But, damn it is hard to make it happen. I have friends with kids that seem to be out all the time. I have no idea how they do it…sans kids.

Now, honestly, I was never a social butterfly. I worked all these amazing professional shows in Atlanta and maybe went to 2 opening nights in 7 years. One of them was a Disney show, so I hung out with Tim Rice and Elton John…ok, we were in the same room. But that really was it. I never felt the need to go out all the time.

My wife, on the other hand, has had a harder time assimilating to married with children. So we try, between work and our own obligations, to date.

But once we threw in a toddler, the dating has definitely slowed down…and the economic down turn…don’t get me started.

But tonight, after asking people all over north Alabama, we have a Baby Sitter. Now, this happens to be the best babysitting team ever…Sarah’s folks. So Sarah and I get to go see a local production of “Sweeny Todd” with a great cast and crew while the grand folks get to listen to Tony snore. Sounds like an even trade.

I hope they know how much we appreciate it.

Sarh had a show Sunday evening. Fabulous production of “The Merry Wives of Windsor”. She’s all grown up and doing Shakespeare. Anyway, it was a Jack weekend, so I took him home. Tony went with me, because of the afore mentioned obligations the talented Sarah Brown had.

We drove the 30 minutes without incident; sing songs and swapping tales of our opossum killing dog. Then, as we rounded the corner and Jack’s other house was in sight, Tony went nuts. He started screaming and reaching for his brother. Jack didn’t know how to act. It was heart breaking.

Tony cried for about 15 minutes after we dropped Jack off…I just said jack off…until I started sing “twinkle, twinkle”…over and over…He cheered up and the rest of the evening was realitivly normal.

Then, as I came in the house from work yesterday, I hear the following:

“Who is that…Is that daddy?” Sarah asked.

“Jack?”

“No it’s daddy…”

“”Jack? Jack?”

He was disappointed that it was me when he came around the corner. He looked up at me and pointed to the door behind me…”Jack?”

For real…I was not expecting this. I tried to find info online, but everything is based on a traditional sitting…older brother goes to school and younger brother is upset, but sees him in a few hours. Ours is different, but I can’t imagine unique.

What do I do? How do I make Tony understand what’s happening, or can I?

Jack and I took at trip to the Space and Rocket center here in Huntsville Al. I played hookey. It was awesome…until I had to go to work anyway.
But we really had a good time. I remember going to the center when I was in 9th grade with the folks. Little did I know I would live in Huntsville one day.

Yesterday I was in Trussville, AL at training. A fellow from Baltimore was showing off his lights made in Yonkers NY. After the training we all went to lunch. The guy from the area picked the restaurant. “Joel’s”

A quaint little buffet kinda place. It was packed. It was mostly a meat and 3 joint, but I could tell by the crowd it was a local favorite.

Well, we got our food and sit down. The food was really good.

But, that really not why I started this post. As we sit there, I noticed a grandfather and his 2 grandchildren sitting near us. The grandfather looked a little bemused and was trying to get the waitress’s attention.

“I never thought this would happen,” I heard him say.

The little girl, about 6 and read headed, had to go to the rest room. He had to take her, but couldn’t leave the 4 year old boy, also with bright red hair, alone.

“I’ll watch him while you’re gone,” the waitress said. And she did. The place was packed. Other wait staff was all over the place. She stayed right next to that little boy for about 5 minutes. Talking to him. Asking questions. At first, he looked like a deer in head lights. But by the end of the pee break, they were best friends.

It was pretty sweet.

So while she was preoccupied with the little brat, we skipped out on the check and left…stupid southerners.*

*I’m from the south. We didn’t skip out. And no animals were injured in the writing of this blog post…but I ate some chicken fried stake at “Joel’s”…

I have started noticing, however, that there is a huge lack of co-parenting within a married home. I think Sarah and I do pretty well. Last week really brought that into focus. Sarah was in Tech week for her show, Merry Wives of Windsor, and I was alone in the evenings with the Binja. He has a nighttime routine. Eat, play, eat, play some more, splasha splash, lotion, brush teeth, to bed. Not hard..Unless he poops in the tube, then eww…

Side note: our dishwasher has a sanitize setting and his bath toys fit nicely into the top rack.

Although we missed the momma, he was happily asleep when she got home.

I am just amazed at how the old school gender roles are still alive today. By alive I mean like a rotting zombie…or Jon and Kate’s marriage… And it’s not really a generational thing. A co-worker’s daughter, who is not old enough to drink, has a little one. The husband really has that stoneage opinion that the woman should do what the woman is built to do…whatever the hell that means. She can’t even go to sork and trust that hubby is going to pick up the little one from grammy’s. And what is he doing while she works? “Stuff”

Stuff…really? I do stuff all the time…with my children. My wife can rely on me. If she couldn’t, my “stuff” would get put up on the shelf and not used until she could rely on me. (Sex reference)

Anyway. I just think we need to re-evaluate gender roles in the parenting world. Men, learn to do everything child related. She’s going to find something better anyway, and leave you homeless with a kid, trying to get an internship with Dean Witter…I watched “Pursuit of Happiness” this weekend.

They had their first game Saturday. My folks came in. It was like 90 degrees at 4:30 when the game was to begin. We showed up and found shade for them to sit in.

The game started. We were home team. The team we were playing against had beaten the undefeated team that skunked us 12-0 a in the last game of the season. After they scored 5 runs on us in the first inning and we answered with 0, I was about ready to throw in the towel. Tony was tired and hot, so Sarah took him home.

Then, we held them in the second inning, but our middle of the rotation was coming up. Not the big hitters, but the pretty steady guys. Jack is one of them. The player before him doubled. Then jack hit one down the 3^rd base line. Now my son is fast…when he wants to be. The ball rolled to the fence. By the time someone got to it, he was rounding 2^nd and the other kid had scored. The ball was cut off at 2^nd base and he was around 3^rd. he crossed home as the ball was almost there, making an inside the park home run. Yeah Baby!

We scored another 2 runs that inning.

We take the outfield and the first batter strikes out. The 2^nd batter hits a fly to right field. Jack is there to make the out. The 3^rd out comes from a great catch at 3^rd base. Jack actually comes to bat again in this inning, with 2 on. He hits a double and gets 2 more rbi’s. He steals 3^rd. unfortunately the 3^rd base coach sends him at the wrong time to try to teal home, and he gets tagged out. Now it was a bad call cause the kid had the ball in his ungloved hand and tagged him with is glove…to the face…but I try not to argue with the ump… ol’ blindy as I like to call him.

We went on to win 10-8. That’s right, without my son’s slugging ability, the game would have been very different. And his defense.

It was a pretty awesome game. And he doesn’t want to play next year. Belch. I am of two minds. One, I don’t want to push him. Two, I do want him to play a sport that he shows aptitude in.

He quit swim team. I am making him pay me back. Next year baseball will be all kid pitch. No mercy rules of 3 walks and the coach pitches. You can lead off to steal. I think he would like it better…so what do I do? His mom wants him to play, especially since this would be his only summer sport.

Maybe it’s time to try theatre…Just saying.