I just smile.

This is what it will be like for the next several hours. She lets me know how when I’m too close, too cold or too far. Welcome to our van, a world where time is measured by muffled iPod music, an entire Goodwill store packed in the back and snacks.

It’s just five of us this time. The two other girls are in a small Idaho college town, awaiting our arrival.I can picture them laughing at us.

Our second oldest daughter sits in the back, bracketed by either brother. It would seem God is punishing her for some unnamed sin.

Not a cloud in the sky as the dirty, white Toyota Sienna moves up I-5, cuts over on the 205, before heading east on I-84.

After listing several infractions by me, my wife is recounting her experience of freeway driving compared to mine. Despite my logbook hours that include Seattle and Los Angeles freeway traffic, I may be directed back to Big Wheels for some remedial driver training.

“Is it stuffy in here,” the daughter asks for the sixth time.

When mom isn’t looking, I turn the AC one click, sending a small stream of merciful cool air in the van. I can’t see her face but I know the daughter gives me a look of approval. I can feel it.

Two minutes later, Barb reaches over and turns the AC off. She looks at me as if I have asked her to go ice blocking in our swimsuits.

“Why would you have the air conditioning on when there’s snow on the ground outside?” she says rubbing her arms. I don’t have a response.

The window goes down again, because of certain noises from the back and a belated “excuse me” from one of the boys. Wind rushes through the van for a few minutes and I reach for another pretzel from the bag on my right.

It’s after lunch and we’ve made it over the first mountain pass of the day. It’s possible the Wendy’s employee is still wiping up 20 ounces of ice water spilled on the carpet. They may not invite us back after this time.

Back in the van, I tap the brakes as I approach a slow car in the left lane.

“You’re too close,” she says.

I smile and give her hand a squeeze. The day is already getting better.

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Get this straight. Movies, books and other composition titles aren’t entitled to anything. They don’t have any rights. But still people use the word entitled wrong every day. National sports radio hosts get it wrong. My kids. The lady selling roses on the corner. For example: Mike’s blog post was entitled “Words Can Kill You.” I don’t care what you may have heard in certain circles or subversive dictionaries. This is wrong.

From the AP Stylebook: Use (entitled) to mean a right to do or have something. Do not use it to mean titled. Right: She was entitled to her promotion. Right: The book was titled “Gone With The Wind.”

Spread the word. America deserves better.

On another note. Dads get so little satisfaction some days, unless my kids start flexing their vocabulary muscles at me. I was driving with my 12-year-old son when he made reference to somebody leaving on fraternity leave. It’s true, son. Moms need time off to pledge as well as anybody else.

Yesterday, he told me “that was a woozy.”

“I think you meant “doozy.”

Some words are harder to say than others. When my wife says rural, it comes out as “RULE.”

To this day, both boys have yet to correctly say hallelujah. More often than not, they pronounce it “hall-way-WU-yah,” sounding like the waiters at the end of  ”The Christmas Story.”

You might think I shouldn’t make fun of my kids like that. Tough. It’s something I’m entitled to.

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“No, you can’t come,” I said, while reaching for the dog’s leash. “I’m going to walk for awhile and you probably won’t be able to keep up.”

Freeze the scene right there. Sometimes I wonder if I learned my parenting instincts from Homer Simpson University. Even with years of parenting experience, I still resort to my Crackerjack box of fatherhood theories.

That’s why I think, if you really listen, there’s something deep inside helping you out. In this case, the voice inside was screaming at me.

“HEY DORK DAD! This a chance to connect with your oldest teen son. This is the boy that would have a crane move him from the house to the car and carries on deep philosophical discussions with no more than grunts. You’re an idiot if you pass up this chance.”

Of course I acted like this was my plan all along. So I invited him to come with me.

We barely left the house before I started trash talking with him.

Think you can keep up with me, can you? I’m going to walk at least a mile. You sure you’re not going to need some oxygen, son? Huh? Huh? Huh? I did everything but pound my chest.

He didn’t say anything and just kept walking.

In less than two minutes, he’s already several paces ahead of me with the dog. I waited for me to insist that we turn back early. It didn’t happen.

See that little spec? That's my boy ... ahead of me.

I waited for him to start complaining. Nothing.

Twenty-five minutes later, we’re within a 100 yards from our house. I managed to break  into a trot and move past him until I reached the house.

Part of me thinks I can never let him catch up to me in anything. I’m Robert Duvall shooting baskets in the rain in The Great Santini because his son just kicked his butt in basketball. I resist the urge to challenge him to arm wrestling. Just to show him who’s the man.

But deep down, I know he’s growing older, stronger and he’s catching up.

And I’m OK with that.

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He was mad at his breakfast, his brother, school, the piece of fabric on the floor and the neighbor’s dog down the street.

It’s one of those days where not even an all-expense paid trip to the TV set and backstage access to the fridge make it better. For some unexplained reason, dad wouldn’t let him miss school and stay in bed all day.

I would be playing the role of the villain today.

It’s a few minutes before we are to leave for school. I am grew more tense as I worked to get him to school on time.

As he walked down the hallway in front of me, he unleashed a rather flippant remark in my direction, to make sure I knew of his displeasure.

I motioned for him to stop and he turned around to face me with a rather defiant look. I stared at him a moment before I spoke, all the while repressing the urge to shout.

“I do not deserve any disrespect from you,” I said in a low voice. “I love you too much and I would give my life for you. I will respect you and I expect that you would respect me.”

When I finished, his eyes averted my gaze. I knew without a doubt that he “got” my message. He turned and walked slowly down the hallway, with none of the defiance from before.

I’m smart enough to realize this won’t last forever, probably until after school at the most. But at least for this moment, I knew he understood.

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When he wasn’t playing music in band, I would find him drawing pictures or cartoons, sometimes at my own expense.

One, in particular, showed a high school student with the caption, “This is the size of a normal person’s head.”

Next to that person stood another person flailing around with an over-sized world globe for a head. The caption read, “This is the size of Mike Henneke’s head, THE HEAD OF ALL HEADS.”

This from my best friend.

His grasp of satire was impeccable, even before ninth grade. I imagined what he could do with more training and experience.

His expertise stretched beyond the arts. He could write great stories and easily grasped academic concepts. Scott left no doubt he could do anything he wanted to, achieving whatever level of greatness he set his sights on.

Only one thing stood in the way. Himself.

Scott had the skills but little desire to do the work. Often he chose to be lazy, missing huge numbers of assignments in numerous classes in school.

When his grades were called into question, he blamed it on the teacher. Said the assignments were too hard or the gas crisis at the time hindered his ability to work. I remember his mom driving down to school to argue with one of his teachers. For the nerve of holding her son accountable.

Last time I checked, Scott worked as a cook for a local coffee shop after graduating from high school. To my knowledge, he is still not married. Maybe he’s changed now. I sure hope so.

When I talk to my kids about having a plan for life, I hope they feel the urgency in my voice. I hope they understand where I’m coming from.

All the God-given talents in the world don’t matter unless you’re willing to pay the price.

Just ask my friend.

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Before I promised to work 60 hours or more a week and give up music, girls and sports for the Lord, I possessed the confidence of a first-grader at a bungee jump.

I kept to myself, acted like a dork around girls and made fun of myself to save you the trouble.

Now don’t get me wrong. It’s not like I was the Unabomber writing manifestos in a secluded cabin. I went to college, lived on my own after age 18 and girls actually agreed to go out with me. (I’m still amazed by that fact.)

I learned to speak to large groups at an early age and made several long-lasting friendships after high school.

Still, I didn’t realize this at the time. But serving a mission for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints changed me almost as much as the message I carried helped change other lives.

It didn’t happen right away in Puerto Rico. On my first day, I watched a mother feed her kids ketchup for a snack. Because that’s all they had for food.

Everywhere I rode on my bike, it always seemed against a stiff wind.

Even in November, the heat seemed 0ppressive and mosquitoes mistakenly saw a vacancy sign on my arms.

Hoodlums stole my bike three times, people lied to me, slammed doors in my face and often assured me I was headed for Hell.

It’s no wonder that for the first few months, I wondered if I was in the right place. I had doubts and yes, I was homesick.

While sitting in somebody’s home, I would stumble through our message in mashed potatoes Spanish. The other missionary nod approvingly until I finished and then would reteach everything I said.

As a newbie, it’s easy to be the butt of jokes. Especially that one time eating lunch with the Rivera family, a local church leader and his wife living in Santa Isabel.

“You really like that food?” the husband asked in Spanish when his wife left the room.

After I enthusiastically said yes, Rivera told me to tell her, “que porqueria.”

My missionary companion Troy Norris nodded approvingly. So it must be OK, because my missionary mentor would never steer me wrong.

The wife came back and asked me in Spanish how I liked the food.

“Hermana, que porueria,” I said with all the enthusiasm I could muster.

Her eyes grew wide and instantly her husband and the other missionary burst out in laughter. Rivera’s body shook and the other missionary wiped away tears, he laughed so hard.

Unknowingly I had told her in Spanish, “Sister, what trash!”

But I learned from that. In a few months, Spanish became second nature. I began thinking and dreaming in another language.

It became easier to talk to people in either language. I began to speak comfortably before a large crowd in church without notes. When I returned from Puerto Rico, my college studies became easier. People came up to me and marveled how different I was.

More than 20 years later, I’m still a dork at times. I’ve forgotten much of the Spanish I learned and my English language often needs a translator.

But there’s no doubt things are much different now. I owe it all to that tiny island where the more time I spent helping others, I ended up helping myself.

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Don’t expect the house to resemble a museum or science lab from a cleanliness standpoint, although it does happen. There’s no guarantee that somebody won’t be in a foul mood, that clean glass might have a four-day-old speck of gravy or the dog will make her bed in your suitcase.

Sandra gets real plates when she eats dinner with us.

When you come to our house, consider yourself warned about watching the boys eat, especially during the scrambled eggs. Unless you’re the president or Sandra Bullock, expect to eat on paper plates. Dinners always begin with prayer, some lasting longer than four seconds.

Because you’re here, we might actually eat at the table and include a vegetable. Almost always count on a dessert, even though it might be a frozen box of strudel. If you’re really important, it might even be cookies attractively arranged on a decorative plastic plate, disguising the fact that they came from the Dollar Store.

OSHA rules require that I check the bathroom before you use it. Don’t be alarmed. It’s simply a must if you go in there after the boys. It’s not that they’re bad. They just happen to specialize in toilet paper art, poor aim and turning the sink water on full blast for no reason.

Sometimes I think we were wrong to give them a bedroom. Move a fridge and a microwave into the bathroom and I think they would be just fine.

But count on this. You will get the best we have to offer. You get the best bed, that may or may not have been slept on by the dog. We promise to keep quiet when you go to sleep. We will even provide ear plugs so you can’t hear Letterman.

We will keep the temperature at a comfortable 68 degrees, unless, of course, it’s during the heat wave in the summer. Then you’ll get our best fan that will blow your dentures off. If you’re prone to perspire, we will include an IV solution at no charge to you.

So after all that, when shall we expect you?

Hello? Hello?

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Despite what the gerunds would have you believe, I really struggle with writing.

I’m a serial metaphor mixer, a renowned participle dangler and still regret driving my high school English teacher into therapy.

I would love for it to be easier, to have the words flow onto the screen more often then they do. Some people make it look so easy. I think I have word envy.

But no matter what, you can all blame my high school social studies teacher Les Darling for getting me started.

He was a tall man with a propensity for floral print shirts. His perfectly coiffed salt-and-pepper hair always included a goatee. I once saw him throw a chair aside, pick up an eighth-grade girl off the floor and remove her from the classroom.

I remember the day he pointed out a story I did for the local paper about an upcoming high school drama production.

He looks at me over the top of his glasses at me as he is prone to do. “You know, you’re a good writer. You really ought to consider pursuing this some more.”

I think of the story he’s referring to. It’s three paragraphs with a scintillating tale of time, date, and place. Less than 150 words and maybe three misspellings.

For some reason, I listen to him and eventually join the Ricks College campus newspaper as a sports writer. I remember walking over to the sports editor’s apartment with a paper copy of my first story, a feature on a volleyball player.

She glances at it, nearly gasps, stifles a chuckle and reaches for a blue pen. Fifteen minutes later, two sheets of typewritten papers are covered in a sea of proofreading remarks.

I keep writing and I listen to people. I don’t remember the name of the person that spoke to us at school. But I remember him sharing his two secrets for good writing.

1. Read good writing.

2. Keep a journal.

A year later, I leave for an LDS mission. I keep a journal the entire two years in Puerto Rico. I write about somebody getting shot four feet from our bikes, the drug dealer who attacked me, miracles, extreme sadness, struggling with the language, the food and the wonderful people.

I begin to see how words have a cadence, flow and create mood. I learn about the necessity to think cinematically,  to pan out on a scene and move in close when needed. Ask yourself what engine is driving your story, what keeps readers going to the end.

I develop writing heroes such as Bill Simmons and Rick Reilly. Scoff if you want because they write about sports. You read Bill’s story to the end about his dog and not cry. It’s not possible.

And here we are. Who knows what the next step is. But when I go there, I won’t forget the first guy who took notice.

Here’s to you, Les.

Photo from here.

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