He’s across from me at the coffee table.  Crab cakes, wild rice and spinach salad between us.  

I am eating chocolate chips straight outta the bag and drinking a glass of wine. Go ahead, ask me how conferences with Flash’s gifted teacher went.

Dare ya.

chicken.

My dad recently joined the rest of the instant messaging world. Along with my niece. My brother and I were already old hats at such communication. My sister just discovered Facebook and with that her own internal chat. So tonight, as I tried to play a few hands of poker (no, not for money), I had an IM from my dad. So I responded. My brother, not 10 feet from my dad, then sends me a message. My sister came on Facebook (where I was trying to play poker) and started sending me messages. Then Birdy got online and well, I started losing track of things quickly. When Flash jumped into the mix, I nearly gave up entirely.

What I learned however, is the following:

1. My niece cannot spell.
2. My sister is still a pot calling other kettles black.
3. Despite their names appearing on each line they type in an IM window, Birdy still cannot spell either my brother’s name or Flash’s name correctly.
4. That the world better look out because my dad learned about Yahoo emoticons.
5. That Flash felt left out and jumped into the mix, whether as further avoidance of studying or just for the sheer challenge of juggling 5 IM windows, I’ll never know.
6. That I can manage IM windows, blog about the experience and still win $2K in fake poker money at the same time.
7. That it is possible for a niece and nephew to drive my brother crazy from 800 miles away.
8. That while I can manage all of that, I still have to count on my fingers how many cards I have in a Hold ‘Em game towards a straight.
9. Flash’s status will read “SAT’ing” when he’s clearly online IM’ing.
10. After all of that, my dad will go back and use the phone to call my sister. Two steps forward, one step back.

It is fascinating to me to watch history in the making in the presence of small children. I spent time in George’s second grade classroom this afternoon watching the inauguration of Obama.

While I was in the room, one of his classmates, an African-American child, pointed at the television and said to me, “I thought our new President was brown.” I confirmed that our new President was indeed “brown” and said the man on the television was our new Vice President and that he was in fact, white. I loved that comment. I loved that to this room full of kids, there was absolutely nothing significant at all about this man’s color. It was just a fact, without any historical significance at all to their young lives.

When it was time for Obama to take the oath of office, I nudged this same student and said, “That is our new President, Barack Obama.”

“Oh, see? He is brown!” the student exclaimed. “What is he doing?”

I explained that he was being sworn in to office. That he had his left hand on the Bible and his right hand was raised and the other person was a judge and he was swearing him in.

“The new President is going to swear? On television?!”

Of course I explained, but his precious innocence was priceless.

It matters not one bit to me whom you voted for. The history made today did not come easily, quickly or without a price. And looking at a room full of children, it was really something to wonder about what these changes will bring to their future. And what changes these children will bring to our future.

Yesterday I was IM’ing with my brother. As it turns out, he was also IM’ing with Flash who was on the couch across the room from me. G decided to simplify and invite us both into a chat conference. Sounded like a plan.

My dad, sitting next to my brother on a couch in TN wanted in on the action. My brother walked my dad through downloading Messenger and then adding Flash and I to his buddy list. My dad commented to G that this was a lot like Skype only without the picture. G turned on his webcam and said, “We can remedy that!”

By the time all was said and done we were all hooked up to cams and mics and chat and whatnot, we realized that everyone could pretty much see and hear each other except me. My computer doesn’t have a webcam or a built-in mic.

My dad thought for a minute that I wasn’t able to see their webcams without one of my own. I typed into the chat window, “I can see you. I can even hear you. You just can’t hear me.”

I watched on the webcam as my dad exclaimed, “Where was this technology twenty years ago when I could’ve talked and you could only have listened?!”

Save by technology. Or lack thereof.

George was out with his parents shopping this weekend and found a game he wanted to buy for his new DS. He realized he had forgotten his wallet with his Christmas money in it at home so he asked his mom if she would lend him the money so he could buy it.

“Do you have enough at home to pay me back?” she asked.

“Yep!”

My sister agreed to buy the game for George contingent upon him repaying her later.

When they arrived home, George ran up to his room to get his money. When he returned he held out a gift card he had received from G for Christmas and asked, “Mom? Do you take Visa?”

I had given up. A long time ago in fact. As of mid-October, I had quit the fight and given up. My two fantasy football teams were barely getting by. I didn’t have TV so I couldn’t even watch the games. I had no idea who was injured, who was off the roster, who was having a great week or who to bench. So I quit. You can’t just leave a league, though, so I just left my roster alone and stopped checking in.

I had some offers for trades that I considered. I mean, if I wasn’t playing the guys, shouldn’t someone else get the points? But I decided that was unfair. If I off-loaded any good players, then wasn’t that creating an unbalanced system? So I just left it alone.

I only kept up on the progress of one of the two teams because friends play on that league and they would send me the occasional email saying “good luck this week!” or “Can’t believe you lost that one!” In general, I got the impression that my team was continuing to tank and that was all fine by me.

It wasn’t until today, however, when I received the final email from the commissioner of the other league that I found out how I fared in the second league. When I logged in to the site, I barely remembered my log in or password. Humoring Flash, I looked up my last team transaction and found the last time I had moved any of my players around was October 16th. And that’s when I saw the Commish’s last posting. Congratulating ME as the Champion of 2008-2009 Fantasy Football. I double checked to make sure I had read it correctly. And then I started laughing so hard I had tears.

Me. I won. The league. Without moving, trading, rearranging or dropping any of my players for the past THREE months. I won.

It’s just further proof that you really don’t need any skill to win these things.

3 leagues in two years. Two Championships. I expect ESPN to be calling any day now.

Earlier in the week I stopped by my local bank to make an appointment with the mortgage guy. I’m not ready to buy a house yet, but I wanted to ask a few questions so I’d be ready when the time came.

We set up an appointment at the branch in the town where I work for the following afternoon. The weather was predicted to be bad and there was a possibility I wouldn’t even be at work the next day so the man let me know that if the weather was bad and I didn’t have to work, I could meet him in the morning at my local branch instead.

We didn’t end up getting the blizzard they predicted and so I met with the man at the branch after school the next day. As he shook my hand and welcomed me into his office he said, “It’s a good thing you didn’t end up meeting me at your branch this morning. We were robbed.”

“What?!” I exclaimed. I couldn’t believe I had missed out on the opportunity to witness a bank robbery.

He went on to tell me all about it. How he had been helping a client at his desk and had come around to their side of the table to show them something and so he actually didn’t see anything happen at all. He only heard it when someone ran and locked the door and yelled. It was then that he realized what had just happened. And so he had calmly told the people he was working with that they would need to make themselves comfortable because the bank had apparently just been robbed and no one would be allowed to leave until the police arrived to question everyone. The teller was shook up but he said, “after some pizza she was fine and went back to work.” It was her second time being held up, it would seem. The first time had been at gun point.

I interjected that if my life ever involved a gun to my head I’d probably change career paths.

In any case, while my meeting with the gentleman went well, I was saddened to think that I missed out on my once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to be present during a bank robbery. Who knew you got pizza afterwards?

The text message was sweet, unexpectedly complimentary. It’s not that it’s unlike him, it’s just not a commonplace text from him on a Sunday afternoon.

I returned the compliment and asked if all was okay.

He tried to push whatever burden he was holding under the rug and assure me he was fine. But I knew better. We may not have been together for awhile but we had loved each other all those years ago.

I called. He cried. He unloaded his burden and told me his sorrows. A battle. A decision. Choices and options he did not know how to face or choose. I had been there. All those years ago. Faced with a relationship that wasn’t as God intended. Now he is faced with a problem he doesn’t know how to handle within his relationship. Does he stay and love someone through it? Does he leave and risk falling apart? I understood. I knew. I had been there.

But his present choice brings up past pain. Of not being enough then and not feeling good enough now. The weight is heavier when pain is added to pain.

I reassured, as I always do with him. He is good. He is loving. He is caring and thoughtful and generous. I don’t agree with his life, but that doesn’t change who he is at heart.

And so we mended in some ways. We embraced over the phone wires and I let him know he had the strength through God to know what to do. To handle or to leave. To stay or to change.

He’s not one to change. He’s not one to move unless pushed. He’s one to stay and fix if he can.

And I expect that’s what he’ll try to do at least as long as the other person lets him.

But I know where he’s coming from. And I don’t wish that on anyone. Even on the one who forced my choice all those years ago.