They stood silently watching each other for a brief moment. Only a faint whistle of wind passing between them on the short flight of stairs. The creature at the top of the stairs was a pile of crushed springs. She was crouched barefooted holding two miniature pink and purple spatulas out to her sides like swords. She looked ready to pounce and devour, but the wide grin on her tiny face gave away the fact that she was enjoying this battle too much. The man below her held up the pair of pink socks like a lion tamer distracting his prey with a piece of meat, and he began to slowly, and fluidly, step up the stairs into the upper rooms of the house.…
A father's struggle to capture his children's brief moment of youth in words and pictures
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When I got home last night the girls were deeply involved in a new religion they had invented. This is the plight of the working father. When you leave the house in the morning your children are sweetly rubbing their eyes and rocking baby dolls in their pajamas. But then you come home after only a few brief hours and they are wearing flowered party hats and “baptizing” each other on the couch. This baptism apparently is a mix between something they saw happen at church, and something they saw on WWF pay-per-view in the ’80s. Clara, in the official position indicated by the pointy hat, would wrap her arms tightly around her little sister and ask. “Do you believe in Jesus?” I do…
I had forgotten how frustrating it can be to hold a crying newborn. As a father, you are nothing more to a crying baby than just another funny shaped couch that Mom has abandoned you on. I was reminded of this fact the other day when my less than a week old little boy woke up screaming the moment my wife stood up from the bed and headed towards the bathroom. I lifted the little man to my chest and began dancing around the room with him, but of course, this did nothing to satisfy his blind desires for comfort and food. I grit my teeth and sighed at my own inadequacy. As I bounced and twirled around impatiently awaiting Andrea’s return, I was suddenly aware…
Being the youngest in the family is a curse. I have tried to explain this to Andrea on multiple occasions. She sometimes points out her own difficulties as an oldest sibling. But such concepts as the “Responsibility of Command”, and the “Burden of Parental Expectations” seem trivial in light of the baby’s “Guilt Due to Constant Weakness” and the shackles of the so-called “Free Spirit” which haunts us younger children like a mocking poltergeist frightening us away from any lofty ambitions in life. Andrea was finally convinced of this by watching Lydia, who has developed a habit of self inflicted guilt that we have aggressively struggled for a long time to cure her of. It is not common for arguments to break out in our family,…
“Clara!” the cry came from somewhere deep in the upstairs chambers of our home. “Clara, you come here right now!” Her mother was obviously quite angry. Clara was sitting next to me in the recliner in the livingroom. At the roar her face became stricken and her gaze turned up toward me as a silent call for help. “Clara.” I told her, “if you obey your mother, I offer you my protection.” She nodded in agreement and began to climb down from the chair. As she reached the stairs her mother emerged and looked down upon the small child. “Clara, did you write on this?” she held up a pink sheet of paper. Immediately my awareness of what was happening came together. Earlier in…
During the week leading up to Gideon’s birth, Clara was particularly concerned about the logistics of labor. She knew it would be unexpected, and she knew it was serious and had lots of people and moving parts involved. So, she had a keen motherly fear about all of the pieces coming together without any unforeseen difficulty derailing the entire game of mousetrap. She made a practice out of thinking up possible concepts and situations that we may not have prepared for and would quiz us on them regularly. This was disconcerting since we already had a natural apprehension about birth and didn’t need to be steadily reminded of how unprepared we might be. Especially in light of our previous births where things did not…
Following the birth of Gideon, we had several visits from family and friends. Many of them brought us food to make life easier in the weeks post partum. Andrea however has still not come much further than the top of the stairs and has been taking meals in her room. This is how I was able to sneak a large box of Froot Loops into the house yesterday for the girls without her noticing. And the best part is, if she ever makes it to the kitchen and finds this criminal box of “froot”, I can easily blame its presence on Tanya Scott. It’s the perfect crime. And it’s logically consistent that Tanya would bring us a big box of Froot Loops along side a…
Clara was sitting on the bed next to her mother and her younger sister. She was obviously thinking about something as her eyes were noticeably out of tune with the world. This matched her hair which was its typical morning bramble of broken antenna. I was just pondering what scrambled bits of data she was receiving from the mother ship when slowly she drifted back into consciousness and decided to share her thoughts with us. “I’m glad a little boy is coming to live with us.” She began. “Because then they will be able to help us with our family church time. You know, he can help say prayers or preach or something.” I nodded and we all agreed that this would be good for…
I was sitting at the church building on Sunday resting in the backroom, having a quiet conversation with my wife, when there was a knock at the door. We were then joined by an energetic squirrel named Macey that happens to be a good friend. She approached me instantly to bring a breathless message about how she was the snow Queen and was hiding here from her younger sister because no one understood her Icey powers. With raised eyebrows I excused myself from the conversation I had been having and calmly informed the smiling child that I didn’t blame people for not understanding her Icee powers because most people prefer Slurpees. But, I think my joke was lost due to her mere 3 years…
The girls are having trouble figuring out how to act while waiting for the baby to arrive. Now that we are a good five days or so past our due date they have had close to a week to spend nervously standing in line for a roller coaster that they have never been on before. Or, to be even more specific, standing in line for a roller coaster without having any concept of what a roller coaster even is. I try to put myself in their little pink shoes and picture getting strapped into some sort of funny little train, and then slowly getting pulled up the first hill. “Oh.” one might say, “I get it now.” But you can’t get it, and you won’t…
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