Tonight I am grateful for the way Clara will grab hold of my the cheeks and pull me in for a kiss.
There will come a day when her kisses are decidedly less exuberant and significantly better aimed, and that will be a sad day indeed.
Yesterday I was grateful for poker, which I described as the perfect game.
Tonight I am grateful for golf, the almost perfect game. I played today thanks to a spat of unseasonably balmy temperatures, my first time on the links this year. I played well at times, poorly at others and finished with a score of 56, which stinks.
But still, it was golf. In March.
Like poker, golf is competition wrapped in a social milieu. Despite the ongoing battle for first place (or the more important battle to avoid last place), it is also time well spent with friends. It does not place nearly as many intellectual demands upon a player as poker does but adds a layer of physicality that poker does not possess.
It’s a magnificent game, and I would play everyday if I could.
Here’s the thing that keeps golf from being as perfect as poker:
At the poker table, anyone can win. An inexperienced, stupid player can make a series of good decisions, become uncharacteristically aggressive, or pick up on a tell and win the game. At the poker table, every player, regardless of skill or experience, is a legitimate and persistent threat to the best player at the table.
Golf is very different. I play golf with guys who are in many ways playing an entirely different game than me. They are hitting the ball so much farther and higher and with such greater precision that beating them is a near-impossibility.
While poker provides a relatively level playing field for all players, golf does not. Experience plays an enormous role.
And some guys are just better.
Still, I love the game, despite its imperfection. Thankfully, winning and losing does not matter as much in golf because it lacks the head-to-head combat of poker.
Simply put, you cannot play poker without an opponent.
This is not the case for golf. Opponents are not required to enjoy the game. In many ways, you play every round of golf by yourself while in the midst of three other people and then compare your scores at the end of the round to see who played alone best.
If given the choice, I prefer the cut-throat, head-to-head battles that poker provides, but golf is a close second.
Tonight I am grateful for poker. It is a perfect game. It creates an environment in which a group of players attempt to extract money from one another by utilizing intelligence, observation, intimidation, daring, creativity, histrionics, experience, bravery and coercion. Yet the game is played in a social setting amongst people who genuinely like one another. It creates a unique context in which I can spend time with friends, chatting and laughing, even as I take their money.
There really is no better game.
The fact that I made about $60 last night increases my level of gratitude considerably.
Tonight I am grateful that my wife is not the woman who was sitting behind me during last night’s Second City performance, failing to hear about a third of the punch lines and then asking her husband what they were after the fact.
I wanted to turn around and say:
Tonight I am grateful for my class of earnest, committed and genuinely talented writers. As part of their reward for completing two weeks of standardized testing, my class enjoyed a full day of Writer’s Workshop today. Nothing but writing, conferencing and the sharing of their work.
In total, the class spent about two full hours engaged in silent writing and another three hours conferencing and sharing, and every student without exception was fully engrossed in the process.
Every single one.
I honestly did not need to correct behavior once.
I could not have been more impressed.
We ended our day listening to a bunch of stories, poems and essays that were hilarious, original, suspenseful and even creepy at times. Quality stuff, some of which I could easily see published as YA fiction or picture books with some work.
It was honestly that good.
It was the kind of day that teachers only dream of, and it was all thanks to my committed class of talented writers.
Tonight I am grateful for the reappearance of Baby Cow.
Baby Cow is one of my daughter’s favorite little people toys, and she has been missing for almost two days. Clara doesn’t get terribly upset when a toy goes missing, but she speaks of its disappearance constantly and continually enlists us in the search for it.
I never expected a lost toy to create so much work for me.
Today Elysha found Baby Cow underneath the sofa.
I’m an idiot for not looking there first.
I saw this tweet by Amy MacKinnon (@AmyMacKinnon) today.
Lately, I'm finding it difficult to listen to the news. Then I think of how it must have been in the 1940s.
#perspective
It’s a fine point.
Tonight I am grateful that my brother, who reappeared from the dead a month ago, is still alive and well. Tonight he and a friend came to our home for dinner, the first time he has visited me in seven years.
I got to know my brother a little better tonight, and I liked what I discovered.
I’m hoping that this is the beginning of something that lasts.
My daughter freakin’ loves dinosaurs.
I don’t know if this is normal for little girls, but if it is, please don’t tell me. I’d like to think that it’s highly abnormal. And permanent. And special.
I’d like to think that my geeky, childhood love for dinosaurs has somehow rubbed off on my daughter or been genetically transferred to her in some unexpected, inexplicable, magical way.
Tonight I am grateful for my students. They aren’t always perfectly behaved, and there are days when they can be more than challenging, but they are a cohesive group of kids who genuinely like one another and do not suffer from the drama that can afflict the lives of so many ten and eleven year old kids.
It’s rare to see a group of kids come together so completely as this year’s class has, and while I’m not exactly sure how or why it has happened (I have theories), I am supremely grateful to them for this unusual level of maturity.
I love my job, but somehow this year’s class has helped me to love it even more.
Tonight I am grateful that my daughter has finally adjusted to Daylight Savings Time. She awoke at 7:15 this morning, which meant that for the first time this week, I was able to spend some time with her before heading off to work.
I cannot tell you how difficult it is to leave for work without spending even a couple minutes with her. Just a squeeze and a kiss is enough to get me through the day.
This is especially important on nights like tonight, when a book event keeps me away from home at bedtime, forcing me to miss out on cuteness the likes of this:
She had better wake up tomorrow morning, too.
Tonight I am thankful for the enthusiastic readers who have been engaging in a new form of live tweeting whereby they send me tweets as they make their way through my latest book, Memoirs of an Imaginary Friend. My first two books, Something Missing and Unexpectedly, Milo, were published during Twitter’s infancy, so I had decidedly less contact with readers via social media. Back then (just two and four years ago), email was the primary way that readers contacted me, and a few even wrote letters longhand. But today, I am only a tweet away, and readers are taking advantage it.
This afternoon, readers in the UK and Australia tweeted about their experience with novel thus far, sharing their thoughts and feelings about the book at that very moment with me. One reader told me that she was experiencing an overwhelming sense of dread over what might happen next in the story (she was about halfway finished), and the other was nearing the end of the book and was “terrified” by the potential outcome.
She actually stopped reading in order to drink some coffee and calm down before finishing.
I’m hoping it was decaf.
The enthusiasm and excitement of these readers and their willingness to engage me in their reading process humbles me. I am so very grateful for their efforts to reach out and allow me to join them on their journey through my story.
It is a brave new world in which readers and authors can so easily co-mingle, and I like it a lot.
Tonight I am grateful for Portlandia. Elysha and I watched the season finale of the show tonight.
It’s freakin’ hilarious.
Happily, IFC has greenlighted a third season of the show, so there is more gratitude to come.
So many parents have such a hard time getting their children to sleep at night.
Some can’t stand the thought of listening to their child crying in the crib during the process of sleep training.
Others end up with a child sleeping in their bedroom for months and even years. I know parents who have actually placed their child’s bed in their own bedroom. I know others who trade beds with their child in the middle of the night so their little one can sleep with Mommy or Daddy in the parent’s bed when the mood strikes.
I’ve known parents who allow their child to fall asleep to the television and parents who haven’t had a decent night of sleep in years.
I was actually one of these difficult children. My mother once told me that she could hardly remember a time when I fell asleep before she did, and she couldn’t remember a single morning when I was still asleep when she awoke.
But to her credit, I was never permitted to sleep in her bedroom. When I was six months old, I was moved into my own room, never to return to my parent’s bedroom.
My mother believed that if your child isn’t going to sleep, at least keep the kid out of your bedroom.
Smart woman.
Tonight I am grateful that my daughter is such a good sleeper.
She’s not the best sleeper. It’s quite common for Clara to play in her crib well after she’s been put to bed, and though she naps at school everyday, she has a reputation for being the worst sleeper in her class.
Last asleep, first awake. Just like her Daddy.
But Clara sleeps. We put her to bed before 8:00 PM on most nights and don’t see her again until 7:00 AM. And since she was four months old, she has been sleeping in her own room. The first week or so wasn’t easy, but we knew that it was important to stay strong and enduring her crying so that she could learn to become a good sleeper.
She did.
This weekend Clara spent the night with her grandparents, and she slept in a regular bed for the first time in her life. She went to bed much later than usual and had more difficulty falling asleep than usual, but once asleep, she slept all night.
And looked damn cute doing it.
Tonight I am grateful that my daughter is a good sleeper. I’m not sure whether my wife and I should take the credit (which I prefer) or Clara deserves the bulk of the recognition, but either way, it’s so nice to have a kid who sleeps through the night, every night, without fail.
Tonight I am grateful that Clara is able to spend as much time with her grandfather as she does. She loves the old guy, and he loves her right back.
Not every child is fortunate enough to grow up with a grandfather, and not every grandfather is willing to get down on his hands and knees and play with his grandchildren.
Clara’s grandfather is quite a special guy.
Not perfect, mind you, but perfect when it comes to being a grandfather.
It is remarkable how much more patient and kind people will be to you when you are holding the hand of your pregnant wife.
Valets smile and try to be more helpful.
Hotel rooms get upgraded to the finest available.
Desk clerks send complimentary plates of fruit and water up to your room with a cute little card featuring a stick-figure drawings of a pregnant woman.
Cab drivers patiently wait as your wife says goodbye to her parents and sister.
Waiters are decidedly more attentive.
Tonight I am thankful to the dozen or so New York City service personnel who treated us like fragile little birds today.
Elysha’s back hurts like hell, but at least we’re getting something out of it.
I don’t think anyone should spend the exorbitant shipping costs to have my new book, Memoirs of an Imaginary Friend, sent from the UK or Australia to the US.
The book is coming out in America in August. That’s only six months away.
Besides, the UK version of the book is slightly different than the United States edition. Language was changed to better suit slight differences in British vocabulary.
Not many changes, but some.
So just wait, my American friends. While I am honored and humbled by your anxious support, the book will be in a store near you soon enough.
Or you can preorder it from any retailer that sells books. Barnes and Noble, Amazon, or best of all, go to IndieBound and preorder from your local, independent bookstore. Preorders are great for authors.
Publishers love those sales already in the bank.
So when an American reader who I only know through social media is excited enough to order the book from the UK and have it shipped to his home in the United States despite the expense, I think that’s pretty special.
And when that reader photographs his newly-arrived book, still resting on its bed of bubble wrap, and sends the image to me, I think that’s pretty amazing.
That’s what I’m grateful for tonight:
Readers who go out of their way to support authors and make them feel exceptionally fortunate to have them on their side.
Tonight I am grateful that my daughter, Clara, requires so little to be happy.
I know this will not always be the case, so I am trying to enjoy it now before the world gets much more complicated.
I treasure moments like these.
Tonight I am grateful for the infinitesimal amount of time I spend on the phone thanks to my friends who also have no desire to use this device on a regular basis. I am blessed with many close friends, but thankfully none of them think that chatting on the phone for any length of time is a good idea.
With three days left in the monthly billing cycle, I have used a total of 41 minutes of talk time on my phone, which amounts to an average of a little more than a minute per day.
Even this seems slightly excessive.
I am more than willing to take phone calls for specific topics that extend beyond the capabilities of a simple text message, but thankfully these occasions are the exception rather than the rule.
This makes me very happy.
Tonight I am thankful for the many ideas I have for future books.
My agent has told me many times that I am fortunate to be able to generate so many ideas for books while writers much more talented than me struggle to come up with a single idea for their next book.
For reasons I do not understand, ideas have always been abundant for me. This causes me to have a good problem:
Choosing which of my many book ideas will be next.
While this is not an easy problem to solve, it is certainly preferable to not having anything at all to write about at all.