“The End is Near: A New Beginning” by Mike Hofner

It’s been way too long since I last sat down at my computer and attempted to create some conglomeration of words that best expressed what I was thinking . . . . who am I kidding, I’m usually not thinking . . . well, perhaps I go too far. Me thinks I always think.

There is always some oddity that is rambling about my tiny brain; a replay and/or revision of the past, some anticipation of that which is yet to come or some impossibility that will never be. Every once in a while over my 8 month (we shall call it a) sabbatical, my thoughts have turned to my long abandoned blog, but the desire to write has always been met with an equally strong desire to be apathetic.

But not today!

Today, I set a recurring alarm in the calendar of my phone. Every Thursday at noon, a blog is due. And as of this moment, I expect to meet my self inflicted deadline each and every week until the calendar on my phone ends . . . December 31, 2030!!!

Alas, our doom is at hand; the world will end on December 31, 2030 because that’s when my calendar ends . . . unless of course it’s already ended some time next year when the Mayan calendar ends . . . I suspect both may be wrong.

Here I sit half a page later and I have yet to broach the subject that my mulling mind meditated mediating manic motion on my mbehalf . . . The Boy!!!

For (here I will insert the number of days, if I can find the spreadsheet I made that calculates a person’s age in days – until then, we’ll just say most of three years – I found it) 1,019 days, I have awaited with undue anticipation that single event which most parents abhor. I have endured hours of torment answering every repetition of the question, “What’s that?” “A restaurant, it’s called Denny’s.” “What’s that?” “It’s called Ace Hardware, they sell tools.” “Tools!? What’s that?”

While I endured for long months, my torture has been lessened of late. He would often pause between queries to exclaim, “Daddy! Mommy, Andrew and Anna went there! We went to movie place! . . . What’s that?”

But it was not until yesterday that my o’er long desire was finally brought to fruition. Andrew came home from daycare and I gave him some direction to do something or such and such. Then out of the blue, it finally came.

“Why?”

With the pride that I’d been saving up for these long years, I pushed down the first response that came to my head (more on that later) and answered his question in unbridled detail.

I’m sure that every parent and most of the rest of you can make a guess at my initial reaction, “Because I said so!” But I have long been determined to not go that route. I feel that it is an easy out for one who doesn’t have the creativity or patience to outlast a three-year olds inquisitions. But not I, I have patience and creativity in spades.

So for the last 17 hours, I have answered the question “Why?” about forty times, each time with an answer that I think is befitting a child’s query. While I am not above requesting that the youthful investigation be put off until a later time (“Andrew, Daddy’s busy and can’t answer you right now.”) I am determined to avoid the parent’s ultimate cop out for as long as I can, or at least until my calendar says the world will end.