Tag: motherhood

What I’ve Learned

I’ve heard that there’s no style of learning more effective than experiential learning. This stands to reason. I have some experience in this area. Here are some things I’ve thought and some things I’ve learned.

I’ve thought, ‘What a freaking nuisance. You know this is just an overprotective helicopter mom and because of her, because of these two or three nut jobs I can’t make myself a damn peanut butter sandwich without breaking building ordinances. Anywhere.’

I’ve thought, ‘Don’t worry about it. We’ve got it covered. Sure, little Billy’s mama made a stink about it, but we got one of the pizza’s with soy cheese. We’re not jerks, of course we want the kid to be safe and able to have fun.’

I’ve thought, ‘This is mom’s issue. The poor kid gets stuck at the table with all the other kids he doesn’t know and has to have a special plate of crap brought out to him with his name on it. All because mom loves the attention she gets calling 13 times a day to make sure he’s not eating anything other than what is on the stupid list.’

I’ve thought, ‘Seriously, what’s the worst that could happen?’

I’ve rolled my eyes and used air quotes when explaining that a kid in my care, but not my kid, had ‘food allergies’ and gone on to explain in coded but withering judgment of said child’s mom and her hyper anxiety.

Whether it was coincidence or not it was always the moms.

Thank god, none of these misconceptions had fatal outcomes or even critical ones.

Then experience came knocking and taught me in an afternoon how mistaken I was.

Do you remember your 9/11 story? I do. For years after that terrible day anytime you were with someone you either didn’t know before or hadn’t seen since before that day the conversation always got around to your story. Your experience of that day. Still happens, just not as much as more and more ‘adults’ are not of an age to have remembered it or you’re so familiar with everyone’s tales that you reference rather then recount them.

Well, parents of kids with anaphylactic food allergies engage in the telling and retelling of their tale whenever we find someone that gets it. Unfortunately for us and our kids, parents of kids with anaphylactic food allergies are the only ones that get it. Each of us encounter the ‘me’ from above who doesn’t get it and we know they don’t get it and it can only make us act crazier. See we have to be crazy, insane, so crazy that you’d rather just bitch about me and my hyper anxiety then have to deal with my crazy wrath if any of my seemingly bizarre and self centered requests are found to have been ignored. We’ve been granted the greatest education possible through our experiences. Here’s what I’ve learned.

Many parents have a crazy period early in their first child’s life, first week or two, when they can’t stop thinking that it’s possible that the baby will stop breathing and just die. We had this bit of experiential learning ourselves and for a 10 day period after getting the kid home one of us was awake at all hours of the day and night to make sure this didn’t happen. How we’d stop it if it did is something we never even considered. Just seemed the right thing to do. Then you realize, this is crazy, if he’s gonna give us a few minutes we need to take them. You learn these fears are baseless.

Then, a year later or so, we were having our normal lunch. Then little red pin pricks around his red and watering eyes. That’s weird. Then bright red blotches all over his face and a high whistle of air trying to get in and out. Then running to the car. Then heavy vomiting as its the only way it seems to breath. Then, no breathing and beat red. Then enormous vomiting. Here’s something. Do you know where you park at the ER if your baby of 1 year of age is red and unable to breathe, turning purple and all of you and your wife and your baby are covered in vomit as he writhes to try to loosen the vice grip of the snake he feels choking him, only its not a snake, it’s his own body choking him from the inside? Where ever the f**k you want. In our case it was at the door. The car was vomit filled, and I mean covering the windows, all of them, including the windshield. By at the door, I mean they see you and guide you right to the door. You leave your car there running, doors open.

I don’t know about you, but my experience at the ER has never failed to include a stop for at least a second of triage. Not us. They see a baby, see he’s barely holding on to his precious little life and the breaths are gone, they point and TELL you, ‘RUN!!’ and you do. Your adrenaline is flooding your body and brain and you do it. You run.

2012-11-13 09.41.29When you get there you don’t care who it is. You just need someone to save your baby’s life. They do. You calm down on the outside and panic on the inside as you help your baby calm down. Eventually he’s laughing and playing and you and your wife are trying to reflect his carefree demeanor, sneaking in conversation about what the hell could it be. You won’t get answers until you see the allergist in a few days. So you empty your kitchen. Almost all of it. Because something in there can cause that silly fear you had as new parents to be a reality. Your little love can just die. It’s knowledge you carry until there is either a cure or you die. That’s it. That’s the list of all the ways you’ll come to stop worrying. You get better at living with the knowledge, but you reorder everything. Used to have a career working in the city, but since I know from all my conversations how many people think this whole ‘food allergy thing’ is being way overblown by nervous parents, I pretty much ignore that job and rest on the laurels I’d earned and after that on the sheer audacity to just show up late, leave early or not show up at all, while trying to find something that works closer to home, since you’re told that if he goes into shock the staff at the daycare’s can’t go with him, he’ll just be taken by the ambulance, terrified, waiting hours, hopefully, until we arrive. So, I take a 20,000 pay cut and take a gig, a good gig, one I love, but a step down to be sure, to be with him for the day, feet away, always ready to run. Which you’ve done once and hope to never do again.

These experiences stick with you. Forever.

Dysfunctional Bliss

2015-01-01 10.59.53This weekend I found myself in the ridiculous position of standing fast, insisting my child finish his pancakes before he could get his Skittles. I’d say its the principle of the thing, but I have a hard time coming up with the principle. Perhaps the principle is the simple exertion of authority. This sounds like bullying even to me, and perhaps it is to some degree, but until you’ve spent a good amount of your time with a four year old in your care you can’t know how important it is to hold fast.

I’ve spent a long time avoiding power struggles. It was a tactic that I not only employed, but one that I taught. Seriously. I co-wrote a curriculum that I’d teach to young adults working at a summer camp for kids with intellectual and developmental disabilities every year about the allure of a good power struggle, what it accomplishes and what challenges it presents. Then we’d work on skills to recognize, deflect, avoid and re-engage in order to avoid the power struggle. As counselors it was a no win game for them since inherently, as the caregivers, the power dynamic was in their favor. By accepting the invitation to the power struggle they were simultaneously lessening their own authority and feeding their charges defiance. Year after year I’d see the best of the best get sucked in. I thought to myself, that won’t happen to me.

Ever notice that when you take such absolute stands they almost always bite you in the ass? I feel so bad for my kids. Before I had them I was a perfect dad. Seriously. I could have easily been a dad-coach. I could write a dad behavior plan with detailed instruction on how to interact, how to behave, what to let your kid win on and how to always end at the result you wanted to and I could have guaranteed the results if you committed to the process. It’s what I did and I was good. Parents consistently praised our abilities, mine and those that worked with and for me, to bring out aspects of their child that were wonderful and yet to be seen. We were good. So what the hell happened that made me so, so… mediocre with my own kids?

It’s a simple answer, really. Its the expected answer, though perhaps one you can know to be correct without fully understanding why. It’s because I love them so damn much. It’s because they love me so damn much. It’s because we resist every separation and on a level we aren’t even conscious of, we know that we have to separate to survive. Granted, it’s decades away, but when you love something this much you need a few decades to let go fully. it’s because disappointed expectations is a part of the process for both growing up and being a parent. It’s because we each, parents and kids, think there’s some version of a perfect god in the other which is hugely disappointing when a perfect god is incapable of resisting the urge to punch and kick you (toddler attacking parent and NEVER the other way around) or when the perfect god has chosen to make a thing like Skittles and then made them ‘bad’ for you. It’s because on the grandest and most minute level we are engaged and intertwined so thoroughly with our children that in order for them to grow up and be independent we must be constantly working at cross purposes, us holding on to whatever control we have in order to ensure their safe passage and them trying desperately to gain more and more self direction imagein order to learn through trial and error, the very errors we try so hard to protect them from, how to navigate the world. The one tiny piece of information I lacked that would have assured my burgeoning dad coaching business its failure was nothing less then the very nature of parenthood and family. The parent child relationship at its best is by definition dysfunctional. Magically, blissfully, frustratingly and wonderfully dysfunctional. So much so that I can’t help being proud of the little tykes and how maddeningly defiant they can be.

We Weren’t Ready Either

There is the light of day and the haze of interrupted sleep. These are two distinct worlds and insofar as we are able to, we keep them separate. Fights that happen in ‘the haze’ should never see the light of day. They are to be dutifully ignored, in perpetuity if possible. If an event were to occur in ‘the haze’ at a later point that closely resembled the initial argument in both substance and tone, then, and only then, can the altercation be referenced. Once past, even if the altercation has escalated, it should fall back into the category of things which must not be named. These are the rules and they are organic and they are good. These incidences are like dreams in that they should only rarely be shared outside of a therapists office and should be done so with great trepidation.

We had such an altercation last night. In complying with the rules I shall not speak to the details of the disagreement other than to say that in expressing my dissenting opinion I can see now that I presented as a lunatic. The vast majority of the overnight happenings are tended to by one parent so the other can sleep, but in this case the concern of the sleeper overwhelmed their exhaustion and a suggestion needed to be made. At the risk of disclosing too much, as I know a certain woman related to me by marriage who may wish to continue to observe the ‘gag order’ in regard to referencing said altercation, I’ll state that in this case I was the night tender and she was the concerned and restless parent. Which I say only so I can tell you that when she interrupted me to suggest that we wake our son and give him a nebulizer treatment in order to allow him to stop coughing and to rest easier I went ballistic. This was not in my plans. I had already fed the baby and taken the toddler to the potty. It was past 2AM and I had decided that I’d wait out the cough. With a beer. And a book. A nebulizer treatment does NOT fit into this equation. Yep. I’m a bit of a jackass. My frustration bordered on the maniacal. Which is to say that it was on the wrong side of said border and had a full head of steam heading to the heartland of lunacy.

A mere hour later my wife lay soundly asleep and had been so for upwards of 45 minutes. I still could not unclench my jaw. The ability to navigate these wide emotional swings and return to a normal enough place to fall asleep, even with the assistance of accrued exhaustion is unbelievable to me. I’ve grown to understand that this is an innate difference. For her part she can’t for the life of her understand why I don’t go right to sleep the second I’m allowed to. But the fact of the matter is I literally can’t. I’m using ‘literally’ literally. If I were to attempt to transition between emotions at the rate at which she can and does I’d be in a hospital bed, likely catatonic, before lunch. Women reading this may read an exaggeration to express emphasis in this statement. It’s absolutely true. I’d break. Seriously.

I’m a LUNATIC when it comes to control of the overnight environment when it’s ‘my turn’. Just irrational in the extreme. And the reality of this is that this isn’t going to change. Can’t really. Which brings me to my point. Perfect is inherently and inevitably imperfect.

When we were fretting about whether or not to have kids the conversations were focused on our shortcomings, both personally and collectively. The financial issues and the emotional issues. The idea of a change so profound seemed impossible to navigate while retaining that which made us work together. But the truth is that the change was simultaneously of a scale that was so large as to have been incomprehensible prior to it occurring and of a nature so profound that it brought with it capacities and endurance that were heretofore unknown to either of us and which allowed us to grow in a way that has made all of the prior conversation irrelevant.

In some way every butterfly parent that has been through the transformation knows something caterpillar couples couldn’t at the time. Prior to our having been transformed their assurances and warnings were meaningless, even if many of them turned out to be more true than we could ever have imagined. So now that I’m emerging fully transformed I would like to amend the standard language of the butterflies thusly…

Rather than the somewhat dismissive statement that butterflies repeat ad nauseum to caterpillars that goes ‘If you wait til your ready to have kids, you’ll never have kids’, I think I would have been more disposed to seeing some hopefulness in a message that goes like this…

Let me cut to the chase, you’re not perfect. I’m not, you’re not, no one is. So stop thinking that merely being human and imperfect is enough of a reason to not have kids if you want them. And if you’re fearing that you’re not ready, you’re ready. That level of concern will in fact put you a step ahead. And besides all your shortcomings, you’re amazingly intricate, complex and talented people who will find a capacity for love you never knew before and it’s beautiful and destructive all at once. And the things that drive you crazy about your partner now will do so even more later. But the variations between your abilities will make you cover all the bases you need to so the kids can rise up because of your exceptional ability and in spite of your inevitable flaws. And don’t worry, your kids will reveal their own flaws, and many of them will mirror yours and that’s okay, cause you know what? They’re human too and they’re NOT perfect, which is something you must keep in mind, as your heart will never believe it. Perfect people do not exist, they are lying to you, and sometimes to themselves, and they should be looked at with empathy as they are in for terrible difficulties. In fact if this unicorn of perfection exists in some cul-de-sac in some suburb know that they are the ones truly missing out on the vast array of life as they are not fully experiencing what it means to be alive. Don’t fret that you are falling short of something so bland as perfect, rather delight in your struggles and move forward knowing that the sooner you accept your human nature the sooner you can get to seeing the beauty in life. Struggle onward and seek to see clearly and withhold criticism as long as you can. The more you can accept of imperfections the richer your experience will be. Oh yeah, and don’t be dick to your wife when she asks you to do something you should do. Its not nice.

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A Son’s Notes from Parenthood

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The parent-child relationship is fraught with misguided and unattainable expectations.

To the parent of a child, pre-adolescent, there is simply nothing that can sway them off the opinion that their child, amongst all the others, is MOST special, MOST handsome and MOST capable of curing cancer, ending war and solving global warming. No one goes so far as to say their child WILL do these things, but most of us wouldn’t be surprised if it happened.

Concurrently the pre-adolescent child can see no more great or benevolent figure than Mommy and Daddy. They may pout and scream and defy, but they are doing so not to the person that stands before them, but rather to the great and powerful Oz… who stands before them. To this child daddy can move mountains and mommy hauls up the sun every morning and puts it to bed at night so the moon can have its turn. To the child there is virtually no booboo that can’t be greatly improved if not cured entirely by the simple act of a kiss from one of these mythic gods known as their parents.

This is as it must be. Fostering a life from birth to independence is an overwhelming feat. Every parent needs to feel that given enough time and patience they can cure all. It is even more necessary for the child who needs to know that the ‘Gods’ know them and will protect them. That they can go out confidently into the scary world, knowing they are being watched and loved and protected by the most powerful beings on earth, their Mommy and Daddy.

With such an inaccurate point of view being reinforced perpetually in both directions it is inevitable that the crumbling of the facade is indelicate. When the child reaches their teens they are likely to have their coming of age prompted by the encroaching suspicion that mom and dad are in fact NOTHING like all powerful and benevolent gods, but are rather flawed and human. The momentum generated by this epiphany pushes that teenager’s opinion right past reality, swinging all the way to the other end of the spectrum, resulting in the firm knowledge that my parents alone are THE most embarrassing and THE most unfit for responsibility and THE pettiest dictators the world has ever seen. [1] Teenagehood is a very dramatic hood. It’s the daytime soap opera portion of your life. There’s no understanding or perspective there. People are caricatures, and your parents are the worst of all.[2] When you can get a break from there arbitrary rule setting that doesn’t consider how capable you are of navigating on your own, you actually feel sorry for them. The way you do for those tiny single-celled organisms that don’t have a brain or free will or the ability to see all the amazing wonder that life has to offer.[3] They’re actually kind of sad with their early bedtimes and late night ice creams on the couch.[4] It’s unfair that you could have been so fabulous without this albatross of a family around your neck[5], and this angers you, generally. But still, they are to be pitied in some way as they’ll never know how deep and meaningful life could be since they’re just not capable of it. But these moments of empathy pass. They are now the enemy, to be tricked and defeated and never to be heeded. What once were gods are now feeble minded and feckless tyrants and it is your job to keep reminding them of their loathsomeness[6].

In a coincidence that is surely one that evolution has deemed necessary, parents discover this idiot kid, this now smelly and gross animal that seems to know less than nothing[7] at almost exactly the same time that it is realized by the child that their parents are not divine entities. This child, once capable of anything, is now capable of only thoughtless and careless behavior that will inevitably leave them penniless and angry. They are certain to make EVERY wrong decision possible. Now, when it is most important that they heed your warnings they in fact are incapable of even hearing you. In fact they have taken on a new language, one you’re not meant to understand, but to your untrained ear it seems to speak only the most vile of ugliness’s and is one that was designed and is now employed to in fact make you understand that this child hates you[8]. You who have done nothing short of committing your best years to this kid! This knucklehead! This jerk![9]

So what was once a beautiful and utopian relationship based on unquestioning devotion and love born of mutual awe is now a war torn landscape covered in mines that while not intended to kill, still sting, often injure and have the potential to maim. This is nothing short of an emotional civil war. The youth is duty bound to secede. If you’ve raised them right and given them what they need, they have no choice. And you, the parent, likewise conscripted to this fate have to provide resistance. It is both your inclination as well as your responsibility to resist with all out total war tactics being implemented. The enemy is at war for something they don’t understand and it is your duty to fight, to fight dirty if needed. You must win the early battles since you know, in your heart of hearts, that you will lose in the end. When all is just about to be lost it is your job as the adult to wave the white flag and retreat.

You will offer council and do your best to respect that the victory was theirs, but you know it was only so because you allowed it. At least by being the one to accept defeat you have now gained some control of the peace. It was not the control you wanted when the war began. But you have to allow that victory has its spoils and the period of detente must also play out through periods of latency, threats of renewed conflict and negotiation to maintain some sway in this new nation’s future as its ability to be self-sufficient and thrive is all you can now hope for.

You start with talks, promising to remove sanctions and provide humanitarian aid[10], but you know your constituents will resist and you make small, easily fulfilled promises at first. You operate through back channels to ensure that this new nation, while still feeling great pride in establishing its independence from you, is provided with what it needs to thrive without it knowing that you are a true safety net that won’t let it fail. You realize soon that your former adversary is in fact making the same mistakes that history shows all new nations make.[11] You learn that this is okay. You learn that mistakes are part of the process and you try to help your former enemy through this challenging time. This relationship, thus established forms what looks like routine. You fund, they spend, you fund, they spend. You come to accept and then rely on its regularity. But change is afoot.

Recently freed from the colonial ranks they are now a free and independent state alight in the world. They are eager to partake in all that has been restricted from them as a dependent state and in doing so they delight in freedoms bounty[12]. New to the world, the lack of security that accompanies the lack of history is not a problem[13]. They have a lifetime of potential to tap and these years are filled with small bets on future greatness.[14] Each gamble easily digestible on its own, but forming an ever more staunch and stark reality that is facing them when story turns to history and security becomes imperative. This adult person, who is free by nature, is now faced with the harsh realities of the ill-advised choices[15] they made when they had no information. More to the point, they face the realities of choices they made before they paid any mind to the now glaringly obvious warnings that their former caretakers warned them of. Realities that they now know were realities forever, and that their parents were struggling with even when this new nation was just a child. Struggles that the parents were generous and strong enough to hide from the child so they could live in glorious ignorance and believe simply that the world was their oyster. Now old, aware and vulnerable, it dawns on them that this rock has been ever present in their life.[16] Their parents. These seemingly odd and eccentric benefactors were in fact the greatest blessing that one could ever be afforded. I was that one. I was the one afforded the most wonderful parents in the world.[17] Parents that laughed at convention because they knew laughter was the only way to overcome. These individuals that chose ALWAYS to make room for more even at the expense of their own wellbeing. These people that put up with endless amounts of your shit[18], not to mention the shit[19] of your brothers and sisters for a period of time that amounts to the entirety of the life you’ve led to this point. It’s superhuman, really. They are not in fact gods only because we have defined gods to be something else.[20] In all other ways they are in fact much much more than merely powerful. They are the personification of love and dedication and trust in your entire life.[21]

Now the pendulum swings back and those giants who controlled all, then fell so far as to be not even deserving of anything but your scorn have revealed themselves, once again defying all reason and equanimity, to be the greatest parents and people that the world has yet seen. Once accepted the evidence is everywhere that the world agrees with you. At least if you’re as lucky as I am, you see this newfound respect and admiration and love of your parents reflected by everyone that has EVER come in contact with them. This is so universally true that if anyone were to disagree there argument would be drowned out by the chorus of good feeling that accompanies the mere mention of the topic.

Likewise, having lived through the battles and learned over a lifetime, the parent can now see that the child is now a man. That he is good and always was. That the acts that felt so much like disrespect and unfixable mistakes were merely needed steps in this beautiful creature of gods journey to become this amazingly talented and loving person you see before you.[22] You are proud and hope that they know that you love them to no end and you believe that ending all war aside[23], the world would be a sincerely darker and less joyful place without them. They are evidence of your love for them, your love for one another and your life well lead.

At no point on this journey, taken together, is there ever anything approaching balance, rational assessment or unbiased understanding. Nope. The child to parent relationship is lacking any reality while simultaneously being the ‘realest’ relationship a person can have. It’s confounding and beautiful and is so entirely out of whack that it is uniformly nonconforming.

Both as a parent and as a son I am so grateful that it’s never normal.

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[1] I am compelled at this point to let you know that I’m coming at this solely from my perspective and with little formal education. My observations of the cruelty of teens in the assessment of their parents is a memory of a terribly mistaken young man that wishes he could have gotten to where he was going without ever stopping at this mile marker, but fears he needed to. Sorry Mom and Dad.

[2] Again, I LOVE YOU TWO MORE THAN ANYTHING IN THE WORLD

[3] So sorry. Again, channeling a jerky, know-it-all teenager I knew once. I’m starting to understand his penchant for self-loathing. Ick.

[4] Now I’m just projecting. You guys have always been night owls.

[5] That’s right. You all knew it wasn’t just gonna be mom and pops, right?

[6] I swear, by the end of this I have restored you to your proper and rightful status as the most amazing people in the world. A sincere belief of mine.

[7] I’m soft-selling it here. Really, I’m amazed I made it out of my teen years, which in my case lasted until my 30’s, alive.

[8] This man, however, adores you. Have I said sorry for my previous behavior?

[9] These are my words. My parents are far better than that and if they ever so much as thought it, they NEVER spoke it.

[10] The need for the aid is real, but you suspect that as many times as not more thoughtful fiscal policy at an earlier time would have obviated the need for support. And in my case, you were right. I owe you like, A LOT of money.

[11] In my case I suspect that my mistakes were not replications of my parents. They’re awesome. Seriously. And funny. Have I mentioned they’re funny?

[12] They drink beer. A lot of beer.

[13] Because of the endless and unappreciated generosity of their parents. Thank you.

[14] Which, even if it does arrive, comes with no promise of wealth. No Promise at all. Like, none.

[15] Pfft! As if I was taking any of the advice given.

[16] Yep. Slow learner here.

[17] Me and like an ARMY of siblings and friends and coworkers lucky enough to be in their presence.

[18] Including your adolescent insistence on vulgarity, despite your obvious vocabulary and facility with language.

[19] Gratuitous.

[20] Blasphemy to make a point.

[21] Yup.

[22] Their sentiments, not mine. Like many others I struggle to accept this, but its so much easier when you can see it through your parents eyes! Thanks.

[23] There’s still time.

High Stepping Out of Toddlerhood

They know its ‘daddy’s car’ that they get into to go to school. They are three and one so it is definitely daycare, but it’s a truly great one and they learn a ton and have the chance to interact endlessly with all kinds of kids and they do so more naturally than kids who aren’t fortunate enough to have this opportunity. It would be nice to spend the whole day with them, everyday, but I could never give them what they get at the Y. Sometimes the days are longer than you’d wish and by Friday all that play and fun can add up to some tired and cranky kiddos, but all in all, its great.

This is because, every morning after me and the older boy drop off the younger boy, getting him to his favorite teacher that got him past those tough early days when it was all confusing and scary, I get to walk to the end of the hall, the other side of the daycare center and drop off the older boy with his teachers and make small talk as we put his special meal away (food allergies) find and move his nameplate from the out board to the in board and ask him if he needs to go potty. Then I take a knee and say, ‘I love you, buddy. Have a great day.’ and he hugs me and I hug him back and tell him I’m proud of him. Finally I get up and once again, more publicly say, ‘have a great day buddy. Bye.’ And he says ‘have a great day, daddy.’ See ya later. There’s really nothing cuter than a 3 year old talking, trust me, its adorable. I tell the teachers to have a nice day and I head out of the room.

Unlike any of the other dads, I turn right out the door, take two steps and go through another door. This brings me to the corridor stretching about a fifty feet or so from the welcome desk to the right, and the doors that are closed all winter but open all summer as they are the point of entry and check in for all staff and campers in the summer day camp program at the Y about fifty feet to my left. I’m 5 feet from the door to Charlie’s classroom, I step directly across the hall to my office. That’s right, I work maybe 20 feet and two doors from my kid all day.

Recently it’s become okay for him to see me and it doesn’t ruin his day if we happen upon each other. So I do my best to happen upon him whenever I can. I sneak onto the mezzanine around the pool he learns to swim in and I spy on him, until he sees me and refuses to do anything other than to wave to me nonstop saying ‘Daddy, daddy.’ I have to leave once discovered. All his friends know who I am too, so they do the same and let him know that his daddy is there. Cover blown I blow him a kiss and he returns the kiss to me and I wave bye bye and leave. In the halls we slap high-fives on the occasions we run into each other. I even have a window in my office that looks out on the gymnasium where he plays an hour a day in the winter months and I sneak peeks when I can and worry when he’s sitting or playing by himself, or if I think he’s sad. Until I look around and see about ten kids playing independently like this and I remember that I was much the same way, still am, and while like everyone I sometimes wish I had opposite characteristics to my own, I’m a decent and well adjusted human and it would be weird if he weren’t somewhat like me.

All these things are highly valued by me. I took a big risk to be sitting here with these perks that I rarely talk about. We’ve only been here for a year. Not even. I dropped a fully formed career (I’m a forty year old dad of two toddlers) that had consisted of two stints, roughly a decade each, at two prominent nonprofits in the city and with not enough education had managed to become a middle management type through doing what I loved to do, doing it well and trading a certain amount of recognition and upward mobility for a level of independence and freedom. I didn’t love all aspects of it, but it was good and it allowed me to essentially be very part time while still getting the benefits of being full time in the early years with the little ones. It was a hard decision to leave a place where everyone did what I did, namely work to provide opportunities for more full and fully integrated lives for people with intellectual and developmental disabilities, to a place where I was the one guy fully in that boat. Where special needs was a dept. and not the entire mission of the entity from the very very top all the way to the 2 hour on weekend bus aid. I’m still a bit of a fish out of water here at the Y.

But it’s all good. Because, at the end of the day I get to pick up the guys! These days its from the small fenced in playground just outside the winter-locked, summer camp doors. At least that’s where I pick up my Charlie, my three year old. Inevitably he is first picked up since the one year old is at the wildcard stage of development and I kinda need to have my hands and feet free to keep him in check.

For the entire time I’ve been working there I’ve walked in, teachers or kids have let Charlie know that I was there to get him, and his knees have started bouncing like crazy as he’s high stepped it over to see me, yelling 3 times, daddy daddy daddy. He runs to me. I get down and we hug and smile and hug and smile and eventually I ask how his day was and he eventually says it was good and that he had fun. It’s our moment before we head in and get his little brother, the kid he has called, affectionately, ‘baby’ for most of his life. His name, Teddy, was already taken by Charlie’s bear by the time ‘baby’ arrived.

This reaction of Charlie at the end of the day is something I’ve never taken the time to think about, something I’ve taken completely for granted. Until today.

Why, you ask. Well, my boy is growing up. We still had our moment at the pool, and I’m sure he’ll give me a high-five the next time I see him in the halls. But today he didn’t have his ‘daddy daddy daddy’ reaction. The knees didn’t pop up and down above his waist like they always had. His smile was tepid and not beaming. He was happy to see me. It was still wonderful. But it’s slipping. I suspect it’ll be slowly at first. It was a strange day as I came from a different angle than normal. And he saw me from a distance and it was going to be some time til I got there. But ultimately it won’t last forever. I hope I get even one more reaction like this from him. His brother is starting to run smiling and I love that he recognizes me now, and I look forward to his excitement. But I can’t help but feel a touch of the melancholy as Charlie so easily shifts between stages and grows up so fast.

It’s a day later and the halting greeting I received yesterday was once again replaced by the ebullient and buoyant energy I’ve come to rely on, though I didn’t know it until it skipped a day. I’m relieved to know it’s not gone forever. Terribly relieved. But I’m also awakened to how much it has meant to me and I cherish it even more.

I’m told that I should make little movies of these things. Of the times they are so excited by there favorite show coming on that they can’t help but run to the floor to dance. Of the times they choose to be our playmates and they make us 3 years old right beside them as we melt in the glorious glow of their exuberant and uninhibited joy. Surely some of these I have recorded and some I will. But this moment of excitement will have to be remembered here, like this. Watching it after it’s a thing of the past would simply hurt too much.

Spent

Charlie and Daddy, First Night

Becoming a parent requires a loss of self. It is a universal truth for those that make it through the fire. Once through that fire it’s actually a freeing and discovering of self, one that’s ultimately cathartic if you let it be. Not everyone does. Some very successful folks just wait it out, endure the fire, only to emerge as close to unchanged as they can estimate. It’s never that close, but that’s the journey they want and it’s the journey they’ll have. For me transformation is the whole point. Emerging laughably uncool, but wholly self possessed; out of shape but accepting of myself; older but wiser and altogether more estimable is what I’m aiming for.

At first though, it’s like being strung out. Having kids is no joke. Flexing and bending, supporting and worrying, it’s all a wear on your tread and eventually all of us that get through can search for those moments when we were completely threadbare, beaten and bedraggled and remember that feeling that so closely approximates failure and defeat. I suspect the vast majority of us can find these moments, either presently or looking back or in some cases we are stuck in them and are waiting for the lifeline.

The good news is that the lifeline is there all the time, and allowing the feelings in that are the ones you fear only makes you stronger in the end. You feel beat up with good reason. That’s the point. It used to be for stupid self pitying reasons, but now the ego that was so worn and battered when it resided in me is safe and warm, being tended to with every tear. It’s being cuddled and hugged and played with all day. It’s being picked up when it wakes up terrified. It’s being fed when it’s hungry and soothed when it’s scared. My ego is being taken care of, I’m being taken care of, by the little kids that have so graciously taken on the burden of providing my life with meaning. So it’s a small price to pay, this exhaustion of the body and of the soul. While your body and mind and heart are being taken for this overlong joyride and your stamina is tricking you, you’re essence is in the safest place possible and will rejuvenate you in the long run as long as you stay open to it.

Whether it’s the secular Saints Kerouac and Ginsberg or the plaintive cries of Bill Wither’s pleading for her to ‘keep on using me until you use me up’ or the fictional Tyler Durden, there’s always been a thread of masculine consciousness that knows the path to secular beatification is one paved with sacrifice and spent capacity. It’s a beautiful thing, really, to be fully spent. I for one couldn’t be more thankful to have taken this path before I missed my chance.

My Perfect Age

I was once asked what age I felt would be my best. That is to say, temperamentally speaking, which age would I be most suited to. The answer I gave was that I’d be perfectly suited for 40-55. Middle age. My ideal.

Well, now I’m here and I’m pretty sure I was right. A delightful discovery! Let’s face it, older than that, well older than 65 or so (I was significantly younger when I came to the number 55 being where you left middle and entered old) is fraught with discomfort and loss. While I think my temperament will endure however long I do, I have little doubt that this time will be incredibly challenging in addition to anything wonderful it may bring.

It was a convenient answer for me. I was hovering around thirty at the time and I was single and the meaning I found in life was real but it was an act of invention as it was me and me alone providing it.

I hadn’t yet fallen in love with my wife and learned what it meant to fear more for someone else and their well being than I did for my own. I was empathic in so far as a person can be when they need put nothing before themselves. Beyond that, I was a pretty treacherous sort. Treachery is overstating it, but you know, I wasn’t being my best self. Nope. I’d be someone I could respect at 40.

Turns out I was right.

So now that I’m here I find myself thinking about the end. Death. The final exit. I think about it in a fearful way when i think of my forebears. I think of it in practical and optimal terms, accepting its inevitability when I think of it for myself. And I think of it as the ultimate in accidental tragedy when it enters my mind in regard to my kids. So far everyone in all these scenarios is peacefully and happily healthy and alive. There have been some close calls, but they appear to be in the rear view mirror. They have brought us all closer together and reminded us all to hold on to that ultimate perspective we can lose so easily.

In my younger days, before gaining any perspective on the finite nature of life, I spent years actively ‘hating’ and wondering why my anger didn’t result in the target of my self righteous judgment changing, only to find that the target was me and it had in fact changed me. Not for the better. I heard a person say this week that carrying hate is like drinking poison and expecting someone else to die. There seems to be a good deal of wisdom in that which could really help me when I lose perspective.

Now, when I’m this busy, surrounded by love in all directions, far enough from the exit to be able to accept it, while close enough to wish it would not come to call for the people that mean the most to me that I’m able to have the strongest hold on perspective. My one and only job is to be happy and make my life one that allows me and those I love to stay happy so that we can go on caring for each other no matter the differences of opinion or frustrations that may creep in to ones thoughts.

The person that this is most difficult with, for obvious and universal reasons, is me. Who, after all, can have perspective on ones self? I try to be easy on me, but those closest know this has always been a struggle. When all this middle life stuff weens and wains, and I’m left without these responsibilities compelling me to move ever onward, what will I do? You see, it seems linear when you’re growing up. You encounter challenges, you learn, you grow, you change and you move on. Right? That’s how it goes? But what will I do when the world that I’ve built, the one that buttresses and supports me, begins to crumble, as it inevitably must. What will I do then?

I hope that I will sit and reflect on the joys my life brought and take pride in the joys it continues to sow as my children become the architects of the meaning of life and I enjoy the fruits of my labors. I fear that I will resent no longer being the builder and master of my world and instead find purpose in complaining and seeking to ameliorate my many pains through the methods I did before I reached that perfect-for-me middle age. Whose to say which way it will go.

What matters now, what matters most, is that I sustain myself long enough to provide a base for the kids so they can wonder how life will go from the comfort of their homes with their own loving families waiting for them to come downstairs so their toddlers can finally give them the checkup they themselves have been giving me three times a day lately.

2014-10-25 12.47.402014-10-21 19.43.05

That’s right. My son is a Dr. and myself and his mother are his only patients. We couldn’t be more proud! It’s time for him to listen through the stethoscope and tell me that my heartbeat ‘feels good.’ Time to give me a shot because, and I have no idea what this means, ‘I have a boo boo on my foot because there is a train in it.’ He tells me to look away when he gives me the shot and to think of ‘rice ream’ (ice cream) so it won’t hurt. And he’s right, it doesn’t hurt if I follow his lead.

Fear and Loathing in Parenthood

I’m not at all afraid of our kids falling down the stairs, at least not moreso than I must be. I’m not afraid of them being bullied. I’m not afraid of the myriad of external dangers that chase us all through life. These are in fact what life is about and learning to conquer and overcome challenges is the point. It’s what I look forward to helping my little ones navigate as they grow up. I don’t even fear the difficult stuff of puberty and hormones. I think I have a pretty good perspective on how wonderful life is and I look forward to trying to help as they navigate the treacherous beauty of transforming from children to adults capable of loving life so much that they can fear it a little.

To some degree I’ve taken this outlook to mean that I am somehow superior to the folks that would call me daily in my previous life as a camp director to check that their kid is eating and didn’t fall down and get hurt or wasn’t stung by a bee or is making friends. I won’t be that parent. I really won’t. Early on it became evident that I HAVE to be incredibly aware of sesame as one bite and Charlie, if not treated immediately, could stop breathing. But even that, I don’t walk around in fear and I think I have been pretty rational and responsible in assuring his safety while allowing for independence.

Fear found me last night. It wasn’t a blow to the head. It wasn’t a brush with eminent danger. Nope. It was specifically my son’s harsh self criticism that has broken me up with fear and sadness.

We went to a friends house last night. This is not something we do. Both Karen and I work and Teddy is just over a year old and Charlie turned 3 last month. Other than family gatherings we haven’t really socialized much in the last few years, but we’re very lucky that our kids love it when we do. So we were all looking forward to visiting a friend of mine from high school who we had just found out lived in our neighborhood, a remarkable thing as I went to high school in another state about 250 miles away.

We arrived and it was instantly delightful. When you get stuck in this parenting bubble, one that we are particularly bad at ever getting out of, you lose perspective. Whenever you get the chance to pop your head up, be offered a beer, and start messing up a playroom you won’t have to clean up at 10 that night, it’s simply amazing.

Charlie and Teddy were awesome. Charlie was shouting hello’s and how ya doin’s from the driveway and Teddy gave big smiles to the new adults almost immediately upon entering their home. And that was BEFORE seeing the amazingly appointed play room! All was good. The kids were entertained, loving the toys and the new playmates and the adults were easily sociable and the laughs and good talks ensued immediately. That’s when Charlie started pooping.

Charlie is at the tail end of potty training. Its a skill he was ready to pursue, and did so with gusto at 18 months, but once baby came around and started getting all that diaper attention, he lost interest and we lost the time and patience, so it happened now. Not too late, but not early. So now he can have an opinion on matters. One such opinion is that he will not go poopie on the potty, at least not regularly. But he is still quite proud to have big boy pants with no accidents. We wear pull ups for sleep and car rides longer than that of the one to school (daycare) and we used such a tool for this visit.

He was constipated and hadn’t pooped in a couple of days. Part of the process and par for the course. So of course he immediately started to make that face. He turns from the group in the playroom and starts painfully pushing. Tears are coming from his eyes and he doesn’t want to be seen, but not knowing the house he finds himself visible from the parents ‘playroom’ where its noted that he’s pooping. We tell him he’s doing a great job and that we’re so proud of him. And he replies with a serious look, a quiet and intense voice and attempts to hold back his tears and he says to us as we get near him, “I’m not proud of myself.” and repeats it, quietly and through gritted teeth as we try to reassure him of how good a boy he’s being. It makes me well up as I write it. It was such an intense insistence and so sincere.

I felt immediately and intensely saddened and fearful. With Charlie it passed. In a few minutes (it was a tough one to get out, and a few minutes was definitely the time frame of intense effort on his part) he was back to playing and came with me so I could change him, fully recovered from the earlier suffering, Charlie was on to singing the popular song in our house from an Elmo potty training video, ‘Accidents happen and that’s okay’ a delightful refrain that is good advice at any age.

This has triggered the cycle of thinking for me that has brought to the fore what my real fears are. The fears I’ve carried for some portion of the last forty years as I’ve acquired them over a lifetime. And now I fear them for my kids.

I am afraid that my kids will have an inner voice that tells them constantly to feel shame and is harshly and intensely self critical. I am afraid that they will inherit the capacity for incredible and copious amounts of self abuse in whatever form it takes for them. I’m afraid that my kids will fall in and out of depression and not feel a sense of self worth. I fear that my kids will engage in increasingly risky and self destructive behavior in attempt to be seen and rescued, and that when people reach out to do just that they will reject them as they do not feel they are worth saving. I fear they will inherit that dark midnight disease that crushes one with loneliness and can and has led to disastrous results in my genetic line. I fear they won’t listen to their better angels until its too late. I fear that they won’t pursue that which makes them fulfilled for fear of failing.

Bumps and bruises, broken bones and intense illnesses will come and go and I pray we avoid the truly disastrous stuff no one can see coming. But when it comes right down to it there is the greatest fear of all, which is that they will be some other, less lucky version of me.

The Problem with Potential

Charlie Builds UmiCityMy children are showing signs of potential and I couldn’t be more concerned. It’s a wonderful thing, ability, but let it out from under wraps too early and it can be awfully counterproductive.

My firstborn is not even three and a half and he is pretty consistently told about his brilliance. This isn’t unusual, most people spend their time praising children for rather standard accomplishments. In the case of parents this is natural. Every new thing your child does is earth shaking. Truly. But it’s becoming evident in school that he is getting some distance between himself and the other kids. He has a memory that is remarkable, a vocabulary that is of someone twice his age and in a class where many of the other kids struggle recognizing their own names he not only recognizes and spells his own name, he recognizes and spells everyone’s name. And when he is confronted with new words he can often sound them out since he’s known the sound of each letter and what letter comes after what since he was two and a half. He reads me bedtime stories.

I should start by saying that I’m aware this isn’t some kind of Doogie Howser, MD level of brilliance or anything. He’s a bit advanced, that’s all. But he hears it all the time. He’s also started to hear and notice disappointment in teachers when he misbehaves or struggles to focus. It happens so rarely that it must be noted as it is entirely out of character. But to have simple struggles like these, standard ones really, highlighted at every opportunity is something that his burgeoning emotional development is starting to register. He’s already a kid capable of harsh self-criticism as noted in an earlier piece, Fear and Loathing in Parenthood, about his struggle with potty training.

Furthermore he is stunningly good looking. I’m not going to explain this one away. I may be biased, but that don’t mean I’m wrong. And on top of that, he’s about the average height of a six year old. When he’s around other three year old kids, as he is all day everyday, the combination of his precocious ability and his mature behavior, combined with his stature and handsomeness make grown ups think he is older and more capable then he is. If he’s struggling there’s a reason. He’s three that’s the reason. But lately, I’m starting to feel like that reason is pressure. Pressure to live up to something that others think of him. Again he’s three.

What makes me crazy is how wrong people get the whole ‘gifted and talented’ thing. I want to foster his curiosity and I worry that it can be stifled if he isn’t able to continue to see the joy in learning if he drifts further from the mean and finds less and less that challenges him moving forward. But this is often where people start talking about ‘tracking’ kids. Getting them into a lane that will challenge them intellectually in order to keep them engaged. It’s important. But don’t for a second think this is the most important thing.

Prior to moving out to New Jersey my wife and I lived in Astoria, Queens. It was our first apartment and the neighborhood will always hold a special meaning to us. While she was pregnant with Charlie it became clear to us that we would have to move. She was working in Parsippany, NJ and we lived in a fourth floor walk up without a dishwasher or a washer and dryer. It became very clear that we could double our space and amenities and get what we needed to be comfortable by moving. So once the spot was picked and the date was set we went about planning. This is something we do now on the fly. Life is crazy with kids. But back then it was something we could plan a dinner for. So we went out to a Greek restaurant on Broadway and 30th, sat on the street and talked about our future.

We hashed out logistics. We did calculations and determined that we could get movers!!! (ALWAYS GET MOVERS) We decided our move day and talked about the various possibilities for daycare. We even daydreamed about our new apartment and planned projects that we had no idea that we’d have no time for after a kid.

Then Karen started talking about the need for us to get our kid into a good school district. I have biases against the education system, biases that have altered in detail but remain present and I dismissed the concern. We weren’t buying at that point. We were getting a two bedroom in Morristown. Who’s to say we’d even be there when the kid started school. Besides, I had a close friend and coworker who grew up there and went to the public schools where we were moving who is one of the brightest and most energetic and engaged people you could know, we should stay zenned out and not worry.

This was and is my way of avoiding many things I don’t wish to confront. But she pressed as she should and eventually got me to access and express my true feelings on the matter.

The first part of my feelings are cynical. I don’t think school matters, and it matters less and less the further you go. The people I’ve known, at least the non-scientists and non-social workers who have gone to ‘the right schools’ are living a life I don’t want for me or my kids. They place value in the wrong proportion. There’s no denying the value of money, but there is greatly overstating it and many of these people in my experience do that. Which pulls these efficient minds further and further away from curiosity and pushes them to cold profit analysis. It’s gross and I don’t want my kid surrounded by these people.

The second part was more optimistic. I told her that the kid, assuming standard developmental health, would be bright. We didn’t have to worry about that. We were both smart. The IQ and capacity would take care of itself. What we had to do, what our responsibliity would be was to foster natural curiosity and be mindful in nurturing his emotional development. It’s our job to make sure he is a compassionate and caring person who is respectful of others and appreciative of all that he will be afforded.

While we may have disagreed on the value of an education, my wife could not have been more in agreement with me. It is our job to raise a person in whole and value the right things. Everyone gets to decide what is right for them. For us it was fostering curiosity and compassion and kindness and enthusiasm and love and a sense of appreciation.

I think that in general we’ve lived up to this. It might be hard to see as he is at an age where his curiosity puts him in a lot of situations that could cause an ambulance ride and as a result I’m more often then I’d like employing my scary dad voice. But we are very proud of the little boy he is. He shares, is kind and is loving and joyful. And at this age that is all that counts.

The problem with potential is that it narrows your outcomes and heightens expectation. So if you show early signs that you might be incredible, you are then tracked to be so. And that’s crazy, you’re a kid and no amount of giftedness, other than effort and curiosity should be highlighted. Your interests may turn out to be in a direction that isn’t yet present. Why stifle these.

I have a visceral reaction to this, one that is personal. Emotional immaturity causes you to internalize the disappointment of others. I have a good deal of experience in this area. And in my case, I reacted to this by failing immediately. I’d pre-fail to get it over with. High School would have been easy for me had I tried. But I didn’t. The same is true with college. And I claimed not to care. I swore up and down that I didn’t care what anyone else thought. I didn’t care so much in fact that I drank to blackout every night and gained 80 lbs. immediately on going away to college. Where I immediately failed off the basketball team and never had a gpa above 2.1 in the ten years it took me to get a degree. I made a point and a show of not caring. To this day I still am able to get access through my first impression and to this day, to some degree, I still set out to lower expectations immediately when I sense that there are high hopes.

I labeled myself a failure and went about making myself one. I didn’t care, and it nearly killed me how disappointed I was in myself. It is for another post, but the seeds of my salvation from this awful cycle of self-defeat was when I went to work at a summer camp for adults with special needs. The result of which was finally confronting my issues and embarking on years of struggle with myself and the eventual ability to find and be loved by Karen. She was the payoff, and as such the WHOLE struggle was worth it.

I hope beyond hope that I can avoid a similar fate for my Charlie. I’m frankly terrified that he won’t regress to the mean of toddlers in his world and that the expectations will come at him fast and furious. I am afraid that he’ll start having his potential squashed by the good intentions of those trying to support him. I fear this will make it nearly impossible for him to know what it means for him to be fine. Which is exactly what he is. Absolutely, joyously and beautifully fine.

My Sentimental Heart

Life has grace notes. Every life.

In the past few days I’ve panicked at 4 in the morning that I wasn’t doing enough to support my wife and our little boy. I’ve drafted a fantasy baseball team. I’ve given several bottles and wrapped and re-wrapped a baby several times. I’ve given Charlie two baths and read not a word. I’ve caught up on many things at work while feeling awful that I wasn’t there to do the things that needed doing at home. I’ve hummed the baby to sleep, his favorite tune being Brahms’ Lullaby. I’ve cooked a few dinners and cleaned the kitchen on a 1.2 times a day clip. I’ve cried and I’ve laughed and I’ve shouted in frustration. I’ve watched international women’s curling. I’ve actually recorded it. I’ve been awake from 1:30 AM until at least 4:30 AM each night. My life is full.

I miss some things from my former life, when I have the time and the energy to do so, but I would never trade the present for the past. I can’t imagine this will be true in the years to come, but for now it is so. Yet I hasten to add that I am becoming sentimental in a way that I never thought that I would.

Don’t be fooled, I’ve always had a sentimental side. I’m a writer and it’s in some ways, at least in the ways and reasons attached to my writing, unavoidable. But it’s different now. It’s not filtered so thoroughly through thought and reason. It’s visceral and it allows me to feel things I was formerly incapable of. It allows for a true empathy if not sympathy that I was unable to access and experience in the past. I am still prone to anger, it being a primary emotion men feel, but I’m now able to feel life like I never have before. In a connective way. In a way that validates my Romantic notion of the human condition. In a way that allows me to cry.

I don’t know necessarily what has brought about this change, but I suspect that there are a number of factors at work. Surely some of this is due to Charlie, and it is most assuredly a delightful development in this regard. I am aware of the fragility of life in a way that’s different from the intellectual understanding I had in the past. Surely the lack of sleep is a contributing factor as well. It could be the onset of age. It’s said that I am on the downside of Mount Testosterone. If I am I must say its a far more livable life and one my temperament was suited for from the start. That torrent of aggression that accompanied my majority was not handled well.

You can ascribe questionable ethics to anyone that has lived successfully. As a game it’s quite easy to find even a well meaning person’s blind spots. In fact for a time, when one is defining oneself it is practically impossible, and I would guess inadvisable, to refrain from poking holes in the facades around you. It’s your societal duty as an adolescent and as a young adult, and it’s your personal duty as the holders to the flame of the wildly hypocritical. This is one functional purpose for youth, no? But like I said before, life has grace notes. Every life.

Jim Valvano’s speech near the end of his torturous and ultimately losing battle with cancer (one that he continues to fight valiantly from the grave) is one of the ways you could always coax a tear from me. I won’t repeat the whole thing, but it was given right at the end. He summoned energy that an athlete can sometimes hold in reserve when they know it will be needed later. There were thousands of tumors (his description) pumping through his body and he was addressing a crowd gathered to give him a ‘human spirit’ type lifetime achievement award. His motivation was to give a memorable and inspirational speech that would move people to give for decades to come after his inevitable demise. This was the one chance he’d have to establish the momentum to make a difference by creating a fund for research. He knew what he had to do and he did it in a breathtaking and heartbreaking way.

One point he made, and this was not on the teleprompter and not in his notes, was how he understood his life to be meaningful. He said that if you laugh, if you think and if you cry everyday, that is a full life. It was a profound accomplishment since he had so eloquently just finished walking the listener through thought, to laughter and ultimately to tears.

I admire his sincerity in grappling with his own mortality in a way that was sincere, forthright and vulnerable. It is a valuable lesson. While it may be impractical at this point in my life to cry daily, it is without question a full life when I do.

I cried a bit this weekend because some very good people, expecting joy were surprised by tragedy. Heartbreaking, life altering and ultimately scarring tragedy. I don’t know how it will be when I see them again but I know the tears are not done on my end. I wish I could grab them and hold them tight for as long as it took. I wish I could jump into the well with them and talk them through the dark. I wish this never happened and I hope they know how many people love them and wish to unburden them of the terrible weight they will carry forth. I wish I was brave enough to tell them I loved them and to cry with them, but not being a person that fills that role in their lives I’m afraid it would only burden them more.

I will go home to my precious boy and I will hold him and giggle and make silly noises and forget everything in the world for entire minutes and there is nothing that feels better. I know joy.

I have known tragedy, it’s human and all of us have. It draws us together and holds us apart.

I am now mature enough to say, I hope I never die and I hope my boy never grows up and moves out and I hope we never change from this perfect moment in time.