Today has been wonderful in a very basic kind of way.

I went for a run this morning before it got too hot. Then I spent some time reading before meeting a friend for lunch. We had delicious Italian beef, dipped with hot peppers. A true Chicago classic.

After lunch, I headed down to the Chicago River for an hour of kayaking. I only saw one other person on the water, probably because it was over 90 degrees. Fine by me. I had the river mostly to myself as I paddled along, looking at the birds, trees, turtles, and ducks.

It’s one of the only times I exercise without listening to music. I genuinely enjoy hearing the wind, the water against the kayak, the birds, and the background hum of the city. It’s peaceful in a way that’s hard to describe.

When I got home, I took a nice cool shower, drank an ice-cold Vitamin Water, and now I’m stretched out on the couch in the air conditioning getting ready to read some more.

Nothing crazy. Nothing life-changing. Just a really good day.

And that’s the point.

All of these little things deserve to be appreciated. I’m able to exercise and move my body. I can read interesting books. I got to have lunch and a good conversation with a friend. Tasty food. A kayak. Open spaces. Nature. A cold shower. Clean drinking water. Air conditioning during a heat wave.

When you start listing them out, it turns out an ordinary day is actually full of gifts. Today reminded me that life is mostly made up of small pleasures stacked one on top of another.

• A run before the sun gets too high.
• An Italian beef with hot peppers.
• An hour alone on the river.
• A cold drink.
• A good book.
• A comfortable couch.

That’s a pretty wonderful way to spend a day.

It’s great to be alive.

As usual, I was wrong again.

I was wrong when my wife wanted to redecorate our older son’s room. To be fair, some of my objections were sustained, so I’d like partial credit for helping make it a great remodel.

I was wrong about spending the money to redo our backyard.

I was wrong about finishing the basement.

However, I was NOT wrong about the Little Free Puzzle Library she wanted installed in our front yard.

You’ve seen Little Free Libraries. Take a book, leave a book. I love them. If I buy a physical copy of a book, as soon as I’m done reading it, I walk down the block and put it in one.

But a puzzle library?

Same concept, except with jigsaw puzzles.

Nevertheless, she wanted one for Christmas, so I bought it. We had it installed about a month ago.

Now, I am going to maintain my position that I am not wrong, but I may be the only person in the neighborhood who thinks that.

The thing has been a huge hit.

My wife loves looking out the window and watching adults and kids stop to browse through the puzzles. It took a week or two for word to spread, but now there are always a few puzzles in there and they rotate regularly.

The final blow came while we were setting up for our block party.

A woman stopped her car in the middle of the street, which irritated me because we were trying to clear the street for the event. But she jumped out and opened her trunk.

It was full of puzzles.

She was genuinely excited that there was a puzzle library in the neighborhood and wanted to contribute.

So yes, technically, I still maintain that a Little Free Puzzle Library is a ridiculous idea.

Unfortunately, everyone else appears to love it.

Including me. (it’s a nice neighborly thing)

That was a nice Father’s Day.

For whatever reason, the last few Father’s Days I’ve been traveling to Utah. I think it’s just been timing. School gets out, a week or two passes, and I’m on the road. Usually, I leave on Saturday and wind up missing Father’s Day entirely. This year was different. Because of a family trip later in the summer, I’m heading west at a different time. Going forward, I think I might stick around more often.

First off, I slept in. Not late. I’m old.

Still, it was nice to sleep in and not have to worry about training. No alarm. No long run. No bike ride hanging over my head.

After coffee and the crossword, my wife and I went to a yoga class at our gym. I possess neither strength nor flexibility, which is exactly why I’ve decided I need to add yoga and/or strength training to my routine. For me, though, it was also another hour I got to spend with my wife. I know. I’m a simp.

We did a chore or two on the way home and then had a nice family brunch with everyone. After that, my wife, the boys and I played Scattergories. I don’t know if there is any scientific evidence that Scattergories improves family relationships, but there should be.

Later, my wife and I went to a cooking class. The topic was smashburgers, but it was really about a lot more than that: grinding meat, making buns, pickles, aioli, and a wedge salad. It was a very nice afternoon and, once again, a few more hours spent with my wife.

When we got home, we watched a harmless rom-com before bed.

Honestly, hanging out with my wife and kids was all I wanted anyway. That’s usually the answer if you ask me what I want.

That said, I also got some great gifts.

A gift card to a new deli in town. Bags and bags of Jujy Fruits and Jelly Beans. My family knows me well.

But the standout was something my daughter made. She created a large framed collage of my life. Apparently, she raided “the box” in the basement, that mysterious storage container where important things go to be forgotten for twenty years.

The collage included my high school suspension letter, my college ID, military dog tags and awards, paperwork from my appointment as a prosecutor, letters from former students, and photographs spanning decades all the way to the present day.

It was spectacular.

Not that I didn’t also appreciate the future pastrami on rye.

What struck me most was seeing all those pieces of my life together in one place. Most of us don’t spend much time looking backward. We just move on to the next thing. The next job. The next project. The next worry. My daughter took all those scattered pieces and turned them into a story.

Maybe that’s one of the gifts children give their parents as they get older. They remind us that our lives look different from the outside than they do from the inside.

From the inside, I mostly remember mistakes, wrong turns, and things I should have done better. From the outside, she saw a life worth celebrating.

All in all, it was a great day.

I have a hoodie that says “Find the Good.” I remember seeing it online and thinking, That’s a great reminder. I should really wear that.

The problem is I seem to have forgotten to actually do it. Find the good, that is, I wear the hoodie all the time.

This should not come as a shock to anyone who knows me. I am not exactly Mr. Sunshine. I tend to see the bad. Everywhere. All the time.

The newspaper is full of suicide, murder, fraud, corruption, war, and all the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse. I see stories about parents brawling at children’s sporting events, fights at kindergarten graduations (yes, apparently we have those now), and seemingly endless violence in my city.

My default setting is, “Why can’t everyone just get along? Why is everyone so aggro?”

The problem is that living that way is exhausting. It makes me miserable, and I suspect it makes me less enjoyable to be around. That creates its own little cycle. I see the bad, I feel bad, people avoid the person who is always seeing the bad, and then I have another reason to think the world is terrible.

So I’ve decided this summer will be the Summer of Finding the Good.

I know what some of my longtime readers are saying:

“Wait a minute. Didn’t you already have a ‘Something Good Every Day’ category?”

Yes. Yes, I did.

Let’s call this a recommitment.

I may not write about it every day, but I am going to look for it every day.

Case in point: last night I volunteered at a soup kitchen. And by soup kitchen, I mean an actual soup kitchen. There was actual soup. It felt like a detail worth mentioning.

My job was handing out bread to around 150 people who came for dinner. It was hard to see. There were people who were homeless, struggling with poverty, battling mental illness, and a few who looked like they walked out of a Jim Carroll story (if you get that reference).

I came home saddened by the reality that so many people in my own community are suffering. I’ve volunteered at food pantries and soup kitchens before, so I’m not sure why it hit me so hard this time. Maybe I’m just tired of seeing so much evidence that the world can be cruel.

But my wife, who has the unfair advantage of being an optimist, gently pointed out something I completely missed.

I was focusing on the 150 people who needed a meal. I was ignoring the fact that a church group was there twice a week, making sure they got one.

I was focusing on the struggles. I was ignoring the twenty volunteers who gave up their evening to help strangers.

The suffering was real. But so was the kindness.

She pointed out something similar when I mentioned problems a friend had recently shared with me. I focused on the fact that those things happened. She focused on the fact that they overcame them.

And the funny thing is, I used to be good at this. In fact, I used to think it was one of my greatest strengths.

A bad post-college relationship ended? It led me to move home, go to law school, and put me on the path that led to the life I have now.

Leaving a job rather than accepting a temporary demotion? It led me to start my own business, spend more time with my kids when they were young, and allowed my wife to pursue her own goals.

Somewhere over the last few years, I lost that ability.

I’ve had a pretty easy life, and when some larger challenges came along, they pierced the bubble I had been living in. Since then, I feel like I’ve been standing guard, scanning the horizon for the next disaster.

It is exhausting.

So this summer, I’m going back to something I used to know.

The world is not all good. It never has been. History is basically a very long record of humans doing terrible things to one another. But history is also a record of humans feeding strangers, caring for the sick, creating art, raising children, loving each other, and getting up every day to try again.

As I sit here writing this, I can see the sky darkening and the rain beginning to fall, literally

The Summer of Finding the Good guy is going to think about the grass, the flowers, the trees, and every living thing that needs that rain.

I will find the good.

This isn’t a post about me virtue signaling that I’m a good person. If anything, it’s the opposite. This is a selfish post. Because today, I was reminded of something every psychology book, self-help article, and therapist has told me for years: one of the best ways to get out of your own head is to do something for somebody else.

Today, I actually felt it.

I took Cleo to the dog park to play fetch. Cleo has no interest in making friends. She has no interest in sniffing around or socializing with other dogs. She has one purpose in life: ball. Because of this, I always bring two balls. Other dogs inevitably steal her ball, because apparently “keep away” is a much more popular dog game than “fetch.” Cleo does not have time for those games. Today, there was another dog there with a mom and her young son. Their dog watched Cleo playing fetch and clearly wanted in. The kid looked around for a ball but couldn’t find one.

So I tossed him my extra ball.

You would have thought I handed him a winning lottery ticket.

He was so excited to throw it for his dog. When Cleo and I were leaving, the mom called out, “Wait! We have your ball!”

I told them to keep it for their dog, or leave it there for the next dog that came along. The look on their faces was like I had given them a million dollars.

That ball cost me about ten cents. I buy them in bulk. Ten cents bought happiness for a kid, his mom, their dog, my dog, and me.

Pretty good return on investment.

Later, I stopped at a corner store to buy a bottle of gin for a celebratory martini. I hadn’t had one in a month because of Ironman 70.3 training. Last night, after the race, it would have wrecked me. Today is recovery week. I’ll survive.

The guy in front of me looked like a painter, covered in paint after a day of work. He was buying three cans of beer. His card was declined. He checked his bank account and said, “There’s a three-day hold. I thought I had at least ten bucks in there.”

The cashier, who clearly knew him, said it was okay. “Just pay me tomorrow.”

The total was $12.55.

After he left, I paid for his beer along with my gin and told the cashier that if the guy came back tomorrow, he didn’t owe anything.

I was going to leave it there. But as I drove home, I saw him walking a block away. I rolled down my window and said, “Hey, just so you know, I squared you up. Don’t let him take your money tomorrow.”

He looked stunned. He thanked me, asked my name, introduced himself, and that was it.

The thing is, I’ve been that guy. When I was dating my wife, she used to call the bank before going to the ATM to see how much money she could take out. This was before internet banking. Sometimes the question wasn’t, “Do I have enough money?” The question was, “Can I take out twenty dollars, or do I only have five?” And back when ATMs gave out five-dollar bills, that was a real thing.

I’ve waited for checks to clear. I’ve had friends slip me gas money. I’ve had people bring me a couple of bags of groceries when I was a broke college student.

This wasn’t charity. This was repayment. A tiny installment on a debt I owe to every person who ever quietly helped me when I needed it.

I’m trying to embrace that idea I’ve heard in so many spiritual traditions: “It’s we.”

We’re all one.

And honestly, both of these moments made me feel better about life.

First, I felt grateful that I am now in a place where I can spend ten dollars—or twelve dollars and fifty-five cents—without worrying whether I can make rent.

Second, there is something deeply satisfying about unexpectedly making someone else’s day better.

Third, and maybe most importantly, it reminded me that there is still a lot of good happening around us.

I spend too much time reading newspapers, scrolling social media, and absorbing the message that everything is terrible and getting worse. But that isn’t the whole story.

The other day, I parked downtown for a doctor’s appointment. The validation sticker made the parking free.

Free.

In Chicago, I was expecting “half off,” which usually means they only rob you for $30 instead of $60.

Instead, I drove away happy.

The night before my race, my family and I went out for pizza. The manager apologized for the wait and brought us a large pizza even though we had ordered a small.

“We’ll only charge you for the small,” she said.

Great.

Then ten minutes later, she came back.

“Funny story. The kitchen made your small pizza too. We’ll box it up for you.”

Even better.

Then the bill came.

No charge for any pizza.  Oh, and there was no ” wait.”  Don’t know what she was talking about.

No matter, I still have a refrigerator full of free pizza.

Granted, I was so nervous about the race that I ate one slice that night. Anxiety is a great appetite suppressant.

But that’s not the point.

The point is that little wonderful things happen every day.

I once saw an old black-and-white video of a man saying:

“Every morning when you wake up, tell yourself, ‘Something wonderful is going to happen to me today.'”

And eventually, it will.

Not because the universe is magically delivering presents to you.

Because you start noticing.

The free parking.

The extra pizza.

The dog with a new ball.

The stranger who doesn’t have to worry about finding $12.55 tomorrow.

I used to write that sentence in my journal every morning: Something wonderful is going to happen to me today. I got away from that habit.

I think I need to get back to it. Not just believing that something wonderful will happen to me and finding that thing each day, but t remembering that sometimes, if I pay attention, I can be the reason something wonderful happens to someone else.

.

When I came to work yesterday, there was a mailer envelope on my desk with a post-it note saying “Hope this brings a smile to your face.”   No name.  No mailing address or return address.

Inside was a t-shirt that had a picture of an eagle and the words “Bald & Magnificent.”

It did bring a smile to my face.

I still don’t know who gave it to me.  Nobody recognizes the handwriting on the note or admits to it.  I wish I knew so I could thank them.

I have to admit that it meant a lot to me.  I’ve been going through some things (all minor in the world) and feeling the emptiness now that I’m not actively parenting.  A bit useless, a bit left behind.  Anyway,  someone out in the world thought of me, thought enough about me, to go out of their way (time/money) to get me something.  It was just what I needed.

Whoever that was, thank you.  It’s appreciated more than you know.

I will also take what it meant to me and pay that forward.

Now it’s my kids.

Twenty-five. Twenty-three. Twenty-one. All standing at that awkward, unsteady edge of adulthood, trying to figure out who they are and where they’re going. Watching it stresses me out more than I care to admit. I want clarity for them. Stability. Forward momentum. A clean, sensible path.

And yet.

When I look back on my own early twenties, I was an absolute mess.

I was figuring it out in real time, making dumb mistakes, second-guessing everything, and thinking every decision was permanent when none of them were. And somehow, that period—the confusion, the uncertainty, the chaos—is one of the most fondly remembered stretches of my life.

I want that for my kids. Not the suffering, exactly—but the right kind of struggle. The post-college figuring-it-out years. Eating way too much cheap ramen and taking jobs that aren’t great but teach you something anyway—making choices that feel huge but turn out to be stepping stones.

After college, I lived at home and worked a truly crap job while studying for the LSAT. Then I moved into the city, went to law school, watched a lot of Mystery Science Theater 3000, drank martinis, and dated a girl who was all sorts of wrong for me. I hung out with Dave—who went to a different law school but whom I’d met at that awful job—and we stumbled our way through our twenties together.

Then there was the same wrong girl, but also weekends golfing with coworkers, wandering through shops in Wrigleyville, and what I now recognize as one small adventure after another. At the time, it didn’t feel magical. It felt uncertain. Unsettled. But looking back, it feels cinematic—like a live-action Richard Linklater movie where nothing much happens except life itself.

I don’t want to deny my kids that. I don’t want to rush them past the messy middle just because it makes me anxious. I want to be mindful—more mindful than my own parents probably were—that this phase isn’t fun while you’re in it, but it becomes meaningful with time.

So I’m here. To support them. To worry quietly. To trust the process even when it makes me uncomfortable.

And I’m also here to keep making memories of my own.

For most of my life, I’ve been able to look at whatever stage I was in and say, This is the best one yet. Somewhere along the way, I lost that perspective. I don’t want to stay stuck there.

My kids are becoming who they’re meant to be. I’m still becoming who I’m meant to be too.

I need to get back to believing that this—right now—is still the best chapter yet.

The other day, my oldest friend—the one I met in kindergarten, went through primary and secondary school with, and then roomed with in college—turned 60.

That stopped me cold.

It’s blowing my mind, in a good way. I can’t believe we’re that old. (To be fair, I don’t turn 60 for another three months, but let’s not split hairs.) Sixty sounds… ancient. And yet it doesn’t feel ancient at all.

It feels like yesterday we were in high school. Even more so, college. My best friend is still my college roommate, and even though I’ve known him for 41 years—holy cow—it still feels like I met him last week. Time compresses like that when the connection sticks.

Every morning I wake up next to the perfect woman for me. Maybe not everyone’s cup of tea, but absolutely mine. It blows my mind that we’ve been married for 27 years and together for 29 (or something like that—I honestly don’t know the exact math anymore). I remember our first date like it just happened. The details are still there, sharp and clear, while entire decades somehow evaporated.

So much life fits between those moments. Kindergarten with Jim. College with Bob. Law school shenanigans and everything after with Dave. So many good times. Plenty of stressful times too—but somehow, looking back, they’re all remembered with fondness. Even the hard parts have softened.

As I settle into what feels like the last part of the third quarter, I’m trying to appreciate that it’s still the third quarter. It’s not late in the fourth. I know the clock can speed up without warning—any day, some doctor could tell me it’s cancer—but for now, I’m here. Aware. Amazed.

I’m not sure where this post is going, other than to say I’m stunned that I’m 59, don’t feel much older than my mid-20s, and have been incredibly lucky. Blessed, really. With friendships that lasted, love that deepened, and a life that turned out far better than I had any right to expect.

If I died tomorrow, I’d be happy.

I got more than I deserved.

It’s great to be alive.