DadCentric

To-mate-o, To-mat-o

"I want some cock," he said somewhere behind me. I was talking to the neighbor.  We were sharing beers and laughs and suddenly silence.

"What did he say?" the neighbor asked.

"I want some cock," he said again as if on cue.  "Daddy, I need cock." 

My neighbor shifted uncomfortably.  A three-year-old requesting roosters does that to a person.

The boy's grandfather, my wife's father, had told him that a penis was called a pecker.  It took me awhile to undo that one.  A three-year-old talking about bird beaks also tends to make people shift uncomfortably and become suddenly interested in leaves and passing clouds. 

It's all in the delivery.

A Mother's Arms are Made of Tenderness and Children Sleep Soundly in Them

Heat, as an extreme, exists only in a relative sense.  It is the hottest thing they have ever known and therefore it is the hottest thing ever known.  I tell them that it is not, that my coffee is actually hotter, but that doesn't soothe them, it only makes them question my sanity as they slowly dare a second sip of their lukewarm chocolate.

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My back hurts.  I've been carrying too much for too long.  For six weeks I've been living as a single father - a single work-at-home-dad.  It has been incredibly hard and surprisingly easy.  I am better for it and I am tired and I am badly beaten. 

My work has suffered.  My 70 hour work week has been cut to less than forty - compiled from a series of minutes torn apart from hours and tucked between goodnight kisses and the taste of warm whiskey across my lips.  The clock moves always forward.

Chores once shared have become mine alone.  All nights are long and lonely.  All mornings are early and full of songs and frustration.

I do not believe that I have achieved anything worthy of praise or pity, only reflection.  Others face obstacles greater than mine on a daily basis.  They make the most.  They do their best.  They are stronger than I ever thought I was and when I sip from my glass the toast is to them.

But this is not their life, it is mine and while I was prepared and up to the challenge, it was unexpected in both timing and time.  From the frying pan to the fire is not a lateral move.  The heat is extreme and it is all relative.

Tomorrow my wife comes home after six weeks sitting at the bedside of her ailing father.  Six weeks of tears and whispers and shouts in the night.  Six weeks of walking in the shoes of a girl much younger.  Bedside seats are lessons in love and fear and the art of turning fond old memories that weren't. That is a chapter not yet closed.  Those wounds are still open.  He will still have a beside in need of sitting and she will carry her thoughts accordingly.  Her back will hurt.

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They do not expect her.  They have grown accustomed to the missing of their mother.  Six weeks is a long time gone and a father doing the best he can is still just one kiss goodnight no matter how much laughter fills the day or how much work is left to the forgotten.

Tomorrow will seem but another day to them, the routine of living with some parts missing.  They will be safe and loved and slightly lost.  She will be on a plane six weeks delayed and her dreams will be of little boy kisses grown wet with salt and the slightest linger of lukewarm chocolate.

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The title of this post is a quote from Victor Hugo.

The New Nissan Sedans - A DadCentric Review

I spent a recent weekend hanging out at Nissan's San Diego headquarters driving fast and taking chances.  I had to sign waivers.  I think.

The good people at Nissan flew me to San Diego, put me up at the W Hotel, fed me some fine grub and invited me to test drive their new line of sedans.  No money changed hands.  I didn't even tip the bellhop.

Let me preface this review with a bit of personal history: My dad was a Datsun man and that led to his becoming a Nissan man because something happened behind the scenes that we weren't privy to, possibly someone named Datsun dying at the hands of someone named Nissan followed by maniacal laughter and lots of files being sealed. Possibly.  Or maybe there was a buyout.  What the hell do I know?  The point is, I spent many a chore behind the wheel of a Nissan truck and I resented them accordingly.

Secondly, I used to have a Sentra back in "the day" and in said Sentra I had some of the best car "dates" ever.  It was epic.  Submarine races in a starlit desert.  My old cassette player should be bronzed.  My old back seat should be in a museum.  Old girlfriends should friend me on Facebook.  My Sentra experience canceled out a youth spent loading and unloading exercises in futility.  

I took Nissan's offer knowing damn well that we were even.

Choke Up on the Bat, Boys

Sometimes I hear her whimper and I turn my head just far enough to remember that she is not there.  She has been gone for weeks and she will be gone forever.

I turn back to my desk and my world and my piles upon piles of work not done and in doing so my eye catches the rain falling quietly upon the place that she has gone.  The place that she will be forever.

Memories echo on two small voices, one small and forgetful and looking, always looking, for the old dog that didn't run from his advance - not because she couldn't but because she wouldn't.  She welcomed him.

The other is older and softer and full of understanding.  Too much understanding.  His turns in anger and compassion. "No," he whispers below six years of furrowed brow. "She's dead."

And sometimes he cries.

The boys haven't seen their mother in three weeks.  She is sitting at the bedside of her father.  His bed grows emptier by the hour.

The World Series is starting.  They watch the games on a hospital television and people come and people go and they talk about the things that people talk about when they don't know the score but feel that they should say something.  There is an awkward silence between hits.  The ball drops.  The conversation rolls softly across the infield.

There is no crying in baseball but hospital hallways are perfect for it.

Four months ago I stood at the funeral of my grandmother and exchanged pleasantries by rote.  My wife and my children were states away and as close as the words that spilled from me.  I spilled other words upon my return. 

Two young boys lay quietly in their respective beds and watched as their father lobbed lessons of life and death in their general direction.  The windup was tainted by a lack of sleep.  The pitch was influenced slightly by the lingering shadow of a ten dollar airport beer. It was wide and just a bit outside, but they were safe at home and they let it slide.

A roomful of tears is a sorry excuse for a rainout.

MS Office Will Revolutionize The Way You Raise Your Kids!

Ok, not really. But now that I have your attention, I would like to direct you to The Parent Toolbox. A few weeks ago, the good folks at Microsoft recruited a bunch of excellent and prominent parentbloggers (and for some reason, yours truly) to write some stuff about how the various Office programs can be used to make household management easier (full disclosure: yes, I got paid - a massive wad of unmarked non-sequential bills delivered to me in an aluminum briefcase by a man who would only identify himself as "Mr. Gates"). 

My first contribution: a simple Behavior Chart, to help us help Lucas be the best he can be. We think it'll work. And if not, we're sending him to the Dollhouse. 

Party Properly

With my eldest son’s 4th birthday looming in just under two weeks, the wife and I have been diligently plotting out the best way to celebrate. Of course all birthdays are special, but four seems like an important milestone, though for slightly different reasons. With three, the kid realized that it was his special day, that all these family and friends were gathered here in the Name of Cake! and Punch! and Presents! just for him. However, there was very little in the way of lead-up. He didn’t seem to recall that a similar celebration had been held just one year prior, or if he did, he didn’t quite make the connection between the two.

But we’re talking about four now. Four remembers three, and may even have a vague recollection of two, enough that a pattern is established. He understands that every year right around this time, we all get together to celebrate the awesomeness that is him. Thus, it stands to reason that whatever decisions we make about how to celebrate this particular birthday could have a lasting impact on the tone of birthdays to come. Go too far overboard and he’ll come to expect more and more grandiose gestures year after year, which will only lead to greater stress, increased expense, and eventual disappointment when we are unable to arrange a battle between a squadron of unicorns and a dragon for his 12th birthday party. Go too far underboard and he’ll end up a big anti-party lamewad. No, my friends, we are not simply talking about one birthday party here. We are talking about ALL the birthday parties. We are talking about the proper setting of expectations.

So with that in mind, I would like to share with you a list of activities that the Mrs. and I are considering for the impending festivities. Perhaps you’ll find some ideas here for celebrating the anniversary of your own offspring’s arrival, or perhaps you’ve some ideas of your own to share.

The Gift of Knowledge

DadCentric is one of approximately 100 blogs helping me today raise awareness of juvenile myositis, the autoimmune disease my daughter has. Why today? It was seven years ago on this date that we found a doctor who figured out what our daughter had. It also happens to be my wife's birthday. This is our story.

Our pediatrician admitted it early on.

The rash on our 2-year-old daughter's cheeks, joints and legs was something he'd never seen before.

The next doctor wouldn't admit to not knowing.

He rattled off the names of several skins conditions -- none of them seemingly worth his time or bedside manner -- then quickly prescribed antibiotics and showed us the door.

The third doctor admitted she didn't know much.

The biopsy of the chunk of skin she had removed from our daughter's knee showed signs of an "allergic reaction" even though we had ruled out every allergy source -- obvious and otherwise -- that we could.

The fourth doctor had barely closed the door behind her when, looking at the limp blonde cherub in my lap, she admitted she had seen this before. At least one too many times before.

She brought in a gaggle of med students. She pointed out each of the physical symptoms in our daughter:

The rash across her face and temples resembling the silhouette of a butterfly.

The purple-brown spots and smears, called heliotrope, on her eyelids.

The reddish alligator-like skin, known as Gottron papules, covering the knuckles of her hands.

The onset of crippling muscle weakness in her legs and upper body.

She then had an assistant bring in a handful of pages photocopied from an old medical textbook. She handed them to my wife, whose birthday it happened to be that day.

This was her gift -- a diagnosis for her little girl.

That was seven years ago -- Oct. 2, 2002 -- the day our daughter was found to have juvenile dermatomyositis, part of a family of rare autoimmune diseases that can have debilitating and even fatal consequences when not treated quickly and effectively.

Our daughter's first year with the disease consisted of surgical procedures, intravenous infusions, staph infections, pulmonary treatments and worry. Her muscles were too weak for her to walk or swallow solid food for several months. When not in the hospital, she sat on our living room couch, propped up by pillows so she wouldn't tip over, as medicine or nourishment dripped from a bag into her body.

Our daughter, Thing 1, Megan, now age 9, remembers little of that today when she dances or sings or plays soccer. All that remain with her are scars, six to be exact, and the array of pills she takes twice a day to help keep the disease at bay.

What would have happened if it took us more than two months and four doctors before we lucked into someone who could piece all the symptoms together? I don't know.

I do know that the fourth doctor, the one who brought in others to see our daughter's condition so they could easily recognize it if they ever had the misfortune to be presented with it again, was a step toward making sure other parents also never have to find out. That, too, is my purpose today.

It is also my birthday gift to my wife, My Love, Rhonda, for all you have done these past seven years to make others aware of juvenile myositis diseases and help find a cure for them once and for all.

*

To read more about children and families affected by juvenile myositis diseases, visit the Cure JM Foundation.

To make a tax-deductible donation toward JM research, go to my personal FirstGiving page or the Cure JM donations page.

You've Wet Your Bed, Now Sleep In It

We all know for a fact that every single solitary thing that goes wrong in a person’s life, every flaw in one’s being, every bit of sadness they experience, every shortcoming, every unattractive feature, every skill one lacks, every inch of height one fails to grow until one is of a suitable stature to become a basketball star and get rich and famous and yell at cameras that one is not a role model, ALL OF IT can be attributed back to one’s  parents. And of course one’s parents are only flawed because of their parents, who are themselves flawed because of their parents, and so on and so forth, ad infinitum. Buried in the ground somewhere, or perhaps on display in some museum, are the bones of some caveman who is the source of all our problems. Boy, does that fucker need to get an earful.

Someone out there is reading this and taking me seriously. Sigh. 

The New Dyson Hand Held - A DadCentric Review

When Dyson tells you that you are going to receive one of their vacuums for review you tend to get a little excited.  Your mind becomes a montage of countless hours spent in Target sipping on an ICEE with your eyes slowly working the contours of the vacuum of your choice.  You imagine it turning and twisting and mocking your dirtiness with a satisfied smirk and enough suction to turn you inside out.  There is sweat upon your brow and money in your hand, but it is never meant to be. There is a vacuum at home waiting for you and it's all so complicated. The Dyson aisle in Target has grown sticky from so many spilled ICEES and the air hangs heavy with the scent of tears and the lingering smell of Axe body spray.

Where was I? Oh, yes, the Dyson review.  Did I want to try their new hand held (DC-31)? Yes, yes I did. You see, I don't look a gift horse in the mouth, unless said gift horse is Mr. Ed and then I CAN"T STOP STARING.

I opened the Dyson, followed the instructions (appx. time spent: 45 seconds) and plugged the battery in to charge.  And then I paced upon the leavings of life that is my carpet.

The Things They Carried. Or Were Carried In.

There are a lot of things about being a Dad that rock me like a hurricane. For example, the fact that my kids have never heard Rock Me Like A Hurricane, but sometime in the near future I'll suddenly explode it into their lives like a 300lb water balloon full of Teutonic-accented ketchup — and the knowledge that this revelatory act of revelation will leave them quivering blobs of white kid jelly, shaken to their foundations and begging for more. That's the definition of badass, my friends, and perhaps the most powerful argument for parenthood you'll ever hear.

On the flip side: kids generate a lot of crap. I don't mean that in the "I'm incontinent" sense, although god knows that navigating your way through years of diapers and butt wipes and handling the fecal matter of others is more than enough justification for a serious case of the screaming heebie-jeebies. What I mean, gentle reader, is that by virtue of them being little people who don't necessarily want to spend their first hours on earth watching reruns of WKRP in Cincinnati or reading magical realist novels of a New York that never was or... um... sleeping, other things are required to keep them amused, engaged, involved in the world around them and - most importantly - prevent them from screaming every fucking minute of every fucking day.