An October roller coaster of emotions

This is a long post. Absurdly long. You don't have to read it. Really, you don't. I just had a lot to say, is all. If you want to read it, go ahead. I just felt I should warn you...


Bill Cosby began what is, for my money, one of his funniest stand-up comedy routines many years ago by saying, "I must tell you about my problems driving around San Francisco..."

Of course, there was nothing "must" about it. He wanted to tell you about those problems, and you wanted to listen because you knew it was going to be funny. Or at least you wanted to be nice to Bill, back when he seemed like a person to whom you should be nice.

In the same way, I must tell you about the emotionally exhausting ordeal that has been my October 2016 to this point. I don't "have" to tell you about it, but I want to tell you about it, and I thank you so much for listening. Or reading, I guess.

Sports, kids, and painful nutshots

If you're someone who indulges me on Facebook, you know that most of my posts these days have something to do with my kids' sports activities. The youngest three are all in the latter stages of their soccer seasons, and of course Jared, my 18-year-old, is also serving as the kicker for my beloved Wickliffe Blue Devils football team.

There are highs and lows when you're the parent of an athlete. You rejoice when they succeed, you agonize when they fall a little short, and you cry inside when they have a difficult time or seem to be losing their enjoyment of the sport, for whatever reason.

Jack, who is 10, is playing his first season of travel soccer. He's a defender, and his team is very good. Very, very good, actually. Jack has had periods when he plays every minute of every game, and other times when he sits the bench. This level of soccer is new to him, and while he has mostly adapted well, there are still things for him to learn. His coach, Arturo, is tough but fair. You earn your spot and you work to keep it. That's the way life goes, and I don't think 10 years old is too early to learn the lesson.

Melanie is a sophomore in high school, and statistically she has had a tougher time this year than she did as a freshman. She's a forward, so Mel measures herself by statistical output: Goals and assists. As of this writing she has one of each. Last season she had something like seven goals and two assists. The fact is, the talent level on her team has risen noticeably this year, and playing time is harder to come by. Again, you get it by earning it.

Virtually no soccer player I've coached or watched over the past 15 years works harder than Melanie. She's the soccer equivalent of a hockey grinder: Someone who goes out there and fights for loose balls, bangs bodies and plays physically when needed, and consistently puts her head down and does the dirty work in front of the goal. Those are the types of things that help teams win, even if they don't always show up on the stat sheet.

Mel is going through a crisis of faith these days. She's a bit disillusioned by her position in the team hierarchy, and she doesn't see much room for upward movement in the next two seasons. My advice to her is simple: Keep doing what you're doing. Work on every facet of your game: Ball control, first touches, decision making, speed, conditioning, etc. Be the hardest working player on the field. The rest will take care of itself.

Not a bad lesson there, eh?

And then there's my boy, Jared. He's one of two boys I have, of course, but for a long time before Jack came along, I simply referred to him as The Boy. And let me tell you, that boy is one busy dude these days.

He's a starting forward on the boys high school soccer team, and the team's second-leading scorer. He does the kicking thing in football, of course, and he also puts on his saxophone and plays (while still in his football uniform) at halftime on Friday nights. Every day is another practice or game, or a combination of all of the above.

He is nearing the end of a football career that began three years ago, but more importantly, of a soccer career that began when he was a fuzzy-headed, six-year-old kindergartner. That's how it is when you're a senior in high school: You do something for years and years and work so hard to get better at it, and then suddenly it's over. Unless you're one of the handful of people who go on to play at the collegiate level, you're done. Just like that. Done.

This realization is coming quickly for Jared. It will all hit him in 3-4 weeks when his fall activities end without the promise of a next year. Part of him will be relieved, I'm sure, as the grind of fall sports and band starts to wear on him noticeably after a while. But part of him will grieve, no doubt in that silent, I've-got-this, keep-it-to-yourself manner of Jared.

And if I'm being honest, I will grieve right along with him. I love watching him play. Just love it. I love watching all of my kids play, but you only get the Senior Experience once, and it has been wonderful. He plays some sort of key role in everything he does, and I couldn't be more proud of him.

But the rest of Jared's life is calling to him, urging him to move on from where he is now and to experience new adventures. I'm excited for him, but I'm going to be so sad when this all comes to a screeching halt in November.

Oh, but you know what I won't miss? Jared taking hard-hit soccer balls to his testicles. Seriously, this happens to him at least once a season. He'll be going about his business playing the game, and someone on the other team will inadvertently launch a rocket shot that will absolutely destroy his Man Region. Jared goes down, he gets tended to by a snickering coach or trainer, both teams on the field laugh while trying to seem like they're not, Jared gets up and hobbles off, and he comes back later in more or less decent shape.

This has happened so many times that I can't imagine watching him go through it again. Maybe it's just as well this soccer thing is about to end.

As for football? Well, Jared has settled into a nice routine every game of executing a series of pooch kickoffs and converting extra points. He had some trouble on the extra points earlier this season, but now he has rounded into form, and the team itself is 6-2 and on its way to its best record in 15+ years. And there may be playoff football in our future, which is stunning.

So I start thinking about whether Jared will be called on to decide one of those playoff games. He hasn't kicked a single field goal in three years of varsity football. Not one. Twice he has lined up to attempt field goal kicks, and both times they were blocked.

What if they send him out there to decide a game with a 35-yard field goal in the final seconds of the fourth quarter? Physically I know he can do it (easily, actually), but mentally, how will he handle it? How will I handle it, for crying out loud?

I'll tell you how I'll handle it: by fainting. Seriously, I'll just pass out on the spot. I'll never see whether the kick is successful or not, because I'll be laid out flat on the bleachers while everyone else is watching nervously.

I'm tough that way.

Saint Terry: The Savior of Our Lives

I am married, as it turns out, to one of the most amazing people on the planet. I've said this before, and if you know her then you know the truth of my words. She is a whirlwind of ability, empathy, laughter and grit. She keeps six of us going every day while maintaining a house that has somehow not fallen down around us in the 13 years we've lived there.

She is, in short, the most remarkable person I've ever met. By a longshot. No disrespect to you or me or anything, but we simply don't come close to her on the Awesomeness Scale.

Which is why her recent emotional struggles have come as a bit of a shock.

When I say "emotional struggles," I don't mean she's going nuts or anything. I just mean that even the mighty Terry has reached the limits of her endurance at a time of year when she is constantly being called on to drive a kid to practice, mend a band uniform, clean up a mess someone else has made, or tend to a very sick cat (more on that in a bit).

Some people can handle more than others. Terry's threshold for work and responsibility is high, but it is not infinite. And over the past several weeks, we've finally reached it.

Which is why I've been on the kids and on myself to step up our games. It never should have gotten to this point in the first place. The family, as a whole, allowed itself to grow entirely too dependent on Mom. That's not good for her, and it's certainly not good for them. You raise independent, resourceful adults by forcing them to be independent and resourceful kids.

We're working on it. Some are better than others, but I'm confident we'll all get there.

In the meantime, Mom has applied for a job for the first time in nearly 20 years. I won't get into the details here, but suffice it to say that she has an interview in a few days, and I know she'll do great. Because that's who she is. If and when she gets the position, even though it's only part time, we're all going to have to adjust and fend for ourselves a little bit more.

This is, by all accounts, a good thing.

Yeah, he was just a cat, but...

A few hours ago, before I had the chance sit down and eat my lunch as I type out this post, I took our cat Bert to the vet and had him euthanized.

That's the medical term they use for it, of course: "euthanized."

What it means, in reality, is that I allowed the doctor to inject a lethal substance into his veins that almost instantly ended the life of the beautiful mess that was Bert.

That phrase "beautiful mess" came from our friend Kelly Gabriel, and I love it. They are the two words that best encapsulate the Bert ethos.

My oldest daughter, Elissa, found Bert sick, cold and alone on Eddy Road one winter evening a few years ago. She called Terry, and they took this smelly, bedraggled creature home. A long bath, a warm bed and several bowls of cat food later, he joined our household as Cat #4 (there would later be five).

We don't know where Bert came from, but it was always clear that his ordeal had left him permanently shy of 100% health. He was fat, he walked with a limping waddle, and one eye appeared to be semi-functional, at best. But he was so, so lovable. He enjoyed being petted. He enjoyed being fed. He enjoyed sleeping in sunbeams.

And best of all, he seemed to enjoy being part of our family.

Not long ago, it became clear that something was wrong. First it was an infection in his mouth. Then it was clear he wasn't eating or drinking much. We quickly discovered that he couldn't eat or drink much, because something was wrong with his tongue. It stuck out sideways, and he couldn't coordinate it with his mouth and jaw to draw in needed food and water.

There was something neurological going on with Bert, though we honestly never paid the vast sums it would have taken to determine exactly what. A brain tumor? A stroke? Something else? Who knows? What was obvious was that Saint Terry, who made it her personal mission to care for Bert every day despite the fact that he couldn't clean himself and quickly became repulsive and smelly, couldn't hand feed this increasingly emaciated feline every day for the rest of his life.

And so the decision was made to put him down. I took him in because there was no way Terry should have had to do that herself. She had already done more than her fair share. The vet, Dr. Richman, was so incredibly kind and empathetic. It was almost as if it pained him more to put Bert to sleep than it did for us to agree to let it happen.

The process itself, if you haven't been through it, is quick and almost painless for the animal. Bert was gone before they even finished fully injecting him with whatever it is they use for this sort of thing. His eyes didn't close. They were just kind of half open. But the life that had been in them moments earlier was obviously gone. It was his body, but it wasn't Bert.

I teared up a little, and not just for Bert. My heart hurts for him, but it hurts even more for the people in my house who loved him. They're dealing with this in different ways, so if you're a praying person, I would appreciate it if you said a few words for them this week.

Which I know sounds silly to those who don't own pets. I realize he was just a cat, but to say that is to deny the reality that Bert was also a presence in our house. He was a personality with whom all of us dealt, just as surely as we deal with each other every day.

And now he's gone. And he's never coming back. The dynamic in our home changes just a little. Among the remaining four cats, it changes a lot.

Ginny, our little semi-kitten, loved Bert. She slept virtually on top of him, helped him clean himself, tagged along sometimes when he walked around the house, and clearly preferred spending time with him more than any of us. It was cute.

Then Bert got sick. And Ginny's tune changed quickly. She avoided Bert. Even hissed at him. A few times in the last week or two, I would see her sneak up on Bert to sniff him. She would get close and take in a good whiff, and quickly recoil.

But you can't blame her. This was nature at work. Pure instinct. Bert had the smell of death about him, and animals avoid death. It's how they're programmed. What had been a loving relationship, at least the way we saw it, quickly became avoidance. Fickle little Ginny moved on to Charlie as her cat buddy. Together I'm sure they'll continue terrorizing the white cats, brothers Fred and George.

And they'll do it without the help of Bert. I don't know how cats' memories work, but I wonder if there will always be a little bit of him in Ginny's mind. I wonder if she'll miss him. Maybe not.

We sure will.

In the end, an October to remember

I have a meeting to get to, so I need to finish lunch and stop typing. But I can't leave without mentioning my Cleveland Indians, who in a few hours will play for the right to advance to the World Series for the first time since 1997.

The year 2016 has been a magical ride for those of us who call ourselves Cleveland sports fans. We endured a comically long period of athletic ineptitude in this town that ended abruptly in one 10-day stretch this past June when the Lake Erie Monsters won the American Hockey League's Calder Cup, and their Quicken Loans Arena roommates the Cleveland Cavaliers captured their first NBA title shortly thereafter.

I had seen so much losing in my lifetime that you would think I would still be on Cloud Nine over these championships.

But in a very real way, I'm not.

And I'll be the first to admit the reason is silly and childish. I never fully embraced or celebrated either title because I wasn't here to see them. I was in Europe for both. When the Monsters won the Cup with a dramatic 1-0 Game 4 victory over Hershey, it was Terry and Jared who sat in our season ticket seats and rejoiced. I was in a hotel room in London on a business trip.

And when the Cavs completed their incredible comeback series win over the Golden State Warriors, I woke up to the news in Barcelona.

That wasn't how it was supposed to happen. It just wasn't. I was supposed to be there with Jared when the Monsters won, and I was supposed to be watching with Jared in our living room when the Cavs finished off the Warriors.

But I wasn't. Best laid plans and all that sort of thing, I suppose.

Again, I know this is stupid, and that I really should be happy for Terry and Jared that they got to witness what they did. I just struggle with it. My dumb little cross to bear.

Enter the 2016 Cleveland Indians.

The Indians were the first sports team with which I fell in love (a statement I realize makes almost no sense to someone who isn't a sports fan). Specifically, it was the 1979 Cleveland Indians. They were a mediocre team that won as much as they lost, finishing in their customary sixth place in the American League's East Division.

But they were my team. The first time I had ever had a "my team." I followed those guys every day in in the paper and on TV. Toby Harrah, Duane Kuiper, Andre Thornton, Bobby Bonds, Mike Hargrove, Wayne Garland. Names that mean almost nothing to most people now, but that meant a lot to me as a 10-year-old fan.

The Tribe has been to the World Series twice in my lifetime, losing in 1995 to the Atlanta Braves and (painfully, unbelievably) in 1997 to the Florida Marlins.

And now they're almost back. One more win and they play for the title, preferably against the Chicago Cubs because that sort of perennial loser vs. perennial loser story is too good for the journalist in me to pass up.

I've been staying up late to watch the Indians games with Jared and paying the price the next day in the form of bloodshot eyes and a stuffy nose. I need more rest, but I won't get it until the playoffs are over.

Hopefully they end with the Indians celebrating yet another Cleveland sports championship. As the guy said on TNT the moment the Cavs won their title, "Cleveland is a city of champions once again!" Unreal.

I want the Indians to win because I want the Indians to win, of course. But selfishly again, I want them to win so I can jump up and down with Jared and hug him and think of my dad and probably start crying.

I cry easily these days. I cry thinking about people who are gone (my dad, my sister), pets we've loved, my kids, my sports teams, etc. Only some of those things are truly worthy of tears, but there you have it.

I am, in the end, a nearly-47-year-old suburban father of five doing my best. And I realize my dad was much the same before me.

So it goes. So it has always gone. So it always will be.

Pet death pool: Which one of our animals will die next?

When you're a parent, the death of a pet is no small thing.

First and foremost, you're in charge of comforting your children and helping them understand that death is natural, that Fluffy had a good life, that yes we can eventually get another kitten, etc.

Then of course there's the problem of disposing of the carcass. This isn't a bad thing with goldfish or small rodents. It's quite another matter if you're talking a St. Barnard or a horse.

So while I enjoy the mini zoo we have in our house, it never escapes my notice that one by one, these animals will all eventually die. And when they do, the responsibility for handling their corpses will fall on me as the father. This is not always the case, of course, but I would say dads handle dead animal management to a greater degree than moms do.

So I constantly keep an unofficial Animal Dead Pool going in my head. At any given time, I try to have a pretty good idea of the overall health of every pet in the house so that I can be prepared when it's time for one of them to take the Eternal Dirt Nap and I'm tasked with finding them a suitable resting place.

Right now, I would classify our pets into three general categories. Here's the breakdown:

Probably Not Dying Any Time Soon

CHARLIE (CAT)

Charlie is a Lynx Point Siamese, and thus he has a pretty slight build. But it took him maybe three weeks of living in our house to establish himself as the alpha male. Thus, he rules the roost and is rarely bothered by the other cats. Charlie does what he wants when he wants, so there's no stress in his life. His only real peril is a penchant for escaping the house and spending the night outside, but he's tough enough to protect himself, so no worries there.

SERENDIPITY (HAMSTER)

You generally don't see hamsters placed into this category because they don't live that long, maybe three years on average. But this animal, which is actually a hairless "naked" hamster, is so secluded that I forget she exists. Chloe is her owner/mother, and she does a good job keeping her fed and cared for. Serendipity will be with us a good while longer, I dare say.

A Trip to the Vet Is Probably a Good Idea

FRED & GEORGE (CATS)

I lump these two together because they're brothers and they both suffer from the constant stress of trying to avoid Charlie and Bert, a good chunk of whose lives are spent tormenting Fred and George. Stress kills, man, and I'm sure it will shorten the lifespan of these two felines. Plus Fred is demonstrably overweight, so I'm sure there's some hardening of the arteries in there for him, as well.

LUCY (GUINEA PIG)

She always looks nervous to me, so I'm thinking stress is a risk factor for her, too. Plus, she's a long-haired guinea pig, and they tend not to live as long as their shorter-haired counterparts (usually about 5 years). I don't know how old Lucy is, but I just don't see it lasting, you know? She has that dull "It's OK If I Die, Really, I Don't Mind" look in her eyes.

PERCY (CHINCHILLA)

Chinchillas live a shockingly long time, at least to me. The figures vary, but domestic chinchillas can stick around anywhere from 10 to even 20 years. I was thinking/hoping our two would last half that long, but no such luck. Anyway, given that, you'd think I would put them both into the "Probably Not Dying Any Time Soon" category. But Percy's feedings are sometimes sporadic, and I'm afraid at some point we'll just forget about giving him food even though his cage is right there in the living room and he'll die. I hope not, but I wouldn't put it past us.

Get the Shovel Ready

BERT (CAT)

Bert is huge. He's a long-haired breed, which of course makes him look even bigger than he already is. But even if you shaved him, you would still be left with a lot of cat. Elissa and Terry rescued Bert from a busy street in the middle of winter a few years ago. He still has some effects from that experience, including what we can only assume was frostbite in his paws. That, plus his excess weight, plus the fact that he moves so slowly that sometimes it seems he's already dead = don't buy any green bananas, Bert.

ANDROMEDA (CHINCHILLA)

Again, chinchillas live a good while, but Andromeda doesn't seem like she's long for this world. She has, on multiple occasions, chewed through her cage and escaped, only to be found days later wandering around the house. One of these times she's going to get out and we'll never see her again. Or at least we'll never see her alive again. We'll certainly smell her once she starts to decompose somewhere in the hidden recesses of the basement. And then of course who will get the call to go down there, scoop her up and bury her in the backyard? That's right, everybody, it'll be Good Old Dad!

Cats vs Dogs - Let's Call It A Draw

I am neither a cat person nor a dog person. I'm a cog person. Or a dat person, if you prefer.

What I'm trying to say is, I like them both. I grew up with dogs, now I own cats. Four cats, to be exact. I thought we had capped the number at three, but a month or two ago, along came Bert.

Bert is an angry-looking gray cat that is actually about the sweetest little guy you'll ever hope to meet. He was rescued from near-death in a combined effort by Elissa, Terry and Chloe.

Elissa was driving near our house on a cold and snowy night when she saw this bedraggled cat sitting essentially in the middle of Eddy Road, which is one of those dark, narrow and hilly streets on which animals of all sorts are regularly run down.

Being Elissa, she stopped her car and got out to try and save the cat from being squashed by a Buick and/or from losing some key paws to frostbite. Scared by another passing car, the cat ran under Elissa's car and stayed there. Elissa called her mother to come and help, and Terry managed to get the cat out from under the car and safely back to our house, where he enjoyed warmth and abundant food for probably the first time in weeks.

As soon as he came home, I knew he was there to stay. Elissa had to go back to school, so Chloe immediately took charge of his care. The first thing she did was to dub the cat "Bert."

This caused a bit of a kerfuffle in the family partly because "Bert" is, by almost any standard, a strange name for a cat, but mostly because it's not a name that appears in the Harry Potter books.

The policy we've adopted in recent years is to name pets, particularly cats, after Harry Potter characters. And specifically members of the Weasley family. Our pre-existing cats − Fred, George and Charlie − all followed this useful convention.

But because Chloe devoted so much time and energy to nursing Bert back to health in his early days with us, the grudging consensus was that she should have naming rights. And so "Bert" it is.

Anyway, as I was saying, I don't count myself a member of either the dog camp or the cat camp. I just like animals in general, which is good in a house with four cats, two chinchillas, a guinea pig, a gecko lizard and a fish. Or at least I think we have a fish. There are pets that will live here for months at a time without my knowledge of their existence.

There are lots of reasons to love dogs. Off the top of my head:

- They're insanely loyal and devoted to you.
- They do tricks.
- They generally aim to please.
- They take care of their bodily functions outside.

That last point is key for me. I am the designated cat litter box cleaner in our house. I do this job every day. Every. Single. Day. Without fail. It's one of the first things I do when I get out of bed. And while not a particularly arduous job, I can never get away from it.

This is why I was the only one who raised any real objections to the idea of keeping Bert. His presence wasn't going to affect anyone else in the family like it would affect me. Needless to say, my opinions were officially registered for the record and summarily dismissed.

Still, I really have come to love cats over the years. They do, as a species, tend to believe they're superior to you in every way. But they're also much more affectionate than they're generally given credit for. And they're great for entertainment when they interact in little cat herds. There's always an alpha male who establishes himself as head cat honcho.

The title of alpha male is currently up for grabs among our cats. Before Bert, Charlie was the clear-cut Big Guy. He ruled the roost, and he did so in a comical way, keeping Fred and George on their toes by constantly jumping on them, biting them when they weren't looking, swatting at them as they passed by, etc.

Bert has submitted his application for the position, though. And Charlie is not happy about it. The two of them have fought a couple of times, but it has been pretty low-key. Almost like they're feeling each other out. Superior size and an "I don't sweat guys like you" attitude will probably mean Bert eventually comes away the victor.

Speaking of dominance, what I don't get is why dog owners and cat people feel the need to establish their choice as the "right" one. This is an ongoing, eternal battle in which everyone involved comes away looking a little...obsessed. And maybe a tad psychotic.

Can we just agree that whatever pet you choose to own (dog, cat, fish, elk, spider monkey, etc.), it does nothing to enhance or diminish your status as a good person and respectable citizen? Is that OK? Good. I'm glad that's settled. I was afraid you crazy dog people would be your usual weird, obstinate selves and mess the whole thing up.