Watson, Hill and Keri: Asking New Questions About Sports and Domestic Violence

Jonah Keri was one of my favorite sports writers.

Keri knew his material inside and out. He peppered his baseball writing with statistics, but kept it accessible to casual fans. He knew how to analyze facts about player performance and how to communicate the data to his audience.

Keri didn’t sacrifice the quality of his writing to do it, either. He wrote with sophistication and simplicity at the same time. His writing included references to pop culture, politics and the music world. He knew years ago what many influencers are still figuring out: you need more than one vertical to stay relevant.

Keri was funny too. He could trade barbs with anyone and used his self-effacing humor to put his podcast guests at ease. (“My voice is sort of a mix of Seth Rogen and Kermit the Frog,” he’d say.) It was that humor that landed him guest spots on The Late Show with Seth Meyers and repeated appearances on the Bill Simmons and the ESPN Fantasy Focus podcasts.

Jonah Keri was smart, endearing and accomplished.

He was also a domestic abuser. Continue reading “Watson, Hill and Keri: Asking New Questions About Sports and Domestic Violence”

The Happiest Animal in the World

The team made its way out to left field for our post-game meeting. There was an obvious mix of enthusiasm among its members. Some jogged, still showing the hustle after the game that their coaches had been preaching all season. Others ambled more slowly than rush hour traffic in midtown.

I couldn’t blame them for feeling listless; we’d just lost 12-0.

The boys knelt or sat cross-legged in the outfield and promptly began pulling out blades of grass while they waited for my coaching partner and me. We exchanged some brief thoughts about who had earned the game ball and walked out to join the team.

“Look,” I began, “I know it’s hard to think about positives after we just lost a game like that.”

A few of the players smiled ruefully as I continued. I mentioned their progress in working together as a team, including some players who played out of position in that game. I pointed out that two of our better players had not been available. And I added that we had played hard against our opponents, who were the best team in the league.

I went on to say that Memorial Day Weekend was essentially our All Star Break. We had passed the mid-point of the season and wouldn’t have another game for a full week. I encouraged the players to come to practice in a few days ready to work, but also to put tonight’s game behind them. I had just finished reminding them that, in our league, everyone makes the playoffs when our starting catcher raised his hand.

“E, you have something to add?” I asked.

“Yeah,” he said, turning to face his teammates.

“We have to be like goldfish.” Continue reading “The Happiest Animal in the World”

The Sweetest Addition

I always said I didn’t want to get a dog until we lived in a house. I said that having a dog in our two-bedroom apartment already overrun by our two human children was unreasonable. It would be too cramped, too difficult, too inconvenient. My wife agreed – at least verbally – but I’m skeptical if she actually meant it. Even if a verbal contract is binding in the State of New York, I wonder if she always knew we would end up getting a dog sooner than I had suggested.

Then, in March of 2020, our lives turned upside down when COVID hit.

The pandemic forced our children to stay home from school, away from their friends and any other in-person interactions. My wife and I could see our children’s moods changing. Their irritability grew and their anxiety skyrocketed. Our daughter threw tantrums and screamed whenever we tried to encourage her to participate in her class sessions on Zoom. Our son argued when we reviewed his schoolwork and voiced his displeasure at only having weekly contact with his class.

We agreed that a dog would be a wonderful distraction for our family from the tensions of the outside world. If our kids could focus on caring for a new furry family member, perhaps they could forget about being terrified to leave the apartment and interact with the outside world. My wife applied to every pet adoption agency in the city in the hopes that one might land a match. Continue reading “The Sweetest Addition”

7:00 PM

It had been a long two weeks, to say the least.

My day at work on that first Monday was bizarre, from the eerie tension on the subway ride, to the general staff meeting we held on the sidewalk outside the nearby church, to the renewed tension on the ride back home. I spent the rest of the week “working from home,” while also trying to entertain two children who suddenly weren’t able to attend school in person. T was still at work, preparing with the other New York City teachers to spend the next months teaching remotely. We were all home together for that second week. We navigated work and school schedules, limited living space and the circumstances that the pandemic thrusted upon us.

When Friday evening finally arrived, we ate Shabbat dinner together. We sang Shalom Aleichem and chanted the blessings that welcomed in the sorely needed weekly Day of Rest. The kids talked about their online class sessions and asked if school would look the same way next week. T and I did our best to reassure them – and ourselves, honestly – of the most important things: that everything was going to be fine and that we were safe. Whatever happened next, we would figure it out together.

When we had finished eating, the four of us went up to the roof of our apartment building. It was a warm evening, though not unseasonably so, considering it was late March. We admired the blend of watercolors that had begun spreading across the sky and the pleasant start to the weekend.

That was when I heard it. Continue reading “7:00 PM”

Building More Than Objects at Home Depot

I have a love-hate relationship with Home Depot.

I love the store. I love its vastness, the sheer volume of its products and the shelves that reach higher than some local apartment buildings. I love the smell of sawdust and sweat, the aisles filled with metal, lumber and potential. I love the impulse to let loose grunts of “More power!” that would make Tim Allen jealous. I love feeling my testosterone levels climbing from the first steps I take at the entrance.

But I hate the store. I hate the way my sense of awe shifts quickly to being overwhelmed if I don’t know exactly what I’m looking for. I hate going into an environment where I know I don’t measure up. I hate feeling like I’m wasting the employees’ time by asking for recommendations of power tools or light fixtures or how to install a toilet seat. I hate feeling like the other store patrons can tell that I’ve put so many extra holes in our apartment walls when trying to hang a simple picture frame.1

Facebook would say our relationship is “complicated.” Continue reading “Building More Than Objects at Home Depot”

Keeping Our Kids Safe Online With Bark

I recently became an ambassador for Bark, an app that helps parents monitor their children’s online activity. You can find my discount code here and at the bottom of the post. Still, as always, all opinions here are my own.


I began working with Kayla1 and her family when she was fourteen years old.

She was a lovely young woman. She had a sharp sense of humor, knew how to take constructive criticism (from me, at least) and was self-aware enough to offer her own insights about the sources of her depressive symptoms. She was open about her relationships, both social and romantic, and seemed to genuinely enjoy asking my opinions about the choices she faced on a daily basis. She didn’t always take my advice – what teenager would? – but she always listened. Continue reading “Keeping Our Kids Safe Online With Bark”

What If, Revisited

I sat in the large ballroom of the Westin Riverwalk Hotel, the site of this year’s Dad 2.0 Summit, simultaneously listening to the opening keynote address from fitness personality Shaun T and tweeting what I thought sounded like poignant quotes. He talked about being caught by surprise when his children were born – the surrogate carrying his twins went into labor early – and how he and his partner reacted when they received the news. He spoke about being privileged enough to be home with his brand new babies during their first few months of life and how he dealt with the feelings of anxiety and self-doubt that often threatened to overwhelm him. He brought up the emotions he experienced as his children grew, the advice he had been given and the lessons he had learned.

I was mid-tweet when my phone began buzzing furiously. The Twitter app disappeared and the screen went black as the call came in, leaving only the red and green circles at the bottom and my wife’s name at the top. I swiped to answer the call and ducked out of the ballroom as quickly as I could.

She was calling from the hospital. Continue reading “What If, Revisited”

Becoming a Child on the Count of Five

Her back was straight, a perfect 180 degrees, without the slightest bit of slouch that eventually comes after years of slumping back in chairs or hunching over cell phones. She sat cross-legged on the high, plush white chair, her small body fitting on the seat perfectly. Her eyes were focused upward toward the television – why else would she be sitting so still? – but her face lacked the dazed and empty expression usually found on zoned-out high school students and brain-hungry zombies. I smiled slightly at the thought of her surrounded by “celebrities” at Madame Tussaud’s; she could have been, if not for the almost undetectable rise and fall of her shoulders and the end of her ponytail drifting in the flow of air from the vent.

“I can’t believe how nicely she’s sitting,” Valentina, the owner of the studio, remarked to us. “Most of the kids that come in at this age are running all over the place, even with the television.”

T and I chuckled and shrugged. “The television is a big help,” T answered, “but yeah, she’ll sit. I’m probably more worked up about this than she is.” Continue reading “Becoming a Child on the Count of Five”

Onward and Upward in the New Year

It was a good thing the wall was inflatable; otherwise my anxiety would have been even higher.

It was only her third try but she scrambled up, finding hand and footholds quickly, as though she had made the same journey hundreds of times before. I assisted her sparingly during her first two trips, giving her a boost when she needed, but usually just directing her to find the next small ledges to plant her feet. I didn’t touch her on that third time, although I was ready to catch her as she went over the curved outcropping halfway up. I hadn’t thought much of it at the time, aside from being amazed at how rapidly she had mastered the climbing wall, but she apparently noticed that I wasn’t holding her anymore.

“Are you still behind me?” she had asked. Continue reading “Onward and Upward in the New Year”

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