By popular demand. Did this at lunch, partly to aggressively defend my personal time and stave off the encroachment of work thereinto (that a word?).
Enjoy.
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grandkid-a-palooza
Back in California and it’s just as hot as Florida but with less humidity. They told me the weekend here was “like Fall” though, so I’ve got my hopes up for more of that.
My brother and his wife had a daughter last week, Kenley, on Sharaun’s birthday. It still feels strange to think that my kid brother is a father, but it’s been a fun thing to talk to him these past few days. He texted me while were in Florida saying, “This is the hardest thing I have ever done. It is completely exhausting. How do you make it look so easy?” To which I replied, after laughing, “It’s never easy, but it does get easier. Welcome to selflessness.” Later that day he wrote, “I broke down into tears. She wouldn’t stop crying and I felt completely helpless. It is so hard.” Yes… yes it is. Man… I remember breaking down into tears myself during a couple particularly difficult instances with Keaton. I empathized with the whole feeling helpless thing, having been there many times and not being able to help the baby or my overworked wife.
For our part, we’ve settled fairly well into a “two kid” routine, although maybe it’s unfair to say having been traveling for a week. Sharaun’s early breastfeeding woes have been erased by time and conditioning and we’re both used to the nighttime routine. Luckily for us Keaton is a heavy sleeper and doesn’t wake up when Cohen cries to alert Sharaun that he’s hungry (lucky for us he’s not much of a crier to begin with). Cohen’s been spending a little more time awake over the past week, not sure if it’s related to all the stimulation of Florida or just that he’s growing up (10lbs 3oz, as a matter of fact – most of it testicles, in the Davis tradition), but it’s nice to see his eyes and watch his aimless facial expressions. I could (and have) stared down at him for an hour.
I think it’s time to go to bed. It’s late and I want to go to the gym before work. Goodnight.
east coast morning writing
Writing from the early morning east coast time, something ungodly early in the west coast analog. It’s right around the middle of our trip and the first time I’ve sat down to do any kind of writing – this feels right for a vacation.
Cohen was wonderful on the flight out, and we’re hoping for a repeat performance on the return flight. Since being here he’s rarely left the crook of some family member’s arm. Keaton, too, gets spoiled at Ami’s house. Between the pool and the beach and the constant attention it’s no wonder she loves going to Florida. Earlier in the week Uncle Tyler took us for an alligator-watching tour on the St. John in his new boat and she liked that too – must have seen 30+ of the pre-historic looking beasts.
The rest of the week is looking tight; filled to the cracks with birthdays and dinners and visiting, not to mention the hope at some solid do-nothing time in between all that (a common lament of mine when we come). I already know we won’t be able to do it all.
And with that, it’s back to figuring out the activities of the day. Writing remains secondary, so the blog may fester for a few more days… but it’s worth it.
See ya.
i had a terrible dream
Last night I had a dream which I woke me, I think, because it stirred such a horrid feeling within me.
I was driving, on our street, heading towards home. Keaton and Cohen were with me, Sharaun wasn’t. As we passed our neighbors’ houses on the way to our driveway I looked out the passenger window and was startled to see a large wild animal loping along the sidewalk in the opposite direction. In the dream the animal was non-specific, as dream-things often are, yet I knew that it was both a) scary and b) man-eating. When I woke I thought maybe it was a hyena or coyote or something, but I don’t think it’s important. Still shocked and now a bit concerned, I made sure to fully close the garage door before thinking about exiting the car. And even though it was clearly headed in the other direction, I checked the mirrors to try and be sure the thing hadn’t followed us in. Once satisfied that we were safely separated I proceeded to take Keaton and Cohen out of the vehicle and head inside.
We weren’t five steps inside the house when I heard it: A gut-wrenching scream from outside. In my dream I knew the scream was from a child, a little girl maybe of eight or nine. I also knew that she was screaming because that animal had found her. Over and over again she said “Oh my God,” and pleaded at the fleshy edge of her screams, “Please! Someone help me! Please! Oh… God!” I froze, not even through the laundry room that separates our house proper from the garage. I had set Cohen down on top of the dryer upon hearing the screams, and Keaton and I stood staring at the wall in the direction of the noise.
I was absolutely terrified. I moved to pull Keaton close to me, but then realized I needed to help this poor girl who was, as I knew from that dream-knowing you get in dreams, being killed by the beast. But I didn’t move right away. I stood there while she called out and I knew the time to intervene was running out. Finally I was able to un-root myself. I told Keaton to stay inside and lock the door behind me and I left Cohen on the dryer in his carrier. I went into the garage and grabbed some heavy metal implement, then I grabbed another and one more still. I opened the garage door to silence.
I was already too late and I knew it. My hesitation cost the girl her life. But I still made a cursory walk of the block, recruiting other neighbors as I went and arming them with the extra shovels and breaker bars and whatever else I brought. I led a circuit search with them behind me eager to help, but I knew that it was of no use. All I could think of was where the thing had drug her body away to, and I remember hoping that we didn’t actually find it on our hunt – it would be too hard to see what I let happen. Because I knew she’d be rent and broken and gone from the world and I knew it was because I failed to act quickly enough.
I awoke with my heart beating fast and I felt utterly ashamed and sad. I’ve languished in the deepest pits of despair over real-life sins of commission, and I swear the dream-inspired shame and sadness over this sin of omission matched it. Sharaun was sitting up in bed next to me feeding Cohen and the room was dark. I told her about the dream and it made me feel better to acknowledge the un-reality of it all in doing so. The feelings slowly lifted out of my chest as the realization that it was all in my head sunk in, and soon I rolled back over to re-join sleep.
Dreams are neat.
the new “can i please watch a cartoon?”
Over the past few months Sharaun has more than once offhandedly mentioned to me that, during the days at home, she thinks about setting Keaton loose on the computer to play around. Keaton has an interest in the thing; how could she not? Her dad is practically tethered to one and her mom makes good use of the Facebook and the Tweeter on occasion as well. It’s only natural for her to desire to use this obviously magical machine herself.
So on Saturday I sat down and created a user account on the machine she could call her very own. For her user icon I used a box of crayons and the wallpaper is a huge spread of Princess Ariel (which she picked herself). I made the interface all magnified and simple thanks to the old-people options in Windows 7, and I got rid of all her desktop icons, notifications, and other distractions. She’s got one big icon in the middle of her desktop that launches Chrome and once inside I pre-loaded about ten or so bookmarks on the top ribbon for her to choose from. I installed AdThwart so she will see only content, and gave her a cursory lesson in mousing. And with that, she was off. Bouncing between bookmarks, she spends her time playing games on NickJr, PBS Kids, and a host of other edu-tainment centric kids’ sites.
Over the past few days she’s become quite good at navigating, and has picked up on the interface and controls surprisingly quickly (a child of a the technological age, I suppose). She knows how to repeatedly get to the same place consistently, figures out how to control games just by trial-and-error, and for the most part is self-taught. In fact, Sharaun and I have a rule that we’re not going to come to the call for “help” while using the computer. There are so many things she can do that will either take her away from where she wants to be or get her “stuck” or something that we told her up-front that if she feels like she needs help she can just click the ‘X’ in the top-right corner and start over. Hopefully that way she learns by herself and we don’t have to come running every thirty seconds (we learned fast that this should be our approach).
And now it’s all she wants to do. “Can I please watch a cartoon?” has gone by the wayside and, “Can I please get on my computer?” is the new hotness.
Hopefully we’ve done a good thing. (Or at least a benign thing.)
Goodnight.
she may have a point
2:30pm and truth be told it’s too hot to still have the house open.
Doesn’t matter; I’m stubborn about it. Throw open the windows and throw open the doors. Raise the blinds and turn on the ceiling fans. Doff your longpants and don some shortpants, consider something that “wicks.” “Too hot” be damned, what do we know from “too hot?”
For one thing, I love the fresh air. You close a house for a few days and the air starts to feel “stale” to me, breathed to many times; recycled through dusty air vents too many times; stagnant. It’s a psychological thing. I also like the idea of being miserly and not running the air conditioning.
Hundreds of years ago the land where we live now was home to a Native American tribe that built stick-huts to shade themselves from the heat of the day. Sometimes they’d dig down into the ground a ways before erecting the structure to increase the cooling capacity. I feel like, if they made it through these 100°+ days with a dugout stick teepee, I should count myself lucky. Somehow, thinking about the days those folks fared naturally makes me even more loath to trip the thermostat.
Sharaun, however, thinks that if the Indians had AC they would’nt have been so dumb as to not use it when it was hot.
She may have a point.
Goodnight.
pointless little pockets
Saturday morning Sharaun had a hair appointment and I was on my own with the brood.
The job is many-fold, and yet ultimately defined by one prime directive: take care of the children. Sharaun should not come back to find them A) missing, B) broken, or C) disfigured in any way. As an adult, my brain tells me there are multiple paths to success when it comes to the directive. In fact, the engineer in me reckons that, statistically, it would be very hard for me to not accomplish my charge. So I take a nonchalant attitude towards the whole thing. I’m a two-time dad, father of a four and a half year old girl who I think is pretty OK, I got this.
Anyway, on this day I was successful yet again – maintaining my streak. And one of the ways I “personalized” my road to success on that particular Saturday was to choose “cute” yet undeniably manly outfit in which to dress baby Cohen. In the end I went with a solid blue one-piece thing on top and these teeny-tiny little frat-boy khaki pants on bottom. Oh man did that kid look sharp for a three-week old.
And as I was pulling on Mr. Cohen’s miniature Sigma Chi specials I couldn’t help but notice the level of “real pants” details, right down to the diminutive little pockets. I had a moment then, thinking for a minute while looking at those small pants how absurd those pointless little pockets were. “What’s a baby going to keep in his pockets?,” I wondered. A spare pacifier? Mylicon for those bender days on the boob? Change for the tollbooth? Kid’s got pockets and no way to use ’em, let alone know they can be useful. I felt like putting something in his little pockets, just to give them some purpose. Maybe a baby girl’s phone number or a stick of gum for his perpetual case of morning breath (you try staying fresh sleeping twenty hours a day).
In the end I left it as a lark. But I really do love those pants on him. One day he’s going to be my big boy and in his pockets he’ll have stuff like guitar picks and firecrackers and ball markers for the links. For now I’ll let them be empty, symbolic of all the concern he has in God’s wide world.
Goodnight.