Another clarification

I knew I wouldn’t come out of this blogging experiment unscathed, and yet I continue to do this.

For you.

My faithful reader.

This is my second official clarification for a blog post (read the first here), although this one is not at the urging of The Boss, as she’s unaware I’m writing this. In fact, she’s dead asleep at 9 p.m. with the Berlin Wall already firmly in place.

This clarification has to do with my early Valentine’s Day post of last week.

On Sunday night we were out for dinner with a group of our friends, some of whom have a sadder existence than I and actually read this blog (wait, is it more pathetic to read or write this drivel? Anyway…). So I’m at the very far end of the table from The Boss (boys on one end, girls on the other, just like a Grade 6 dance) and I overhear her saying that people likely think I’m some sort of hero and great romantic after reading my Thursday post.

She – clearly – was not moved by the heartfelt softening of my anti-Valentine’s position. She said it had something to do with the fact I chucked a card and a bag of chocolate (are you telling me Zellers doesn’t use the finest cocoa beans?) at her after I got home from work Thursday night as we rushed to feed The Hurricane and ourselves, pack our bags and make a short 350 kilometre trek home for the weekend.

Well, if that was wrong, then I am guilty. As charged and as sin.

But here’s the deal. I didn’t – no, couldn’t – do the whole flowers thing because we weren’t going to be home for the weekend and they’d be withered and dead by the time we returned Monday night. That’s logical.

The following isn’t, but here it goes anyway.

I simply couldn’t sell out my buddy Dutch like that. There’s a reason that, come June 6, we’ll have been each other’s best man – we take a bullet when we know (or figure) the other is likely to do something stupid like not even get his fiancee a couple of flowers a few months before they exchange the rings.

How could I let him be the only one who failed to achieve the lofty standards set by my jerk someday-brother-in-law and his dozens and dozens of roses, moonlight walks, singing telegrams and $25 entrees? Well, I just couldn’t (although, Dutchie, a card probably wouldn’t have killed ya – you could’ve picked one up when you were grabbing a pack of smokes or hangin’ out at coffee club, y’know).

It’s the whole ‘bros before h … yeah right, you’re nuts if you thought I was actually going to write that.

So I came up short. Again. And I want everyone to know that. I couldn’t sleep soundly ever again knowing there was one person out there who thought I was a Romeo-incarnate, bound to profess my love for my wife with the greatest of spectacles on February 14.

But next year … oh baby, you just wait.

Dutch and I will start the planning at his stag party.

10 seconds of sheer terror

I came across a horrific story out of Michigan about a month-old baby who died while sleeping with his parents.

That was always a huge fear of mine, even though The Hurricane never did and still doesn’t have any inclination to sleep in the same bed as us.

I remember either the first or second night we had her home from the hospital. With all the grandparents around, and a new Mommy trying to bond with her baby, I hadn’t had a lot of time with my new daughter. So, after a feeding, I sent an exhausted Boss to bed, put on the movie The Last Samurai, found a comfortable spot sitting up on the couch, and snuggled with my new baby, who was sleeping soundly.

Well into the movie, I realized The Hurricane, who was swaddled and cradled in my arms, hadn’t moved for a while – not a leg kick, finger bend or little cry – and I started to panic. I remember trying to rouse her while we were still sitting on the couch, but she didn’t respond to anything I did, which admittedly wasn’t much because you can’t exactly shake a baby awake or flick their ears when they’re less than two days out of the womb.

I then remember leaping to my feet and calling her name, doing what I could to wake her up – to get some sort of response - without completely losing my mind. All I could think of was that I had suffocated her against my chest while I watched a fucking movie, and I didn’t deserve to be a parent, and I could never forgive myself for this horrific act of irresponsibility …

And then she woke up. I don’t think she started crying, but just made a peep, just enough to let me know she was OK, and I had over-reacted to a soundly sleeping baby.

What I do remember clearly is the greatest sense of relief I have ever felt – it washed over me like a rolling wave in a warm ocean. I sat back down on the couch with her, stunned, my heart racing.

I hugged her tight, but made double-sure she was still breathing.

I know it was the scariest 10 seconds of my life, and I can’t imagine the pain, and guilt, and self-loathing, and sadness, and heartache those young parents in Michigan are feeling today.

Parenting solo

Last night The Boss had a long list of work and social activities to tend to after her work day ended, so I was on daughter duty, with no net below.

I don’t know what it is about knowing you’re parenting solo, but it still makes me a little nervous whenever I look at the clock on my computer screen. Yes, even 18 months after becoming a father.

Maybe it’s the fact that I have to get out of work at 5 p.m. so our poor babysitter doesn’t have to stay in the eye of The Hurricane any longer than necessary.

Or maybe it’s because I know I have to pick up, drive, de-coat and de-boot, feed, water, clean, change, bath, read to, rock and drop this wild-child all on my own, with nobody there to say, “Here you friggin’ idiot, let me do it.” (I’m paraphrasing, The Boss only thinks about calling me a friggin’ idiot, but I know … I know).

So, even on a random Wednesday night, the pressure was on. The pick-up I managed (albeit, not until 5:35 p.m. because of work issues – sorry Carolyn!) and I even got her in the door just fine. Then, because she won’t stop saying (Musical) ‘Baby on’, I put her favourite DVD on while I fried us up a pizza.

And then, once we got settled in, it was like nothing. Food, check. Water, check. Time out for pulling the dog’s hair and screeching ‘No Dadda!’ when I pried her hands off the dog, check. Book, check. Bubble bath, check. Jammies, check. A quick rock, a goodnight kiss and a soundly sleeping baby a few minutes before her regular bed-time, check, check and check.

And I was worried? Shee-it.

I guess it’s just because Moms are the favourite and so damned good at what they do, that it’s easy to just let the jobs that don’t involve rolling around on the floor tickling baby tummies fall to them. So when we have to do everything ourselves, it can be a little daunting.

But it’s a good reminder for myself to know that I can pull off a victory when parenting solo.

Gettin’ creative here

I haven’t had a chance to try some of the interesting options that WordPress offers the cheap bastards who won’t pay for a subscription and only use the free version.

So, because the past two days have been pretty draining at work and I just finished embarrassing myself on the basketball court, I thought hey, maybe it’s time to try building a poll for the … uh … masses of people who drop by daily.

(Although you can’t see me, trust me when I say I couldn’t manage to type that sentence with a straight face)

So here’s my first poll. If it doesn’t work, well then, I’m an idiot. If it does, then I’m a tiny bit less of an idiot than I was five minutes ago.

Pearl Jam-ming with my daughter

One of my goals during my week at home has been to introduce The Hurricane to music.

Not Elmo, or Old MacDonald, or that horrible counting CD that is so damn catchy I wake in the middle of the night with Three Blind Mice running through my brain. I can actually see how they run!

Nope, she’s going to Dad’s school of music, and Wednesday was the first class. Instead of having the TV or some other nonsense on in the background as we played, I threw on Pearl Jam Vs., the band’s second album, and second best in my personal book. Why not Ten, their acclaimed 1991 debut, you ask? — too overplayed, even though you likely didn’t ask. I want my girl to be a true Pearl Jam fan and know that Dissident is 1,000 times better than Jeremy, but it’s the latter you’ll hear on the radio and it’s a damn shame.

So we rocked out, man, me and The Hurricane. Although the first couple of tunes are a bit heavier than anything she’s likely ever heard, when Daughter came on, she danced without prompting.

And my heart leapt.

A Pearl Jam fan, right from the first listen — I wasn’t this proud when she took her first steps.

OK, that’s being overly dramatic, but it was still awesome to watch her dance to one of my all-time favourite bands.

Throughout the rest of the album she was in and out of attention, like an 18-month-old is with anything other than Baby Einstein. But I wasn’t going to let her away that easy, so I scooped her up for Elderly Woman Behind the Counter in a Small Town, one of the most beautiful songs the band has ever written. Click the link, listen to it, enjoy it.

This time we danced. Hand in hand, eye to eye, in the middle of the living room, not caring that the curtains were wide open and any number of passersby could see us. We went in circles slowly, we spun around quickly (to her great delight), we dipped, we got dizzy, and we laughed.

It was likely the best 3 minutes and 15 seconds of my week, and possibly of my life.

I don’t know why I have this desire to pass on my music to my daughter. Christ only knows what will be ‘cool’ when she’s a teen, but I feel it’s my duty for her to know what music was important to me in my younger days, and there’s nothing cooler than being the person that introduces that ‘old’ band to your buddies who are listening to Top 40 crap. My cousin was always that guy, buying Queen albums before Wayne’s World made Bohemian Rhapsody cool again. Or having the complete Twisted Sister collection when all we had ever heard was We’re Not Gonna Take It (OK, maybe not so cool, but a trend setter nonetheless in a small Ontario town of 600 with nothing but a Celine Dion playing radio station and its Randy Travis country counterpart).

The Boss always mentions to me that I know every song on the radio, no matter the station we’re listening to, even though I rarely listen to music outside my car anymore. I think it’s because some of my earliest memories were of singing along to The Old Man’s music, which unfortunately at the time was Air Supply (really Dad, seriously, in the early-80s when Queen, and Led Zepplin, and Aerosmith, and The Beatles, and ACDC, and the pre-Disney Elton John, and CCR, and so many other kick-ass bands were recently broken up or still going strong you were listening to Air Supply, the cheesiest group ever assembled?).

But if I’m going to rip on The Old Man, I also have to give him serious props for showing me how to run his 8-track player in the garage so I could wear out Meat Loaf’s epic Bat Out of Hell, which still kicks my ass whenever I listen to it, even without the 8-track channel changes and fading in and out mid-song.

He also had a great multiple-tape collection that was a giveaway from the local gas station — Shell Solid Gold it was called and even though I can’t even find a link for it on eBay, it existed — that introduced me to all the hits of the 50’s and 60’s — songs I still know by heart, although I haven’t heard them since, well the 80’s. Sure, these songs may not have moulded my future listening tastes — unless Motley Crue, Warrant and Poison are direct results of The Temptations — but I’m glad I know the music that came before me.

So I think that’s what I want to give The Hurricane. A working knowledge. I don’t pretend to be a music snob — I’ve been to four Poison and a (shudder) Creed concert for Christ sakes — and maybe she won’t like my music at all. But maybe, just maybe, she’ll be the kid in school who tells her friend to turn off Miley freakin’ Cyrus and listen to this mind-blowing shit from a band from the mid-80s called Guns ‘n Fuckin’ Roses.

That, to me, would be cool. Even if she swears, because sometimes the situation just calls for it.

Next up — Our Lady Peace. Then I Mother Earth. Then Nirvana. With GnR, Motley Crue, Poison, Aerosmith, Bon Jovi and so many others to follow.

School’s in session, little one.

Christmas gonna suck? Blame Santa

An article shows that 44% of 1,000 mothers surveyed are going to hang the Big Guy out to dry this Christmas.

Yeah, the shitty economy is even causing reverberations at the North Pole.

Belts are tightening because jobs, brokerage firms, sub-prime mortgages and Wall Street suits are disappearing at alarming rates, and almost half the people surveyed said they’ll be telling their children that Santa has had to cut back on Christmas this year, because of the trying times.

Meanwhile, five per cent have actually said they’ll shatter the lore of Saint Nick for their kids and have a frank discussion on the economic downturn and why their present haul isn’t what it used to be.

And then there’s the oblivious troopers – the 49% who said they’ll do whatever it takes to make sure their child’s wish list is fulfilled. Because what good parent wouldn’t put themselves into more debt just so their kid can have an XBOX 360 or the coolest $500 iPod, or an iPhone or any other technological crap that a person without their own multi-million dollar corporation doesn’t need?

I’m definitely with the 44% who would rather pin a smaller Christmas on Santa Claus’s struggles than tell a six-year-old that Mommy, Daddy, Suzie and Billy are one bounced cheque away from standing in line at the soup kitchen while big men with back braces take everything out of their home – yes, your cute little Dora bed too, sweetheart – because the economy is in shambles and we can’t afford anything and Santa isn’t real, and what do you mean you lost your innocence prematurely and will blame me for your growing up too fast when you turn to drugs and alcohol at 13 and start turning tricks at 16?

Nope, not in my house. Santa is walking the plank, baby.

The Hurricane: Dad, why did Santa bring me a pair of old socks and a book of stamps for Christmas?

Smartest Dad Ever: Well honey, Santa is having a tough go this year. See, over the past 10 years he hasn’t paid much attention to the shift in the market and continued to make these huge, giant toys that his highly-paid elves produced at a steady rate, despite nobody really wanting them anymore. Then, when the fuel prices got too high for Santa to deliver his presents, he decided to move his business to China, India and Mexico, to save money on staff. This caused a terrible chain reaction in the North American toy market, and now, there’s just not enough toys out there for everybody. So, instead of you getting that (check the list) really big dollhouse and that super-awesome giant dog that barks and wags its tail and walks and licks itself and costs $200 at Canadian Tire, Santa has to spread his toys out to all the boys and girls and the kids that are a lot less fortunate than you get the best toys first, and the ones who get to eat turkey on Christmas get what’s left. So here’s your peanut butter sandwich with a candy cane on top, now who do you want to mail that stinky sock to?

Oh yeah, that totally works for me.

A time-out for time-outs

I’ve never really believed in or understood the ‘time-out’.

Y’know, the two minutes in the box for the toddler who hits, spits, kicks, tricks, takes and breaks.

But, having a 17-month-old, there’s times where discipline is necessary (or maybe it’s easier to categorize the times where discipline isn’t necessary). And, despite always thinking a spank never hurt a kid because it didn’t hurt me, I’ve never had the urge to whack a child I love so deeply on the pants to straighten them out.

So, that leaves me with the time-out, a mode my social service working wife believes in, because she sees the horror stories about abusive parents and what it does to kids.

The Boss uses it more than me, but not because she’s meaner, but because she’ll put up with less crap than me. But, I’ve sat The Hurricane down on the mat by the front door where she can pretend to cry while looking at herself in the full-length mirrors/closet doors a couple of times this week when asking and telling her to stop hitting (the latest craze) hasn’t worked.

But then I read this article by Kimberley Clayton Blaine, a child therapist, which explains that time-outs aren’t only ineffective on toddlers, but also harmful to their development.

A toddler’s developing brain cannot process and integrate the complex message of a time-out. Although I personally am opposed to using time-outs with children, unless it’s implemented in a loving and humane way; i.e., sitting with them to help them calm down, think about what they did, and to come up with a better solution. This is mentally impossible for a child under 2.5 years of age – especially alone.

And how are they supposed to know how to do it unless someone shows them? Toddlers are one-dimensional and depend on their parents to guide them through tough times and learning moments.

Huh.

Good points.

How are toddlers, and their developing brains, supposed to know that hitting is wrong, when they’ve only recently discovered the action, learned that it can be used to get things from the dog, Dad, or daycare playmate, and always encites a response?

They may not realize that it hurts or is wrong, because they can’t relate the actions to the emotions.

Now my baby’s smart – and it’s not just the blind love of a first time Dad talking. At 17 months she has a vocabulary well over 50 words, she learns new things quickly – this morning, after a fresh blanket of snow (the second this year), she looked out the window and said ‘No’, but meant ’snow’, because her regular ‘no’ sounds differently, if that makes one iota of sense. Every day she does something a kid her age isn’t supposed to do.

She even tests us – doing things she 100% knows she’s not supposed to do just to see what sort of reaction she’ll get out of us. She’ll start to drop food from her high-chair for the dog, and only pull it back once we give her a warning.

And then smile.

And do it again with the next bite.

She’ll raise her hand above her head and wait to see if we say ‘don’t you dare’ before bringing it down into our face, while wearing a shit-eatin’ grin for good measure.

And then she’ll immediately lean in to kiss us better and say sorry, because that’s how she gets off the hook.

So, although she’s the cutest, smartest baby in the world, she’s no saint. In fact, the devil may be rubbing his hands and thinking he has a new leader on earth.

So what the hell do we do? If time-outs aren’t healthy for a child (and the article makes a good case, so go back and read it if you didn’t) and a tap on the bum will get Children’s Aid on your ass – even though I still think a spank is not the same as a beating – what are our options?

Because I have a hard time believing that sitting on the floor and trying to reason with a 17-month-old – do I bring pie graphs that depict what percentage of her behaviour is anger, misunderstanding, and learning, while showing her on a line chart how her actions effect her Mommy and Daddy’s moods in relation to the time of day? – is the answer.

Dads helping dads

Welcome to my blog.

Nah, too lame.

Class is in session.

Oh yeah, all guys love school. What a great way to draw in the readers …

Boobs. Boobs and beer! Boobs, beer and sports!!

Now that’s the way to start a new blog. Who could resist reading more about the primary focus of pretty much every man on earth (well, nine out of 10, if you believe the statistics)?

A guy with a kid, that’s who.

I’m sure every new Dad’s priorities changed when his first child came along. It happened for me when my daughter Layne was born on July 3, 2007. (And I’ve officially pissed off my wife for linking to a picture of her 10 minutes after delivery – it was bound to happen sometime, I guess).

In the past 16 months I’ve spent a lot of time trying to learn – through experimenting and guessing and taking advice and making up the rules and doing what I thought (hoped) was right – how to do the only job in my life that will really, truly matter after I’m in the ground - raise a smart, healthy, socially-conscious, fun, responsible, hard-working, adventurous, and respectful child who will make me proud, not through winning awards or accolades (although those would be nice), but through helping others and making the world a better place.

So, instead of fumbling blindly along holding onto my wife’s hand as she leads me down the proper hallways, I thought a blog that brings dads – new and old – together to share thoughts and ideas on how to raise a ‘good’ kid would be a good idea. Hopefully it can be fun and somewhat informative, and maybe our better halves will drop by and tell us what we’re doing wrong and how to improve (admit it, our wives/girlfriends are vastly superior to us, because they can run on two hours of sleep for six straight months, be elbows deep in green poop, have vomit in their hair and still turn us on – see engorged breasts).

So check back daily and send me comments and discussion points.

If you’re anything like me, you can use all the help you can get.