Excuse me while I get a little emotional

I cried in the movie theater watching "High School Musical 3."
I cried watching the "Diary Of A Wimpy Kid" movie at home on my couch.
I cry at movies....a lot.
I cry listening to the Celine Dion song "Come To Me."

I can't remember if I've always been that way, or if (as I think is the case) my brain to tear duct connection turned into an expressway when I became a dad.

Yesterday I cried, and I can't really figure out why.

I had just watched my 6th grade daughter run in a cross country meet.
I didn't cry tears of joy because she won.  She probably came in about 30th of 40 runners.
I didn't cry out of sorrow because of how slow she was.  She was far from the slowest runner there, and finished with a smile on her face.  She always tries hard and has fun.

Yet, as I walked to my car, I was almost sobbing.  And I had no idea why.

As I drove home, I tried to figure it out.  And here is what I came up with.

I was overwhelmed by the incredible potential of my children.  A middle school cross country meet by itself is not that big of a deal....but it's just one more building block, one more memory, one more piece of the puzzle that is becoming an amazing young lady.

Children are awesome, scary, inspiring, humbling...and make me cry.  But in a very good way.

Dude, you're a dragon!

As you've seen before, sometimes I write stories and put them on this blog.  They are either based on my kids, inspired by my kids, co-written by my kids, or just things I think kids would like.  This one is inspired by my awesome son.  He is really into dragons at the moment....he is also really into saying "dude."

Originally they idea was to write a story about a boy that spends all of his time playing video games until one day his dad makes him go outside to play.  He meets a dragon in his backyard and they have an adventure.  But I was having trouble getting started...all I could come up with was a list of "Dude" phrases they boy would say.  So that became the whole thing.

As I've also said before, I can't draw worth a hill of beans....and this story is 99% visual.
So I tried something different instead of using my weak drawing attempts.

Let me know what you think.

Dude, You're A Dragon

“Dude, I’m home.”

"Blah blah blah blah blah"

"Dude, what’s for supper?”

“Dude, I’ll do my home work later.”

“Dude, it’s too hot outside.”

“Dude, it’s too boring.”

“Dude, you’re a dragon!”

“Dude, don’t eat that!”

“Dude, are you for real?”

“Dude, where did you come from?”

“Dude, can you fly?”

“Dude, not too high!”

“Dude, where are we?”

“Dude, this is awesome!”

“Dude, wait!”

“Dude, don’t go!”

“Dude, will you be back?”

“Dude!”

What's Next on the Career Path?

We have a "Daily Celebrations" calendar in our kitchen.  Most days I'll write something on it for the day....as simple as "had Pizza Hut for supper" or as monumental as "Allison was born at 1:52."

Yesterday I was reminded that back in 1997 I had a job interview at a Minneapolis TV station.  The job was Traffic Coordinator....which was a job I was not in the least qualified for.  But I knew I didn't want to be a computer programmer forever, and I did have some TV production classes while in college, so I applied for the job and got an interview.

(When I got the call for the interview, I had no idea what a traffic coordinator at a tv station did, and that was before you could google it, so I remember driving to the public library in Edina to research the old fashioned way - in books!)

I didn't get the job...in fact I think I called back the next day to tell them I wasn't interested.  I knew I would have been in way over my head....which I'm sure they could tell from the interview.

Any way...remembering that interview got me thinking of all the other jobs I've thought about taking over the years since I finished college and started my I.T. "career":

• Interviewed at WCCO radio in Minneapolis to be an engineer/call screener for their morning show
• Interviewed with Walgreens to be an assistant manager
• A couple interviews for different I.T. positions
• Went to a meeting about becoming an unpaid intern for an oldies radio station
• Had a couple bank teller interviews
• Sent an application to the school district to be a preschool classroom helper
• Applied to be an office assistant for the Cities Parks and Rec department
• Had a phone call about working with the YMCA after school child care
• Started working at Target

And after all that....I'm still not sure what I want to be when I grow up.  But as each year passes, and my kids get older and more self-sufficient, I'm getting closer to needing to figure out the next step.  The "at-home-parent" tag only works when there are kids at home that need me (or at least I can pretend they need me).

So what I'm looking for is for you all to help me brainstorm ideas.
What should I do next?
What do you do?
What would you do if you could do anything.  (mine is play third base for the Phillies.)