I love my son, I really do. But man, some days…
Above, the picture on the left is Nathan being a good kid, pleasant, smiling. The picture on the right is Nathan being a serious pill, on the verge of a tantrum. Same, day, same hour –I think. This was from a few weeks ago, but you get the idea.
Any of you dads (and moms) with babies will know what I’m talking about when I say that these little darlings can go from adorable to nuclear in about a second and stay crying and fussy for hours on end.
As guys, we don’t really think about diaper bags. No really, I dare you to find any guy who’s actually thought about diaper bags…until he has a kid and realizes that he (and the wife) now have to carry around a miniature Baby’s R’ Us with them at all times.
Gentlemen, I’m here to tell you to think proactively and look for a diaper bag fits with your sensibilities, your style, and your need for function. Because whenever you go out as a family unit (mom, dad, baby), guess who’s going to be carrying said diaper bag most of the time. Yup. It’s you, pal.
“You’re going to be a daddy!”
Well congratulations, bub, and welcome to the hardest, most rewarding, and most mind numbingly awe inspiring job you’re ever going to have as the male member of the human species.
I’ve noticed that getting that news from your wife/fiance/girlfriend can lead you to have either one of two reactions. Either you feel it as the single most world changing event in the history of the universe, or it feels all very abstract. I have to confess, I was of the latter persuasion. I knew what it meant, I understood the responsibilities and the implications on an intellectual level, but it didn’t really hit me emotionally until maybe the 2 to 3rd trimester and I started to actually feel the baby in my wife’s belly. THAT was freaky. I had visions of Aliens and V going off in my geek brain – there’s a lifeform in my woman’s belly! – while at the same time it no longer became a theoretical little blob on an ultrasound.
2011 must be a banner year of Kieun’s friends and reproduction because quite a lot of my friends and my wife’s friends (aka our friends) are having children. It occurs to me that I haven’t really gone into the 9 month process leading up the D-Day (that’s D for delivery, pal). I could write a tome about it, but who’s gonna wanna read that? So I thought I’d put down some thoughts, observations, and other highly opinionated advice for anyone who may have just recently heard those fateful six words.
Once again, I am jealous that I don’t live in NY anymore. Call me a total nerd, but I am excited that this kind of festival is taking place. It’s the World Science Festival to be held in NYC in June.
In my continuing series of sites that I think are worth noting and are of interest to fathers and would be fathers, I’d like to introduce the Study Hacks. It’s a blog by a fellow named Cal Newport. Cal is a post-doc at MIT and he started this site in 2007 when he was a grad student. It’s built on a simply premise, one that seems almost fantastical in today’s world – that one does not need to be stressed to be successful. It’s fantastical, that is, until you actually read his well written posts.
