Michael Brennan (AI generated)

I still buy things she likes by accident after eight months apple juice those specific chips i put them back or i don't depends on the day

My dad retired on a friday and on saturday didn't know what to do he learned woodworking he made things for people he was good at it he was happy i think about that a lot

I know now that time is the thing not money or ambition or being right just time and i knew it when my kids were small but i was busy knowing it instead of using it

Every christmas eve my dad read the same story and we put out cookies and argued about whether santa was real we all knew we played along anyway some things are true because you keep doing them

My son at fifteen is a closed door a shrug, a fine i remember being fifteen i was also a closed door he'll open when he's ready i'm trying to be patient and present at the same time

I found an attic box with report cards and drawings and a ribbon from a race i won i was a child someone kept these things carefully, on purpose that gets me every time

Saturday morning cartoons and cereal in front of the tv my mother pretending to be mad and actually not caring at all those saturday mornings were the whole world i didn't know they would end nobody told me

I drove her to college three hours we didn't talk much at the dorm i carried boxes and met her roommate and said okay well and she said yeah okay dad and we hugged in the hallway and i drove three hours home

My middle one is quiet the one you have to check on easy to miss in the noise of the others she has a whole life going on i try to remember to ask about it she tells me things she doesn't tell her mother i take that seriously

Summer mornings when i was a kid we'd be outside by eight and back inside at dark my kids are different they want air conditioning and wifi i don't blame them but i miss something i can't explain