The Grocery List

My wife sent me to the store to buy 4.5% milk, tuna pops, vanilla wafers in a can, and organic gluten-free tomato paste - "but just the one in the blue tube." I can't even find tomato paste normally. It took me 45 minutes before I realized the wife was playing a joke--her cruel shopping list coming just a few days before April Fools. I suppose I have time to get her back, but I'll be honest I've been feeling very Wofford lately. First my daughter told me to pick Wofford College to win March Madness simply because their Terrier mascot looked like our old dog and because, well, a Terrier can beat a Kentucky wildcat, right? Wofford candidly sounds more like a state of depression than a basketball champ, but I gave it a shot. She was wrong. But what do kids know anyway. I turned off the games and turned on Finding Nemo but strangely found myself crying, which my son found bewildering. "You're crying at Nemo!" I told him he will get it when he's a parent. At least I got a good laugh during hoops Sunday when my buddy Steve's Apple watch thought he was on a brisk walk 20 minutes into a game of 5 on 5 full court basketball. Sometimes we can't control our emotions even at the oddest times and sometimes despite all our effort we just can't figure things out like we used to or move like we did in our 20s. All we can do is grow as we go as Ben Platt sings about. We can cry a little, wince a lot, and with any luck, have a good laugh.