A Poem for Joshua

Good morning, my Joshua
A new day is here
Your bright eyes are bushy
Dry diapers are near

But first you scream, you cry
And raised is my ilk
What you need is quite simple:
A full tummy of milk

The crying and pouting, you roar at full throttle
For chrissakes, dear wife, please get me a bottle!

You down it with ease, like you’ve never been fed
But you’re easy to please—it goes to my head

Hunger pangs gone, you’re cooey and happy
It’s time for a day of playing with Pappy

We laugh, we sing, and then we run errands
And in between play I teach you your gerunds

Late in the morning, as you get more forlorn
A smile comes quickly when you get in the Bjorn

We move, we dance, in front of the mirror
And I sing you a song; to you I feel nearer

You nap at midday, for an hour at times
The house is then quiet; I can type a few lines

I wonder at you, I love watching your face
You’re a gift from above, a marvel of grace
It warms me inside to hear all of your cooing
Though later I see you were really just pooing

A ripe and full diaper bin I do empty
I look at the stack, the diapers are plenty
The wipees are warm, the Balmex at hand
But I love you so much, and the smell I will stand

The sun winds down, and night time comes
One last moment to suck on your thumbs
It’s time to be quiet, to read and tell tales
While daddy sips an assortment of ales

I love you, Joshua, sleep well do I say
It is time to go down, we are done for the day
Today has been fun, tomorrow comes soon
Until then, my sweet son, I give you the moon

iBaby

I'm a huge fan of the iPod, and this might be the coolest thing I've ever seen: a onesie with an iPod scroll wheel iron-on, from ipopmybaby.com.

I have not ordered one because they're not cheap; you can buy a ten-pack of onesies at Babies-R-Expensive™ for the price of one iPod onesie ($15.95). And what's nice about the cheapo ones is that you can throw them away when they get covered in poop from a leaky diaper. (Note to new parents: keep scissors handy so you don't have to pull a poopy onesie off over your baby's head. Just cut it off. Trust me). Plus the cheapo ones make great butt wipes in a pinch--no pun intended.

Still, this onesie makes me wish babies were like iPods sometimes. I wish you could plug them into your PC and upload your favorite songs. It would be really cool if, for example, when he got hungry he belted out Hunger Strike from Temple of the Dog, or when he got tired he sang himself to sleep with KC and the Sunshine Band's Get Down Tonight. I'd be like, "Hey cool, he's hungry! I haven't heard this song in, like, forever!" And it would be really awesome if he had volume control. Like, totally.

My son is not an iPod, of course, but like the iPod he is a marvel of design. And every sound he makes is music to my ears. Try and top that, Steve Jobs.

Not All Fun and Games

Today didn't contribute much to my confidence as a father. My four-month old boy fussed and spit up constantly and nothing would comfort him. It was the first such day I've had with him, and definitely the most trying. I ended the day mentally spent and marinated by the contents of his tiny stomach, which actually didn't seem so tiny when it decided to shower my shirt with curdled ejecta. It's like I have Mt. St. Helens for a son.

My wife chalks it up to "growing pains," or babyhood. I chalk it up to hot molten magma in my son's inner core, a diagnosis slightly consistent with my suspicion that he is the Terminator (see previous posting). I'll be keeping an eye on this little fellow, watching for signs that he's trying to travel back in time to kill the future leader of the post-apocalypse resistance. You never know--kids do the darndest things these days, like snowboarding.

On the other hand, the fussiness might truly be due to babyhood. Which I can sort of relate to--I must be going through something similar, as occasionally I find myself so overwhelmed by parenthood that I just want to cry and let it all out. I'll bet that's how a lot of new parents feel. What Babies-R-Expensive™ should carry is a mobile that exhausted fathers can hang from the couch and just stare at as they lie there and drool themselves to sleep. The mobile, of course, would be a slowly rotating whirl of beer bottles set to the tune of Steppenwolf's "Magic Carpet Ride." That would be really cool.

Dreft will remove the day from my shirt, but only experience and time will remove the day from my psyche. It's said that when your baby gets older, you only remember the good stuff of his younger days. The constant crying, screaming, and spitting up--you don't remember those things so much (fortunately, I will because we have them all on home video). But today left an imprint on me that will take some effort to shake. It doesn't mean I love my son any less; it's merely a reminder that though I'm a daddy, I'm just a tired guy doing the best he can.

At least I'm not the future leader of the post-apocalypse resistance. Because that would be really awkward.

The First Turn

I'd describe myself as a darn good skier, but I admit that I still get butterflies when I'm peering over the edge of a super-steep run that I'm about to schuss. Depending on the angle of the slope and whether any obstacles are present--such as rock or ice patches, or dead skiers--a fall on a steep slope could be anywhere between mildly damaging to the ego and severely damaging to the skeleton. So I stand there for a while working up the nerve, but in doing so I'm giving myself time to think, "What if I fall?" It is exactly what I shouldn't be thinking about.

Ask anyone who skis the steeps and they'll tell you: it's all about the first turn. Nail it, and your apres-ski will include beer and hot tubs. Miss it, and your apres-ski will likely include anesthesia and operating rooms. The first turn has absolute power, and you'd better respect it.

Becoming a parent for the first time is a lot like making that first turn. For a while you stand at the edge of the experience, peering over the edge with eyes wide, wondering what it's going to be like. Anticipation grows. The uncertainty and excitement build and can even manifest themselves physically--you might become queasy, and sometimes you can't sleep. Ultimately, you reduce it to a simple question, one that you unconsciously ask yourself a million times over: Can I do this?

And then it's time to make the first turn. Your child is born, and you hold him for the first time. You hear him scream for the first time. You feel his breath as you lean in closer and gaze into his eyes for the first time. Amazingly, he gazes back, and when he does, you answer your own question: Yeah, I can do this! Scary as it was to stand at the top of the slope and stare down onto what seemed to be infinite steepness, you find that this first turn wasn't so hard to make.

I nailed that first turn, and now I'm having the run of my life. I think I see beer and hot tubs in my future.

Hairy Subject

I cut my hair the other day, using a $10 pair of clippers I purchased at Walgreens. I inadvertently used one of the shorter clipper attachments--the 1/4-nanometer attachment, to be specific. By the time I realized how short I was going, I had carved a decidedly unfortunate groove in my cracker afro. What I grumbled to myself immediately afterward began with a letter that falls somewhere between e and g.

When I finished cutting my hair and began cleaning up the 27 pounds of clippings--the floor looked like Sasquatch has just shaved his back in my garage--I noticed that the bulk of them were tinted gray. Call me crazy, but I might be the only person in the world who, upon seeing an omen of his own aging, enthusiastically says, "cool!" I just don't feel the need to wash that gray right out of my hair.

Because life is pretty cool, and my gray hair reminds me that I'm living it, that I'm in the game. It gets better as I get older, so if this is what aging is all about, sign me up.

Just please don't stare at my nanohair. It's rude.