Laid-Off Dad

The rules of extraction

Today was the last day that my kids will live in New York City. Tomorrow morning, the three of us will pile into my '99 Rolls-Canardly and head west for several consecutive hours. In fact, I think that once we get over the GWB, there will be exactly two turns, as we breathe in the great breadth of Pennsyltucky.

(Which I mean affectionately. I know not all Pennsyltuckians like being called Pennsyltuckians, and it might sound especially dick-ish from a New Jersey native like me. I think it's just a great word that's fun to say. And really, what other regions can conflate themselves like that? South Dabraska? Massachumpshire? I say, exult in your uniqueness! Texarkana is totally jealous.)

This morning hit me harder than I thought it would. I woke up with a tight chest, and I suddenly felt like taking the kids everywhere at once, to the Empire State Building and the Intrepid and the Staten Island Ferry, then maybe a nosh at Zabar's, then Wave Hill and Conservatory Water and Coney Island, and then to the East Village to get Giants logos tattooed on our clavicles. This will be a day you'll remember, my boys. The day your father showed you this wonderful, magical city that simmers in its own, special, summertime sauce.

(New tourism slogan: NYC is like a mole, in every interpretation of the term: it's a blind, dirty animal; a potentially cancerous bump on your cheek; a spicy, sweet, and savory gravy; and 6.0221415 × 10²³ molecules of amazement flubbering around in a confined space.)

Greetings from Inertia Week

This post is an experiment.

I'm not accustomed to trying to write anything when I've had about three hours of sleep, and my doddering, ancient A/C is about to emulate the Blues Brothers' cruiser, and my kids are 15 feet away having a Greco-Roman Wii-nybrook. (Say it with me: "WEENYBROOK!") They really have honed their skills of conjuring conflict out of anything. (That LEGO is MY LEGO and YOU TOUCHED IT!) They are alchemists of antagonism. They are antalchemists.

Worse, they are playing a game which very aptly translates to "Les Lapins Crétins" in French, and the constant aural affront, mostly in the form of screaming and trumpet blasts, is making my eye twitch.

I'm embarrassed to have bought this game, much less to let them play it, because from what I've seen it has all the redeeming value of a throatpunch. But after 2+ weeks at the shore, and an 11-hour drive looming on Monday, this is Inertia Week. I've promised to let the boys direct their daily flow. They're up for a pretty weird month as we all transition to Ann Arbor, and I think all this computer mayhem is actually calming them down. This somehow makes sense to me, but I admit in my current state my sense-o-meter ain't all it could be.

We have a new plan, since I still need to find housing in A2. So I'll spend the first 10 days of August out there, trying to convince right-thinking people that it's OK to rent to a freelance writer with intermittent cash flow. In fact, I've been telling potential landlords about my blog, just to show them what a charming (and solvent) person and doting father I am. (Hello, Potential Landlords! I swear I don't normally let my kids use video games to turn their brains to nougat.)

And while I'm doing that, I will be living at least part of the time (and very gratefully!) in my ex-in-laws' basement. Among the cats. Nocturnal, affectionate cats.

It's a lot for my exhausted brain to process, but I am planning on doing an August Blop to commemorate it. In the meantime, I spend lots of time looking at this picture, which was our morning view in New Hampshire: 

It reminds me that, one day, all this will be long over, and I will laugh myself to sleep in my hammock.

Zero visibility

Word is, it's hot. All over the land, tempers and tweets are pulsing while the US turns into an enormous kiln. But my family and I are removed from all that, eerily, by a persistent fog that keeps things cool, damp, and inscrutable.

The fog is extremely localized. Drive five miles north, and the sun shines balefully down. But here, everything is shrouded, and horizons are gone. We are not of this earth anymore, my child. We are Fog People, groping for landmarks, touchstones, any frame of reference. We are ensconced in the ether, with but a small weatheradio and three random TV channels--NBC, Qubo, and ion--to remind us that other people exist, and that America's Got A Severely Depleted Reservoir Of What Some Might Consider Talent.

We drove home from dinner last night and had to avoid a peacock that wouldn't move from the middle of the road. TwoBert has suddenly decided he likes avocado. The surrealism is unsettling.

About the only things I know about the next several weeks are these:

• I'm driving to New York (and its adorable little poo problem) on Sunday;
• I'm flying to BlogHer11 from Detroit on August 4;
• I'm visiting the Dad 2.0 Summit site on August 25;
• I have a writing deadline on September 1;
• I've signed an agreement to take up residence in Ann Arbor at some point; and
• TwoBert reallyreallyreally wants a snake for a pet. 

Other than that, I have no idea how the rest of the summer will pan out.

Right now, it feels like J.J. Abrams is writing my life. I hope he eventually ties up all these loose plot points.

A2

This post is a quickie, as the boys and I are picnicking outside the library, and as usual I'm at the mercy of 1) a fraternal fracas that could strike any second, and 2) a laptop battery with the life expectancy of a popsicle at the Equator.

Last week, Moxie and I finally struck a deal to move to Ann Arbor, MI, at the end of the month. Until then, the kids and I are traveling around New England as part of BeachQuest '11, while she's there looking for housing for both of us. It's not the most orthodox way to go about things, but I sort of gave up on orthodoxy years ago.

It's been noisy inside my head for the last few months, as BachelorMe and FatherMe debated our next move. BachelorMe loves New York and will stifle a sigh every time he sees familiar landmarks on Louie or 30 Rock. But FatherMe never really considered raising his kids as full-time New Yorkers, even before CoParentMe had an ex-wife who routinely broadcasts her hatred for the place. After we inked the addendum to our divorce agreement, all the ManyMe's finally shut up and I slept for 11 hours. We all needed it.

It's also helped that everyone I've talked to--every single everyone--says Ann Arbor is just a great place to raise kids. If you've let me bend your ear about A2 in the past, thank you. Your testimony has been more helpful than you could ever know.

We announced the decision over at WTFGU, and amid all the helpful commentary was a theory that we had been negotiating a way for us to live in two separate cities. For the record, that was the furthest thing from my mind. Despite the divorce, I will always think of the four of us as a U-shaped family, with two heads seeking their separate fortunes but conjoined by two boys who, when not developing innovative ways to hospitalize each other, delight me more than I ever thought possible. 

For example: Yesterday TwoBert conducted an experiment of singing to periwinkles, to see what music they'd respond to. Of the eight-gastropod focus group, three popped from their shells for Katy Perry's Firework, but a whopping four waggled during the Star Wars theme. Pleased with the result, the scientist transcribed his findings in his journal and then set about creating some superpower wristbands out of envelopes.

You think I'd ever agree to miss out on that? The popsicle has a better chance.