Madness On Little Squam Lake: Our Summer Vacation

Just over a year old, Gus completed his ninth cross-country trek (eighteenth if you count both ways). If he could say more than a few words, which he can’t, he’d probably say he had a heck of a vacation on the East Coast this summer.

Instead, he just smiles and says “ball.” As in, he had a ball.

Gus had a ball

We touched down in Logan and stayed that first night with our good friends Peg and Dave. Before putting Gus to bed I set up his video monitor and turned on the camera. The image I saw on the flickering, Poltergeist-like snowy screen was a baby I didn’t recognize sprawled out in a crib I didn’t recognize.

Gus, after all, was very much awake and downstairs playing with Bixie and Peg.

When I realized this, and since Peg’s house is old and her floor boards creaky, I felt the hair on the back of my neck raise at the possibility I was looking at a ghostly baby from the home’s distant past.

It took a minute for my heart rate to return to normal, whereupon it occurred to me that my monitor must be picking up the signal of a baby next door or down the street. At least that’s what I’m telling myself.

The next morning we visited with my brother Brandon in a park in Boston’s South End. Gus rolled around on a blanket and attracted his fair share of hugs and smooches. Then it was off to my parents’ house in Georgetown, where we stayed for a few days before heading to Little Squam Lake in New Hampshire (where On Golden Pond was filmed, in part. There were indeed loons bobbing about in the gentle currents. And yes, I’m talking about birds, not the local yahoos).

Before Squam it was relaxing at my folks’ house in G-Town. Gus enjoyed the pool, I think, once he got over the initial shock of the chilly water. My mom threw a little b-day party for Gus, who just turned 1, and she whipped up a couple of tasty home-cooked meals (“more balsamic drizzle, anyone?”).

B-day boy

During the day Bixie and I headed to Plum Island for some sand and sun. Bummer to see all of the beach erosion, and I felt sad for the homeowners whose major investments were teetering precariously on the edge of destruction. Come to think of it, that fairly describes millions of American homeowners.

After the beach we stopped by Michael’s Harborside in Newburyport for some delish seafood. Bixie scarfed down a lobster, after holding it up and scaring Gus, and at that point it truly began to feel like vacation to us. My shoulders felt less tense.

Fast forward to Little Squam Lake in New Hampshire. Hot has hell. Humid as hell. Oppressively so, which was fitting in that it forced all of us to swim about 10 times per day.

Bixie’s parents rented a kick ass lodge at the water’s edge. It was the third time we’ve stayed in the rustic seven-bedroom place, and this time was vastly different than the others. Whereas in past years we’d stay up until 3 a.m. sipping cocktails and playing poker, this year we were all busy scrambling after little kiddos. This time the place was like a sprawling lakeside nursery.

Bucket O' Fun

Gus, of course, is one baby. Then you had Bixie’s sister Ali and her husband Josh (Bones) and their little six-month-old lollipop-faced girl named Evie. You had my wife’s other sister, Nicole & her man Todd, and her two kids (3-year-old Sadie and few-months-old Page). Meanwhile, back in Mass, Bixie’s brother Josh and his wife Carolyn had a little boy named Teddy (during our vacation!). He’s only a couple weeks old now. One nickname already in play is “Teddy Ballgame.” If you know baseball you’ll understand the reference. If not, you’re free to draw your own inferences.

Anyway, this year was all about the kids. Toys and formula bottles and diapers and little bits of cheese and fruit and tubs of yogurt. Cries and squeals and tantrums and giggles. Grunting noises and 50 proof suntan lotion and grass stuck to sticky bodies and reddened cheeks and slimy fingers.

My kingdom for a triscuit?

A few times a day, when a few of the kids happened to nap at the same time, the adults would steal away for a spirited game of badminton or horse shoes and then a restorative dip in the lake. Very fun. Very summer vacation-like.

Two bad bits of news about the trip: Bixie’s dad Eli sliced open his foot on a fresh water clam, requiring stitches. We decided to bet on how many stitches he’d need, and Bixie was the winner (four). The poor guy was relegated to a lawn chair for the rest of the trip, which I think he secretly enjoyed since he’d been running around like a teenager after the kiddies.

The other annoying thing was that on the last day I stepped on a yellow jacket on the way to the horse shoe pits. Yowch.

My favorite thing? We did so much that it’s hard to narrow it down to one thing, but if I had to pick it’d be the boat rides with Bones’ dad, Mo Lafrenier. Josh and I went tubing (which means we got dragged behind the boat on an inflated object that resembled an oyster shell pillow). And Josh also did some impressive wake boarding. I tried four times to get up; my hips never got above water.

But the best thing about the boat rides was when we took Gus out on the lake. We strapped him into a puffy life jacket and sat with him on the bow of the boat as it glided through the shimmering waves. He wore a pretty constant smile as he looked almost stoically out on the horizon. For a while he was smiling so brightly that all of his teeth were showing. His face seemed to be saying “I feel truly ALIVE at last!” His mom was having a blast and Gus, as noted in the introductory paragraphs, had a ball.

Gus feels so ALIVE!

The weirdest thing that happened this vacation? Okay, check this out. One night I was coughing a lot and waking up Gus (who was sleeping in our room because it blessedly had an air conditioner). So I decided to sleep downstairs in the Great Room on the couch. About 20 minutes or so after I flopped down I felt something jump on my legs, like a cat or (shiver) a skunk.

But no. Turns out it was Bixie’s mom Claudia. She was checking under my blanket because she was trying to find Nicole’s daughter Sadie, who had gone to bed that night in Claudia and Eli’s room on an air mattress.

But now she evidently was missing, and so Claudia was frantically saying something to me but I couldn’t hear her because my ears were almost completely blocked from lake water. I saw her shuffle back down the hallway, waving her arms around oddly.

I didn’t know Sadie was missing at this point, so I figured Claudia was probably sleepwalking, since her daughter Bixie sometimes whispers conspiratorially in my ear while she’s completely out cold. Once she actually yelled “steamroller!” and rolled her entire body over mine – and she was dead asleep at the time.

So, I turn over and try to ignore her. That lasts about five seconds until the dim hall light gets flicked on, and this is when the scene starts getting nuts. At the end of the long hallway I see the outline of tall Eli in his two-piece pajamas, but I can’t see his face. He’s limping dramatically through the shadows down the hallway toward me (his foot has been hobbled, remember). Since I was half-asleep I worried that perhaps Eli had become unhinged and that, worse, he could be dragging an axe at his side.

My irrational thoughts at the time: “Had he just ‘offed’ Claudia in the bedroom? Had she been trying to wake me up to save her from impending doom?”

How such a kind man looks so scary is a function of the perceived seriousness of the situation, which now has nearly everyone in the house awake, the lights on, as the search party for Sadie gets worked into a lather.

But the hoopla ends nearly as soon as it begins: Eli and I notice the doors to the house are locked (which confirms that Sadie is in fact still in the house). Claudia at this point – and I say this with the utmost affection – has dissolved into a blithering mess. She’s whimpering and frantically looking in every direction like a game hen trying to escape the butcher.

Nicole is understandably right there with Claudia in Frantic Land, and she literally collapses in my arms when I point to the pair of little feet sticking out from under Eli and Claudia’s bed. “Thank God,” Nicole gasped, and then crumpled.

Crisis averted at the tender young hour of 4 a.m. As you can imagine, my dreams over the next couple of hours were insane. One of them involved lots of ducks furiously typing on a keyboard and squawking orders at me.
In the end, it was a memorable trip. The kids all had a great time and the adults had a great time making sure they did.

I don’t know what the next year holds, or if we’ll again make the trip to Little Squam Lake. But what I do know is this: Bixie and I will have two children by then.

And if the second child is anything like the first, we’ll have a ball next summer.

Crouching Bixie, Hidden Baby

Summer scene

Dadblast Author Gets Food Poisining from Domino’s pizza.

Domino’s pizza poisoned me.

I haven’t written about this yet because thinking about Domino’s has made me so ill that committing words to paper, or the thought of doing so, has made me involuntarily upchuck in my own mouth.

You could call this blog post slanderous. You might accuse me of being reckless. But the fact of the matter is about nine months ago I ordered a pizza from Domino’s that made me almost hallucinate as my body sickeningly, and for hours, expunged the offending bacteria from every orifice.

Domino's pizza made me ill.

My bedroom smelled of pepperoni. My bathroom smelled like pepperoni that was puked up by a hairy, drooling Yak.

Proof? I have none. So I’ll default to the language Dominos’ lawyers would use: I’m making a baseless claim.

After all how, exactly, does one go about proving they’ve been poisoned? I’m no biologist. I’m not a chemist. And I don’t even watch the popular cop shows that invariably have a hot, smart young woman with plastic goggles who pinpoints the cause of injury and casually – dispassionately – points the fuzz in the right direction.

There’s no trail to follow in my case. I flushed the evidence and then laid my cheek on the cold tiles next to the toilet, wishing there was some recourse. Wishing I could bring Domino’s to justice.

Here’s my detective work: Every opening in my body spewed toxins, for hours on end, and it was so bad that I had to call in sick for work. It was so bad that I almost went to the Emergency room. It was so bad that I actually cried real tears (I’m a human being!) as I reverted to the fetal position while lying naked and cold in the tiled bathtub. That’s right – I hoisted my naked body off the bathroom floor and into the tub.

You might ask “Couldn’t something else have made you sick? What else did you eat that day?”

Look, I ate things like salads and bananas that day, before cramming a Domino’s pizza pie down my face. I ate the pizza with ferocity, the way a dog would pummel a peanut butter sandwich thrown near his bowl. I folded the pieces and basically inhaled them, mentally praising Domino’s for the bounty I was enjoying.

But the enjoyment fizzled. About 16 hours later I threw up. About 17 hours later I had to park my body in the tub, since hideous things were flying out of my body from every which way. I was like a lawn sprinkler in hell. There was no telling which way the corrupt stream of bitterness/fire/venom would spray… the only certainty is that it wouldn’t stop quickly.

I was craving the softness and joy of heroine withdrawal.

Tragically funny is the fact that my wife posted on Facebook that her husband, me, was gravely ill. Her friends immediately chimed in with this response: “Domino’s?”

Yes, Domino’s.

There, it’s out of my system now, literally and figuratively.

I will never eat Domino’s again unless a designated chef prepares a pie for me in person, using all of the customary sanitation tricks, and assures me that the company takes seriously any health concerns.

Since that’s not going to happen, I’ll just stick to local pizza places.

Places that don’t place a premium on speed, but instead place a premium on quality.

Domino’s let me down in a big way.

Big milestone on Dadblast – Gus turns one year old today!

A year ago Bixie was in the hospital, just hours away from the delivery of our first child, a little boy named Gus. We were so nervous. So thrilled. So hopeful!

In the intervening months we’ve received quite an education about what it means to be parents, full-time, all the time. And our reward has far exceeded the opportunity cost, because we’ve watched a quivering, helpless little squishy creature evolve into a sturdy, playful, curious little boy who is a constant source of entertainment.

Sure, it isn’t always easy, but then nothing worth doing ever is.

And having Gus was so worth doing. The first year of his life has passed by so quickly, yet in some ways it seems odd that he wasn’t always with Bixie and me.

Maybe cosmically he always was with us, in that he was our destiny, but our stars hadn’t yet collided to create the spark of his life.

Probably that’s too deep of a thought to explore in this post, but with another baby due in October it’s sort of easy to slip into the realm of the metaphysical or the philosophical for clues about why everything does what it does. Why we are who we are and become what we become. What makes us us.

For today, what makes us happy is Gus. Our little monkey. Our turkey faced boy. Our little meatball.

Happy 1st Birthday, Gus! Your mom and dad love you like crazy.

The king of all Birthday Monkeys!

Mommy Monday – Bixie Likes Dadblast Author!

This is a huge week in our house. Parry’s first father’s day was yesterday, Gus’ first birthday is on Thursday and my bro and his wife are going to have their little one any second now. I’m beyond excited about all of these things – but it also makes me think just how crazy this year has been – and how much has happened.

I’d be remiss if I didn’t focus a Mommy Monday on Parry and Father’s Day. And I really can’t put into words what an amazing father he is and how lucky I feel to be growing this crazy family with him. So instead of trying, I thought I’d share some of my favorite pictures over this past year. Parry’s first year as a father:

The day Gus was born...

One of the first times Parry read Barnyard Dance to Gus. In one year, this book has already been ready thousands of times.

Introducing Gus to a place we LOVE - Falmouth Heights, MA

Parry & Gus bonding at Mission Ranch in Carmel, CA

Boo! Gus' first Halloween!

Lounging at home in Sausalito

Lazy boys on a lazy day

Jumping the Gun on Mother’s Day

I jolted awake a couple nights ago at the realization that this Mother’s Day isn’t just about my own mother. Shocking revelation: for the first time, the woman lying next to me is ALSO a mother!

I mean, I obviously understand she’s the mother of my son. But when I think about Mother’s day I think about long-time moms who wish their kids lived closer and called more often. I think about technology-challenged older women – “How do you Google so fast?” Women who are quick to remind you, dejectedly, that “things are so different nowadays.”

Bixie is not one of these women.

She’s young, drop-dead-gorgeous, and runs an edgy technology PR firm in San Francisco. She’s fashionably dressed and spontaneously dances like a 20-year-old at the drop of a hat. Even to commercials. Even to commercials with crappy music.

She methodically conquers Sunday’s New York Times crossword puzzle and she goes BANANAS when she gets a great deal on clothes or groceries. She watches Wheel of Fortune religiously and cracks up at Pat Sajak’s jokes, and she … and she … and …

…oh, Lordy. She’s a mom. No way around it.

My wife is all grown up, and she’s about to become a card-carrying member of the timeless sorority cherished by all on Mother’s Day. I fully expect to wake up on Sunday to see her hair in rollers. Wearing an apron. Shaking her head at the morning’s headlines.

But rather than wait until Sunday, when everyone and their brother is focused on their mamma or mother, I thought I’d preempt the occasion by pointing out today a few things that make me so fortunate and proud to know that Bixie is the mom raising my children.

To be clear: some of this will be *unreadable for a male audience*, but I don’t care. Truth be told, I’m writing this blog primarily for my family, and for my kids. Some day they’ll skim these pages and, well, I want them to know how their mother really was back in the day.

So, here’s how she is. She does the little things that make all the difference.

Let’s start with her nurturing disposition and comforting voice. After giving Gus a bath, she’ll scoop him up while he’s kicking his slippery legs and settle him into the soft, hooded towel stretched across my lap. I wrap him up and hold him close while she prepares his toothbrush.

She talks him through what she’s doing as she puts a dab of paste on the brush. Her voice is upbeat and comforting. Then she leans down and gently scrubs his baby teeth. He smiles and looks right into her eyes as she says encouragingly, “first the bottoms … good boy! … now the tops!”

The scratchy sound of the bristles scrubbing his teeth in the quiet bathroom (and the way she smiles at him) almost makes me wish I was the little kid wrapped up in a towel. Holding Gus close like that, his cheeks wet from the bath, my shoulders heave with laughter every time.

Bixie brings the love. She brings it strongly and she brings it always.

It’s the little things. Yesterday we were driving along the San Francisco Bay, right in front of Alcatraz, and she blurted out that she was “SO excited to take Gus to swimming lessons soon.”

She said, “seriously, I can’t stop smiling about it!”

And as I think about her excitement for Gus, I can’t stop smiling about her.

So many nights she gently rocked Gus to sleep, refusing to leave until the little nugget was sufficiently transferrable – that is, sound asleep – to his crib. Instead of complaining that she hadn’t slept, she’d say she felt bad that Gus wasn’t getting a comfortable night of rest.

It’s never about her. It’s always about him.

When she doesn’t know it, I sometimes watch my wife studying Gus as he plays. She gazes at him with wonder/surprise/joy and mostly amusement, and you can almost tell what Gus is doing by watching the story of his movements relayed in her expressions.

You can see him in her eyes. And you can see her in his.

Bixie, as some of you well know, has the kind of laugh that catches fire. When she smiles and cracks up laughing the room brightens and the plants perk up. Gus has his mom’s oversized smile and infectious laugh. His smiley eyes share her essence. So early in his life, they already twinkle with her joy and good humor.

I know he’ll some day see the goodness in people, because he’ll see the world through his mother’s eyes and feel it with her noble heart. I know he’ll grow up to be a person capable of feeling empathy, and that he’ll try to do the right thing. Not because he’ll get credit, but because his mom showed him by example that the reward is in the doing, not in the getting.

If you live your life in this way, it turns out sometimes great things happen. Small wonder Bixie is over the moon about her gorgeous little boy. It sounds corny, but I believe Gus is the gift she got for a lifetime of being such a special and giving person. He’s a present that crawled into our lives on pudgy knees and with clean hands; one that keeps on giving even as he keeps needing.

And my sweet wife will keep giving everything she’s got. To Gus, and to the new baby growing inside of her this Mother’s Day.

A person close to me once said the best thing a father can do for their kids is to love their mother. And if that’s the case I must be one hell of a dad.

Because I love their mother like crazy.

Rudeness: Over-the-Counter Edition

Normally this space is devoted to good things about my young family, but today I thought I’d excuse myself from unicorns and rainbows and focus on something that I suspect annoys lots of folks.

Crappy customer service. Not over the phone, but in person.

Yesterday morning I’m standing in line at Starbucks and a counter person clearly sees me and says nothing. He just stares. So, I also say nothing and stare.

Finally he says: “What’s up?”

Crazy me, I was expecting to hear, “Hi, what can I get you?”

Sunday at Babies R Us, I place my things on the counter and try to follow along as the counter person mumbles incoherently something about a rewards card.

“I’m all set, thanks,” I say. “I just want to check out.”

She proceeds to mumble about – I think – some sort of service protection plan. It was tough to tell what she was saying because she wasn’t looking at me, and her words were muffled and inaudible. It was like she was reading from a script somewhere in a dark closet.

“No thanks,” I say.

“Up to you,” she says surprisingly clearly, and throws my stuff in a bag like a litter of kittens headed for the river.

Didn’t say thanks. Didn’t say have a nice day. Didn’t say squat.

Sunday night Bixie and I headed to Fish in Sausalito for an early supper with Gus. The place is always packed, so we felt blessed to find an empty table outside. I get Bixie’s order – a hamburger — and stand in line for fully 20 minutes. Not a big deal; it’s par for the course at Fish. However, just as the person in front of me was finishing placing his order (I’m next!) a young girl appears next to me and tells the line of people the following:

“I don’t know if you know this already, but the kitchen is transitioning for the next half hour. So, um, here’s the menu you can order from until we’re done.” She holds up an abbreviated menu that had no sign of a burger on it. It was primarily fish-related salads and beverages.

A second later it’s finally my turn to order, so I nicely ask the counter person if he can hook me up with a burger for my pregnant wife, who either can’t have or doesn’t want a fish salad. I point at my wife outside, who is all set up at the table with our infant son, and she’s starving for the burger she said she wanted 20 minutes ago. And besides, that random girl with the new menu appeared just seconds ago – is there any way you can help me out?

“This is the menu for the next half hour,” says the young man, pointing to the piece of paper. “Sorry.”

To his credit, he sort of apologized. But it rang hollow.

End result: I paid $33 for a bowl of guacamole and chips, one garden salad and a Coke.

And I didn’t enjoy a bite of it because I was pissed off that the restaurant ruined what was supposed to be a fun dinner outside. It wasn’t because they changed the menu – that happens. No big deal! The problem was that they let people stand in line for 20 minutes before telling us we were wasting our time.

Look, I know retail counter clerks make terrible money. I get that. I worked at a convenience store once. And I also know customers can be condescending jerks. But the part I don’t understand is the lack of basic communications skills or simple common courtesy.

You know how you know that customer service is on the wane? Because every now and then you’ll meet a cashier or store clerk who is *helpful and nice*, and you walk away thinking to yourself: “Wow, that person was actually helpful and nice – for a change.”

Being rude is becoming the rule and not the exception. I can remember when it used to be the other way around.

I know I sound like an old man, talking about how it “used to be.” I can picture the conversation I’ll have with my kids some day:

“When I was your age, clerks and cashiers used to say ‘Hello’ and Have a nice day’!”

And my kiddies will elbow each other conspiratorially and say, “Sure, dad. I bet they did.”

But they did. They did!

It was all unicorns and rainbows back then.

Got any examples of poor customer service you’d like to share? I’d like to hear about them.

Expecting a 2nd child. It’s different this time.

It’s different this time.

Bixie’s second pregnancy is humming along nicely. She’s already past the morning sickness phase (though she gets hers in the evening). She tires more easily, too, but you’d barely know she was pregnant save for the fact she’s beginning to show just a little. That, and she abstains from that evening glass of wine she loves.

But I think the real reason it’s so different this time is because we’ve already been through this once. We have proof in the form of a jolly little monkey named Gus.

To be clear, this isn’t a commentary about being less excited the second time around. To the contrary, we’re both amazed and happy that our next child is in the oven, even as we’re scratching our heads about where the new baby will sleep (we have a two-bedroom condo and Gus is current on his rent for his room).

I think the difference this time is this: the fear is gone. Do we know how to feed a baby? Check. Do we know how to burp and change a baby? Check. Do we know what it’s like to wake up several times a night with a wailing infant? Check. Is there reason to think we can’t do all of this again with a new baby? Hell no.

We have a blueprint.

This morning I woke up with an analogy in my head, and it has to do with college. See, most people are extremely nervous and excited to attend their first year of higher education. There’s so much planning involved and, well, it’s all brand new. Will they fit in? Will they fail any classes? What about the exams? Will they miss their parents? Can they afford it? Where will they live? And so on.

And that first year is generally thrilling and scary and challenging and fun, and inevitably the new college student walks away feeling more “grown up.”

See where I’m going with this? Bixie and I feel more grown up having experienced the ups and downs of early parenthood. Sometimes it’s been frightening and hellish – like when the baby chokes on solid food or when he used to wake up every single hour during the night – but otherwise it’s been one of the truest and purest forms of joy we’ll ever know.

To me, “know” is the operative word. When a college freshman is gearing up for his sophomore year, it’s exciting but no longer scary. There’s not a frantic feeling pervading the second-year college student’s every thought. The ropes are known. The fear is diminished.

But the optimism remains high.

I remember being afraid, before we had Gus, that I might not be a good father. “What if something’s wrong with me and I don’t … love him enough?”

I remember being terrified about changing diapers. “Can I really do that? Sure, a couple of times – but ALL the time?”

I remember being afraid of being afraid.

Since having Gus, I now know that I can absolutely love a child with every atom in my body. I know that instincts kick in when logic fails. I know that I’ll make mistakes, but that the sun will still come up and beam warmth on my smiley boy’s face.

I know I can do it. WE know WE can do it together.

Yeah, it’s different this time.

It’s better.

News Every Daddy Blogger Loves to Share: My Wife is Pregnant Again!

We rarely argue, but one evening a few months ago Bixie and I quarreled over an unwashed sauté pan in the kitchen. I decided it needed to soak overnight; she decided to badger me about it unceasingly; we both decided that staring at the ceiling was better than having to speak to one another between the covers that night.

It was a real domestic dustup!

Flash forward to the next morning. I’m sitting in my leather chair before work, my eyes toggling back and forth between emails and our son Gus, who is incessantly spinning one of the noisy contraptions inside his walker-toy-thingamajig. Whenever our eyes meet he smiles broadly and tilts his head to the side, like a puppy curious about a funny noise.

Enter Bixie.

I pretend not to notice her come into the room, on the grounds that I feel 100 percent morally correct about our argument. But I can feel her walking straight toward me, forcing me to acknowledge her – or else I’ll come off like a total moron if I don’t.

I do.

“You can’t be mad at me anymore,” she says in a singsong voice, extending her arm toward me. Aha, I think. Here comes my apology. The old girl buckled!

I look up and suddenly my smile freezes. Everything slows down. My senses are on high alert. I focus on the details as I scramble to process them: at the end of her arm is a hand. Clutched in that hand is what appears to be a plastic thermometer of some sort. Inside the window on that device is a clear and bold PLUS sign.

What does a plus sign mean? Every muscle in my body is tight. Wait, that’s not a thermometer. Where have I seen this befo — OH MY GOD!

“YOU’RE PREGNANT?!”

Flabbergasted, I nervously joke that we can talk about this pregnancy thing AFTER we settle the dispute about the dirty pan in the kitchen. This makes us both laugh hysterically and we hug tightly and, in that long and exhilarating moment, we try to digest what is happening to us.

To our family.

We both look down at Gus, who is smiling up at us and making silly grinding noises with his four little turkey teeth. We let him hold the pregnancy test and he waves it above his head like a rattle. Waving a great goodbye to his “only child” status.

It’s funny, this whole fatherhood thing. Less than a year ago I had zero children, and less than a year from now I’ll have two babies. There will be four of us, when so recently there were just two people.

But today we’re just two people madly in love with the family we’ve started. And that family is about to get bigger on the quick.

It will be challenging to have our children a mere 15 months apart. Gus will be toddling like mad by then, but I bet he’ll still be a smiley head who can adapt quickly, fondly, to the blinking, cooing little stranger in his midst.

As for Bixie and me, I’m sure we’ll make out okay. The other day I decided to let a dirty dinner pan in the kitchen soak overnight, and she didn’t make a fuss.

The next day she wouldn’t even let me wash it. She said it wasn’t a big deal; that she wanted to do it. And she meant it.

My guess is she didn’t dare to fight about it because, well, if we went to bed angry again it might result in twins.

Dadblast Salute: Happy 66th B-day, Eli!

Today I thought I’d give a shout-out to my wife’s father, my father in-law, who turns 66 today. Eli Mladenoff is his name, and living an unassuming life is his game.

I first met Eli about 10 years ago, and was struck by how large and dignified he looked: soap-opera-perfect salt-and-pepper hair framing a handsome face with a modestly chiseled jaw. But it was his eyes that I couldn’t stop looking at.

See, his daughter Bixie has those same eyes. For that matter the whole Mladenoff clan seems to share basically the same face – which is at once true and false. It’s true because if you meet one of them having already met the rest, you can instantly tell they’re from the same family. It’s false because, sitting side-by-side, they each possess unique characteristics that serve to assure the viewer that he or she hasn’t walked into an alternate universe in which everyone is expected be a carbon copy of Eli Mladenoff.

The Big Easy, as I sometimes call the gentle giant, was born to off-the-boat Macedonian parents (Jordan and Pauline), and it is their genetic coding – deep, dark smiling eyes – that pervades Family Mladenoff. Those attributes have also been infused into the genes of my own son, Gus.

And knowing Eli as I do, I have to believe that his parents instilled in him the sort of Old World ethics and ABSOLUTE devotion to family uncommon in this country today. Perhaps that’s a naïve, romantic view of Eli’s Macedonian ancestry. But when I think about the big guy’s human kindness, his fundamental decency, I can’t help picture a subtitled film playing in my head in which his otherworldly parents teach young Eli the values they cherish:

MOTHER (Majka): “No matter what, you must always sacrifice for the sake of your wife and children. Always. Do you understand?”

YOUNG ELI: “Yes, Majka. Of course. Now, can I make you some tea or massage your feet? Perhaps I can wash the laundry by hand for you?”

PAPA: “One more thing, my son. We are not asking you to be perfect, for no one is perfect. If you honor us by always doing the right thing for your family, you are permitted to have one vice, and one vice only. Choose wisely.”

YOUNG ELI: “Yes, Papa. That’s easy! For my vice I shall choose vanilla cream donuts, and I will sneak off to eat them every day, rain or shine. Now, can I please go do some yard work or other chores to help you? Maybe I should go chop up a winter’s worth of firewood?”

And so on.
I’ve watched Eli interact with his three daughters and one son, and the one constant in all of this is how absolutely devoted he is to their collective and individual happiness. And now his kids have rewarded Eli by having their own children, which has made Eli a happy man, indeed.

I can’t speak for anyone else, but when I watch the Big Easy gather my son into his considerable lap for a long, cozy snuggle, I think to myself: that’s one lucky kid.

And when I watch Eli rush off to help one of his own daughters in need of assistance – day or night; rain or snow – I think to myself: that’s one lucky kid.

And when I watch Eli get up early to make his wife Claudia a pot of coffee, or to walk down to the basement to switch the laundry, I think to myself: that’s one lucky wife.

And when I listened to Eli’s heart-warming speech the day I took his daughter Bixie’s hand in marriage, I thought to myself: I’m one lucky guy.

Of course, Eli isn’t perfect. Everyone knows that at least a few times a week he sneaks around behind our backs for an indulgence he’d rather not openly discuss.

But if you happen to spot a sprinkling of powered sugar on his cheek, he won’t deny that he had the vanilla cream-filled donut. Instead he’ll break into that Santa Clause laugh and tell you, without remorse, that it was delicious.

One lucky guy indeed.

Happy Birthday, Eli!

Daddy blogger’s Wife: “Advice for My Sister — the New Mom”

The following was penned by my lovely bride, Bixie:

When I first wrote about Gus going to day care it was BEFORE he went. I was jumbled with feelings of super sadness and guilt; I tried to think of every way I could somehow NOT leave Gus. But I did it. And I survived.

I’m being reminded of what a sad process it was now that my sister Ali is getting ready to head back to work after having Miss Evie Sugar on January 1st. She is sad, of course, and even though I try to comfort her I know there is nothing that I can really say from making her feel sad, or even guilty. It’s just one of those crazy processes that some mothers have to go through, I guess. While I know I can’t make things better for her – I can share a few things that I wish I’d known when I was going through it.

Quality time ROCKS

It is a major adjustment going from spending every waking moment with your babe to getting back into the swing of a work schedule. It’s quite obvious that you don’t get the same amount of time with your babe when you go to work. But there is a lot to be said for the quality time you can squeeze in before and after work. We call our night time ritual with Gus Happy Hour because all he does is squeal and giggle and roll around like a happy little munchkin. I like to think he’s as happy to be with us as we are to be with him. It’s the best possible way to end the day and I never imagined his bedtime ritual could be so much fun or fulfilling. Sounds dorky – but it’s SO true. Whenever I’m feeling bad about not being with Gus during the day – I think about how lucky we all are that we have that time together. Makes it all a-okay.

He’ll make “friends”

While it’s true that I would have FAR preferred to stay home with Gus at the time (and I’m sure he wished the same, right?), it quickly became clear that he liked going into the baby room at day care where a bunch of other similarly sized humans were. There were a lot of staring contests in the early days but stories from his teachers reinforced that he really was socializing. The earliest story was how Gus was “holding hands” with one of the little girls in the room while they laid under the gym mini (with pictures to prove it!). Most recently, Gus started eating lunch so he gets to sit with the other kids at the table. One of his teachers told me that at the beginning of the meal Gus sits at the table and kicks his legs wildly while looking around and just smiling at all the other kids. He’s excited to eat lunch with his friends. Something about that just melts my heart.

Teachers are teachers for a reason

Now, my sister should know this more than anyone, because she is a kindergarten teacher. But, for some reason, I kind of forgot that I wasn’t going to be leaving Gus with just a random sampling of people. I was leaving him with people who choose to be with kids every day because they love them. They all have their own very distinct personalities but I have no doubt that each teacher in that room really loves Gus. And nothing makes me happier.

If anyone else has gone through this and something to share with Ali, I’d appreciate it. She’ll still be sad but it might help her see that it DOES get better.