Mike O'Connell

Dear Dad,

It’s been 10 years since we last got to talk. There hasn’t been a day since that I haven’t thought of you, and I find myself speaking of you often even to those you never got to meet.

First things first, I have some good news: almost three years ago I became a dad myself. I’ve got a little boy named Franklin and he’s the most adorable child ever. Also he can also drive you nuts. For Pete’s sake I hope I didn’t cause you that much grief when I was his age. We get to have so much fun together, though, that it’s all worth it. I’m remembering now things that you and I did 30 years ago I can do with him and it makes me smile. Things I had long ago forgotten are coming back to me. Remember when I used to jump on your bed and we’d play the game “crash”? Okay, it’s not really an actual game but Franklin loves to climb up on me and crash down to the mattress like I used to. He’ll jump on the bed and look at himself in the mirror and I’ll call him a little monkey and it’s 1985 all over again. Mom and Dad and monkey on a late Sunday morning.

I met my wife about a year after you passed. It wasn’t long after I met her that I knew we’d marry and have a family. I remember once asking you how you knew that Mom was the right person for you and you didn’t really have an answer, just that somehow you knew. Yup, that’s how it happens. My wife’s name is Leia and she is my greatest companion. She is my constant encouragement and the best mother a little boy could have. She knows a lot about you, of course, and she sees you in me every day.

Five years ago I left Binghamton, a move I know we’d discussed many times. Yeah, Binghamton just wasn’t doing it for me anymore and Leia and I decided to move closer to her family. We live in Northern Virginia now and though they’ve got the usual group of morons here there are many people who are genuinely nice and I think it’ll be a good place for Franklin to grow up. Honestly, though, I don’t think you’d like it: everyone here is a terrible driver.

Not long after we moved I started another journey that’s now near its completion. I’m becoming a public school teacher, Dad, endorsed in middle and high school English and social studies. High school English teacher. Real original, I know. Well, over the last 10 years I’ve just become more and more and more like you and I thought I’d make the transformation complete. I started out by teaching kids at our local community center during the summer, then became a substitute teacher during the school year, then a teacher’s aide, and now I’ve just received my official teaching license from the state of Virginia. You and I both tried a few things before we found our calling to be teachers but we found it eventually.

I don’t think I ever told you, Dad, but over the last 10 years I’ve realized more and more how much you meant to me. It’s too bad you had to leave when you did, because I think we were just beginning to have an actual mature, adult relationship. There have been many times over the past decade I wished I could have asked your advice about something but of course you weren’t there. But somehow you were there and I’ve been able to sort of piece together the things we would have talked about and the advice you would’ve given me. Something sunk in and somehow I was able to figure it out, even with you not here. I remember what you said in that last meaningful conversation we had, just a few days before you were gone, that things were going to happen I didn’t expect or plan on, and I would have to deal with them. There have been plenty of such occurrences and your advice has been most appropriate.

I’m sorry I didn’t listen more attentively to all your other advice before that, when I was a teenager and probably didn’t think it was so important. Somehow, though, I can hear your voice 20 years later with something that I would have ignored and see now its wisdom. I find myself saying things to Franklin you would have said, or doing things you would have done. It’s scary sometimes, but not in a bad way. Turns out that I turned out just like you: husband, father, teacher. I wasn’t any of those things 10 years ago, yet here I am.

You’re my greatest idol, Dad, and I guess it’s hardly any coincidence that we ended up so much alike. Remember when I was a kid and said I wanted to be like Joe DiMaggio or Frank Sinatra? Over the last 10 years I realize the person I wanted to be was you. I had no better teacher and no better person to emulate than the man who lived right in my own house. I was lucky to have you for a role model even if I didn’t realize it at the time. I wish I had told you then but it took me a while to figure it out. I did, though, and that’s all that matters. You taught me so many wonderful things and somehow you’re still teaching me. How to be a good husband, a good father, generous, fair, honest, and faithful. Franklin’s going to hear all of it, too, of course, because that’s what being a dad is all about.

I learned from the best. Thanks, Dad.

Mikey

Even with Monday’s embarrassing overtime loss in Pittsburgh, the Washington Capitals still finished the day with the most points in the NHL (since tied yesterday by the upstart Blue Jackets). Yes, yes, we’ve seen this narrative before, but ya gotta love a team as hot as the Caps in your hometown.

And don’t look now, but the Caps’ Verizon Center roommates have gone on a bit of a streak as well. Our hometown Wizards have won seven of their last ten and are now holding the fifth place in the Eastern Conference playoff picture.

High-scoring wins have brought excitement to D.C. and a flurry of 50% off days at Papa John’s.

Nice to hear some good news coming out of Washington for a change.

The last weekend with you-know-who as president brings us football, of course. Sweet, sweet, NFL playoff football.

Kudos, schedule makers, for saving the—dare I say?—marquee matchup of this weekend’s quarterfinals for last. Sunday evening we’ll be treated to arguably the NFL’s hottest team, the Green Bay Packers, versus arguably its best team, the Dallas Cowboys. The ‘Boys skidded a bit toward the end of the season, losing two of their last four games, but still had the best record in the NFC. Believe it or not it’s been more than two decades since they won a Super Bowl.

Well, the road to the next one begins this Sunday.

I’ve said it before… this is the football equivalent of March Madness.

We didn’t exactly see any buzzer beaters in the weekend’s NFL matchups—more like some lopsided 16 vs. 1 games. Tonight, though, should be different, with a rematch of last year’s more-than-entertaining College Football Playoff National Championship (is that what it’s called?) game from Tampa, Florida. Both the Clemson Tigers and Alabama Crimson Tide won their semifinal games last week with stingy defense, hardly portending the 45-40-type game we saw last year.

Alabama is going for its ridiculous fifth national title in eight years. Call me a spoilsport but I hope they don’t get it. Having no particular allegiance to either team I simply want to see something different.

Go, Clemson!

A front-page article in my local paper (that would be The Washington Post) Sunday exclaimed that a once-doubting “scientist” now believed in global warming. A Festivus miracle: he has seen the light.

I think one of the most useless phrases in 21st century politics (or English for that matter) is a “belief” in global warming. Can one “believe” in global warming? Has it now reached religious status? For some I suppose it has.

By definition I suppose we all believe certain things about the weather. I believe June is, on average, warmer than January. I believe snow is colder than rain. I believe Tuesday begins with the letter T and Wednesday begins with the letter W as long as we’re comparing one thing to the next.

What our friends mean, of course, when they say that one believes in global warming is that he or she promotes a public policy designed to lessen its effects. This is several steps removed from reading a thermometer.

I can look at a thermometer and measure temperatures from day to day, week to week, and decade to decade. Has the average temperature on Earth risen slightly in recent years? My friends who do these measurements tell me it has. Okay. Can I assume this trend will continue without abatement? Can I conclude with certainty that it has been the effect of man (aerosol cans and the like) that has caused this temperature rise? When temperatures rose in previous centuries was it the same effect? Did the last Ice Age end when cavemen began driving gas-guzzling cars?

Even if we were to draw a direct link from human activity to temperature change, would we assume that we could not reverse the change without curtailing our activities? Could no one figure out a way to satisfy both desires? The species who has brought us iPhones, iPads, and deep-fried Oreos? The only way for us to survive the next 50 years is to make our lives worse? Require by law that all of us make our lives worse? I can FaceTime with someone in Guam but I can’t buy the light bulb I want?

Let’s set aside “beliefs” of one thing or another when it comes to the weather. To use a much-maligned phrase, it is what it is. So let’s move to the real questions: 1.) Will continued temperature fluctuations adversely affect life on Earth? 2.) Has it been the activities of man that have caused or will cause this havoc? 3.) Will continued activities make our planet uninhabitable? 4.) Are we willing to reduce our lifestyles to reverse the trend? 5.) Are we willing to force our neighbors by government fiat to do likewise?

I believe these are much more difficult—and salient—questions.