

Love,

Dad

P.S. Happy Birthday!

P.P.S. Sigh. This took me over 1 month to write and it’s over 8K words. Sorry I keep putting it off and ending up with too much to tell you. It’s not easy finding the energy to put it together after feeling kicked in the balls at the end of each day. (j’s got the case of terrible twos – non stop screaming NOOOOoo! for hours and not sleeping.) So how it goes most of the time is I try to write something anyway, even if I feel like shit. And often these will be scattered notes or bullets and unfinished sentences. These scrawlings collect and build up until one magical day, I get fired up by something exciting I want to tell you, or the guilt gets unbearable and I decided to “just finish the damn thing” because it feels like a growing monkey on my back. And when I finally finish, like today, I can breathe a sigh of relief. That is, until my notes pile start to up again. Take care, write to you next time.