A SHARP LIFE: Summer has finally arrived!

And yes, before my more detailed readers correct me, I realize that it is still technically spring until June 21st. But even the negativity of the overly detailed and critical can’t bring me down right now. For purposes of this column I am defining summer as, “that time of year when life mercifully slows down.” Or alternately, “It’s about dang time!”

As a general rule the Wonder Woman and I try to be careful not to over-commit ourselves or the kids, but despite our best efforts the past few months got out of hand. Earlier this month the Zoologist attended his last Trail Life meeting until September, the Zoologist and the Ballerina’s school year ended, and the church commitments that the Wonder Woman and I made finished up. This week the Fashionista and the Jedi finished preschool, and the Zoologist played his last soccer game of the season. By the time you read this the only thing left on the schedule with be the Ballerina and Fashionista’s dance classes every Saturday morning through their recital on Father’s Day weekend. At this point we are so tired that just getting down to one extracurricular activity sounds almost too good to be true.

So what are we going to do with all our free time? Here are my four fatherly initiatives for the all-too-brief period of time this summer when our schedule is free.

>> Get more sleep. I suspect at least four members of the family will protest this initiative, but that will be when I remind them that our family is not a democracy. No doubt they will wake me up early anyway because they apparently love democracy.

>> Teach the older kids how to change their two-year-old brother’s diaper. So far they’ve resisted this, but they can already fix their own breakfast and this is the only thing standing between me and reaching the parent nirvana of sleeping in late.

>> Finish potty-training with the three-year-old Fashionista. This has been a family initiative for over a year now and we are just now making slow, incremental progress. I hear she has to be done by high school so we better get moving on this.

>> Keep the kids in the dark about July 4th fireworks for one more year.

I have no idea if any of these initiatives will amount to anything. If recent history is a guide then they will last about as long as a snowball in a Texas summer, but a guy can dream.

Or at least I could if they’d follow my initiatives and let me rest.