An attempt at poetry…

As a daddy, I'm in the stage of my life where I'm prone
to feelings of age. It worries me, because I often
think that I feel older than I should. Last night, as
Leora and Natasha slept, a few snippets of a little
poem popped into my head. I wrote it down on my 'Notes'
iPhone app before the wisps of it drifted away and were
lost. Here's what I wrote. I know that this is probably
pretty lame and I certainly don't pretend to be a great
poet, but I thought I would risk a little criticism and
publish it for all to see. It's mushy and a touch
melancholy, but I think that anyone who loves someone
can relate (or, at least, I hope they do) ... Being a
dad is fantastic but, as like everything in life, it
has its difficult side. It's the side where you try to
wrench time to a standstill, even when you know that
such a thing is impossible. It's the side where the
saddest thing that you can possibly hear is "she's
growing up so fast". Kids are only kids for so long...

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tug-of-war with a conveyor belt

That girl
With the mop of hair
And the trusting laugh,
The silly faces
And the wobbly walk,
Will someday cease to exist
Replaced with an adult
An equal --
Serious,
Burdened,
Tired.
It makes me wonder how my parents managed it
Managed to say goodbye
To the boy that I used to be
It must be because time fooled them
Like it will fool me
Like it's fooling me now
Aging her while I'm not looking
Ushering her ever so secretly along while I sleep
But I'll accept it.
It's the only way,
The only way that I can keep up
Because if it all happened in one day,
If tomorrow that little girl was gone forever,
It would be enough to break my heart.
I'm not ready for her to go.
I never will be.

Opposites actually do attract (with a little effort)

A lot of you know the story of how Leora and I ended up getting married, but since one of the main purposes of my blog is to attract new readership, i.e. people who don’t necessarily know me, then I’m going to go ahead and tell the story. And beyond that, I’m going to talk a bit about how two people who really have a lot of differences can make a marriage work.

Leora and I first met when we were something like 12 years old, in junior high school. I was the quiet, nerdy brainiac who had a small cadre of friends, and Leora was the more-popular pretty girl, with a quick laugh and a slight touch of sarcasm. We were the same age. I lived in Palisade, CO. She lived in Clifton, a slightly bigger town about 10 miles to the west. When our days at junior high came to an end, I went to Palisade High School, which was barely 2 miles from my house. Leora lived much closer to another high school – Central High. But in those days, Palisade H.S. was brand new and even parents of children who lived in Clifton, like Leora’s did, often sent their children to Palisade. That’s because in those days, Central was….well, it was a dump. So we ended up going to PHS together.

We didn’t speak much, but we knew each other. She had that ‘something’ that somebody like me was intrigued by – a hot girl, funny, and extremely extroverted. It’s my theory that every introvert wishes they could be an extrovert; they just don’t know how or don’t have the guts to put themselves out there. So for those who can’t do it themselves, the next best thing is to get close to one. It almost makes you feel like you’re the life of the party, when you’re standing next to the actual ‘life of the party’. You get a little of that to rub off on you….

Anyway, I’m rambling. Even though Leora was one of maybe 3 or 4 girls in my entire high school career that I ever seriously considered getting with, it never happened. It’s funny – I remember 2 conversations that I EVER had with her of any length in all 4 years at P.H.S. And when I mean any length, I mean like 30 seconds. One time was talking about Nirvana. The other was when Kurt Cobain shot himself, Leora was crying, and I gave her a surely-awkward, feeble apology. So, as you can see, we weren’t exactly testing each other out for likes/dislikes/much of anything. She was the girl that you could instantly pick out of a crowd, but all you could do was observe. You never had near enough cajones to make a move. Many years later, after we ended up together, Leora told me that she had liked me and wanted to get with me, but thought I was disinterested. She was more than a little surprised when I told her that I had felt the same thing. 😉

But I’m getting ahead of myself… Towards the end of her high school years, Leora joined the Army. I have vague memories of seeing her in the halls once or twice in her Army uniform. But the end days of high school are hectic, both literally and emotionally. You begin to realize that most of these people are people you won’t be seeing again. It’s not the time to even consider establishing relationships. You’re still there, but in your mind, you’re already gone. These people are your past. And coming up fast is college and all of its forks in the road. You’re supposed to be working on your A.P. classes but you’re spending all your time applying for scholarships and thinking how you’re way too old for this kiddie high school crap (probably at least partially explains my D in Pre-Calc; never lived that one down).

So Leora left for Basic Training. If I think REALLY hard, I think I can remember hearing that she had left, but man, that seems so long ago now.

And that was it. Leora made it through Basic and got married. She ended up all over the country at one time or another – Texas, Las Vegas, West Virginia, Missouri (not necessarily in that order – can never remember exactly…hehe). I ended up in Palisade for many more years. Ended up blowing off college and losing a scholarship. Started a long relationship from a girl I met through friends, got a job at Sam’s Club, kinda got lazy and unmotivated, but I had some good friends and was near family, so life was decent.

Then fate intervened, in a series of weird events that brought Leora and I back together again. My girlfriend/fiance broke it off with me, leaving me in a 1-bedroom apartment in Grand Junction feeling pretty alone and stuck. I moved in with a couple good friends of mine and had a lot of fun doing the bachelor thing, but I never really got over the fact that my one and only serious relationship had come and gone and put me right back at square one. And after living in the same area for 20 years, I was ready to go see some other part of the country before I ended up dying on my couch in the same 4-plex 50 years later. So I moved up to Minneapolis, the city of my birth, with another good friend of mine and began my great “starting-over” experiment.

In the meantime, Leora’s husband-at-the-time (who was also in the Army) was transferred to Denver. A year or two later, because of a few personal reasons that I won’t go into here, their marriage was coming to an end. It was at this point that I, up in Minneapolis and happy (albeit still single and lonely), logged onto Myspace. I was feeling a bit nostalgic that day and decided I’d see who was on MySpace from my old high school class. So on August 15, 2006, I found Leora and sent her a message.

And… *cue cliche*…the rest is HIS-TO-RY!

The courtship didn’t last long. I was up in Minneapolis, happy with my surroundings but unhappy with my relationship status. She was in Denver, her home state, living with a man that she was in the process of divorcing. It was perfect. Weirdly perfect. hehe … We began visiting each other. Every week or two, I’d fly to Denver or she’d fly to Minneapolis. Three months after we first reconnected, we became engaged. And next June, we were married.

A lot of people would say that happened too quickly and that a whirlwind courtship like that only inevitably leads to disaster. But at face value, that’s not fair. Yeah, Leora and I have fights. Have you ever heard of a couple who hasn’t? We have different ways that we do things and see things and perceive things. Who doesn’t? No couple in history has had the same likes and dislikes, the same perceptions and opinions. If they did, then you’re talking about literally the most boring couple ever. I do stuff that grates on her nerves, and vice versa.

So how has a quiet, nerdy loner and a boisterous, outgoing party chick held it together this long? I know all you married folks have their own ideas of how to keep a marriage alive , but here’s a few of mine off the top of my head…

1. Compromise. I know that sounds boring and cliched, but it’s the truth. We don’t get many chances to go out, but when we do, Leora sometimes wants to go to a bar or club or concert – get out there and have fun, as befits an extrovert. Meanwhile, I’m itching to hit up the bookstore, seeing as how I’m a huge nerd. Well, I’ve gone out to the bar with her when maybe that wasn’t at the top of my list. And she’s gone with me to B&N when I know that’s not usually her thing. If you do something for your significant other, they’re willing to do something for you.

2. Find bonding opportunities. Seriously, you could have put Hitler and Einstein together and you’d have found SOMETHING that they both liked, or had in common. There’s always something.

3. Don’t let yourself get too bored. If you’re both sitting around, heaving sighs and staring at the ceiling, that means danger. Bored = Annoyed = Irritable = Fights. Play some cards, have a drink, watch a movie, buy a board game, look at some old pictures, get naked. tee hee

4. Don’t compare your marriage to another couple’s marriage. I could compare our marriage to anybody’s I know and find something we have that they don’t, or something they have that we don’t. Everybody’s marriage is different. Everyone met differently. Everyone married at a different time in their life, had babies at a different time (or didn’t), and have/had different hurdles to overcome (financial problems, work problems, infidelity, deaths in the family, crappy in-laws….a MILLION different things that all affect the marriage in general). Focus on your own marriage and don’t think that you’re missing something just because someone else’s looks “better”. It’s just different.

5. Let it go. I’m sorry, but this “don’t ever go to bed angry” stuff doesn’t work. I hate to break it to you newlyweds, but that’s fantasy. You’ll go to bed angry. You’ll wake up, remember last night, and be angry again. But you’ll get over it. You’ll find things to distract you. You’ll start to realize his/her point of view. And you’ll realize that you probably over-reacted and both of you will just have no more energy to be angry any longer. And it’ll be ok again. If you can’t let it go, you’re guaranteed to be headed either for a divorce or a stroke. So chill.

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Leora and I have been married for just over 2 years. We’ve JUST left the supposed Newlywed stage. So the point of this isn’t to lecture somebody who’s been married for 50 years. I’m still new at this. But I’ve heard of marriages last weeks. I’ve heard of marriages lasting days. There was a story I read today on AOL or somewhere where two people in Poland or Germany or something got married, had a huge argument at the wedding dinner, and both are seeking an annulment. This couple was married for literally a matter of MINUTES before they both announced that they were through. Leora and I still love each other. And we still fight. But that doesn’t mean we’re unhappy. We have our little daughter and the 3 of us have a lot of great times. We’re going to have good times and bad times down the road. But I hope it’s a long road. When things come together so bizarrely like it did with us, it’d be a shame if it wasn’t. 🙂 … Love ya, baby!

My Obligatory Father-to-new-father Advice Post

As a father of a 21-month-old, I have been magically endowed with knowledge that I could not have obtained by any other means. So why let my newfound accumulation of useful tips go to waste? I’m sure that there will (hopefully) be new fathers or soon-to-be fathers reading my blog, so let me give you some advice. Don’t thank me – just pass this on and do your part to avoid all kinds of headaches. 🙂 … (Also, note that I will put this all in the form of “she” because I have a she. You may not have a she, but I’m not going to clutter this up with 50 he/shes. Are we cool? … lol)

1. See that $40 thingamjig in the kiddie toy aisle at Target? Man, that looks pretty awesome. Unfortunately, through some quirk of evolution or something, only you (the adult) will think the toy (for kids) is pretty sweet. After you drop the $40 and bring it home, your child will play with it for a total of 10 minutes. Possibly ever. She’ll move on to some other toy of hers before you have the chance to turn on the camera and line up a shot of her and her new Sewing Machine Sally. It DOESN’T MATTER how many bells, whistles, twisty-things, rattly-things or spinny-things are on this new toy. She’ll play with it, throw it across the room, and MAY NEVER TOUCH IT AGAIN. Give her an old remote to a broken DVD player, however, and she’ll play with it every day from now until she’s 9. Save your money and just give her some old electronics. You will save hundreds and that’s not an exaggeration.

2. This is really tough to do, but don’t feed your child what you personally would like. There is NO chance that your baby’s eating habits will make any sense to you. Yesterday, I warmed up a Gerber Graduates toddler meal for Natasha. It had pasta and meatballs in sauce in one portion and corn in the other. The pasta and meatballs looked literally good enough for ME to eat, and the corn was watery and smelly. Natasha wouldn’t touch the meaty side. I gave her a spoonful of each and then spooned more pasta for her. She looked at me like I was an idiot and repeatedly tapped on the corn side with her finger until I obligingly dumped out the pasta and scooped up a massive spoonful of nasty corn. She immediately opened her mouth, wolfed down the corn, and ran around the room gleefully. You think she’ll like Gerber Cheeto-y things, she wants the green beans. You think she wants the applesauce, she wants the Mac n’ Cheese that looks like it came from a homeless shelter. You need to try to keep your own tastes completely out of the equation. Just because you could eat bananas every day for the rest of your life doesn’t mean your baby would touch them with a 10-foot pole. So get ready to try to guess every day for the first 5 years of her life what it is that she wants to eat that day. 😉

3. Don’t buy Diaper Genies or wipie-warmers. They are utterly pointless and a waste of your money. Don’t buy rocking chairs or automated vibrating baby swings unless you have the chance to give your baby a test run of them and she likes them. Leora and I got those for baby shower gifts and Natasha hated them. Don’t buy toys beyond your baby’s understanding. They will be completely ignored.

4. Do you like keeping your house or apartment “just so”? Well take a picture of it. The next time you see it that way will be around 2016. Rethink your entire home furnishings/trinkets layout. You’ll be fine until your baby learns to crawl. Then everything from the ground to 2 feet high is fair game for your baby’s slobber, your baby’s keen sense of destruction, and your baby’s swallowing reflex. All bad things. When your baby learns to walk, raise the bar to 3 feet high. When your baby learns to scream, yell, point and say “THAT!!!”, you pretty much have to put everything fun and movable away for the next 5 years.

5. If you have cats, then fate rolls a 20-sided D&D die to determine “cat/baby tolerance”. The cat will either love the baby and shower it with affection, tolerate the baby and give it a wide berth, or immediately engage the baby for house dominance. Unfortunately, no matter how much you love cats, the formula ‘baby>cats’ is the only rational result. You’ll have to train the cat to include her in the things he puts up with while living with you. If the training proves unsuccessful, then it’s time to say your kitty goodbyes.

6. Your baby will always be the cutest baby you see, but there’s no known way to express that without suffering social consequences. You just have to make peace with the fact that you know it but can’t say it and leave it at that.

7. You will need to retrain yourself to THINK like a baby. Just knowing that nails aren’t good to eat, that jumping off the couch will hurt you, and sliding glass doors only LOOK like you can walk through them are all things we adults take for granted. But your baby doesn’t have any clue about that stuff. When she’s up and about, you’ll find that you absently switch into ‘analyze any and all possible threats’ mode. If you don’t, you’ll end up visiting the hospital and/or listening to a baby cry for most of your waking hours.

8. Like staying up really late? That’s over, unless you count 3 a.m. feedings for the first 6 months of her life. That’s an interesting period of your life when you go to sleep, wake up just a few hours later to plaintive infant cries, warm up a bottle in the kitchen while 3/4 asleep, shuffle over to her room, take her out of the crib and lay her on your lap, feed her the bottle while nodding off, hope that she eats and falls back asleep, put her back in her crib, shuffle back to your bed, sleep a few more hours, and get up for the day. And repeat. About 200 times. Like sleeping late? BWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!! Enjoy that now. Because the DAY your baby is born, you won’t sleep past 9 a.m. for years. And when I say 9, I’m being generous. More like 7.

9. TV is not a babysitter. Natasha didn’t pay a second’s worth of attention to the TV for a year. She barely even cares about cartoons yet. The only time she gets excited for TV time is when I have the Game Show Network on. Lots of beeps and boops and dings and whistles. She loves that stuff. The Price is Right and Press Your Luck. Go figure.

10. In 99% of all situations, if your baby is crying, it is because she is hungry, tired, hurt, or scared. (When they hit 12 -18 months, add ‘bored’ to the list). Analyze the situation, whittle down the possibilities from those options, and it won’t take long at all to pinpoint the problem and fix it. Babies don’t cry for no reason. There’s always a reason. You just have to find it.

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And finally, #11 — Being a daddy is awesome. Every single day, she’ll do something to make you do a double-take, to make you think that she’s just playing you for a sucker, and could tell you Einstein’s Theory of Relativity if only she felt like it. She’ll make you a better person, even when she laughs at you when you try to scold her, when she breaks your trinket but you don’t have the heart to get mad because she already knows she messed up. She’s a blank slate, a test to see how well you can bring up a well-rounded, intelligent, goofy little tyke. And once you get the hang of it, it’s not very hard at all. You’ll never be the same. She makes you grow up, and you’ll end up thanking her for it in the end, no matter how much of a kid at heart you are yourself.

Love you, punkinator. xoxoxo

"Who's awesome? You're awesome."