I have to answer that question all the time. In my profession, we leave for the summer and when we return, people we hardly know start every conversation with “So, what did you do this summer?” Normally I answer truthfully, but this year like a few others in my past I answer evasively. I know that this sounds like the beginning of some sordid tale, but relax.
The last time I was evasive, was similar to this time. I don’t like funerals. So when I attend one, I am usually not very interested in talking about it to anyone. The last one I attended was for a fallen soldier, father, brother, and friend. His funeral was horrible and honorable. This year it was for a newborn baby. But this isn’t a story about how horrible the summer was to my family. Its a story of what I did this summer, told in many parts.
My tan is amazing. But more importantly I have definitely put some mileage on my flip-flops this summer. I can’t tell this story from the beginning, it would be too much of a snoozer. I did buy a portable video player that connects to my iPod so that I could show movies in my old car. Why, because I took those kids everywhere. Beach, Busch Gardens, Aquarium, Dolphin petting, trail hiking, swimming with manatees, Disneyworld. I did it all, and many times I did it by myself. In the beginning of the summer, my wife was in training all day for two weeks. So the kids and I went all over the place. Sometimes by ourselves, sometimes with friends.
At one point I got up the nerve to take them over to the Magic Kingdom at Disneyworld. Yup, my three kids solo with me. Once we got there, we actually made it through dozens of rides across two theme parks with a stop for lunch at a resort. It was amazing. Of course, everyone I know thought I was insane, but we did it. The kids had fun, the baby took a nap, and we came back ready for more.
So how does a commando dad like myself top something like that. Well, when I had my brother’s kids, that brought the total up to five. I took them to a lot of places, but the pinnacle came on a rainy day when my wife was suffering a lot of pain. Instead of keeping them at home and making noise I had to get them out. This was definitely a low point of the summer. I did decided to accept the most painful way out and took the troop over to Chuck E Cheese. I figured that the bigger kids could run around on their own, and I could manage those in diapers. Although everyone had fun (let me rephrase, everyone under 4 foot tall had fun) I spent the entire time on damage control.
So when a chance to go to Disney presented itself later in the summer, I jumped on it. Five kids, from 13 down to 2 at Disney. Oh yeah, just me. I could have done something smaller, but I wanted my wife to spend some quality time with her sister. They don’t see each other that often, and my wife is surrounded by my family all the time. So this was the most obvious way to spoil her big time. I can’t help but add that there was something else enticing by this little venture. I looked forward to hearing my wife tell the story to other couples and family. “Yeah, Eric took all the kids to Disney so I could spend some time with my sister.” Oh yeah baby, I would be king.
So with confidence, a loaded backpack, a stubborn and worn stroller, and five excited kids I set out to prove the impossible. I know the Magic Kingdom better than most. Short cuts, line lengths, fast passes, bathroom locations, ride timings. I have it all down to a science. A few checks of the crowd calendar, day time peak line levels, and weather conditions and I was ready.
We arrived at the park shortly after it opened, bought our passes, loaded the baby and the backpack with the essentials and launched our day. The park has roughly 24 attractions of which 5 off limits to this group. So that left us with a sizable number. I had one member who wouldn’t do anything associated with princesses and a couple who only eat one or two items of food. By 3:30 pm that afternoon we had made it through 11 rides and I had the visiting kids asking, “how long do you usually stay here?” It was hot, they were sweaty and had ridden almost everything that they could. Pumped them all full of water and slushies, got them all to eat a big lunch and had shoved snacks down their throats all day. I’m the man, for the next hour they shopped for trinkets as I sat back and played gatekeeper to the cash register. Got on my favorite ride, the parking lot trolly and loaded them back in the van for the, thankfully, long and quite ride home. McDonald’s screwed us in the drive through and the baby did some basic bitchin, but we got back to the house around 8 pm and no one had trouble falling asleep that night.
As I tell everyone who will listen, I had a plan that day, but the truth was I just was willing to see if I could do it. I had as much fun as would be expected, but I was hoping for a little bragging rights. Now of course, I had invited my brother to join me with his own kids. He declined thinking my wife and sister in law were coming. After the day was over, he found out I did it all by myself and recanted, wanted to join me. Truth is, I figured he just wanted to steal my thunder.
You see as a father, I have a chip on my shoulder. I’m out to prove that I can do anything with my kids. I’m tired of seeing dads portrayed as these bumbling fools. Or worse, movies designed to demonstrate that it takes a Navy Seal to deal with a group of kids. I’m hear to show that as a father, I can be more than a Disneyland dad. You see, its not the trips to all these places that was tough, it was the knowledge that the day after the trip, I would still be responsible for them. Meaning, that even though I was able to have unbelievably over the top trips solo with the kids, I wasn’t looking to be rescued the next day. I have a chip on my shoulder. I want to prove that dads can do amazing things too.
Of course now that the summer is over, I wish I had spent some more time on the house, spent more time getting the kids to work in their summer workbooks, spent more time on my business. But now the kids can ride their bikes without training wheels, throw the ball all the way from the pitchers mound to home, swim the length of the pool both directions without stopping, remember to check the gerbil cage for food, say please and thank you (even at age 2), know where the bathrooms are outside of Pirates of the Caribbean, check their toys for recalls, and set up our plot on the beach.
Part of the summer was taken away from my wife and I, but upon reflection, it’s hard to believe how much stuff we packed into the time we had. I was reflecting upon this all while my wife was laying out clothes for the beginning of the school year. Thinking about all the things I hadn’t had a chance to do. Thanking God that I didn’t get everything done. My cup is brimming, and I need to leave something for next summer. Besides, I need to keep telling myself that just because the summer is over, life doesn’t end.
Wednesday, August 15, 2007
Friday, August 03, 2007
God and Babies
Here I am at a shoot listening to an “expert” discuss how to calm a fussy baby. Of course, having had a couple of babies, its hard to hear someone suggest that there is only one way to and it has to be done just right. My babies ranged from supper easy to supper fussy, and I am very aware of what it takes to calm a baby, most of the time. It is just so hard to hear all these first time moms and a couple dads, giving out their advice. Its funny, I know I was there at one time too, but first time parents really have no idea what they are doing or saying.
Putting it all in perspective, I am doing this on a Friday, but just four days before, I was at my nieces funeral. Kimberly Grace, was born at 5:21 PM on July 19th at 22 weeks gestation. She didn’t survive her surgery to remove a growth that had developed in her lungs and chest. Although terribly hydropic, the baby had appeared to recover from surgery and was showing improvement, but did not survive the first 48 hours.
My brother and his wife are devastated, and I am of little comfort since I can only remind him of why he is so angry. They are currently surviving day by day and are at least enjoying the comforts of their home. It is bad enough to endure what can possibly be described as the most horrible day in any couple’s life, but to do so thousands of miles from home without the support of the people you love and trust, I am sure makes it even more difficult.
We were fortunate enough to dine with my brothers family the other night, and he brought with him, the pictures he took of he, his wife, and Kimberly as they held their daughter and had a chance to say goodbye. It struck me clearly as I looked at the pictures, how simply tragic the whole summer has been for them. I don’t pretend to empathize, since I can scarcely imagine the tortured existence they have lived through, but seeing the looks on their faces and the devastation in their eyes, brings home how tragic the whole thing was.
At the funeral, the priest never tried to explain why God had seen fit to begin a life, only to recall it so quickly. People who don’t believe are quick to point out that as animals, there will always be genetic and developmental problems and that the conception of life is a mere mechanical process. Fertility doctors are no better, suggesting that they can scientifically create and control the entire process. It makes you wonder, if Kimberly had such severe problems detectable from the beginning would those same doctors have suggested using drugs to force her body to maintain the pregnancy even if it was hopeless? They did not use any such measures and were very lucky to have gotten pregnant so easily this time. But, this week I would say that although lucky, it was not good luck.
My brother is a good father, his wife a good mother. They have a warm and inviting home. On the same week that they lost their child, a local mother brought her new born baby to a local firestation and abandoned her. Again, how does the priest explain that it is Gods plan that my brother have such trouble creating a family why others are so quick to discard theirs?
I am not going to let this incident tear down my faith, since I can still see God in the intricate nuances of the universe. Being a scientist myself, I know that the equations and laws we use to describe nature are woefully insufficient that the elegance of it all is not simply happenstance. “God does not throw dice” as Einstein once mused; but a benevolent loving Lord who shepherds us day by day? My sister in law lost a baby on the day of her birth nearly 10 years ago and she denounced God for a long time. Even now, I believe she is still quite angry with His plan.
Watching my brother during the funeral, and listening to the calls of his 18 month old baby daughter as she happily contemplated the serenity of the ceremony; openly mocking the somber mood and tears, I saw how much the recent year of his life had aged him. Although younger, he has endured his adulthood with often more sadness than he should. But again, his daughter, simply smiled and called to those in attendance. She laughed, ate crackers, threw toys, begged to be put down to roam, and sang song. My own, two year old, well behaved as she was, stuffed herself with pretzels, yelled to here her own echo and played pattycake with herself as those around her cried and mourned her cousin whom she will never meet. There was the answer to the priest’s dilemma. There was the missing part of non believers; not the innocence of the babies in the church. That answer is too easy, too cheap. Its something more elusive that the toddlers can teach their parents. They have all encompassing needs wants and desires; most of which they are too immature to even begin to contemplate. They are thrust from place to place day to day yet, they stoically sing their songs, eat their snacks, play their games. They can find happiness in the most tragic of situations. They don’t understand the implications. Time is not linear, there is no future, past. Everything is the present. A baby's mere existence, however short, pained, or happy is punctuated with extremes all in search of intense times of happiness and solace.
God cannot be contemplated by adults without intense study, habitual reflection, and a mature sense of reasoning. But belief doesn’t require contemplation. Toddlers believe in the moment with unparalleled intensity. God requires belief and obediance not understanding. Just as I believe that the Earth will continue in its path around the sun by an intricate set of rules, I believe that those rules must happen this way and this way alone for the universe to continue its elaborate ballet. Belief doesn’t always require me to be happy, agree with events, or understand. God is not malicious, he created the rules and must therefore be bound by them. Imbuing me with free will, necessitates that people can be evil, but tragedies of nature are not the work of evil, they are simply the happenstance of nature.
God will understand if I am mad, will forgive my brother for being mad, will warmly accept the soul of Kimberly into his embrace knowing that even as he sent her to the Earth that she would be recalled under tragic circumstances. His knowledge doesn’t suggest he was a causal part of her death, but that he too is bound by nature. Cheating nature, as he has demonstrated in the past requires a great need on the part of his flock. I just wish that my brother’s need was great enough to warrant a miracle.
Good bye July.
Putting it all in perspective, I am doing this on a Friday, but just four days before, I was at my nieces funeral. Kimberly Grace, was born at 5:21 PM on July 19th at 22 weeks gestation. She didn’t survive her surgery to remove a growth that had developed in her lungs and chest. Although terribly hydropic, the baby had appeared to recover from surgery and was showing improvement, but did not survive the first 48 hours.
My brother and his wife are devastated, and I am of little comfort since I can only remind him of why he is so angry. They are currently surviving day by day and are at least enjoying the comforts of their home. It is bad enough to endure what can possibly be described as the most horrible day in any couple’s life, but to do so thousands of miles from home without the support of the people you love and trust, I am sure makes it even more difficult.
We were fortunate enough to dine with my brothers family the other night, and he brought with him, the pictures he took of he, his wife, and Kimberly as they held their daughter and had a chance to say goodbye. It struck me clearly as I looked at the pictures, how simply tragic the whole summer has been for them. I don’t pretend to empathize, since I can scarcely imagine the tortured existence they have lived through, but seeing the looks on their faces and the devastation in their eyes, brings home how tragic the whole thing was.
At the funeral, the priest never tried to explain why God had seen fit to begin a life, only to recall it so quickly. People who don’t believe are quick to point out that as animals, there will always be genetic and developmental problems and that the conception of life is a mere mechanical process. Fertility doctors are no better, suggesting that they can scientifically create and control the entire process. It makes you wonder, if Kimberly had such severe problems detectable from the beginning would those same doctors have suggested using drugs to force her body to maintain the pregnancy even if it was hopeless? They did not use any such measures and were very lucky to have gotten pregnant so easily this time. But, this week I would say that although lucky, it was not good luck.
My brother is a good father, his wife a good mother. They have a warm and inviting home. On the same week that they lost their child, a local mother brought her new born baby to a local firestation and abandoned her. Again, how does the priest explain that it is Gods plan that my brother have such trouble creating a family why others are so quick to discard theirs?
I am not going to let this incident tear down my faith, since I can still see God in the intricate nuances of the universe. Being a scientist myself, I know that the equations and laws we use to describe nature are woefully insufficient that the elegance of it all is not simply happenstance. “God does not throw dice” as Einstein once mused; but a benevolent loving Lord who shepherds us day by day? My sister in law lost a baby on the day of her birth nearly 10 years ago and she denounced God for a long time. Even now, I believe she is still quite angry with His plan.
Watching my brother during the funeral, and listening to the calls of his 18 month old baby daughter as she happily contemplated the serenity of the ceremony; openly mocking the somber mood and tears, I saw how much the recent year of his life had aged him. Although younger, he has endured his adulthood with often more sadness than he should. But again, his daughter, simply smiled and called to those in attendance. She laughed, ate crackers, threw toys, begged to be put down to roam, and sang song. My own, two year old, well behaved as she was, stuffed herself with pretzels, yelled to here her own echo and played pattycake with herself as those around her cried and mourned her cousin whom she will never meet. There was the answer to the priest’s dilemma. There was the missing part of non believers; not the innocence of the babies in the church. That answer is too easy, too cheap. Its something more elusive that the toddlers can teach their parents. They have all encompassing needs wants and desires; most of which they are too immature to even begin to contemplate. They are thrust from place to place day to day yet, they stoically sing their songs, eat their snacks, play their games. They can find happiness in the most tragic of situations. They don’t understand the implications. Time is not linear, there is no future, past. Everything is the present. A baby's mere existence, however short, pained, or happy is punctuated with extremes all in search of intense times of happiness and solace.
God cannot be contemplated by adults without intense study, habitual reflection, and a mature sense of reasoning. But belief doesn’t require contemplation. Toddlers believe in the moment with unparalleled intensity. God requires belief and obediance not understanding. Just as I believe that the Earth will continue in its path around the sun by an intricate set of rules, I believe that those rules must happen this way and this way alone for the universe to continue its elaborate ballet. Belief doesn’t always require me to be happy, agree with events, or understand. God is not malicious, he created the rules and must therefore be bound by them. Imbuing me with free will, necessitates that people can be evil, but tragedies of nature are not the work of evil, they are simply the happenstance of nature.
God will understand if I am mad, will forgive my brother for being mad, will warmly accept the soul of Kimberly into his embrace knowing that even as he sent her to the Earth that she would be recalled under tragic circumstances. His knowledge doesn’t suggest he was a causal part of her death, but that he too is bound by nature. Cheating nature, as he has demonstrated in the past requires a great need on the part of his flock. I just wish that my brother’s need was great enough to warrant a miracle.
Good bye July.
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