Go the *&^% to sleep!

Parenthood is amazing. The show is moderately entertaining, I'm speaking here of the real deal. Having a kid - it's awesome. Those of you faithful readers without kids are undoubtedly in the phase of life where you are surrounded by people like me, high on their own blissful cloud because of the joy that comes from having a kid.

You can't stand me.

It's okay. I've been there. I know how unbearable I am. I also know that the ability to reproduce doesn't make me any better, smarter, or faster than anyone else. God knows you just have to look around once in a while to see that being a parent doesn't automatically qualify you as #winning at life. But, all other things being equal, it's pretty awesome.

Olivia is probably in the best phase of babyhood I can imagine, though undoubtedly I will say that of every phase. Right now, she is smiling and laughing all the time, babbling nonstop in her consonant-heavy language of nonsense. Undoubtedly, if we could interpret her revelations, it would just be "42" over and over again. She is rolling over, and getting close to sitting up on her own. She loves to stand and sway and cuddle, but can't yet crawl or walk away, so she's not getting into all the stuff babies eventually get into like electrical sockets and day-trading. And she's sleeping through the night.

Correction. She was sleeping through the night. We have begun to experience the dreaded dormis interruptus (not to be confused with another genus of interruptus that flows naturally from having kids).

For about three blessed months, Olivia slept through the night. 5:30 or 6:00 wake-up calls were common enough, but any new parent will tell you that this is an amazing lie-in. Especially if we actually went to bed shortly after we put her down at 9:00 or 9:30 the night before. Oh man, those were the days.

Then something changed. We don't know what, or why, but suddenly she stopped sleeping all the way through the night. She first started waking around two or three, crying or wanting to play. We assumed, because this was about the time she was mastering rolling over, that she was waking herself up with her new mobility, and it would pass. Then she started needing to be fed in the middle of the night again. After going months without a midnight feeding. She started fighting tooth and nail against being put in her crib. Lately, she just doesn't really go down at all. She sleeps fitfully for a few hours, then yells. Another hour. Another yell. Another...and another...

I do not get the full brunt of these midnight air raids. Saintly Wife sees to her at night so I have an outside chance of functioning at work (I really am the luckiest man alive, and I know it). But even so, it is taking its toll on both of us. I'm getting paler, and sunlight really irritates me. Also, I've noticed that I'm starting to sparkle sometimes, and no longer think Stephanie Meyer was just writing to pay the rent. Something is truly off about me.

Parenthood really is awesome. But if you can get a robot nanny to get your kid through the night for the first year or so, definitely jump all over that. You'll all be better for it.

Weekend Edition: Primary Day

I detest politics and political discussion, and I'm not about to use my blog as a stump for any political ideology. I have enough to be getting on with on spiritual, parenting, and geek ideologies.

But today is primary day here in South Carolina, and suffice it to say, I am not impressed with any current candidate for political office, or any current incumbent politician, which doesn't give me warm fuzzies about the immediate future of our state and country.

Despite that, I do believe voting is important. If you don't vote, you have absolutely no right to gripe about the condition of our country. I value my right to gripe, so I am voting.

Just not necessarily for anyone with a shot of winning....

Please vote.

Musings upon my imminent deterioration (happy birthday...to....me)

"Thirty is just a number," he said, weeping openly into his scotch glass.

No, seriously, thirty is just a number. As ages go, it's one day older than twenty-nine.

Most of the people I thought of as "old" when I was "young" still consider thirty to be quite a youthful age.

But then, they've aged a lot since then.

If it's not clear to you yet, I've just turned thirty. Despite my rather morbid title, I really haven't been terribly bothered by the "milestone" birthday. Maybe it hasn't sunk in yet. Maybe the fact that my daughter's birthday present to me was to decide depriving me of her presence at 2 a.m. was unacceptable, and I was too tired to care about turning thirty. But the fact is, thirty really doesn't feel that much different from twenty-nine. Twenty-two? Yeah, a little different. Sixteen? Sure, lots more energy back then. Three months old? I only vaguely remember, but I'll take it as a given that there's a difference. But the subjective difference between twenty-nine and thirty is negligible.

And I find that rather odd.

See, in the back of my mind, I always sort of pictured thirty-somethings as... well... adult. Twenty-somethings are party-animals, drunks, spendthrifts, and dreamers with no real prospects. You know - college students. Thirty, though, was supposed to be the beginning of adulthood. I don't know why I assigned such significance to this number. Probably as an excuse to enjoy my twenties more. But, as stated previously, I don't really feel any different.

I don't think I expected to magically have all the answers by virtue of seniority, but back in the dark ages of my adolescence, I sort of thought that one day I'd stop having to wing it. That maybe I'd get the important stuff down. And yet, here I am. No different than I was a week ago, except that I need to shave.

By any objective measure I can think of, I'm about as adult as you can get. I've got a wife, a baby, a job, a mortgage, one and a half dogs, and Cat. I commute and listen to NPR because the rock station plays the crap today's kids listen to. And it is crap. I work behind a desk, and mostly enjoy what I do. I get excited about home improvement projects and ask for practical Christmas presents. I go to happy hours out of professional obligation, and leave by seven so I am home to see my baby girl before she has to go to bed.

And yet, most of the time, I still feel like a kid dressing up in his dad's suit. (I'm speaking metaphorically here, but as it happens my closet is about half hand-me-downs from my dad. Just FYI. That's how I roll.) I don't have all, or even a big fraction of the answers. I can't even manage most of the simple stuff on my own - stains are my nemesis, and my wife has to throw out my old  underwear to keep me from wearing stuff that has worn down to nothing but elastic bands. As excited as I get about home improvement projects, I am very fortunate I have not burned down our house. Not kidding. I'm really just kind of faking it through this whole "adult" phase until I start to get a handle on things.

Thirty hasn't changed much in that regard. But I suppose not having all the answers keeps life from getting dull. Like the old proverb says, "May you live in interesting times." I know I do.