Opening Day: The Language of Baseball

Image property of Major League Baseball

Today, in celebration of the 2014 Major League Baseball season, a chapter from my book is available as an excerpt on both Huffington Post Parents and Huffington Post Sports. Baseball, Part II, is the story of how my son and I often communicate about life in baseball terms and how the game lends lessons that go far beyond the field.

The chapter captures a moment from my son Cole's 2012 Little League all-star tryout and ends with a conversation that we had about setting goals, perseverance and the love that we share for each other and baseball.

I hope you have a few moments to check it out and click share over at Huff Post. 

2013 Fall Championship game

Winner of the Gold 2013 Mom's Choice Award

I can't tell if I'm more excited to share my book on a big stage or to see a picture of Cole playing baseball on the front page of HuffSports, on Opening Day. 

Life Is Short, Laundry Is Eternal is available at Amazon.com and everywhere that books and eBooks are sold.

Howard Stern Show: News Brief

Today was perhaps my favorite day since 'Life Is Short, Laundry Is Eternal' was released last year...

I've been a daily listener of the Howard Stern Show since my sophomore year in high school. I genuinely wish that I could climb into a time machine and tell the seventeen-year-old me what happened today.

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Speaking: Federation of Woman's Clubs

I want to say a huge thank you to the Edgewater, NJ chapter of The Federation of Woman's Clubs for inviting me to speak at their meeting. I had a fantastic evening!

These lovely woman gather together and do good works, giving back to their community and helping others to realize their dreams. I was lucky enough to be with them on the evening that a young high school student returned to tell the group about what their generosity meant to her. - Very inspiring stuff!

Later, I spoke about my journey to being published and we laughed about the crazy year that followed the release of 'Life Is Short, Laundry Is Eternal'. I hear that I'm going to be invited back for a Q&A/Book Review. I hope they like it! 

Contact Scott with speaking, freelance or interview requests.

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Great women, doing great work!

Life Is Short: Writing

There are in excess of 70,000 images in my iPhoto library. I've taken so many pictures over the years for two reasons. I enjoy photography, and the thought of Kelly and I looking at those pictures later in life makes me smile. Here in present day, I don't look at them all that often because we are too busy making new memories. I love that they are waiting for us and part of me is excited to grow old so that we can spend our days watching the images that made up our life as they glide by on a screen. I hope that we all get that chance, a victory lap of sorts. Raising children is difficult and I imagine that getting to look back and remember the journey so vividly after we have the benefit of knowing how everything worked out, is going to be the icing on our life's cake.

But that's a long way off... opportunities like that, they come at the end.

That's why getting to write my book was such a blessing. Life Is Short, Laundry Is Eternal is a difficult book to explain, when you read it you'll be left with a feeling, one that I think you'll be very happy that you experienced. However I worry some times that you might not be able to quantify the book after you've put it down, at least not in standard terms. Some days I can't decide if that possibility is a concern or a triumph. Is it a memoir, yes but no. Is it a parenting book, yes but no. Is it an uplifting read, definitely, but it doesn't belong on the inspiration shelf. Is the book about diabetes? In some ways it is completely, but then not really. Did I write a book that's nothing more than stories from my life as a stay-at-home dad? No, they are so much more than that.

Privilege.

Far and away the most intense feeling that Lynne's phone call left me with was one of privilege. Perhaps my book will sell five copies, and maybe it will sell fifty-thousand, who knows. The one thing I do know is that it will be published, bear my name and forever be associated with me. If I were to step off of a cliff tomorrow, my book will stand as the culmination of what the last forty-one years has taught me. I took that responsibility very seriously. Is the book just a bunch of stories, no. Could it have been, certainly it could have. I've had some intensely funny and interesting experiences in my life and I could have easily told them in a way that you would have enjoyed, but then they would have just been stories. I wanted to put my name on a book that was more then just entertainment. I wanted to leave a record that my children could proudly read as adults. A book that you would enjoy, respond to and perhaps retain.

I wanted my book to be more then just a a way to pass a few hours.

So I did something that I wish for all of you. I spent time thinking about my life. Not just a moment of reflection, not a day, but months of days. I was able to look back through my mental photographs and locate the moments that impacted me, the process allowed me to retrace my steps and see, from a new perspective, where the knowledge that I've accumulated originated. I got to relive my life through my now more mature eyes. That time was a gift. This opportunity was a treasure, one that I worked hard to share with you. I hope that I did that, I guess we'll all know shortly if I succeeded.

Is the book funny, yes! Will it make you cry, oh yea. Will you think, feel, love? Will my moments cause you to look back at yours thoughtfully, I think so. I'm most proud that Life Is Short brings it's readers to these emotions without preaching, I desperately didn't want to be that person and I'm confident that I succeeded.

I don't want you to think Life Is Short, Laundry Is Eternal is some bore fest from an overly earnest guy. Because oh no it is not, these are entertaining stories full of truth and real life. It looks at parenting, marriage, sex, love, loss, renewal and the moments when all of those things begin to make sense.

Life Is Short is a love letter to the women that so thoughtfully do what I do everyday, a reality check for those who don't see that job for what it really is and my addition to the world of books that I'm getting very excited for you to be able to read it.

The next entry in this series is tentatively titled Life Is Short: Intent Meets Doubt.

Life Is Short, Laundry Is Eternal has its own FaceBook page, you can visit it at this link.

Life Is Short: Where do I Sign

It was the Monday after Lynne's pitch meeting and I was folding laundry when my phone rang. This would seem like foreshadowing if I wasn't practically always doing the laundry. I was standing in Arden's room, putting her clothes onto hangers when I heard Lynne's voice come through the phone. I have to admit that I knew right away that her call must be good news. I mean, who would call with bad news that early in the week?

My table of contents and outline made a good impression at the pitch meeting and I was going to be offered a contract to complete a book based on my idea. Lynne's words took my breath away. I almost immediately pictured a book spine with my name on it. The little boy inside of me, the one that always wanted to write, he was smiling! I didn't know that I could still feel so childlike at my age.

We spoke about the reality of delivering a manuscript and when Lynne asked me if I could do it, I said "yes" immediately, but I had no idea to be honest. The most I write on Arden's Day is seven hundred, maybe a thousand words at a time. I had conscientiously taught myself to be brief for blogging (I know that I do go on longer sometimes) and I wasn't 100% sure that I could write in a longer form in a meaningful way but I was going to find out. A number of days later I was reading my first book contract, it's no windfall mind you, but I was inching closer to becoming a published author and it felt astonishing freeing and terrifyingly constraining all at once.

I'd tell you more about what Lynne said on that call but who knows, I can't remember one word that she spoke after the reality sunk in... I was going to write a book. My brain was throwing a party and dancing with a lamp-shade on it's head. When the music stopped I pulled myself together and called my wife. I told Kelly that Lynne asked me if I could delivery a manuscript on time, Kelly replied, "can you?".

"Yes, I think I can..."

I spent a couple of weeks finding out the true answer to that question. I wrote at much greater lengths to find my voice in long-form. I wouldn't call what I wrote an outline, that wouldn't be fair to outlines. It was perhaps more like a stream of conciseness about what I thought the book was. Some of the sentences in that exercise exist now in the book, some times word for word and others in tone or theme. Mostly, I just needed to prove to myself that I could tell my story in a way that hopefully would be meaningful and well received. 

I was nervous during that process for reasons that had little to do with writing a book. First off, this was a life-long dream. I couldn't imagine what I'd feel like if crafting a book was something that I couldn't do. What if I had no ability to accomplish the thing that I spent two decades believing that I was meant to do. What if it sucked? What if I like it and no one else responds to it? What if I let my wife down? I remember vividly being in my early twenties and telling my then girlfriend that I wanted to be a writer. Now here I am almost twenty years later and I was getting the chance to make good on my wish. I didn't want to let Kelly down, I didn't want to let myself down and I really wanted my kids to see that wishes can come true. Most of all, I wanted to write a book that impacted someone. I wanted to make a difference. So I wrote and wrote and didn't stop until I loved my voice at three thousand words the way that I do at seven hundred. When I found my legs, I typed out the first topic from my table of contents onto a blank page and began to write you a book.

I didn't have the courage to read those first words for a few days. When I did finally find the nerve, I never looked back.

In my next entry Life is Short: Writing I want to tell you about the catharsis that accompanied me as I wrote. It was a once in a lifetime feeling that I wish for everyone and a gift that I won't ever forget.