imperfect dad

On fear

2010-08-22T21:46:00.003-06:00

Let me just preface this entry by mentioning that I am not, by any means, "back." Nor do I think I ever really will be. The reason I will never be back is because, simply put, the title of this blog isn't merely self depreciating jest. I've seen plenty of "Mom blogs" and "Dad blogs" that update once every week, if not day, and I have wondered exactly what it takes to be that type of person. Such a pattern of thinking usually finds me laying somewhere, vision blurred, unidentifiable stains on my clothes, a throbbing headache, and an immense desire for a calming cup of tea.

As I am not the biggest fan of tea, you'll forgive me if this is the only entry I end up posting this year.
(or perhaps you won't forgive me, at which point I can do nothing for you and I think it would be best if we said "good day" and pretend this whole thing never happened.)

So, Fear.

I happen to beam inwardly at myself after having yelled at my daughter this evening and causing her to immediately break down into near tears and sobbing.

Before you report me, again, to child services, let me explain (which is something that, when child services is involved, you never really want to have to say even once).

I'd let the girl watch a TV show while getting the table ready for dinner and her mother was out fetching groceries, occasionally popping my head in from the kitchen to make sure she hadn't jammed a crayon in her nose, eaten her younger brother, or packed a suitcase and jaunted off to Rio for some sun. Things had been fine for the most part, and eventually the pleasing tones of whatever it was being over were heard, and as such a kind, loving, attentive parent, I went back over to the TV to start something new that would keep her locked down like a tiny human zombie.

When what to my wandering eyes should appear than a near three year old spanning the gap between couch and chair, acrobatically with one leg on each, giggling as her one year old brother runs gleefully under "Bridge Toddler". This is infuriating for two major reasons.

NO! THAT IS NOT WHAT MOMMY AND DADDY'S FOUR POSTER BED IS FOR!...Well I'll tell you when you're older.

The first is that she has been told, repeatedly, not to do this thing before. Many times. More than once.
This is how children drive you crazy. It has been said that the definition of insanity is repeating the same action over and over, expecting different results. This is dumb. The definition of insanity is available right here and it mentions nothing about repetitive actions. That doesn't mean, however, that repeating actions while expecting different results won't drive you insane. This, is of course, why I yelled at the girl. There comes a certain point in your day where "No honey, we don't hit your brother with the truck in the eyes" just doesn't convey the gravity of the terms which you are trying to impart.

Gravity, of course, is the second reason I was furious. Her brother was, at the time, playing gleefully underneath his precariously balanced sister, happily unawares of the shock, discomfort and sheer inconvenience that would emerge should his sister's foot slip ever so slightly and the whole of her being be propelled rather quickly into his eye or face or body or any other portion of his being. This, I can forgive him for of course. He is, after all only now very nearly one year old, and as has been previously addressed by this publication, Babies are rather not very smart at all (See item III here).
She, on the other hand has a great deal of experience and should know better. We had a similar discussion about her electronic keyboard when she attempted to use it as a skateboard and I rather thought that the lesson had stuck. Quite simply, I paid a great deal of money for that boy, and she certainly isn't going to be getting a new one if she breaks it.

However, my smug sense of satisfaction wasn't due to simply venting this frustration. I must note that I really do not yell at my children very often. Other than the occasional "NO!" I'm really a pretty groovy, laid back kind of cat. So when I berated my eldest for attempting to join Cirque du Soleil before legal age, explaining to her quite loudly that she had disappointed me and would not be able to watch another episode of talking animals show due to this thing, and her eyes drooped, and her shoulders drooped, and her lower lip drooped, looking for all the world like she was melting, I understood something. She was not unhappy because she had gotten caught, she was not unhappy because she wasn't allowed to watch TV, she was unhappy because she had done something that very and quite obviously had made me unhappy.

This sounds like a power trip, and certainly part of it is probably that, I am human after all. But moreover, it means that my daughter is aware consequences outside of the immediate. This was reinforced when she came up to me later, after dinner, bobbing and bouncing and saying "you were MAD at me Daddy!", to which the only response possible is "yes, I was, honey. Let's go read a story for bedtime."

The Zen Art of Changing Diapers

2009-10-27T08:27:00.005-06:00

Before you even begin this month's article, I feel that it's only fair and proper to tell you that this is my "Halloween" edition. It contains a whole lot of horrifying junk, the whole dang thing is basically about poop. Consider yourself duly warned.

There are lots of things I could discuss in this blog only weeks after the birth of a second child into our growing empi-, er , family. Deep, meaningful subjects that would likely spur furious but polite debates for months to come in the comments section of this blog. Concepts run the gamut from large to small, here's a short list of some blog entries I thought about writing about:

• The confidence of being on the second child
• Sibling rivalry, day 1
• How a hospital treats a new dad.
• The household division of labour
• Home, baby, work, cleaning, cooking, maintaining, entertaining, and you.
• Attitudes people immediately have about boys vs. girls
• How to unhear a screaming baby.
• Things to do with one available hand at 3:00 A.M.
• Grandmas and Grandpas: a Love Letter
• Colic is a myth.
• Oh God how are we ever going to pay for this on just my salary if only the readers of my irregularly updated blog would just send us massive gobs of money we could afford to eat occasionally and what ever will we do if the car breaks down or the house needs maintenance we're doomed that’s it just doomed. (Alternatively titled : "Interesting recipes involving instant noodles and water.)
• Hand me downs
• Don't shake the baby Vol II.

I was very seriously considering writing Don't Shake the Baby: Vol. II (but really that would have been just me posting pictures of cement mixers, paint shakers, and jackhammers to make myself feel better) , when it hit me full on in the face.

Pee.

After cleaning myself off and desperately trying to save the laptop from watery doom, I put the boy's diaper back on and said "to hell with it with all that deep crap, I'm going to write about crap!"

Or, perhaps more universally, bodily fluids. Odds are good that if you're actually taking the time to read this and not just skimming it to make the author feel better, you've had most of life's available bodily fluids spilled, splashed, dashed, sloshed, or dropped on you voluntarily or involuntarily (and hey, who am I to judge?) at some point in your adult life. It's even possible that if you look back and make a tally, most of those are probably your own! Good for you!

then.

now.

look how far you've come!

Most often, you will find yourself coming in contact with urine. Urine, as far as the soon to be discussed subjects go, is the least offensive of the lot. It is sterile, generally not foul smelling, and comparatively easy to clean. It’s a damn good thing too, because you'll be positively bathing in the stuff before your newborn is a few months old.

Kids pee. A lot. Newborns, in particular, pee when they are cold. The #1 time a newborn is cold, is when the diaper is removed, therefore, evolution has conspired for the perfect set of circumstances to completely ruin any and all of your shirts before you leave the house on a Monday morning.

One is told stories, myths, legends even, of what it is like when a baby boy pees. It is said that dams are broken, flood waters rise, and species are eliminated from the face of this now yellowed Earth. So deep seated is this fear that there actually exist products to attempt to prevent you from drowning. These are, however, really dumb. We were lucky, we thought, we had a girl first.

What no one tells you is that girls are nearly as deadly. The same confluence of events occurs and you find yourself with a diaper in one hand, while your other is thrust before you trying desperately to keep the spray from hitting your face or filling your shoes. You see, no one sex has a moratorium on bodily fluids, despite what those dirty websites might imply.

The difference between baby boys and baby girls however, isn't the volume of the stuff, its in the projection (which right there probably explains a significant portion of the history of relations between the sexes). Boys don't just have simple tube there, it's a precision instrument ultimately designed to fling fluid as far as is physically possible. Because of this, your dodge pattern is all messed up from changing girl diapers and honestly you can never expect where the spray will go. It's like in cartoons when a fire hose would get turned on and just start to whirl around soaking everything except the fire. Only, you know, its pee.

ohgod there is pea everywhere

Of course pee isn't the only thing that will be fired, launched even, from your new child. No, that would be far too easy. Instead, you'll be treated to a whole new milieu of substances!

Children can, for example, actually projectile vomit. Now to give you some hope for your future, if you're planning on spending time around a child, this is a rare occurrence, and should it happen the poor thing should be taken to a doctor immediately. Projectile vomiting is one of those things written into things like "What to Expect the First Year" that a person who has not had a child for a significant amount of times looks at and says to themselves "This is not a real thing, this doesn't actually happen." I mean, you remember Freshman year, right? You know what throwing up is. Why do they bother calling it projectile vomit instead of simply "vomit"? When it happens, you will know.

There will be no doubt in your mind. No doubt on your shirt. No doubt on your pants, your couch, the walls behind the couch, Grandpa, nor any small furry animal who happens to have the unfortunate luck to be in the house at the time. Doubt itself will have had the good sense to have left the room seconds before your adorable little baby transforms in less than a second from the one you know and love to something resembling a broken fire hydrant.

We originally had a "Home Game" section here, but I finally admitted that honestly, there is nothing that can prepare you for this.

an unforgettable experience to be sure

It is amazing though, what a person can get used to, and what they can't. Several of my non-parent friends have expressed both fascination and horror that my wife and are able to stomach (as it were) changing diapers. The studied response to this is "It's different when it's your kid." which is by all means true. Changing your own child's diaper is somehow very different than mis-stepping in a downtown alleyway and finding the results of a stranger's bran muffin bender. It's a significantly more pleasant experience than one might otherwise imagine getting your face inches from human feces might be. But perhaps the statement can be made more accurate and more descriptive by changing the emphasis and saying instead, "It's different when it's your kid."

Even as a parent, few and far between are the people who aren't just as disgusted as you are when their finger slips through the 1-ply in the airport restroom, the major difference is that a parent probably has disinfectant wipes on-hand.

So why then, isn't a parent as grossed out as they should be when changing a diaper? Perhaps its because we're largely in charge of determining what goes into the kid in the first place (excepting rocks, slugs, small bits of fluff from the carpet, and Lego bricks). Breastfed babies are the easiest. Milk goes in one end, something vaguely spoiled milk-like comes out the other. Really at that stage its less like the kid is an animal eating and pooping and a whole lot more like the worlds least exciting luge track. Formula fed babies smell worse, but are otherwise functionally the same.

Things change, however, when you start feeding your children solid foods. This is when the kid's product goes from a mustard-esque sticky cream to a semi-solid, foul smelling, creeping-crawling pile of dark essence, determined to do whatever it can to attach itself to your flesh long enough to travel, sap-like, into your nice white carpet.

But really, in the back of your head, you know that despite its costuming as the devils own tile spackle, you know its really just a smashed composition of cheerios, goldfish crackers and apple juice anyway, so you plug your nose and get to work.

baby diapers, the home game

Not knowing makes all the difference. Hell I don't remember what I had for breakfast today, let alone yesterday morning. Whatever is coming out of me is certainly a combination of things I never ever wanted to see again. That's half the reason I ate it in the first place, to make it suffer.
This is then magnified when encountering "strange poop" that of someone who's diet is a mystery to you. Add in the fact that most sane people (read: people without kids) don't tend to encounter poop on a regular basis, and its easy to understand why people are disgusted by the stuff.

But hey, just because you don't have kids (or have grown up kids) doesn’t mean you need to feel left out. With my simple guide, you too can re-create the baby experience without all that nasty, uncomfortable, sticky sexual reproduction.
Just follow the below instructions, and you can grin at your friends who are parents and tell them that they can't whine to you anymore about how hard it is because NOW YOU KNOW!

Level I. Newborn:

1. Empty your bank account
2. Purchase diapers with your debit card knowing you'll have to just pay the overdraft fee.
3. Purchase a small, squeeze bottle of mustard
4. On returning home, pour mustard from bottle into a small, quart sized bowl.
5. Carefully measure one (1) rounded tablespoon of mustard, and return it to the bottle. Tighten lid.
6. Discard bowl of mustard
7. Wrap diaper clumsily around bottle, as a drunk might wrap MadDog 20/20 at 2 am on a Saturday night.
8. Place bottle/diaper on a flat, floor level surface carpeted bedrooms work well for this.
9. Weighing either 150 lbs, or finding someone who does, jump on bottle.
10. The resulting spray will likely blow the diaper clean across your room, spattering a thin layer of mustard in an arc not unlike a Jackson Pollock painting. Contemplate what you have done to deserve this.
11. Didn't you feed the mustard bottle?
12. Didn't you care for it?
13. You bought it clothes, and keep it warm right?
14. As you attempt to clean the harrowing mess, contemplate how exactly you went from being the clever, cute guy at parties to being on your hands and knees, wrist deep in shi- er, mustard.

Today,

2009-09-16T00:16:00.002-06:00

My son was born at 10:12 pm today, 9.15.09.
7 lbs, 0 oz

A way with words.

2009-09-15T17:10:00.003-06:00

Learning to speak is one of the most exciting parts of a child's development. Oh certainly partly because you're starting to get a glimpse as to the thought processes and opinions and ideas that make up this little person you've been really wanting to get to *know* so badly. But there's also another, lesser known aspect of the whole process. The sense of adventure.

Few parents know what exactly they're getting into when bringing a developing one or two year old into the public sphere. What makes this truly dangerous is the fact that your child's sponge like brain is absorbing everything at a disturbing rate. Even, almost especially, things you don't pay attention to in your everyday speech.

You already know the basic idea that this article is built on, little kids pick up words that you don't want them to say.

It just takes once, really. When changing a diaper, you accidentally dip your finger in the peanut butter-like sludge that leaks from your child on a regular schedule, and the next thing you know, she's happily trotting up to things and saying "DAMMIT!" It happens to everyone, and not only is it not new or special, for the most part its also incredibly easy to correct.

oh god, we don't own any peanut butter...

Specifically, you use a counter-phrase. Kids in general simply want two things, attention and praise. In this case, you simply need to convince them that "Dammit" is the improper pronunciation of "Dangit", and when she says "Dangit" you praise her, and everyone wins.
These counter-phrases diffuse almost all inappropriate words…

This wouldn't be a very interesting read though, if it were that easy. And honestly raising kids would be cake if that's all it took to change a kid's mind.

Counter-phrases are fantastic things in select situations, but they don’t always work. There are plenty of times in your child's life that they'll simply incorporate your great idea into material they'll use for the book they'll write and later split the profits with the therapist.

For example;

Apparently, my wife and I apologize a lot. This is something that I kind of already knew. But nothing in this world has been able to highlight it quite like my daughter bumping into my leg and saying in her tiny, adorable voice, "sory."

At first of course this seems like a great thing, what a polite little girl you say. And you smile. But then, you notice her saying it, a lot. She'll say it when it is not appropriate to say, she'll say it when it is *least* appropriate to say.

"sory." she says when trying to grab for something she shouldn't have.
"sory." she says when dropping a stuffed animal.
"sory." she says, when walking down the street and she trips .
"sory." she says, when playing quietly by herself, in the corner, facing the wall.

You, of course, being a parent, chuckle quietly to yourself and tell yourself that this is just a phase, and you take steps to correct it with a counter-phrase. How about "No, honey, it was my fault", as an example?
She learns this too, and now, when the nice cashier lady smiles and waves, she's treated to "sory, my faut."
Then, people stop smiling as much.
Instead, they turn their gaze to you, with a look that says "what have you done to this poor thing?"
And as subtly as possible ask for your drivers license while looking for the number for the police.

just insert dirty words any old fucking where.

There are other situations where a counter-phrase simply can't do the job, as the problem isn't the wrong word, its that little lips, throats and vocal chords simply cannot pronounce the proper words.

My daughter, genius though she is, still lives in a world where zoos are populated by "Arigadors" (alligators) and "Warus" (walrus). She eats "geddy" (spaghetti) and "chapup" (Ketchup), her favourite fruit seems to be "sawberries" (strawberries) and "balalas" (bananas). Most, but not all of these are easy enough to puzzle out, largely because at this stage, she can point and grab for what she wants, or what she's referring to.

This, non-parents, is why it seems like parents are able to understand what their kids are speaking. Sure there's a little bit of parent/kid translation, but mostly we just get used to it because by the time you see our little works-in-progress, they've already said "chapup" eight billion times…
…by breakfast.

There are, of course, certain times that this deficiency passes from the realm of cute or annoying into the downright embarrassing. Of course, even if you aren't a parent you've heard the stories or even heard children directly mispronounce "Truck" or "Frog" at the opportune moment for the 13 year old that lives in the back of your brain to pop up and giggle.

Oh yeah you're real mature.

Other words that provide a great deal of entertainment when shouted loudly in public:

Fog
Ship
Pitch

Essentially, think about words a 13 year old would use trying to get around the rules and your two year old is probably saying them "unintentionally". Finally then, you can come to the horrific conclusion I have… they're practicing.

But this is all a basic part of growing up, as we learn what is and is not appropriate in any given situation. So we are granted plenty "teachable moments" wherein our children get a chance to encounter these options.

You can imagine it now, you're walking through a Big Box retailer, because this is what you do with your days. (Big box stores are the entertaining, child-safe alternative for having a life.) This is the moment your little one has decided upon, the moment that you and she will learn together.

She reaches her hand up as far and as excited as she possibly can at her height and age. This happens to be about the realm of your crotch, and only a quick dodge can save you.

She then shouts excitedly at the latest object of her affection, just as the big box employee comes around the corner, to see you leaning over your daughter as she shouts.

"Very good" you say "that is indeed a clock."

"Next time, see if you can pronounce the 'L'".

Dad Time

2009-08-20T07:30:00.001-06:00

"Well spent" weekends take on a whole new meaning when you're a father. It's not that I don't still occasionally get out of work on a Friday afternoon and announce to the world while ripping off my tie that "IMMA GET TORE UP!", it's really just that the phrase means something a little different than it used to. Instead of being a portend to me slogging enough Ketel One to void the warranty on my rental liver, its now a dedication to myself. Indeed, you could call it a pact, to say that I will do whatever it is that I can do to absolutely destroy whatever vestiges of connective tissue may remain in my knee joints.

This is a two part process.

Step 1: Feed child breakfast.
Step 2: Attempt to go outside of your home.

Inevitably, at some point near the beginning of your adventure, the child will ask to be carried. This is understandable as evolution has cursed them with short, stubby legs better suited for kicking fathers in places that will reduce the possibilities of siblings than for actually getting them from place to place.

Carrying your kid, combined with breakfast, and the sack of lead-dust quick-crete she somehow managed to devour overnight is the perfect recipe for guaranteeing that you'll be using a walking cane at the ripe old age of 30.

But I'm getting ahead of myself here, and that's just the morning.

First, we'll set the scene.
On the weekends, I take over and become chief parent in charge. I do this for a few reasons.

First, doing the same job 24 hours a day, 7 days a week sucks. So I like to give my wife a break.

Second, it's important to spend dedicated time with your kids. Specifically, it's important to spend time with the kids that isn't all fun and games. It’s not fair for Mom to be the only person who says "no", and for Dad to be all Parks and Zoos. I'm sure there's a whole web community dedicated to the issues that come out of that kind of lack of balance.

Third, my wife is pregnant. And any human being that asks a pregnant woman to do something that they themselves are capable of will swiftly find themselves reduced to a steaming pile of ash, if they are lucky. Unlucky ones will only be able to wish for such a gloriously quick death.

So with this stuff in mind, Friday evening comes, and Dad takes over the household. In a smooth swift transition that third world governments can only dream of, my crack team of experts (read: me and my wife) decide on a plan for the weekend, and I become its enforcer.

Now, I say enforcer for a reason. I'm a bit more dedicated to schedules than my wife is. When I say "a bit" I really mean that I am a Drill Sergeant, who's only goal becomes getting what needs to be done, and done on time. Perhaps this is a male thing, perhaps instead it lies in my upbringing, or, more likely, it has to do with the fact that I don't stay home with the kid all day and therefore have the renewed energy and patience only achievable by one who is not exposed to someone who wanders around holding the bowl of her practice potty taking sips from it and calling it soup for 8 hours a day (though my co-workers may disagree).

So, when Dad is on duty, we follow the rules. The Schedule. The Plan.
The Plan is as follows;

8:00 AM : Wake.
8:02 AM : Brush teeth, brush child's teeth
8:04 AM : Downstairs for breakfast
8:05 AM - 8:35 AM : Prepare/Eat breakfast (preferably waffles, or maybe crepes with fresh cut fruit)
8:35 AM - 9:00 AM: Get dressed
9:00 AM - 11:00 AM: Errands (usually grocery shopping)
11:30 AM - 12:00 PM: Lunch, this must be timed precisely because of the next entry
12:00 PM - 2:00 PM: Naptime. The child will sleep during this period to refresh herself for the day.
2:00 PM - 2:30 PM: Break. This is where we warm up for the afternoon. Cool off for a while.
2:30 PM - 4:00 PM: Play at the park! I'm not heartless, the kid gets to go outside and play for a bit, get some fresh air.
4:00 PM - 4:15 PM: Snack time.
4:15 PM - 6:00 PM: Attend to afternoon errands if any remain. If not, calm play in the house.
6:00 PM - 6:30 PM: Prepare Dinner
6:30 PM - 7:30 PM: Eat dinner
7:30 PM - 8:00 PM: Cleanup, then calm play.
8:00 PM - 8:15 PM: Bedtime ritual, change diaper, brush teeth, read a book.
8:15 PM : Sleep until 8:00 AM Sunday, repeat.

This is Dad's day. Note that when Dad is in charge, no detail is left untended to.
When Dad is in charge, this shit is on the ball.

Now, with such a regimented day, it’s probably easy to imagine that things might go a little off course here and there. Nothing could be further from the truth.

The end result of the above schedule essentially boils down to the following:

6:30 AM: Kid wakes up screaming about the fact that she has a trail of poop from one end of the bed to the other. Honestly, I'd scream too. I change the diaper, and put her back to bed, maybe with a book or two to keep her entertained, so I can sleep till 8.

9:30 AM: Wake up, stagger to get the kid, who has since given up on her parents and gone back to sleep. Wake her up, talk about how awesome the park will be, especially the swings.

9:50 AM: Facebook

10:20 AM: Breakfast, I guess. (Cereal) Assure her that if she does well at breakfast, we'll spend extra time on the slide at the park!

10:50 AM: Oh hell we needed to run errands we still have time don't we quick get her dressed no she doesn't care if she wore it yesterday there are no stains on it its good lets go!

11:59 AM: Continued behavior such as crying and rubbing eyes indicates that child is hungry and exhausted, prompting parents to actually look at clock. Promise that it's going to be okay because after her nap we'll go to the park.

12:50 PM: Lunch, but oh God all the food we have is frozen or needs to be prepared.

1:30 PM: Lunch (Cereal) Assure her that if she does well at lunch, we'll spend extra time on the climbing wall at the park!

2:00 PM: Naptime

3:30 PM: Kid stops screaming and is now (probably) asleep, but you don't dare check on her because you might wake her up.

3:45 PM: she's up.

3:46 PM: maybe?

3:47 PM: yep she's up

3:57 PM: After a successful diaper change she is now sleeping peacefully at last thank God and all the Saints in Heaven above. Console yourself that some time at the park will make up for all of this.

5:00 PM: Wake from nap

6:10 PM: Kid wakes from nap.

6:11 PM: Facebook.

7:00 PM: Oh crap we forgot to get Groceries earlier and all that's in the fridge is potential half-meals, cursed by the laws of nature to live a dual, semi-life until their companion parts are brought to bear. But its cool we'll just pop over to the grocery store that's 5 minutes away, get what's on the list and come home, eat and put the kid to bed. Oh, and stop at the park for just a few minutes.

8:30 PM: Finish picking up Chick-Fil-A because it was the healthiest thing you could think of at the last minute that wouldn't take an hour to get ready.

8:45 PM: The kid has successfully eaten one grape, and now refuses to listen to the slightest indication that she should so much as put her tongue on her $6 chicken sandwich that you spent ten minutes and a half a pint of blood cutting into baby-bite sized chunks.

9:10 PM: Kid eats. (cereal)

9:30 PM: Bedtime ritual (all joking aside, this is the holy grail of the day. this stays the same if at all humanly possible)

2:30 AM: AW FUCK WE NEVER WENT TO THE PARK

So essentially what this boils down to is that I get a taste of not only what my Wife's day is like when I'm at work, but I also get a nifty taste of Humble Pie. When you're exhausted at the end of a day that's been utterly ruined by nothing in particular, and you climb into bed, in shambles and wracked with guilt for the things that left undone, there is one thing that should make it all worthwhile;

That special moment when you're putting your daughter to bed.

When you lay her down on her new toddler bed, whose sizable mattress makes the poor thing look minuscule and tiny and helpless, and she looks up at you in the room lit only by her nightlight, and you can see her huge, soulful eyes staring up at you.

Those pools of light that gaze upon you with the awe and reverence only the very young can have for their parents, that seem to say with every tiny breath of her body that you are the arbiter of all that is good in her world.

That despite the ravages of the day, she loves you implicitly, and trusts you more than any other human being alive to do what is right and necessary to protect her, and teach her, and help her, and keep her clean, healthy and happy. When she looks up at you and you understand that parents are the God for all children. And that everything she'll ever need she can entrust in you.

And she looks up at you,
and you look down at her.
And you say "Goodnight honey."
and she says "nite!"

And you look down at her,
And she looks up at you.
And you say "I love you..."
and she says "love 'oo!"

And she looks up at you,
and you look down at her.
And you kiss her on the forehead and say "My darling daughter"
and she says "Mom."

Reports Of My Death Have Been Greatly Exaggerated - Mark Twain

2008-02-19T01:07:00.002-07:00

I suppose it's been a little while since I've written here, and you've likely given me up for dead and gone. Well, I 'aint dead. What I have been, is very, very busy. As of late my job has demanded significantly more of my time than it ever has previously. That, and of course the whole baby "thing".

So with no further adieu, let's make up for lost time with a long entry;

I honestly have to be one (out of two) of the luckiest parents on the face of this planet Earth. Since about two months of age, my little girl has slept peacefully on her own, all the way through the whole night. Sure, raising a child is harrowing, exhausting, and children have the innate ability to destroy your self worth, sense of smell, and best shirt in one mighty blast from the ol' baby cannon, but overall my wife and I never really had to add forced sleep deprivation to that already impressive list.

...

Until she got sick.

Now, before you worry, the little monster is better now, and next week I hope to have a post all about all the new wonderful noises she's learned to make right in your friggin' ear, but at the time it was pretty awful.

About four-weeks-ish ago, she got something called "Bronchiolitis". This is apparently Not A Cold. I have been informed by my doctor of this. The tone my doctor used to mention this to me had connotations of bodily harm if I confused the terms again. Likely followed by possible intervention from CPS.

The practical upshots of this condition were, as far as the baby's doting parents could tell, was that she had a cold.

If you don't have a child, yet, or never plan on having one, I'd like you to have some information before I continue, so we're all on the same page. Specifically, when babies are born, as I have previously mentioned (Essential Truth #6), they really aren't too bright.

In addition to not being able to walk, eat, flee from danger, communicate, climb, make animal sounds, fight, dissuade people from fighting, tune in a radio station, turn on a radio, know what a radio is, fish, swim, paint, draw, act, fly a plane, get in a plane, buy a plane ticket, know what a plane is, write, sing, clear their throat, do their taxes, drive, or type 10+ WPM, babies can't BREATHE very well. No matter how adorable your little love-lumpkin is, and whether they are born vaginally, or by c-section, all babies are born looking like Persian cats, along with the associated respiratory difficulties. Not that I can blame the poor things, I look the same way after getting out of the elevator during the morning rush into work.

As if being smashed into the side of a Uterus and not in a pleasurable way wasn't enough, some of the many fluids that fill your fledgling bag of goo have filled the nasal cavity and associated passages. Over the next few days and weeks, this baby will be dealing with these issues the best, and most American way they know how. Through brute force.

When I say brute force, I don't mean that your child will be having long, drawn out, multi-episodic battles with things that look like this: (though this may happen with Japanese children I don't know I have never been to Japan)

Who are you to judge their culture anyway you racist?

Rather, what it does mean is that you will be spending the next few months of your life sharing your living quarters with mini-Darth Vader, only, instead of a mechanical respiratory mask specifically designed to look menacing when commanding a legion of clones, the baby has, you know, their own face.
(any and all parent who have kids on actual artificial breathing masks may contact me via notintheface@blearg.net for my physical address, which they may then use to find me and beat me to within an inch of my miserable life.)

Thankfully, this is a) Only a small fraction of a much fuller newborn experience leaving you with very little time to focus on it, and exhausted enough to sleep through most of it, and b) only temporary. Unless, of course, your child gets a cold (Edit: OR BRONCHIOLITIS OKAY I AM SORRY!). At which point your child suffers a buildup of mucus, and George Lucas starts cataloging your address to reference when James Earl Jones comes to his damn sense, gets some self respect, and won't do any more voice overs of shitty movies that ruin decent characters.

ahem

This time, however, the child's congestion comes accompanied by a myriad of symptoms, chief among which is the fabled "feeling like absolute and utter horseshit". Which, as you know is just plain not fun for anyone, no matter what age you are. I imagine that the only thing that likes feeling like utter horseshit is, well, horseshit, and that's only because it doesn't know any better.

there was going to be an illustration here but I decided to save you.

Question : Based on the facts that you know so far, what is the primary way that a child will express displeasure with something such as, for a wild example “feeling like absolute and utter horseshit”?

a) Screaming at the top of her lungs.
b) Screaming at the top of her lungs.
c) Screaming at the top of her lungs.
d) Screaming at the top of her lungs.

If you answered “Screaming at the top of her lungs.”, you are correct! You are now fully fledged to be a new parent, and I highly encourage you to perform many dangerous and life threatening activities before you regain your senses.

Now, besides the predictable effects of you losing your hearing and your patience there is another part to the fallout of having a sick child screaming in your face whenever the chance presents itself (which is always).

Blessedly, she lost her voice.

Almost instantly, she went from 11 on the dial to “mute”, and life became bearable again. Now, I know that this makes me a terrible person, father, and generically a rotten human being, but there could have been no greater blessing to our family than my daughter’s voice being taken from her at that time. Her face still turned red, but instead of foundation shattering blasts, we were treated to a gentle breeze, not unlike that of a personal cooling fan.

For the next few weeks we were able to coddle and tend to our sick infant in the ways that parents should, rather than doing what instinct and sheer desperation was driving us to do.

There was a downside to this, of course, as there always is with a baby. And no, this time that downside is not the fact that the baby is covered in poop from her armpits to her toes.
The downside in this case was that the times when she was happy, she would try to make the adorable baby “coo” noise which is honestly about the only reason that this species gets fooled into even being in the same room as a member of the opposite species any more. This coo noise is that important. Seriously, without that noise even the most hardcore hippies and pro-lifers would not only run screaming, but be the chief lobbyists of the ZPG movement.

So, combine that with mini Darth Vader HIIIIIIIIIIISSSHHHH KIIIIIIIIISSKKKing in your ear (from the other room) and our house was not a happy one for a good few weeks.

As I mentioned earlier, she’s better now, and as such, I'm a tired guy. See you next time.

A short note

2007-12-19T00:42:00.000-07:00

Both my wife and my daughter are ill.

If you wish to experience the joy that is a sick infant, you can follow my guide below.

Step 1. Find an excited puppy.

Step 2. Take that puppy into your bathroom and stare into the mirror.

Step 3. Hold that puppy as still as you possibly can while screaming into your own face.

Step 4. Do this until the puppy falls asleep.

If your first thought is "the puppy won't fall asleep because I am screaming at my own face", then you are still too sane to have children, congratulations!

Because of this, I'm sure you can understand, I have a monstrous headache that will not leave me be, and this is all you get for an update today.

Happy Holidays.

The F-word, and Pink

2007-12-05T00:05:00.003-07:00

Last time, I’d mentioned that this next article would be about parents who try too hard. That is incorrect. In the spirit of the season, we’ll be talking about something else entirely.

(In the interest of not having my little wing of the family disowned forever, I think I must mention that this article is meant to be entirely overblown satire. I love my family, just as much as the family of my wife, and we're very blessed for all the love and attention they've given us.)

Since it is “that season”, let us today talk about the F word. You all know the F word, right? The F word, of course, is Fuck.

Fuck being what you say when you are bombarded by the other F word, Family.
Now, before I dive headfirst into an essay that I’m sure will guarantee Santa never visits my house again except to hurl the occasional brick of coal through my window, I’d like to at least mention that I am very, very lucky when it comes to my family. Both my blood family and that of my wife are very kind, giving, helpful people that have provided a support network that has kept our heads above water more than once.

So if they’re so loving and wonderful, what do I have to write about? It would be nice if your parents were the only people you had to deal with when you have a baby, however, such is not the case. Like some sort of horrid, dread gong, the arrival of a baby sends forth a pulse of attention. This siren call beckons any who can detect a certain scent, similar to bears and menstruation. Your estranged cousin? On his way. Your aunt who lives in that cabin in the woods and only comes around for Easter to tell you about how sinful you all are? Booked a flight. That crazy uncle that moved to Indonesia to become a hermit living only off of the yolks sucked from turtle eggs? Yeah, he’s just arrived at the hotel down the avenue.

I wish I could adequately describe to you this event. It isn’t possible, but I will try. Imagine yourself as an Egyptian during the time of Moses, and the walls of the Red Sea are crashing down around you. Now imagine that these massive walls of water are made up of human bodies who you barely know but you are supposed to allow into your house anyway and let them give you advice about how to raise your only child even though they have never raised a child of their own. Also they pinch cheeks.

The fortunate thing about all of this family, however, is that almost all of them bring you stuff. A significant portion of the time, this stuff is money. Now before you go thinking about having a child to collect early on what you think is your rightful inheritance, remember that this one time gain is overtaken quickly by long term diaper costs.
Second only to money, you will receive gifts of clothes. While this, in and of itself, is fantastic, there is a catch.

Somewhere, there exists a book. This book is as ancient as the stars, and contained within are the basic laws that govern the universe. Things such as Time, Thermodynamics and Gravity are detailed within its vast, eldritch pages. Within this book, there is a note. A tiny scribble written into the margins of the entry on Biology, added shortly after this galactic codex was sent to the galactic printers to be bound. This note states simply “Boys wear blue, Girls wear Pink.”. If one is to violate this rule, they will be beset on all sides by people who assume that dressing your baby girl in blue actually causes some horrible brain warping anomaly to appear and this will magically transform her into a gun-toting, football playing, bowl-haircut-wearing butch-dyke lesbian feminazi (not that there’s anything wrong with that). Some of the dirtiest looks I’ve ever gotten have been from people who’ve called my daughter a boy (such a handsome little boy!), and had me correct them (oh she’s a girl). The Look is a silent way of saying “DON’T YOU KNOW THE FUCKING RULE?!”.

Now I have to place equal blame on parents here. You see, a large portion of them have subscribed to this rule for a good portion of their lives as well, and thusly, when some Neanderthal dares call their child by the opposite sex, the very foundation of their belief that their baby is the cutest/most handsome little girl/boy ever born begins to crack. Usually the retaliation is The Look accompanied by a terse “SHE is a GIRL” or some equivalent.
This is inappropriate, not just because it’s rude, but also because it is incredibly stupid. All babies look fundamentally the same, like Winston Churchill.
Compare (click for big):

A noted statesman, orator and strategist.

Baby.

In addition to this near featureless, almost basset-hound looking face, there is nothing included in the baby package that could be listed as a “secondary sexual characteristic”. Yes, it would be easier to identify your little girl as a girl if she had D cups from day one, but I’ve got news for you. That news is that even your little boy will have C cups when he’s born, due to the influx of hormones from his mother, and after a few days, boy or girl, they will end up as flat as a board for a good 12 years or so. After that what your boy decides to do with his chest is up in the air…er, so to speak.

I’ll let you in on a little secret here. Pink, blue, green, or yellow? Your baby does not care. She has no preference, no subtle understanding of the concepts of tone. When first born, your baby can’t even see color, and thusly will not be making any choices about which flowers you should set up in the bedroom to match the duvet, paint an impressionist painting twenty feet high, or make any fashion choices, no matter how much pink you set her up with. Let her work on figuring out the many points of articulation on her own fingers or at least that her feet aren’t some alien creature attached to her bottom half before pushing societal pressures like feminization on her, ok?
My daughter looks terrible and sickly in most pink colors. Blue brings out her eyes. Simple as that.

Thirding Money and Clothes is Food. Astonishingly, I have nothing to complain about about this. Food is awesome, and the less cooking/dishes you have to do, the better your life will be. Food, again, is awesome and your family is awesome for bringing it to you.

One of the primary downsides to Family is simply that, after nine months of knowing your child is going to be born, you have certain ideas about how you plan on raising your child. You want things to be a certain way to build up habits and traditions of your own, and you certainly don’t want anything that you perceive as a danger anywhere near your precious child. If you’re as lucky as I am, you also get to spend some time with your child before the deluge of family breaks over your home. This opportunity allowed my wife and me to build up some habits and preference about how our daughter was treated, and scheduled. Your Family, however, has little or no regard for any of this and will cause your entire, fragile little world to come crumbling quickly down.

Like a wrecking ball, your family’s job is to identify cracks in your façade, points of weakness, and use those to cause your entire structure to violently implode, getting bonus points if they do it within a certain amount of time. Jenga is no longer the family game of choice.
By far the most intrusive to our lives were repeated ~~accusations~~ suggestions that we weren’t keeping the baby warm enough. To family, a baby cannot *be* warm enough. In a house in which “room temperatures” are high enough to cause lizards to spontaneously evolve sweat glands, you would think that she’d be safe, but no, some relative has to come along and inform the parents of said child that she needs a hat. A good ninety percent of holiday dialogue will revolve around the child’s need for a hat. The child being inside has no effect on this. The child already wearing a hat has no effect on this. The child being perfectly happy has no effect on this. It does not feel pain, it can’t be reasoned with, and you are at its horrible mercy!
Once you’ve adorned the child with a hat (or a second hat, or a third), you begin to realize that nothing could possibly keep the baby warm enough to meet your family’s criteria.

This is an actual conversation from Thanksgiving*.

“This baby is cold, you better put a hat on this baaaaby!”
“Oh put some mittens on this baaaby!”
“Her feet are cold you better but some socks on this baaaaaby!”
“Oh she’s cryin’ you better put a blanket on this baaaaby!”
“Its cold in here you better put some fire on this baaaaby!”
“The baby is cold somebody get some hot magma for this baaaaaby!”
*may not be an actual conversation

It was at that point that we decided to leave. We probably should have left after the fire suggestion, but hey, free pie!

Inspired by the fantastic Baby Owners Manual, I’ve created some helpful diagrams that you can reference when visiting family over the holidays with your new baby.

Fig 1. The baby at rest. This example shows the baby as she commonly is.

Fig 2. The baby at rest-er. This example shows the baby how the parents wish her to be.

Fig 3. Get the hell away from my child. This example shows the baby as the family would have her, if they could pry her from my cold, dead hands.

I hope this prepares you a bit, but nothing can ever save you.

And now, the bonus content I'd promised you.
One icon, so you can remember how screwed you are;

And two baby icon wallpapers, 1024 x 768, if you'd like a different resolution that can be arranged. Yes, one of them is pink. Enjoy!

Blue or Pink

Wants vs. Needs

2007-11-20T22:40:00.002-07:00

It is important to clarify that when I say that people are dumb for thinking that babies should be okay with being set down on their backs in a quiet room, I visit very little blame on the parents of said babies. New parents, as far as I’m concerned, are incapable of being guilty for crimes short of intentional neglect or straight up murder. Rather, the main bearer of my blame and anger about this, and in fact most things baby related is the baby industry and American baby culture itself.

Certainly, it is impossible to fully prepare any new parent for the journey that they are about to embark upon. However, when you compound that with every doctor trying to sell you their favorite home remedy, every baby book leaving out vital details or telling you to buy the products from every corporation trying to sell you their new, miracle crying cure that they’re just begging Oprah to shill and later turns out to be made of Chinese irradiated, lead embalmed, reconstituted brains from hoof-in-mouth cows, a new parent can end up very confused indeed. (Much like you probably are after wading through that sentence.)

Lets take a look at Babies R’ Us’ “baby needs checklist”.

stationary entertainer???

I’m going to tell you a secret here, we own about a quarter of that stuff. We own that little of their needs checklist and (as of this writing), our baby has yet to explode. Now, I am a father of only a six week old, and I suppose that in my inexperience it is completely possible that there will come a day that I touch an improperly warmed baby wipe (due to our lack of the proper warming device, you see.), and my baby will immediately crash, undoubtedly requiring a full format and restore. However, I put that in the “Highly Unlikely” category, right below “Genghis Kahn showing up to take the baby for just a night.”, and just above “actually having enough clean dishes to see the bottom of the sink for more than a night.”.

It is though, very easy to convince new parents that they absolutely must have the Stroller/baby carrier with pivoting chair, rear view mirrors, vibrating, heated seat, all terrain wheels, onboard point defense anti missile system, and oil slick dropper. The companies that produce these things are very lucky to have their chosen demographic. Parents to be are scared, nervous animals; eager for items to purchase that will alleviate their many fears. New parents are much the same but with the added, special sauce that we like to call “desperation”. You remember how it was in highschool? Where the object of your affections first ignored you, then had her boyfriend beat you up, installed barbed wire on the tree outside her window, and finally filed that restraining order that still keeps you out of that damn grocery store in Colorado Springs, all because you reeked of the perfume of desperation. Bitch.
Anyway, the point is that these companies are the exact opposite of that. Upon smelling your pregnancy, they will be all over you like flies on ca-ca. I’m fully convinced that most major pregnancy tests contain little RFID chips that notify companies of positive results on said tests, and within days, you’re awash in Similac samples, ads for sales at Babies R’ Us, and dollar off coupons for diapers at Target. (I’m fairly sure that this was developed by the same company that knows to send Victoria’s Secret catalogs to houses the very second the male children in them hit puberty.) My daughter got her first junk mail before she got her social security number. The only demographic that comes close to being such complete suckers are people about to get married. You know you didn’t need that baby seal skin wedding guest album, and you do feel kind of bad, but dammit it was the only one that went with the churches candelabra.

Now, honestly, it is nice enough to get free stuff every now and again, but I don’t want to feed our kid Simulac. Sorry, the baby on your packaging is creepy, and I don’t want your crap in my baby. Were I less ornery though, and more trusting of companies than I am, I could easily see myself pouring those samples down my daughter’s milk vacuum at the witching hour when I just need her to be quiet.

This stuff is everywhere, buffeting parents left and right until they’re so confused they’re finally forced to pick any port in the storm, trying the entire time to convince other parents to join them so that they feel validated in their choices (and doing the company’s advertising for them in the process.) . So when an “authority” such as Babies R Us, or “What to Expect When You’re Expecting”, rises above all the others on the shoulders of those parents, more and more people will cling to it, or at very least default to it. Therefore, I think said sources bear a responsibility for providing you with more actual information than advertisements, more facts, and less checklists for Crap You Do Not Need. A real checklist needs to look like this.

boob(s) is really sort of extravagant, actually.

See the difference? I knew you would.

Special Baby Update Section:

A yeast infection of the mouth. That, in a nutshell, is what Thrush is. Last week, our happy baby exploded (oh man I knew I should have bought that wipe warmer!) in fury and rage. Well, as much fury and rage as someone who can’t control their limbs can do so. No amount of “Cuddle Cure” is going to work when one of the chief steps involved (sucking) is the primary source of discontent. Thrush is apparently, “just one of those things that happens to some babies” such as gas, or constipation, or lycanthropy. However, as an astute person, I noticed that it miraculously appeared just after her father gave her her first bottle of formula.

Feeling like you’ve failed or somehow harmed your own child is one of the worst, most unhappy things I’ve ever felt, and I can get pretty emo…
But really, sometimes you just need to accept that you goof up, and you forget to wash a bottle’s nipple after dropping it in the toilet (kidding!!!), and move on.

Ultimately, babies, like their wolf and bear ancestors, are fairly logical creatures. They function on a simple tenant that they have some core needs, and if those core needs are not met, they cause other beings physical harm (wolves bite, bears claw, babies sonic blast.). To that end, I have developed some tools to provide babies with those core needs in as efficient a manner possible, some of which I will share with you for your own use and defense.

This is a flowchart that you can use to troubleshoot a crying baby. You’ll find that it is fairly logical, and takes you on a step by step journey that hopefully ends with a satisfied baby, wolf, bear, or possibly your laptop I don’t know

theory

However, I have to be honest with you, it really ends up working out like this;

reality

I wish you the best of luck, and have a happy Thanksgiving should you so choose to celebrate it.

The Stages of Babyhood

2007-11-13T22:39:00.002-07:00

A few weeks ago, I wrote the essay that would appear as the first entry in this journal, at the time of that writing my daughter was about three weeks old. The essay was written from my perspective about the first two days of her second week.

This is important to note because as babies get older their behaviour changes. There are several identifiable stages to a baby’s development.

Most pregnancy and early childcare books would have you believe that these stages are as follows;

Stage 1) Baby.
A baby, to these books writer’s minds, is your adorable offspring.
This is the product of your last nine months of exhaustion, and you have earned this joy. Babies are capable of making noises after a few weeks, and even smiling, isn’t that grand? Other things babies are capable of are recognizing their parent’s voices, focusing on black and white imagery, and melting the heart of the mother.

Stage 2) Walking.
The second stage, walking is characterized by a baby being able to walk. A walking baby is capable of making noises, eating solid foods, and, of course, walking. This is usually where these books wish you a fond farewell and good luck on your joyful journey into ~~parenthood~~ motherhood.

The realities, as you might be expecting, are somewhat more intricate than that.

I) Newborn
A newborn is characterized chiefly by being able to breathe. Note that I say “able” to breathe. They are not particularly good at it. Newborn babies snuffle, snort, squeak and sneeze. Newborns are also able to eat. You will also note that I do not use the word “capable” here at all. While it is possible for them to do so, “capable” is not a word that describes, in any adequacy, a newborn baby’s capacity for eating.
In short, breastfeeding is not as instinctual as you might want it to be.
A newborn baby is characterized by the two above activities, punctuated by a deposit or two of the most vile spackle on the face of the planet Earth, known as meconium.

II) Less-New-Born
A less-new-born is about two weeks old, Characterized by the above, coupled with a change in the colour of the poop. Instead of being meconium, the stuff yellows to a mustardy goop, which has the special property of being almost magnetically attracted to baby feet. Specifically socks. Never before in my life had I imagined we would go through so many damned baby socks. A baby at this stage is also capable of screaming until she turns a color reminiscent of the Kool-Aid man.
More than once I expected the Crimson Crusader to burst through my wall and demand that I return his infant, punctuated by a hearty “OH YEAH!”.

oh no!

I imagine that this is less an effect of the crying, and more some sort of latent ability of humankind, not unlike that of the noble Jackson’s Chameleon. A baby at this stage is capable of changing colours, starting with a bright blue and rapidly shifting through spectrum blending in with things such as brick walls, fire engines, and that elevator in The Shining.

III) Less-Less-New-Born.
This is the stage my daughter is at now. My daughter is now comfortable enough to say “goo” (which I assure you is not simply a sterotype, I honestly thought that my wife was the one making the noise, articulate as it was.), giggle, smile, and spray her urine at her parents as though she was prepping her changing table for use as a slip n’ slide.

I mention most of this, because it is important to know that human babies are extraordinarily Stupid. As mentioned before, the basic animal instincts of “eat, fornicate, and get the hell out of the way” are there, but babies just can’t do anything about it. You see, Mother Nature, in all her glory, finally gifted human women with the amazing ability to die less when they gave birth. “How,” you might ask, “did Mother Nature accomplish this glorious task?”. To which I would answer, “You know how men get laughed at for pre-mature ejaculation? That’s just a trial run, baby, have another vodka tonic.”.

Babies, when they are born, are dumped out of the comfort of the womb about 3 months too damn early. Effectively, the bun from your oven is still doughy on the inside. In doing this, your baby’s head is significantly smaller than it will be three months later, and instead of being split open like the Reach Toothbrush Fliptop Head Guy, a mother gets the lovely parting gift of simply being torn open like a packet of airline peanuts. Ain’t Nature lovely?

There are several interesting things to know about this. The first is that most of the world is blissfully unaware of this fact. They do not know to tell you that your baby is fundamentally useless to you or to even herself during this period. As a matter of fact, the biggest detriment to your baby at this time is herself. She’s used to being packed in a waterbed, a thumb always at the ready for sucking, and a heavy metal soundtrack playing right in her ear every single second of every single day. Instinctually, she knows that that is the way things are supposed to be. So when we American idiot parents lay a baby to rest in a quiet room on her back, she wakes up to think that she’s fallen out of the womb, and cant even look behind her properly to see the bed she’s laying on to correct that notion. Add this, to her noting that she’s all alone with no thumb in her face, her theme music is gone, and she’s all of a sudden feeling like something has gone horribly wrong.

You probably noticed that I mention Americans above. I do this for a reason, but really when I say that, I mean industrialized “modern”, westernized cultures. We have, for some inane reason, decided that we don’t really like the idea of continuing the species that much, because it’s just too inconvenient. The companies we work for don’t have the time to deal with their employee’s snot nosed brats or the time that those employees selfishly steal from them in order to attend the heat seeking knee gremlin’s every whim.
So, in order to maintain the standard of living to which you have become accustomed, namely, having the ability to eat Food, our children need to come second next to Work. For this purpose, these cultures have evolved a very special retardation of the brain that makes us think that a near-fetus should be able to sleep through the night in an environment completely unfamiliar to them. It’s like the whole of these cultures somehow turned into X-Men with the special mutant power of “Act Like Babies Are Supposed To Want To Get Left To The Dingoes.”.

This needless to say, is incorrect. So called “primitive” cultures do a damn fine job raising their young, and in fact, many have never developed a word analogous to “colic”. This is in large part due to the fact that mothers tightly bind their children (similar to the tightness of the womb) , wear them and go about their daily lives (swaying them like they would be in the womb), and allow them to listen to the cacophony of daily life (you see where this is going.).

Keeping all of those things in mind has made parenting a cinch since we figured them out. I can’t take all the credit, however. This knowledge was mostly gained from a book named “The Happiest Baby On the Block”, which I would highly recommend to any new-ish parent. The doctor who writes it is a horrible writer, and obviously tries to beef up the core thesis of his ideas with a bunch of words like “The Cuddle Cure”, but I promise that the actual information within is solid.

We learned about the existence of said book during prenatal classes while my wife was pregnant, and decided that we didn’t really need any of that hippy crap. Eleven o’ clock on the second day of that second week however, found us at the local Barnes and Noble, baby and bags under our eyes in tow. Please, if you’re a new or soon to be parent, do yourself a favor and buy this book. You may never need it, but I promise you that at 2 am, after your eardrums are bleeding and you’re pondering just how easy adoption is, it’s a truly friendly face.

See you next time!

Dr. Strangelove, or, How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Baby.

2007-10-26T06:02:00.000-06:00

Hello,

It's been about three weeks since my daughter was born, and I've spent very little time at the computer, hence my lack of updates. I appreciate all of you being understanding about my lack of individual replies, I do read each and every one, and if you're on my friends list, there's a damn good reason.

So, speaking of which, this is going to be a rather long, hopefully not too rambling post. Some of the opinions, thoughts, and expressions in this post may disturb you slightly. If you're weak of stomach or have an idealized view of babyhood you may get uncomfortable.

I've decided to be rather frank in my discussion of this, quite simply because I think there are those of you that will benefit from my honest perspective. Some of you don't have, and never plan on having children. Some of you have children and are veteran parents that have much to teach me. Others still are mere weeks, days or months away from being where I am now, typing softly on a keyboard at 5 am, with a just barely sleeping baby resting on your lap, twitching your legs despite the muscle fatigue for fear that any disturbance in your rhythmic movements will wake your new overlord and master.

To the first and last groups, I need to begin by telling you this, as it is a fundamental understanding you need to have. Not only for your own futures, dealing with other human beings, but also appreciating what your parents went through with you.

Essential Truth #1- Babies Destroy Man.

Bill Cosby has an oft-celebrated comedy routine called "Fatherhood", wherein he describes how two intellectuals holding PhDs, himself and his wife, have a baby, and are reduced to "oggie-woogie baby need a widdew poopy change" style speech. This, while true in a fashion, is not an accurate view of child rearing. Rather, the truth is a bit darker than this, and doesn’t make for quite the mass-appeal comedic routine.

You see, a baby knows no mercy. No remorse. No logic, reason, kindness, compassion, or even basic expression of most human emotions. At first, it’s single, solitary way of expressing anything other than complete satisfaction is an ear-piercing shriek several decibels over that of a lawn mower, usually directly at your face. Imagine, if you will, someone that you have never met before, screaming in your damn face for over four hours straight, at the top of their lungs. Never ceasing, barely even breaking to draw in breath for another banshee-like wail. This is the most accurate description I can give you of the first two days of the second week of a baby’s life.

The first week is much simpler, of course. As a baby is born it’s “turned off” more or less, and that first week is time for it to charge its batteries and prepare to soften concrete, bend support beams in skyscrapers, and destroy most of Neo-Tokyo (I made an anime joke there) with its unhappiness about the fact that it has, again, shit all over itself.

All of this, in and of itself, wouldn’t be that big of a deal (unless you live in Neo-Tokyo) if it weren’t for one stupid, horrible fact. It’s your baby.

Babies, by design (evolution motherfuckers, hell yeah), have this cry that sets off a specific trigger in their parents. Sure, other people hate the sound of a baby’s cry too. It is, after all a loud, near ceaseless, high pitched sound that usually you can’t quite get away from. But to the parents of that baby, it’s something special. A gift, if you will, from Mother Nature is that a baby’s cry is specifically designed to set its parent’s teeth on edge, and cause them grief. You see, in nature, it would be a hint that the mother needs to remember to pick up its young and maybe put some food in its horrible little mouth so the other ape-people can get some fucking rest.
However, the wonders of modern society such as work, school, and my shiny new XBOX 360 mean that occasionally you want to put this adorable little lump of flesh down for a few seconds of non-back breaking peace. In America, and most westernized countries we’re supposed to be able to do this occasionally. When most people even think of babies, their third thought (after poop, after screaming) is usually one of an adorable little tiny human, tucked safely into a crib, snoozing away. For some newborns, this is easily the case, and those are lucky parents indeed. For most real parents however, babies, in their first three months, who notice that they’re alone in a crib, flailing and unmoving, flat on their backs and unable to change it, freak right the fuck out. Which of course cues the parental freak-out, and the circle of life continues (If you’ve ever seen The Fifth Element, and, like me, practically memorized Zorg’s speech about destruction causing chaos, you know exactly the kind of chain reaction I mean.). The screaming begins, and the parental checklist is brought out.

This checklist is often as follows;

“Is she hungry? Did she poop? Did she pee? Is she uncomfortable? Did I break her? Is this the time when we’re just supposed to let her cry? Holy shit what if I did break her? Why won’t she shut up? Did you try feeding her? What? I can’t hear you over the Jet Engine in my ear. Screw you I was just trying to help. I know but I just don’t know what’s wrong! Jesus should we go to the emergency room? Yeah I guess so. Get the Diaper bag just in case. Oh God in Heaven I swear I will go to church every single Sunday for the rest of my life if only you make her be okay. Oh she just burped, and she’s just staring at us like we’re idiots now. Hey God you know I might miss a Sunday or two, that’s okay right?”

It is impossible for any human being to take proper care of a baby, and not be reduced to a complete moron at at least one point in the process. Four nights ago, my little girl was screaming at the top of her lungs, and my wife needed a break. I decided to be useful while I was pacing about with the baby in a sling, and got ready to go to the grocery store. I started the car, to warm it up, and because I didn’t want any strange homeless people stealing my child (that I didn’t want someone to take her at that point is the truest sign of insanity), I locked my drivers side door. From there, I moved around to the rear passenger side door, and after about 20 minutes managed to get my screaming heap of fleshling genetic code strapped into the car seat. Again, not wanting anyone to walk off with my baby, I locked this door. I then went back around to get in the front seat to drive off to the store and be productive, only to realize that my screaming, cold, terrified infant baby girl was locked in my car, safe from homeless man and parent alike. My wife, who I’d “given a break” staggered half naked to the back door with the keys, and was, thank the good Lord, too out of it to realize what her idiot husband had done.

This is the kind of thing that happens to parents. Perfectly reasonable people are reduced to this sort of thing on an almost daily basis. You need to also bear in mind that all of this comes right along with all the regular, everyday things like trying to do laundry (which I’ve never been good at to begin with), the dishes, and God-forbid, some actual homework.

But it’s all worth it when she’s not crying because you love her, right?

Essential Truth #2 – You do not love your baby.

When you first met the love of your life, it was very likely not obvious. Even if you really, really liked that person, actually saying “I love you” probably took at least a few more jello shots. Over time, you got to know them. Their habits, their likes, their dislikes, the fact that she leaves dishes all over the house, and all of these different aspects collect until you know a person well enough to love them.

You don’t know your baby. Partially because they are new, and partially because they have little to no personality to know.

Sorry, all of those nifty little greeting cards and TV movies are horribly fucking wrong. I need to reiterate. You do not love your newborn baby. You don’t, for large swaths of time, even like your newborn baby. At this point, your newborn baby represents a gigantic inconvenience to your life, and everything you ever want to do. I don’t mean fancy things like “learn to paint”. I mean basic things, like, you know, eating.

Now, you know you should love your newborn baby, because that’s what all those greeting card TV specials and cheeky American comedies with that dry witted British guy have told you. Especially at those times when she’s in what’s called the “quiet-alert” period. This is when they are staring around at the world, wide eyed and wonderful, almost the ideal baby.

A new parent knows differently however. The baby being awake is A Bad Thing. This “quiet-alert” stage is best thought of as this;

You see, the reason you don’t get a feeling of peace or serenity from this picture is because you know what’s fucking coming. Much like someone who winces when he looks at a closed fist after having been punched in the face several times, you can associate an image with a result. You see, even though you’ve been reduced to a useless idiot, you still have the basic animal pain instinct.

I don’t watch a lot of television, but I have friends who do. They’ve told me that recently here in Denver, the gub’mint has been stepping up the Public Service Announcements discouraging baby shaking. Up until about two weeks ago, both my wife and I saw the entire thing as one huge tragedy. “Who the hell would shake a baby?” we’d say to each other, a look of shock and vague amusement at the misfortune of those weaker of wills than ourselves (don’t get all high and mighty with me here People, you have the same wicked joys sometimes, we all do.).

Three AM, on a Wednesday night, having someone Who You Do Not Love scream in your face for four hours is incentive to shake a fucking baby. (Uncomfortable moment coming) You start to come up with plans to rent a paint shaking machine from Home Depot, just to make sure the job is done right. (Uncomfortable moment over.)

This is where society comes in to save the life of your child, and indeed, has likely actually saved the human race from complete extinction due to baby shaking. Shaking your baby gets you in trouble. It’s honestly not so much that you don’t want to end this horrible, teeth grating, nails-on-a-blackboard-times-one-fucking-million sound, any way humanly possible, from bags to hammers to the lathe in the metal shop of the nearest high school. It’s that you know you’re going to be in a heap of trouble the second you do. That’s right buddy. Likely a good portion of the reason that your mother didn’t kill you when you were young was a good ol’ helping of “what would the neighbors think?”. Think about that next time you’re ticked off at lawmakers.

Speaking of your Mother (see what I did there?), brings us to my next point. Luckily for you, it’s a little more upbeat.

Essential Truth #3 – Everyone has done this.

In the afternoons, when I’m at my most lucid, I will think about my child’s future. This is a vastly humbling experience. Not in so much that I’m worried about college, or my daughter’s potential suitors, but more that I’m cleaning the fecal matter out of her vagina, behind which lay her ovaries. Six months ago (approximately) she got eggs in those tiny ovaries. That means that any potential grandchildren I may have are halfway there already.

Thinking about potential grandchildren leads me to think of my daughter eventually having sex, which of course, as a modern parent, leads me to the terrifying thought of teenage sex and pregnancy. I think of myself as a teenager, and my attitude, how cocky I was and how much I mouthed off to my own mother. And now, I’m thinking, how can anyone be so full of themselves with someone who has cleaned shit off of their genitals?

Everyone you see. Every last, single human entity on the face of this planet (except possibly test tube babies but they aren’t common enough to worry about…yet.), has been here. Whether their mothers or fathers did a very good job of it or not is all up to life, the universe, and everything. The fundamental truth still lies there, however. Everyone you meet has shit on their own genitals at one point in time. Everyone you meet, everyone you shake hands with, have sex with, hate, love, vote for, vote against, shoot, rape, kill, convict, execute, admire, lust after, model yourself after, or clean up after, has been grown in the uterus of a woman. Either thrust violently, three months too early, through a tube, one to four centimeters smaller than their head, or had that woman’s abdominal wall sliced open, organs moved aside and been drawn out by the cold rubber gloves of someone they may never meet again. Every, last, single person.

Think of this as you speak to others.

Essential Truth #4 – There is Shit They do not tell you.

About three days after my daughter was born (or was it four? They all blend together), I was acting like a good dad, and changing yet another diaper. I opened this coffin for feces expecting the usual smorgasbord of sights, smells, and even occasionally sound, and I wasn’t disappointed to find a veritable battlefield of mustard yellow poop speckled with bits of white here and there (milk curds from her mother!). However, this time, my daughter had given me a very special surprise. Nestled there among the rolling hills of amber was about an eyedropper of the most terrifying fluid to a new parent. Blood.

When a baby is in the uterus, it is flooded day in and day out with hormones from its mother. This causes it’s genitals to become engorged, and even causes the breasts to plump up and form small breast buds. We were informed of this by our very helpful nurses and told that this swelling should go down in just a few days. Easing the worries of a new dad, they also told me that there might be a bit of milky discharge due to these hormones and that it was nothing to worry about. What they did not mention to her father, was that as these hormones go down in baby girls, it actually triggers the baby’s very first (and last for about a decade or so) period. What not telling a father that blood will be leaking from his daughters vagina will do, is cause some poor fucker a heart attack and won’t they just feel awful then? Jerks.

Essential Truth #5 – A pacifier is not an Off Button.

From nearly the moment that my daughter was born, she could be nearly instantly calmed by the insertion of her mother’s or my pinky finger in her mouth. While this proved to be a very useful aid in Not Killing Our Baby, after a while we realized that having your finger plugged into the baby at all hours impeded important tasks such as typing, diaper changing, showering (ourselves), sleeping and playing Puzzle Fighter HD online on XBOX Live Arcade. (Username : Fishdinner27 )

In light of this, we decided to maybe give pacifiers a try. While we’d been warned that occasionally babies didn’t have a strong enough sucking reflex right off, we had not been warned that the insertion of the pacifier into the mouth of the baby would cause instant disgust on the face of the baby, followed by an intensification of aforementioned Neo-Tokyo destroying screams. At this point, Godzilla actually knocked on our window and asked us very politely if there was anything we could do to quiet her down, as he had a busy day at the office tomorrow.

Back to the finger. We are now convinced that our baby overlord is only satisfied by the taste of parental suffering and desperation.

At least we know that she’s our baby.

Essential Truth #6 – Babies are born too early.

Human babies are born about a trimester earlier than they should be. Why is this? Humans have huge brains. Most animals can walk, talk, and run the fuck away from scary shit a few minutes to a few days after they’re born. However, they don’t really tend to do a whole lot else for the rest of their lives. There was a time when that was the case for human beings also. As they evolved though, humans’ heads got bigger and bigger to fit bigger and bigger brains. Eventually this got to the point where they killed mothers more often than not in childbirth. So, somewhere along the line, something caused the human body to get smart and push the ejection seat button about two to three weeks after that head has gotten to the “just too big for your actual vagina” point. What this means is that the babies human beings give birth to are very, very stupid.

Human babies have, as I’d mentioned before, ONE method of real communication. They retain this single ability for a very long time, in animal terms. They cannot walk, they cannot talk, and they cannot run the fuck away from scary shit for about the average full lifespan of a Red Breasted Robin. This means that human babies need a lot more attention, a lot more saving, and a lot more fucking headaches than just about any other animal baby. This also means that the cherished, beautiful, happy baby you’ve dreamed of having (or dreamed of others having, or expected others to have, or whatever) is a FUCKING LIE. A human baby is more or less useless. A human baby, in its first three months of life is more or less still a fetus. One you can touch and hold and have to clean the poop off of, sure, but otherwise still a fetus. Any sort of joy that you may have expected playing adorable little games with your baby will have to wait, because until that three month mark, she will likely do little other than eat, sleep, poop, or terrify the living hell out of you. Sometimes they combine all of these, but even still, any interaction you have with them is purely out-of-context in what passes for their little minds.

For you new or soon to be parents though, I have managed to compile a list of things a newborn baby is useful for, and included it in this document for your use.

1. Paperweight (only when swaddled tightly).
2. Weight.
3. Counterweight for grocery bags.
4. Relationship fight starter.
5. Counter to caffeine.
6. Anti-Theft Alarm (only works at night).
7. Hole that you throw money into to watch it vanish into the blackness never to be seen again and oh God I’m so poor how will I ever afford to feed this thing?
8. Neurosis inducer.
9. Restaurant Meal Buying Grandparents attractor.
10. Free pass to be a jerk to just about anyone (“man I’m sorry I yelled at you, my daughter was just born three weeks ago.”)
11. Hot chick attractor.
12. Vomit squirt gun.
13. Poop squirt gun.
14. Pee squirt gun.
15. Wife’s breasts maker-bigger-er.

I’ve now spent about two hours bouncing my baby girl on my lap, and it’s getting time for her to eat. I can tell because she’s smacking her lips, even as she sleeps, no doubt dreaming that her servants will bring her more food, and more of the sweet suffering she so desires.

And just so you know the face of the monster I am battling, I’ve included a picture below of the little monster as she’s being burped after having been topped off with poop-fuel.

Okay, so maybe I do love her.

But just a little.