Gosh Darn It Pizza: What a Botched Pie Taught Me About Grace

The kids were hungry. And as they hurried into the kitchen and chirped at me for another snack, I withheld another slice of cheese and assured them I was close.

And then, with dinner on the line, I screwed up.

I had rolled the crust so thick, it felt like a beanbag. After three minutes of pre-baking, the bounce-house-looking crust rolled and was caught over the edge of the pizza stone. When I went to pull it out, the crust separated from the base so badly I thought it was beyond repair.

And I yelled. Loud enough that the big three boys heard me through a brick wall outside and came running. Robyn came to my aid too—assuring me that we still had one pizza in good shape and offering to grate some cheese for me.

The truth? It wasn’t really about the pizza.

It was about everything else: the stress of our newborn’s health and surgeries, the onslaught of demands at work, the unpredictable news cycle, and being weary from solo parenting most of the day. This pizza was the one thing I knew I could do right that day. And when I botched that too, it broke open the anger I’d been ignoring.

I had worked so damn hard for that dough, however deformed it was. I didn’t want to just pitch it.

I tried to make the best of it by ripping off the pillowy, bounce-house-scale crusts and making them into breadsticks. This left the pie crustless, jagged, and super thin. I added sauce and fixings to both pies and thought—let’s see how this goes—as I peeled them back into the oven for their final bake.

The family laughed supportively as I introduced the “Gosh Darn It” pizza to our Saturday night table.

I took off my apron and moped to the table, setting out everyone’s water bottles, still feeling the sting of the moment. Bo turned to me—so sweet, so kind, so gentle—and said, “It’s SO good, Papa. These breadsticks are the best. I love Gosh Darn It pizza.”

And in that small moment, my spirit rose.

Suddenly, my anger and embarrassment became relief. It was all fine. We were all together, eating pizza—and that’s really all anyone wanted.

Our house is its quietest when everyone starts on their first slice on pizza night. And as everyone happily munched away, I wondered: maybe “Gosh Darn It” pizza just accidentally became a new tradition.

Sometimes great new things come from mistakes we made the best of.

—

But as I reflect a morning later, there’s more to learn here about growth.

As I see it, this story is a good metaphor because we are all Gosh Darn It pizzas. Me, you, my kids, your kids—all of us.

We’re all so imperfect. Many things about each of us feel like a flaw or a mistake. We all screw up, and our charge to grow—spiritually and morally—is to become something better by making the best of our mistakes. That’s all we can do.

Inner work—that slow, winding journey toward becoming more whole—doesn’t follow a straight path. It’s like a long walk through the woods. It’s cold and windy, and you can’t do it alone.

If not for my family—checking on me, helping me, encouraging me, and offering me grace—my deformed dough would’ve become garbage instead of Gosh Darn It pizza.

And this is what I want to remember most about that Saturday night: we’re meant to walk this winding path toward goodness together, because what transforms us is the grace from those sitting next to us—even when, and maybe especially when, we’re just trying to turn some imperfect dough into a Gosh Darn It pizza.

The Legend of Griffin the Brave

Griff,

The way you came into this world—so boldly—is already legend in our family.

You will hear many retellings, each filled with rich detail, each from a different perspective. But some things will always remain the same.

Your mother’s labor moved so quickly that you were born in front of the fireplace before the ambulance could even arrive. You spent nine days in the hospital because your tiny body was too cold to register a temperature at Dr. Marlene’s office.

And then, you recovered at home in the very room where you were born, tethered to an oxygen machine that hummed its steady rhythm: whirr-hiss-boom, whirr-hiss-boom, whirr-hiss-boom.

But there is another part of your story I want you to know. The story of your name.

Just like your birth—three weeks before your due date—your name, Griffin Aditya, was a surprise. It wasn’t on any of our lists. You were supposed to be Graham, or maybe Owen.

But when we saw you, we knew. Neither name was bold enough. Your entrance into this world was far too grand—too intense—for anything less.

So I started Googling and asking questions in a ChatGPT thread which titled itself “Fierce Baby Name Ideas.”

As I read the names out loud to your mother in the hospital recovery room, we didn’t choose Griffin—it chose you.

A name of Welsh origin. A mythical creature known for its courage, fierceness, and strength. It was perfect. It was you.

Then came your middle name. We wanted something warm, something radiant—something that carried the fire of the marble fireplace in front of which you were born.

So we chose Aditya, Sanskrit for "sun."

But the meaning of your name doesn’t stop there. In the days and weeks after your birth, Griffin came to represent a different kind of courage for each of us.

For Robert, it was the courage of leadership—gathering your brothers (and Riley the pup) upstairs just minutes before you arrived.

For Myles, it was the courage of responsibility—stepping into his new role as an older brother, standing silent and strong at your bedside.

For Emmett, it was the courage to love. Though he was just shy of three, he spoke of you and Mommy every day while you were in the hospital, missing you with an intensity that many don’t experience until much later in life.

For your mother, it was the courage of sacrifice—weeks spent sleeping in a chair, pumping milk to nourish you, letting go of every expectation she had for what this time with you would be.

And for me? It was the courage of humility—learning to accept the love, support, and kindness that poured into our lives when we needed it most.

And for you, my son, Griffin will carry its own meaning. Because when I think about it, your bravery was the purest kind—unintentional, unknowing.

You didn’t choose it. You were just born. In the dead of winter, in difficult circumstances, and you survived. You fought without realizing you were fighting.

And in doing so, you made us brave.

When I was afraid—wondering if you and your mom would be okay—you were there, finding a way to stay warm, to breathe. You kept going. And because of that, we did too.

That is the greatest lesson from the night you were born: bravery can come from the smallest of us. From those who don’t even know they’re being brave.

And that kind of bravery is powerful. It spreads. It lifts us all. Whenever I hear your name, I remember that quiet, unassuming, unstoppable courage.

You didn’t choose this. Just like your name—bravery chose you.

How to accept help during a family emergency (a tool for family resiliency)

Friends,

During a family emergency, one of the hardest things is knowing how to ask for and accept help. Often, if we’re fortunate to have loving friends and family around us, there’s a quiet army standing by, ready to support us as soon as they hear we’re struggling.

But here’s the tricky part: what do we ask them to do? How do we take them up on their offers? And what do we really need? These questions can feel impossible to answer in the middle of a crisis because we’re already overwhelmed by the situation itself.

I know this because Robyn and I just went through it.

When we welcomed our newborn home, we had to rush back to the hospital with him just a day later. It was the hardest week of our lives. By midweek, I was completely overwhelmed, even though we had so many loving offers of help and support.

That’s when I realized I needed to simplify things. I spent 30 minutes breaking down the problem into something I could actually manage. I created a worksheet to help me organize our needs and accept the help that was already being offered.

It made all the difference.

The worksheet helped me clarify what we needed, communicate it to others, and accept support in a way that felt natural and manageable. It worked so well that I plan to use it whenever we face a family emergency (though I hope that won’t be often).

Because this tool made such a big impact for us, I wanted to share it with you. I’ve attached two versions below:

• A blank template, ready for you to use.

• A version with notes that explain how it works.

This is for any family emergency—whether it’s a sick child, the death of a parent, emergency house repairs, or something else entirely. Please feel free to use it, adapt it, and share it with anyone who might need it.

I also plan to be more proactive by creating an emergency plan with close family and friends. That way, when life inevitably throws us a curveball, we’ll be ready.

Emergencies are going to happen. Let’s be prepared—not just to offer help, but to accept it when we need it most.

With Love from Detroit,
Neil

Tears and Laughter Make us Rich

Every Christmas, Robyn and I watch It’s A Wonderful Life together, and every year I cry harder.

This year, I felt myself resisting, but eventually, I let myself go. And when Harry Bailey walked in the door and said, “A toast, to my big brother George, the richest man in town,” I just wept.

And it’s not just this film, I’ve noticed. When I read A Sick Day for Amos McGee at bedtime, I cry harder and smile bigger because the simple story of friendship between a zookeeper and his animal friends reminds me of my own experiences of friendship. When I hear the song Joe, I can’t help but feel my lips tremble mid-verse while I’m singing it in the car, even though I’ve never lived through addiction or recovery. It just gets me, because the protagonist—a gas station attendant—is a hero because of the content of his character and his success in slaying his own demons, not because of any external measures of success.

Or in Finding Nemo, now, I cry for different reasons in both eyes. When Nemo and Marlin reunite, I now understand the perspective of both father and son. And I find myself marveling at the beauty, relevance, and power of children’s stories—these tales we dismiss as childish often hold the simplest and truest wisdom.

And when I watch comedy specials—whether it’s Matt Rife, Hasan Minhaj, Dave Chappelle, or Trevor Noah—I laugh and laugh and laugh in ways I didn’t know were possible without being a bit drunk with my college friends at the pub.

As we get older, we just get it more. Because, if we’re doing this right with each passing year, we’ve actually lived more.

I see now how courageous it is to be an everyday guy who consistently swims upstream to do the right thing, like George Bailey does in that classic film. In a way, writing the book Character by Choice has been my attempt to figure out how to be more like George Bailey.

I find him so remarkable as an example of what a good, everyday man can look like. Because at the end, George doesn’t even “win” in the conventional sense. He doesn’t walk away with a big payout or a victory over the villainous Mr. Potter—he’s still a modest business owner. But his years of sacrifice are validated when the rest of Bedford Falls comes to his aid.

Now, I get how special it is to sacrifice for others and to accept the sacrifices they make for me.

And I also see the mirror universe of what my life could’ve been, just like George Bailey does after he “saves” his guardian angel, Clarence. It’s like I started making choices for myself as a teenager, and each of those choices was a fork in the road—left or right. Over time, those choices compounded as I kept making right turns. Again and again, at each fork, I went right.

And now I see so clearly what my life could’ve been. I could’ve been richer, with fewer kids and responsibilities, probably living in Washington, D.C., or San Francisco. That version of me would’ve had a nicer house and a more vibrant professional and social life. But would it have been a universe where I was here with Robyn, Riley, Robert, Myles, and Emmett? Probably not.

Honestly, I would’ve probably found a way to rationalize my story if I had made all those left turns instead of right. I might have convinced myself I was content. But damn, I’m glad I’m here and not somewhere else. And that clear, honest realization—that it may never have been this way—keeps my heart from stiffening.

And so the tears flow.

Maybe this is good, maybe it isn’t. Maybe it’s a sign of strength, maybe a sign of weakness. Maybe both. Honestly, I don’t really care. I’d rather avoid the culture wars and punditry about men and crying. That kind of commentary—no matter where it comes from—feels reductive and unnecessary.

Because at a minimum, I think crying and laughing harder is an indicator of acceptance—of life and all that it brings. It’s a sign that I’m letting myself live life—letting it soak into my bones and my soul, rather than keeping it at arm’s length.

It’s not the choice everyone makes, but for me, I can only hope that as I age, I let myself live more and more. I can only hope that with each passing year I cry harder and laugh harder. Because in my own way, that makes me feel like one of the richest men in town.

What if death wasn’t certain?

Friends,

I was driving the other day when a thought hit me.

Death feels unpredictable, doesn’t it? We have no idea when it’ll come.

But it’s also the most predictable thing there is—it’s the only thing we know for sure is coming.

But here’s the thing—it’s not just certain that we’ll die. We even have a rough window for it, right? Most of us can expect to go somewhere between 70 and 100 years old, and almost no one makes it past 110.

But what if that wasn’t the rule anymore?

Imagine this: a new treatment for longevity. You’d have to take it by 25, but here’s the kicker—it only works for half of us, and we can’t even tell who it’s working for.

This kind of life? It would be tough—devastating, even.

I can’t imagine not knowing whether I’d have to live without Robyn for 100 years. Just thinking about it—it’d tear me apart.

And what about my kids? Their kids? Would I end up burying generations of my own family because I lived to 500?

Then there’s friendships. Would they cross generations too? Or would we all start isolating, afraid to get close to people when we had no idea how long they’d be around?

Money—would we work forever? Could we even retire?

And politics? Would having immortals who cared about the extreme long-term make things better? Or would culture fall apart because the thread of shared experience stretched too thin?

I don’t have the answers. This idea—this uncertainty about how long we might live—it’s unsettling in ways I didn’t expect.

But what about you? How does this land for you? What would it mean to live in a world where death was no longer the one certainty we had?

With love from Detroit,

Neil

Days Like These: A Father’s Wish

I forget sometimes how large I loom in their world. But on this Father’s Day, I am reminded of it, and it’s something I don’t want to forget.

All my sons put so much effort and care into my Father’s Day present. It helped me remember that, no matter who you are, as a young kid, the people who raise you are your whole world. Mothers and fathers are just…giants to a kid. All children explore this, fascinated and in awe. That’s why all kids put on their parents’ shoes and mittens and walk around in them.

“Maybe someday,” we wish, “these will fit and I’ll get the chance to be like them.”

Mothers and fathers are giants to a kid.

This is such a gift of love, not just for our joy and hearts but for the people we will become in the future.

I’ve been thinking about how this year, on my birthday, my perception of age changed. When we’re young, the first change comes when you realize how awesome it will be to be older: bigger, stronger, and more free. Then you hit the invincibility years of your twenties, wishing to stay 27 or 28 forever.

Next come the years of control—or lack thereof, I suppose. There’s not enough money, not a good enough job, the kids grow up too quickly, and you find yourself nervously joking about the increasing gray in your hair or talking about revisiting old haunts to recapture fleeting youth.

Then my 37th birthday hit, and my perception of age changed again. It was a birthday where I thought, “Damn, I’m just glad to be here for it.”

Why? Because I became very conscious of how our table grew more crowded this year, not less. This year, we’ve added children, brothers, and sisters to our table of friends and family. And we lost almost nobody. I’m old enough now to realize how rare and precious birthdays like this one will be from here on out.

So yes, when I blew out the candles on my pineapple birthday cake this year, my wish was: “Thank you, God, for letting me celebrate this birthday. My wish is for my next birthday to be like this one, with our table more crowded, not less.”

One of my greatest fears about death now is not the pain, suffering, and uncertainty that surrounds it—though that’s still a real fear. I have started to fear that a birthday will come—especially if my friends and family are gone, and I’m the last one standing—where I won’t wish for another one.

That’s the final change in our perception of age: moving from a place of peace and gratitude for our life—where we’re just happy to be here—to hoping for death to come peacefully, but also soon. I don’t want to ever slip into that last phase of age. I hope this last birthday, where I was just happy to be here and hoped for another birthday, is the last time my perception of age meaningfully changes.

No matter what happens, I know today that I have mattered to my sons. Days like these, marked by little celebrations and small gestures of love, remind us that we mattered to someone—whether it was our kids, friends, family, colleagues, or neighbors—that we loomed large.

These little Father’s Day gifts, like the ones I received today, are more than just presents. They are symbols we can hold onto as we age, reminders that we loved and were loved. These symbols of love will always give me hope and a feeling of worth, a reason to keep wishing for more birthdays. Because we were loved once, there’s always hope that each day we wake up, there will be that light of love again—whether it comes to us or is the light we carry and gift to others.

In the lingering, there is love.

One of the greatest acts of love is to linger.

When we linger we are saying, “Let us stay here, together. The time we have is better together. Let’s cheat our departure for just a little longer. With you, this moment is complete.”

This is what we do in our Michigan goodbyes which makes the end of a dinner party 20 minutes instead of the time it takes for a quick handshake. We want to chat a little more, hug a little longer and with an extra squeeze if you live far away - so I know it’ll say with you until you make it home. We want to hear one more story about our grandfather or our college days and laugh one more time together while we can. This is a mark of a family and not people who are simply related.

With you this moment is complete.

As much I wish our kids went to bed faster and didn’t rouse us awake when they slip under our covers, so gently, before sunrise, it still brings tears to my eyes thinking about it now. That is how they linger and the most honest way they show us that they really do love us. Don’t grow up so fast, my sons because each morning is one day closer to when you soar away from this place.

With you, this moment is complete.

I remember so fondly the lingering we would do in the fraternity house or our senior house, after the party or last call at the bar. When we’d eat our grubby burritos and play FIFA or become Guitar Heros. Most of the time, I preferred that time to the party itself. It was in the lingering that we became brothers. It was in the lingering that we formed a lifelong bond, that survives across the time zones that separate us today.

With you, this moment is complete.

Even at work, there are some times we linger in fellowship or in pursuit of the magical moment of “aha!” The meeting after the meeting, where we are free to be ourselves and speak as equals. It’s some of the only time we aren’t compelled to spend together, making it feel rare and special. It is in the lingering where we put away our masks, and finally get real - and that’s energetic and joyous.

With you, this moment is complete.

And you, my love, are who I most want to linger with. This is what we have always done. Just a little longer with our glasses of wine. Just a little longer with our walk around the neighborhood at lunch time. Just one more song, one more kiss, one more smile, one more whiff of your perfume that smells like warm vanilla sugar.

With you, I will never have enough time. I will take every extra breath together that we get. You, my love, are who I most want to linger with.

With you, this moment is complete.

Photo by Tim Mossholder on Unsplash

The Waiting Place

It’s not the lung stuff that has knocked me out ill as an adult, it’s the stomach bugs. And this one was a gut punch like I haven’t had in half a decade.

I had lost water in both directions, still unable to eat or drink more than a little without twitching and convulsing sleeplessly with abdominal pain. Even with full blankets, socks, pajamas, and hours of adorning a second comforter I just couldn’t get warm.

“This one’s a nasty one,” I thought.

The kids were going about their “home day” downstairs, and Robyn was bridging both worlds to check on my condition. I was upstairs, just laying there. I was drifting in and out of semi-conscious daydreams and actual dreams. And damn, I was probably thinking too much about work, too.

But more than anything, I was alone. It was just me, with the bedroom door closed, laying witness to the bug battle being waged in my upper abdomen.

This is the first time I’ve been home sick with the kids around, that I can remember, at least. The other times, must’ve been while they were at daycare, I guess.

It wasn’t different than a typical day, their comings and goings seeming like what I would expect. There were bumps and kicks. The clinking of dishes in the sink, accumulating because I wasn’t doing them. The half-hearted tears of sibling friction. Riley, of course, barked as the mail carrier made their daily rounds. A neighbor in his seventies or eighties stopped by with children’s books, in hopes that they’d find new life with our sons. I heard celebrations, I think, after a victor emerged after a game of Uno.

In our home, these sounds are businesses as usual. Except, today, I wasn’t downstairs in the thick of it. I was at a distance, hearing muddled and softened versions of it all. It was as if all the scenes were familiar, photographically familiar, but somehow fuzzy and uncharacteristically muddled.

And as I lay there, I wanted to rise. I wanted to get up, shuffle downstairs and just be there with them, even if I was relegated to the couch. I wanted to hold them, to kiss them on the crown of their heads. My fingers longed to be interlaced with Robyn’s.

All of a sudden I missed them all, desperately and with panic, like I was in the desert and being present for their afternoon snack was the oasis I needed to even just survive. I was only a floor above them, but all of a sudden, without any warning I felt like I was a whole world away.

And I wondered, in my half lucid mind, what if this is what it was like. What if this is what it was like when we moved from this world into the next world away?

Could it be that the next stage our soul goes to after we die is the equivalent of “being a floor away”? To a place where we can catch glimpses of the life happening without us? Where we hear the yelps of victory and the melody dishes clanking? Where we hear, but never see, muffled and fuzzy glimpses of home?

If the first stage of the afterlife is being the equivalent of a floor, but really a world, away, it would be a place of love and gratefulness, but also of the deepest sadness. If that were the afterlife, I thought, I would wait there. I’d wait, on the floor, back and ear to the door all day, hoping to hear just a little bit more, for a little bit longer.

I would hope to hear laughter and pray that someone could wipe the tears I could not wipe myself. I would eat when they ate. I would sleep when they’d slept. I would wait up for them, meditating and thinking, while they were out of the house, scratching a couple verses if there was a notebook at hand.

If waiting is all I could do, I thought, I would wait.

But if this place, this room of waiting, were the first stage of the afterlife, I thought further, how long would I wait?

Because surely, if whatever God there was created this waiting place, this good but anxious waiting place, he would create something more and better for us too. Surely, no God benevolent enough to create this purgatory of waiting would be so cruel to make it without a heaven that follows.

That’s where that heaven would be, right on the other side of the waiting room door. If this waiting place were purgatory, unity with God would be right on the other side of the door…

But no, if this were purgatory and I had made it here, surely Robyn would follow. I would wait here, I would wait here for her. Like Yudhisthira refused Indra, I would not cross the threshold without her.

One day, I would wake up, and she would be here in this waiting room with me. We’d take a few days or weeks, to see to it that our sons were on their way to being settled. And then we’d open the door, and we’d cross the threshold together.

As I thought about this possibility of a waiting place, frenetically, and with feverish mind, I started to weep - losing a few drops more of saline that I could scarcely afford to lose. I missed my family, even after just a few hours, and I wept.

I thought of them, a world away downstairs, and tried to feel the halo of their love in the air. And then I went to sleep.

When I woke, my toes, surprisingly, were warm again. From my core to my knees, I was warm again. The pain in my stomach had subsided. I tested out a few crackers and a few larger gulps of the electrolyte mix Robyn had brought me hours earlier. Sure enough, I was able to stomach both.

And then, I remembered that this was just a minor stomach bug, from which I would recover. This room, our bedroom, was not a purgatory of waiting. I was not in a waiting place.

I was here, right now. I was alive, right now. My wife, and my children, and our pup - my family - they were here right now.

I long to be with them, for the business as usual days the most, maybe. I want to be with them for the daily grind, with all its struggles, joys, illnesses, and small mercies. Being with them is a form of heaven for me, and it’s right here, right now. A heaven, I thought, is just on the other side of that door.

Photo by runnyrem on Unsplash

The blessing of a sturdy table

The center of a family is not its family room, the heart of a family lies in its dining room, at the table it gathers around.

Photo Credit: Unsplash @ddealmeida

I remember the table my parents had growing up. It was styled like the early nineties, a light looking piney wood with a glossy finish. Kind of like the wooden equivalent of acid washed jeans. Its legs were curved and ribbed, the type of texture that little hands love to run their fingers and nails over. I remember feeling such glee when my father would put in the table leaf, because it meant we were having a special amount of company over.

The wooden chairs we had were a similar, light, hue. They were the sort of kit chairs a young, modest, immigrant family could buy from Kmart or Service Merchandise to assemble and stain themselves to save a little money.

The table always scared me a bit, because it was built as if to be a little wobbly. I remember my father tightening the bolts, every so often, to ensure it wouldn’t shake too much. I never played under it, because I was always a little scared, in the way a four year old might be, that the time it would finally topple might be the precise moment I was underneath it. But beyond that, I never had a little sibling or a puppy to chase around, so I never really had any reason to scurry under that first wobbly table we had.

That table was were we had dinner, where as a young lad I would, invariably, beg for Kraft macaroni and cheese instead of bhindi and dal. It was where my parents would review the bills and make ends meet. It was the only place in America I ever ate and talked with my with my visiting grandparents. That table and those chairs are one of the only fixtures in my family home that we’ve had with us from Williamsville, New York to three different cities in Michigan: Grand Blanc, Rochester Hills, and Rochester.

Eventually, my parents were on the come up. And one of the first purchases they made was a new, sturdier, dinner table. It was darker wood, stained to a cherry-esque finish, and they bought a china cabinet, server, and eight upholstered chairs to match. More than anything else they ever bought, I think, this was the symbol that we had made it in America.

—

The first table Robyn and I had was a small one, an IKEA outfit, but one of the nicer ones that I had from the roommate era of my life. It was solid and flat, its surface resemblant of a butcher block, but thinner. Robyn and I first ate together around it before we started dating, when in the same building in Midtown Detroit, the one with the coat of arms in the lobby. Robyn came up when she was sick on her birthday, I made soup and played John Mayer’s Where the Light Is album.

Little did we know, it would be that table that we would first sit down for dinner at, in our first apartment together, after our marriage. It would be the table that we would dream about our family, and make bucket lists of all the fun things we wanted to do together in the upcoming season. It would be the table - the one by the window, nestled between the wall and the slightly-too-big-for the-room couch - that our 10 month old, nervous, rescue dog would vertically leap onto after sprinting around the room.

When Robyn and I bought our home in Detroit, we packed up that little IKEA table, along with the rest of our boxes and ends, and moved uptown to a friendly, tree-lined street on the north side of the City. After we unloaded the truck, Robyn stayed back while I I led the movers in a caravan up to my parents house in Rochester.

After my father passed, that sturdy cherry table they bought, along with the matching chairs, cabinet, and sever had been mostly idle. My mother was gifting the whole set to Robyn and I, as we started life in our new home and I went up to retrieve the whole set.

And so, on that overcast January afternoon, the movers packed everything up in blankets, with care, and brought it all to Detroit, into our cozy little dining room, with the french doors where Robyn would later hang up photos of our children in the glass panes, every year on their birthdays.

That sturdy table, I’ve realized, is where all my dreams are represented.

Robyn and I have our candle-lit mini-dates there. When our sons were born, we’d pull up a high chair right to the corner and give them mushed up bananas, peas, and sweet potatoes. It’s where we gather our family and friends around, with easy access to the pot in the kitchen filled with a meal that can feed us all. It’s where our sons and pup can confidently hide and chase each other, without fear of the walls crumbling around them.

It’s where we blow out the candles on birthday cakes or share what we learned or were grateful for after a school day, while eating leftover tacos. It’s where Robyn and I talk for a few minutes, after the kids have already moved onto to their next adventure, after breakfast on Saturday mornings, and we smile, and then whisper to each other, “This is the dream.”

That table, that sturdy table, is where the blessings we count in prayer first came to be.

And now, as I see my sons around that table, I understand why my parents were so particular about picking exactly the right one, after weeks of research, budgeting, serious discussion, and several trips to the Thomasville store. The chance to upgrade to a sturdy table, wasn’t only a symbol of securing their seat solidly in the middle class.

I know now, that my parents were thinking of the future when they bought that table. They wanted to pass that table - that sturdy table, onto me and Robyn, even though they would not know her until decades later.

That table reminds me of the blessing and the sacrifices of both our parents. My parents had no choice but to start off in this country with a wobbly table and chairs they glued together themselves. They wanted to help us start our lives together with something sturdier.

They dreamed for us, what we now dream for our own children: that we have a lifetime of love and memories around our table - a childhood our kids want to remember. And we dream of helping our children start their lives beyond us with a table of their own. Maybe not one that’s opulent or expensive, but one that is sturdy - sturdy enough to build their dreams and their own families around.

I don’t always know who reads these posts, or where in the world they are from. But if you’re reading this, I hope you are blessed with the gifts of a sturdy table, and a community that gathers around it, just as we are.

Memories Are Only Shards

At around 2:30pm, when he emerges from the chamber of his midday nap, Myles is at “peak snuggle”. And this day he chose me. I was outlayed on a sofa, tucked into a corner at it’s “L”.

And then, in one single motion, he scooped on top of me, jigsawing in between my knees and sternum. This was a complete surprise, because this never happens. It’s mommy that invariable gets his peak snuggle, not me.

And I was excited-nervous like some get right before an opening kickoff and maybe even before a first date. I wanted to soak this one in, because in addition to this never happening, I’ve come to accept the difficult truth that our kids won’t be little forever.

We will only get 18 Christmases, Diwalis, and birthdays with each of them at home. We will only get 18 summers with them at home. Eventually, Myles’s sternum and knees will outgrow my own. It’s not just a thought of “oh my gawd, this never happens, I’ve gotta soak this in”, it’s a realization that there will be a time where they’re too big for this to ever happen again. Eventually, Myles, and all our children will outgrow the very idea of peak snuggle.

I know this is all fleeting, and so I was trying to just be there, so still, so as not to perturb Myles into realizing he could move on with his day. I tried to notice everything: the softness of his newly chestnut colored hair, which has lightened as the summer unfolded. I noticed the fuzzy nylon texture of his Michigan football jersey. I tried to cement the feel of his fingers as he tried to read my face like a map, as he reached up above his head, past my chin, and to my cheeks. I embraced the particular top-heavy way his two-and-a-half year old frame carried its weight at this specific moment of his life.

But hard as I tried, my efforts to remember were an exercise in grasping at straws. Memories have the shortest of all half lives.

Even 5 minutes later, as I desperately tried to encode my neurons with this moment, I couldn’t quite remember it as it actually happened. Even after just five minutes, I had only the fragments and feelings of something that now was fuzzy and choppy and bits and pieces. What remained was more like a dream than a memory.

All my memories, are this way. I’ve even experimented to test my mind’s resilience to remember, and everything still fades. Even for the most exhilarating moments of my life - like our marriage vows, the birth of our children, or my first time walking into Michigan Stadium - only the fragments remain. It’s excruciating but true that the only time the we ever experience reality is in the very moment we are in, and only if we’re fully there. After just seconds, the memory decays irreparably. All we are left with is a shard of what really happened.

This unfairly short half life of memory has softened my judgement about social media. After stripping away all the vanity, status signalining, and humble bragging, I think there is at least a sliver of desperation and humanity that’s left. At the end of the day, we just all want to remember. And because our minds are too feeble to remember unassisted, we take a photo and share it as a story.

In the past few weeks, as I’ve realized that I don’t truly have any clear, vivid, life-like memories. I’ve almost panicked about what to do. This is why we have to tell stories. Stories, just like photographs are a way to save a little shard of something beautiful. This is why I have to get sleep. The sleep keeps my eyes wide open and puts a leash on my mind so it doesn’t recklessly wander away from reality as it’s happening. And, most importantly, this is why I have to be with them.

We treasure our relationships and are so protective of them for a reason. If we find friends, family, or colleagues that we actually want to remember, we know intuitively that we ought to see them as much as we can. We know intuitively that if we see those treasured people often, maybe it’ll slow down the decay of our memories a little. Life is too short to throw away chances to be with the people we want, so desperately, to remember. This is why I have to be with them.

And just like that, Myles moved on with his day. He scooped off the sofa, just as quickly as he arrived. Peak snuggle was over. And my memory started to decay immediately, as I expected. But at least I do have this fragment of a feeling. And, thank God that even if I won’t be able to ever have full, real memories of this beautiful moment, I will at least have the shards of it.

Don’t Work Saturdays

As a young twenty-something, I had a friend from work who told me one time that he went to great lengths to avoid working on Saturdays. It was some of the best advice I’ve ever received, and was provocative given that at the time both of us worked for a consultancy that required long hours and many of our colleagues bragged about how many hours they logged.

And what fortuitous advice to get from a peer at a such a formative time in my professional life. I started to avoid work on Saturdays and I still do. And thank God for that. Saturday mornings are a sacred time.

To some extent, I think I always knew this, or at least acted as if they were by accident.

If you grew up in the Midwest or went to college here, you know that our ritualistic observance and respect of Saturday mornings runs deep, and might as well be explained by “something in the water.” Because, after all, we have college football.

This observance and participation in the magic of saturday morning college football started when I was a pre-teen. I remember little of what happened when I was 10, except for the herculean Michigan team that won the National Championship. I still remember Charles Woodson, Brian Griese, and many of the key plays of that season. Every week I would get up, watch the pre-game show and then the game. That was that. No exceptions. Saturday mornings. That’s just what we do.

This continued, obviously, when I showed up for college in Ann Arbor and learned the true glory and glee of a collegian’s tailgate. When we lived in the fraternity house, we’d rally the brotherhood, and march down the street to a nearby sorority house - as if we were part of a parade - trays of Jell-O shots in hand. We’d then rouse the sorority sisters from sleep, with said Jell-O shots before continuing to the senior party house by the football stadium where the tailgate had already begun, and the streets had already started filling with sweatshirts and jerseys laden with maize and blue.

It’s absolutely magical, and for some borders on being a quasi-religious experience if you can believe that. Saturday mornings are a sacred time.

Buy Saturday morning magic extends far beyond football. There were the summers in Washington D.C., for example, where I interned every year of college. We lived in the George Washington University dorms, with about 50 other Michigan undergrads and the few others living down the halls from smaller schools that we’d adopted.

The morning would always start slow, and we’d have an invite for everyone to venture through our open door and brunch on some pancakes that my roommates and I had made, catching up about the latest stories made into zeitgeist by the The Washington Post, the pubs folks had visited the night before, the latest policy paper from a think tank making the rounds, or plans for sightseeing over the weekend.

As we’d wrap up shortly before noon, someone would inevitably bellow, with full throat and diaphragm through the dormitory corridors, “TTRRRRAAADDDERRRR JOOOOOOOOEEEESSS!”, which was our universally understood cry that someone was going grocery shopping and was looking for a friend to join them for round trip to and from the edge of Georgetown.

And that was that. That is just what we did, for no other reason than it being Saturday morning. Magical times.

I was reminded of the sacredness of Saturday mornings just yesterday. It was our first trip as a family of five to Eastern Market - Detroit’s largest farmer’s market, which is one of it’s crown jewels, rights of passage, and among the most illustrious and inclusive farmers markets in the country.

We strolled through shed-by-shed, perusing the day’s produce - me pushing the littler boys in the stroller and Robyn walking a few steps ahead with Bo, our 4-and-a-half year old. We grabbed a coffee, and worked our way back through the market’s sheds, stopping by a few farm stands that caught our eye for their fresh produce and attractive prices.

Then we stopped by the Art Park on our way a crepe stand for an early lunch, waiting patiently and with gentle smiles, because we were glad to just be there together. We didn’t care that it took a while, being slow was an opportunity, not an inconvenience.

This is what Saturday mornings are supposed to be like. If you ask me at least.

They’re not for moving fast, they’re for being uncharacteristically slow. They’re not for gearing up, they’re for gearing down. They’re not for hustling, or even for walking with a modicum of fierceness, they’re for ambling. They’re not for to-do-lists, they’re for togetherness and tradition. They’re not for working, they’re for everything but.

I am so grateful that someone set an example for me to not work on Saturday’s. It changed the course of my life, and I don’t think it’s hyperbolic to say that.At every phase of my life, with every community I’ve been part of, in every location I’ve ever lived, Saturday mornings have become magical, sacred times.

But none of that Saturday has a chance if we’re working - whether that’s emails, doing chores with tunnel vision, or otherwise doing something with the intention of being “productive.” We only have a few thousand of these Saturday mornings and it’s a tragedy to waste them.

Don’t work Saturdays.

Mentors are momentary fathers

I met Phelps Connell in 2005, during my fraternity pledge term in my freshman year at Michigan. Flip, as everyone called him, was an alumnus of my fraternity, Phi Gamma Delta, and moved back to Ann Arbor after retirement. He was always around the house for alumni matters, and our fraternity was one of the organizations he devoted himself to. 

He was 80 when I met him, but I would’ve never realized that from his demeanor. He was as vibrant and active as the collegians who lived in the fraternity house he now was overseeing as part of our alumni board. I found this excerpt of his obituary to be a perfect representation of the man he was:

Phelps was first and foremost a gentleman, adored and respected by many for his kindness, loyalty, personal integrity, and concern for others.

I distinctly remember one day I was talking to Flip, in the Fraternity’s kitchen, because I was on dishwashing duty that week. I was a Junior at the time, living in the house, and serving on the Chapter’s executive board. I had gotten to know Flip well during my time as a collegian. He had always taken an interest in me and checked-in on me often.

Flip and I were chatting, but then he asked me - quite directly - if I was going to run in the election for the Interfraternity Council’s executive board, which was the governing body for many of the fraternities at Michigan. In campus life, the IFC as it’s called is one of the more influential extra-curricular organizations for undergrads because it oversees a huge part of the greek system, which at Michigan is a major part of campus life.

I gave him a hemming and hawing answer, and basically shared some lame him excuses for why I didn’t think it was a good idea to run. To be sure, deep down I wanted to run for an office, but didn’t believe in myself enough to try.

Flip was having none of this, of course. He encouraged me to run for a post. He told me that I was a capable leader and that I would represent our chapter well. He saw that I was intimidated at the responsibility and scrutiny that would be part of a campus-wide office and convinced me I could handle it.

He saw something in me and cultivated it. He was probably the first person to do this that wasn’t a teacher or related to me.

And this mentor ship didn’t stop once I graduated college. As a young alumnus I lived in Ann Arbor and served on my fraternity’s alumni board with him for a few years. I got to know his wonderful wife, Jean, over the years I knew home. They invited me and my close friend Jenny - my roommate at the time - over for dinner. It learned the important lesson of what adult friendships are supposed to look like.

I only knew Flip for eight years, from 2005 until he passed in 2013. But in that time he had an outsized influence on my life. He wasn’t just a mentor he was a father to me for a narrowly scoped, temporally limited part of my life.

I realized only recently that the concept of a mentor comes from Homer’s Odyssey (a new translation came out recently, it’s terrific). 

In the epic, Mentor is a friend of Odysseus and counsels Odysseus’s son Telemachus to rise up against the suitors wasting his father’s wealth and courting his mother. Mentor, who is inhabited by the goddess Athena during this scene, is a critical figure guiding Telemachus, who has been without a father his entire life, while away at war.

My own father, Girish, was deeply influenced by Hindu philosophy and lived by a code: take care of yourself and then take care of your family. Only then should you help others. He always questioned my community pursuits because in his view, one should get his own house in order first, so that he doesn’t burden others in the community.

As a young man, I thought his view was selfish and narrow minded. But over the years, I’ve come to find great wisdom in my father’s approach. Getting my own house in order does come first, because he was right - we need the community to help with our burdens. But he was also right in that our own stability must quickly be followed by serving others. We cannot enrich our own households indefinitely.

This has become very real to me lately. If I’m being honest, our house is almost in order - at least once we’re out of the newborn phase with all our kids. I am much better off than my parents were at my age, mostly due to their financial sacrifices, their insistence that I get an education, and their upbringing of me. 

This is actually a scary, slightly unnerving thought, because the burden of serving others is heavy and consequential. 

In our culture today, I think we use the term mentor a bit too lightly. At their best, mentors are not just advisors, they are momentary fathers. Flip was not just a mentor, he was a momentary father to me. Moses and Roger, are not just my neighbors - they have been momentary fathers to me when they taught me how to change my car battery or offer advice on how to go on a camping trip with young kids. 

Two Police Commanders were not just my colleagues, they were momentary fathers to me when they reminded me to take a leave of absence when Bo was born or rushed me out of a situation at a community event when a dude who beat double murder was asking me a ton of personal questions. 

The father of a friend from business school, who happens to also be a writer, has been a momentary father to me when we have chatted on the telephone about finding purpose in life and work.

I think if we’re honest, those of us who feel like we’ve had some success at living life have been blessed with many momentary mothers and fathers along the way.

There is a time that comes where we must expand our sphere. When that time comes, we cannot walk away from being momentary fathers to others. I - and many of us, I think - am closer to that time than I expected.

How to camp with young kids

My wife and I took two kids across the country to camp at North Cascades National Park - and survived! Kidding aside, the trip was hard but it was terrific, special, and full of life-long memories - which you can read about in a companion post here: Moments from North Cascades.

Don’t be afraid to go camping with kids. It was well worth the challenge. Here are some things we learned that we wanted to share with other families like us. I’ve organized our lessons into four categories:

• Tips for when you’re planning your trip

• Tips for when you’re preparing / packing for your trip

• Tips for when you’re on your trip

• Tips for after you return home

Thanks to my wife, Robyn, for adding her reflections into this post!

Our situation and trip

Here’s some context on who we are and the trip we took. Of course, apply our tips with care based on your circumstances.

We’re a family of four and a half. My wife and I, Bo (age 3.5) and Myles (1.5). At the time of our trip my wife was about a trimester into her first pregnancy (hence the “half” kid). We unfortunately had to leave our pup at the kennel. This trip was the first time our boys ever went overnight camping.

Between us, Robyn and I are pretty experienced backcountry campers, we’ve been on two backcountry hikes together and I’ve been on several trips with friends. I don’t think you have to be “experienced’ to have a great trip, we just happen to have a lot of “light” backcountry equipment from trips we took when we didn’t have kids.

For our trip we flew from Detroit to Seattle and then drove to North Cascades National Park in northern Washington. We intended to spend a few days in Seattle before heading to the park, but had to cut our trip short because of logistical reasons. Instead, after landing at SEA-TAC we had a spot of lunch, bought some supplies (camping fuel, food, etc.), and drove straight to the park.

Tips for when you’re planning your trip

The first step is picking a park and making a reservation. Most of this is very easy to research from the comfort of your couch. Here are a few filters to consider when googling and some helpful tools.

• Proximity to a city / airport - we wanted to be within 2-4 hours of a major city for two reasons, we didn’t want to fly across the country and camp for two nights and come home. Since our kids aren’t old enough to be in a tent for a week, we looked for national parks near cities. Luckily, there are plenty. Take a look at a map to get your bearings or google “National Parks within 3 hours of a city” to find blog posts like this one.

• Time of year - with two young kids you want to minimize uncertainty and risk as you’ll have your hands full just taking care of them. Look at the weather for the park at the time of your trip to get an idea of the likely weather. Again, a simple search like, “best time of year to visit North Cascades National Park” or “Weather for North Cascades National Park in August” can help you get some quick tips from fellow travelers.

• “Kid friendly” - Again googling to read posts and reviews is great here. Googling “kid-friendly national parks” or “Kid-friendly activities at North Cascades National Park” will get you plenty of great posts from other adventurous families.

• Recreation.gov - Recreation.gov is a terrific clearing house for all the national parks, forests, lakeshores, etc. If you search for a park on this site, it’ll take you to the appropriate website at the National Park Service or other governmental websites. Each park has a well curated list of activities, travel warnings (like if there are wildfires or other issues going on) and usually have a list of family-friendly activities. Recreation.gov is also how you search for campsites and make actual reservations online. Recreation.gov also has a pretty decent app which you can use to make your search a little more user-friendly. I didn’t realize this until just now, but the National Park Service also has some spify trip planning tools at FindYourPark.com, they even have a neat quiz to help find parks that you might like!

• Finding a reservation - Campsites are reserved quickly at most national parks during peak season, especially at the popular ones. I almost pulled my hair out finding a campsite that worked for us - but you don’t have to! One of my colleagues at work told me about a site that scans for campsite openings / cancellations based on criteria you specify and sends you an SMS alert when an opening is found. He said it worked well for their family and the fee was reasonable (plans start at $10). Check out CampNab for more information. Alternatively, you can google “Underrated National Parks” to minimize your competition for a campsite. Campsites at National Parks can be booked 6 months in advance so plan ahead.

Tips for when you’re preparing / Packing for your trip

• Shop at an outfitter for the big stuff - we have been members at REI for a long time. And we love it. There are plenty of team members at the store that can answer questions (and they don’t make you feel dumb) and everyone there I’ve talked to gives their personal reviews of the equipment available for purchase. Go there, and ask questions to people who do it for a living. As an example, there are a million websites talking about the minimum age for using a sleeping bag and I was confused and scared. Once I got to the store and asked someone, they advised to just wrap our little guy up in blankets or a sleep sack and put him on a sleeping pad to stay warm. Problem solved. We got the easy stuff on REI.com and Amazon.

• Involve the kids when shopping - It would’ve been easier for me to buy everything online or head to REI by myself. But we’re glad we took the kids with us, because our big kid had a blast. He picked out his own socks and some of his clothes and just though REI was the coolest place ever. By being there he started to get excited for the trip and feel invested in the process.

• What to buy - If you’re a seasoned camper, you probably have a solid gear list. If you’re not a huge camper, knowing what you need can be pretty overwhelming. To start, here’s a link to our gear list for our trip. Be sure to also look at the National Park Service website to learn about any special equipment you may need (bear canisters, water management supplies, etc.) for specific parks. And of course, google is your friend.

• Damn this stuff is expensive - Yes, camping gear can be really expensive, especially for your first outing. Two tips of advice here: 1) ask a friend and 2) the stuff lasts for a long time. You know who your friends are who camp. We’re kind of annoying about it, because of how much we love to talk about camping. Ask them for advice (you can also do a lot of googling obviously) and most camping people are more than happy to lend you their gear and show you how to use it. It’s just kind of an unwritten ethos amongst people who camp - we spread the gospel, so to speak. And most of the durable equipment you buy will be built to last, so think of it as a capital investment into equipment with a long useful life.

• Do a dress rehearsal - Our kids slept in a tent for the first time on this trip. We practiced pitching the tent in our backyard which was great to get them used to the idea of a tent and getting comfortable inside it. And, I had to check it was in good working order, anyway. By the time we were done with our “test run” both our boys were so excited about camping. If you have the time, you could also do one night at a nearby state or county park to really do a more realistic dress rehearsal. At a minimum, you can find some trails near your home and go for a long walk to break in the kids’ new gear and get them used to long walks outside.

Tips for when you’re on your trip

• Getting there - A lot of the basics apply here. Pack light. Buy as much as you can locally (food, liquids that can’t be legally carried on planes). Don’t put knives in your carry on. Plan extra time because kids are slow. Pack extra clothes for potty accidents. What really was complicated was how much luggage we had - don’t try to be a pack mule or a hero. Weigh your bags at the house to make sure you don’t have to shuffle supplies across bags. We also rented car seats instead of carrying our own, which was a game changer. In retrospect, I should’ve sprung for a luggage cart at the airport because I had to haul so much stuff and was exhausted before we even got to the park. Make the transit part of your trip simple so you’re not stressed when you’re actually camping.

• Sleep - if you can conquer sleeping in a tent, everything else is easy. Our first night was rough, but here are some techniques that worked:

  • Tent Expectations - Our second night, Robyn had the master stroke of proactively setting expectations for sleeping in the tent. The second night went much better than the first, mostly for that reason. Our kids just needed some calmly communicated structure.

  • Infant warmth - Myles (our 1.5 year old) was too small to have his sleeping bag. It would’ve been a suffocation hazard to put him in one. In lieu of blankets, we put him in a large sleep sack that we had for crib sleep. It kept him warm enough when paired with a sleeping pad underneath him. Don’t skimp on the sleeping pad for anyone - at just about any park the ground will sap heat from you overnight.

  • Separating the kids - At first we thought we’d put the kids between us in the tent: big mistake. Separate them if you can so they don’t egg each other on or have as much of an audience. By a stroke of luck, our oldest had to go potty after about 30 minutes of chaos in the tent, which gave me a chance to rock the baby down without any distractions. Upon Robyn and Bo’s return, Bo realized he lost his audience and was relatively quiet until he fell sleep. Divide and conquer if you need to.

  • Parental bladder management - make sure you hydrate and pee well before bedtime and go one extra time just in case. It is seriously the worst when you have to pee at four in the morning but are afraid to unzip the tent and wake up the kids that you worked so hard to get to bed!

• Potty time - Pack extra clothes, for the trip and in your day pack, for blow outs or accidents. Also, hit the potty at the trailhead (if there is one) before and after every hike. We had to turn around just before we hit the waterfall at the end of a trail because our oldest said, “hey mommy, I need to go potty.” We were so close to the end, too!

• Options for activities - Do your homework in advance and find all the options for short “easy” hikes you can. You know your kids best, so choose the distance and elevation change that makes sense to your family. Be sure to visit the Visitor’s Center and ask the Park Rangers for advice when you arrive. We found it helpful to print off a whole bunch of guides and trail reviews from blog posts we found when searching “family friendly hikes north cascades”, the official NPS website for the park, and from AllTrails.com. We spent breakfast planning the day based on the forecast, what were feeling like doing, and how fatigued everyone was. It helped to have a paper list at hand with 10-20 options to choose from.

• Calorie and water management - When you’re outside, you have to drink and eat a lot more just to be healthy, obviously. I made the mistake of letting the kids drink from a common water bottle, which was a problem because I couldn’t make sure they were hydrating enough. Having their own water bottles would’ve been smarter. Keep a close watch on exactly how much the kids are eating and drinking, because it’s much harder for them to know how much extra they need to consume and for them to verbalize what their body is feeling like. And if they’re not hydrated enough, it can cause crankiness, or worse, cause their behavior to become erratic, which can be dangerous out on the trail. Also, buy lots of trail mix!

• Be brave enough to turn around - We were on a trail, late in the afternoon and the kids didn’t nap well that day. It was hot, and as it turned out, the trail we were on was all uphill. It had a beautiful vista at the end, so we really pushed hard. About halfway up, our kids started to fade. We pressed on for a few minutes, and I quicklyrealized that was a mistake. So we turned around immediately. I was frustrated, but it was the right decision and we wished we had done it sooner. Unlike adults, kids totally shut down when they are sore or tired, instead of just getting cranky and pressing on. Rest and breaks also don’t help them as much. In retrospect that’s obvious, but I forgot. Be brave enough to turn around, even if it means missing the great view at the summit. Because you need to get the kids safely back down to the trailhead, and that’s dangerous if they’re delirious on the trail. Turn around before they meltdown, not after.

• Cooling off - They’re so much excitement and energy and fatigue on a camping trip, which can get kids to a pretty boisterous state of mind. Taking a loop around the campsite 1-1 with a parent was a great strategy that Robyn thought of on the fly. If you need a child to cool off and calm down, taking a lap with them is a great tactic.

• Backup plans - In retrospect, I wish I would’ve had a backup plan, including nearby hotels (in case sleeping in a tent was a big failure), restaurants, supply stores, and medical facilities. Especially with Robyn expecting, it would’ve given me piece of mind to have thought of a plan for “if shit hit the fan.”

• Gear management - Camping requires a lot of stuff, and when you have kids it grows. Have plenty of extra stuff sacks and triage as you go. We found it helpful to separate everyone’s different clothes and laundry in different bags. That made it much easier to keep everything organized and have ready access to what we needed. Our approach was to have two large backpacks with lots of little bags for organization (just like a backpacking trip). We used a large laundry bag / duffel bag and put our tent and sleeping pads inside there with a backpack for the plane, which also helps to keep the gear safe through baggage claim.

Tips for after you return home

• Family Photo / Souvenirs - We took a family photo on our trip and we’re glad we did. We immediately printed a photo upon our return, and it’s already hanging in a frame on our wall. We all get to relive the trip just a little every time we see it. I feel so happy and proud every time I pass it to go upstairs. It could be something other than a photo, like a Christmas ornament, pin, map, or other souvenir. But a tactile or visual reminder made a much bigger emotional connection than I expected. And, it reminds us that we’re adventurers!

• Storytelling - We used the drive back to Seattle to debrief on the trip and ask our sons how they enjoyed it. It was so wonderful to hear how excited our kids were, 10 minutes out of the park our big guy already wanted to come back. We also made it a point to let the kids talk about the trip with friends and family (instead of us just speaking for them). Talking about the trip gave them a sense of pride, and hopefully helps them remember our time there.

• Cleanup - I tried to involve our kids when unpacking from the trip. It gave them another chance to talk about our awesome trip, and it was actually nice having some little hands to help out. And, it was a nice way to introduce them to taking care of gear which is a very important skill for any camper - junior or senior.

• Start planning the next one! - Of course, the trip was really hard but it was so worth it. The time when you’re most excited is when you’re still riding the high of a successful trip. So starting planning right away, and go find your park! You’ll be so glad you did.

Kitchen Table Entrepreneurship

I have been trying my damndest this year to not give into the “that’s 2020” mentality. This whole year, I’ve been operating with a mantra of “get up off the mat, get up off the mat, get up off the mat.”

And let me start with honesty: I’ve failed on many fronts.

I didn’t finish this book, I shouted a lot at my sons, and attended church less, even though it was easier than before - to name a few ways I’ve failed.

But I’m encouraged. At the beginning of the year, I thought basically everyone but me had given up on 2020, as if it made you one of the cool kids to talk about how much 2020 sucked. 

But this week, after taking a breath, it hit me how many people hadn’t given up on 2020, and were just going about their lives, quietly, but with tremendous courage and persistence.

In retrospect, I’ve seen an explosion of what I’d call “kitchen table entrepreneurship.”

By this, I don’t mean the venture-backed startups that develop software or some lifestyle product. Though I’m sure that’s continued.

I mean the ideas that were born around kitchen tables, in WhatsApp threads, or on Zoom calls by regular folks just trying to find a way to make things better for the people around them.

Like my sister-in-law who proclaimed it to be “Pajama Christmas” this year, rolled with three onsies to our family get together, and found a way for us to do a family social-distanced wine tasting after virtual church, complete with tasting scorecards to make up for the fact we couldn’t safely do our normal traditions.

Or the public servants in Detroit who just figured out how to rapidly build out drive-through Covid testing within days and weeks of the pandemic starting, put in protocols almost literally overnight to prevent the spread of Covid within DPD and DFD, launched a virtual concert of Detroit artists to help people stay sane, or delivered thousands of laptops to schoolchildren that didn’t have remote learning capabilities.

Or my wife, who’s been charging with some of her colleagues on legit, sincere Diversity and Inclusion programs and a Caregiver support group. She’s too humble to make noise about it, but she and her colleagues are doing really innovative work to change their particular workplace and improving the lives of their colleagues.

Or there are so many people who have figured out how to get their elderly neighbors groceries, or shovel their sidewalks, or get things like neighborhood storm drain cleanings coordinated even though some folks in the neighborhood barely knew how to send an email before this thing started, let alone join a Zoom call.

Or just today, I was able to use my Meijer App like a mobile cash register to scan my items as I shopped - minimizing time in the store and contacts with frontline employees.

Or our local businesses on Livernois, just turning on a dime to find ways to stay in business and operate safely. Narrow Way, our local coffee shop, is really efficient now, has used technology and new offerings to make their customer experience even better than it was before, and even though I’ve been in a mask, they still found a way to know me by name and make me feel respected and welcomed.

And even people who’ve had relative after relative get sick or pass away - I’ve heard so many stories of how they’re finding ways to get through, or continue to help others, or just keep doing what they do.

These are just examples from my own life, but they seem to be illustrative examples of people just making things better where they are, without a lot of money or a lot of fanfare. They’re just doing it.

Maybe this has always been happening and I haven’t noticed it as much. Either way, I think this kitchen table entrepreneurship is worth celebrating.

As I’ve reflected on these stories of kitchen table entrepreneurship, there has been one lesson that’s struck me most.

During this year, the entrepreneurship I’ve seen has all been on things that are important. Like, I haven’t seen stupid or totally self-indulgent or narcissistic apps, products, and services emerge from this situation. Those are getting less buzz at least.

The kitchen table entrepreneurship I’ve seen has addressed problems that matter. People are finding ways to make things better in material ways for the people around them. They’re not doing this stuff to get a pat on the back, get in the paper, or hustle someone out of a dollar. They’re doing it because it matters for the people around them: their families, friends, employees, neighbors, and customers.

And the lesson for me has been relearning a simple but wise idea: focus on what matters. That’s when hard stuff gets done, and new ideas emerge from unlikely places - when the outcome matters.

In that expression - focus on what matters - I’ve always leaned into the focus part. If I just focus more, I can live out my intentions, I thought.

But I’ve learned this year, that it might be wiser to lean in the the “what matters” part of that expression. Is what we’re trying to do really, really important? If not, why are we even doing it?

The lesson of kitchen table entrepreneurship, for me at least, has been to dig deeper for why something matters. If we can find things that matter, the focus part seems to mostly take care of itself.

Seeing all this entrepreneurial activity emerge from kitchen tables all across the country has been truly inspiring to me. And more importantly, it has been a great reminder that we get up off the mat if and when something truly matters.