I wrote the following in 2004, when my son was 6 and my daughter was 2.

The time is waning that my son will want nothing more than to play Battleship and The Magnificent Race with me all afternoon.

Some day I’ll make a silly joke, and my daughter won’t giggle with glee, she will roll her eyes and say, “Dad, you’re embarrassing me.”

I played the Stage Manager in Our Town when I was 16, and, as silly as it sounds more than 30 years later, I really did try to take this climactic exchange to heart:

Emily: Do any human beings ever realize life while they live it–every, every minute?

Stage Manager: No. (pause) The saints and poets, maybe they do some.