In five years, some things change and some things don't

Back when I first signed up for Facebook, I came across one of those Facebook-y things we see so often:

List 25 random things about your life.

Here's what I wrote in January 2009, when I was still living in Los Angeles, along with some comments (italicized) by way of explanation.

1. I never thought that the best thing I would do in my life would be being a father. My birth father deserted us when I was 2 and I had tremendous conflicts with my stepfather when I was growing up.

One of the few things of which I am truly proud is my performance as a dad. Of course it helps to have great kids. I'm not sure I would have been a good dad with me as a son.

2. I can be weird about songs. If there's a song that really strikes me, I'll keep flashing back to the beginning and listen to it five or six times before I move on to the next one.

I think my most recent one is "Come What May" from "Moulin Rouge."

3. Little things sometimes aren't so little. One of the five best moments in my entire life came when my daughter Pauline (technically my stepdaughter), who had always introduced me to her friends as "my stepfather," introduced me as "my dad" at Christmas 2006.

Still a wonderful moment.

4. I think my kids might be the two best people in the world.

Hey, all dads are proud of their kids, but I can tell the rest of you, you're battling for third place.

Down and Ford

5. I love movies, and they don't always have to be good ones. I've probably watched "Hanover Street," with Harrison Ford and Lesley Anne Down, 25 times.

Guilty pleasures. I've seen Melanie Griffith in "Shining Through" a lot more times than I've seen "Citizen Kane."

 6. It's tremendously frustrating to me that I can hit what is literally a perfect golf shot and then follow it up with one that is a total failure.

I'm getting better. I generally shoot in the 80s and I have broken 80 several times.

7. It's very strange to me that after never gaining weight until I was an adult, I've been fighting a losing battle with my weight ever since.

A terrible frustration.

My dad, right, in 2006

8. One of my greatest regrets in life was not appreciating my dad when I was growing up.

My dad died six years ago, and there are so many things about his life I wish I could have asked him.

9. I started out as a liberal, became more conservative for a while and now I'm probably slightly left of center.

On economic issues, I have become much more radical the last five years, an admirer of European Social Democracy.

10. I always thought it would be cool to have a sidekick.

It is, but it takes a lot away from the enjoyment when the sidekick doesn't admit he's a sidekick.

11. I've never been able to sing.

Still can't.

12. The best way to be a friend to people is to listen to them, and I've found the best way to be friends with people I wasn't friends with in high school is to write a book about them.

I just wish I could finish it before we all die.

Love of my life

13. I love my wife Nicole more than anything in the world.

My beautiful, talented, troubled wife has had such a difficult time health-wise the last three years. I hope we can get past it and enjoy retirement.

14. Few things annoy me more than born-again types who tell me I'm "not a Christian" because I'm Roman Catholic.

Religious fanatics of all types are killing our world. Everyone claims God is on their side, but I think Abraham Lincoln was right when he said I was more important that we be on God's side than that he be on ours.

15. Most of my professional problems -- when I had a career -- came from conflicts with short, balding men.

Napoleon Complex? It's real.

16. Old friends are better than new ones, because you have a history with them. My closest friend in the world, Mick Curran, is someone I probably wouldn't hit it off with if we met now.

Mick Curran

Harry Chapin said it best. Old friends are better than new ones, because they know who you are and they know where you've been.

17. On balance, I regret more things that I didn't do than things that I did.

Timidity is one of the most damaging traits humans have.

18. I played musical instruments for eight years and was actually pretty good at it, but I can't even read music anymore.

Actually, saying I was good is an exaggeration. My son Virgile was good on the sax. I was mediocre.

19. I always wanted to live in California, but L.A. would not have been my first choice.

San Francisco is one of my favorite cities in the world, with a climate I love. I came close to getting jobs there twice in 1988, but couldn't quite get there.

20. My high school graduating class of 804 had one Asian student, and she was an exchange student from South Vietnam. I was definitely not prepared for multiculturalism.

Not quite this bad, but ...

Hard to believe in 2014 that a middle-class to upper-middle class school could be so homogeneous.

21. I didn't eat pizza until I was 15.

I didn't have Mexican food or Chinese food until my twenties. Anything more exotic was completely unthinkable when I was growing up.

22. My favorite book is William Manchester's "The Glory and the Dream," a social history of America from 1932-72. I've probably read it 20 times.

I'm amazed at how many things I learned from it that I never knew, starting with the Bonus Army.

23. I am an Anglophile and a Francophile, which can be confusing.

I've loved England for most of my life, and have been married to a Frenchwoman since 1992. In the last five years, though, I have become a major Aussiephile, if that's a word.

24. If it was completely up to me, which it isn't, I would retire to the Front Range of Colorado.

At the time I wrote this for Facebook, we had never thought about retiring to Georgia. But as it worked out, we are very happy here. I'm sure we'll visit Colorado at some point in the future.

25. Other than people, the one thing I really love in the world is baseball.

I really don't know if everyone in the world has a great passion in their life, but I have loved baseball since the first time I walked into a major league stadium in 1957. I don't think so much about all the great new stadiums I've seen, but instead the ones that no longer exist.

Crosley Field in Cincinnati, the Vet in Philadelphia, Municipal Stadium in Cleveland, Shea Stadium and old Yankee Stadium in New York, Memorial Stadium in Baltimore, RFK Stadium in Washington, Fulton County Stadium in Atlanta, old Busch Stadium in St. Louis, Mile High Stadium in Denver, Jack Murphy Stadium in San Diego and Candlestick Park in San Francisco.

***

That's what I wrote in January 2009, and those are my updates. The only thing that surprises me about it is that at the time I did the original list, my granddaughter Madison -- aka the Amazing Baby -- was four months old. I'm surprised I didn't say something about her somewhere.

As of April 2014, Maddie is 5 1/2, little brother Lexington is nearly 2 1/2 and a third grandchild is due in November. They are the lights of my life.