My, it’s been a long time since I’ve updated here, much less posted a rant. And I’ve never done much with my fiction section, have I? That will change, I swear. I have something to post there, but it isn’t ready yet. Soon. Very soon.

Well, I’ve been busy with work and, well . . . hanging out with my family. Been a little depressed for unknown reasons, can’t find any good music to listen to and am bored with most of the movies I’ve been watching. I hate the book I’m reading and I think there may be a conspiracy against me getting good coffee.

GeekFriend has decided to move and, though I will miss him terribly, I laud him for the decision. The move will be good for him, especially if it gets him to produce some creative work again. In the very least, I’ll have an excuse to visit my beloved (because of Twin Peaks) Pacific Northwest. I just hope that when the day comes, he’ll understand why I’m wearing a dark blue suit, slicked back hair and keep yelling, “Damn good coffee. And HOT!”

Side note. Never wash down Tylenol with hot coffee as I just did. Ow.

My lovely wife has a new haircut. She’s swears it’s the last one for a while. It looks good. She has this sexy, avant garde artiste thing going for her. Very swanky. I just hope that no one else thinks so. It’s my sexy, avant garde wife, damn it.

However, things are actually going really well, despite my general funk. The kids are amazing. Fantastic. Wonderful. The best.

Baby Gertrude is crawling like a maniac. And teething. Which, of course, means that I’m ready for a disaster at any minute, with very little sleep. The poor kid just can’t sleep. She only wants her mother for comfort in the middle of the night, which means mom can’t sleep. I try to help, but Gertrude just won’t have me in the middle of the night. Poor kid. She’s still cute though.

She’s also trying to walk a little. She mastered crawling. The challenge just isn’t there anymore. So, walking is the next logical step. We have this little rolling play . . . um . . . thing that she motors around with, looking like a mini-bag lady. Periodically she’ll stand there without holding on to anything. Of course, she falls down because everyone starts screaming, “OH MY GOD! YOU’RE STANDING! LOOK AT YOU!” She gets a startled look on her face and falls down.

Matilda, who now knows her screen name, is growing smarter and smarter everyday. On Saturday, we were driving along, going to the park and she asked her mother how the world will end. Mom valiantly launched into an explanation of how stars die, etc. After explaining supernovas and large explosions, Matilda says, matter-of-factly, “Well, that will be an experience.” Startling.

She’s so wise beyond her years, it’s scary. She took a summer school class that involved making books. One of the stories she wrote was about a turtle that didn’t have any friends. No fish wanted him. No snail, no whale. He was all alone.

As I read it, I expected the turtle to meet another turtle, or have some sort of revelation on what it means to have friends. Matilda’s ending? “That’s okay. The turtle liked being alone.” Wonder where she gets that?

Since I’ve been working freelance, I feel as though I know this kid better than I ever had. I didn’t meet her until she was two, so our history doesn’t involve her infancy. However, to us, we’ve been together forever.

Her latest interest, and therefore mine too, is Harry Potter. We burned through the first book and are nearly finished with the second. We hope to have the third completed before school starts. I can’t explain how much I look forward to our hour of reading together at night. Maybe it’s the knowledge that she can read it herself, albeit belabored, and knowing that she’s doing it to share an experience with me.

We discuss the books over breakfast, float theories together and mine the Internet for new things. We have an elaborate fantasy life in which she is Harry’s main nemesis Draco Malfoy (her favorite character) and I am his evil father Lucious. It’s wonderful.

The books really are wonderful and I find myself enjoying them much more than my other diversions these days. I look forward to that hour a day like no other hour I’ve ever had.

It’s odd. Matilda and I have always been close. When we went to Disney World, mom felt left out. As if we had our won two-person club and we allowed her access periodically. We conspire together all the time and hatch plans to get the things we deeply desire (usually a movie or some sort of food). We’re partners in crime.

Plus, we talk all the time. About feelings, her friends, etc. Every Friday it’s just the two of us wandering around the city. We fight, we make up, we laugh, we cry. We talk about our feelings.

But this one hour a day is different. We’re sharing something in a way that we haven’t been able to before. On an intellectual level of sorts. We’ve always enjoyed movies and books together, but Harry Potter is different. Perhaps it’s that we have discovered a fantasy world in which we both enjoy finding relief from the usual grind. We do it together, and that’s pretty special in and of itself.

When we look back on our childhood, we have these warm and fuzzy memories of our parents. Special things we used to do together. Camping, vacations, going to theme parks. Little did I know that parents look back at their children’s childhood with the same warm fuzzy feelings.

On Matlida’s wedding day, as I’m holstering my shotgun, I’ll look at this beautiful young woman embarking on her adulthood and I’ll see this little blonde girl, wearing the T-Shirt I got for Father’s Day that says “Too Blessed To Be Stressed” as jammies (I get misty every time she says, “I’m sleeping in Daddy’s shirt!”) and carrying a Harry Potter book.

Everyone else will be hearing “I do” but all I’ll hear is, “Come on Daddy! Just one more chapter tonight.”

Damn it. I made myself all misty.