Walk With Me Daddy

Walk alongside me, Daddy, and hold my little hand.

I have so many things to learn that I don't yet understand.

Teach me things to keep me safe, from dangers every day.

Show me how to do my best, at home at school at play.

Every child needs a gentle hand, to guide them as they grow.

So walk alongside me, Daddy--we have a long way to go.

Five Fingers

Not a day goes by that I don't think about how blessed my wife and I are to have our son in our lives, how lucky we are that he's healthy. If I ever needed a reminder, I would look at his hands--five fingers on each. And then his feet--five toes on each. Saving the best for last, I'd then look at his face. More than likely, his big blue eyes would be looking back at me, and his mouth, with all eight crooked teeth, would be smiling. I'd say to him, loudly and for all the world to hear, how much I love him and how proud I am to be his dad.

For all you parents out there, I know you feel the same way. The love you have for your child transcends love; it's way past anything you can put a word on. It's a force more than anything else, almost a law of nature--it's there all the time, no matter what, and it's unbreakable.

Chaos Theory

I have something to confess: I still get a little misty eyed when I return from dropping my son off at daycare every morning. The house is just too quiet.

Josh has been going to daycare now for two months, though his attendance has been a bit sporadic due to sickness and travel. Still, we've kept him on as regular an attendance schedule as possible, and it has been good for him. His development has been kicked into turbocharge now that he's interacting with kids his age. And he just seems happier, at least when he's not battling colds and the like.

I've also benefitted from Joshua going to daycare. I've been a SAHD for 10 months now, and I have to admit that it's nice to have time to myself to do projects, time where I'm not constantly meeting the ever-increasing demands of a toddler. It's not that I haven't enjoyed these 10 months--in fact, they've been the most profound of my life--but, quite honestly, it's nice to have a break from Joshua for those three days a week.

I lose sight of this, though, when I return from dropping him off and walk into a silent house. When Joshua is here, the house brims with energy and noise and the wonderful babbles of a child learning to talk. The floor is alive with movement as he cruises and crawls and tosses toys all over the place. I didn't realize how satisfying and reassuring this chaos is until it was gone. I would never have guessed how much I'd miss it.

The stillness hits me like a hammer, and I'm reminded how there's nothing more wonderous in the world than watching, and hearing, a child just being a child, epecially when it's your own child. I miss the energy, the noise, the chaos. Fortunately, the silence is only temporary. He'll be home from daycare soon and once again filling the house with childhood. Until then, I'll try not to miss him.

One Year

October 8th may not have been the most meaningful day in my life, but it definitely ranks in the top one. October 8th, you see, was my son's first birthday. Not ones for extravagance, my wife and I kept the day low-key, celebrating by having a few family members over for dinner and cake. The guest of honor, his face sporting a beard of frosting and ice cream, didn't seem to mind the sparse attendance.

His birthday was almost two months ago, but it seems like two days ago, and that has me thinking about how fast time is moving and how milestones have come and gone without asking my permission if they could come in the first place.

Among the significant milestones, besides his first birthday, that have passed since my last posting:

• He goes to school--a.k.a. day care--three days a week, and he's socializing well with the other kids and learning a ton. In fact, Josh now knows advanced calculus and can recite the number Pie to the ten-thousandth decimal place. Wow.
• He faces forward in his car seat, where he can see the world as it's coming toward him, not as it's passing him by (coincidentally, now that he can watch daddy drive he's also learning a certain finger gesture--sorry, mommy).
• He clearly understands a LOT of words, as well as simple context. Ask him where his head is, and he puts his hand on his head. Ask him where daddy's head is, and he puts his hand on daddy's head. Sounds cute--and it is, trust me--but it's also a major milestone. He's not just observing life anymore; he's participating in it.

As for me, I've seen some changes myself, though nothing as dramatic as what Josh is seeing. My changes are more incremental, less noticeable. I swear a lot less, for example. And I have a lot more patience. I'm definitely not a saint, but I continue to make a sincere effort to become, figuratively speaking, a holier man. I should probably drink less beer, but whoa whoa whoa there tiger, let's not get carried away. One step at a time, okay there chief?

And so the journey continues, and with the passage of these milestones, I'm reminded more than ever that parenthood is just that--a journey. I think I'll have a beer to celebrate.

Crawlspace

Josh is crawling now. He's still a little awkward at it--he sways and rocks some as he attempts to sync the movement of hands and knees--but he manages to move forward with frightening efficiency. I almost want to test him for steroids.

With his newfound mobility comes great pride--and fear--for both parents and child. From Josh's perspective, his horizons have just expanded considerably. Now that he can explore the world, he's realizing that there is, in fact, a world to explore. As he crawls, it's easy to see the look on his face that says, "Hey, I can get around now! Neener neener neener!" But like a superhero that uses his powers for the first time--powers he didn't know he had--Josh also seems spooked by his ability to move using his own hands and legs.

As for his parents, we're naturally very psyched that he's crawling. It means he's developing on schedule, and we couldn't be more pleased (and relieved) by this. And of course we're also nervous. His bigger world has bigger dangers from which he needs protection, and we can only pray that we'll be able to keep him safe from himself. In doing so, I also pray that we'll be able to keep him safe from us. By this I mean that I hope we don't become so overprotective that we deprive him of the minor bumps and bruises he needs to sustain in order to learn about his bigger world. I hope we find the right balance between mommy and daddy's loving arms and the School of Hard Knocks.

So Joshua, go forth and conquer. Explore your world. Mommy and daddy will be right there next to you, probably with a video camera in your face, ready to give you a hug when you need it.

Close Encounters of the Jack Kind

My wife and I were recently flattened by a fun little microbe we caught when we toured a local day care center. This thing came at us like a hurricane and its DNA instructed my body to do things you only see on America's Funniest Home Videos - Effluvium Edition. I'm pretty sure it was a variant of ebola.

I suspect we caught this mutant virus specifically from a proto-baby named Jack. He was an interesting looking infant who had big eyes, no hair, and wrinkled, pinkish skin. He could easily be mistaken for Bat Boy. (I know every child is beautiful, and that Jack's parents love him just the way he is, and God bless them for it, but I hope their rabies shots are current.) We almost stepped on the vaguely mammalian Jack when we entered the baby care area. He was flat on the floor, slithering on his tummy, just behind the entry gate--presumably hunting for insects and other small prey. Any way you cut it, this poor child is clearly an errant twig on homo sapien's evolutionary tree.

The first thing I noticed about Jack was that he was oozing mucus from nearly every pore of his body. When he crawled--and I'm totally serious here--he left a noticeable trail behind him, just like a snail. I wasn't sure if I should feel sorry for him or call Animal Control.

The day care staff didn't seem too concerned about Jack's prolific drippings. Maybe there was a perfectly reasonable explanation for it: perhaps his parents were mollusks, I thought, or he was pupating. Still, I assumed Jack was sick and I wasn't going to take any chances. I knew I had to keep my son away from...

Too late. Before I could finish taking a picture of Jack with my cell phone to send into Weekly World News, Josh grabbed a slobbery, glistening toy ball from Jack's hand and put it in his mouth. (At least I think it was a ball. I suppose it could have been an egg sack, as Jack appeared to be spawning during our visit.)

Josh was exposed, and now the wait was on. He had not yet been sick in his eight months of life, and though we knew our luck would run out, we were dreading his first illness. Would it now be upon us, thanks to Gelatinous Jack? Well, Josh did get sick, but it wasn't that bad. He was fussier than normal for about a week, and was definitely fighting something, but for the most part he emerged unscathed from his encounter with Jack. He dodged a bullet.

My wife and I weren't so lucky. The bug that caused Josh some mild discomfort almost sent me to the hospital in writhing agony; my wife didn't fare much better. Happily, it was rather short lived, and we're feeling human again now that we're on the tail end of it. We're emerging from the cave.

Watch your back, though, because Jack could be, too.

Tainted Milk

Much has transpired in the nearly three months since my last posting. We moved into a bigger house. I quit my job to be a full-time stay-at-home dad. And most significantly, our son has evolved into a little person.

Not that he wasn't a person three months ago. In fact, he was, and is, much more than a person to me. In him is a spirit unpolluted by the world you and I inhabit. In him is a purity as bright and clear as the smoothest glass, a window to a world where bad things don't happen. He doesn't know about the latest suicide bombings in Iraq. Or the poverty and disadvantage that was shoved, necessarily, in our faces during last summer's hurricane season. He doesn't know how many of the world's children go to bed hungry. I don't want to know either, actually.

He also doesn't know how much he inspires me to be a better person. When I look at him I remember that my body and soul were once unpolluted, just as his are now. So I examine how I was raised, how I react to events and experiences, and how, basically, I deal with life. I examine how I can read on cnn.com that 17 people were blown to pieces in Iraq and then switch to comedycentral.com and laugh my head off at clips of the Daily Show. Am I the only one who makes such a disturbing transition so easily? When in life did I stop being affected, moved, saddened and angered by all the badness in our world? I can't change it if I'm numb to it.

Enter my son. My wife and I are everything to him. He is everything to us. When I get down on the world, I look to him to assure me that all is okay.

And he does. He smiles and laughs and wiggles. He lets me look through his window, and when I do, I can't help but smile and laugh and wiggle alongside him.