My Happiest Father's Day

If you told me what it was going to be like being a father thirteen years ago, It would have been as foreign a concept to me as setting a digital clock is to a senior citizen. My now ex-wife and I were trying to conceive and after one month succeeded. As expectant parents, we were anxious, excited, conquering the unknown together and we were happy.

It was nine months of struggle, but we did it together. The morning of my daughter's birth, I was supposed to go and play golf, I was sleeping on the couch, so as not to disturb when I woke up for my early tee time.

I was awaken abruptly by a frantic Lisa, she proclaimed, "My water broke!", I groggily replied, "I'll fix it after the golf game.". She tapped me on th shoulder and said "It's time!".
We timed the contractions as we got into the car, damn they were close. We flew down the Parkway to the hospital. Thoughts of being pulled over and getting a police escort in bad tv style rolled through my ape brain, how cool would that have been? I was slapped back to reality as Lisa yelled, "Another one (contraction) and it was big!"
I punched the gas and when we got to the hospital, dropped my wife off, parked the car and grabbed my bag of change. (Pay phones, not Cel phones in the hospital.)

I thought we were totally prepared (naïveté of a first timer). We had taken Lamaze courses, we read all the books and watched all of the videos. The scene I arrived to in the hospital was pure chaos. Lisa was asking the orderly for an epidural in a demonic tone. The orderly was explaining in vane, that she would need the anesthesiologist. When we got to the room, I told her, “Just breath!”, she told me, “Shut up.”. Now my ape brain realizes those breathing classes are for the father not the mother and as my mother-in-law and I try comforting Lisa, I catch myself going hoo hoo hee, to keep from hyperventilating. After 5 hours of labor and several walks around the hospital corridors, it was time. As a thick black head of hair began to crown, I realized my life was about to change forever, hoo hoo hee.

Within a short period of time and some suction later, the head was out. A creature had emerged from my wife's body and it appeared reptilian in nature. The doctor proclaimed it was a girl. As I cut the cord, I knew this would be the least painless time for me to do so.
The placenta came next and it looked like an alien life pod that resembled something from the fifties Blob movie. As the nurse wiped the baby, our baby off, she handed it to me and my whole life became meaningless for myself, but more important because of the small human being, my little girl, that was now looking at me. As I handed our daughter to my wife, I realized she had never been more beautiful, Lisa wore the struggle and strength of the delivery well. I found a strange comfort in my daughter's tears, she was healthy and she was born.

Emily was an easy child, she cried very little and at 6lbs, 13 (actually 12.7) ounces, was a true joy. We were very lucky to have her as a first child.
Now thirteen years later (in August), I can't let go of the image of that little baby and watching her grow up. I know she is now a young woman. I wish I could freeze time and keep her young forever, but alas only memories stay frozen, and we age together. I'll stop here before going into Lizzy's birth, I'll save that for next Father's Day. Lizzy seems to get the Lion's share of my blog time now anyway. She is still young enough to believe daddy is superman and I still foolish enough to believe that she will always be my baby girl. I fear before I realize it, both of our perceptions will be lost.

Now my childless friends tell me of the things I missed out on; the parties, the vacations, the money. They do not understand, the parties I went to had goody bags when I left, my vacations were the places I saw in my childrens' eyes and the money that was spent was not wasted, but paid for the dreams of my children that my parents never could have afforded to have me realize.

Make memories with your children whenever you can, before you know it, they'll no longer be children and adult memories aren't nearly as magical.