Is College Worth It?

Peanut's first year of Kindergarten is coming to an end soon. Another school year behind her, if you include daycare. Twelve more years to go. So many things still to come. So many more milestones and memories. Firsts and lasts. Yet, there's something else that keeps popping up in the back of my mind. It's nagging me like a piece of prosciutto stuck in my tooth. I'm worried about college. Yes, college. Specifically, paying for college It's something every parent thinks about, worries about, frets over, from almost the moment of conception. Now that Peanut's actual education is underway, I feel the savings clock is ticking. And it frightens the hell out of me.

A recent study by Fidelity Investments shows most families fall far short - not even 25% - of the money it takes to pay for their child's college education. It shows parents don't do enough to save for college, or they wait too long. I must admit that My Director and I are in the same boat. More than six years into our daughter's life, we haven't put away nearly as much as we would have hoped, or thought we would have by now. Things always come up. Bills, debt, home improvements, illnesses, job changes, a life-saving surgery for our dog. Even vacations, because sometimes you have to actually enjoy life. So the issue isn't as clear cut as the black-and-white facts and figures of a study. 

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My Dying Wish

"He would make a lovely corpse." -Charles Dickens

Till death do us part. It's in the vows, yo. The only thing that will separate me from My Director is a dirt nap. Marriage. When you think about the whole thing, committing yourself entirely to one person for the rest of your life, it's pretty freakin' deep. I love it. Until you're six feet under. And that's pretty freakin' shallow. I don't love that.

This photo is just dripping with irony, is it not?

So shallow, in fact, that it creeps me out. Since I first experienced death with my Grandpa Sal when I was 11 years old, the thought of being buried totally gave me the heebie jeebies. The thought of dirt and bugs and just laying there rotting...gross. I can't handle it. Just mentioning it makes me nauseous. I decided at a pretty young age that I wanted to be cremated. I didn't really think about it until decades later when my dad died, and was cremated. "Oh yeah," I thought. "That reminds me. Sign me up for one of those too please."

Over My Director's dead body. Whenever the subject of our final resting place comes up, she puts me in my place.

"You're not getting cremated," she insists. "I want to be buried and I want you next to me. So you're getting buried." 

"Not if I go first," I counter. 

"You wouldn't," she shrugs. 

"No. I would respect your wishes because I love you," I admit.

Yet, she would not do the same. The sad and frustrating part of this whole morbid mess is that it's inevitable that I will die first. The man almost always does. You know why? Because we're tired and eventually we just want quiet. Some uninterrupted sleep.

"I can't believe you would do that to me. Deliberately go against my wishes," I protest. Meekly. 

"What do you care?" She says. "You'll be dead." She's cruel is what she is. 

"If you go first," she reasons, "I want a place to go and visit you. With a headstone and a bench. Maybe under a tree somewhere. So I can talk to you and tell you about my day."

It's a little worrisome that she's planned my death in pretty vivid detail, don't you think? I'm rethinking my recent purchase of an axe for chopping firewood. While that sucker might come in handy during the zombie apocalypse, maybe My Director has other plans for it first.

"If I'm in an urn, you can take me with you. Wherever you go," I tell her. "I'm so portable." 

"No." 

"We can BOTH be cremated and Peanut can spread our ashes somewhere special. Somewhere we love. Like the beach at LBI. Or Venice. Or at Syracuse." 

"It's too cold at Syracuse. I don't want to be there for eternity." 

"But it's where we met." 

(Shakes her head and wrinkles her nose in disgust.)

Now she's just being unreasonable. So I give in, with a quid pro quo.

"Fine. Bury me," I say. "But no open casket. I don't want to be preserved or put in a box. If you're going to bury me, just dig a hole and dump me in. No chemicals. That way I become one with the earth. You know, the circle of life."

"No. That's gross." 

"Right. Which is why I want to be cremated in the first place." 

"I'm putting you in a coffin." 

"Please don't. I'm claustrophobic. And it's such a waste of money. You're gonna need that money." 

"You're insured."

WTF?!

When I do die, she will have final say. She will make the decision and I will be powerless to stop her. She handles our finances. She plans our social calendar.  She even gets to control the television most of time. Now she's got her sights set on my afterlife.

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The TV Hierarchy

Laying on the couch with a severe case of Man Cold for past few days, I've watched a lot of television. Most of it classic, awesome movies like Die Hard With a Vengeance, Field of Dreams, and Midnight Run. There is no better way to sweat out a bad case of Man Cold than by channeling the testosterone and coolness of the likes of Bruce Willis, James Earl Jones, and Robert DeNiro.

Watching all of that television inspired me to unveil this list, the undisputed rankings of what takes precedence on the television in our house. It is the result of years of negotiations. Now despite its length and detail, you'd think we watch a lot of television. Fear not. We watch just enough. You will notice it is very top-heavy in my favor. That is because I am willing to sacrifice what's on the television for a majority of the year, just to have complete authority when it counts. So without further ado, here is what rules the tube in the DKL house:

1. Pro football: For the sermon at our wedding, the pastor asked me and My Director to write about why we love each other. Neither of us was allowed to know what the other wrote until we heard the sermon. One of the things I wrote was, "Because she understands Sundays are for football." The pastor made sure to interject that Sundays are for church too. Well played, padre. Entire weekends are planned around me getting to sit on the couch for six hours and watch nothing but football. Or the Jets, who occasionally resemble football.

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For This I Am Forever Thankful

"How do I know when it's love? I can't tell you but it lasts forever." -Van Halen

When do you know the person you're with is the one with whom you want to spend the rest of your life? I knew early on in my relationship with My Director, but our first Thanksgiving clinched it.

Hall of Languages
Syracuse University

It was 15 years ago. We were in college at Syracuse. We had been dating just three months. I knew earlier in the semester that she was "the one," but when I took her temperature to see if she felt the same way, I didn't get the response I was looking for.

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Ready... Or Not

"Having a baby is like getting a tattoo on your face. You really need to be certain it's what you want before you commit." - Elizabeth Gilbert.

I think I'm ready. Ready to have a second child. As ready as I'll ever be I guess. Why else would I make such a wild, impulsive purchase?

One morning after the Peanut's dance class, we popped in on our neighbor's newly-reopened consignment shop, which is right around the corner from the dance studio. There on the shelf with the other toys, games and baby supplies, was a mobile. But not just any mobile.

My impulse buy

This was a genuine, fresh in the box, Otto the Orange mobile. Otto being the mascot of my and my wife's beloved alma mater, Syracuse University. Yes, our mascot is an orange. Yes, it's completely ridiculous. But unless you went to Syracuse, you just wouldn't understand the love affair that students and alumni have with this adorable, fuzzy, walking citrus.

I made the purchase on the spot. Without even thinking twice. The best eight bucks I've spent in a while.

"What are we going to do with that?," my wife asked.

"Save it until the second comes," I replied while shrugging my shoulders, dismissing her preposterous and insulting question.

A second. The thought makes me shudder with terror and excitement at the same time.  Our life as two working parents of an active daughter is crazy as it is. We want to double the amount of children? The amount of responsibility? The amount of stress? The amount of chaos? The mountain of expense we already have?

Yeah... I guess we do.

Our daughter is certainly ready. She's been telling people that mommy is having a baby for months. Let me be clear: mommy is NOT having a baby. Yet. Not even close.

But when a friend dropped off a bouncie seat that she had no use for anymore... a fancy new one that their newborn loved... alarm bells went off inside my daughter's head. We explained to her that one day we're going to have a baby (God willing), that it will be in mommy's belly, and that she doesn't get to choose whether it's a brother or sister. For the record, she wants a sister.

Later that week, my daughter then went and told my mother-in-law, who was so convinced my wife was pregnant she actually called her at work and asked her if there was anything she wasn't telling her. She also told everyone at daycare... leading one of the other moms to approach my wife at our daughter's birthday party and ask her if congratulations were in order.

Of course we've talked about it. Talked about when we want to have one. Talked about when we don't want to have one. Of course we know that sometimes you can't control these things.

Ridiculous, yet beloved

Then again, when your alma mater's sports teams are led onto the field or court by a smiling, dancing piece of fruit... you're programmed to embrace the ridiculous, and expect the unexpected.

And now, with Otto safely tucked away on the shelf next to the stairs that lead to the attic, we're ready. Whenever it happens. If it happens.

And while we're closer than we've ever been, it bears repeating for the record: not anytime soon.

**My wife and I met at Syracuse. When the SU hoops team won it all in 2003, it was really special to us, for more than the obvious reason... I recently wrote about that here.

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How I Met Your Mother

"And when she smiles the whole world stops and stares for a while." -Bruno Mars

Everything happens for a reason. You hear that a lot when something bad happens to you or when you're faced with a challenge.

It almost never makes you feel any better, but it's true.

I have proof.

In the summer before my sophomore year in college, my parents closed the swimming pool business they had owned for the better part of two decades. I realized a tuition bill would just add another burden; so I offered to take the semester off until they got their financial house in order. We agreed that I would return to school in January no matter what.

I did nothing but work that semester, and in January I was back on campus. But I'd have to make up that semester I missed. I would graduate in the fall, not the spring, of '97.

Good thing.

Because that's the semester that changed my life forever, and for the better.

That smile started it all

It started at the end of the spring '97 semester. The semester I should have graduated.

We fit perfectly together

She was across the room during a party at my fraternity house. She smiled at me. I thought that smile meant that she was interested in me. Later I found out she was just bored, and was passing time by smiling at anyone she could lock eyes with, pretending to flirt. It's a good thing. That smile gave me the courage to ask her out. That's the first thing I did that next semester. The fall of '97. The make-up semester.

The rest, as they say... is in this blog.

Happily ever after: 12/7/02

I graduated. We did long distance. She graduated. We moved in together. Got married. Bought a home. Got a dog. Had a baby. Bought a house. And are living happily ever after as I write.

 All because of a smile.

If not for that smile, who knows how my life would have turned out?

I'm so glad that everything happens for a reason. My daughter wouldn't be here today if it weren't true.

So next time you hear it... as much as you don't want to... believe it.

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Orange We Glad

"All I needed to know I learned at Syracuse University." -A t-shirt I received after attending freshman orientation in 1993

The words flashed across the screen below the coach's name and immediately my wife said, "Wow, that was that long ago?"

Boeheim cutting down the nets in '03

The words I'm talking about read "Won 2003 National Championship." The coach under whom it appeared, of course, is Jim Boeheim of Syracuse. My alma mater. Our alma mater. If not for Syracuse, there would be no us. There would be no Peanut.

The Hall of Languages on SU campus

Syracuse University holds a very special place in our hearts. It is arguably the most important place in our lives. Good ole' SU.

Syracuse would go on to lose that game during which my wife made that comment. They lost in the second round of the NCAA tournament this year, outplayed and outcoached by an inferior Marquette team. A team that clearly deserved to win. Another disappointing March for the Orange. No Final Four this year. Another year of "if only.." If only they had made that shot, grabbed that rebound, denied that pass.

But... we still have 2003. That magical run. That amazing journey. Just thinking about it right now brings a smile to my face.

2003 National Champs

Syracuse won their first and only men's basketball championship a little less than three months after my father passed away. Earlier in the season, I took a trip to D.C. with a group of friends to see SU play Georgetown. It was a welcome diversion.

Thanks for the diversion, Carmelo

Syracuse won a close game that day... and you felt it. You felt this could be a team that could win the whole damn thing. You felt it because they had a freshman superstar named Carmelo Anthony. I also felt relief... that I had made it through. I learned that day that I can have fun again. I can have a few drinks and laugh and enjoy the things I love... and still miss my dad.

And so they did... they won the whole damn thing. We celebrated. We hugged. We partied. And I still did... I still missed him. But Syracuse made that year a little easier to endure.

So here's what I'm taking away from that 2003 National Championship, a moment now eight years in the rearview mirror: enjoy every minute. We did. And that makes it so much more special.

And that's what I continue to try and teach my daughter. Enjoy.

Tickle. Laugh. Dance. Run. Love.

Cherish.

She'll be this age only once, and then the next age, and then the next. I want her to ride that tricycle with abandon. Hit the bumps. Fall off. Get back up. Get back on.

That's what Syracuse taught me.

And my parents wanted me to go Rutgers.

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