I'm not a wise man, but there can be little doubt – even without the benefit of definitive proof - that I am nevertheless wiser than a young child. Some of you will call this assertion into question, I don't blame you. But for the sake of this blog, let us assume that this current rendition of me carries more knowledge than it's 6-year-old predecessor.
New Years Day in my house was always one of my favorite "holidays" growing up. Holiday is in quotations because New Years doesn't signify anything particular except for a spike in health club memberships and a need for new calendars.
When I was six, my sister hadn't yet been born and my mother still worked a large percentage of holidays as a nurse. New Years Day was a day spent alone with Dad. I can't accurately describe why these days were so important to me… frankly, I may never fully come to grips with the importance of these times.
I suppose the argument can be made that these times weren't as important as I've since made them in my head. But there can be no argument that at the time, I enjoyed our New Years Day tradition. That is an unshakable fact.
January in Chicago is cold, gray and often filled with ice; three moods of Mother Nature of which I've never gotten along. Somewhere along the line, Dad thought it would be fun - perhaps even cathartic - to pop in a videotaped Cubs game from the previous summer; cook up some hotdogs; buy SlimJims, Crackerjacks, popcorn and whatever else is normally eaten at baseball games and spend the afternoon recovering from the holidays.
This emotional vacation from winter seemed - both to a 36-year-old man and to his 6-year-old son - to be the most fitting way to begin each calendar year. Never mind that pitchers and catchers wouldn't be reporting to spring training for another three months and never mind that the games we watched each year were more than five months old. It was fun and warm and most importantly, it was ours.
The process itself wasn't complicated, indeed many weekends of my life have been filled sitting in front of the television watching baseball and eating junk food. But the 6-year-old me rarely got junk food and my mom would have a conniption fit if I ever came home with candy.* It was this rarified air inhabited by junk food that made this New Years event so damn exciting.** To this day SlimJims and peanuts are among my favorite all-time snacks.***
Recreating a day at the ballpark was just about the best way I could imagine spending an afternoon. There was even an unspoken understanding that on these specified first days of each new year, it was even okay to be messy and spill on the floor. 1986 was the era of the Dustbuster and damned if Dad didn't come prepared with one of those too.
Peanut shells on the carpeting? No problem, Dustbuster it. Popcorn pieces that didn't quite make it into my mouth? No problem. Dustbuster it. Coca-Cola spilled all over the floor because we're re-celebrating the homerun Ryne Sandberg hit back in June? No problem. Go get a sponge and don't tell your mother.
I loved New Years Day. There can be no mistaking this fact.
I wonder where the social chain of adolescent idiocy begins? A nice normal kid goes to middle school, comes home and suddenly outgrows the usefulness of his parents. When? How? Why? The influence of "other kids" at school are a popular scapegoat, but those kids had to outgrow their parents before influencing others. What happens in between piggyback rides as a toddler and that same toddler growing up and wanting to be dropped off a block before the movie theater all his friends are hanging out?
I suppose if I knew the answer to that, it would stand to reason that I'd know the answer to a few other mysteries of parenthood and I'd be compelled to write a book instead of this blog. But I don't have those answers so here we are: me the writer, you the reader.
By the age of 12 it started occurring to me that New Years Eve was an occasion for friends to party, create a ruckus and go crazy. With this type of behavior came the inevitable fatigue the following morning. It became increasingly difficult to make it home to watch the old ballgame with Dad.
But for several years, I did my best and the tradition remained intact. It was different though. It wasn't as much fun. It was just tradition. It was comfortable, but it wasn't as shiny with excitement as it once was.
That's the problem with growing up and gaining independence, very rarely do kids know how to handle it. Lord knows, as a teenager, I started eating peanuts and Cracker Jacks and SlimJims a lot more than once a year. And while I had no way of understanding at the time, buying that junk food was helping to kill something that looking back now, was one of the most special things I had in my life.
Dad and I prepared less and less for New Years Day after a while. Instead of shopping for all the game's essential ingredients for a week leading up to New Years, we started going an hour beforehand and did without the stuff we couldn't find in the store. And while she cannot be blamed, once my sister was born and became old enough to understand what was going on, her presence changed the tradition's meaning as well.
It's not her fault; sometimes even the most insignificant changes can release the lightning from the bottle.
I'm not sure if Dad grew tired of the tradition or if he was just hurt by the understanding that I had, but by the time I was 15, he stopped asking if I'd be around for New Years. He'd wait until I mentioned that I would be.
But he always made sure to tape a good Cubs game sometime during the previous summer just in case.
By the time I was 17, the social sleeperhold that high school inflicts on so many kids choked everything else out of my life. The parties grew bigger and louder and more fun and it was damn near impossible for me to get excited for the Cubs game with Dad (and now my sister). Dad hadn't mentioned anything about the game or our tradition and my foolish teenage brain reasoned that he probably didn't want to do it anymore; that he probably hadn't really thought about it much.
I don't remember the reaction my dad had when I told him that I wouldn't be around New Years Day, but I do remember the guilt and sadness I tried to stifle within myself after I said it.
There's a wonderful line in a Bob Seger song that says, "I wish I didn't know now what I didn't know then." I find this sentiment to be true quite often these days, but never moreso than in this situation. I don't really remember any of those teenage New Years parties with much detail or fondness, but I think back to my New Years tradition with Dad every time I recall the things that made my childhood good.
What makes these recollections so painful is the knowledge that they ended and that I ended them – selfishly.
The day after New Years when I was 17, I went looking for a snack in our kitchen pantry. On one of the highest shelves where we kept some of the lesser-used dishware, I noticed a plastic bag with a familiar red and yellow package inside. I stood on my tiptoes and grabbed it. Inside were CrackerJacks, peanuts and the familiar primary colors of the SlimJim box.
All purchased and silently waiting in case I had wanted to keep the tradition alive.
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* Although I can't verify this information, I've been told that I never had a sip of sodapop until I went to kindergarten – an outcome my mom laments to this day.
** There are some things older people just can't teach younger people. With my children, I am certain to want to assure them that not getting what you want all the time makes the times that you do get what you want, all the more special. But there hasn't been a 6-year-old yet that hasn't been made constantly upset by wanting something and not having it.
It's funny, I feel like I get so much more of what I want now, than I ever did as a child. But I'm wondering, am I getting more or am I just wanting less? Either way, I find myself excited about things less and less as the years move further away from my childhood.
*** A year ago I would have called peanuts and SlimJims "food," but I'm an adult now and it's time to admit that they are just "snacks."
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