18 years old

So it was pretty cold when we left to go to the hospital that morning. It ended up with snow flurries that afternoon. Somewhere between those two events, DJ was born. 

DJ stands for Daniel, Jr, obviously. Now he goes by Daniel to most of the general public, but I still stumble over that. He says that he doesn't care one way or the other. Good thing.

He was always a pretty good kid. He never cried much as an infant. He was never any trouble to get to sleep. In fact, we were pretty impressed that he would often put himself to bed when he got to be a toddler. He always wanted to help. I've told the story a million times about the time that he and I were sitting in the family room in the old house. It was a long, narrow room with a bathroom at one end. He got up and was heading that way, so I called "Hey, go to the bathroom for me while you're in there." He said ok, took a couple more steps, stopped and said "How do I do that?"

You remember that beer commercial with the frogs, right? He was real little then, sitting in my lap when it came on one time. The next thing you know, he and I were sitting there going "Bud" at each other and laughing like loons.

To this day, I still find myself wishing he hadn't gotten hurt on that tackle and having to end his football career. He really loved playing. He was in the first grade and one day we were watching football when he said "I can't wait until I'm old enough to play." I told him they have leagues for his age group, and the rest as they say is history. He played 8 of the next 10 years after that. {I've come back 2 or 3 times to edit this paragraph to make the first line more powerful, but I can't quite get it to express the true sadness I feel about the situation without being too dramatic.}

I try not to treat him like a kid, especially in front of his friends, but I am a dad, after all. For his birthday yesterday, he wanted to go to BB King's Blues Club downtown for dinner, so the family met him and his girlfriend Savannah and 3 other friends there for dinner. Of course, while we were there, I pulled a dad on him when I heard him order his cheeseburger medium-well. Now I've always ordered his stuff medium-rare for him, so when I heard that, I thought he misspoke. Yes, you got it, I asked him if he was sure he wanted it medium-well. He rolled his eyes with that teenage patience and said "Yes, Dad. I'm sure."

Happy birthday, buddy. I expect the next 18 years to be just as much fun!