Caleb is adamant about the Christian rock. Someone gave him the digits for the big Christian rock station, and so now he dials them in on his radio. Ordinarily I wouldn't allow any radio other than baseball games, but since it's rock about Jesus, I feel wicked telling him no. It's not the Jesus part I'm opposed to, after all, just the unartful licks and painfully trite lyrics.

In an effort to steer the boy in a better direction, I made a CD for him. He refused outright my offer to put on some blues or jazz. "Christian rock, Dad. I want Christian rock." I told him that's what I'd put on there, only some that's better than what he's likely to hear on the radio.

So I loaded it up with tolerable Christian rock. Lifehouse, because their lyrics are thoughtful. Jars of Clay because their Who We Are Instead album has some nice gospel-sounding, bluesy numbers. Kutless because if you're going to do Christian rock, then let's rock. As Sheryl Crow says, this ain't no disco.

I also put on a Sam Cooke gospel number, along with Johnny Cash's "God's Gonna Cut You Down." Redemption can be a slow process. One song at a time, I'm going to win this boy back from the beige side.

I remember back when Wife and I were younger, how terrible we thought it was when we saw older couples sitting wordlessly in a restaurant. "I can't believe he's reading a newspaper," I would say. "We'll never be like that when we're older," Wife would affirm.

We said these things because we were stupid. I came home from Atlanta last night, and to celebrate we all went to Red Robin. Wife and I are eternal optimists, it seems, because no matter how hectic the last dining experience proved to be, we manage to tell ourselves that this time it will be pleasant.

Do you want to know why older couples go to restaurants and sit without talking? Because they've had twenty-odd years of this:

"Dad, I want to invent a hamburger!"

"Good. Isaac, get off the table."

"Dad, can I sit in your lap?"

"No. Eat your food."

"Isaac, get out from under the table."

"Why is this baby squawking? Did you bring something he'll eat?"

[Insert deadly glare from Wife here.]

"Dad, I'm going to tell them to put the burger on a Kroger bun. It will be a Kroger burger."

"That won't work."

"Yes it will."

"Kroger is just a grocery store. We buy Kroger buns from the grocery store. There's nothing special about Kroger buns."

"Isaac, stop kicking the table."

"No Dad, Kroger is a special food company."

"Fine. Do what you want."

"Isaac, get off your brother."

"Dad, can I put my head in your lap?"

"No. Honey, the baby is still squawking."

"Do you really think I can't hear it?"

"Sorry."

"Isaac, sit up."

"Maybe I'll invent a macaroni and cheese burger."

"Dad, will you rub my back?"

Sigh. "Yes. I can just eat with the one hand."

Only to really get the feel, you should make all those sentences collide, and layer that cacophony with the noise of a baby who wants to be held by his father because he senses an opportunity to get food all over his father's shirt, lay hold of his father's silverware and toss it to the floor, and otherwise give his father indigestion.

Eventually Baby Isaiah discovered a table of pretty girls nearby, and commenced to flirting. He grinned and made baby noises, and when they looked over he dropped his chin to his chest and practically batted his eyelashes at them. Soon they were all waving and cooing at him. So he tried to crawl away from us to sit with the pretty ladies. His mother had to drag him back to our table. He is going to be trouble, this boy.

Then Isaac and Caleb got in on the act. They are going to be trouble as well. Eli stayed close to me, but with those eyelashes and freckles that boy isn't going to have to work at it. He is going to be the most trouble of all, mark my words.

(Note to self: keep them on the farm once they hit puberty, at least until each of them knows a profitable trade. They're going to need to be able to support my grandchildren.)

The point is, Wife and I understand now why older couples are quiet in restaurants. It's because they are all talked out. Just watch them. They don't even speak to the waitress; they just point to what they want on the menu. I imagine once the last boy is out of the house we may go for a good solid year without saying a word. And it will be blissful. Then we'll spend the rest of our days wondering why they don't come visit more often.

But that's okay, because we'll visit them. Mostly because we love them. But also to watch them eat with their own children. Heh heh heh.

William Isaac Woodlief: "Where is the tooth fairy's house? I want to go there."

I don't believe he's thought that out. I mean, what does she do with all those teeth? And how does she earn all these coins she hands out? And what kind of person goes creeping into children's bedrooms?

I'm just saying.

The snake ate my grass carp. I think I told you how I stupidly left my pond fountain off long enough to kill all the fish (but not the $#!%!*! snake). As a consequence, an algae problem has presented itself. Thick wide islands of slimy green algae, anchored to the bottom of the pond by long runners of progressively darkening stuff that terminates in a base of sludge. (For those of you who were planning on having sushi for lunch, I apologize.)

So I bought some grass carp. Two six-inch, rambunctious fish, just aching to get at my algae. I haven't seen them since I dropped them in. And it's not like I've only casually visited this pond, you see, because recently I had to go in to slough off the algae.

Allow me to paint that scene for you. Picture me in shorts and knee-high wading boots. No shirt, because I'm an idiot. We'll come back to that point. In one hand I'm carrying a metal rake, and in the other I have my big machete. But of course I have to put down the machete, because the algae is so heavy that I need two hands to rake globs of it toward the shore, where I scoop it onto the grass. I don't know how to accurately portray the smell, but imagine death being simmered at the bottom of a big pot, and you should get close. Now let's add the heat: 101 degrees. Because it's Kansas, and the heat is the only way we know to keep away the shallow coastal types.

So there I am, slowly working my way around the shore of the pond, which is a good thirty by forty yards at its widest points. I'm stomping and slapping at the tall grass, and talking really loudly in hopes of scaring away the snakes. I'm scooping algae. I'm jumping at every movement in the grass at my feet. And meanwhile, my shoulders and back are acquiring third-degree burns, because of the part I mentioned earlier, about me being an idiot.

At some point Isaac, my worker buddy, came out with his little rake to help. We eventually realized that we needed to call in the Woodlief Navy. So I dragged our inflatable raft down to the edge. If you've ever had a big dog try to sit in your lap, this was me attempting to situate myself in that raft. The only reason God didn't let me roll over is because I was providing him too much entertainment right-side up.

I rowed to the center, and began reeling in algae. Don't underestimate the weight of water-logged algae. I heaved in a little at a time and wrung it out, creating giant balls of rolled, dried algae that I plopped at my feet. All the while I kept looking over my shoulder for that ginormous snake. I think he was nearby, because I kept hearing these swishing, plopping sounds. He is a crafty one, this snake. I pulled at least 250 pounds of algae out that way, and I think next time I'd just as soon use napalm.

But back to my grass carp. There wasn't a sign of them. What would eat two six-inch grass carp? That $#!%!*! snake, is what.

So now I've got to get more grass carp. And I'm going to have to stake out the pond with a shotgun. Somebody told the snake I bought a machete, because he's made himself scarce. But sooner or later he'll have to rear his bruised head, and that's when I'm going all Bolivian army on his Butch and Sundance. Because a man can only take so much.

I hit the heavy bag Monday for the first time in five years. I didn't have wraps or bag gloves, but there it was, hanging insolently in the corner of the gym, practically begging for a beat down. Which it got. I have a bruised hand now, but it felt really, really good. A therapist might suggest that instead of beating an inanimate object, I ought to identify the people who have caused my anger and talk things over with them.

But the thing about the bag is that: 1) it doesn't talk back, and 2) you can beat the living daylights out of it without getting arrested. A lot of the world's problems could be solved, I think, if everyone had a heavy bag hanging in his garage.

I bought a machete this weekend. It seemed more practical than carrying a gun around on the property. Just let that probably-not-poisonous-but-nobody-is-really-sure snake rear his viper-like head now. It's definitely going to be up to me, though. The other day a mole popped up directly in front of my lazy dog, and I tried to get her to sic it, but instead she just rolled over for me to scratch her belly. The mole actually tunneled under her to make his escape. I didn't really want it dead; I was just curious about how the dog would handle a real live critter. Obviously if anyone is going to be killing creatures around here, it's going to have to be me.

Maybe I should have killed the mole, I don't know. We're still sorting out our place in nature. I was all set to shoot coyotes and bobcats until a friend explained that I ought only to do so under certain circumstances. I caught the boys, meanwhile, splashing about in the creek without shoes again. We have a concrete bridge to the back part of our property, and beneath it are three drainage pipes through which the creek flows. The boys have discovered that it is fun, when the creek is low, to crawl through these pipes. Given what I know of snakes and spiders and other creeping things, I admire their pluck.

Nonetheless I had to give them a stern talk about snapping turtles, and how difficult it would be to go through life lacking a finger, or toe, or wiener. That last one got their attention, and led to all sorts of interesting dinner-table discussion about how, exactly, a turtle could bite off one's wiener.

They wear pants most of the time, and at least two of them consistently have on underwear, so I think the threat of a wienerectomy is minimal, but if that visual works to keep them from wallowing in the creek, I'm all for it. I suppose a child psychologist would suggest I not fill their heads with irrational fears, but this imaginary child psychologist probably agrees with the imaginary therapist who says I shouldn't hit the heavy bag, and we all know how useful that advice is.

Caleb broke my heart last week. He told me that he prefers Christian rock to blues and jazz. And not even the good stuff, but what they play on the popular Christian radio station. In an effort to open his ears to the truth, I played him one of Stevie Ray Vaughn's first concerts. Nothing doing. The boy wants Christian pop.

Then, as if to rub salt in my wounds, he and Eli went outside to play golf. They play with plastic clubs, since none of us thinks Isaac should have access to anything so lethal as a real golf club made of genuine skull-crushing metal. Christian rock and golf. Sigh. The things these kids pick up from their friends.

I'm thinking maybe I'll tie him down and make him listen to Stevie Ray's version of "Little Wing" until he understands the error of his ways:

Several people sent me suggestions for the little-boy parts that I was having so much trouble naming with something appropriately descriptive yet not clinical. Some of my favorites, along with the slightly anonymized name of the offender:

And finally, my personal favorite, and the new Woodlief family word for those most important of particulars: Nuggets. As in: "Hold on to your nuggets! I'll be there in a minute!" Or, "Watch your nuggets in the ring, son, that one fights dirty!" The applications are endless. Many thanks to my friends Amy and Paul.

The thing about boys who call their thingies by the clinical name is that it's creepy. This is why my sons call it a wiener, to Wife's utter mortification. She defers to me nonetheless, as the resident expert on all things wiener-related. The problem is that, as some of you may know, there is more to the toolkit, if you will. And said equipment needs a name, because one Mr. William Isaac can't be troubled to get all of his junk out when he pees. Instead he lets his waistband rest just below the, um, point of exit.

He doesn't seem to have a problem with this. But it's giving me the willies. Lately I've just pointed in horror when I catch him doing it and urged him to pull his pants all the way down. Sometimes he tries to comply in mid-pee, and that's just not a good idea. So I need a word to refer to what it is that I want him to liberate from his waistband.

I understand if nearly every woman who would ordinarily read the entire post is now exiting. I understand that I am being irrational. I merely submit that whereas we guys don't tend to get all emotional about Julia Roberts movies, or sappy Internet stories about handicapped puppies and the Life Lessons they hold for us, or about the tone of someone's voice in a conversation, or the ten billion other things that some women, sometimes, on rare occasions, get emotional about, we do bend in the direction of sentimentality where the wiener is concerned.

So I need to have a discussion with Isaac, but I'm finding myself at a loss as to what to call his . . . other parts.

Jellybeans? That might ruin a perfectly good candy.

Marbles? Little boys play with them enough without giving them a toy's name.

Peanuts? That's bad on about ten different levels.

It's a real conundrum. I'd ask you your opinion, but apparently Movable Type hates me, and has decided to shut everyone but professional spam dispensers out of my comments section, including me.

Recently I found myself in a distant city, on a subway, and there was a guy next to me reading a handbook for first-time fathers. I wanted to ask him if there's a section on this problem, but I didn't want to scare him. Somebody ought to write the real father's handbook, though. It would cover stuff like what to call the wiener, how to deal with foot odor, and where to hide your bubblegum so your three year-old can't find it.

I'm just saying.

Yesterday I was supposed to spend the afternoon painting. We have many square feet of wood in need of paint. This was my mission.

Instead, we drove into the biggest honky tonk near our wilderness spread, which happens to be the little Kansas town of Newton. Little Newton has two worthy bookstores, and a health food store, and at least two nifty diner-type eateries. Also a local donut shop. Doughnutery. Whatever.

Isaac and I wandered off on our own and into the health food store, where we found a tray of free chips and spicy spinach-asparagus dip. We agreed that lunch hadn't really tided us over in the manner to which we were accustomed, and so we stood there grazing until people began to give us disapproving looks. Double-dip one time and everybody gets completely pharisaical. It's not like this is cold and flu season, people.

We all spent about an hour in the bookstore. The way this works is Caleb immerses himself in books, while Eli and Isaac make a faithful effort for approximately ten minutes, in the older boy's case, and ten seconds, in the younger boy's case. Isaiah alternately squawks to be picked up or put down, whichever is most inconvenient for you. The way to handle Isaiah is to give him Cheerios. We are teaching this boy to squawk for Cheerios. When he is grown he will sit on a milk crate in Times Square, holding a big sign that says: "Will squawk for Cheerios." You don't often find street people who can spell "squawk," but we are aiming to home-school the child, after all.

So the point is, I bought a nicer paperback edition of Canterbury Tales to replace my worn-out version at home. Please don't take that to mean I am a Chaucer scholar. I only read it one good time in high school, and that was because they made me, and because I discovered it has lots of dirty parts.

Anyway, I like to see the names of people who owned books before me. My old copy of Canterbury Tales was once owned by Martha Ann Elliott. I don't know anything about Martha Ann Elliott, except that she wrote her name on the title page of my book in curvy cursive letters, as well as at the top of page 241. Perhaps she did that to snare the clever thief who might purloin her book and rip out the title page. The constable would have him by the collar, demanding that he return the book to Martha Ann Elliott, only this devious thief would sneer: "Look, her name isn't in it. Possession is nine points of the law." Criminals always know the law better than the rest of us. Case in point: lawyers.

But because she had been so foresighted, intrepid young Martha Ann Elliott would confidently step forward, coolly flip to page 241, and in so doing send the wretch to reform school. Afterwards, Martha Ann Elliott would skip with her best friend to the soda shop, where they would share a chocolate malted.

I don't know where Martha Ann Elliott grew up, but I like to think it was a place with constables and reform schools and chocolate malteds. I like to think that Martha Ann Elliott led a life with many adventures, and that years later, as she lay in her comfortable dying bed surrounded by her rambunctious yet respectful grandchildren, she wondered about this copy of Canterbury Tales, and sent a good thought to the person who owns it.

As for my new copy, it was once owned by Mary Esther Hill, who wrote her name on the title page as well, in sassy, forward-slanted cursive. I don't have a story made up for Mary Esther Hill yet, except that she greatly admired Flannery O'Connor and raised peacocks on her family's milo farm. But I think she had a fine life as well. I'm happy to report that neither she nor Martha Ann Elliott underlined the naughty parts of Canterbury Tales. I appreciate that because sooner or later my sons will start perusing these books, and I want them to have to hunt for the naughty parts, just like I had to do. Start coddling your kids and they'll end up on a street corner begging for Cheerios.

But the real point is this: I've gone from Martha to Mary. I like to think that means something, if perhaps only that I should aspire to do so. Which is why I'm writing to you instead of painting. Now I'm going to go inspect each boy's Lego spaceship, which they have been laboring on in the basement for the past half hour. And then maybe I'll paint. Or maybe I'll see if there's anything to Chaucer beyond the naughty parts.

I hit a snake in the head with a rock the other day. It was a fat water snake, the kind that all the experts say isn't poisonous, and is more afraid of you than you are of him, and a lot of other baloney that you shouldn't believe coming from somebody who likely as not managed all the A/V equipment in high school and was captain of the Dungeons and Dragons Club before getting his snakeology degree. (Speaking of D&D, check out my friend John Miller's essay in the WSJ.) All I know is that this snake had a triangular head like a viper, and showed no intention of moving as I approached. I think he wanted me to step on him.

(Brief and graphic aside: Did you know I was almost bitten by a water moccasin as a child? He was five feet if he was an inch, and he looked to be ten feet to a kid. He was as big around as my bony leg, and he came out of a bunch of reeds at me. My testicles didn't drop back down again for a month. Only guys will understand this.)

So there I am on my property with that slithery snake who thinks it's his property. I pick up a few rocks, and sizzle one just past his head. No movement. He's one cool customer, this snake. So I try a different approach, with a rock the size of my fist. I launch it like a basketball. It lands on his head with the sound a walnut might make if you whack it on your tabletop.

This gets his attention. It also gets my dog's attention. She comes running over to investigate, and at this point I'm wishing I had one of those aggressive hunting type dogs, instead of an old once-abused lab-retriever. She thinks she can be friends with anyone. But this snake, nursing a headache now, isn't feeling friendly. So he lunges at her, and she jumps out of the way, and then he starts slithering into the reeds by our pond. I launch another rock at him, and hit him in the tail, which makes him jump like a certain Woodlief baby who recently learned to keep his wet fingers away from electrical outlets.

And then the snake was gone. I like to think he is lying dead in the reeds, but I suspect I'll be seeing him again. And since he's shown he doesn't like to cede his ground, next time it's for all the marbles. Mano a snako, if you will, just like John Wayne would have done it. And don't think the Duke wouldn't have used a gun, even if all the so-called experts say water snakes in these parts aren't poisonous.

We bought a bunch of algae-eating fish yesterday for the very same pond where Mr. Snake is in residence. Two animated grass carp and a bunch of wiggly fathead minnows. The boys stood with me on the dock while I opened the thick plastic bags in which the irritated fish had been placed, and then emptied them into the water. It probably would have been wiser to squat at the edge and ease them in, so differences in water temperature didn't cause some kind of fish shock. But see the above section about the water snake. I dropped in the fish like they were Airborne Rangers, and if they can't hack it, I'll go buy some tougher ones. Does anyone know of a fish that eats snakes?

Maybe I should take an approach like the U.S. military hunting Talibaners in Afghanistan, and just start firing buckshot all along the shore. If nothing else it would relieve some stress. But if snakes are anything like Islamofascists, I'll only attract snakes from all the neighboring ponds, and find myself in a protracted holy snake war on hostile terrain. Probably better to win the hearts and minds, with limited psych-ops. I wonder what music most repels water snakes? The Alan Parson Project? Mr. Mister? The Carpenters?

Or perhaps I could adopt the tactic used by the little boy in There's an Alligator under My Bed. I would have figured that my most tender-hearted and imaginative child, six year-old Eli, would not want a book about a large carnivorous creature under a little boy's bed. Instead it is the only book he wants to check out from the library. I suppose we are going to have to break down and buy it. Or perhaps he might enjoy Mercer Mayer's lively reading. Check it out and tell me if you think it will work with snakes:

Friday afternoon it was just me and Isaiah, biggest grump and littlest grump. I was painting when he woke from his nap, and so I fetched him from his crib and we tried to figure out what to do with each other until the Mama and brothers came home. I put on my Best of Steely Dan CD. There's something both troubling and endearing about seeing one's year-old baby wiggle in delight to:

But we went with it. For all Isaiah knew, they were singing:

You didn't know this, but Isaiah has had trouble swallowing. He would gag even on baby food, and he wasn't gaining weight. The doctor had his throat X-rayed, which revealed nothing abnormal. We were relieved by this, though perturbed by the extra year's savings I'll have to put away to pay for the therapy he's going to need after the psychological trauma of the X-ray, which involved me handing him over to strangers who shoved him beneath a big scary machine. If he refuses to get in cars when he's older, and insists on sleeping outdoors, and has trust issues, we'll know why, won't we?

The point is, we've been excited by little milestones, like his not choking on mashed sweet potato. So there we sat on the kitchen floor, Isaiah and me. He had a lean and hungry look, young Isaiah, and I was feeling a rumbly in my own tumbly. So I fetched the Cheerios.

I sat down in front of him and opened the box. He did a happy, anticipatory wiggle. "I think you're ready," I told him. He wiggled. I gave him a Cheerio. He gummed and chewed at it, let it float around in his mouth for a minute, and then swallowed with a smile. I clapped, and he wiggled, and then he squawked for another.

So we sat on the kitchen floor and ate Cheerios, and it was a good afternoon.

I kept all the boys last night while Wife had a much-needed break. She had a pedicure, and a meal without interruption. The boys and I did alright. Isaiah ate his sweet potato mush without fuss, and then crawled from Daddy to brother to brother, begging tiny spoonfuls of chocolate pudding.

I explained to the boys that old-school Brits call desserts "puddings," which they thought was odd but endearing. Then I told them that french fries are "chips." That seemed just downright odd to them, especially since "fries" doesn't mean potato chips. Caleb asked me where the french fry was invented. "Germany," I told him. He'll realize that's funny in a couple more years. In the interim, however, he's likely to misinform all his friends.

I realized, after posting about his birthday, that I haven't said much about Isaiah. This has been largely the result of his being unable to do anything but poop and squawk. But I gave it some thought, and came up with two lists of particulars for those of you who want more information about the littlest Woodlief.

Things one year-old Isaiah has decided he likes:

Things Isaiah is decidedly against:

"Dad," Eli asks me in a whisper, "why did Abraham kill Isaac?" We are in his bed, looking out at the darkening sky and listening to crickets. In his bed across the room, our Isaac is already asleep, a lamb clutched to his chest, his mouth agape.

"He didn't kill Isaac, remember?" I kiss Eli on the head. "God sent a ram to be sacrificed in his place."

"I thought Abraham killed him."

"Nope."

"But why did God tell him to kill Isaac?"

It's more complicated to explain than some might think. As I explain how God wanted to stretch Abraham's faith, and how Abraham thought God would bring Isaac back to life, and how God was even then writing the story of Jesus, I feel myself coming to that place where I am struggling: the doctrine of propitiation, of score settling, of wrath. In my mind I can hear the fussy answers from self-satisfied types who take a masochistic delight in the Angry God. I hear a string of preachers from my own childhood, warning me to be a good boy or go to hell. I remember the nightmares I still have, of demons coming to take me there.

"Why did Jesus have to die?" Eli asks.

A good Presbyterian would tell him the wages of sin is death, and that a price had to be paid, a sentence served. Instead I tell him that when sin came into the world, it made all of us sick. "Do you know how when you do something bad, it makes you feel bad inside?" Eli nods. "The blood of Jesus will make all of us well," I tell him. "It works slower on some than others, but it's the medicine we need. And one day he will come back, with all his angels, and then all the evil things in the world will try to fight them, but they will lose, and then none of God's children will be sick any more."

Eli lays his head down on my arm. He asks me why we can't see God, and why God made the Devil, and when Jesus will come. I tell him about heaven, and how all things will be made right one day, and that Jesus will never let him go. I put my head next to his, and breathe in his scent of wet puppies and toothpaste. "I will always love you," I tell him, "no matter what."

"I know."

Somewhere beyond the crickets and our line of hedge trees is the world into which one day he will venture. Maybe he will have a more accurate understanding of whether the blood is a cure, or a debt paid, or both. Years ago the answers seemed more certain to me.

I think sometimes my children will leave me with more questions than answers. But they will go knowing that they are loved by their God, and by their father. If you ask me what is my creed, this is what I will tell you: that I am selfish through and through, but for them to know those two things I will lay down my life, walking all the chastened paths along which a parent must stumble.

I've had to travel four of the last five weeks, so that by Friday I was feeling thin, as Bilbo Baggins claimed, like butter stretched over too much toast. Traveling like that leaves me muddle-headed, and not in the good way. Some of you know what I mean about a good muddle-headedness — you get it when your thoughts are focused on a project, or a dream you have had, or a beautiful scene in the novel you are writing. People speak but you only partly hear them, bugs bite but you don't notice, you forget what speed you are traveling on the highway. I didn't say that good muddle-headedness wasn't dangerous, did I? But so are most things worth experiencing.

Then there is the bad muddle-headedness, which is what I get sometimes when I travel. It's the feeling of being shot out of a cannon, so that every field you darken and every cloud you scatter on your journey is a physical reminder that you are out of place, that it is only your thin skin that holds everything inside you. It's lying exhausted on a hotel bed unable to sleep, and the nightmares that come when you do sleep, and the feeling, when that alien sun penetrates your eyelids, that your soul has gone slantways, and won't ever be right again.

Or maybe it's just me.

I always feel like the prodigal son when I come home, welcomed though I don't deserve it, and amazed that I could ever have felt disconnected from the earth when I have this woman and these little ones waiting for me there. It reminds me that I am just water and faint breath and the thinnest spirit, even though to them I am Husband, and Daddy.

And so yesterday we celebrated Father's Day. They gave me (in no particular order, though you can probably guess which I liked the most):

To top it off, a good friend loaned me his 20 hp Kubota tractor, replete with belly deck, tiller, and grader, until I get my feet wet (metaphorically speaking — if I actually get them wet it means I took the tractor on too step an angle near the creek, in which case stop reading this and come get me out). This involved borrowing another friend's trailer, which was located at a third friend's spread, and then maneuvering the whole 4,000 pound rig on back country roads, on account of our not exactly being street legal, what with the lack of lights and chains on the hitch and so on.

And this is how you know God has a sense of humor. We moved all this heavy equipment without so much as a scratch to my truck, and then, as an afterthought, my friend suggested I take an old dead Christmas tree for my pond (it gives shelter to the smaller fish). I strapped it in, but botched the job. Halfway home it flipped over the back before the straps locked it tight, so that its trunk pressed a three-foot dent into my tailgate, mangling the latch.

The thing is, though, I'll take a busted tailgate over leaving home any day of the week, and twice, as it turns out, on Sundays. I used to feel guilty over never having slouched around Paris, or speared fish in Fiji. I suppose those things will be nice should they come my way. But for now, there's plenty of adventure right here on the home spread. And from the way I feel when these babies and this woman crowd onto our big bed and burrow themselves into my chest, as if I am the Christmas tree and they the little fish, I can't imagine any place more suited to who I am, or more importantly, who I am supposed to be.

This is how the dinner table works in our house. The food is ready, and Wife is announcing this in her best I-cooked-for-you-people-while-you-all-conspired-to-drive-me-crazy voice. Baby Isaiah is squawking because he came equipped with a special squawk alarm that goes off the moment anyone puts him down. His older brothers are doing a Three Stooges routine around the door, Isaac stopping because he realizes his socks are wet from playing in the creek, Eli bumping into Isaac as he bends to remove the wet socks, sending him sprawling, and Caleb bumping into the door because Eli, in an effort to be our one obedient son, has closed it behind him lest the cat/dog/mosquitoes/stifling heat/snakes get in. Their father, meanwhile, is asking how many fingers of whisky he can pour without setting a bad example for the children.

This is followed by tromping up and down the stairs, as each boy either washes his hands but forgets to pee, or vice versa. Wife is warning them the food will get cold, and ignoring my question about the whisky. I am holding baby in one hand, and a whisky bottle in the other. Isaiah is still squawking, despite being in my arms, both because I won't let him have the whisky bottle, and because he has realized, once again, that while I am generally a big Daddy-barrel of fun, I am not currently equipped with lactating breasts, and this being dinner time and me being stingy with the whisky, he'd just as soon have his mama.

Eventually we make our way to the table with clean hands, and get water cups distributed and napkins placed and the appropriate level of utensil technology before the appropriate little people. Sometimes we even do this without sending Wife into tears. I strap the baby into his seat and stuff into his mouth a spoonful of whatever mush is on his menu. We all sit. There is talking and immediate eating, down at the young heathen end of the table, until they are reminded that we are going to bless the food, that we always bless the food, that we have been blessing the food since before they were born, and have done so every day of their short lives, and that if they don't start remembering this soon their lives will not get any longer.

We all hold hands. There is silence. Baby Isaiah has been watching, these past weeks, and now he knows, when we do this, to reach out his mush-covered hand and place it on top of Mama and Daddy's hands. He does this, and smiles at me, and then I pray: Thank you God for this food, though really I am thanking him for all of it, for the good and the bad and especially for them, without whom all my meals would be lonely and quiet and pointless.

So me and the boys are flying down the highway in my truck.

[Editorial aside: there is little better, men, than being able to type that sentence and have it be true.]

Like I said, we're flying down the highway in my truck. My full-sized pickup truck, to be more precise. Me. And my boys. The sun is low over the trees on the distant Kansas horizon, and we're sweaty and tired after a long day of man stuff. I turn up Blues Traveler's "Crash Burn." This is good, driving-with-the-boys-in-a-truck-like-real-men-do music.

So then Caleb says to me: "Dad, this sounds like old-timey music. Like from the 1990's."

Got that, everyone? Richard Marx, Celine Dion, and Melissa Etheridge are old-timey. Caleb may actually be more right than wrong, now that I think about it.

Still, I prefer to think of some music as timeless. Which is why we were listening to Blues Traveler, and why Caleb has an Oscar Peterson CD in his bedroom, and why I'm hoping all those violin (read: fiddle) and piano lessons naturally turn into a folk/jazz/blues ensemble when the boys are older. But until that day, here's some old-timey music for your Monday:

It's come to my attention that there are rumors floating around on the Internet, to the effect that I have killed myself in a tractor accident. That's a ridiculous notion, of course, that I could get myself into a fatal tractor accident, for the simple reason that I don't yet have a tractor. I do, however, have weeds taller than three of my four children. And poison ivy growing thick enough to reach out and grab you if you get too close. And a pond full of dead fish.

Yep, apparently you have to keep those ponds aerated. That's what that fountain is in the middle of it for. I thought it was just for show. In the suburbs, the fountains are for show. Out here, they're for making sure your fish and turtles don't all go belly up, making your pond smell like a second lagoon. So now I've got to get on the waders and go scoop up dead creatures from my pond. And adding to the excitement, there's a really big snake in there who seems to think that the deed on this property has Snakey S. Snakerson written on it, instead of Tony "Snakes Give Me the Heebie-Jeebies" Woodlief.

So I want you to picture me in waders, with a net in one hand and a shotgun in the other, because that's the only way I'm going in that stinking pond.

Inside, meanwhile, the walls are mostly painted, and the floorboards and wall trim are up but in need of painting, which means I have about five miles of narrow boards to paint without getting said paint on the walls where they reside. I thought I was a genius because I painted some of them before they went up, but then I stacked them while they were still tacky, plus I forgot that they get about a bajillion nail holes in them, each of which my perfectionist wife smears with stark white putty.

Our bookshelves are up, but there are no books on them, because I have to anchor the shelves to our newly painted walls. This is imperative because we have not one, but two climbers in our house now.

The books are safely (so we thought) in tall stacks of boxes in the garage. We have a lot of books. They are taking up a substantial portion of the garage. This is relevant because for a time there was a stray cat on the property, trying to insinuate himself into our family. Our cat took exception to this. They spent several evenings staring at each other and making that high keening sound that cats make when they want to fight or procreate. Eventually, our cat beat up the other cat and sent him packing.

But not before seeking a peaceful alternative by peeing on everything he could find.

This includes some of the book boxes. I'm not sure which ones. It will be like Christmas in Hell, opening those boxes, waiting to see which books are ruined. I'm hoping it's the Wife's Bodie Thoene books, and not my Everyman's Library editions. Because while I may not know all the ways there are to skin a cat, I can come up with at least one that will suffice.

So that's all for now, because it's beginning to look like rain, and if I don't mow around my barn soon, I am going to lose sight of it. Ever stub your toe on a barn? Not an experience I want to have.

The Great Woodlief Migration of 2008 has begun. Today I spent 12 hours painting in the new house. I also made the flooring guys listen to my music, which ranged from Lyle Lovett to the Hackensaw Boys to Death Cab for Cutie. The probably think I'm deranged, but then they probably don't care so long as the check cashes.

The boys played by our new pond a good part of the day. We saw a dead snake floating in it, which I thought would make a good deterrent for Isaac ("See? He drowned. That's an icky snake in there, isn't it?"). Instead he got a stick and tried to fetch the thing out. For the most part there's nowhere on the property where he can drown unless there's been a hard rain, but now I hear there are bobcats.

Bobcats. I was all set to get a rifle, until a friend explained that his daughter shooed one away with a stick once, when it threatened her chickens.

I'm still getting the rifle, with scope, because I also have a beaver issue. Beavers are only cute in cartoons. In real life they chew down your saplings. There's one working on a sapling to which my back porch has a clear LOS. Best get your affairs in order, Mr. Beaver, because there's a new sheriff in town.

I'm sure after a couple of evenings I'll break down and get somebody to trap him, but it gets the blood up nonetheless, playing sniper from one's own back porch, which I could never do in the old neighborhood, except with an invisible rifle, which is a pity because it was a target-rich environment, if only lawyers and accountants were fair game, and around tax time I think we all agree that they should be.

Tomorrow we load a big truck. I'm pretty sure I would rather take a baseball bat across both knees, but with my luck that's not going to happen between now and the time I have to go pick up the truck. So we'll be loading. I may even tell you about it, if I can figure out how to get my satellite-card Internet doohickey thing to work, because in our new and unnamed locale, there's no cable.

No cable, no city water, no sidewalks, no homeowner's association. Actually there is an HOA, but it has one member, and his name is Tony Woodlief. Further, as King of the Woodlief Homeowner's Association, I hereby decree that there will be no ridiculous walls built at homeowner expense, no strictures against ugly treehouses or redneck-looking sheds, and further, that all members of our HOA can walk around buck raving naked whenever they please.

It's good to be the king.

Isaac has this thing where he feels like he needs my company any time he has to pee between the hours of midnight and 6 A.M.

Which is inconvenient, because every once in a while I try to sleep between those hours. This morning I was coming out of the bathroom a little before six, freshly shaved and showered, wearing my navy business suit on account of needing to bring some smack today, and there he stood in the bedroom doorway, like a little haunt. Frankly, he scared the bejeesus out of me, but when you're wearing your smack-bringing business suit, you have to play it cool.

So I picked him up, and he pressed his warm chubby cheek against my neck, and I carried him to his bathroom. There we enacted our usual routine, in which he leans back against my legs and tries to fall asleep in mid-pee, and I try to keep him pointed at the interior part of the toilet.

I don't care how nice your suit is, there's just no looking cool in that situation.

Afterward, I carried him to his bed, and tucked him back in. He told me goodnight, even though daylight was beginning to whisper its arrival. Little stinker.

Every night before I put him to bed, I fuss at him not to wake me up. But part of me, the part that has given up on foolish ideals like world peace and a good night's sleep, is glad that he searches me out in the dark hours. I doubt he even remembers these times, but I like to think that some part of him will remember that when he needed me in the darkness, I was there.

One of the nice side benefits of home-schooling, other than the occasional highly inappropriate parent-teacher conference, is that you get to deface the textbooks as you see fit. For example, Caleb is using a reading textbook that contains brief essays, and about which he has to answer questions. Recently the essay of the day was about bullying. "Dad," he asked, "what should I do if I get bullied?"

This is a common tactic for Caleb; he innocently asks for my parental advice, while keeping his reading book by his side, in hopes that I'll inadvertently answer one of the questions for him. His teacher has scolded me enough times, however, that I'm on to this trick. Even if I didn't care so much about his education, I would still have to listen to my son's teacher, because I have to sleep with the woman.

So I answered: "I don't know, son. What does your essay say you should do?"

Caleb scrutinized the essay, looking for clues. "Oh," he said. "If they call me a coward, I'm supposed to agree with them."

Now he had my attention. "Can I see that book?" He handed me the book. The essay explained that the best way to deal with bullies is to let them do what they want, and not fight back. If they call you names, laugh along with them. If they call you a coward, tell them they're right. Bullies like it when they're confronted, the essay explained.

"Give me your pencil," I said to Caleb. He handed it over. I crossed out a good quarter of the essay, leaving the parts about how bullies are disturbed and unhappy, and how it's important to tell adults when you're getting bullied.

"Why'd you cross those sentences out?"

"Because sometimes the best way to deal with a bully is to punch him in the nose as hard as you can, and to keep punching him until he falls down."

"Oh."

I know, I know, turn the other cheek, and all that. I'll get my sons started on pacifism once they're confident they can punch out the bully. Because unless you're willing to punch the bully, turning the other cheek isn't Christianity, it's cowardice.

We've lived in our house with a For Sale sign in the front yard longer than we've lived without it. Yesterday we finally sold the thing, albeit not before getting dunned for a ridiculous neighborhood boondoggle, which I've already informed one HOA officer I fully intend to come back and egg once it's completed. It's the only way I see myself getting my money's worth.

But back to the house, which isn't ours any more, though we live in it for one more month via a rent-back deal with the new owner. He's an attorney, which gave me a queasy feeling, but he proved to be a decent enough fellow at the closing. We like the house very much, with its swimming pool and rounded castle walls. But somehow we settled on the conclusion that we aren't going to be the family who lives in a house like that amidst meticulously edged and fertilized lawns. The new owners will be that family, and I'm sure they'll be just fine, and the neighborhood gossips can now breathe a sigh of relief.

As for us, we've found a house on twenty wooded acres north of the city. It has a creek running through it, and a pond, and a basketball court, and the boys are beside themselves. There's also a garage/barn-type structure that is apparently a mechanic's dream, though all I noticed is that it has a corner office which will serve nicely as my writing haven. We've traded suburban for rural, and mortgage for mortgage, and somehow we're becoming country people, which when I say it makes me conjure Nellie Olsen's mocking voice.

Now there's just the small matter of moving our houseful of stuff without divorcing one another or accidentally leaving behind one of the children.

I wrote about the potential move a while back at World on the Web, and faithful reader Coneen Brace was so excited for us that she went to my Amazon Wishlist and sent me Frederick Buechner's The Sacred Journey, along with an album by the Hackensaw Boys: "Love What You Do."

I wanted to take the latter as a sign from God that I should quit right now and just work on the books I've been writing, but the Wife noted that it doesn't rightly count as a burning bush if I picked out the album myself and put it on my own Wishlist. Plus there's that new land to pay for, and the baby needs new shoes, and when you get right down to it, women are far more practical, as a general rule, which is why more of us aren't starving. But the point is, thank you Coneen, for both your generosity and your optimism, because there's a good many people who know me better, and who are taking private bets about what will do me in first, a chainsaw or an overturned tractor.

And you people know who you are.

So it's off to the country in the next few weeks. Fresh air (allergies). Clean country living (well water). Nature in all her splendor (poison ivy, snakes, the frogs my sons keep capturing). Man in his natural element (real men, anyway). Praise the Lord, and God help us.

My nine month-old beat me up this weekend. It was only for a moment, but in that brief time I was clearly on the defensive, and he bringing the pain. He didn't mean any harm, he just likes to get rambunctious. I think it's the influence of his three older brothers.

He was on my lap, trying his best to bite my nose, when next thing I knew he did this little baby judo move, slipped under my arm, and clamped down on my nipple.

This is the same nipple that Caleb once latched onto as a baby. I don't know what my sons find so alluring, or perhaps threatening, about this nipple. It is basically the same size, shape, and configuration as your average man-nipple, although much more abuse and it's likely to get deformed. I've got a mild case of cauliflower ear from my unaccomplished wrestling days; I know from whence I speak. This nipple never hurt anyone, but still it's been a target of abuse from my children. I'm thinking I'm going to start duct-taping it until they're all well beyond nursing age.

So there I was, with a baby clamped onto my nipple. And the thing is, you don't just yank his mouth away in that kind of situation. For one, he's a baby. I'm beginning to think he's impervious to pain and dissuasion, but still. Furthermore, that thing he's clamped onto? It's my nipple. If you're having trouble getting the point, I suggest you clamp a vise-grip on your own nipple, and then keep reading.

I began to negotiate the release of my nipple, which only made the boy giggle, because it involved my fingers under his chubby chin. That's when he pulled his second kung-fu move; he reached up and grabbed hold of my bottom lip.

I know a thing or two about fighting. I can name you several places to inflict inordinate pain on someone's body. In all my years of training, however, I never covered the bottom lip pull. Thumb to the underarm, yes. Fist to the temple, all over it. But this lip pull maneuver is still relatively new to me, even though his older brother used to do exactly the same thing.

Now, those of you with vise-grips on your nipples, imagine trying to dislodge your tender bits while your lip is being stretched to your belly button, and you get the picture. I fought him off, and I only talked for half an hour like I'd been injected with Novocain, but the fact remains that my baby beat me up. I knew the day would come when they would be tougher than me, but I always thought I would have a little more time.

Since we have bidders on our house, we've gotten back into the habit of looking for houses in the country. The boys' favorite thus far has been a log cabin-style house in lovely Mulvane, which is the sight of the finest Italian restaurant in all of Kansas, and an elderberry winery to boot. The house looks like a giant got really creative with his Lincoln Log set. All it lacks is the little red plastic chimney. The inside corners even had criss-crossed log ends.

As we were preparing to leave, I looked at the corner nearest the door and whispered to the Wife, "How long do you think, if we bought this house, it would take Isaac to figure out that he could climb those corners all the way to the ceiling?"

Isaac crouched by the door as I whispered this, squeezing his shoes back onto his fat little feet. As he stood, he reached out a hand to balance himself. His hand settled on one of those log ends. He looked at it, then looked up to the ceiling. His epiphany blossomed into a beatific smile.

He was a quarter of the way to the ceiling by the time I scooped him into my arms. A fish swims, a bird flies, and Isaac climbs.

I really do love the little stinker, and so I'm hoping he survives to adulthood. Some days I'm not so confident.

Monday was Caleb's birthday. He is eight years old now. That morning I made breakfast for the family, and then took him to work with me. He did school work at the table in my office, and I did my own work at my computer. He finished first, because he is smarter than me, and a more diligent worker. So he took out a Lego spaceship kit that he got from his great-grandmother, and he put it together. After that, he built a hangar out of office supplies, and then built a paper airplane for me, to keep in the hangar. They're on my desk now, though Caleb is at home, busy being an eight year-old, doing schoolwork and reading everything he can find and getting bigger by the second, so big that soon I won't be able to pick him up and carry him to bed at night.

When we finished working we went to lunch, and then to Target so I could buy him a pencil sharpener he's been wanting. On the way into the store, he walked beside me, and even though my hand was dangling near his arm, he didn't take it the way he used to do when he was a little chattering boy. Now he is a big boy, and he doesn't need to hold my hand so much any more.

They keep getting older, if you're lucky, and so do you. Soon they don't need you to hold their hands or make their sandwiches or say their bedtime prayers with them. Soon you have all the quiet time you ever wanted, hours and days and weeks of it, interspersed with an occasional phone call, if you're lucky. Soon they are grown and they are gone.

I have years and years left with them, and I am sure they will grind me down to dust before the last of them leaves, but sometimes I am sad when I think about an empty house. I am happy too, in a way I didn't expect, because I know one day each of them will have his own house full of youngsters. They will crawl into his bed at all hours, and make messes and fill every room with giggles. He will toil and fear and laugh over each of them just as I have over my own children, and there is nothing better on earth.

I would give them anything, because their happiness is mine, and so I am happy when I think about their houses full of children, because I know that no matter what I do to make them smile now, there is an incomparable joy awaiting them, the joy of their own children. It almost makes it worth letting them go, not that I have a choice, which is probably best, selfish as I am.

That's a lot of philosophizing for an eight-year birthday, more than I did on my 40th. It's warranted, I suppose, because while I am simple and shot through with weakness, they amaze me. They come out so small and defenseless, and before long they are throwing crotch-level tackles and asking impossible questions, and healing wounds I didn't even know were there. We look far and wide for miracles and even rumors of miracles, and forget the miracles among us, the small lives that God is either foolish or hopeful enough to trust us with.

I've had eight years with Stephen Caleb, and five with Timothy Eli, and three with William Isaac, and less than one with Isaiah John, and I've not appreciated the time as I should. Let me appreciate the years to come. Let them be many, a great many, and forgive me for the time I've wasted. Forgive me for overlooking these miracles.

We could fill up a life with thank you and forgive me, couldn't we? I imagine we should say both every day.

It occurred to me that one day in the less-than-distant future, a young lady may decide to conduct an Internet search on the term: "William Isaac Woodlief." Said lady will be, of course, interested in marrying young Isaac, and itching to bear an entire brood of Woodlief babies. The last post might, naturally, give her pause. Being chaste and of good upbringing, she won't know how to, as it were, verify the goods. So in the interest of setting her mind at ease, I'm happy to report that everything is healed up nicely.

So tonight, in between stripping naked and getting into the tub, there was some jumping and general little boy rambunctiousness. I could hear them upstairs, and the thing is, I only needed one more minute for the task I was trying to finish. One more minute, and then I would be up the steps to supervise the bathing. One precious bloody minute.

It's those one-more-minutes that kill you as a parent.

Have you ever seen a bruised penis? I'd never actually seen one before tonight. It's not pretty, let me tell you. Whatever you're imagining, Isaac will tell you that his is worse. Somehow the boy managed to injure his penis, his face, both butt cheeks, and his big toe. In one fall. There were no steps involved. No baseball bats or blocks of concrete. Just a bed, and a push from his brother, and BAM: we're in a home triage situation. One boo-boo bunny to the face. Calendula ointment on the butt cheeks. Arnica cream all over the place. A package of frozen peas on the pee-pee.

I never thought I would have to hold a package of frozen peas on my son's penis. They don't tell you this may be a possibility in parenting class. It's all breathing and learning to count to ten and not freaking out when they get a diaper rash. But penis bruises? Nowhere in the manual.

I have to confess, it shook me up a little. I'm going to have a drink now. Maybe two.

A couple of nights ago I shot a cat. Lest you animal fetishists send me nasty email, or the anti-feline masochists among you send me packages of veal, I'll note that I didn't use my 9mm, but rather my Daisy Red Ryder underlever cocking BB gun, from ten yards out. You see, I thought he was picking on my cat. You might recall that we have a cat. The Wife would likely assert, were she reading this over my shoulder (which is, incidentally, not an advisable way to blog), that it is my cat.

It used to be that fat neighborhood cats would slink into our garage, beat up our kitten, and eat his food. He's grown a bit, however, and he still has his claws. Recently I found cat fur all over the garage, and assumed he'd beaten up one of those neighbor cats. The worm has turned, I thought. How now, brown cow? And other such exultant internal monologue. But the other night, I heard this curious keening from the garage.

Some of you are chuckling right now. I need you to understand that I never owned a cat as a child. If you read the earlier post about this animal, you will also notice that I used to think he was a she. I sometimes have this problem with humans as well, especially on college campuses. The point is, I am naive when it comes to the ways of the cat. Or I used to be.

So I grabbed my shooting iron, and went out to the garage. The noise was on the other side of the garage door. I opened it, and there in the driveway stood my cat, who is black, facing down another black cat. The problem was that in the lamplight I couldn't tell which cat was mine. I got a bead on one, and waited. They waited too. Then it occurred to me that if I moved toward them, my cat would stay, while the intruding cat would bolt. I took a step forward, my sights trained on what I thought was the intruding cat. She bolted. I shot her in the rump. She snarled and disappeared into some bushes.

At this point, I expected some gratitude from my cat. Instead, he looked at me as if to say, you idiot, and disappeared into the bushes after the first cat.

This was no food-dish raid. It was a booty call. Incidentally, I've since learned that cats like the rough stuff. This would explain that fur all over my garage, as well as my cat's new swagger. He's turned my garage into his playboy lounge. My cat is a player.

I understand at this point that several of you are already typing officious comments about how I need to get him neutered. But I'm hoping we can take him, naughty parts and all, with us when we move to the country at some future date, where he will sire a long line of mouse- and snake-hunting cats. So until then, the neighborhood ladies had best guard themselves.

This may be a moot point, now that I've gone and shot one of his girlfriends in the rump. I have to confess, it ran through my mind that this might not be a bad strategy toward young human ladies of questionable repute who come sniffing around my boys in the coming years. I understand that it is of dubious legality, but it certainly leaves an impression. I'm sure my sons would give me that same you idiot look, but they'd likely thank me for it later, don't you think?

Wednesday night I went with some of my uber-trendy, DC blogger friends to the Rock & Roll Hotel to see the 1900's. They have a great act, and those of you who live in real cities should go see them.

Afterward, I got interviewed by somebody from Spin magazine. They even put my picture on their website. Notice that I am the oldest person they interviewed. Then someone asked me the last concert I'd been to. The answer was Rush, in 1995, with my good buddy Bill Chandler. I couldn't hear for three days afterward. Explaining all this to my younger companions made me feel very, very old.

So I went back to my hotel room and went to sleep. In the morning, I showered, and scrubbed at the ostentatious black ink mark on my hand, the stamp I'd gotten at the club. It wouldn't come off. This led to some amusement among the fifty or so young people to whom I had to speak later that morning. Is that a tattoo? Surely he didn't go to a club, did he? Do they allow people his age into clubs?

This, too, made me feel very, very old. I suppose it's good to be humbled in this way. So I'm resolved to go see more indie bands in small, dark clubs.

This morning I stood in line at Starbucks, reading my Atlantic and waiting to order my customary grande hot chocolate with no whipped cream. My friend Ben recently explained that brain scientists believe happiness is generated by the successful pursuit of a goal, such that instant gratification — through video games, for example, or pornography — short-circuits the process, providing an initial boost of happy chemicals but leading quickly to a let-down, which perhaps explains the gloomy faces on all the overindulged teens at the local mall. I don't read science, because I have Ben for a friend. He loves science, and reads it, and then we meet at Starbucks and he tells me about it.

So I stood in line, enjoying both the instant gratification of holding and gingerly turning the pages of my beloved Atlantic, while working toward the happy goal of my hot chocolate. It was the perfect blend of immediate and future happiness that enables me to function. Writing is usually like that; there is the work of crafting lovely sentences, but also the immediate thrill of knowing that I am good at it, and that something holy may come from my unholy hands, and that it was what I was created to do.

The Starbucks guy was asking each customer if we have a busy day ahead of us. I like this Starbucks guy, because he is nice, and because once he gave me a free hot chocolate. I think if more people gave me hot chocolate, I would like more people. I like the Starbucks people in general, because they are refreshingly cheery. Someone at Starbucks is very serious about screening out the grouchy, slack-jawed doofuses one frequently finds staffing other such establishments. This is what hiring comes down to, in the 21st century: don't hire doofuses. It's harder than you think.

The cute, plaid-skirted Catholic schoolgirl at the front of the line apparently has a big day of doing whatever it is that Catholic schoolgirls do; I couldn't make out what she was saying, but she said it with exuberance. The business guy in front of me got to the front, and announced that he just wanted coffee, black, he didn't care what kind, and for them to leave room in the top of the cup. The Starbucks guy asked him if he had a busy day ahead of him. "Always," he said, gruffly, followed by something about being in his own business, or being a captain of industry, or being some kind of implement that one might purchase from Home Depot — I couldn't quite make it out, but I'm sure it supported the impression he wanted to create for all of us, which is that he is a Very Important And Busy Man who can't be troubled with coffee choices and Starbucks banter.

He took his cup without saying thank you, and strode out of the store, the long tails of his overcoat trailing behind him. He was the star of a movie playing in his own head, as I suppose we all are from time to time.

The Starbucks guy, somewhat chastened, took my money, but didn't ask me if I had a busy day. So I volunteered it. "In case you're wondering, I don't have a busy day. I'm going to shut my office door, drink my hot chocolate, and read." He smiled. It's not a bad day, I think, if you can restore the air when someone sucks it out of the room. And I think we all know I'm full of hot air.

This year, Santa decided that it would be great fun to leave whoopee cushions in everyone's stocking. I received two, perhaps one for each cheek, or maybe as a sign that I ought not to get a hot chocolate from Starbucks every day, even though it's how I talk myself out of bed in the morning.

The boys think this is great fun. You get to play a trick on someone, which is hilarious in and of itself, and said trick results in a fart noise. Whoopee! How aptly named is this device.

They are good sports about it, too, recognizing that a brother's enjoyment comes partly from the deception. Even though the whoopee cushion is always in plain view, the "victim" pretends as if he doesn't see it, and sits down extra hard. Forget the more expensive toys; most of Christmas Day's play consisted of my sons nonchalantly asking one of their brothers to "have a seat," or "come sit down," as if this is everyday conversation for young boys. "Sure," is the reply, and then the fart sound, and then they roll around laughing.

Eventually, Eli came to me with a mournful look. He'd become over-exuberant with his whoopee cushion, filling it too full of air. It burst. "Since you got two," he asked through his sniffles, "can I have one of yours?"

"Sure," I told him, as if I had a choice, as if I can say no to that sad little face. I suppose this means I really will have to lay off the hot chocolate.

Christmas night I made a pot of Christmas chili (it has red and green peppers in it). I played Handel's "Messiah" on the stereo. As I chopped peppers I could hear, mingled with the appearance of the angel to the shepherds, the sounds of farts and giggles. Somehow, this seemed right. That's part of the significance of the annunciation to the shepherds, that the King of kings was introduced to the lowest of the low, completely upsetting the hierarchies of man. Those shepherds were an uncultured lot, after all. Who knows, perhaps Handel might have incorporated the whoopee cushion, had it been available to him.

I like to think that more of our highbrow than lowbrow ways will rub off on our children, but maybe it's best if they get an equal dose of both. I can't imagine, after all, getting along with anyone who can't appreciate a whoopee cushion. In fact, once they're older, and serious about some young lady, I'll recommend that as the test. If she laughs, she's a keeper; if not, throw her back and keep fishing. Because we're rednecks that way.

There's probably some irony in writing an essay for a major international publication about how I am going to ease back on the throttle come this Christmas season, only to find myself collapsed in a chair at the end of December, praying for the quick approach of January 2nd. The plain truth of it, I think, is that being a parent of four boys is serious work, Christmas or no Christmas.

I'm still struggling to lay down my urge for efficiency, and be a full-time teacher. Instead of chopping vegetables in ten minutes, I need to work with one of the boys to chop them, and show him how to do so without slitting a finger vein. Rather than shovel snow in record time, I need to get my sons engaged, even if it means I get whacked in the shins — and other sensitive body areas — eight or ten times with the flats of their small but incredibly hard shovels. There is no speed in a family this size, except in the transmittal of vomiting- and snot-based viruses, which spread faster than rumors in church.

The work aside, however, it was a good season. A few days before my birthday we had a snowstorm, and the next day the boys and I had the mother of all snowball fights. I made a pile of snowballs, like Will Ferrell in "Elf," which I used to pelt the little whippersnappers. Isaac, not understanding the rules of war, kept toddling over to my pile, beneath his ten layers of coats and sweaters, and taking snowballs. He seemed so wounded, when I told him to make his own, that I just let him use mine against me.

Caleb, on the other hand, was a fount of knowledge about the rules of snowball war. There is, for example, a rule that says you can't hit someone else's snowball-in-process with your own snowball, which is one of my favorite things to do. I think of it as akin to when Jackie Chan grabs the bad guy's gun and takes it apart. There is also a rule about knocking down snowballs with your hand, another of my snowball aikido moves. Breaking these and other rules led to extreme displeasure expressed in no uncertain terms by Mr. Stephen Caleb. I don't know where this first son of two firstborns gets his rule-centered uptightness.

Eli proved the wiliest of the bunch. I could make the others scatter when I charged them, but he would stand his ground until he launched his snowball, and then scamper away. He also nailed me in a penalty round. The penalty round happens when you hit someone in the head. I accidentally pegged him in the noggin, and so I had to stand against a tree while he fired a snowball at me. He caught me square in the face. Then he giggled, looking very much like a snow elf must look, if one were to believe in such things.

On Christmas morning, the children were beside themselves, even Caleb, who has been having his doubts about Santa. More than once he's asked me if Santa is real. He's been hearing rumors, you see. I know lots of parents struggle with what to tell their children, and many try to walk a fine line by hemming and hawing about Santa being the spirit of Christmas, and so on.

I flat-out lie, and I have no problem with it. Santa, I explained to Caleb, is as real as you or me, and he is coming, so you'd better leave him some milk and cookies. Preferably chocolate chip. Homemade chocolate chip.

They were delicious.

Isaac was so excited, Christmas morning, that he did a little happy dance, capped by rearing back while I wasn't looking and punching me square in the groin. I think that's how Houdini got killed. The kid uses his hips when he punches; it's an innate warrior skill.

After I recuperated for a few minutes on the bed, we opened presents and emptied stockings and ate lots of delicious yummies and listened to Christmas music. It was a delightful day and we didn't miss driving from house to house one little bit.

Now we're observing the twelve days of Christmas, which means we have until January sixth to watch Christmas movies and listen to The Nutcracker Suite and read "The Night Before Christmas." Every night we also read the explanation behind the items in the song for that day (how the partridge on the first day of Christmas represents Christ, and so on). Then we hang an ornament depicting that item on a little tree. It's a nice complement to our Jesse tree.

We'll likely leave all our decorations up until the end of the month, because that's just how we roll. If our neighborhood busybodies don't like it, all the better. We'll slowly take them down, a little at a time, like we're weaning ourselves from a delicious drug. That can take some time,