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I'm Major Jackson, and this is the slowdown.

The winter holidays are upon us. It's the most wonderful time of the year.

I am thrilled.

My daughter is arriving with her partner who we will get to meet for the first time.

I've been looking forward to this moment. No, not looking forward to meeting him,

but to pretending to be the tough, overly protective, no one is worthy of my daughter kind of dad.

But I have a feeling that act will last only so long, and I'll quickly be laughing it up with the person of her dreams.

When Anastasia was little, she and I drove from Michigan to Vermont.

As we approached Mohawk Valley on I-90 through upstate New York, a ginormous thunderstormrike pierced the sky. Still gray clouds and lightning made

the drive fearsome. In her sweet, nine-year-old voice, she said, Dad, I'm scared. I told her a storm was

merely passing over, that we would survive.

Then another heart-rattling blast thundered down.

She started to cry.

Heavy rain pelted the car.

I couldn't see a head.

I put on my hazards and slowed down.

Through tears, Anastasia said, we are supposed to turn off everything and be still, Daddy. I told her that's only when we are home. A minute later,

...