Lucy's Biological Disaster (Plus a Bear in a Vest)

Newsletter 2019-07-08

Like most of my weekends as a parent, this one started out with high hopes and ended with bodily fluids going all sorts of places they shouldn’t. My five-year-old, Lucy, wins the award for most dramatic exit from a family function. The prize should be a lifetime supply of bleach.

Every year around the Fourth of July, we make a pilgrimage to my Aunt Ruth’s house in the suburbs of Minneapolis to spend the weekend with my mom's side of the family. My mom is one of nine kids, and most of them now have kids and grandkids of their own. I don’t have an exact count of how many relatives I have on that branch of the family tree, but if we all showed up, we'd double the population of Minneapolis. Ruth’s house is a long drive for most of us, but we make the trip anyway because there’s nothing more important than family. Also, it’s an excuse to spend a full day drinking in a pool. If the reunion were held on dry land, we'd all probably be busy that weekend.

My wife Lola and I woke up at 5 a.m. Frid…