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< > March 2005

• Wed, Mar 23, 2005 9:22 PM

  just back from "Dear Frankie", a tearjerker about mothers and sons and missing dads, dysfunctional families, etc., so please disregard the following emotional rant and go about your daily business.
  
  i enjoyed this film, because of the anguish it puts me through which makes me feel alive. imagine me, 34 years of stoic-faced non-emotion embedded within, crying like a baby at the longing looks and wispy soundtrack as the boy and the dad skip stones together. seriously, i am getting waaay in touch with my feminine side - it's like suddenly i wanna spend my wednesday afternoons ironing as i watch the soaps.
  
  what i'm not so elegantly saying is that i'm become a very, very different person since i've become a da'. (not "dad" - remember to read this entire entry with a Scottish accent, as that's where 'Dear Frankie' was set, and it gets my wife all hot and bothered when you talk Scottish). i don't think i truly understood what family meant prior to having kids - family was something imposed upon you, and it was simply a given fact, something that would always be.
  
  now, presented with children of my own, i feel not just the grapevines of history, tradition and time, but also an outlet for all the emotion pent up for so long. i really, really, really can't get enough of my kids, and for just one second let's put away the parenting books and stop stressing out about whether i'm overprotective or overly sensitive or whatever and just bathe in the comfort and wonder of the two little kids running around my house.
  
  i'm having a really hard time articulating exactly what IT is, and it's more complex than i think i can wrap my arms around in one sitting. it's a mix-in of pride and love, to be sure, but what i feel is also the feeling of groundedness, and a newfound comfort with myself.
  
  ok, enough non-sensical babbling. go see the damn movie. i'm off to tahoe with the kids to show these kids what snowballs are all about.

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• Mon, Mar 14, 2005 4:49 PM

  today was kaya's first day of school.
  
  ok, that sounds a bit dramatic - it was her first day of PREschool. but it has many of the trappings of regular school - she's now got a place to go 5 days a week, she's got a teacher, and, perhaps the biggest change is that she's got her own CUBBY! it's got her picture on it and everything, and it's quite cute.
  
  unfortunately, due to the neurotic ways of her new school, only mommy was allowed to accompany lil' k today, so i was relinquished to the parking lot for dropoff and pickup duties. still, i couldn't help but find the poignancy in watching my daughter walking through the gates to her new school, where new friends and new experiences awaited her.
  
  this is definitely one of those moments where we relive our own childhoods through our kids. i flashed back to the big yellow school bus, the name tag affixed to my jacket, the butterflies and nerves of a new place, a new routine. it all seems so long ago, and yet i can taste the fear like it was yesterday.
  
  so when she came out later that day, all smiles, i got to ask her for the first of many, many times:
  
  "hey kaya...how was your day?"

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• Fri, Mar 11, 2005 7:00 PM

  is it OK when you're in the shower to let your daughter fill up her tea cups with water running off your weenie?
  
  these are the kinds of moral dilemnas that i face these days.
  
  (in my case, the answer is yes, it is ok. slightly awkward, but ok).

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• Mon, Mar 7, 2005 3:22 PM

  we're back from hawaii. and i've learned some important lessons:
  
  1) trips with young kids just aren't relaxing. even with a nanny and all sorts of helpful hands, you're up early, constantly moving, never resting. i brought a 500-page book for the trip and read exactly 4 pages, none of which i can even remember, of course.
  
  2) trips with young kids are invigorating and nostalgic. there's something truly timeless (and really quite fun) about holding kaya's hands as we walk down the beach, building (and destroying) sand castles, touching dolphins and sea turtles and doing all the stuff that i did from 2-12 and then just stopped.
  
  3) staying in a house on the beach is, well, amazing. we went to sleep every night with the doors open and the waves crashing, and if we wanted to go to the beach, we simply took 30 steps.
  
  we had a great time, and i think lil' k's just getting to that age where she'll remember this stuff for a long time. zade...err, well, he'll get to see lots of pictures of him in a baby bjorn. ;)

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