I Saved My Kid's Life!!

Our family has officially perfected the ability to never lose one another in public. As I write this I’m realizing how blatantly I’ve now pissed off the jinx yourself gods.

In the movie Robots, there’s a scene where the two main characters crash a party to try and talk to Big Weld. Before going in they agree to scream “Cuh Caw” is one or the other person needs help. And there our family safety words were born.

At first it was a kind of a joke. I was at the store and my wife and daughter got separated from my son and me. So I loudly screamed “Cuh Caw!!” Immediately my son copied me and started loudly calling “Cuh Caw!!” Five minutes later the entire store wanted us dead and we found the other half of the family. The wife….annoyed as shit. The daughter…..jealous she missed out on the screaming and quickly made up for it by yelling “Cuh Caw!!” for the next 20 minutes.

My wife is a huuuuuge wanderer. If I blink a split second longer than I should, she’s gone. So this extremely handy calling has come in handy many, many times. In fact, here’s a list of a few of them:

Jewel Osco                                          The Park

The Field Museum                                During Sex

Target                                                  On Bike Rides

Downtown Downers Grove                  On the Metra

Our House                                           Shedd Aquarium

Noodles & Company                           Wrigley Field

cuh caw from Why Is Daddy Crying on Vimeo.

You get the drift. But this past weekend I saw that while hearing my kids scream Cuh Caw throughout a store is annoying for everyone except me, it’s also a damn fine safety feature.

We were in Target. My wife was 20 yards ahead of me, I was keeping an eye on her while holding the boy’s hand, and glancing behind me to keep an eye on the girl who was lagging. I noticed my four-year-old daughter had lost site of us and was looking around with a worried look on her face trying to spot us.

Immediately she put her hands up to her mouth and yelled “Cuh Caw, Cuh Caw!!”

The crisis was quickly overted, but a lesson was learned. Despite my wife's constant bitching of how I'm ruining our kids lives, I actually saved one that day. Kinda like Saving Private Ryan....or...something. Whatever - all I know is....when anyone in this fam hear's "Cuh Caw".....we alll come running.

*as a side note, if you know us and see us out in public - please don't fuck with us by yelling "Cuh Caw".....we'd be up shit's creek for sure....

Thanks!

Music Obsession Meets Old Videos

As all new parents do....we documented the hell out of our children's first words, falls, shits, walks, laughs, and insanity. I have about an hour commute every day to work. Along that wonderful, adventurous journey I listen to a ton of music - 90 percent of which my brother claims is "shit" cause he can't pull his head out of the 80's ass.

But along that journey I listen to songs and lyrics and I can immediately connect them to moments in our family's life that make sense...or just flat out fuckin' rock.

Recently I've melded my obsession with music and film. These two films are rookie at best....but they at least give you a taste of the path I'm venturing down. One is low quality....other, is painfully short but filled with potential.

Enjoy kids!

Christmas 2007 from Justin Lyons on Vimeo.

Grayson - A Father's Confessional from Justin Lyons on Vimeo.

Wanna See My Underwear?!

Work, walk a half mile, catch the train, 22-min. ride, walk .7 miles and I'm home. In the fridge there's a beer. Above the fridge there's wine. In-between both of those is a wife and two kids, one of which shouts:

"wanna see my underwear?"

Yeah....marinate on that for a minute world. Every man's dream is to walk in his front door to hear those words from his beautiful wife? Of course in that dream the words are also followed by a variety of other terrific adjectives, verbs, action words, etc....

But on this particular day....it was my 6-year-old son saying that lovely phrase.

My mind kicks into overdrive as I think:

• should I say no to teach him not to ask grown-ups if they want to see his skibbies?
• should I say "wha?" and keep walking quickly towards the mecca of alcohol?
• should I say "sure dude" and uncomfortably hope he's not about to show me some type of unbelievable stain, growth, or whatever...

I chose the latter. And he immediately dropped trow as I clenched and waited. And what did he show - boxer briefs.

"Just like you wear daddy!!!"

The little bastard was so happy to show me that he was wearing the same underwear as me. My heart shattered, I truly felt touched, and I gave the kid a hug.

It's the obscure, subtle things in life that pop out when you least expect it and make you feel like shit for yelling at the kid for not eating his breakfast, or potentially breaking his sister's arm. I felt like a role model for a split second. I imagined my fat-ass on the cover of GQ being oogled by dudes thinking "I'd get so much ass if I looked like that." But alas...it was because I wear the unique and privileged hat of father and in the mornings, put on undies that don't ride up, hold my boys just right, and to my son......look like rock star underwear.