I sort of suck at New Year’s resolutions, I’ve only attempted a couple of times and usually strike out by February. With the baby on the way I figure that I need to get it together soon, and what better place to start than at the New Year.
Acknowledging that I am absolutely horrid at these things, which for the record so is 95% of other Americans, I decided to try to lower the bar just a little bit. If I miss these I did really badly.
Do not get (too much) fatter – The biggest cliché resolution is to lose weight. It is also the most broken. This year my goal is to try not to gain any, and if I do keep it within reason. Ava does not need a polar bear for a dad after all.
Don’t Die – Lots of people try to make various resolutions in terms of getting healthier. My goal is to stay healthy enough not to die.
Don’t spend all of my money – Most people need more money, I am no exception. Some people put down here to get a new job or start saving better. I’d take either of those options, but mostly I am going to shoot for just not spending all of whatever I do have. Even holding on to a penny here works for the record.
Visit Friends – I love my friends, really I do. With a new baby on the way I can’t possibly promise to spend more time with you though. My only goal is to visit you at least once sometime between now and this time next year.
Finish school – I’ve got one semester left and need a weekend course sometime. Heck, I’ve already paid for it, all I have to do is basically show up a reasonable number of times. I am not even promising to finish my degree, which requires me to complete my master’s paper.
Love Ava – The easiest of all. I plan on mastering this resolution.
I have found this strange period between being excited about having a baby and being scared to death about having to take care of one. Somewhere in this transition period it occurred to me that we actually have to start getting things for the baby. Apparently you can’t just buy it a few squeaky toys and a bag of food like we did when we got the dog.
So the baby momma (stealing one from @kerrijack) and I loaded up and went to Babies R Us to start registering for things. I have absolutely no clue what a baby needs, so I just figure if a store like that has it then a baby must need it. Seemed like a logical assumption. I for some reason don’t think I will be invited back on future baby registering trips. Here is basically how it went:
Note to self, taking the pregnant wife shopping gives you rock star parking. Now if they would just put these spaces in the rivermarket I would be set.
Brandie for some reason thought it would be a good idea to give me the scanner. Big mistake.
My idea to register for 2 of these and put them together to make a baby belly pinata was denied. Not registered
I am not real sure what this thing is, but I think it might be the human equivalent of one of those dairy cow milking machines. I thought it would make a cool Halloween costume. Needless to say she would not let me register for it.
I am not entirely sure what Butt Paste is, perhaps like tooth paste for the other end. Whatever it is I don't want to have to put that on my child.
Who knew there were so many types of bottles and nipple sizes and all sorts of strange things? At this point I started wondering back to the Dairy machines and let Brandie decide.
Daddy needs toys for the bath too
Unfortunately I could not find the one that said "My dad has more twitter followers than your dad"
My back seat will never be the same.
Ava's new ride. It even has cup holders in the back for daddy to put his drink. The wife was not amused.
I was told that I had to get a diaper bag for me. I am having a hard time finding one with a laptop sleeve though.
I told Brandie we should start right away on trying to housebreak the baby. I thought this "poop with me Elmo" was en excellent start. Denied again.
The best part about having a short name is we save on decorations.
Somehow we managed to get through all of this. If having a baby is anything like preparing for a baby, this might get interesting. If you are looking for our registry for some reason these are the two I know about:
This may sound a little strange coming from someone who hates surprises, but I really like mysteries. Mysteries manage to create creativity. They inspire us to try to do something better than we believe we are capable of doing. They give us hope in the worst times and a reason to keep smiling in the best. Mysteries have taken us to the moon, literally. If we were able to fully understand anything then it never has the possibility to mean everything to us.
I was going back through some of my favorite Ted.com videos the other day and rediscovered a talk from JJ Abrams. He talks about this mystery box that he keeps on his shelf and uses it for inspiration. He gets into the whole concept of mystery and how that influences the work he creates. Take 20 minutes when you get a chance and watch the talk, one of my absolute favorites.
I think my mystery box has become this kid. It seems like unending mystery. I was a little worried honestly about finding out the sex of the baby. The world of mystery was so wide open; it could be a boy or a girl with unlimited possibilities. I was afraid by knowing I would for some reason stop imagining quite as much. Of course I hate surprises so I had to know.
Thankfully by finding out it has opened up a whole new level of mystery. It allows me wonder even more. I can now think of her as a her, instead of an it. I can call her Ava and feel motivated to give her the best life possible. I can feel inspired to solve some of the problems I see in this world she will grow up in. But most of all, I can work to instill a sense of mystery in her that will allow her to ignore limits and push to get everything she wants out of life. That is what a dad should do.
They call us the young invincibles. We rarely get sick, never go to the doctor and give relatively little thought to our health. It is mostly mid to late 20′s males. We are that little gap between the paranoid generation ahead of us and the generation behind us that was babied by their parents.
Before this week I’ve been to the doctor once in my adult life for actually being sick. I was working at a camp 6 years ago and I met this cute girl with an awful haircut. Then some kid gave me pink eye. I was going to keep working to spend time with her but my boss told me to either go to the doctor or go home. I decided to go, the doctor told me it would be best to take the week off. Naturally I went back and told my boss he said everything was fine and I could go back to work, and more importantly the girl. That girl became my wife for the record, probably was a good call on my part.
This past Friday I started experiencing a pain in my tailbone. It quickly swelled up and I was unable to sit. I started thinking about my good friend @RobbyMatthews and what he is going through with his father’s spinal cancer. Then I started thinking about the little bump growing in my wife, the one who married me despite the funk eye she saw that summer I worked at the camp. Then I agreed to let her take me to the doctor. It turned out to be just a cyst, but nothing I would have been able to fix on my own, I actually needed the doctor.
That day the Superman inside of me died. When it was just me I could afford to fight it off. I could take on the world and most likely win. But now that it is not and there is a little one who will need a father that small chance is too much to take. I never thought I would experience that. I can probably count on one hand the number of real sick days I have taken (I take some just to have a single day off). This week for the first time I took an actual week off. Not because I could, I’ve got a pile of work to do and would rather take care of it), but because my body needed to. It appears this Superman found his kryptonite, it is in the form of a beautiful boy or girl growing in my wife, who has a much better hair cut now.
Dear fetus,
Sorry for constantly referring to you as “It”. I swear you will have a name eventually, the problem is that we have absolutely no clue what you are at this point. Frankly it is driving me a little nuts to call you It all the time, hell even “he” or “she” would be better than It, which makes you seem not quite real.
For a while we could refer to you as “the peanut” and that worked great until I was informed that you were no longer the size of a peanut. Currently you are a shrimp or lemon (I can’t keep up), and I certainly don’t want to call you either of those.
We hoped to have another meeting visit with the Dr this week but it was rescheduled. So any chance of you turning the right way for us to see your manhood or womanhood before the Chicago trip is out of the question. Not to mention we would really like to get the ball rolling on registering for baby stuff so some of the people who want to give you a baby shower can start that process.
So looks like you are It for at least one more week, sorry whatever you are.
I have never been a huge fan of the lame mommy bloggers (with the exception of Kerri) and certainly never even heard of a daddy blogger. However when Brandie became pregnant I really found myself at sort of a loss for what to do exactly. I started kicking around the idea a while back about doing a blog, but I didn’t want to be lame. I just wanted to tell our side of the story so that maybe other people who are as confused and lost as I am can find some hope in it.
So here I go, about to do the dad thing. I put a bun in the oven and I feel completely and totally lost. I really have no clue what I am doing here. God help us all.
