"Larry" Adams, "Moe" Jefferson, and "Curly" Washington?!?

Lora ambled over to my chair in the corner the other night to see what I was reading.

"I'm reading David McCullough's Pulitzer Prize-winning biography of John Adams," I replied.

(Actually, I told her I'm reading a book about a man named John who used to be president.)

"Is that him?" she asked, pointing to the cover.

"Yes, that's him. He was a really neat man."

"He looks like that guy in [hip, pricey, chain hamburger joint]," she said, pointing to Adams' hair.

"Huh?" I pondered, until I remembered the cardboard cutout standing in the entrance to [hip, pricey, chain hamburger joint].

Lora saw John Adams and thought Larry from the Three Stooges.

Boy, I have a lot of work to do.

No wonder Ralph Kramden was a grouch

Is there any lonelier job than driving a bus in Birmingham?

I saw a Greyhound bus on 280 today heading into town. There was one passenger on board. One. She was a middle-aged African-American woman wearing a red hat. She sat three rows behind the driver on his side of the bus, staring straight ahead as he did.

I wonder where she came from. How does it feel to be the only passenger on a bus leaving town? Are you thinking Those fools can stay there if they want but I'm getting out while the gettin's good or are you thinking How come nobody else is leaving?

I wonder where she was going. How does it feel to be the only passenger on a bus arriving in town? Are you excited to be ahead of the crowd, with the opportunities to yourself at your first-come, first-served feet? Or are you questioning your judgment, wondering if you missed the Welcome to Nowheresville sign at the city limits?

How does it feel to be the driver of a one-passenger bus? Gotta be some weird economic indicator karma going on there. This chick's fare won't buy the diesel fuel for this trip, much less pay my salary. What kinda two-bit outfit have I hooked up with? It just ain't cool tooling in a big ole bus like this with only one passenger.

He probably doesn't know it, being an out-of-town Greyhound driver, but it could be worse. He could be driving a MAX bus down 280. They never have any passengers.

What a difference a week makes

Tonight I was sitting in my chair in a quiet corner, watching the wind blow the pansies in the window boxes, a little jazz on the radio, a bowl of popcorn in my lap. Evan was checking his e-mail, staring intently at the monitor, the click of the keyboard barely audible over Duke Ellington. Lora wandered into the room to tell me about her very first big-girl choir practice. Then she said, "Can I go to sleep on your shoulder?" So I set aside my popcorn bowl, lay my head back as she crawled into my lap, and in three minutes she was sound asleep.

What a difference a week makes.

Last Wednesday, Joan and I had an important dinner meeting to attend. A minute and a half before we were to walk out the door, I noticed some peanut butter on Lora's shirt. I took her to her room to change it, but nothing I picked out would do. Nothing. A wardrobe malfunction with a four-year-old. I finally picked a shirt for her and made her put it on. She followed me out of her room, protesting, and then she about-faced and came stomping back with a Raggedy Ann doll under each arm, both of which were as tall as she is. "I'm taking these with me," she declared, the air thick with self-appeasement.

"No, you're not," I replied. "They are too big. Find something smaller." To which I headed to the garage to open the car for Evan, who was uncharacteristically anxious to go somewhere since he had a friend waiting to meet him. I opened the garage door, cranked the chariot, and waited. No Joan. No Lora. Not even a Raggedy Ann.

Faced with the prospect of entering late a room full of people, I went back in the house looking for my wayward women. I didn't have to search very hard; I just followed the trail of wails. Lora ran past me into the garage and collapsed on the floor in an hysterical heap. I went to pick her up and she did something she had never done before. She screamed at me. Actually, "scream" is such an impotent word. It was one of those Darth Vader "I am your father" guttural groans that stabbed me right through the heart. I expected her head to start spinning round and round at any moment. I realized quickly that I had a struggle on my hands.

I picked her up and gave her the I'm-bigger-than-you speech as I put her in her car seat and tried to buckle the seatbelt. Mission accomplished without getting kicked anywhere important, I took my frustrations out on the car door, giving it a slam that rattled my teeth. I got behind the wheel, slammed the chariot into reverse, and began backing out of the driveway. And then I caught an earful from Evan.

Evan is a wonderful big brother. He has been wrapped around Lora's little finger since day one. He is eight years older than her and when she was a baby and we were trying to get her to go to sleep on her own, he would yell out from his bed, "Am I the only one that hears her crying?" and "Is nobody going to feed her? Are y'all just going to let her die?" He came to her rescue again tonight, wondering aloud if I was proud of myself and why I hadn't let her bring her dolls so we could have avoided this major scene.

So I transformed into a mode that surely was the catalyst for dueling back when black powder pistols were all the rage. I let him have it. I told him how wrong giving in to her would have been, for that night and for the future. I told him how hard I worked to provide a safe and secure home, insulated from the outside world as much as possible, and that I wouldn't stand for her disrespect. Nor his.

And then he got hysterical. About how he didn't feel safe and secure and how upset he was and that I didn't care. I coasted to a stop at the traffic signal at a major crossroads on the way to our destination with a carload of insane, irrational, emotional, and hysterical people, three minutes away from our meeting.

And it hit me. I was at a crossroads not just on the highway, but in my relationship with my kids and within my inner being. I was three minutes away from sending Lora off to childcare in a state of emotional upheaval, wreaking unknown havoc on herself and her caregivers. I was three minutes away from sending Evan off to find his friend and fend for himself for an hour and a half when not thirty seconds before he had declared his insecurity. I was three minutes away from dragging Joan and myself into a room full of people to discuss their Purpose Driven Lives, having painted on the happy family masks and pretending that our lives were conflict-free.

When the light changed, I asked the chariot occupants where they wanted to go for supper. Evan got more upset when he realized he wasn't going to meet his friend as planned, so I offered to go pick his friend up and take him with us. We popped into [local chain deli with the good salad bar], and within five minutes I had my family back. Lora was sharing her fruit cup with me, Evan and his friend were talking about the latest releases from Hollywood (that neither one will probably get to see).

When we got home, we had long talks with the kids individually. Lora understood the importance of obedience, and Evan talked through why the incident upset him so. And we healed a little bit.

And tonight, the click of the keyboard and Lora's drowsy hiccups on my shoulder bear testament that the healing has held up pretty well so far.

What a difference a week makes.

Splinter Removal

I performed one of the more dreaded duties of fatherhood today: splinter removal.

Lora came home from a friend's house yesterday and said she had a splinter but she wouldn't let me look at it. This evening I caught her favoring her middle finger, and I coaxed her out of a peek.

It was red and swollen, and it had to come out.

It was horizontal across the second joint palmside, parallel with the end of her finger. The wound had closed over; there was no accessible exit point. This was going to be bad. An excavation. Code-3 emergency. Certified personnel only.

To say I was merely worried is to understate the lack confidence I had in my excavation skills. I had a flashback to when Evan was just a little older than Lora is now. He had a splinter deep in the sole of his foot that he wouldn't let go of. Or, more accurately, wouldn't let anyone touch. It, too, had to come out, though, so into the floor we went, Joan holding him topside and me latched onto his ankle. Oh, the screaming. Shrill, hysterical, pterodactyl-level screaming. Whether I was actually touching him or the splinter or not. Once, a stray sigh of desperation wafted from my nostrils and brushed across the wound, starting the scream cycle over again from the first octave. I thought I would never get the splinter out of his foot and get his voice back down into a comfortable decibel level again. I was dreading a repeat situation with my little princess.

But it didn't happen. Oh, she cried. Ok, she wailed, a little. But she was not hysterical. I comforted her with my tone of voice and usual calmness, as I had done with Evan, but she responded much differently than he had. I know it hurt her, but she was a trooper. I have seldom been as relieved as I was when I made a desperation grab at the splinter and came out with it. A little soap here, a bandaid there, and something to drink, and my little smiley girl is back to normal.

God help me when her hurts get bigger.