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It was one year ago today that our friend Joshua went home. I still think about him often. My life is different now.

I was driving home from South Carolina on Sunday, and some words of Sandra McCracken’s song “Age After Age” stood out to me:

First, the chorus:

Age after age
of heroes and soldiers
it gives me sight and makes me brave,
standing on their shoulders

And also this verse:

To the ones left behind who are picking up the pieces
of planes, bombs, and buildings of innocence and evil
‘Cause when the news and noise and flowers die,
and you still wake up alone
There is a God who knows every tear you cry
and this world is on His shoulders

I watched the World Trade Center movie the other night. I thought I could handle it. I was wrong. The horror of that day came flooding back to my mind. We went to the late show, and I felt like I needed a couple hours of Family Guy to let my mind unwind and be able to sleep.

The movie was actually really well done. It tells the story of two people who got trapped in the debris. I should also point out that this movie is in no way political. There is a small clip of a press conference with President Bush making comments about the attacks, but politics were left out of the movie completely.

Should you see it? I’d say yes. Watch it once. I’m not sure I could handle watching it again. In a way, it was sort of like Mel Gibson’s Passion of the Christ movie where seeing it once was more than enough. In another way, it’s a good reminder of what happened on that horrible day. We should never forget 9/11/2001, and maybe this movie will help us remember.

My 5 year old munchkin becomes a 6 year old munchkin today.  She’s such a wonderful little girl.

6 years as a parent….wow.

My dad pointed this out to me.  If you check the box score from Tuesday’s Dodgers game, you’ll see that 5 of the 9 starters are former members of the Braves.  All season I have doubted that the Dodgers had any chance, but with all the ex-Braves, I’d say the Dodgers have a great chance of getting eliminated in the first round of the playoffs.

Without taking too much pleasure in another person’s frustrating circumstances (Richard), I wanted to post a quick update on my neighbor.  You will recall that he had someone mow his front yard and half of his back yard, but he never had them finish the back yard.  As of this morning when I left for work, he had still not cut it.

Last week I saw him putting a gas can into his car (as if he would be taking it to get gas) and had hoped it meant he would be mowing soon.  Apparently he was using it for some other purpose, because there has still been no grass mowed.

Next Monday is the date he either has to go to court or pay the fine for his 2nd ticket.  Tuesday morning, if he still hasn’t had it mowed, he will have to go to court (and won’t have the option of just paying a fine).

Does anybody know what the county can do to you if you refuse to mow your lawn?  Do they just keep raising the fine, or can they do something more severe?  Not that I hope anything like that happens (Richard)…I was just wondering.

I’m not old. Really. I turned 29 last month, and I realize that’s still very young. Recently, however, there have been a couple of things happening that made me realize I’m getting old.

1. I realized that I can remember stuff that happened 20 years ago. The fact that I can remember is a good sign, but 20 years is a long time. I was at the chiropractor earlier this week, and he asked if I had ever been in any car accidents that required me to get chiropractic help. I started telling him about the accident I was in, and when he asked how long ago that was, I was shocked to realize it was two decades ago. I mean, the 16 year old girl who was driving that Toyota is almost 40 now. Wow. (…not that 40 is old…)

2. Thursday night I had the opportunity to sit among parents - as one of them - in a school parent meeting. Kids in our area start school on Monday, and I told my wife I’d make the trip out to sit through the meeting.

The meeting wasn’t so bad, but I remember back (20 years ago) when I had to go to those type of events because my parents worked at the school. I remember seeing all those parents walking around with strange looks on their faces.

Now I know they were just realizing that they were getting old.

My friend Rick sent me this picture today.  He’s such a comedian.  I normally wouldn’t post this, but the Yanks are on top of their division thanks to a wonderful Boston loss last night.