In Fear of Shark-Jumping

A week or two ago, after I wrote that hilarious blog about what my parenting book would look like, my son said, “I liked it, but that post was just like your one on helicopter parenting.”

“Well, your mother is a whore,” I responded – my typical response when I feel insulted. Because I saw a very clear distinction between those two posts, and I was totally offended that he didn’t get it.

But, God knows, there are only so many storylines before things start getting repetitive, and, including today’s post, this particular blog has had 170. That’s a lot. So I think it’s time to take a break.

I don’t know when I’ll start back up – maybe never, maybe under a different title – but it’s been an experience. I’ve had the chance to catalogue my trip through law school, most of my neuroses, the hilarious hijinks of my mom, dad, and son, turning forty, taking the bar, running a marathon, my love of grammar and books, my frustration with kids these days, and losing my dad.

Thanks for your support! Thanks to all of you who didn’t complain when you saw your name in a post. Thanks for those who managed to look past my liberal use of swear words. Thanks, especially to those who gave me encouragement along the way. Anything can be done once - trying to do it week after week is a little more challenging, so I have deeply appreciated your thumbs-up, shares, comments, and personal encouragement. Now go read a book.

Go Bucks, Part IV

Every year since starting this blog, I’ve done a post about the Buckeyes. To recap: I love my Bucks, I think most Buckeye fans are freaks, I can’t stand when people refer to a team that they are not part of as “we,” and I will NEVER forgive Jim Tressel. Okay, we’re caught up.

Anyway, my dad was the biggest Buckeye fan, despite the fact that he didn’t graduate from Ohio State. He didn’t finish college at all. But he considered his several quarters at TOSU as good enough to form an allegiance, and he was a lifelong Buckeye. This is the first football season that he’s not around to scout the games with me and do a post-game debrief. Well, technically, he’s not around, because he died in January, but I’m still having these weekly conversations with him.

For the next several years, I will still be able to have these conversations with my dad, because we’ve already talked about Braxton Miller, Jordan Hall, both Pittsburgh and Philly Brown, Ryan Shazier, Carlos Hyde, Kenny Guiton, Bradley Roby, and a host of other Buckeye players. In a few years, as new players start to roll onto the team, I won’t have his voice in my head, reminding me of where these kids played high school ball or their stats to date. My dad had an encyclopedic knowledge of the players. Aside from watching soap operas and the stock ticker on CNBC, he obsessively listened to talk radio, especially the call-in shows dedicated to the Buckeyes, and he remembered everything.

On my longest run before I completed a marathon in May – a grueling 20 miler in a biting wind where my friend and running partner, unbeknownst to both of us, had a temperature of 104 degrees – we ran out to the statue of Woody Hayes, gave it a tap, and asked Woody to guide the winds in a friendly way and help us through the rest of our run. (He was supremely unhelpful.) I have run out to that statue more times than I can count, because to me – to a lot of Buckeye fans – it IS where Woody is now. I mean, I know Woody is in heaven, but the spirit of Woody is in that statue. Likewise, I know my dad is in heaven, but his spirit is on the sidelines. Standing next to Woody, yelling for these kids to get up, to play together, to give it their all, in every play.

At my dad’s funeral, my brother told a story about how, when he was a little boy, he watched a Buckeye basketball game with my dad, probably for the Big 10 title. When the Bucks won, my dad grabbed my brother’s hands, and jumped up and down in pure joy, celebrating his Buckeyes’ victory. This year, that’s what I imagine doing with my dad after every Buckeye victory. Jumping up and down with him in joy and love for our Buckeyes. And yeah, there are tears running down my face as I celebrate, but they’re tears borne of so many memories of Saturday game days, Sunday debriefs, and anticipation of autumns and Buckeye football seasons to come.

Carmen Ohio, the most beautiful song in the world to any Buckeye fan, says the joy that lives in the heart of every Buckeye fan can only be stilled by death. I disagree. I know that death didn’t end my father’s love for the Buckeyes. I can feel it in every play, every down, and every toll of the victory bell. And every play, every down, and every toll of the victory bell gives me a chance to be with my father again. And now I understand that being a Buckeye fan isn’t just about these kids, and this team, and Woody, and the scarlet and gray. It’s about the memories that are passed down from generation to generation. Of cheering with family and friends, near and far, present and past, and those who live on in our hearts. Go Bucks.