Important Stuff

By Ronald N. Guy Jr

The workday is done.  Dinner is consumed and cleaned up.  Other daily audulting (yes, it’s a verb) nonsense - paying bills, ironing clothes, making lunches for the next day – is complete.  An aging domestic warrior saunters upstairs, grabs the remote and flips on the television.

Countless channels are available (the spoils of a modern world enabling sedentation), but only a few are needed – i.e. the ones broadcasting live sports.  Every night over these last few fabulous weeks has offered NBA and NHL playoff showdowns in New York, Raleigh, Los Angeles, Miami, Oklahoma City, Minneapolis and several cities north of the 49^th parallel (Canada!).  “Waiter, I’ll take one of everything, please!”

An ancillary routine has emerged in my household during execution of the ritual described above.  The games beamed from across the hinterland into my man-loft inevitably produce a fantastic shot or sick goal that prompts a loud guttural sound from my loins that would make my hairy, meat-eating, cave-dwelling ancestors proud.  On cue, my son, whose bedroom is adjacent to the man-loft, will run in to survey the scene.  He’s likely been watching the same event and takes the primal reaction next door as evidence of my presence upstairs and an invitation to watch the rest of this night’s fantastic competition with his old man.

As east cost dwellers, we stay up past our bedtimes to watch to conclusion.  I neither have nor want the discipline to turn off epic games in crunch time.  I certainly don’t want my kid thinking he should.  This is important stuff! 

Important stuff.  The games?  Yes, of course.  These are the greatest athletes in the world battling for their sports’ biggest prize and team and individual immortality.  But something more important is happening.

An admission: Sometimes I don’t watch the games.  My mind wanders.  My vision drifts from the television.  And I just watch my kid, the one-time little fellow who is now entering quasi-adulthood.  He jumps.  He laughs.  He produces similar caveman noises.  Most importantly, though, he’s present, with me, in this moment.  Age and life experience have provided me the wisdom to recognize the preciousness of these daily gatherings and this moment in time.  This will not hold.  It will not last.  There’s a clock on this experience, just like the one governing the games we watch.  The countdown to zero is inevitable. 

My son is a high school senior.  He’s off to college this fall and our lives will never be the same.  The life that we’ve both known since he arrived as we all did – naked and screaming gloriously – is about to change forever.  I know this because I’ve lived it as a younger man and as a father (with his older sister).  I think he does too, as much as he can.  We’ve never actually talked about it, but it is what draws us together at night.  I’ll admit that I embellish my reactions during these games, ensuring he can hear me.  I smile wide when I hear his door open seconds later, indicating he’s in-bound.  Do my eyes sometimes swell with tears as he darts into the room?  Every time.  Why?  Because next year he won’t be down the hall for the NBA and NHL playoffs.  He’ll be in a dorm room.  I’ll be in my man-loft - alone.  Sure, we can text and FaceTime, but it won’t be like this.  Not next year.  Not the year after.  Probably never again.

During this graduation season, many families are facing this same inflection point.  The emotional roller coaster is real – a combination of sentimentality and excitement for the present and future.  What I tell myself: I have to be okay with my son’s departure for college.  This is how it’s supposed to be.  He’s worked hard and created this opportunity; this is the first step in building his life, not existing in the life his mother and I built for him.  Like a lot of parents, I’ll get to this point eventually.  For now, it’s elusive and I’m just grateful for sports, the daily games and the treasured memories they are creating for this dad and his son.