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Power vomit. That’s the central element in my lives these days. A child that power vomits. (The other child likes to lick. Long story. Not the vomit! Eew. No, she licks people's cheeks. She has an odd dog thing going for her.) I don’t own a shirt that has been vomited upon.

Of course, this is normal for any parent of a newborn. It’s not like I’m surprised. However, that doesn’t mean I have to like it. Soldiers know they are going to be shot at, but that doesn’t mean they’ll like it.

I’m also not supposed to call it vomit either. It’s “spit up.” Next time I drink a six-pack of beer while eating a cheese ball, I’m going to call it “spit up” when I spend an hour in the bathroom puking my guts up.

But, babies are afforded that cutification (I invented that word) of their bodily necessities. They “dirty their diaper,” or are “wet.” They “spit up” or have “gas.” They are too small and defenseless to have such base acts as puking and defecating associated with them.

Just try it one time. Hold a baby and say to the mother, “Hey, the kid just sh** himself.” See what sort of reaction you get. (See if you can still walk at all.)

Babies are also “fussy.” Which is merely a nicer way of saying “screaming at the tops of their lungs.” Babies are never annoying, either. They may be demanding or clingy, but never annoying. They never irritate you either. You get “frustrated” or “frazzled” but you are never allowed to say, “This baby is pissing me off!” No matter how much you want to. Babies are too small and defenseless to piss you off.

Babies are too small and defenseless to elicit any reaction other than awe and love. They have chubby little cheeks and cute little eyes. They have little arms and legs that kick and do cute little things, like poke themselves in the eyes.

But then they grow up, and parents find them fair game. While babies can get away with anything, including masterminding the domination of the universe, school-age children are totally screwed.

They forget to put their cereal bowl in the sink. They leave their toys on the floor. They put their homework off until the last minute. They don’t flush the toilet. They complain about dinner.

This is the age of “because I said so.” Quite often parents don’t have a tangible reason for asking kids to do certain things. You can’t answer, “Why do I have to pick up my clothes” with “Because I don’t want to!” Nor can you say, “Because I’m trying to teach you take personal responsibility for your life and property so that you don’t grow up to be a selfish little brat like the girl next door.

Babies can eat and sleep on demand. Kids have to wait until you say it’s okay. Are they tired at 7 p.m.? NOOOOO! They can’t fall asleep then! They’ll wake up too early! What will I do then?
All the things we expect of kids. Everything we ask them to do. How often we compare them to ourselves. How often we try to make them ourselves. No wonder kids these days are stressed out.

But what a ride. For every one of those moments I mentioned above, there’s a totally mystifying moment.

A baby’s smile. Proudly displaying a report card. Realization of self. Goofy dances. Made up words. Excitement over mail sent to “resident.”

It doesn’t matter. Children are a wonder. They have powers beyond comprehension. One little coo or “I love you daddy” and the day’s problems don’t just melt away . . . it’s as if they never existed. Those simple words, or the clasped hands on the back of your neck put everything in perspective.

If the events of the last few months have made us feel small and worthless . . . insignificant, I seem to have forgotten.

For in the moment of that coo or “I love you” I feel like the world’s most colossal man.

Yeah, I know. The ending of this one is gooey . . . kind of makes you want to spit up, doesn’t it?

I’m back again! I’m in such a chipper holiday mood! I have many feelings I need to get off my chest.

Here’s a sticky situation, let’s see how you handle it.

I hate my job and love my family. One impedes my ability to commit myself to the other.

I’ll provide you background. Why do I hate my job? Well . . . I don’t feel as though I fit in. That’s one. It’s not a supportive environment. The work is mind numbing. The office is much too far from home. And more.

Why do I love my family? Well . . . that should be obvious.

Here’s where the disconnect comes in. Each day I wake up and trudge into a job that I find so emotionally draining that by the time I get home, I don’t want to do anything.

As it stands now, I get home right when dinner is ready. Gertrude is either asleep or hysterical. Kaitlyn is done with her homework Her friends have all gone home and she’s already sick of telling about her day. After dinner, we have about an hour before bath/bed time.

I feel like I’m missing out on something here. I feel gypped. Perhaps if I were in an industry that mattered to me, I’d feel differently. But, I don’t think I would.

Why? I see my full family for three hours a day. The rest of the time I’m either a work or one or more of us is asleep.

I want to be a dad. That’s all I want to be. I want to be a supportive father who is devoted to raising his children. I don’t want to be a ghost who brings home a paycheck every week. Granted, I want to be able to support my family financially, but at what cost? Missing their growth? Having to be told about their achievements over the phone?

It’s not worth it.

This isn’t a new problem. I’ve struggled with it for years. At one job I made it patently clear that I would not be out of town on Kaitlyn’s birthday. At another, I almost walked out because they, inexplicably, scheduled a meeting (that turned out to be pointless) for a Saturday (which is the only day of the weekend I get to see Kaitlyn. Sunday she’s at her dad’s.).

I’ve always made it clear that, for me, family comes first. If that means being stuck in a position for years then, so be it. I’m not much of a career guy. That’s not where I get my personal satisfaction.

Some people do. I respect them. However, I have yet to find a job that makes me feel good about myself. A job that I’m a proud to have. StreamSearch offered a little of that sensation. Though the company was tanking, I felt I was doing something exciting and useful. I also enjoyed it.

I worked a lot of hours at StreamSearch. But, you know what? I rarely felt that it impeded on my family. There were always balances. My co-workers understood. We balanced things out. They were happy that I wanted to be a committed dad.

Tell me, why is it a crime these days to want to be a committed parent? When did life’s importance shift from family to career? Why? What could possibly be more important than your family?

You can feed me a line of crap about society and the need for wealth or even Maslow’s hierarchy of needs. But it won’t change my mind. From the moment I wake up in the morning, to the moment I go to bed, everything I do is for the benefit of my family. Each keystroke at work, each minute spent in traffic.

But it’s not enough. I want to be there when the kids get off the bus. I don’t want to transfer that excitement to a daycare worker. I want to be there the second my child walks. I want to be there for each heartbreak, each achievement. I want to experience every up and down.

Most of all I never want to say, “Not now honey, daddy has work to do.”

I’ll never be that parent. Never.

All in all, I’m not sure what I’m rambling about. Sorry. I guess, in the end, I feel like I miss out on some of the best moments of the day in order to work on products that no one buys. My time at work is spent merely for money. It provides no emotional benefits.

Go ahead and tell me I’m selfhish, especially with troops overseas, far away from their home and families. Go ahead. It won’t change what I feel.

No, everything that is dear to me . . . everything that makes life matter for me is away from me right now. And you know what? I don’t like it. I’m selfish, perhaps. But, I know where my priorities lay. And those priorities are the three girls I’ve left behind each day in order to be here at my desk.

And I miss them.

Oh yeah . . . minor geek moment here. The first installment of Lord of the Rings opens tomororw. Are you going to see it? May I live vicariously through you? I'm going to try to see it this weekend, but with an infant in the house . . . it's not easy to get away for three hours our so. My wife's a huge fan of the books and is dying to go. So am I.

I suppose it was bad planning to have a baby a month before an eagerly anticipated film opens. Perhaps we shouldn't have done that. Damn. What was I thinking?

But she's so cute. And she doesn't have hairy hobbit feet.

So here we are. It’s Christmas time. The shopping malls are filled to capacity with the rude and inconsiderate. Santa is everywhere, spreading is suspicious benevolent good cheer. Stockings are hung by the chimney with care. Sugarplums are flying off the shelf in an effort to populate children’s dreams, replacing the new terrors they’ve been introduced to. The Salvation Army is out in force, ringing bells and collecting for the less fortunate.

Hold on. I want to talk about that. “The Less Fortunate.” Let us consider this for a moment. To say that one is “less fortunate” is to imply that they simply are missing a few key elements that would make their lives whole again. For example, if you compare someone like Bill Gates to myself, I am less fortunate. If you then compare my family to that of a single mom who works two jobs in some industry, then she is less fortunate than I am.

And yet I think of a man a co-worker of mine met recently. A member of her church encountered a man at the cemetery while she was visiting her mother’s grave. He was at the grave of his wife sobbing uncontrollably. He’s about eighty years old. This summer his house was broken into. The intruders killed his wife of over fifty years. He has no friends or family in St. Louis, no one to spend the holidays with him. This is a man who is truly alone. He doesn’t feel safe at home anymore. He’s terrified to leave his home. He has no one to share his stories with. Even if he were wealthy, as I sit and look at my healthy and large family, I can’t help but think he’s less fortunate. He may be able to put food on his table but he seems to have lost his reason to do so. It tears out my heart.

I can’t imagine a loss of that sort. To lose your entire world. No, not to lose it . . . to have it forcibly removed from you in a violent fashion. To look at your fading years and know that you will be alone. That the one person whom you dedicated your life to has been taken from you. To wake up in the morning and realize there is nothing holding you here anymore. To know that everything you held dear . . . is gone.

So, why am I writing this instead of my usual self-serving goofiness? Because it’s Christmas. And I think we tend to get lost in the excitement over gifts and lights and trees and freakish reindeer with nasal issues. Sometimes we forget that there’s more to being “less fortunate” than not being able to pay a heating bill (not to diminish the severity of the problems that many low-income families have, nor how difficult their lives are).

I guess what I’m saying is that many people suffer in silence, alone. They have no recourse for their needs. They’ve lost their faith in the world. They don’t feel safe.

So, this year, in addition to helping out with your money, or just volunteering your time at a soup kitchen, take a look around your own neighborhood. See who is suffering around you. Bake some brownies for the elderly neighbor across the street. Don’t just drop them off; spend a few hours with her. Find out when she got married. Where is she from? What are her interests?

You’ll be amazed. Many of these poor, lonely souls have better stories to tell than any John Grisham novel or episode of Touched By An Angel. And these stories are just waiting to be told. Don’t let them become a forgotten past on an anonymous face. Just listen. It may just be the best Christmas gift you give all year.

And who knows? Maybe you’ll make a friend.

After a long hiatus . . . he returns . . .

In the course of human events, certain things happen that amuse you. Then there are things that touch you and you feel all gooey and excited. As a parent, most of the time, these two feelings intersect on a daily basis. You look at your kids and think, “What a beautiful, wonderful, insane little creature this is!”

It’s true. Kids are insane. That’s part of their charm. Be they six years old or six days old, a child is insane.

Case in point: Last night we had pizza for dinner (a.k.a. “Like hell I’m going to dirty a dish, this baby won’t let me put her down.”) So, we’re all enjoying our pizza, listening to our arteries slam shut with a mighty THWUMP and we’re listening to music. I don’t know how it happened. I may be responsible, but I’ll deny it in a court of law. Matilda decides to start dancing in her chair like a maniac. Pizza is flying; garlic sauce is coming out of our noses. Pepperoni is stuck to the ceiling after being flung in a fit of hysterical laughter. Then, as suddenly as it began, it ended. And she went back to eating her pizza.

It’s not like this is the only time this ever happens. Turn on “Shake Senora” and the kid will come running from miles away just to dance for us. It looks like some sort of bizarre tribal ritual passed on from generation to generation of people with no rhythm. And it’s damn funny. Matilda knows this. She knows its funny and she milks it for all it’s worth.

Further examples, but this is my fault. We decorated the Christmas tree this weekend. Not a small feat, considering we’re all exhausted and still haven’t done any Christmas shopping. Looks like 7-11 Gift Certificates for everyone this year! Woo hoo!

Anyway, Matilda and I are gingerly adding ornaments to the tree while Gertrude stares at the blinking lights like a raver strung out on Ecstasy. At one point, I go get a soda and sit down to eat a cookie while Kait continues her jolly work. Two minutes later she sits down in protest. “I’m doing all the WORK here. I’m not doing anything until you put up some ornaments.” My daughter is Tom Joad. Great. The next thing we know she’ll by trying to set up an egalitarian society in our house and I’ll lose what little power I ever had. I swear.

So, we finally get every ornament on the tree (excluding the lead ornament my company gave me . . . I was afraid it would topple the tree). We have a zillion ornaments. Why? Who knows? Perhaps we fear that the natural beauty of a tree might shine through and that would scare us, so we cover it with glitz and glitter and Winnie the Pooh.

We’re a young family. We need our traditions. So, for some reason Matilda and I put in a Chieftains Christmas CD and start dancing around the tree like a bunch of drunken Christmas leprechauns. Again, why? Who knows? But it was exhausting. I’m sure at one time I could have pranced around the tree like the Lord of the Lame for hours. But, for some reason, after two laps I was too tired to continue. Probably all the plaque in my arteries from ignoring the concept of health these days.

Then Matilda insists that I carry her upstairs to take a bath. Why not? Gertrude’s being carried. Why not carry the other kid up two flights of stairs after performing in the Tour de Tannenbaum? So I did. Then the paramedics came and revived me. Not really. The wife just poured coffee on me and said, “YOU WANT TO KNOW ABOUT TIRED? TRY FEEDING AN INFANT EVERY TWO MINUTES WITH YOUR OWN BODY FLUIDS. I’M THIRSTY, I’M TIRED AND I’M FAT. DON’T MESS WITH ME.”

And here I thought the baby would be the one I would have to calm down. Try to dig your way out of that one fellas.

Gertrude's going through her “Colic” period. This is where she cries for hours on end for no apparent reason. The cries escalate in desperation as you frantically try to calm the child by every possible means. And none of it works. Your frustration rises. You wonder if the baby is about to die. What have you done wrong? Did you break the baby? Does an infant come with an error log? Can I try a hard reboot?

Then she stops and either stares at you contently or drifts off to sleep. She just stops. That’s it. She’s done. I know she’s thinking, “I have you just where I want you, sucker.”

Why do they call it “Colic” anyway? Where did that term come from? It sounds like a spice. “Would you like a Watercress and Colic sandwich?” I guess it sounds better than “Inexplicably Pissed Off Baby Syndrome.”

Last night Gertrude was performing one of her crying jags. She was putting all she could into it. Arms, legs, blood pressure. Meryl Streep couldn’t pull off such a brilliant performance. Wife and I were at wits’ end. “What can we do? She’s miserable! She hates us! We’re terrible parents!” So, I decide to rock and sing to her. I sing one of the few songs I can remember the full lyrics to. “California Girls.”

By the time we hit “I dig a French bikini” she was dozing. Go figure. I think she particularly enjoyed my “Ombedoobydooby girls, girls.” It was rather inspired, I must admit. Mom comes in and tries to feed her. Somewhere in the transfer Gertrude goes back into Streep mode and can’t stop crying.

At this point I lie down in a corner, curl up into a fetal position and start speaking in tongues.

Later in the evening, I have Gertrude duty again. She’s still inconsolable. Nothing can be done. So, for the hell of it, I put in the Beach Boys, select a few calming songs and . . . she goes to sleep! Nods right off. I suppose I could take it as a criticism of the music but . . . I think it made her feel comfortable for a change. What a great kid. I suppose her support of Brian Wilson’s genius is a sort of paternity test.

Tonight I’m going to try the first side of Pet Sounds. Boy, if that baby thinks “In My Room” was good . . . wait until she hears “God Only Knows!” Ha ha!

Just think, when her musical genius manifests itself and I take control over her career like any self-respecting domineering show biz dad should, I’ll be able to stop her in the middle of recording a song and announce over the booth’s intercom, “Honey, you’re flatting.”

Shhh. Gertrude’s asleep and Matilda is upstairs building a fort in her room. Mom is in the shower. I’m alone! It’s just me for three blissful minutes until Matilda comes downstairs or Gertrude discovers that’s she’s lost consciousness.

There are many things you discover when your kids multiply. One thing is the moment of solitude that you used to take for granted. These days, I think we all feel we’re always on top of each other. Matilda and I are actually fighting over the television, which is funny because we never used to watch TV.

But when you place a baby in the equation, everything changes. Even if my wife has the baby, I feel like I shouldn’t be more than a floor away, in case she needs to be relieved of duty. So, when everyone is content and happy, it’s an odd feeling now. So, I’m sitting here with an unconscious infant on the floor, and two uninterested people elsewhere.

I have a few minutes! So . . . what do I do with those few minutes? I talk about the people from whom I’ve escaped. It’s a disease. I’m obsessed with them. It’s a good thing they’re my family, otherwise the restraining order would be difficult.

This week Matilda and Gertrude were in a photo shoot for an ad brochure for a textbook. The theme was “Big Things Come in Little Packages.” So, they put the girls in boxes. Poor Gertrude, being so small, had to be propped up in the box. She did really well, though, until the flashing lights pissed her off. Matilda, on the other hand, acted as though she was born to be in front of the camera. Flipping her hair this way and that. Smiling, posing.

She doesn’t realize that Gertrude has an advantage on her in the modeling biz. Gertrude has the whole eat, barf, eat, barf cycle down pat. Matilda would have to pick that up again. The learning curve may be too great.

That’s okay. I don’t want Matilda to be a model. She’s going to be a singer/songwriter/teacher/scientist/dancer. It’s her chosen career and I, for one, support it fully. I feel there aren’t enough multi-tasking professionals with post-graduate degrees and an artistic side. Besides, she can teach everyone about the cure for cancer she discovered by writing a musical in which she stars. Beat that Jonas Salk!

There have been some major discoveries in the house in recent memory.

First, Matilda has discovered comedy somehow. I suppose it’s some sort of a defense mechanism to counter the inherent cuteness of a squishy baby. Still, the kid’s talent for performance and comedic timing is amazing. I’m considering changing her name to Shecky. What amazes me about Matilda is the fact that she’s still resisting the influence of her friends. They all love the teenage crud that’s floating around on the radio. I understand this. At her age my favorite song was “Lovin’ Touchin’ and Squeezin’” by Journey (though at that age I would also cite “City of the Angels” as that bled into “LT&S”, for those in the know). All of her friends love Brittany, ‘Nsync and BSB (see? I’m hip.) Matilda, however, has no time for such trivialities. I think she enjoys the more eclectic music we have playing in the house constantly. When our friend comes over, there’s European Pop playing. When I’m in charge it’s either Power Pop or sixties pop. She’d prefer that. Oddly, right now I think she likes Calypso over all other music. She’s so cool.

Gertrude has discovered sight. Granted, we can’t quite figure out what she’s looking at. But it’s clear in her face that she is looking at something but it’s not clear what. Still, there is a look of curiosity on the little face. Or is it more stunned wonder? “What the hell is that thing? AAAHHHHHH!”

Here’s the one thing I don’t understand yet. Whenever Gertrude is awake and looking at me she stares at me with a look of suspicion. I feel the need to apologize for being her dad. It’s as if she’s fully aware of all the weird things she’ll be doing over the next few years, before she can say no. Granted, most kids don’t memorize Pet Sounds by the age of two, but I feel that doing so will give her a good grounding in the traditional pop sensibility. Right?

Sigh. Maybe my friend is right. Gertrude has absolutely no chance of growing up normal. But, that’s a good thing, right? Who wants a normal child? Not me. I think I was able to get a pretty good model, though.

I still wish she could fly.