Driving The Kids To School

I got to drive the kids to school today. My wife's back has gotten better, but my job told me that I should take a couple of days to help her get around and do the stuff that she needs to do-- you know, like pee-- so I took those days off (my job is pretty cool). So I'm helping my wife today, and part of that is taking the boys to school.

My 9 year-old goes to school before 8 and my 13 year-old goes to a different school on the other side of town before 9. My wife figured out that driving the 9 year-old to school, then driving home, then driving the 13 year-old to school and then driving home again was something ridiculous like, oh, I don't remember... let's say it's 173 miles. It's a lot.

But something cool about it is that you get to spend one-on-one time with the boys, and that's something we don't get much of in our family of four + next door neighbor + cat - at dad's more than half the time (sometime I'll tell you why the joint custody isn't really a joint venture, but more of a Dad's-Being-A-Vindictive-And-Spiteful-Asshole-And-Hurting-The-Boys-In-The-Process venture). So driving the kids to school is really cool for everyone.

Today I got to hear about my 9 year-old's newest obsession: Warhammer 40,000. It's kinda a role-playing game, but not really. You make models of your armies-- their weapons, their vehicles, the little people themselves-- and they're all really intricate and detailed, and you can paint them if you want to or put decals on them, and then you "fight" another dude who's got another army. And you role dice to figure out blast radii of cannon shells and how far your men can move and who gets hit when you fire stuff. And the lovable geeks at the game shop gather on the weekends to play and we go and watch them and it's a lot of fun. And my 9 year-old loves it, so he's all about saving his money until he can buy just one more tank or Army Leader Dude from the Futuristic-Sounding Army Faction. So he told me about this new book that he's getting that tells him stats on another faction that he's thinking about playing. And he told me about how excited he is to get it. And he's all smiley and energetic and ready to face his day with a grin and a positive heart.

I take my 13 year-old to school and he's all about this computer that he found on Craig's List for $40 and how it's going to be his first computer and how it's going to totally revolutionize his life. I tell him that it might not be able to get on the Internet, and he doesn't care. I tell him that he won't be able to play video games on it, and he doesn't care. It's a computer and it's gonna be awesome! Somehow this little bit of electronic gadgetry which is over 11 years old is making him happy and he's excited and jumps out of the car, telling me that he loves me, and heads into school.

I like giving them the freedom to spend their money on whatever they like. I like seeing them happy when they figure out how to make it do what they want it to do. And even though I don't like seeing them unhappy when they run out of money, I like knowing that they're figuring out how to save it and work for it and they're doing it at a time when it's relatively safe to completely run out of money. I'd rather have them learn these lessons now rather than when they are on their own and run out of money and lose their home because they can't pay rent. That would be just like driving with your eyes closed. I totally made it fit at the end. I'm super cool like that.