My Random Keys

Mancubs 2014- Please do not reproduce

I love these guys.

I watched them have fun this afternoon with their church group, running around a gym doing flips, jumping into foam pits, swinging on large ropes and much more.  They had a good time, but I get a little more filled when I watch them having fun with each other. God I love them.

I am a lucky dad.

Through no fault of their own, they have learned to live successfully in two different houses for over half of their life.  I've seen that tear down kids in my classroom and my kids have resiliently avoided possible pitfalls. I will always hate that I played a part in my kids having two homes. I hate that I've not been in one house for most of their life, a place they can look back as 'home'.  I see these as negatives on my plate. Mancub1 reminds me that he likes having so many places that he has called home.  My kids have learned to find the positives when possible. I am so lucky.

God has blessed me.

I should be working on finishing one workshop and starting the second.  Both are this week. Both are not ready.  I sit down, finally, at start to work.  Coldplay's last album is playing in my ears and I'm sinking into the soft, deep memories of the Mancubs that are ever in my head.  Her giggles.  His efforts to be taller than me. Her bringing me the brush to fix her hair.  He playing video games with me.  Her fear of the distant train and us conquering it together. His bout of chicken pox turning into the creation of Fort Pox, a ceiling-high behemoth that we built together. Good memories and trying times.

God has blessed me.

The ADD is a curse. Relationships have created scars. There are other curses, but those things can always point to some remarkable gift or valuable lesson learned.  I will continue to persevere and push forward. One reason the positives rise to the top? The Mancubs.  I thank God every day for blessing me with those to awesome people.   The icing on the cake is that they know I love them. Of that, there has never been any doubt.

Now, about that workshop....

Sure, I wasn't a great student going through my school years. Not until I was teaching and making modifications for my students with ADD did spend time reflecting on why I didn't do well. I had a 'professional' spend time with me and was issued the golden ADD seal of distraction.  And since then, I've recognized parts of it all the time.

We've joked a lot about *SQUIRREL!* ... being a lot like the dog Doug in the movie Up.  You can be the most well-meaning, thoughtful, loyal person and totally lose face during the all-too-frequent 'Squirrel' moments of distraction.

For example, I started this post and was half-way through it when I hit 'Save as draft' so I could finish later. That was almost a month ago. I wasn't procrastinating or putting off, but instead got side tracked and moved on to other things. Not until today, ironically enough, did I find this started and work to finish it.

So how did the ghost of Squirrel rear it's ugly tail today? I'm writing this blog, because it needed to be done, instead of fixing a scout uniform, finishing the bills, mowing the yard, cleaning the 2nd floor, shopping for food for next week, riding my bike (for excercise), redesigning the Mancub pages, calling mom (she doesn't read this, so don't remind her that I haven't called lately), putting away the beach paraphernalia from last weekend, etc...  But it's good to be back on the blog.

Ha! Making that list reminded me of a blog I needed to bookmark, which drug me into Diigo, which led to....  I'm back again. So to Doug, I tip my hat. I'm off to the next task on my lis... ooo, Band of Brothers is on...