April 29, 2009
The Death of Cool.
I am hopelessly addicted to wondering if my daughter has poo'd. I know how very uncouth that sounds, trust me. But, I can't help it. Maybe its because at first Violet seemed so uncomfortable around me and I kept burying that reality under the false reasoning of: she's gotta poop. It's a little technique I picked up after years in a band van with four or five other daytime grumps for hours and hours on end. That snarl they were giving me as they fingered a sharp stolen salad fork as I glared at them in my rear view mirror...it wasn't personal. They were backed up. No wonder they'd been acting borderline postal for the last 1400 miles. Now, as Violet and I are progressing nicely and she seems to be getting familiar with my goofy faces and stuff, I still find myself hoping she'll be dirtying her diaper sometime real real soon, but why?
Have I finally lost my battle with basic coolness? I knew it was coming. Hell, everyone knew it was coming; I've been miles away from the cool pool and drip-drying fast for years now. But this?
Hey folks, Serge here, just pulling back my baby's Elmo diaper corner to see if I hit THE FUCKING LOSER'S LOTTERY! Is this at all natural? This can't be natural. Do lion fathers or elephant dads keep hoping there young will crap? This could even be a crime in some states, who the hell knows.
But maybe/just maybe I am dealing with some kind of bizarre reward system here. Maybe that little poo is actually some sort of prize, huh? If I am feeding her right and treating her right and letting her breath air right, then maybe since she can't say too much just yet, maybe that doodie is her, I dunno, her A-OK sign. All is well over here! Please stop staring at me!
Oh Violet, look at your poor Papa. I mean well, I do. But I am feeling somewhat upset that someday before too long you won't have some chic edgy daddy to talk to, or to emulate. Instead, at this rate, you're going to have a perfectly plotted little journal of all the poops you ever took, and plenty of written accounts of how proud your Daddy was to know you were, more often than not, loose as a goose. I haven't started that book yet, but its coming, I'm afraid.
I'll give it to you for your Sweet 16th, along with a homemade coupon that allows you to hold Daddy's head under water for as long as you need to.
Have I finally lost my battle with basic coolness? I knew it was coming. Hell, everyone knew it was coming; I've been miles away from the cool pool and drip-drying fast for years now. But this?
Hey folks, Serge here, just pulling back my baby's Elmo diaper corner to see if I hit THE FUCKING LOSER'S LOTTERY! Is this at all natural? This can't be natural. Do lion fathers or elephant dads keep hoping there young will crap? This could even be a crime in some states, who the hell knows.
But maybe/just maybe I am dealing with some kind of bizarre reward system here. Maybe that little poo is actually some sort of prize, huh? If I am feeding her right and treating her right and letting her breath air right, then maybe since she can't say too much just yet, maybe that doodie is her, I dunno, her A-OK sign. All is well over here! Please stop staring at me!
Oh Violet, look at your poor Papa. I mean well, I do. But I am feeling somewhat upset that someday before too long you won't have some chic edgy daddy to talk to, or to emulate. Instead, at this rate, you're going to have a perfectly plotted little journal of all the poops you ever took, and plenty of written accounts of how proud your Daddy was to know you were, more often than not, loose as a goose. I haven't started that book yet, but its coming, I'm afraid.
I'll give it to you for your Sweet 16th, along with a homemade coupon that allows you to hold Daddy's head under water for as long as you need to.
April 28, 2009
From A Couch In The Sky.
Me and Violet are on the couch. She's milkdrunk, slobber glazed all down her little cheeks, and we just now got done watching some Georgia cops chase a tractor trailer cab down the highway. Live. Usually all we get is some crappy soap, but today the tide turned. Sometimes God works in mysterious ways. And to make our afternoon more super-charged there happened to be a living breathing guy on the back of the truck holding on for keeps out in the fast air.
I worked the daddy angle and explained to my bean blossom that she shouldn't ever do that shit. You don't just stand out on the back end of a big rig and ride around. She slurped at some fallen drops on her forearm and peered up at me with baby sparrow eyeballs.
I explained to her that its bonkers out there and that when she gets older she's going to have to make a lot of decisions every few minutes. Many of those can result in trouble, I told her. Kids do things that are silly sometimes, I said. Expect the unexpected. I felt a bit like an ass but I was all shot up with FatherHood. What the hell am I even saying, I wondered to myself. I pointed at the TV: look at this guy, I told her, you think he woke up a few hours ago and had his Captain Crunch guessing he was gonna be on CNN this afternoon getting truck-jacked and driven around like a hound dog on a summer back road?
She blew a spittle bubble and melted my heart. I was getting through. The guy on the back of the truck pulled his ghost colored t-shirt up over his head. The CNN guy pointed this out.
Honey Bunny, I said, you know Mom and Pop love you more than five-hundred heavens and all but you have to understand that out there...out in the streets, out in the crazy world there are manhole covers that blow up out of the sidewalk for no reason and stingrays and black ice. And killer bees. Acid throwers. And Facebook. I was getting all riled up. I get overcome with emotion about Violet and feel so damn helpless.
Violet began to get fidgety; she seemed distracted...as if she had more critical things to do. The state troopers were pulling up in front of the racing rig which was now sporting two exploded tires. Things on the screen began to wind down. I smelled poo. Even here thousands of miles away you could almost feel the cops getting mega-pumped for the uncertain ending. I leaned down toward DiaperTown and caught the whiff from her diaper. Yep.
Down on to the highway the guy on the back of the truck jumped. It was a safe speed now but dude still hit the concrete, spun, and fell on his ass on live TV. He limped to the roadside, cop cars racing by him like he was just some deer. What a day he was having.
Violet started crying a little. You want Poppa to change that diap?, I asked?
Her long eyelashes blinked. Her interest in our TV time had waned. The state troopers and sheriffs surrounded the stopped truck in the middle of the highway and began banging on the doors and the hood with balled fists and nightsticks. The truck-jacker was hiding in the cab, scared as hell, I guess. I lifted Violet up into my paint-splattered arms and kissed her nose just as a swarm of law finally pulled the guy down from the rig and wrestled him to the grass. And with that, we headed back towards my peanut's room and all the diapers and the Winnie the Poohs and stuff.
I worked the daddy angle and explained to my bean blossom that she shouldn't ever do that shit. You don't just stand out on the back end of a big rig and ride around. She slurped at some fallen drops on her forearm and peered up at me with baby sparrow eyeballs.
I explained to her that its bonkers out there and that when she gets older she's going to have to make a lot of decisions every few minutes. Many of those can result in trouble, I told her. Kids do things that are silly sometimes, I said. Expect the unexpected. I felt a bit like an ass but I was all shot up with FatherHood. What the hell am I even saying, I wondered to myself. I pointed at the TV: look at this guy, I told her, you think he woke up a few hours ago and had his Captain Crunch guessing he was gonna be on CNN this afternoon getting truck-jacked and driven around like a hound dog on a summer back road?
She blew a spittle bubble and melted my heart. I was getting through. The guy on the back of the truck pulled his ghost colored t-shirt up over his head. The CNN guy pointed this out.
Honey Bunny, I said, you know Mom and Pop love you more than five-hundred heavens and all but you have to understand that out there...out in the streets, out in the crazy world there are manhole covers that blow up out of the sidewalk for no reason and stingrays and black ice. And killer bees. Acid throwers. And Facebook. I was getting all riled up. I get overcome with emotion about Violet and feel so damn helpless.
Violet began to get fidgety; she seemed distracted...as if she had more critical things to do. The state troopers were pulling up in front of the racing rig which was now sporting two exploded tires. Things on the screen began to wind down. I smelled poo. Even here thousands of miles away you could almost feel the cops getting mega-pumped for the uncertain ending. I leaned down toward DiaperTown and caught the whiff from her diaper. Yep.
Down on to the highway the guy on the back of the truck jumped. It was a safe speed now but dude still hit the concrete, spun, and fell on his ass on live TV. He limped to the roadside, cop cars racing by him like he was just some deer. What a day he was having.
Violet started crying a little. You want Poppa to change that diap?, I asked?
Her long eyelashes blinked. Her interest in our TV time had waned. The state troopers and sheriffs surrounded the stopped truck in the middle of the highway and began banging on the doors and the hood with balled fists and nightsticks. The truck-jacker was hiding in the cab, scared as hell, I guess. I lifted Violet up into my paint-splattered arms and kissed her nose just as a swarm of law finally pulled the guy down from the rig and wrestled him to the grass. And with that, we headed back towards my peanut's room and all the diapers and the Winnie the Poohs and stuff.
April 27, 2009
Dog Park.
At the top of the trail, me and Danger Violet stare down into the blooming canyon for signs of banditos or grizzlies or Indians. A bright sun in the sky pings off the high snowy peaks above us. The creek in the valley is raging drunk on runoff snow. Even up here we can hear the gushing rapids. Danger Violet lets out a high-pitched sigh and reaches out to grip my finger with her small pink fist.
I know, I say. We gotta go down there, hell or high water.
She squeezes tight then lets up a little. We'll be alright, Mountain Daddy,...she says without words.
A crow flies straight into a picker bush.
We'd better get movin', Danger, I tell her. I can't let on that I am jittery. Fear has no place in this land. With a snap crack of the reigns the two beasts whose purpose in this world is pulling us begin to move hard; black fur ripples over their awoken muscles like a horrific sea heaving charred and drowned sailors at a midnight sky. They are a team -- related maybe, probably in-bred-- from over in Labrador, a small mining outpost way back in the Siskadee Valley where beasts and peoples mix in bad ways and the outcome can be as perverse, as hellacious as these two in front of us. Half man? Half oxen? Wolf, whale? No one knows. No one wants to know. Each of their living moments is nothing but a curse to them. They reek of Satan's innards. One is called Max and one is called Milo and it wouldn't surprise me if either one of 'em turned around any second and put high holes in my gizzard, them being so protective of my green young partner and all. Danger Violet is the only one they recognize. The rest of us are just biding our time in their filthy company.
We descend on loose rock. I try and take things ginger but the beasts pull us in their desperate way. Beasts out-know any darn fool man that this is mean country and its best to pass down and through swiftly and silent. My burden is made more cumbersome: Danger Violet is strapped to my chest in a sacred elk belly Indian pouch. As things have panned out Danger Violet ain't too fond of walking and I'll be livershot if I'm the man to argue with her. So she moves across the wilderness bolted to my chest like a Lakota arrow come home to roost in my rotted heart. Our ways are our ways.
In the river bottoms I cut the black devils loose. In an instant they are gone. They need water and will do us more good if they are way out in front. Should a wildcat get stealthy, they'll wind it and tear it to bits or perish in the pursuit. And should Indians appear in the ways of a summer mist, well, their bullet ridden beast bodies will make good places for Danger Violet and I to hide behind, or under should it come to that.
We are alone here now, Mountain Daddy and Danger Violet. And we still have so damn far to travel. The late afternoon sun collapses down upon the tender green shoots and buds of early spring. Without each other we might not make it out of here. Our bleached white bones crinkle cut with a thousand coyote's teeth and laid out in these lush grasses for some half-drunk trapper to stumble on some other season long from now. Yet, we are not alone. We are together. And together by God we are determined to climb up out of this godforsaken canyon someday soon. Soiled but unbroken. Then, by the grace of so many unseen angels, we'll wander many many miles back to the homes we left long ago for reasons we can no longer even recall.
I know, I say. We gotta go down there, hell or high water.
She squeezes tight then lets up a little. We'll be alright, Mountain Daddy,...she says without words.
A crow flies straight into a picker bush.
We'd better get movin', Danger, I tell her. I can't let on that I am jittery. Fear has no place in this land. With a snap crack of the reigns the two beasts whose purpose in this world is pulling us begin to move hard; black fur ripples over their awoken muscles like a horrific sea heaving charred and drowned sailors at a midnight sky. They are a team -- related maybe, probably in-bred-- from over in Labrador, a small mining outpost way back in the Siskadee Valley where beasts and peoples mix in bad ways and the outcome can be as perverse, as hellacious as these two in front of us. Half man? Half oxen? Wolf, whale? No one knows. No one wants to know. Each of their living moments is nothing but a curse to them. They reek of Satan's innards. One is called Max and one is called Milo and it wouldn't surprise me if either one of 'em turned around any second and put high holes in my gizzard, them being so protective of my green young partner and all. Danger Violet is the only one they recognize. The rest of us are just biding our time in their filthy company.
We descend on loose rock. I try and take things ginger but the beasts pull us in their desperate way. Beasts out-know any darn fool man that this is mean country and its best to pass down and through swiftly and silent. My burden is made more cumbersome: Danger Violet is strapped to my chest in a sacred elk belly Indian pouch. As things have panned out Danger Violet ain't too fond of walking and I'll be livershot if I'm the man to argue with her. So she moves across the wilderness bolted to my chest like a Lakota arrow come home to roost in my rotted heart. Our ways are our ways.
In the river bottoms I cut the black devils loose. In an instant they are gone. They need water and will do us more good if they are way out in front. Should a wildcat get stealthy, they'll wind it and tear it to bits or perish in the pursuit. And should Indians appear in the ways of a summer mist, well, their bullet ridden beast bodies will make good places for Danger Violet and I to hide behind, or under should it come to that.
We are alone here now, Mountain Daddy and Danger Violet. And we still have so damn far to travel. The late afternoon sun collapses down upon the tender green shoots and buds of early spring. Without each other we might not make it out of here. Our bleached white bones crinkle cut with a thousand coyote's teeth and laid out in these lush grasses for some half-drunk trapper to stumble on some other season long from now. Yet, we are not alone. We are together. And together by God we are determined to climb up out of this godforsaken canyon someday soon. Soiled but unbroken. Then, by the grace of so many unseen angels, we'll wander many many miles back to the homes we left long ago for reasons we can no longer even recall.
April 25, 2009
On Saturday We Rocked.
Its 7am on a Saturday and I am not hung over in a hotel bed. And I wonder what that means. For so long, my life was double-stapled to a few sure things, things that defined the road I'd taken. Bleary eyed early mornings in far flung places was my thing. With last night's sweat caked to my skin like a fried trout, I'd bounce out of a bed I'd never sleep in again and prepare to travel hundreds of miles away from that place fast. Playing in a rock'n'roll band meant moving, always. Stopping, pausing was suicide. What love and money had been available to you a few hours ago were completely gone now. To survive, you had to go.
But here I am this morning writing on a laptop by a muted TV. I am not still drunk from last night. I didn't drink at all. There is no mysterious hot woman here looking for her other Chuck Taylor. There is a woman who remains a mystery to me and she's sexy as fuck and all, but she is sleeping like a stone in the bedroom, there's an empty wine bottle by the trashcan in the kitchen, and if she's dreaming at all right now: it ain't about me. And there's my peanut here too; Violet...passed out in her electric swing. Milk drunk. And the whole little vignette has got me positively confused this morning as to whether or not all my youth is dead.
Its the stuff of so many novels and memoirs, I know. The whole searching your heart for the truer meaning of life. Family is everything. Strength and Honor. But its all so exhausting too. At what point did I actually make the decision that seems to have somehow been made here? At what precise moment, at what exact second, did my mind and my heart and my gut all limp over to the same beater convertible, climb in with resignation faces, and head off over the proverbial distant hills dipping below a sunset horizon and pointed at the fairytale cities of FinallyGrownUp and BitterFucker...uncertain which one they'd eventually settle on. And where the heck was I when this was going down? How come I keep missing these somewhat monumental decision-making Pow-Wows that decide, like, everything.
I don't know what I really want and that pisses me off. I am probably supposed to have it somewhat figured out by now. I don't. In my adult life I delivered auto parts and then played guitar. For years. So, I wasn't exactly your Mr Career Path. Don't get me wrong either, I had a blast. A sensational blast. And what's to come...it will be a blast too. Maybe even more of a blast, but different. I know this. It's just...oh forget it.
What I don't know for certain is what I'm supposed to do today. It's going to be a rainy Saturday and I am in a city I never dreamed I'd live in with a wife and a baby I'd never dreamed would know me and actually love me with serious dependent love and we can't just go around killing time walking around the damn mall or whatever now can we?
Dude, dude, dude. Of course you can.
But here I am this morning writing on a laptop by a muted TV. I am not still drunk from last night. I didn't drink at all. There is no mysterious hot woman here looking for her other Chuck Taylor. There is a woman who remains a mystery to me and she's sexy as fuck and all, but she is sleeping like a stone in the bedroom, there's an empty wine bottle by the trashcan in the kitchen, and if she's dreaming at all right now: it ain't about me. And there's my peanut here too; Violet...passed out in her electric swing. Milk drunk. And the whole little vignette has got me positively confused this morning as to whether or not all my youth is dead.
Its the stuff of so many novels and memoirs, I know. The whole searching your heart for the truer meaning of life. Family is everything. Strength and Honor. But its all so exhausting too. At what point did I actually make the decision that seems to have somehow been made here? At what precise moment, at what exact second, did my mind and my heart and my gut all limp over to the same beater convertible, climb in with resignation faces, and head off over the proverbial distant hills dipping below a sunset horizon and pointed at the fairytale cities of FinallyGrownUp and BitterFucker...uncertain which one they'd eventually settle on. And where the heck was I when this was going down? How come I keep missing these somewhat monumental decision-making Pow-Wows that decide, like, everything.
I don't know what I really want and that pisses me off. I am probably supposed to have it somewhat figured out by now. I don't. In my adult life I delivered auto parts and then played guitar. For years. So, I wasn't exactly your Mr Career Path. Don't get me wrong either, I had a blast. A sensational blast. And what's to come...it will be a blast too. Maybe even more of a blast, but different. I know this. It's just...oh forget it.
What I don't know for certain is what I'm supposed to do today. It's going to be a rainy Saturday and I am in a city I never dreamed I'd live in with a wife and a baby I'd never dreamed would know me and actually love me with serious dependent love and we can't just go around killing time walking around the damn mall or whatever now can we?
Dude, dude, dude. Of course you can.
April 24, 2009
Bah-Bah-Baby.
I have many dreams for my daughter. I have four savings bonds so far and way more cutesy outfits than she'll ever be able to wear. On the bookshelf by the tv await copies of Hans Christan Andersen, Brothers Grimm, Aesop's fables, Little House On The Prairie, and The Wind In The Willows.
Ahem, on this other bookshelf over here we have this twelve volume edition of The Definitive Journals of Lewis and Clark which cost me over a hundred bucks and which Monica still thinks I bought for myself. Why would you think that, baby? You seriously think I'd wait til you announced you were pregnant and then immediately order something like that? And that I'd make the foolish buy pretending that it was a gift for our daughter who was still nine months away from being born, let alone much interested in the discarded crumbs of a long ago journey across America? Honestly? Jeez. You really don't know me at all.
So anyways, as you can see: I got her entire future mapped out just fine. Mapped out. Hmph...that's kinda Lewis and Clark huh? Fuckin brilliant.
One thing I wish I could give her years from now though, I won't be able to. The Howard Stern Show. In all my years of music listening and movie watching and book looking and seeing paintings and watching very intense installations of David Beckham sleeping like an angel fallen to Earth from The Glory Cloud( what a wasted fuckin afternoon that was)....in all those years of mopping up my corner of culture's dusty floor...nothing has ever made me more giddy, or happier, or so overcome with joy and laughter than the King of All Media and his radio show.
Since I was about 15, its been there on my radio. And if what you think is that I was intoxicated by the sound of strippers moaning into a mic, let me tell you the truth: I already had like eight video tapes with that sort of stuff. From the beginning The Stern Show, even at its perverted peaks, has always been way way more than that to me.. Sex and sexism. Race and racism. Laughing at and laughing with. This thing, this radio show has helped me to understand better than, dare I say, anything else, that life is beautifully messed up. And that you need to sit with people you aren't familiar with and share some simple wasting time with 'em before you can seriously judge them. That may sound like an inflated boast, or some very warped stretch of a plug for this particular show, but I stand by it with everything I got. Plain and simple: the Stern Show helped me to learn what it is to be a liberal-minded person who sometimes wants to run over dumb-ass people in his car, but probably shouldn't.
The art of conversation is dying. It just is. Technology reigns and if we don't dig that, then we too fade away. I really really hope to be able to have family dinners with Violet as she gets older, talk about our days out in the world. But chances are we'll be lucky to have that every now and then rather than each night. With Stern and his greatest pageant ever given, me and Monica have had weird connections even when we're not together. Something happens on the show and we both nearly piss our pants with laughter... together but in different places. And often, its the first thing we can't wait to talk about when we hook up again. So, you might think I am a shitty dad for actually wishing that The Howard Stern Show would last forever, so that my daughter could one day listen in. But you'd be wrong. By laughing for so long at the things we aren't supposed to laugh at, I have learned to love what is so drastically different than me, that others want to stomp it dead with Biblical Doc Martens. Fuck them. I want Violet to know that laughter and all the wisdom hiding out inside it.
Ahem, on this other bookshelf over here we have this twelve volume edition of The Definitive Journals of Lewis and Clark which cost me over a hundred bucks and which Monica still thinks I bought for myself. Why would you think that, baby? You seriously think I'd wait til you announced you were pregnant and then immediately order something like that? And that I'd make the foolish buy pretending that it was a gift for our daughter who was still nine months away from being born, let alone much interested in the discarded crumbs of a long ago journey across America? Honestly? Jeez. You really don't know me at all.
So anyways, as you can see: I got her entire future mapped out just fine. Mapped out. Hmph...that's kinda Lewis and Clark huh? Fuckin brilliant.
One thing I wish I could give her years from now though, I won't be able to. The Howard Stern Show. In all my years of music listening and movie watching and book looking and seeing paintings and watching very intense installations of David Beckham sleeping like an angel fallen to Earth from The Glory Cloud( what a wasted fuckin afternoon that was)....in all those years of mopping up my corner of culture's dusty floor...nothing has ever made me more giddy, or happier, or so overcome with joy and laughter than the King of All Media and his radio show.
Since I was about 15, its been there on my radio. And if what you think is that I was intoxicated by the sound of strippers moaning into a mic, let me tell you the truth: I already had like eight video tapes with that sort of stuff. From the beginning The Stern Show, even at its perverted peaks, has always been way way more than that to me.. Sex and sexism. Race and racism. Laughing at and laughing with. This thing, this radio show has helped me to understand better than, dare I say, anything else, that life is beautifully messed up. And that you need to sit with people you aren't familiar with and share some simple wasting time with 'em before you can seriously judge them. That may sound like an inflated boast, or some very warped stretch of a plug for this particular show, but I stand by it with everything I got. Plain and simple: the Stern Show helped me to learn what it is to be a liberal-minded person who sometimes wants to run over dumb-ass people in his car, but probably shouldn't.
The art of conversation is dying. It just is. Technology reigns and if we don't dig that, then we too fade away. I really really hope to be able to have family dinners with Violet as she gets older, talk about our days out in the world. But chances are we'll be lucky to have that every now and then rather than each night. With Stern and his greatest pageant ever given, me and Monica have had weird connections even when we're not together. Something happens on the show and we both nearly piss our pants with laughter... together but in different places. And often, its the first thing we can't wait to talk about when we hook up again. So, you might think I am a shitty dad for actually wishing that The Howard Stern Show would last forever, so that my daughter could one day listen in. But you'd be wrong. By laughing for so long at the things we aren't supposed to laugh at, I have learned to love what is so drastically different than me, that others want to stomp it dead with Biblical Doc Martens. Fuck them. I want Violet to know that laughter and all the wisdom hiding out inside it.
April 20, 2009
Ladies and Gentlemen, My Face Is Melting.
On Monday, around lunchtime, El Diablo backed his black'n'flame three-story dump truck right up to my house, released a lever, and unloaded a good three or four tons of hellfire onto the roof. It came crashing down into the living room where I was standing and landed on Violet, who was in my arms semi-asleep. There I was one second just whiffing her milky burps, my nose to hers, a little lullabye to see her off. And then out of the blue my baby gets dipped in Inferno.
Her eyes bulged and I gently asked her what was up. You burping? She didn't really respond but rather began throttling her stubby arms as if she was trying to take off for a little flight around the room. Then, the dreaded sounds: slow rolling fogs of moan that pile into and on top of one another like a terrible highway scene, until its just a single blood-curdling scream on high.
Oh my.
I panicked, I guess. I tried the binky but but no dice. We whirled around the room singing fucking Rudolph The Red Nosed Reindeer again ; these days in times of despair it is my go-to tune even though I don't want it to be; it just is. Purple baby face. Tears. Crying so hard you can see the dogs look up at you with eyes begging for me to shower mercy upon them, to spare us all this harsh midday torture session. But it was useless. Everything was useless.
Six hours later it was still pretty much going on. I'd put her down for a sec in her swing, the fires would burn hotter. I'd pick her up, move toward...I dunno...the yard?...and she'd squeal the squeal of an unsettled soul. I fed. I diaper changed. I stood by the shower, hoping the tranquility of running water might enchant her. Nada. Twice giant poos offered the possible promise of relief...but no. Finally, I felt the Devil's fingers grappling in my torched hair.He was flirting with me and it was fucking working. Seduced by evil: I looked down at my daughter and screamed out 'NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!'
I set poor bawling Violet down in her crib and walked into the bathroom and slapped myself in the face. Except what was supposed to be a slap became a fist punch in the spirit of the moment, and so I actually punched myself on the high cheek. Pain shot through my adrenaline and tickled a nerve. But I liked it, needed it. Iate the pain like a hot wing. It was delicious, spicy. And no, I hadn't been close to belting Violet right then either. It was more that I needed to chill myself out by setting the babe down for a moment and bashing myself in the noodle. So, I stood there looking in the mirror at my mug. Maybe I took a couple deep breaths,I don't know. There was still big crying in the other room, but it had faded to background music.
An hour later, around 8, she finally passed out. I stared at her exquisite smallness as she breathed out and in over and over in my arms. We were both exhausted, our spirits water-logged. How could such a tender innocent three-month old ever pull off such an unholy display of terror? And oh the commitment. The hours of dedicated discomfort. Never giving in. Rarely giving up. What had it been, I wondered. Was it gas? An early tooth beginning to poke out? A full moon?
No.No. And no. It was: the devil, plain and simple. And we beat him at his own game, Violet. All that legendary badness and you and me, we licked him. And we'll do it again when we need to, huh? Just give Daddy a couple of days, sweetheart. Please.
Her eyes bulged and I gently asked her what was up. You burping? She didn't really respond but rather began throttling her stubby arms as if she was trying to take off for a little flight around the room. Then, the dreaded sounds: slow rolling fogs of moan that pile into and on top of one another like a terrible highway scene, until its just a single blood-curdling scream on high.
Oh my.
I panicked, I guess. I tried the binky but but no dice. We whirled around the room singing fucking Rudolph The Red Nosed Reindeer again ; these days in times of despair it is my go-to tune even though I don't want it to be; it just is. Purple baby face. Tears. Crying so hard you can see the dogs look up at you with eyes begging for me to shower mercy upon them, to spare us all this harsh midday torture session. But it was useless. Everything was useless.
Six hours later it was still pretty much going on. I'd put her down for a sec in her swing, the fires would burn hotter. I'd pick her up, move toward...I dunno...the yard?...and she'd squeal the squeal of an unsettled soul. I fed. I diaper changed. I stood by the shower, hoping the tranquility of running water might enchant her. Nada. Twice giant poos offered the possible promise of relief...but no. Finally, I felt the Devil's fingers grappling in my torched hair.He was flirting with me and it was fucking working. Seduced by evil: I looked down at my daughter and screamed out 'NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!'
I set poor bawling Violet down in her crib and walked into the bathroom and slapped myself in the face. Except what was supposed to be a slap became a fist punch in the spirit of the moment, and so I actually punched myself on the high cheek. Pain shot through my adrenaline and tickled a nerve. But I liked it, needed it. Iate the pain like a hot wing. It was delicious, spicy. And no, I hadn't been close to belting Violet right then either. It was more that I needed to chill myself out by setting the babe down for a moment and bashing myself in the noodle. So, I stood there looking in the mirror at my mug. Maybe I took a couple deep breaths,I don't know. There was still big crying in the other room, but it had faded to background music.
An hour later, around 8, she finally passed out. I stared at her exquisite smallness as she breathed out and in over and over in my arms. We were both exhausted, our spirits water-logged. How could such a tender innocent three-month old ever pull off such an unholy display of terror? And oh the commitment. The hours of dedicated discomfort. Never giving in. Rarely giving up. What had it been, I wondered. Was it gas? An early tooth beginning to poke out? A full moon?
No.No. And no. It was: the devil, plain and simple. And we beat him at his own game, Violet. All that legendary badness and you and me, we licked him. And we'll do it again when we need to, huh? Just give Daddy a couple of days, sweetheart. Please.
The Ballad Of Two Couch Potatoes.
Watching Violet this past week has been just badass. She'll be sitting in her electric swing, eyes completely fixated upon the little pink and brown mobile that's attached, and all of the sudden, BAM! She starts to coo and sigh and she moves her eyes toward me or her momma and let's out a shrill exclamation of recognition, or love, or "I have crapped myself...a little help here, folks!" The messages are sort of lost in translation. But the gist is clear enough. She is beginning to connect the dots that shape our world. Watching her eyes widen just before she lets out a sound, its almost as if I can see the soldering going on inside her baby brain, teeny wisps of smoke leaking from her ears. Sweet connections are being made over here and then over there as lines of current are opened for the very first time. I had never given it a moment of thought before, that life begins so beautifully: with swinging in the living room and mobile flowers and the sounds of a three-month old recognizing something or feeling excitement. Now its crammed into every nook of me.
Maybe the best part of all this is seeing that my daughter is captivated by the TV. Yeah yeah, I know, studies show that too much television dulls a child's intellect and limits learning capacity and ultimately leads to unemployment, bongs, and dreams that die on the wings of an eagle that lives in the basement. But, I don't know. I ain't parking Violet in front of the tube for hours on end or anything. Its more like when she is chillin for a bit, no crying/no fussing, and I am able to hit the pause button on the day for a sec and grab a Diet Coke and some pretzels; I set her up, softly lodged, in the crack between the cushions on the sofa. Then, we watch a little pro bass fishing or baseball or Friends and she glares at the damn thing as if she can see something far beyond the screen: some hidden world of secrets being revealed to chosen babies. It's an impressive attention she pays.
Sitting there on the couch and relaxing for a little while as a long day winds down,...that can't be all bad, right? I mean, leaning up on somebody else's story can be a good thing sometimes, no? Everybody can say what they want about how to raise the perfect baby and how TV can hurt their intellectual chances down the road, maybe even make them dumb. But I don't know. We each have to trust our guts when it comes to all this. And here and there, television allows me and Violet a bit of a break each evening. A respite from all that seriously hard work going on during the live-long day. Something to watch together between all this getting used to each other.
Maybe the best part of all this is seeing that my daughter is captivated by the TV. Yeah yeah, I know, studies show that too much television dulls a child's intellect and limits learning capacity and ultimately leads to unemployment, bongs, and dreams that die on the wings of an eagle that lives in the basement. But, I don't know. I ain't parking Violet in front of the tube for hours on end or anything. Its more like when she is chillin for a bit, no crying/no fussing, and I am able to hit the pause button on the day for a sec and grab a Diet Coke and some pretzels; I set her up, softly lodged, in the crack between the cushions on the sofa. Then, we watch a little pro bass fishing or baseball or Friends and she glares at the damn thing as if she can see something far beyond the screen: some hidden world of secrets being revealed to chosen babies. It's an impressive attention she pays.
Sitting there on the couch and relaxing for a little while as a long day winds down,...that can't be all bad, right? I mean, leaning up on somebody else's story can be a good thing sometimes, no? Everybody can say what they want about how to raise the perfect baby and how TV can hurt their intellectual chances down the road, maybe even make them dumb. But I don't know. We each have to trust our guts when it comes to all this. And here and there, television allows me and Violet a bit of a break each evening. A respite from all that seriously hard work going on during the live-long day. Something to watch together between all this getting used to each other.
April 17, 2009
Modern Love.
Me and my wife will be married forever, and probably, the way things are going, in the goddamn After-Life too. I know this despite recent events because I smell love coming from our room. It is early in the morning here and I woke up at Violet's first chirps of the day. Mainly that happened because when I heard her and rolled over and looked at my phone it said it was 4:30am and that's when TMZ comes on the tv. So: I lifted her gently out of the crib and we moved on in the darkness, toward the gossipy light. A few steps on, I felt my daughter's tiny bottom let out a tiny fart and it wafted up kind of milky and not unsweet and so I just knew then and there that anybody who could team up with me to create such a tiny bit of pure tiny awesomeness, well, that woman was gonna have staying power. Long long love. Like it or not.
Then, I got Violet to sleep in the swing for a bit and was feeling sorta romantic for Monica...well, during the commercials. She's a really complicated treasure with a tender motherly heart. And she loves me with the gangsta fierceness that sometimes means she has to bitch-slap me in the face, but that once we settle down, maybe gorge on some burritos, we all good. Often, we end up even better than before. Now lately, she's been acting kind of sexy like, showing me her pre-baby jeans on her ass and stuff. This is never bad.
The thing is though, I never even really noticed any weight gain on her. I mean, yeah she did get pregnant with a baby and all but I guess maybe that didn't register with me as a physical weight thing. It almost seemed more like spiritual. Or like she was just wearing an easily un-zipable fat suit. Maybe it's because there wasn't exactly a lot of doin' it on the kitchen counter while she was busy throwing up every twenty minutes...so my sexual radar wasn't powered to full. Whatever it was, I always felt she looked glowing (sweaty?) and natural (pissed?).
Now though, we are back landed on Earth. Back to real life with baby. And if my lady says she wants to get back to her pre-pregnancy weight, well then who the hell am I to say anything? Look at Tori Spelling, right hon? That girl had her second baby and then was back to HER OWN BIRTH WEIGHT of 8 lbs 4 oz within a day. Nice. Plus, the way I see it, I weigh way less now than I did in high school when I'd smoke three bowls after my mom went to bed and then eat mozzarella sticks or Twinkies dipped in pudding cup.
It's hard being the hot one, but I enjoyed it while it lasted. That's all I'm saying.
Then, I got Violet to sleep in the swing for a bit and was feeling sorta romantic for Monica...well, during the commercials. She's a really complicated treasure with a tender motherly heart. And she loves me with the gangsta fierceness that sometimes means she has to bitch-slap me in the face, but that once we settle down, maybe gorge on some burritos, we all good. Often, we end up even better than before. Now lately, she's been acting kind of sexy like, showing me her pre-baby jeans on her ass and stuff. This is never bad.
The thing is though, I never even really noticed any weight gain on her. I mean, yeah she did get pregnant with a baby and all but I guess maybe that didn't register with me as a physical weight thing. It almost seemed more like spiritual. Or like she was just wearing an easily un-zipable fat suit. Maybe it's because there wasn't exactly a lot of doin' it on the kitchen counter while she was busy throwing up every twenty minutes...so my sexual radar wasn't powered to full. Whatever it was, I always felt she looked glowing (sweaty?) and natural (pissed?).
Now though, we are back landed on Earth. Back to real life with baby. And if my lady says she wants to get back to her pre-pregnancy weight, well then who the hell am I to say anything? Look at Tori Spelling, right hon? That girl had her second baby and then was back to HER OWN BIRTH WEIGHT of 8 lbs 4 oz within a day. Nice. Plus, the way I see it, I weigh way less now than I did in high school when I'd smoke three bowls after my mom went to bed and then eat mozzarella sticks or Twinkies dipped in pudding cup.
It's hard being the hot one, but I enjoyed it while it lasted. That's all I'm saying.
April 15, 2009
Holiday Road.
Yesterday at work I thought maybe I was having a heart attack. My chest got all tight and there was pain. I kept going though, John Henry mofo that I am...I kept mortaring tiles up on the scuzzy bathroom wall. All the while I waited for the legendary tingling of the arm or the blurred vision. Didn't happen. I did stop once for a sec to do a Fred Sanford chest pound with my fist. Insult to injury, that was. Anyhow, my not-so-near death morning got me to thinking about Violet and how much it would suck to croak now, before we've had any Christmases together.
Back in December, when Monica would just puke in a plastic bag in the car as breezily as if she were enjoying a snack cake, I tried to buy unborn Violet a Santa Claus outfit. But my wife put her swollen foot down on that one. Up til then I'd been allowed to indulge myself whenever we had a couple bucks. I picked up some cool duds at Old Navy, last year's fashions I guess. Whatever. And then one Sunday afternoon we were at Crazy Wal-Mart, where children are free to open shit up and ride it like lightning down the aisles, when I spotted a bumble-bee outfit. Oh no they dih-int!, I said to myself.
I had to have it. It cost 9 dollars. And the way I look at the world is through hourly-paid eyes so it didn't take me long to configure that almost one whole hour of dusty hard labor in my life was now about to add up to a BeeGirl suit for a kid I don't even know yet. Still, I didn't flinch. And I was prepared to argue or even get physical for my wonderful find (yes yes, it's fine to throat-punch your wife here, sir!...that's why we call it CRAZY Wal-Mart, yo.) No need though, as Monica smiled/sighed and I was a proud poppa-to-bee. It is thirty-six sizes to big, of course, but I am feeding her extra baby formula on the sly to fatten her up. Shhh.
Where's this going? I'll tell ya. In between having little heart attacks and and giant panic attacks I have been slowly planning Violet's first Christmas. I have always loved that time of year, chaos and financial hardships aside. There is nostalgia in these nicotined bones; a nearly constant longing for a wintery night and a glowing window with me behind it; for that special "seasonal" red wine buzz and a coffee table heaving with sliced pepperoni and supermarket cheddar on a snowflake dish. And Emmett Otter or Elf on the tube. A tree so high it curls at the ceiling. And presents wrapped up in festive paper. A beer buzz. Ice cream. Antlers on the dogs. I love it, all of it. Need it to live. Need it to sparkle ever so faintly from months and months away like a jolly old eye winking at me from the North Pole. Keep-on-keepin'-on there, Serge. Suck it up and fling off them chest pains, son! There's another Christmas coming 267 days from now!
And now, thanks to Violet I am absolutely insane with Christmas fever. I cannot wait to share with her the Santa story and the baby Jesus story and the Grinch story and how to use a candycane as a pepperminty straw in soda. And, of course, I already got her her first gift. BeeSuit. And yeah, I know, as Monica has so reminded me: this year Violet will be 11 months at the holidays, still slobbering down her pretty little face. Probably won't know how to speak at all. But, whatever. She will love the thing that I love....that unmistakably enchanted time of year
when grown men and women who still believe in little wonders are able to put their stupid petty concerns aside for the sake of the children! And the man-children!
So, here's us practicing our tunes. Its never too early, people. Never ever.
Back in December, when Monica would just puke in a plastic bag in the car as breezily as if she were enjoying a snack cake, I tried to buy unborn Violet a Santa Claus outfit. But my wife put her swollen foot down on that one. Up til then I'd been allowed to indulge myself whenever we had a couple bucks. I picked up some cool duds at Old Navy, last year's fashions I guess. Whatever. And then one Sunday afternoon we were at Crazy Wal-Mart, where children are free to open shit up and ride it like lightning down the aisles, when I spotted a bumble-bee outfit. Oh no they dih-int!, I said to myself.
I had to have it. It cost 9 dollars. And the way I look at the world is through hourly-paid eyes so it didn't take me long to configure that almost one whole hour of dusty hard labor in my life was now about to add up to a BeeGirl suit for a kid I don't even know yet. Still, I didn't flinch. And I was prepared to argue or even get physical for my wonderful find (yes yes, it's fine to throat-punch your wife here, sir!...that's why we call it CRAZY Wal-Mart, yo.) No need though, as Monica smiled/sighed and I was a proud poppa-to-bee. It is thirty-six sizes to big, of course, but I am feeding her extra baby formula on the sly to fatten her up. Shhh.
Where's this going? I'll tell ya. In between having little heart attacks and and giant panic attacks I have been slowly planning Violet's first Christmas. I have always loved that time of year, chaos and financial hardships aside. There is nostalgia in these nicotined bones; a nearly constant longing for a wintery night and a glowing window with me behind it; for that special "seasonal" red wine buzz and a coffee table heaving with sliced pepperoni and supermarket cheddar on a snowflake dish. And Emmett Otter or Elf on the tube. A tree so high it curls at the ceiling. And presents wrapped up in festive paper. A beer buzz. Ice cream. Antlers on the dogs. I love it, all of it. Need it to live. Need it to sparkle ever so faintly from months and months away like a jolly old eye winking at me from the North Pole. Keep-on-keepin'-on there, Serge. Suck it up and fling off them chest pains, son! There's another Christmas coming 267 days from now!
And now, thanks to Violet I am absolutely insane with Christmas fever. I cannot wait to share with her the Santa story and the baby Jesus story and the Grinch story and how to use a candycane as a pepperminty straw in soda. And, of course, I already got her her first gift. BeeSuit. And yeah, I know, as Monica has so reminded me: this year Violet will be 11 months at the holidays, still slobbering down her pretty little face. Probably won't know how to speak at all. But, whatever. She will love the thing that I love....that unmistakably enchanted time of year
when grown men and women who still believe in little wonders are able to put their stupid petty concerns aside for the sake of the children! And the man-children!
So, here's us practicing our tunes. Its never too early, people. Never ever.
April 13, 2009
Summer Nights.
Out back my Uncle Carl's house, the long summer day would draw cool air into its engines, then kill the power to glide like a phantom from out of the sky, over across the cattail reeds and wooden docks and down along avenues of curving lagoon. Around flag-less poles, once popping with afternoon flags now safely lowered and put away by retirees who folded them ever so gently in the old style, the evening would rise up from the baked pebbles of the unfenced yard and spread out into all the places day had been an hour or so ago. Under the seagulls, I would stare across the bay at the twinkling lights of Atlantic City getting turned on.
It was 1981, and the Philadelphia mafia was everywhere over there, killing and gambling. But I didn't know, or care. My fingers smelled like sand shark and flounder from all the fish we'd been catching. My hair was matted with salt and wind. I was away from home, alone without my Mom, for the first time. A week of fishing in my ex-State Trooper uncle's small boat. Of fried fish and lemon. And a week of falling asleep to the gentle voice of summer. Harry Kalas.
After I'd helped with dishes and kissed my Aunt Betty goodnight through her breath of a couple Manhattans, I'd skip steps up to my room, close the door behind me and turn on the radio for the Phils. Baseball was my life, was everything in the universe that could possibly mean anything at all. Well, baseball and baseball cards. There in the dark, I would lay on the cool clean sheets and listen to that distant galaxy I loved.
Harry Kalas and Richie "Whitey" Ashburn were the Phillies announcers. And they were my captains into the boundless night. Their sly war-buddy rapport made me somehow feel more grown-up, kind of like my Uncle Carl made me feel at his house that week; I probably could have mixed myself a Manhattan in front of him and he'd of let me down it. The way they'd poke each other just a bit during long stretches of time when little was happening on the field, I just loved it.
That week, as the Phillies played the Expos or whoever, I listened to every single second of broadcast. At times Whitey would chuckle for no real reason, and you could almost tell that he and Harry were conducting an inside joke. Whitey would laugh at someting unknown to me. Then, some really long moments of the sparse Expo crowd: a lone holler, an airhorn in the upper deck, the peanut vendor's pitch. And finally, Harry would come back in like a jazz genius, a smile on his voice, and say something simple like its Fireworks Night at the Vet in Philly in two weeks...and the whole fuckin' thing played out like the most wonderous American opera ever written. I had a week of that. Of flounder fishing and that. Was one of the greatest of my life.
Later, me and my brother Dave had a friend pull some strings for our band. Next thing you know we were in the bowels of the ballpark where the Phils lived and Harry Kalas was recording some stuff for us for our first record. Just some things we'd written just for him to say. He was really gracious and nice. Me and Dave were in awe of him. All of our lives, his voice had been there. Now here we were together. He told us to go down on the field before the afternoon's game. He made sure it was ok. Then, he invited us into the announcing booth. It was just him and Whitey and us. We stayed a whole half inning. Harry introduced us to people as "the band guys". It felt like a dream.
Anyways, lots of guys like me have baseball memories. We were the last of a kind in a lotta ways, I guess. Still, my guy died today. Harry Kalas. And with him goes something I will never know again. A deep gentle timbre to guide me through the black of space to some brightly lit concrete spaceship landed on the edge of a dirty city. A once-in-a-lifetime voice that brought baseball to my room for many many years. I hope my little daughter experiences something so cool in her lifetime. Maybe not with baseball, but with whatever it is that captures her young heart and mind.
Night, Harry. Thank you.
It was 1981, and the Philadelphia mafia was everywhere over there, killing and gambling. But I didn't know, or care. My fingers smelled like sand shark and flounder from all the fish we'd been catching. My hair was matted with salt and wind. I was away from home, alone without my Mom, for the first time. A week of fishing in my ex-State Trooper uncle's small boat. Of fried fish and lemon. And a week of falling asleep to the gentle voice of summer. Harry Kalas.
After I'd helped with dishes and kissed my Aunt Betty goodnight through her breath of a couple Manhattans, I'd skip steps up to my room, close the door behind me and turn on the radio for the Phils. Baseball was my life, was everything in the universe that could possibly mean anything at all. Well, baseball and baseball cards. There in the dark, I would lay on the cool clean sheets and listen to that distant galaxy I loved.
Harry Kalas and Richie "Whitey" Ashburn were the Phillies announcers. And they were my captains into the boundless night. Their sly war-buddy rapport made me somehow feel more grown-up, kind of like my Uncle Carl made me feel at his house that week; I probably could have mixed myself a Manhattan in front of him and he'd of let me down it. The way they'd poke each other just a bit during long stretches of time when little was happening on the field, I just loved it.
That week, as the Phillies played the Expos or whoever, I listened to every single second of broadcast. At times Whitey would chuckle for no real reason, and you could almost tell that he and Harry were conducting an inside joke. Whitey would laugh at someting unknown to me. Then, some really long moments of the sparse Expo crowd: a lone holler, an airhorn in the upper deck, the peanut vendor's pitch. And finally, Harry would come back in like a jazz genius, a smile on his voice, and say something simple like its Fireworks Night at the Vet in Philly in two weeks...and the whole fuckin' thing played out like the most wonderous American opera ever written. I had a week of that. Of flounder fishing and that. Was one of the greatest of my life.
Later, me and my brother Dave had a friend pull some strings for our band. Next thing you know we were in the bowels of the ballpark where the Phils lived and Harry Kalas was recording some stuff for us for our first record. Just some things we'd written just for him to say. He was really gracious and nice. Me and Dave were in awe of him. All of our lives, his voice had been there. Now here we were together. He told us to go down on the field before the afternoon's game. He made sure it was ok. Then, he invited us into the announcing booth. It was just him and Whitey and us. We stayed a whole half inning. Harry introduced us to people as "the band guys". It felt like a dream.
Anyways, lots of guys like me have baseball memories. We were the last of a kind in a lotta ways, I guess. Still, my guy died today. Harry Kalas. And with him goes something I will never know again. A deep gentle timbre to guide me through the black of space to some brightly lit concrete spaceship landed on the edge of a dirty city. A once-in-a-lifetime voice that brought baseball to my room for many many years. I hope my little daughter experiences something so cool in her lifetime. Maybe not with baseball, but with whatever it is that captures her young heart and mind.
Night, Harry. Thank you.
If It Rains On You, I Will Shoot The Cloud.
Part of me really wants to wake up early one Saturday morning and walk up into the mountains to kill all the bears and the mountain lions. And the snakes. This, I would do so they never can bite Violet if she decides to go hiking or something. Then, on Sunday morning, I will head over to the airport and disassemble all the planes so they can't crash with Violet in them, or under them. Rivers and lakes: drained dry. Highways: jackhammer'd. If I let it, the list goes on and on.
Can't let it, though. I have to look across the room here, past my sock feet parked by my coffee cup, and over to the left of the bookshelf, to the automatic swing where she now sleeps... to the recorded sounds of the only babbling brook in the world that I know could never hurt her. I have to look over there and see her sleep slobber trickling down her little chin and I have to just be cool with the fact that there will come a day when she will lay her head down to rest in some other place than where I am. Dragons might surround her in some moonlit faraway room, but I won't be around.
But that's the way it comes down. The more you love a kid, the crazier you will get. I am starting to see that now in the newish ways I'm living my life. Slide across the floor with her in my arms. Dog toys are land mines. Stare up at the waiter in the diner, make sure he notices how cute she is. Make sure he clocks that I expect him to say so or I might butterknife his jugular with the Ninja quickness. Just weird insane impulses and cravings that all lead to bettering the world for my baby in some twisted vision I conjure up. And almost all the behavior will be excusable later on: in some Shakespearean way. Tragedy, comedy, all that. But please lord, guide me away from fist fighting with other crazy dads at T-ball games. All that amateur violence out under the sun. Kids crying. Hand prints on red faces. Heart attacks. I just can't.
So, I move forward with trepidation and absolutely no idea how to do what needs to be done. To someday offer myself up to some sinister earthquake crack in exchange for letting Violet skip away safely. But I'm a dad now and so I gotta keep brainstorming. I know the way shit stacks up. But what else can I do.
Can't let it, though. I have to look across the room here, past my sock feet parked by my coffee cup, and over to the left of the bookshelf, to the automatic swing where she now sleeps... to the recorded sounds of the only babbling brook in the world that I know could never hurt her. I have to look over there and see her sleep slobber trickling down her little chin and I have to just be cool with the fact that there will come a day when she will lay her head down to rest in some other place than where I am. Dragons might surround her in some moonlit faraway room, but I won't be around.
But that's the way it comes down. The more you love a kid, the crazier you will get. I am starting to see that now in the newish ways I'm living my life. Slide across the floor with her in my arms. Dog toys are land mines. Stare up at the waiter in the diner, make sure he notices how cute she is. Make sure he clocks that I expect him to say so or I might butterknife his jugular with the Ninja quickness. Just weird insane impulses and cravings that all lead to bettering the world for my baby in some twisted vision I conjure up. And almost all the behavior will be excusable later on: in some Shakespearean way. Tragedy, comedy, all that. But please lord, guide me away from fist fighting with other crazy dads at T-ball games. All that amateur violence out under the sun. Kids crying. Hand prints on red faces. Heart attacks. I just can't.
So, I move forward with trepidation and absolutely no idea how to do what needs to be done. To someday offer myself up to some sinister earthquake crack in exchange for letting Violet skip away safely. But I'm a dad now and so I gotta keep brainstorming. I know the way shit stacks up. But what else can I do.
April 10, 2009
I'm A Junkie For You, Kid.
Temper and patience. There was a line for them in heaven, right? Or Pre-Heaven. Wherever that hot spot where they hand out the chiseled cheekbones to the left, triple ripple necks to the right.
Brains over here, darling...
Asswipe-in-the-passing-lane level smarts?, ....over there son.
You heard of the place. Anyhow, when they were handing out the even tempers and the patience and the chilled beach bum aura....I was over in the man tits line, all excited, thinking I'd beaten everyone to the front. Christ. Now, I am tested like never before. And I knew all along that it was coming. Every single thing you read about being a new dad, they all say the same stuff: If she's crying, make sure she isn't hungry. Check that diaper....babies don't wanna baste in their own piss, cowboy! Is she on fire?....babies HATE being aflame. Make's 'em weep every time.
What the fuck? What kind of racket is this whole new parent market? What wisdom exactly are they really selling me, besides the basic shit that you could learn from a crusty pamphlet in the pediatrician's waiting room. I have like 16 books. Last night, while thumbing through one of them (this one's supposed to let you in on all the minutiae of each week of your baby's entire first year)
I was in the middle of week 12, about where Violet is hanging out. And honest to God, I came across this sentence.
"To keep her from swallowing too much air make sure she doesn't cry for too long."
I read it again. I looked at the back of the book where the price was. $16.99. I read it again. Make sure she doesn't cry for too long? Did I miss that bit on voodoo? Did I just skip over the section on making tiny miracles happen?
What a douche, I thought. Whoever wrote this book simply copied all the other shit from the trillion other books; not that different from getting paid to write a Chinese take-out menu.
Who is going to teach me then? I was pissed. How am I going to pick up tips on controlling my mind when Violet is deep into that second hour of death-rattle bawling? Where is the secret wisdom, for fuck's sake???!!! When that "fussytime" hits in the evening and time slows and then rushes and then slows like when I used to have too much blow in my face and everything was frentic and uncool and my temples squirting open like busted jalepeno poppers was not at all far fetched....when all that wackness hits so hard what do I do, what do I do, what do I do?
Sigh. It ain't in the books, huh? I wasted my cash. Last night, I just held on for dear life, kept touching her tender face skin with my nose, kept whispering through the tempest. It didn't really do much. She freaked for a long long couple of hours. Finally she drifted off. I was proud and shaking. My mind was goose fat but I'd hung in there.
I bit into a taco. Crying came from the crib. Dear Jesus. I picked her up and we walked to the changing table. I undid the Winnie the Pooh diaper and there was a poop the size of a Yugo. Oh sweetheart, I said. Oh dollgirl, no wonder you were so sad. Some got on my finger.
I thought about eating it in some primative ritual of love triumphs over all daddy's defects. But I had cold tacos out in front of the tv just sitting there, you know?
Brains over here, darling...
Asswipe-in-the-passing-lane level smarts?, ....over there son.
You heard of the place. Anyhow, when they were handing out the even tempers and the patience and the chilled beach bum aura....I was over in the man tits line, all excited, thinking I'd beaten everyone to the front. Christ. Now, I am tested like never before. And I knew all along that it was coming. Every single thing you read about being a new dad, they all say the same stuff: If she's crying, make sure she isn't hungry. Check that diaper....babies don't wanna baste in their own piss, cowboy! Is she on fire?....babies HATE being aflame. Make's 'em weep every time.
What the fuck? What kind of racket is this whole new parent market? What wisdom exactly are they really selling me, besides the basic shit that you could learn from a crusty pamphlet in the pediatrician's waiting room. I have like 16 books. Last night, while thumbing through one of them (this one's supposed to let you in on all the minutiae of each week of your baby's entire first year)
I was in the middle of week 12, about where Violet is hanging out. And honest to God, I came across this sentence.
"To keep her from swallowing too much air make sure she doesn't cry for too long."
I read it again. I looked at the back of the book where the price was. $16.99. I read it again. Make sure she doesn't cry for too long? Did I miss that bit on voodoo? Did I just skip over the section on making tiny miracles happen?
What a douche, I thought. Whoever wrote this book simply copied all the other shit from the trillion other books; not that different from getting paid to write a Chinese take-out menu.
Who is going to teach me then? I was pissed. How am I going to pick up tips on controlling my mind when Violet is deep into that second hour of death-rattle bawling? Where is the secret wisdom, for fuck's sake???!!! When that "fussytime" hits in the evening and time slows and then rushes and then slows like when I used to have too much blow in my face and everything was frentic and uncool and my temples squirting open like busted jalepeno poppers was not at all far fetched....when all that wackness hits so hard what do I do, what do I do, what do I do?
Sigh. It ain't in the books, huh? I wasted my cash. Last night, I just held on for dear life, kept touching her tender face skin with my nose, kept whispering through the tempest. It didn't really do much. She freaked for a long long couple of hours. Finally she drifted off. I was proud and shaking. My mind was goose fat but I'd hung in there.
I bit into a taco. Crying came from the crib. Dear Jesus. I picked her up and we walked to the changing table. I undid the Winnie the Pooh diaper and there was a poop the size of a Yugo. Oh sweetheart, I said. Oh dollgirl, no wonder you were so sad. Some got on my finger.
I thought about eating it in some primative ritual of love triumphs over all daddy's defects. But I had cold tacos out in front of the tv just sitting there, you know?
April 9, 2009
I Miss You When You're In The Other Room.
It's pouring here this morning. I can hear the rain swish off the tires of the cars out on the street. In the morning, I drink my coffee with the tv sound down now. And I listen for the morning peeps. Violet will wake up maybe half the time when I am getting ready for work. When she does, there is no screaming or crying. Just short quiet peeps, like smoke alarms with dying batteries.
It sucks when there are none. When she lies there by her momma in peaceful sleep and doesn't need anything or anyone. Or me. I get eager to go in there with the stealth of a prowler and just pluck her up from the little Wal-Mart sleeper thingy she is dreaming on. But to do that would be to invite myself to crash nature's ball. Dudes like me should not be crashing nature's ball.
So, on she sleeps. I poke around some fly fishing sights on the web; look at fish porn. These gray shitty days bring on the good Blue Wing Olive hatches. I wish I could get out to the river today. Thoughts of a quiet stretch to myself, of afternoon hatches. Thoughts of the summer days to come and the big caddis flies that cause brown trout to explode from the water with reckless greed.
Awww shit who am I kidding?
Thoughts of MAKE A GODDAMN PEEP ALREADY !!! Maybe you don't need me just this sec, butterbean. But I need you. Again.
It sucks when there are none. When she lies there by her momma in peaceful sleep and doesn't need anything or anyone. Or me. I get eager to go in there with the stealth of a prowler and just pluck her up from the little Wal-Mart sleeper thingy she is dreaming on. But to do that would be to invite myself to crash nature's ball. Dudes like me should not be crashing nature's ball.
So, on she sleeps. I poke around some fly fishing sights on the web; look at fish porn. These gray shitty days bring on the good Blue Wing Olive hatches. I wish I could get out to the river today. Thoughts of a quiet stretch to myself, of afternoon hatches. Thoughts of the summer days to come and the big caddis flies that cause brown trout to explode from the water with reckless greed.
Awww shit who am I kidding?
Thoughts of MAKE A GODDAMN PEEP ALREADY !!! Maybe you don't need me just this sec, butterbean. But I need you. Again.
April 8, 2009
The Itsy-Bitsy-Spider.
I sang the only verse I know. Over and over and over again. If there are other verses, I may need to find them.
"The Itsy-Bitsy-Spider went up the water spout,
Down came the rain and washed the spider out,
Up came the sun and dried up all the rain,
And the Itsy-Bitsy-Spider went up the spout again"
At first, the soft singing does nothing. Violet just stares up at me with a quivery lip; the hair trigger is being caressed. Then, the moment all oxygen is vac'd from the room. And the dam gives out. Her tiny nostrils flare and collapse. That little face goes ruby. Eyes squish. My daughter's crying is somewhat akin to a 747 taking off. With sirens. Maybe a teradactyl State Trooper.
I keep the verse going though. On a steady loop...
"The Itsy-Bitsy-Spider went up the water spout,
Down came the rain and washed the spider out,
Up came the sun and dried up all the rain,
And the Itsy-Bitsy-Spider went up the spout again"
Careful not to waver my voice too much, I keep the volume the same: low-ish. Violet's stumpy limbs flail and kick and I can feel the super small fingers of right hand gripping my t-shirt. It's surprisingly tight for such a dainty fist. A few minutes go by and we are waltzing in a certain circle across the hardwood floor and back again. I know I am slumpy as I move cause I want to lean in and nibble her ear a little; I like the idea of playful maneuvers maybe relaxing her a bit. But I pull back time and again. She's too young for that shit yet... an ear nibble will just up the stakes.
Eventually, her eyes begin open a smidge and the gasps and gulps subside. She has a moment of clarity and out of nowhere stares into my face with shakey cheeks. The last of the tears rolls away, warm drips on my finger tips behind her neck. I smile down at her, keep the spider rolling.
It's working!!! OH HELL YEAH!
Her open eyes flutter, close, open, shut. I can see her watery eyeballs roll back into her eyelids. Then they pop open fast. But the verse is mystical and I am a snake charming medicine man with a itsy bitsy spider in my mouth. She is drifting. Off. To. Sleep.
I don't dare stop the verse. Ten minutes go by and my daughter is asleep in my arms while I move around the room same as before, the very short song continuing to be sung at the same volume, same timbre, everything the same same same.
I don't want to put her down. Finally.
"The Itsy-Bitsy-Spider went up the water spout,
Down came the rain and washed the spider out,
Up came the sun and dried up all the rain,
And the Itsy-Bitsy-Spider went up the spout again"
At first, the soft singing does nothing. Violet just stares up at me with a quivery lip; the hair trigger is being caressed. Then, the moment all oxygen is vac'd from the room. And the dam gives out. Her tiny nostrils flare and collapse. That little face goes ruby. Eyes squish. My daughter's crying is somewhat akin to a 747 taking off. With sirens. Maybe a teradactyl State Trooper.
I keep the verse going though. On a steady loop...
"The Itsy-Bitsy-Spider went up the water spout,
Down came the rain and washed the spider out,
Up came the sun and dried up all the rain,
And the Itsy-Bitsy-Spider went up the spout again"
Careful not to waver my voice too much, I keep the volume the same: low-ish. Violet's stumpy limbs flail and kick and I can feel the super small fingers of right hand gripping my t-shirt. It's surprisingly tight for such a dainty fist. A few minutes go by and we are waltzing in a certain circle across the hardwood floor and back again. I know I am slumpy as I move cause I want to lean in and nibble her ear a little; I like the idea of playful maneuvers maybe relaxing her a bit. But I pull back time and again. She's too young for that shit yet... an ear nibble will just up the stakes.
Eventually, her eyes begin open a smidge and the gasps and gulps subside. She has a moment of clarity and out of nowhere stares into my face with shakey cheeks. The last of the tears rolls away, warm drips on my finger tips behind her neck. I smile down at her, keep the spider rolling.
It's working!!! OH HELL YEAH!
Her open eyes flutter, close, open, shut. I can see her watery eyeballs roll back into her eyelids. Then they pop open fast. But the verse is mystical and I am a snake charming medicine man with a itsy bitsy spider in my mouth. She is drifting. Off. To. Sleep.
I don't dare stop the verse. Ten minutes go by and my daughter is asleep in my arms while I move around the room same as before, the very short song continuing to be sung at the same volume, same timbre, everything the same same same.
I don't want to put her down. Finally.
April 7, 2009
Thunder Pie.
If you are a new dad then you don't know shit.
I have to believe this as my life falls apart in front of my fat face. Wife? wants me to move out and get an apartment. She says I am selfish because I want to go fishing and never really get up in the middle of the night when WeeOne is screeching death. Then, when I do hold WeeOne in my arms, I spazz out if she begins to get fussy. I thought I was going to shine as a father. But, no.
Last night, as Wife? attempted to calm me down and show me some calming stuff, I ripped open my shirt and tried to breastfeed my shrieking daughter. I had wild eyes and I could even hear the Zoloft in my bloodstream just give up like ballet boys on the Little League field. What's the use, they sighed. We are not designed for this. This seems to happen more often than not. WeeOne was weaned on her mama's milk and touch and whispers. Me, I am just some rough skinned lummox who waves Tigger the Tiger around like a gun. No wonder my own baby might not even like me.
Now I am sad.
I love WeeOne more than the dumb-ass cliches that say you will never know love until you have a child. I love her enough to wish I was more. More tender, more patient. More fucking sane than the ex-rocker who used to huff Dust-Off in the back halls of a mall when other people were developing social skills and growing mentally and emotionally.
Anyway, tomorrow Wife? goes back to work after three months off. At one pm I leave work and come home. I am taking over WeeOne's life. Please join me, you judgemental bastards...
I have to believe this as my life falls apart in front of my fat face. Wife? wants me to move out and get an apartment. She says I am selfish because I want to go fishing and never really get up in the middle of the night when WeeOne is screeching death. Then, when I do hold WeeOne in my arms, I spazz out if she begins to get fussy. I thought I was going to shine as a father. But, no.
Last night, as Wife? attempted to calm me down and show me some calming stuff, I ripped open my shirt and tried to breastfeed my shrieking daughter. I had wild eyes and I could even hear the Zoloft in my bloodstream just give up like ballet boys on the Little League field. What's the use, they sighed. We are not designed for this. This seems to happen more often than not. WeeOne was weaned on her mama's milk and touch and whispers. Me, I am just some rough skinned lummox who waves Tigger the Tiger around like a gun. No wonder my own baby might not even like me.
Now I am sad.
I love WeeOne more than the dumb-ass cliches that say you will never know love until you have a child. I love her enough to wish I was more. More tender, more patient. More fucking sane than the ex-rocker who used to huff Dust-Off in the back halls of a mall when other people were developing social skills and growing mentally and emotionally.
Anyway, tomorrow Wife? goes back to work after three months off. At one pm I leave work and come home. I am taking over WeeOne's life. Please join me, you judgemental bastards...
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