Skip to main content

The Next Best Option

Kenzo has zero problem chickening out of stuff. At the cheapo barber shop he famously panicked and declined a haircut after I’d already paid using the ticket machine and it caused a bit of trouble trying to get a refund. The surly barber guy even gave me a warning.

So today I saw the ticket machine for the ski lift and looked at Kenzo and then at the ski lift going up the mountain. There’s no way we’re getting a refund here. So I pulled the boys over, even though Osamu was fully revved to go. I pointed to a nice old couple getting on the lift and we all observed as they slowly crept crept up the incline.

I asked the boys if they could do that and they both gave me the affirmative. Eri doubled down. “Are you suuuure?”

Somehow we made it up Mount Izumi with a finicky 6-year-old and Osamu on what I termed a “flying chair”. I just made that up in the moment to assure success. The idea of a flying chair was sure to mentally distract them until we were already on our way. Up to about the halfway point I was ready for Kenzo to panic and cause the entire lift system to go into code red so he could be escorted back down the mountain, especially after it stopped and started a couple of times, causing the lift chairs to shake pretty good.



But we made it. I think it’s safe to say the sense of achievement was not just felt by Kenzo. Twenty-six bucks for the round trip tickets hung in the balance, and since the boys can’t ride alone and it’s only two per chair, if anyone decided they weren’t going there was gonna be a disgruntled gaijin dad making a scene.


Eri’s not an outdoorsy type. She likes cafes and shopping downtown and air conditioning. Even the walk from the car up to where the ski lift is elicited a muted sigh of weariness. Weekend adventures to random crazy places are the norm for the boys and me at this point. Eri may never just truly give in to the shenanigans. 


And that’s okay. 

She prefers to use the GPS navigator when driving. I like to see if I can find the way myself. Somewhere in between those two sensibilities is where our relationship thrives. 



Some boys gave Kenzo a red dragonfly they caught.  Second weekend in row.


I did a late afternoon walk that turned into an early evening walk real quick. The boys were napping hard and Eri told me to take my time. I love listening to podcasts while I walk but today there was plenty of audio in my mind already. Sometimes I wish I could freeze time so I could just grab a coffee and sit and stare at everything before it has a chance to pass by.


But since that’s not possible the next best option is to grab a glass of wine and be in every moment as it passes by.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Not About Baseball

I stayed up past my bedtime again last night. I almost made it. I watched a couple of episodes of Ted Lasso and came to a good stopping point where I was satisfied with myself for enjoying some quiet TV time with my favorite show and even though it was after midnight, I was confident I could still get a pretty good night's sleep.  But no. For some reason I decided it would be a good idea to just lay on the living room carpet and put on a movie. I saw the first seven or eight minutes of Goodfellas and then I woke up when the end credits were rolling with Sid Vicious' is cover of My Way . I brush my teeth and I can see the light of day already shining in through the bathroom window. "It’s almost the longest day of the year," I told myself, to at least rationalize why I'm brushing my teeth and crawling into bed at this hour. I was trying to minimize the mental anguish I regularly put on myself for not just going to bed like I should. I told Eri that I was thinking a...
Post a Comment
Read more

Overpriced Highball for the Big Guy

I keep falling asleep at my desk and waking up all groggy and surly in the middle of night, stumbling downstairs to brush my teeth without waking anyone, and slinking back up the steps and into bed. So I was the last one up again this morning, but I made up for it by quickly getting ready and taking the boys out on a Sunday morning walk to look for bugs. Kenzo has been particularly keen on capturing another lizard. He doesn't understand that lizard season is ending and those guys are becoming more and more rare. He got his hopes up when we came across a little one walking up some woodsy steps. After that we took a break. Eri's sister and her husband stopped by to grab the car seats that the boys just graduated from. Their little girl Emika is just now big enough to start using one and next spring she's gonna have a brand new baby brother or sister who will also need a car seat, so the timing worked out nice for all of us. Emika apparently loves Thomas the Tank Engine (who d...
Post a Comment
Read more

Mr. Blue Sky

Man, I conked out so hard on the living room floor tonight. Right after bath time, before story time. I barely remember. Completely exhausted. Big adventure day. Another in a long series I hope the boys will remember when they’re older... our first IMAX movie, a downtown city outing, and some life lessons in the game center. We left the house at 9:15 a.m. and didn’t get back until nearly 6 p.m., totally spent but full of pizza and memories. The Wild Robot in IMAX was totally stunning. The scale, the colors, the sound. We could feel every gust of wind and rustle of leaves. I made sure we had prime seats, row G, right in the center. Two big buckets of popcorn too, which, according to Kenzo and Osamu, I  absolutely should not  be sharing. “You should get your own!” they kept saying. I think a little bit of popcorn thievery is well within my rights as the papa. After the movie, we headed through the cold and wind across to the game center on the other side of Sendai Station. Being...
Post a Comment
Read more