By the time I was around 10 or 11, I had basically become a single child. My older brother was in the habit of running away from home every chance he had, and since he was a teenager and I was not, we had nothing in common. Our house was quiet, not because we were not playful children but because we had a mean step-dad who demanded that kids be quiet and stay out of the way. The old adage, “Kids are not to be seen or heard” was the every day routine in our house. So I learned the importance of independence, while also yearning for a large family that was loud, chaotic, and wild.

Which is probably why my favorite movie as a child was Home Alone.

The opening scene in Home Alone has always been one of my favorite scenes in any movie. Where Kevin McCallister and his countless uncles, aunts, cousins, mom and dad are running around a beautiful, huge house preparing to leave for a trip to France. They bickered, teased, laughed, name-called, and made tons of noise. Mom and Dad double-checked their lists, the pizza boy came and couldn’t find anybody to pay him, and the crook (under the guise of a police officer) stood in the entryway without anybody paying him any attention.

That scene is what I always hoped for, dreamed for, yearned for as a child, teenager, and into early adulthood. At some point I realized that it probably wasn’t going to happen, so I turned back into that single child who spent all of his time alone in silence reading, writing, playing music, and working. I got so used to silence, that when the time finally presented itself to start a family- I had long forgotten about my childhood dream of having a loud and large family.

Even now, as a father of four children with the most beautiful wife on the Kenai Peninsula, it can be difficult to remember that I secretly hoped for this life. When the big kids are pulling at my leg and following me everywhere, asking to help, teasing each other, yelling, crying, pushing, punching, screaming, and running wild- I turn into the single child, or my first step-father, the curmudgeon, and I demand that they be quiet, pick up their mess, and be nice to each other. When the babies start crying, and poop leaks out of one’s diaper into the bouncy seat and the poopy diaper sits on the table for three hours stinking up the house before being moved outside to the overflowing trash can full of poopy diapers that tips over onto the ground only to be torn apart by a dog, I forget that this is part of my dream. This is part of the hidden-scenes section of Home Alone, the parts of the story that don’t cause people to be warm and fuzzy. When I try to go into the greenhouse to plant seeds in silence because I have thousands of seeds to plant and I need to get to work, only to have the two big girls follow me out there to laugh and play and insist on helping- and I succumb to the pressure and work at a snail’s pace so as to include them, I teeter on the edge of insanity with self-imposed deadlines, bills to pay, IRAs to fund (we are $50 right now ladies and gentleman), and vacations to plan.

I always longed for the big, chaotic family like in the first scene of Home Alone (and the final scene, when they return home to see their “incompetent brother” had fended for himself while they were away and they tell him how much they really love him). And while I don’t have the uncles, aunts, brothers, sisters, and cousins running around my tiny house, I am no longer dreaming as Kevin McCallister- the little blonde boy. Now, I am the father, Peter McCallister. The one who makes sure everybody is packed for the trip, who orders enough pizzas, and supports the stressed out wife, and is calm, patient, and loving of his children and family.

I have to remind myself of this yearning for a large family every day when the dishes pile up after preparing food for the tenth time of the day, the floor is swept a dozen times and still has toys and dog hair, paid work is neglected, baths are once a week, and quiet time is non-existent. But when the four kids are asleep and I am snuggled up beside the Queen of the Kenai Peninsula, I nod my head in gratitude of this wild pack of kids and our Home Alone life.