Lydia is in a post nap funk and is mad at Aidan for being Aidan while we wait for the elevator. Aidan is annoyed at Lydia for being mad at him. “I didn’t do anything”, he says. Lydia said, “yes, he did, he’s always talking.” On the ride down from the 8th floor I tell Aidan that you need to notice when someone is not in a good mood and give them some space. I tell Lydia that she needs to notice when she’s not in a good mood and pull back on some of her frustrations. It seems to have no effect.

We are out the building and walking to dinner. I is a beautiful June evening, maybe 85 degrees and not too humid. Lydia stays grumpy as we walk to Element Fresh. Half way there I try to warm her up and she says “I’m not in a good mood right now.”

We order and sometime before the food arrives, Lydia lightens up, and is a joy for the rest of the evening. As I type this she is playing Youtube videos of the family history -- Elisa learning to walk, Aidan singing, Lydia playing. The kids laugh hysterically.

I once thought I never wanted to be a dad. And then I did want to be a dad. And I thought I would be lousy at it but I was ok. Not great, but ok, which is to say I didn’t mess them up in anyway. But then the past two years I became a single dad, at least every other week, and I became a much better dad. When the kids are with me, we do everything together. It is magical. Sure, they fight, but never that bad. Mostly they are just crazy happy with each other and while my fun bit got turned off at some point I am crazy content with them.

For Father’s day, I took them to hot pot. I wanted it to be the old beijing style hotpot but I didn’t read the resturant sign correctly and it was Sihuan style. The kids told me. It was good. I am still full.

Yesterday was 端午节 (dragon boat festival) in China. It is a big day for families to be together. We went to one of the biggest urban parks in the world, Chaoyang park, and did rides.

When we got home we had a sushi dinner and made sure we had the traditional dragon boat festival “rice dumplings”. The story behind the rice dumplings is they were fed to fish in order for the fish not to eat a famous poet who drowned himself in a river.