People tell you that having a child
will change your life forever. This
statement is assured, unnecessary, and bordering on silly. Of course having a child will change your life
forever. Winning the lottery would
change your life forever, as would waking to find that your hands had been
replaced by flippers and your voice sounded like ducks farting. It goes without saying.
My lament, then, is that I was not
adequately prepared by society or my own life experiences to understand what
would change. True, comedians had told
me for years that having a baby was like caring for a tiny drunk person and
that has proven to be accurate. My
mother tended to recall my more endearing qualities. Though, if my daughter is anything like her
father, Mom must have had to dodge a poop missile once or twice back in the
early 80’s. No, both of my parents
assured me that I was a wonderful baby, fearless, chubby, and generally happy.
The intent of this writing is not to
complain about my lot in life. Nor is it
to brag about my daughter even if I think she is the greatest baby since Jesus. I have ideas and musings rolling around
inside my head that culminated in a general awareness of myself, an awareness
that I am a different self having spent the past sixteen months in the presence
of my little girl.
Here I must make a mandatory detour
to applaud my wife who ferried this little hellion in her belly for nine
months. She never sent me out to get
pickles or ice-cream, and she genuinely enjoyed the feeling of life growing
within her.
Now back to me.
I guess the first question I should
ask is how did Maggie change my life. By
that I mean, what is it about her?
About two moths ago Maggie began to
point at things and say dat. Whatever dat
was she wanted a better view and she wanted to know the name. Often, she was not satisfied to hear it once
or even a dozen times. This has led to
conversations that would only take place between a toddler and an adult or a
crazy person and another crazy person.
Maggie: Dat!
Me: Star!
Maggie: Dat!
Me: Star!
Rinse and repeat for three straight
minutes. You can substitute any of the
following words in place of star: ladybug, strawberry, cookie, butterfly,
snowman, so on and so forth.
One morning Maggie woke up and dat suddenly changed to dis.
Now she was pointing and saying this
instead of that. The words were never interchangeable. For two weeks it was dis and now we are back to dat
as of a few weeks ago.
Maggie is very busy. She isn’t much of a sitter. I often wonder what goes through her head as
she is deciding which book to look at or toys to smash together. Is it deliberate or is it instinct? She has a habit, especially when Miranda and
I are eating on the couch, of walking in elaborate circles to retrieve a sample
of food from us. For whatever reason,
she usually closes her eyes tightly as she approaches us, groping in front of
her with hands like antennae. Once she
has the food in hand she will crane her head to the ceiling, close her eyes
again, and walk away.
I can go on for pages about the
adorable or just strange things she does.
But, this is about me and I have to be selfish.
I have never been much of a
crier. My older sister and I are a lot
alike in that way. This doesn’t mean I
am less empathic or affected by tragedy.
It just never triggers that particular response, or rarely does
anyway.
The twenty-four hour odyssey of
Maggie’s birth was physically and emotionally draining. Like any proper husband not corrupted by
modern media I witnessed the event, to include the slimy bits. And that is what changed me.
The times I have cried in my life
are self-explanatory as to why. I either
was hit by a car, hit by a tennis racket, or watched Forrest tell Jenny’s
headstone how smart little Forrest was.
There was always something there, some feeling (and usually blood) that
I could point to as the source.
When I saw Maggie emerge with her
eyes wide open I felt like the dam burst.
I cried. My face quivered, and
I’m pretty sure I was laughing through most of it. Had you stripped away everything else that
was going on in the room and just focused on me it would look a lot less
endearing.
But, there was Maggie.
Those were very happy tears.
Had I guessed that I would become a
crier after Maggie I would have said no.
I would probably cry at certain things, sure, but I’d spent twenty-nine
years perfectly happy not crying.
A few days ago I decided to punish
myself by watching a documentary listed under the heading Twenty-Five Documentaries Guaranteed to Make You Cry. The documentary was lovely and Miranda and I
bawled together. Hey, it was guaranteed,
what was I supposed to do?
Today, though…
While on my lunch break I watched a
video a Facebook friend shared about the Air Force band doing a flash mob at
the Smithsonian. They played a Christmas
song (forget the name) and I watched the spectators smile, swell with pride,
couples hold onto each other, and so on.
And then the picture went blurry and I realized I had tears in my eyes.
This is how Maggie changed me.
It’s easy to be affected by the
endless streams of negativity. From your
personal life to the media, it’s a wonder we all aren’t crazy. Or maybe we’re all just crazy together and so
no one knows the difference.
Then I think about Maggie pointing
at the same ladybug picture she’s pointed to literally a thousand times and
demanding to know the name one more time.
I think about how excited she gets when she successfully steals the
remote control. I think about her
squeals when her Baby Signs DVD starts to play.
I think about all of the beauty I can show her and all of the firsts yet to come. Yes, she is a little drunk person with half
of my DNA. Yes, reading Goodnight Goon forty consecutive times
can challenge even my nearly endless reserve of patience.
Despite any petty drawback I don’t
want it to end.
And I know it will some day.
But some day is a long way from
today.
