Looky, Daddy!

Because It's Not Like Moving Will Add Stress to Our Lives

Dear Rental House,

You are small. I'm sorry if that hurts, but you are. When we moved in three years ago, we found that a good deal of our furniture could not fit inside you. Our bed frame and mattress, our dresser, one whole couch, and a desk all went back to Texas in the moving truck that had brought them here the day before. The driver said he'd donate them to charity at some point down the line, but secretly I think he's kept them to make his own portable bedroom in the back of his truck. He seemed the type.

You weren't always so small, of course. Almost 200 years ago when you were built, you were spacious: A grand and glorious house replete with bedrooms, dining rooms, parlors, and the like. But then someone had the idea of putting up a wall right down the middle of you and doubling your housing capacity while halving your housing space. Who wouldn't like that, right? Who, indeed.

Rental House, I don't like you. There, I said it. And I don't think I'm alone. Remember that young man, over a hundred years ago now, that young man who lived here with his parents? Remember that day, in 1905, that fine day in May when he hatcheted his mother to death in what would later be our living room? Then he went upstairs and shot his father five times, once in the head? Happily they didn't make guns very well back then and the father survived. Of course, they didn't make houses very well back then either, no offense. It is rumored in the publications of the time that the young man was unstable, which begs the question of what need a stable young man might have of taking a hatchet to his mom, doesn't it? But I think his stability is beside the point. I think he did it because his parents chose to live in you.

Rental House, you were not always sitting where you are now. No, about ninety years ago you were down the block, right where that five-lane street is now. Finding you a hindrance to the building of that street, yet not wanting to deny anyone the pleasure of living within you, the good people of this town moved you. They built you a big basement and then moved you on top of it, and who am I to complain if the two of you didn't match up exactly right? I mean, I can barely set a cup of coffee down in a saucer correctly. And if those gaps between you and your basement let in a little dirt, a little sunshine, and sometimes a little water, well that's just part of the charm in living in you. You charmer, you.

Oh, how I'm babbling on, Rental House. I'm sorry. I never was any good at break-ups. Because that's what this is, you know: a break-up. My family and I have found someone else. A real house, the kind you take home to meet your mom, the kind you buy. And buy it we did.

Rental House, simply put, we're through. I hope the new For Rent sign doesn't hurt much when we pound it into your front lawn. Well, not too much.

Love,

Brian

I'm Still Two!

There's something that we do everyday, but today I will refuse to do it. I don't know what it is yet, but it will most likely be something important.

I have so many toys, it is impossible to choose one. I'll just take my sister's.

When you pick me up and toss me into the air, I am overcome with a happiness that I never want to end. See that it doesn't.

Breakfast is only the most important meal of the day if it is Goldfish.

Did you know it is possible to scream so much you throw up? Here, watch.

I'm Two!

I am thinking of an object, but it is a secret. Bring it to me. Quickly. It will be the third thing you bring me, but it will not matter as I'll be incoherent by item number two.

Kindly do not suggest we go to the park before I suggest it myself. If you do, I will need to rub my face on the ground in anger.

Pick me up. No, not that way. Pick me up the other way. Nevermind. Try again when I stop screaming. Tomorrow.

May I wash my hands by myself? Very good. First I must let the water run for twenty minutes. Please do not disturb me for the duration or the time will start over from the beginning.

Television is the perfect compliment for any activity, don't you agree? I'm already filling my lungs in anticipation of your response.

An 85% Accurate Birthday Wish

Dear Kathryn,

You were a day-and-a-half old when your mother woke me to tell me you were choking. It was sometime around 3 AM and you, your mom, and I were all sharing the same hospital room. Never in my life before or since have I moved as fast as I did then. You were lying there, still, quiet when I jumped up from my cot and wrapped my hands around you, not knowing what to do but knowing that picking you up was probably a good start. And you wailed. And that was how I interrupted the first full hour of sleep I had had since you were born.

You weren't choking at all, of course. You were sleeping. The word your mom had said was "joking", not "choking," and to hear her tell it, she had said it a good fifteen minutes before I jumped up and made you cry so pitifully. It seems your mom had woken up in some discomfort from her surgery and had asked me for a cup of water, prompting me to stand up from my cot, walk to her bed, and hand her my pillow. As I shuffled back to my cot, she asked if I were joking.

Fifteen minutes later my sleep-deprived brain processed that last word. With about 85% accuracy.

Since that day, I've tried to maintain that same 85% success rate in my raising of you, my first child. Certainly some days have been better and some days have been worse, but all-in-all, I feel that I have earned a solid B on any fathering report card I might be issued.

And now today, Kathryn, you are seven years old. So far the biggest change is in your timeline for the future. For the past year, seven was everything to you. At mealtimes you'd regale us with tales of your future seven-year-old accomplishments, and now that you are there, you have already begun the monumental task of shifting those feats up one more year. Like when you're eight, you'll read that book we bought you. Or you'll swim the width of the pool. Or you'll be famous. And then we will all celebrate by jumping in our rocket-powered hovercrafts and jaunting over to your favorite restaurant where the food is cooked entirely by robots.

But seven is still really exciting to you, and when we were driving the other day, in one of those rare moments when the twins were quiet and we could speak to each other, you told me that you thought Kate or Katy might be a good name for a seven-year-old. You said it hesitatingly, nervous how I might take it, as in the past I have expressed a general dislike of diminutive nicknames. But you were about to turn seven, a wonderfully delightful seven at that, and I was determined to not fall below the 85% mark on this occasion, so I said that you could certainly call yourself anything you wished, because it was your name and you were the boss of you.

Then I asked if you thought it would be okay if I still called you Kathryn, because calling you that made me happy. For a long time you were quiet, and when you spoke, you sounded two years younger. "Daddy," you said, "I really like it when you call me Little Bear."

So Happy Birthday, Little Bear. May your next seven years be at least as good as 85% of your last seven.

Love, Daddy

An Auspicious Beginning

Victoria came into the bathroom this morning during my morning constitutional, and it being Father's Day, I asked for something I never get otherwise.

"Victoria, can Daddy have some privacy this morning?"

"Okay," she said, then opened up the cabinets and started hunting around for something. Seconds later she found it.

"Here, Daddy. Here's your privacy," she said and handed me a tampon. She walked out humming.

"I gave Daddy a privacy," I heard her tell The Mom a few minutes later.

I Shouldn't Have Married a Girl, Either

Camilo turned seven and called the marriage off. He broke it to Kathryn with all the tact and delicacy of his newfound age.

"I'm seven and you're still six. I'm not going to marry you anymore."

"Now I don't know who I'm going to marry," he added half a beat later.

"Camilo," Kathryn began, "Icannotgetmarrieduntilaftercollege." She said it like it was one word, just like we taught her. "And after college you won't be seven anymore. You might be, like, nine! And I might be twelve, or something. We can still get married."

Camilo, however, remained unconvinced and sadly shook his head while no doubt thumbing through the little blackbook of his mind for the names of suitable seven-year-old replacements for his now-forbidden child bride. The rest of the car ride to school passed in silence, and by silence I mean Ernie singing all two minutes and nineteen seconds of the rubber duckie song 47 million times because God hates me.

Later that night, Kathryn hit the rebound.

"I think it's good that Camilo won't marry me because when he talks really fast I don't understand him and a lot of times I don't think his jokes are funny and all he wants to do is play lightsabers and he never listens to me or does what I say" (Kathryn is six and saving her punctuation for later years) "but if I don't marry him I don't know who I'll marry because the only other person I want to marry is Erin and she's a girl."

Kathryn paused.

"Daddy, did you know in some places girls can marry each other?"

I nodded.

"But I don't think I'm going to marry a girl."

"Why not?" I asked, hoping the answer was blog-worthy.

"Because girls have babies, and if I marry a girl, then we will have too many babies."

This was followed by another, longer pause. Kathryn looked at me, her eyelashes as long as my forearm. We could hear the twins playing in the next room.

"I don't want too many babies."

Shhhh

Shhh. Shhhh. Don't say anything. Don't spoil this for me.

I'm not sitting at my computer. No. I'm at the beach.

I'm not staring at a monitor. I'm not staring at anything. My eyes are closed. The sun shines red through my eyelids.

I'm not fully-clothed, wrapped in a robe because I'm cold, because my windows leak air. I'm in a bathing suit, gently covered in a beach towel, keeping my skin from burning.

That sound is not the sound of my babies waking up from their nap. No. That is the sound of waves.

Do not spoil this.

That is not stale, cold coffee I'm drinking. It's a frozen drink. A frozen drink with a paper umbrella, fresh fruit skewered on its wooden pole.

Those are gulls I hear, not cries from the babies' room. Gulls. Swooping down for a crust of bread from a playful child. A playful child who is not mine.

Shhh, gulls, shhh.

Shhhh.

Conversation with My 6-Year-Old Daughter at 2:19 AM at My Parent's House in Texas

"Daddy? Mommy?"

"Hmm?"

"Daddy! Mommy!"

"Kathryn? What is it, sweetheart?"

"Can I flush the potty?"

"Can you what?"

"The potty. Can I flush the potty?"

"Of course, sweetheart. Why not?"

"I didn't want it to wake you up."

Mr The Dad Goes to Washington

Today's post will be a short one, as I just got back from a quick weekend trip to DC to listen to my dad deliver a speech to a museum full of important people that would have easily laughed themselves out of their chairs had they known a stay-at-home dad was in their midst. (And no, thankfully, my dad is not a politician. He's a homebuilder. Actually, he's the National Homebuilder of the Year due to his remarkably high-performing building techniques and his recent construction of a "zero-energy" house outside of Dallas. Not that I'm proud of him or anything.)

Anyway, on the Friday morning before I felt, as I was driving Kathryn and Camilo to school, Kathryn asked me in her timid (read: whiney) voice, "Daddy, how long are you going to be gone?"

I explained that I would only be gone for two nights (two nights! Just remembering it causes me to get a little weak in the knees) and that I'd be back in time to take her to school again Monday morning.

Kathryn is just a tiny bit attached to her dad and she replied with a very sad, almost teary, "Okay."

Silence followed. Impossibly, Camilo and the twins were even quiet, too, perhaps sensing the gravity of the situation in Kathryn's mind. So I lamely tried to make light of my little trip with a couple of dumb jokes. It didn't work.

"Dad?" Kathryn began, her whine approaching the upper register of human hearing.

"Yes, sweetheart?"

"Can you be gone longer? Momma said we would have ice cream every day that you are gone."

Dorothy's Been Thinking About Feminism, Too, and Dorothy Has a Question! Let's Ask Mr. Noodle.

Monday on Elmo's World there was no Mr. Noodle. There was no Mr. Noodle's brother, Mr. Noodle. Instead there was a rare appearance by Mr. Noodle's sister, Ms. Noodle. Now if you don't know who the Noodles are, or even the steps to the Noodle Family Dance, then perhaps you should go explore the LookyDaddy archives    let your child watch more television   congratulate yourself on your parenting skills    go ask the nearest 3-year-old read something else, because this post is definitely not for you.

So Kathryn is sitting there, watching Mr. Noodle's sister, Ms. Noodle, lamely try to answer the Dorothy's question when she turned to me and said, "You'd think Ms. Noodle would be smarter. I mean, she is a girl."

Right on, sister. Right on.