I’m writing this in bed with a cold beer on the nightstand next to me. Jen is downstairs working and the girl is next door, fast asleep after a long day.
We’ve had two very busy days, each ending in late bedtime. Friday Jen and I picked the girl up from daycare and drove to our friends’ house for a lovely backyard barbecue, with excellent food and conversation among the music of crickets and cicada. Finn fearlessly climbed the treehouse ladder and called to me quietly for help when it was time to come down; I must have climbed that ladder for her five times, happy to see she’d made it up there on her own with no complaint (I’d say it was a full story high). Late in the evening, as dusk gave way to shadow, after accompanying her to the bathroom, I followed her back out of the house, smiling wide as she bound fearlessly into the dark ahead of me looking for adventure.
Saturday morning I brought her shopping with me, and in the car we had a long talk about throwing fits when she didn’t get her way. She knew there was a pool party planned and I made it clear that she needed to behave if she wanted to go. She did really well sticking with me in the Target, Old Navy, and finally the Kohl’s, where she got close to a meltdown after running off on her own. I took her to a quiet corner and reviewed the rules, and we came to an agreement after some deep breaths and discussion. From there, we picked up groceries and headed home.
After naptime, I packed her up with a fresh bowl of guacamole and a bag of beach gear and we drove out into a light drizzle to a pool party thrown by my boss; a little downpour didn’t spoil the fun, so we all just stayed inside. Finn’s already met almost everyone there, but it wasn’t until she’d had some food that she finally warmed up to the crowd. And then, there was no stopping her. Four hours later, at the time she’s usually putting head to pillow, she was blowing kisses and making the rounds, charming everyone she touched. There was no drama, no screaming; the worst point was when I had to wave off the third cupcake, and then have a quick chat to remind her of our agreement (a clean plate of real food first and then dessert). All afternoon I kept a close eye on her from afar, and everything I saw looked good—let’s just say I didn’t have to go running to correct anything the entire visit.
We talked about our day and sang to each other on the way home (Eyes Without a Face, She Drives Me Crazy, and I Love Rock ‘N’ Roll were standouts), and when she went down for sleep, she stayed down. I’ll take another fifteen years of days like that, thank you very much.
This morning I said goodbye to my old MacBook Pro, the 17″ workhorse that got me through three years of freelance and the beginning of my current job. I’d had it on Craigslist for the last month or so, gradually lowering the price by $50 each week, but it wasn’t until yesterday that I got a solid offer. Walking away I had a twinge of regret and a fear that I’d sold it for too little, but had to remind myself that cash in the pocket is worth more than an unused computer on the desk.
Meanwhile, my Moleskine notebook and sunglasses have gone missing somewhere in the house ever since I got back from Bennett’s place this weekend. I’ve grown accustomed to carrying my notebook with me everywhere I went, writing notes down for myself (it’s little more than a reminder/planner, but for my attention span, the perfect size and shape) so I’m feeling a huge hole in my conscious brain every five minutes, when I think of something else to do, check on, or remind myself of. I’ve had it for about two weeks shy of a year, so the habit is strong. I tore the house upside down last night looking for it, but it wasn’t until this morning when I realized my sunglasses are gone too—this is a good thing, because it means both things made it back inside after my trip on Saturday, so they must be someplace inside the house. The question remains: where?
Sometimes people ask me about how I created my….
As someone who struggles every day with getting my design/carpentry/mechanics/parenting/husbandry to be where my ambitions lie, this is the best bit of advice I could read.
Sadly, after 20 years of loyal service, my surplus combat boots have sprung a leak. The sole of the left boot is cracked open to the point where my foot got very cold and very wet this morning on my way in to work. Actually, I was going in to a farewell breakfast for a colleague, so my normal commute was extended by a 6-block walk to the harbor through puddles of mushy snow, and on our return I began to notice the leak. I’m not entirely broken up about it, though—these boots are better suited for dry weather anyway, because they have lousy soles for winter grip (read: none) so I only wore them about 1/2 of the year anyway. My hiking boots, which date back to 2000 or so, are literally falling apart at the seams, so the timetable for wet weather footwear has now been moved up dramatically.
I took Finn shopping with me this weekend to give Mama some time to work on a big catalog job; one of my favorite things these days is to spend time running errands with my girls, because we get to be out of the house and exploring together. As she and I traversed the aisles of the Giant, avoiding the other holiday shoppers, Never Tear Us Apart by INXS came on over the store radio. Now, this is not the first time we have heard this song together, and I can never resist the temptation to serenade my daughter and make a fool of myself in public if it makes her laugh:
We got some smiles and laughs from the other shoppers as well as a few puzzled looks, and a woman who hurried away from us after snatching her soda off the shelf, but it was worth it.
We also had the good fortune to be invited to a pre-holiday party on Saturday evening, hosted by some new friends, and found it (and them!) to be warm, funny, and engaging. Candles set a cheery mood, Interesting people mingled, tasty foods were assembled, wine and beer flowed freely, and children of all ages ran underfoot up and down the stairs. Finn is getting to the age where she’s beginning to explore and socialize more on her own, and before we even got her coat off she was wandering inside to check out the scene.
This is all new territory for Daddy, because I’m used to chaperoning her relatively closely. At this age I’m not afraid she’ll eat the sofa cushions, but lately she’s been very interested in building towers to get up onto the dining room table and bringing us random items from previously inaccessible locations. When faced with a household where other children her age live, I figured the breakable stuff was already put away, so Mama and I hung back a bit in an unspoken agreement to see how she would handle the situation. Apart from a request for some hors d’oeuvres, she spent a good bit of the evening out of our direct eyesight, which was nice for Mama and I, even though we each admitted to keeping at least one eye peeled for her. And mostly, it went really well. She mingled and played and found things to do with new kids she’d just met. At one point she went upstairs to play with the bigger kids and apparently got very scared by something; luckily Mama was coming up at that exact moment to check on her and Finn came back down with us until she felt a bit safer.
I find myself going back to my internal argument about being a helicopter dad vs. letting her experience things on her own, and peeking in on her as she watched and played with the other kids in the living room filled me with a heady, sickening mixture of love, fear, hope, dread, and bittersweet sadness. She is the most amazing creature on this earth, and I will do absolutely anything for her. I also realize she must try and fail and love and hurt on her own, making sure that I am nearby to pick her up, brush the dust off, dry her tears, and send her back out on her own to try again. The urge to wrap her in my arms and protect her from everything is overwhelming, but I know I’d only do her more harm in the long run by fighting her battles for her, and the knowledge that she’s growing up so fast and gaining independence with every passing day is both a source of pride and an ache in my heart. On the day when she is too big to ride on my shoulders and play with my ears, laughing, as we stroll to the park, I’m going to have to find a nice quiet spot by myself to be alone for a while.
It’s cold and dreary in Baltimore (again) but that didn’t stop me from driving the Scout in to work yesterday. The soft top is back on for the duration of the winter so the cabin is relatively warm, and with the heat turned up the only cold chill I feel is on the back of my neck, which reminds me of Chewbacca in the old days. After work I drove up to MICA for the first evening of a figure drawing class, something I’ve done on and off for the past ten years. It was kind of strange to be back on the third floor of Main building for the first time in 20 years. The class went well, even though I was positioned poorly for the first half and the better model was doing the long pose (the other model was a disagreeable woman they’ve used since I was an undergrad).
Finn is in a state of serious separation anxiety, or perhaps suffering from the lingering effects of a cold. Everything has been “Iwantmymama” followed by uninterrupted crying jags for about the past week or so; any refusal to provide service immediately results in hysteria. We could be in the Terrible Twos or fighting off the flu, but it’s hard to tell when proper sentences can’t be formed.
In the meantime, we cranked up the heat at the house for the first time on Monday to battle an early cold snap, which has me considering replacement windows in certain key locations. The biggest offender at present is the west window in the attic, which currently holds a vintage air conditioner of dubious quality and indeterminate weight. Last year I wrapped the entire thing in plastic but that was only a temporary fix. Off the shelf replacement windows can be had for as cheap as $88 at Lowe’s but I would need to get a three-story ladder to place it properly from outside (Or I could just cheat and do it from inside, which is more likely).
We’re also waiting on replacement windows and doors for the side porch, which have been on order since before our vacation. I need to block out time over this coming weekend to clean off the side porch (top floor) and do as much demolition as possible before Mr. Scout is ready to start, which will most likely be in the middle of October. The trick will be getting it hauled out, which I may try to do in loads with the Scout.
→ This is a syndicated post from my Scout weblog. More info here.
I’m exhausted for reasons I won’t get into here, but hopefully it will have been worth the loss of sleep. Between company on Saturday and Sunday, Finn’s nightmare early Saturday morning (“I scared of frogs under the bed, daddy”) and a large, time-critical project, I got a total of about 8 hours’ sleep this weekend. But it was all good; the house is clean, we have a new (used) snowblower sitting in the garage waiting for reassembly, and we hosted my brother in law and his beau for lunch on Saturday and our neighbors and their daughter for dinner on Sunday.
Somebody in Baltimore thought it would be a good idea to host a Grand Prix race downtown in 2011, which means they’ve been blocking off and ripping up giant swaths of concrete and pavement throughout the neighborhood where my office is located. All of this means A. I won’t be in the city on the one day they run the race, and B. my commute has gotten interminable because every available artery coming north from I-95 is down to two usable lanes or clogged with people like me trying to find alternate routes.
Yesterday afternoon, after a gaggle of older screaming kids had finally vacated the neighbors’ pool, I called over to see if I could bring Finn for a swim. She knows that Aloha means “hello” because we talk about it when I put on her pink swim shirt and she literally vibrates with excitement when we get near the water.
I set her down on the steps and we both got in slowly, basking in the afternoon sun, until she was up to her chest and I was floating in front of her. Instead of free swimming the whole time like we normally do at the Y, she was content to sit on the steps and watch as I crept up to her toes underwater and surfaced with a loud “Boo!’, which sent her into fits of giggles. Then she would stand up, hold her arms open, yell, “Ready!” and jump into my arms for a brief tour of the shallow end before practicing her paddle back to the stairs, and we would do it all over again.
There was a moment when the sun hit her face as I knelt in front of her, and her blue eyes looked deep into mine, right before she stood up to jump into my arms again. In that moment, I saw the trust she had in me, knowing I would be there to catch her as she made her leap, and I made a quiet promise to myself that I would never let her down. And as her arms wrapped around my neck, the sun warmed my back, and her giggles filled my ears, I felt like the luckiest man on earth.
Yep, I’m still here. I haven’t had a whole lot of time to write lately, and by the time I’m settled down enough to write I’m usually out of things to say. I haven’t been doing much picture-taking either, so I guess I’m just falling down on the job all over the place.
That having been said, life is good. The girl is talking up a storm, work is rolling along smoothly, my efforts to organize and structure my life are slowly bearing fruit, and I feel better about everything in general. Stick with me, guys; I’ll get back to a reasonable writing schedule soon.
The weather finally broke here in Baltimore, and 90° suddenly feels downright balmy to me. Which is a sad state of affairs, considering the load we’ve put on our air conditioners in the month of July.
It’s been exceptionally busy the last couple of weeks, which means Idiotking.org is a quiet place. I’ve been juggling baby duty while Mama is recovering from a monster infection, helping remodel and move my daytime office, and also reorganizing my day to day life in order to be a better husband, father, and employee. No mean feat to be sure, but I think it may be easier to accept sweeping change when everything is in flux.
Mama is recovering from her illness, and I will be giving back the keys to the swanky babyhauler tomorrow (mainly because I have a dentists’ appointment in the morning, not because she’s at 100% yet) but I’ve enjoyed my mornings with the girl. Even when it’s been an hour before my alarm clock rang. She’s getting so big so fast. To see her walk a set of stairs, upright, by herself fills me with an immense surge of pride and a wave of sadness, because there’s no better feeling than to have her reach up for my hand and circle one or two of my fingers with her little palm, and there will soon come a time when she won’t want my help with the stairs anymore.
We’ve just finished remodeling our offices at work after about four weeks of work, and it feels good to be settled again. What was once a large space subdivided into tiny offices has now been expanded into an open-plan area with expansive desks, exposed brickwork (my suggestion), new carpeting, and better lighting.
In order to keep costs down, we all pitched in to help paint, move, assemble furniture, and organize the space, so I spent much of the early part of this month at the office after hours pitching in. The payoff has been immediate, though; I feel much more motivated and focused on my work being out in the open instead of holed up in my office.
On that same note, I’m trying a new method of personal organization, which involves a smaller, lighter notebook and a resolution to keep using it. I’m pairing this with my own basic version of the Getting Things Done Methodology that is in a state of kaizen, and I’m really going to work hard to make this stick. I’ve also started using Mint.com to track my personal finances and start setting some specific long-term goals for the future; I’m hoping to dovetail this in with all the work Jen has done on household budgeting in order to save more money than we currently do.
So, in a nutshell, I feel more optimistic than I have in a while, more motivated, and at peace with a lot of things in my life. The trick will be to maintain that peace and forward momentum.
Tomorrow morning I’ll see the dentist for the first time in ages, which is a good feeling.