Happy New Year

My last column of 2011:

Happy New You

Published: Wednesday, December 28, 2011 9:40 AM CST

I love the tradition of making New Year’s resolutions. One year, back when I was a teenager, I resolved to stop using the word “smurf” as a verb. I have say, I really smurfed that one out of the park. Another year, I vowed to drop “cornucopia” from my vocabulary. I survived by substituting “plethora” in its place. Don’t even get me started on the year I promised to stop saying the word “fixin’,” as in, “I’m fixin’ to go fix me a turkey dinner with all the fixin’s.” As you can imagine, that was a pretty tough one to stick to, but I somehow I managed.

Most New Year’s resolutions are slightly more meaningful. We’ve all vowed to eat better and exercise more. Some of us have promised to give up a bad habit such as drinking, smoking, or cursing. A few of us have sworn to build our sons treehouses. I put that one in writing on December 30, 2006. You may recall that I finally fulfilled that promise just a few weeks ago.

The beauty of making New Year’s resolutions is that it gives us an opportunity to reinvent ourselves. If we have become less than satisfied with who we have become over the past 365 days, we can hit a reset button and start over on January 1. The following is an excerpt from my blog written on January 1, 2009:

“I love to reinvent myself each year. I make resolutions that help to redefine who I am. It’s almost like creating a character in a story. I can write my character to be however I want. In years past I have changed my character from a shallow, self-centered drunk to a caring father and husband who writes a ridiculous blog. Last year, my character was a mostly tragic figure beginning with the death of my beloved dog Jake on January 10 and ending with the death of my dear mother on December 30. This year, my character will be a comic figure. I resolve to play the role of an unemployed philosopher who is writing his first book and blogging about his adventures as a stay at home dad. He is a man who makes people laugh wherever he goes. He doesn’t take himself too seriously and when life gets messy, he just rolls with it rather than feel sorry for himself. When people are around him, they can’t help but smile. He lives to make others happy, which in turn makes him happy. He treats his wife and kids with love and respect. He rarely gets angry and when he does he gets over it quickly and never holds a grudge. He spends more time with his friends no matter how far away they live and no matter how high gas prices get because he understands how fleeting life is and how few opportunities we have to spend time with those we care about. Guys want to be him and girls want to be with him. He is Magnum P.I., Cosmo Kramer, and Buddy the Elf all wrapped up into one irresistible, enigmatic, and ridiculous character. This is the character I have always wanted to play…”

How did I do with that resolution/reinvention? Well, I wrote and published that first book. I turned my blog about being a stay-at-home dad into this column. I continue to try to make people laugh. I am good to my wife and kids and friends. I guess you could say, I really smurfed that one out of the park.

Happy New You!

My Take on Albert Pujols

Living on $69,589 (or $2.67) a day

Published: Wednesday, December 14, 2011 9:40 AM CST

I don’t get out much. Living in the sticks forces me to limit my excursions to civilization in order to conserve gas, so often times the only contact I have with people not related to me occurs when I go to pick Truman up at preschool. I enjoy visiting with the stay-at-home moms who gather outside the classroom each day very much, but sometimes I yearn for an opportunity to talk about “guy stuff” such as sports and cars and flatulence.

That is why I was thrilled this morning when one of the moms broached the subject of Albert Pujols. The all-star first baseman who thrilled the fans of the St. Louis Cardinals for the last eleven years broke the hearts of those same fans last week when he accepted an offer to play for the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim. The Redbirds offered King Albert a ten year deal worth around $210 million, but the slugger opted to take the ten year, 254 million dollar deal offered by a team with a fan base who has not lived and died with every swing of his mighty bat for the last decade. While Albert claims that his decision to move on was not about the money, it is hard for Cards fans to accept the implication that our adoration and the organization’s $21 million per year was not enough to convince him to remain a Redbird for life.

I am not mad at Albert Pujols for leaving. I am disappointed in him sure, but I am more disappointed in myself for investing so much of my heart and soul and time and money in supporting him so fervently over the past eleven years. My oldest child Alex is eleven, and I am beginning to realize how much time I wasted watching a complete stranger play a game while my own son patiently waited for his dad to give him a little attention. That’s a pretty sobering realization.

One of the other moms involved in our conversation had a vague notion of who Pujols is, but admitted she didn’t even know his first name. At first I wondered if she had been living under a rock, but then I realized that this was a person who had her priorities in order. She said she didn’t own a Cardinals ball cap, but the more she thought about it, she actually didn’t want one. Instead, she wanted a cap with the number 3 on it. When I asked her why, she said, “Because of my three kids.” Priorities.

$254,000,000.00. The moms and I tried to wrap our heads around the concept of any one man earning that much money. The calculator on my iphone tells me that Mr. Pujols will receive $69,589 every day for the next ten years of his life. I guess he didn’t think he could survive on the $57,534 per day that St. Louis was willing to give him. My wife gives me a monthly allowance of $80 (which she labels in our budget as “Trav’s Fun Money”) for doing the housework and performing the duties of being a stay-at-home parent. That’s my walkin’ around money, my going out with my friends once in a blue moon money. That amounts to $2.67 per day. $2.67 for the privilege of raising three wonderful children. I should probably pay to have that privilege. (Don’t tell my wife that.)

I think I’ll save up some of my allowance for a new hat. One with the number 3 on it.

Princess Naughton

By Travis Naughton

Published: Wednesday, December 7, 2011 9:48 AM CST

My daughter Tiana is not the first princess to be adopted by the Naughton family.

Six years ago, following a visit to Bethany’s family’s farm, we brought home a Saint Bernard named Princess.

My wife, the Voice of Reason, apparently had taken the day off. I know this because Bethany the Enabler acquiesced to my desire to adopt the one year old dog without protest.

Her only question: “She isn’t going to get any bigger is she?”

“Of course not,” I lied. Most dogs are done growing by the time they are a year old, but not giant-breeds.

Tipping the scales at a mere 45 pounds, Princess weighed a fraction of what most Saints do by age one.

Of course she was going to get bigger. Much bigger.

Within three months of bringing her home, Princess’s weight doubled. Our veterinarian, the lovely and talented Dr. Patti Cuddihee, cautioned me that perhaps I didn’t need to give our new pet six cups of food per day.

I’ll admit that I may have been overcompensating a little. You see, Princess had had a rough first year, and I was determined to make up for it.

Her life began in December of 2004 as the runt of a litter of thirteen puppies. Strike one.

Before she had even opened her eyes, she ventured over to her mother’s water bowl, fell in, and drowned. Strike two.

When Bethany’s step-mother found her, the puppy was cold and unresponsive. By all rights she was dead. Without knowing how long the poor creature had been gone, Helen decided to try to revive her.

She administered mouth-to-mouth resuscitation and believe it or not, it actually worked. But the puppy had suffered brain damage, as was evidenced by the fact that she was completely paralyzed. Strike three.

Not willing to give up on the pathetic pup, Helen took her in the house (the other dogs lived in the barn) and began to nurse her back to health. She and her children took turns bottle feeding the dog they had by then named Princess.

The kids also cleaned out her kennel and encouraged her to move her limbs.

The pup was a fighter, and no one was surprised when she started to move her front legs one cold day in December.

Bethany, Alex, and I were introduced to Princess when we came to visit for Christmas a few weeks later. She was adorable, but unable to move her back legs or stand.

I remember wondering what would become of the handicapped puppy in the kennel. Perhaps a Christmas miracle would save her.

One year later, as we returned to the farm again for Christmas, several dogs followed us from one barn to another as the kids showed off their prized sheep, cows, and goats.

Helen leaned down to pet a dog and asked, “Of course you remember Princess, don’t you?” I said that I did not. “She was living in the house last year when you were here,” she continued. “The one that couldn’t stand or walk.”

Princess had made an amazing recovery in the year since we last saw her. She not only stood and walked, but she could run, albeit with a decidedly awkward gait.

With her enormous tongue, jowls, and ears flapping in the wind as she ran, Princess was the goofiest-looking lummox of a dog I had ever seen. She was beautiful.

Then Helen said, “You know we can’t sell her because she’s not up to breed standards, and we don’t want to give her away to just anyone. Would you like to have her?”

“Well, as long as she doesn’t get any bigger.” Wink, wink.

Princess has been a member of our family ever since. Believe you me: Miracles really do happen this time of year.