A Proud Family Moment Captured On Camera

This is a picture—from quite a few years ago—of my brother Cam and I modeling underwear we had received as Christmas presents.

I can’t recall for sure but I think my mom may have taken this photo. It must have been an incredibly proud moment for a loving mother, huh?

Photo With A Mystery Man

I received a text message a few moments ago from my brother Cam which included the photograph attached to this post.  There are three people in the photo, Cam is on the left, Cam’s son Kyle is on the right and a man in the middle.  The photo was taken today at a wedding reception.

Cam’s text message said, “Does the man in the middle remind u of anyone? Met him @ a wedding today.”

The answer to Cam’s question is an emphatic “YES!”

The man in the middle of this picture bears an uncanny, almost eerie, resemblance to our dad who passed away several years ago.  In fact, if Cam sent the picture and did not tell me the details I would simply assume that the man in the middle of the photo was our dad and that the picture was taken a few years ago while he was still alive.

I don’t know who the mystery man is but as I’ve showed the photo to various family members it has given us all something fun to talk about.

(NOTE:  I wanted to be able to finish this post by writing that the mystery man walked away after the photo was taken and no one on the bride’s side or the groom’s side, or for that matter, none of the guests at the wedding could identify him.   And he was not seen again for the rest of the evening.  That would have been fun, wouldn’t it?  Oh well, maybe the next time we encounter a mystery man…)

Brownie For Jill

When I was in 3^rd grade, I had a crush on a cute girl in my class named Jill.

What do you do with such feelings of love when you are 8 years old?  How do you make your love known?  No matter how brilliant a case you make, your dad is very unlikely to let you use the car for a date.  (You know, the whole thing about “reaching the pedals”, and all…)

One night my mom made brownies and I had a terrific idea.  I would take a brownie to school the next day and give it to Jill!  Yes!  This was a fantastic idea!  I would take a brownie to school and I would say, “Jill, we’ve known each other since first grade…and…well… I was thinking…um…do you like brownies…”  Alright, I didn’t know what I would say.  I hadn’t figured that part out, yet.  But even though I didn’t have the whole plan mapped out, I felt pretty darned good about the brownie part of it.  Most girls like brownies, right?

That night, before I went to bed, I wrote “Brownie For Jill” on a piece of paper and I taped it to my closet door.  I knew that I would be likely to dash off in the morning and forget the brownie if I didn’t make a note for myself.  (I was sort of forgetful, even then.)

It was at this point that I made a mistake.  The major flaw in this scheme was taping the note to the door where my older brother Cam could see it. 

Yep, sure enough, “What’s this?!?” laughed Cam, when he saw the note.  “Brownie for Jill?!?”  Cam was pointing and laughing uproariously.

“Ha! Ha! Ha!  Isn’t that cute!  Danny’s got his little reminder here that he’s going to take a brownie to school tomorrow and give it to Jill!”  He was incredibly amused by it all.  In fact, if it’s possible that there is something inherently good about bringing laughter to a fellow human being, I did something good for my brother by putting that note on the closet door that night.

In the morning I was running late for the bus…as usual.  And my thoughts were scattered…as usual.  And I ran out the door without the brownie for Jill.  Oh no, don’t feel bad, though.  The truth is that I never would have given the brownie to Jill, anyhow.  I would have been too scared.  I was about 27 before I actually worked up the courage to talk to any girls.  (Which is strange when you realize that I got married at age 25.)

Long after that incident occurred, Cam would laugh and tease me with that three word phrase, “Brownie for Jill.”  He’s liable to smile and say it to me even today.

And I suppose the childhood psychological impressions created by this incident may explain why I now prefer chocolate chip cookies.