smallchou

[smallchou]

60 Months as Dad

E turned 60 months old today. We celebrated with her favorite dinner of Mac-and-cheese, peas, and carrots. Ivy and I made a terrible mess of some beef short ribs that we subjected my parents to as well; they’re in town for a few weeks. We had a couple of local NYC beers (still struggling to find a decent local IPA). We each had our choice of ice cream for dessert, which E stuck candles into to inspire us to the Nth rendition of Happy Birthday today. It was clear most of the day, temperature hovering within a crisp range of 35-45 degrees F all day long.

Two nights ago I popped awake at 3:30am to the murmuring cries of E next door. Ivy and I did the usual parent silent negotiation of who could pretend to still be asleep for longer. But by the time I started stumbling towards the kids’ room, I was moving pretty quickly because I was actually worried about something.

Gabba and I have been pretty ill over the past week. I spent 36 hours in bed with a triple-digit fever earlier in the week, but he probably would have traded places with me. And what I was worried about was this: E’s birthday party was “two sleeps” away, and if she was really ill… and we had to cancel or postpone it… she would be devastated. DEVASTATED, really. At 37, I’ve only been as emotionally distraught two or three times as a cancellation-worthy illness would’ve made E. All of this ran through my head in the course of just a few steps.

That’s the best explanation of what being a dad of 5- and 3-year olds is like to me.

First, you know so much more than these kids. That birthday parties come and go. That E barely remembers that her fourth birthday party was canceled due to California wildfire smoke. That every other parent attending the party is secretly (or not so secretly) happy to have one less obligation for the weekend. That it will all be FINE. No, really E, it’s OK. I’m sorry this happened, and yes it is the worst, but let’s reschedule and maybe get some ice cream and you’ll feel better. Oh hey, Frozen 2 AND the Nutcracker are this month? High five!

Second, at the same time, you just want these things to be perfect for them. I can’t remember the last time I had as elaborate of a birthday party as every one we’ve planned for E. When I was 10, my parents rented out the arcade venue Aladdin’s Castle. That may have been it. And that’s truly, completely fine by me. But when I think about how devastated E would be… it really hurts with a unique helplessness of parenthood. Because you don’t want to tell her not to care; what is a life, a young life, without that caring. So you can’t also tell her she shouldn’t have cared.

And then third… what the fuck am I doing up at 3:30am in the morning and how much longer does this happen?

It has been a whole year since I’ve written one of these. I didn’t stop trying until several months into this past year. But I found it hard to distinguish the notable differences from month to month. They were 4 and 2 by then basically, and so each month brought fewer leaps forward.

We’ve changed so many things since a year ago. Basically same family, new lives. East coast. Real fall. Real winter. Own a coat, carry an umbrella. NYC. Walk to school. Walk to the office. New work. No car. High-rise living. No idea where we will be a year from now. And fully understand why McCaffrey and Luck never won the Heisman. One thing we were right about: this is the PERFECT age for two kids to have a family adventure.

A few years from now, E’s memory will be so vivid and long, and her thoughts so fast-paced, that who knows how she would take a move. Those are the two personality characteristics that pop out most: vivid memory and linear thinking. She is so observational and pensive, remembering tiny little things and noodling on them silently for days. A few weeks ago, we were walking on a weekend and she suddenly asked why I didn’t wear the parents’ security badge for her school on a lanyard like the other parents. A tiny little thing she observed, bouncing around in her head for days, as she watched parent after parent carry a little plastic badge differently from me. There’s rarely anything that she hasn’t mentally processed to no end.

She loves art, which is why her birthday party was at an art studio. You’ll know this when you see her, because she will tell you very directly, “I am an artist.” I remember being amazed when she was two or three and able to sit and color by herself for an hour on end. And now, sometimes she will just stop mid-play, tell us she is going to go make some art, pull out the supplies herself, and get to it for hours on end, signing each piece with impeccably written all-caps “E T O I V Y” or “T O J A C K”.

This past week she turned to me and asked, “Daddy? This weekend, if it’s nice out, can we go have a picnic in Central Park?” A pretty innocuous and sweet ask by any child. But for E, it’s a really precise question because she both knows that her dad loves to cook, eat, and relax outdoors… and she asked it because she knew that just asking it would make me happy. She does this often now, choosing to do things to make Ivy or me feel better. It is as sweet as it sounds.

Sometimes one piece of her daily prolific art even reads, “E T O G A B B A”, which he diligently appreciates for a few seconds before he races off. He adores her, he just doesn’t have the patience to be held still for quite that amount of time. In the grand scheme of sibling relationships, theirs is one of playfulness, fun, and contrast. He is so sweet and thoughtful, always remembering to get an extra of anything for her. And she knows him so deeply, skillfully convincing him to do dumb shit for her entertainment. And of course, he knows how to get on her nerves when he needs to.

He’s at an age where his emotions will regularly overrun his own logic. “Gabba, can you please help clean up.” “No.” “OK, but no dessert then after dinner. Do you want dessert?” “No.” “But Gabba, don’t you -“ “ No.” The first row of his Responsibility Chart just reads ‘No Whining’, which he has yet to ever earn a star for.

But when he isn’t in a mood… it’s hard to say there’s ever been a sweeter child who ever walked the earth. Snuggles, hugs, giant smiles, total enthusiasm, constant enjoyment of life, clockwork thoughtfulness, wholly inclusive of everyone, wants to try everything, no grudge kept, and oh so friendly. At the doctor’s office yesterday, he eagerly listened to every ask and took part just to try it out. Cotton swab jammed all the way to the back of my throat? Yes please! Three different temperature readings from three different places? Can we do a fourth? I wish that I had the good-natured, positive openness that both he and Ivy have. I’m sure E does as well.

A few weeks ago, putting them to bed, E sat quietly on her bed while I helped Gabba, shifting around in an odd way. I looked at her funny, she froze up, and immediately we were both jumping to her pillow to see what she’d hidden under there. When I pulled it up, 5 Paw Patrol action figures sat there while E plaintively explained that she and Gabba have been plotting and playing Paw Patrol together after bedtime. It’s one of the rare times as a Dad when I’ve felt like I have no idea what’s the “right” thing to do. Honor bedtime or love their friendship?

A running theme of these posts used to be a general regret (paranoia?) about feeling like each thing was happening too fast and then ending too fast. I think in the past year, my mindset has shifted to now just being present in enjoying the moment as it happens and not grasping at last occasions too plaintively. That’s to say that I’ve come to peace with how our lives will turn. All that matters is that I’m still ready if Gabba turns to me tomorrow and requests Sit on your shoulders? while we walk somewhere.

When I burst into their room the other night, E’s birthday party flashing by in front of my eyes, she was luckily *just* cringing from a nightmare and a slight nosebleed. Whew, devastation averted! And right on cue, wide-awake sitting in his bed, was Gabba holding up his pillow, wide-eyed with a huge smile. “Look, daddy! No poo-poo on my pillow!” He was legitimately proud (really, don’t ask), but also hopeful that he would get some of my attention too.

Of course, when I got E all back ready for bed, Gabba asked me to “Daddy, sit in the middle” of their room, as I often do on a small circular rug, talking to them while they go to sleep. And who could refuse these angels. I sat, at 3:57am, listening to their breathing slow and quiet, knowing this could always be the last night they need me this much.

[smallchou]

48 Months as Dad

E turned 4 years (48 months) old today! We celebrated as a family of four, technically E's fourth birthday party this week; kids these days :)... Gabba turns 23 months old in a few days. To celebrate, I cooked one of E's favorite meals, scratch chicken noodle soup deconstructed. She particularly loves dipping the noodles into the soup like a tsukemen ramen, which is another way of saying that she hates food that is mixed up for her. Ivy and I also shared a bottle of champagne, a Laurent-Perrier cuvée rosé.

Those four birthday parties weren't really planned, they just sort of started falling into place with the holidays arriving and wonderful family members remembering her big day. Ivy and I made a strategic mistake though, which we didn't realize until early this afternoon when E started asking, "When are my friends coming over?" It turns out while we'd been thinking of the partying as winding down to a close, in E's mind it was all a big lead up to today, her *actual* birthday when (of course) the grand finale would be going down. Needless to say, we had a tenuous toddler moment in the Whole Food parking lot that Ivy saved by turning the evening into a 'last party' that was 'just for the three of us, but maybe Gabba could come too?'

Of course Gabba would be coming. After all, he absolutely *must* do everything that his sister does, usually punctuated with the phrases, "Dabba, too!" or "Dabba also!" He states these phrases in a tone that is best described as a cross between Pure Cute and hyper desperation to keep up with whatever E has going on. 

I know he'll only be using his mis-pronounced nickname to speak in the third-person for a few more months at most, but I wish he could stay this age referring to himself as "Dabba" until the end of time. It's not just his usage of his own name that's adorable, it's really every word right now. He frequently does something clumsily or inadvertently that requires him to apologize to his sister (today it was six times) which is just part of being an annoying little brother I'm sure, but when he earnestly whispers "Saw-wee" even E has to melt and give him a hug.

I recently realized that the name 'Gabba' won't last. That at some point, he or we will stop calling him Gabba because isn't that what happens to all baby nicknames? My family used to call me 'Boo-boo' until I was four or five, and Gabba's nickname will probably fade away in the same manner. Which is all the more reason to use it now while it lasts :).

Watching their relationship grow to fill in the space between their very different personalities is truly inspirational. They are so different from one another, and neither of them remember a world without the other. Recently their back-and-forth really started taking off, and now I could sit and listen to them talk to one another for days. E with her authoritative proclamations to her brother ("No, Gabba. You have to sit here. You cannot do that.") and Gabba with his silent rebukes and two-word retorts. E casually flipping the pages of a book that she can't read, "reading" him the story, while he just stares at her brilliant sister in amazement. E building up a structure of blocks, pretending like she doesn't want him to knock it down, but somehow conveniently letting him know, "All done. Look, Gabba!"

In real-time, I'm observing her learning how to influence her brother with just her words, her tone, and her approach. But it's not just him that she's learning to influence, she's taken to actively testing out what impact showing her emotions has on her mother and me too. Fake cries, conveniently ignoring asks the first time, kindly thanking Ivy before asking her for something, peeking at me out of the corner of her eyes when she's pretending to be mad about something. The last strategy always cracks me up because she often executes on it by just saying, "I'm mad!" 

I think in many ways she is exploring these boundaries as a puzzle or a form of a game. In the same way that she sits for long periods of time grinding away at jigsaw puzzles or painting on her own, I think she really grows in comfort by understanding the game or the medium in front of her. Oftentimes when she doesn't understand that yet, she is highly resistant to trying it out, much more so than other kids - her peers, her brother, etc. This is after all a girl who claimed to hate ice cream for years without ever having eaten it. I recognize this same trait so heavily in myself that I've taken to telling E at every chance that she needs to "have an open mind." 

On that dimension at least, I'm convinced that Gabba will have a huge impact on E's life, if for no other reason than he has a much more laid-back sense of interest and wonder that will inevitably pull E to try new things. While E never gives in, she also often sees Gabba doing and enjoying something, which I can see pulls open her own biases. She'll often wait for him to try something, almost like her own personal scout, and then follow up if it looked like he enjoyed it. And because Gabba tends to enjoy almost everything, that pulls her in the right direction.

I remember my parents telling me when I was young that my brother and I should be the most important people to each other's lives. I think they mostly meant in a very direct sense - that we were family members of roughly the same age, and therefore we would likely spend more time together than with them. But I can also now see the value of the statement for balance of personality. That, as a toddler and a kid and a young adult, you're inevitably skewed to your own natural demeanor and preferences, but pairing that with some balance from a sibling's point of view rounds out your own.

It's also heartening as a parent to be able to tell your children that they can count on each other. After all, it's become clear that if all goes to plan E and Gabba will likely live in a very different world from the insulated life that I've grown up in. Between a changing climate, gun culture, toxic masculinity, and emboldened domestic racism, I've started to come to grips with the very real possibility that there might be better lands out there for our children. How do you tell your young children to prepare for that? Maybe the simplest way is to anchor them in the comfort that their best friend will be there.

[smallchou]

44 Months as Dad

E turned 44 months old today. We celebrated by warming up some (pretty tasty!) smoked brisket from the weekend and pairing it with a simple mixed greens and avocado salad. Drink of choice? S. Pellegrino sparkling water. Yup, Mondays :). Gabba turns 19 months old in a few days and he’s definitely bounded right past that 18-month milestone.

Let’s get one thing out of the way, because I keep forgetting every month and I know I will just forget again: the most happy pang-inducing moment of my day is whenever E mentions her favorite color yellow. She pronounces it “Lellow” (“I like the lellow balloon.”) and it just crumbles me every time.

I’ve started writing this post a few different times already, but E has called me into her room several times, while being well past her bedtime. The reasons for delaying her own slumber? Various alibis including, “Daddy, come look outside the window with me!” and “Daddy, tomorrow can I watch Elmo TT [editor’s note: also known as Elmo TV, also known as Sesame Street, also known as any form of TV]? I don’t want Gabba to watch with me.” 

A few moments ago (8:37pm), she turned to the ultimate Big Gun excuse:

 E: “Daddy?”

 Me: “Yes?”

 E: “Can you come snuggle with me for just ten minutes?” 

I defy any parent to resist their three year-old’s request to huddle in her room with her and her plush toys for a few minutes, listening to her chatter about her day and her hopes for tomorrow. The girl certainly knows her audience. At the 50th of these moments and others like them, when we’re just a bit too frustrated, Ivy and I just turn to each other and say… “10 years from now….” Which is our now-shorthand for, “Let’s just remember that 10 years from now, she probably won’t want anything to do with either of us."

Gabba has gotten into the act too lately, waking up in the evening between the hours of 7pm and 7am randomly to whine and cry for “Mama. Mama!” When I walk in to calm him, he’s usually standing up in his crib, faking an urgent issue. How do I know it’s a fake-out? Because when I firmly explain, “Mommy is sleeping right now. Time for you to go back to bed,” he immediately turns into a limp noodle and dramatically crashes back to his mattress in a full trust fall, asleep in minutes.

With the exception of his late-night episodes, Gabba has basically turned into your prototypical 18-month old: Adorable one- and two-word phrase vocabulary. Endless curiosity. Insatiable interest in being a big kid like his sister. And 100% urgency to get anywhere and climb anything… with 37% body control. I really can’t count the number of times he’s face planted or scraped up a knuckle at this point, and it seems to be accelerating as he’s now interested in scaling any vertical object in sight. Our nanny today announced that she had a dream… and the dream was that Gabba climbed up to an insanely tall play structure and was going to leap off. Accurate for sure.

It’s been striking how different he is in this way from E, who I was always coaxing to take almost any kind of immediate risk. She was so consistently observant and thoughtful and, dare I say, careful about her movements that we recently enrolled her in regular gymnastics to grow her physical strength and confidence. With Gabba, we’ll probably just start him straight to rock climbing and base jumping.

They’re talking to each other. A LOT now. It’s a constant chatter of E telling her brother what to do and him replying, “Yeah,” which is one of roughly 20 words that he knows. For a while he didn’t actually know “No,” so you could ask him any Yes/No question and getting a firm, innocent “Yeah” back. Of course the word he uses the most as of this week is “Turn!”, a simple one-word moniker for “Hey! It’s my turn because you let E do/eat/play/see that thing first.” Often they’re plotting how to play together, E the confident leader and Gabba the occasionally (20%?) diligent, but often rebellious, follower. It is like being handed a fleeting and incredibly thoughtful gift every time I hear them agree on something. Is that the 100th time they’ve talked and agreed? 100th of many thousands forever? So easy to lose count.

E finished her first full year of preschool less than two months ago and it’s been fun to realize that she could grow up with some of these same kids for the next 15+ years. It first occurred to me when I made smalltalk with a tech professional who told me how she had grown up in our small suburban community, attending K-12 with the same small set of local kids. Who knows how E’s classmates’ lives with evolve and where they’ll go, not to mention whether we’ll stay in the same town, but the idea is at once both charming and loaded: will these kids like each other forever? Will they be friends and when won’t they? Who’ll be the first to share secrets? Who’ll be the first to fight? To make fun of each other? To star as an athlete or a musician or a student? To date? To drive? To sneak a drink? To leave for college? 

As a parent, your mind can run so many places with the future that it’s easy to forget that you actually get to *shape* that future. I lose sight of that all the time already, crammed into the day-to-day of family, marriage, career, commute, breakfast, dinner, bedtime, bath time, and the litany of daily tasks. How does one carve out the time to thoughtfully plan the shape of our children’s lives? And not even just the big moments, but how do we make sure to keep introducing the small things that brighten their days for just a moment with something new. How do we keep finding ways to take them for their baby haircuts or make pizza at home for the first time? 

few weeks ago we visited the annual Marin County Fair for the second time. Simple calendar events turn out to be an incredibly useful marker for the passage of time. Were we here before? Yes, we were. We did walk through the same petting zoo area, gosh, was that a year ago already? Yes, Gabba was in a chest carrier then, now he’s scrambling to grab animals’ tails while giggling gleefully. Did we go on the rides last year? No, E was so scared of them. And then this year, under her breath, she’s whispering to us: “I am not scared anymore, because I am a big girl.” Did our hearts break last year and this year too? Yes, they did.

[smallchou]

42 Months as Dad

E turned 42 months old today, also known as 3.5 years old. We celebrated by cooking a pretty standard quick weekday meal and E got an extra helping of pasta for actually finishing her whole plate. Gabba, who usually doesn’t take down much for dinner, kept asking me for ‘Moar!’ and scarfing down the carbs too. He turns 17 months old in just a few days (!). He is honestly and surely at the cutest possible age.

With so much going on these days, I unfortunately missed the 40 month update completely, the first that I’ve neglected to complete. Going four months without marking down what’s going on at the kids’ age is a really simple way to realize how quickly they’re growing. Four months ago, Gabba hadn’t even started walking yet and E was *just* getting out of diapers. Today’s E and Gabba would run circles around those kids of four months ago, literally even.

Gabba is now walking everywhere. No, actually, that’s not right: he is speed-walking and basically sprinting, which he does with his spine arched back and hands high in the air like he’s constantly on a roller-coaster. His speed-walking form is a simple compensation for the fact that he’ll often get his head out in front of his feet and fall flat onto his face when he doesn’t think about it. Whenever this inevitably happens, he stops for a moment, face down, momentarily stunned, and then climbs up and keeps going. In sports, commentators will often remark that a player has a “great motor,” meaning that she plays at constant high energy and is undeterred… that’s Gabba, all day every day. Occasionally, he’ll really hurt himself, which causes his nanny and parents a lot of concern, but of course at 16 months he just walks it off with a short crying session. 

Recently he accidentally had a car door slammed on his fingers. He bled for a while, cried some, and will lose three of his fingernails… but within a couple of hours he was no worse for wear emotionally. He’s our little tank.

He’s also just so curious and unafraid. His favorite Saturday activity is walking (no, running) through our local farmers’ market waving at strangers and climbing onto random people’s laps. Where does this come from? Certainly not me, a natural introvert and ultra-cautious personality. Of course it’s his mom, who shares his optimism and open outlook on the world. He’s also a little jokester, often taking some action and then chuckling to himself in amusement - his latest joke is pretending to give E a hug by actually diving on top of her while she’s watching a few minutes of TV. How does he learn to do this at 16 months old? I have no idea.

And of course, he always wants to do what his sister is doing. E’s only recently begun to understand the power that she has over him and at first she would get incredibly frustrated that he wanted to play with her all of the time, following her around the room. He has his own name for her, ‘Ya-Ya’, which also happens to be what I’ve called one of my own cousins my whole life. On occasion he’ll enter E’s room in the morning  while she’s still sleeping and, upon seeing her, quietly whispers, almost to himself: Ya-Ya! It is, as you can imagine, just heart-melting.

They’re so different that I ask myself almost daily whether we or I have been, despite our best efforts, socializing them into stereotypical gender roles. Gabba is constantly running, climbing, standing on the tallest platforms that can hold him, throwing himself onto couches, and just generally scrambling to keep us busy, all with a giant smile. E is alternately cautious and quiet, and then comfortable and boisterous. She loves taking reams of construction paper and meticulously cutting them into small shapes with a pair of safety scissors. And she always wants to paint or draw. Have we done something subconsciously as parents? Is constantly worrying about what subconscious gender roles I’ve impressed on her actually just demeaning her own personality and interests? I don’t know, but it’s something I think about every day.

E is so, so much like me in many aspects of her personality. There’s nothing that she likes more than quietly and observantly developing a plan. And then she loves to go walk through that plan, step by step, often trying to corral others around her to help with her intentions. And she does so loudly with such bravado that I’m regularly taken aback. Of course at 3 1/2, she then loses her mind when her brother, mom, dad, and I assume anyone else decides not to follow along quietly. And then, like her dad, she is stubborn to a fault. There are often some hilarious outcomes from her own personal certainty. Most humorously, she’s certain that she doesn’t like ice cream. Absolutely certain. And she’s never tried it, not even once. 

Slowly but surely, she’s started to understand how to use her own words to persuade her parents to do things. She’ll regularly look at me quite sincerely and say the words, “Daddy? I’m so happy that you’re here… (pause for impact)... [insert unreasonable ask at unreasonable hour here].” She of course has learned that her dad is surprisingly much more willing to listen to her unreasonable ask when sequenced right after these little verbal lollipops. How / when / who / where has she learned this? Who knows, but every few days brings a new test phrase that she trots out and closely watches my facial expression for impact. Smart girl…

Parents talk about how quickly time passes with kids. I think that’s true, but I think just as impactful to the timeline of the parenting experience is how there’s no Pause or Stop button. Life just happens, and keeps happening, and they continue growing, and there’s no way to truly stop and step away from it to reflect for a moment. In many ways, I often wish that I could hit Pause, rewind the tape a few years, and just re-experience some small part of the path, just to remember or re-live it. 

We went to another Disney property a few months ago and I thought there would be just such a natural moment of nostalgia when E saw one of the characters. When she was 18 months and then just over two, we took her to Disney locations and she was terrified of the characters both times, probably wondering why her parents had taken her to be intruded on by giant, grinning creatures. I readied my camera to catch her reaction this time and… she broke out a big smile and gave Minny Mouse a giant hug. I smiled in relief and then I paused, realizing that those idiosyncratic and nostalgic moments of the past were truly gone.

There are many artifacts of those moments that litter our house now, old vestigial organs of infants and young toddlers of the past. Plush toys both of them are no longer interested in. Formula bottles and paraphernalia from months past. An infant bathtub that now just serves as a living room toy. Some of those things we keep in the house carelessly, just a matter of time before we discard them summarily. In some cases though, I think we know in the back of our minds that we’ll miss this symbol of a fleeting time gone by.

[smallchou]

38 Months as Dad

E turned 38 months old today… more important news is that Gabba turned one year-old last month! We celebrated today with an early-in-the-week meal of on-demand Coq Au Vin and hopefully an early bedtime. E had an *extra* helping of Mac-and-cheese too. 

12 months is such a milestone, and yet even as I sat down to write this, I found myself straining to remember what things were like when E turned one. I think we were mostly relieved to have raised a newborn/infant a full year. With Gabba now one, it just feels like things are accelerating in a fun way. He’s on the move quite readily, lets us know when he’s uncomfortable, and is on to solids and cow’s milk. When you’re past this point, particularly the second time, it feels like a tiny baby constraint is being lifted from your life every week. Will we ever long for the days when we had a child on formula? Probably not. What about when our child wasn’t walking yet? Eh.

And one thing we know for sure as of this month: we definitely won’t miss the kids being in diapers when that’s gone, because since last writing, E has largely gotten off of them into undies and it feels like the last hurdle in some race. The first couple of weeks of potty training were challenging, but ultimately it turns out that’s because she probably thought it was some type of a game since Mommy and Daddy were home; the day we headed back to work, all her accidents largely stopped. Losing the diapers is a pretty significant milestone, but like being able to purchase beer when you turn 21, you quickly forget your past problems.

From there, parent Baby Knowledge just continues to plummet. Roughly three months ago, I mentioned to Ivy that we were at our peak baby knowledge, just having completed the gauntlet of raising two babies to nearly 12 months old. This time next year? I’ll probably barely remember how to hold a baby or the right way to rock it, and I definitely won’t recall how to swaddle or otherwise take care of a newborn.

Despite helping to raise him for a year, I realized last week that we’ve spent so little time as a pair. We are usually spending time as a family or I’m taking care of both him and his sister. On a random morning last week, after dropping his sister off at school, Gabba and I just crawled around at home, playing with all the toys that his sister won’t let him touch. I was really warmed by his calm and happy nature. I can’t really remember E being content to just sit and follow me from station to station. I don’t think it ever happened, honestly.

Many of the same dynamics between the two of them still apply - Gabba often wants to do whatever E is doing, following her around diligently. E is often trying to avoid Gabba when she’s solo playing, punctuated with fervent “No, Gabba!” exclamations. This regularly (read: daily) ends in emotional ruin, as he knocks down her blocks or she shoves him away. This also applies when E is spending time with Mom - it’s just a matter of time before Gabba comes bounding around the corner in full crawl-sprint. The one new wrinkle is that I’ve realized it’s often Gabba’s fault, but I haven’t yet figured out what to do with that information. After all, it is tough to reason with a 12-month old. I used to pick him up and tell her, “E, it’s OK, Gabba’s just a baby!” Pretty soon, that little dude is on his own with responsibilities.

That’s not to say E is a model of perfection. Her latest new habits are enthusiastically and cheerfully telling those close to her, “I… don’t… LIKE… you!” with a bright smile or just flat-out refusing to do things. In both cases, I can see her watching closely to see our reactions, largely convinced that it’s all a big game. When she sees that telling someone directly to their face that she doesn’t like them has an effect, she’s quick to immediately backtrack with, “I like you!” often repeated 5-10 times. That being said, it turns out she did tell someone that she didn’t like them truthfully once - she was at the playground and a bigger boy grabbed a toy she was playing with. So good for her on that front.

Christmas and its celebratory lead-up happened since last writing. It turns out three is just the perfect age when Christmas really installs itself as a thing. Every morning E would stop to admire our tree, plug/unplug/plug/unplug the lights, and move the advent calendar forward a day. It was so pure and miraculous when I explained to her that Santa would be coming down the chimney, particularly when she pointed at the range hood. I didn’t have the heart to tell her, both that that wasn’t right and, you know...

She loves games and puzzles, like her dad. She especially loves jigsaw puzzles and will sit for an hour at a time, piecing and re-piecing a single puzzle, stopping to announce its completion each time. Like many things as a parent, I don’t know whether to clap and shrug at that, or apply her for a MacArthur Fellowship. For now I’m just happy that she can turn her focus for tens of minutes at a time to a quiet endeavor.

We recently had a preschool Teacher Conference to go talk to her educators about how she’s doing at school. E’s such a shy person who opens up so firmly and vibrantly after she gets comfortable that I actually took video of her running around yelling and playing at home before we visited her teachers just in case. I imagined that they might be used to some reserved version of E, tentative and silent. To my relief, I didn’t have to break out the proof as they happily reported that she was often the loud, boisterous leader in class and was the one to usually lead the whole group on full-volume singings of imaginary Happy Birthday.

For at least the past year, those imaginary birthday parties have been a mainstay in her days. I don’t know where she got them from, but E often finds a “birthday cake”, usually a random jumble of toy parts, and exhorts everyone in the room to sing Happy Birthday, usually to Minnie and Mickey Mouses. She’ll often pop up in the morning and announce, “Today Mickey Mouse and Minnie Mouse birthdays!” followed by a quick scramble for the nearest fake birthday cake. 

It is, of course one of those most endearing of moments, stuck on an endless repeat until one day it’ll just disappear altogether. Well into E’s fourth year now, every time it happens I am reminded of how quickly the time passes. So I sing along and often snap photos, for this could always be the last time she ever throws an ad hoc birthday party.

[smallchou]

36 Months as Dad

E turned 36 months old yesterday, Thanksgiving Day. We celebrated by hosting a dinner of 15 family members and going full-out on the menu. Turkey, brisket, green beans, carrots, wok-fried rice noodles, my mom’s sticky rice, stuffing, pumpkin pie, and, of course, birthday cake from our local bakery.

We’ve somehow managed to turn E’s birthday into a multi-day extravaganza, with three separate birthday parties: her classroom at school, family, and then her “friends” tomorrow. I use the term ‘friends' loosely because it continues to make me laugh how they interact with each other at this age. E will spend an entire evening spouting off her classroom friends’ names in imaginative play at home, but then when we run into them in-person they just peer at each other sheepishly and walk in the general vicinity of each other not saying a word. I know it’s totally normal at this age (Parallel Play, it’s called), but even as an introvert I find it hilarious.

The one person who she has no problem talking about, around, or to directly is Gabba. The best way to describe their relationship is Hero and Fanboy. If E is doing *anything*, that’s what Gabba suddenly wants to do. Like, now. Right now. And because he’s 11 months old, he usually crawls over at high-speed and attempts to do it, often while E is still engaging in said activity, which turns into loud protestations of, “No Gabba!”. Generally Gabba is undeterred. 

I struggle a bit with how to handle these situations. On the one hand we often tell her to be patient and share. On the other, isn’t this the start of a lifetime of less effective men interrupting her in professional environments repeatedly and without awareness? In fact, this one is more than just less effective, dude is less than a third of her age and can’t even walk. Lately I’ve taken to just letting her stand her ground until they get to some point of physical pushing and shoving, but I honestly don’t know whether to step in sooner or later.

What helps is that Gabba is generally incredibly emotionally resilient. Take a toy away from him? Oh well. Box him out from a container of blocks? He’ll grunt and then move on to the next thing. Move an item to the next room? 50-50 on whether he’ll race after it in determination or just emit a mild exasperation and forget in seconds. I used to catch myself when remarking how similar E’s personality was to mine because it felt like too tenuous of a connection - what if all babies act this way? Now, seeing Gabba’s reactions to everyday occurrences, I can see how different he is from both E and me. He just has so much more chill than either of us.

He sure does look like me though. Actually, I can’t really tell, but everyone remarks how he looks like me, so it must be true. My aunt last night went so far as to say he looks like a carbon copy of me at the same age. As a dad, you sort of do a double-take when someone says this. “This super cute baby? Looks like me? Oh no, does that mean I just think he looks cute because of some evolutionary defense mechanism and/or vanity?”

Parents joke about their own differences with first and second kids. How much less neurotic they are about every little thing AND how much less celebratory they are about every development. And… it’s true. Or at least our natural reactions to moments are much more tempered. Gabba just started walking with the help of a push cart in the past few weeks and has shifted more and more towards solid food. And in just a few weeks, he’ll be walking by himself. I can honestly remember the feeling I had with each of these milestones when E hit them. I can remember waiting for weeks in anticipation for the next milestone, excited encouraging her with each half-step. The events themselves were the celebration. With Gabba, the anticipation is much more about him getting to there other side of those achievements and celebrating the progress.

I think much of that is because the first kid doesn’t just stop. And in E’s case, she just keeps going and growing with rapid surprises at each turn. I’m amazed by how complete and connected the narratives in her head now are. She stitches together entire days and weeks, remembering backwards with high fidelity and planning forwards with anticipation. And she learns so, so quickly. A few weeks ago, she heard the word ‘complicated’ and thought it was funny. For the next few days, she pointed at random items and asked me, “This is complicated?” I replied and explained in each case. And a few days later, she looked at a book with lengthy passages and sighed in exasperation/resignation, “This is COM-pli-cated” before putting it down like a college student done studying for the night. 

More than factual learning though, I’ve been most in awe of her imagination, which has exploded over the past couple of months. Whether she’s stacking blocks and explaining to me how she’s building “a rocketship” to take Mommy and her to the moon, or pointing in exclamation at a tree, telling me, “There is the penguin,” it is inspiring to see the extent of the three-year old imagination. One imagines entire dream worlds, in full splendor, overlaid on top of the real world in her eyes. She really does SEE these things, with such authenticity, excitement, and honesty that it often wets my own eyes.

I try not to push her too hard in any direction. Of course there may be a time and place for that, but right now I just try to play companion when I can in her world. If she tells me, as she often does, that she doesn’t like Ice Cream, candy, or many other things that I know she eventually will, I try my best not to correct her. And when she talks non-stop for hours on end, ordering her dad around and often saying the words, “No. Daddy. You cannot do that. Sit HERE. We are going to the pizza place [note: a made up one in her head]. We get in the trolley.” I just reply excitedly, do as she asks, and *never* interrupt her. The last thing this strong-willed asian-american woman needs is a dude, even or especially her father, interrupting and correcting her. 

Every now and then she knows to give me something though. She’s just three, but I get the feeling she knows how to really play her hand with her dad. The other week, she was up a bit past her bedtime as I watched a Warriors game, and she sat right next to me fidgeting with a few legos and “watching” the game too. After literally ten minutes of silence, she remarked very assuredly, “I like the blue team.” It is those moments, all of a sudden and without any warning, that bizarrely take your breath away. They zoom you forward and show you what the future might feel like in its most fun, unexpected times. When I started writing regularly three years ago to process my own experience and feelings of being a parent, I definitely did not expect my own identity to be expanded in such a way. No one ever really tells you that, or at least no one told me that. Folks will always describe the tactical and literal ways that your life will change. But no one really expressed that I would quickly come to identify myself as E’s Dad (and now Gabba’s Dad) so quickly and unequivocally. Strangely, older parents whose children are moving to college and beyond do express this to me though. They often speak in resigned and/or relieved terms about almost returning to being their own individual and couple selves. As a young parent, the most dominant feeling that I have is disbelief that this short stretch of my life is three years gone, with not that many more left.

At times I worry I’m too self-aware about how quickly this will pass. Is there a level of awareness in which you actually over-compress the time by lamenting about when it will all be over? A few Sundays ago I was solo dadding and thinking about this exact question as I drove both of them home from the playground. "How many more playground trips will we have in our lives? When will E decide she’d rather hang out with her friends than me? Six or seven years?” In that moment, as if she could hear me thinking, E said the perfect thing into the gentle cabin hum of the car…

“Daddy? We had a great day today."

[smallchou]

34 Months as Dad

E turned 34 months old today and Gabba’s now eight months old. We celebrated by taking advantage of some opportune Grandparent Babysitting this afternoon to stop by a few old and new favorite spots in Napa. Sprinting up to Wine Country for the day used to be one of our favorite weekend pastimes, now it’s a rare respite from our real lives.

I didn’t really expect E’s comprehension and linguistic skills to grow so quickly. I knew that her vocabulary and comprehension would grow beyond piecing together phrases that she’s heard, I just didn’t know it would happen before the age of 3. It’s a bit of an exaggeration, but basically the only thing left for E is to learn more words and their definitions. She often stops mid-sentence to describe a thought or concept in the scant words that she understands, not knowing the right word, and then folds the right word into her head the moment an adult or peer explains it. 

Last night she mentioned to Ivy during storytime, “This book is long.” As they read through the next book, her reaction was: “This book is… um… not long.” Not knowing the word ‘short’, she stopped, sputtered, and sought the right phrase that would explain this five-paged book. The moment she heard it, she whispered it to herself and quietly filed it away for future reference. As I’ve heard so many parents say, it is amazing to have a front-row seat to the explosion of my child’s linguistic growth.

It’s also made the process of parenting so much more fun because she listens with equal intensity to the constant stream of words coming from her. We can talk, explain, and reason with her. She expresses herself with words. And we all hit repeat, conversing and negotiating in the most normal and constructive way. If it wasn’t for her adorable sing-song voice and wide-eyed curiosity, I’d almost forget that she’s not even three yet.

Gabba has had his own communication breakthrough too. After months of expressing himself mostly through cries, irritation, moans, smiles, and giggles, he now has a whole new move: a quiet, nervous pawing wave of “Hi.” He doesn’t actually say Hi as he does it, but as he sees someone for the first time in the day (or, really, in the last five minutes), he reaches out his right arm and slowly paws his wrist and fingers with a small wave. I’ve been a parent for almost three years now and, I have to admit, it is the cutest thing I’ve seen in the world.

The adjective that Ivy and I most often use to describe Gabba is ‘sweet’. I spent over three decades of my life silently and idly thinking about how I would instill grit and toughness in my children, yet I find myself just celebrating in my son’s warm, casual, sweet nature. It turns out being a parent and imagining being a parent are really very different. 

I remarked to Ivy a few months back that we are probably in our moment of Peak Baby Knowledge. At no point in our past or future will we have more understanding, tactical knowledge, or general ease around babies. I’m reminded of this whenever a parent of older children sees me with Gabba, shakes their head, and says, “What a little baby. You forget how small they are.” All I can think is, “What? This kid is getting huge!” It’s true though, you do forget so quickly. 

A few months from now, Ivy and I will willingly discard all of our baby bottles and formula paraphenalia, and will have largely moved on from changing E’s diapers ever again. What will these everyday holstered objects of our lives be replaced with? By that time, Gabba might even be walking around confidently (after starting to pull himself up this week), skipping quickly right by crawling, and maybe refusing to be hugged or held ever again. He’ll be fine, but how will I react to not reliably having a cuddle-loving baby in the house? It will be hard, but we will also forget it before we know it, which is both sad and beautiful.

Those small moments and rituals will be rapidly replaced by larger, more deliberate patterns. We kicked one off last month by taking E and Gabba on a quick roadtrip to LA, visiting Disneyland and celebrating their cousin’s first birthday. While Gabba largely stared and smiled at everything in Mickey’s kingdom, we were expecting E to have a tentative, but warm reception for the characters, rides, and attractions. 

Instead? Two straight days of panicked fear and scream-crying at almost every attraction. With enough A/B testing it was clear: giant furry animal entities, even if E has seen and loved them on TV, can be pretty fucking scary to a 38-inch tall 33-month old child. 

She did love one attraction though, the musical boat ride “It’s a Small World”. And once she got comfortable with it, suddenly the E we know arrived at Disneyland, ordering all of us (four adults and Gabba) around, telling us what we’d be doing next, which was mostly sitting on the Small World ride again.

It was a simple reminder of what my role in her life really is, now that she’s walking, running, talking, laughing, deciding, intending, and direction. If I can just guide her to explore the right variety of interests, set the right boundaries for her, share my own enthusiasm for her future with her, and be there to support how she takes it on with vigor, she and I will both be just fine. It’s the least I can try to do given that we won’t be changing her diapers for much longer.

[smallchou]

32 Months as Dad

E turned 32 months old today and Gabba's now six months old. I celebrated with E by making dinner for two together with her while Ivy celebrated for our household at a friend's wedding. After E and I put Gabba to bed, we made a highly-complicated dish of boxed mac-and-cheese together, accessorizing it with individual sides: salami and peas for her, cherries for me. As the capstone meal for a wonderful week of vacation, it was perfect.

So much happens in the course of two months when you're E, Gabba, or really any kid. At their age, it's astounding to step back and realize how much they've changed in 60 days. For instance, two months ago E's vocabulary was expanding with phrases that she'd heard several times as she tried to apply them correctly. Just two months later, she's truly communicating back-and-forth. One Thursday evening as I gave her a bath and asked the rhetorical question, “Can Daddy wash your hair?”, she calmly replied, “Not today, maybe Saturday.” I stopped dead in my tracks. Had she heard me or someone say that repeatedly before? Did she understand what it actually meant? Was she actually expressing what she wanted instead of just finding a good conversation point to apply something she'd heard? It turns out all of the above were true - she has opinions and is now finding the phrases and sentences to express them actively.

Most notably, after months of “No”, July has been the Month of Yes from E. She really pauses and considers each individual question. And then she calmly, but firmly utters “Yes.” or “No.” I'm amazed by how much confidence she has in each of these proclamations. How do you bottle up the amount of confidence and certainty that she feels right now for her to use when life gets complicated? For that same reason, I find my biggest challenge is drawing the line of when, if ever, to restrain her behavior. I think the world deserves one more strong-willed, assertive, opinionated asian woman whose dad tried his darnedest not to rein her in.

Meanwhile, Gabba has continued to draw stark differences between her and six-month old E. Having a second kid really accentuates how dumb it was when I or any parent start drawing conclusions for all parents from our first children. Situations that E would have viewed with caution or skepticism (even at six months), Gabba just tackles and absorbs with a wide, good-natured smile. I distinctly remember E flipping out at the sight of any stranger when half a year old, meanwhile Gabba will give any stranger a giant grin within seconds. We've taken to thinking of it as a reflection of his mom's personality - open, warm, and friendly as opposed to my naturally introverted caution. He smiles so endlessly and innocently that if he was our first kid, I'm sure I would be worried that it might be indicating some overly earnest and gullible nature. Luckily he's our second, so I know he's just a really, really happy baby.

E has these small, focused obsessions that take over her days. Right now, they're in no particular order: everything Minnie Mouse, spontaneously imagining any stacked objects to be a birthday cake and singing Happy Birthday randomly, and sharing constantly with the copied line, “Guys... want some [cookies / crackers / raisins / sausage / etc.]?” The last one slayed me the first 50 times I heard it, knowing that she probably observed some adult at school intoning it and assumed it's how everyone shares. These small mannerisms and tweaks in her life come and go so quickly though. Ivy and I talk about trying to capture them in some way, but there are too many to count and they're so fleeting. In fact, as I think about it now, I haven't heard her use “Guys, want some ... “ in a week or two, having replaced it with a sing-song declaration of “One for you... one for you...”

As Gabba has started to sit up more, with the help of supportive toys or those two “arm” appendages that he didn't really know he had a month ago, it's been fun to watch them interact more often. I think it's simply the practical matter of them being oriented vertically that helps - it's hard to have a conversation with someone who's positioned perpendicularly to you. She's very sweet to him, but also often stomps around and exerts her demands on him - she's going to be a great older sister. For his part, he generally just grins at her and grabs her hair, so not a whole lot going on there yet.

We took them to their first baseball game, an unmemorable Giants game where we sat in the bleachers and E ate totally obscene volumes of popcorn. Of course they won't remember it. After all, I'm pretty sure that E didn't see a single pitch and wasn't even aware there were people on the field, but I had to smile with excitement the next day when E's first morning utterance was, “I want to go to baseball game today.”

[smallchou]

30 Months as Dad

E turned 30 months old today. And Gabba turns 5 months old in a few days. We celebrated with six-hour spareribs, a crisp salad from our vegetable garden, and a bottl of ’14 Sequoia Grove Syrah. E refused to eat her dinner, asked to eat cereal, and eventually plowed through a banana as payment for getting to her birthday cookie for dessert #toddlerparentinglife. 

I’ve been finding it a bit challenging to keep up with these posts each month, so I’m making the hard switch to every other month. It’s not about finding enough to write, it’s about summoning the energy and time with two kids. Folks always ask whether it’s easier or harder with two. The answer is that it’s definitely without the single-kid angst, but if the first kid took of 90% of your free time, the remaining 10% isn’t enough to cover kid #2. So particularly at these early ages, it becomes quite a bit of work.

We’re lucky to have quite a bit of help and resources, but I find it difficult to imagine getting by as a parent with less of either. Raising two small children is a lot of work, full stop. It’s been extra work as we’ve reset so much in the past few months with a new nanny to take care of Gabba, a new preschool for E, and a new job for me, just in the span of a few weeks. I often wonder how these changes must look from E’s vantage point - she was spending so much time with Dad, and now he’s seeing me for a few hours every day again. So weird!

And if I said that last phrase to her tomorrow, she would undoubtedly repeat it every day for the next year. She’s taken to applying new terms and phrases that she picks up constantly in our presence. Every spotting of like objects turns to pointing paired with an enthusiastic, “Same? Same!” Every unexpected occurrence turns into an alarmed, “Oh no… what happen!” Each picturesque moment becomes a request, “Daddy, take a picture!” followed quickly by, “Look it, look it.” And every captive audience turns into a target for her commands: “Daddy, sit there… Stop! … Read a book please!… Hold hands.” I had gotten into the habit of asking her how her day at school was each day, not expecting a response, when one day she matter-of-factly replied, “Good!”

Her brother no doubt observes this and takes it in. It’s clear how and why many younger siblings gather increased confidence in their actions as Gabba constantly just sits and observes his older sister. Her movements, comments, cries, and actions… he takes them all in while he smiles and coos at her. Of course you hope they will always have such a warm relationship, even if it feels farfetched to hope for it. 

He’s not yet at the age where he’s taking on toys in earnest, but I do wonder how quickly he will move through them compared to her. E always tended to master a particular toy and then discard it in completed form, on to the next one. Will Gabba take more care and time to study the curves, edges, and pieces of each part, knowing that his wise sister used to work on it ceaselessly? Or will he be in a race to catch up to her?

One can’t help but look back on E’s first five months and then compare their progress. Sometimes I visit Timehop and see photos of adventurous episodes in the peaceful early days of a six-month old. Two years ago today we were with her in NYC, exploring subways, restaurants, and museums. We would take her so many places over SF, trotting her in her baby carrier that she loved. Now, as suburban dwellers with two children, we’ve given Gabba such a calm, slow existence so far. Will he be jealous someday? Will he care?

From early days, it seems unlikely that he’ll care about much. He is such a placid, smiley baby, brightening his face at the sight of any known person and displaying his wide, toothless grin. Everyone says that he looks like a carbon copy of me, though they said the same thing when E was his age. You get used to many things as a father, particularly the second time around. What you are never, ever, ever prepared for is the bolt of joy that hits you when you see your child break out in a huge smile. 

He’s rolling over now, just getting used to flipping onto his tummy until he remembers that he hates it and moans to roll back. Like many babies, he loves sitting out and viewing the world (and hates being held like a little baby in your arms). And he commonly spends 20-30 minutes just laying on his back on the playmat, content to fiddle around with the toys hanging above him. His demeanor and quiet agreeability regularly surprise me, particularly when compared with his sister.

E has become the General of the house. She knows how she’d like the place run and isn’t afraid to tell us at every turn. At 2.5 years old, she’s reached that age where she wants to do everything herself and the best way to get her to try something new is to just quietly start doing it next to her. A few weeks ago I sat and started eating my cereal out of a bowl with milk right next to her after she told me she didn’t want it. Nonchalantly, she started peering over at me, interested in what I was doing. She never did muster the courage to ask me what I was doing, but curiously stared at me long enough that I had to laugh and ask her if she wanted to try. “Yeah, Daddy!” She’s been eating cereal with milk out of a bowl by herself almost every day since.

Someone once jokingly told me that having kids is like having terrorists in the house - they constantly take hostages and you have to decide whether to negotiate with them. That is… very true of this toddler. As E’s mood goes, so goes our day. When E is upset and has in mind a different plan, often for food, she holds a Toddler Meltdown trump card that she uses liberally and we are constantly glancing at each other to decide if we should negotiate for the hostages this time or hold strong.

The counterpoint is that the opposite is true too: when E’s mood is happy, the whole house is ecstatic and bubbling. In some ways, she’s just beginning to understand this power that she holds, often trotting out a playful phrase to pull a positive reaction out of us. I think all kids have this power over their parents and, in parallel, all of us probably had this power over our own parents. Sometimes I want to tell her how happy she makes us and I wonder how many parents in the world are thinking the same thing looking at their child in that moment. I think she’s realized now how disarming and heartwarming it is when she runs up to me when I arrive home each evening, yelling, “Daddy, Bao Bao (hug)!”

Recently she’s started driving our agenda with her own interests. We went to the beach for Mother’s Day and then this past Sunday I asked her what she wants to do next weekend. She replied, after some thought: “Go to beach. Eat crackers!” I smiled on two levels. As regular readers know, I’m constantly grappling with how little control I will have over my little girl’s life in the near future. Of course I want her to be the strongest, most independently-minded woman that we can raise, but I’d ideally like that to happen with a snap right at 18. When she asked, or rather stated, that we go to the beach this weekend, I realized it was the first time that she, with foresight, had expressed her own planned agenda for all of us. 

As Dad, I could only imagine the many years and decades of riding on her coattails as she plots her way through this world. It was a soft, gentle reminder that while she’s a central character in my life, I’ll soon be a sidekick in her own.

[smallchou]

28 Months as Dad

E turned 28 months old today. And Gabba turns 3 months old in a few days. We celebrated by feverishly eating leftovers of slow-roasted pork shoulder, seared carrots, and a few beers. Look: I'm sure we'll find some time down the road to return to elaborate celebration dinners, but right now we're just trying to get by :).

One realization upon having a second kid is how slowly children progress in the early months. I remember feeling like E was conquering huge mountains with each poop and feeding in her first few months. Now with Gabba, his advancement is compared with the constant hurricane of E and it's just a gentle, constant reminder of how quickly things will pick up later on.

Our two kids are so different from one another. I mean, of course they are, they're different people. But I think I, like many other first-time parents, didn't really process how thoroughly these two human beings would differ in their personalities and demeanors. Gabba's so much calmer and measured in his reactions. He started staring at us much earlier. And sometimes he just sits still, content in observing what's going on around him. Where was that with the first kid :)? He is such a cute kid. Gabba loves baths, smiles a lot, and enjoys watching basketball with his dad. And, maybe most importantly, he emits these babbles and cooing noises non-stop that his sister never did.

We moved out of SF this month to the suburbs. Like many young families in SF, the specter of navigating the city's school system was enough to send us looking in other directions. But now that we're in the suburbs, I've realized how familiar its benefits for our kids are to me. When we first moved in, E peered outside longingly to our backyard and asked me if it was OK to go outside. And she asked and confirmed three times before tentatively walking to the lawn, as if a crosswalk, bus, or stop sign might stop her in her tracks at any moment. In that moment, I realized that I had never imagined our kids growing up within the limits of an urban environment. It's not that it was bad, I just didn't have (and still don't have) a mental precedent for it.

E has a personality and will that is exploding with every passing day. Now she always has a logical narrative in her head, she just hasn't shared it with others (i.e. her parents) until it reaches the end and she reacts in frustration. If only there was a way for her to communicate what's going on in her head, maybe using human language! I've noticed that her internal narratives range about 30-60 seconds now, which means I often have 30-60 seconds to figure out what she wants before she reacts emotionally. I never understood the phrase, “Use your words!” until this month, but I say it ten times a day now. Her favorite word has now become, thankfully, “Yes.” She says it calmly whenever she is fully heard and understood, and it's really adorable. And she is stitching together so many thoughts now in response to all kinds of prompts. The other day, she finished throwing all of her dinner onto the floor. When I saw the mess, I exclaimed, “E, oh geez. What will Mommy say when she gets home?” She stared at me intently in recognition, looked alarmed, and then said slowly: “Mommy come home. [She'll be] So sad!” Watching her connect prompts and responses is fascinating, but maybe only for her dad.

I had lunch with a friend recently whose two kids are finishing high school in the next couple of years. As he was talking about their college applications, it occurred to me that we're about 1/8 of the way there with E. Wow! But it's more than that, he mentioned, “Actually man, I hate to tell you, but you really have about ten years to really raise your kids. After that, you're just the bumpers at the bowling alley.” It's hard to imagine right now because we're such central figures in E and Gabba's lives, but we are really not so far from the day when they will choose a friend's sleepover over whatever we'd like to do with them. 

And maybe we'll have less influence than even that. Because when I watch Gabba interacting with his sister, even three months in, I can see how influential she will be in his life. Even now, he watches her intently, staring and smiling at his big sister who knows everything. It is heart-melting, but also really telling. I can see how so many younger children develop greater confidence by building on what they see their older siblings take on. He'll be so willing to watch her learn and struggle before engaging himself. 

If having one kid “changes your life” as every parent remarks, then having a second clarifies that your old life really isn't coming back :). When that happens, all you can do is realize that you now fundamentally value different things. It's one dynamic that I'd love to impart and explain to Gabba and E: that life is very non-linear, and that phases begin and end at will. This is a whole new one for all four of us and we're going to make the most of it.

[smallchou]

26 Months as Dad

E turned 26 months old today. We celebrated by slowly braising pork shoulder for 6 hours and pairing it with seared brussel sprouts. E also had some noodles and carrots (not a big sprouts fan) and we all washed it down with some ice-cold water :). So let's see, did anything happen this month? I can't recall... oh yeah, this:

Gabba arrived and our entire home was enriched by the 33% population increase. A few weeks before he was born, I asked E, “What should baby's name be?” She paused for a solid ten seconds, furrowing her brow and pensively thinking... and when she spoke, the name 'Gabba' was blurted out, followed by a fit of her own laughter. It was the first time I'd ever seen her truly amuse herself so thoroughly. And it didn't stop, as she kept repeating the name while laughing at her own joke, with a tone of... “Man, I can't believe I came up with such a good one. Great work, E...” So Gabba it is.

The biggest takeaway is how quickly one forgets what having a newborn is like. Several weeks in, I look at Gabba and wonder, “My gosh, was E ever this tiny? Did she ever have these pin-sized toes and fingers? Was she ever so fragile, dependent in every single way?” When the doctor announced that Gabba was the exact same weight and height as E at birth, I found myself blinking in bewilderment (and lack of sleep). How could that be? It's really highlighted the speed of E's growth, as well as a gentle reminder that Gabba will similarly be a full-grown toddler before we know it.

Of course they are their own people though. Where E was an active baby with gifted vocal chords and insomnia from the moment she emerged, Gabba has been calm, mild, and snuggly. It's dangerous to say this because things can change quickly, but he has been incredibly easy and accommodating so far. He eats, he sleeps, he poops, and he does all of the above with little complaint.

I'm different with them too. As much care as I thought I took to treat E no differently than I would a boy, I realize now that I don't treat them the same, even at Gabba's nascent age. It's hard to explain, but I find myself holding him, talking to him, and changing diapers for him differently than I did with E. Undoubtedly part of it is also the realization that our babies are sturdier and oblivious than I thought, but it does bother me. I've found myself speaking to E differently in an attempt to treat them equally, often thinking, “Is this how I would say this to Gabba?” 

E also started attending an early preschool this month, so she's had quite the change of scenery in her life. First she discovered that all that talk about Baby was real and she now has to share our time with Gabba. And then she discovered that much of her days would now be spent interacting with several peers. What a month! That transition into school seemed to be much harder on Dad than E, as I found myself peeking back into her classroom in the hopes that she's doing OK. After a few rough drop-offs, there haven't been any problems. She's still very quiet in class, observing her surroundings and gathering up comfort to be her normal, gregarious self. I find myself wanting to tell everyone in the classroom, “Watch out, she's going to start acting like she owns this place any moment now!”

Instead, she brings the energy and vocabulary explosions home with her, chatting vibrantly the moment she leaves school all the way to the car. There are so many words swimming around in her head now and she nonchalantly pieces them together into short sentences that constantly surprise Ivy and me. It is a legitimate miracle and delight to observe her words and language change every single day. And not just the words, but the underlying meanings and ideas, pieced together and retained instantaneously. The human brain is capable of absorbing so much so quickly, as shown to me this month by our two-year old. I've never seen anything so expected and inspiring at the same time.

I am so excited to watch her develop and then to see it repeat differently for our son. Having a second child is more than that though, because the emergence and growth of the relationship between them is a whole entity in and of itself. So far, we have been so lucky to have a daughter who seems nervous and excited to be an older sister. She's slowly learning to interact with him even without any return, and she hasn't shown a drop of jealousy so far (knock on wood). And I'll be honest, to hear her (even nonchalantly) say, “Goodnight Gabba” before she heads to bed each evening is enough to make my heart melt every time. As a friend once told me, adding a second kid bumps up the family size to four, but it doubles the number of relationships in the house.

I struggle every day with how to express and record this experience of being a dad in a way that I will remember it years from now. Not the facts, but the feeling of it all. I don't really know how to convey to E and Gabba, at an age they will truly understand, what it's like to feel so vulnerable as their father - to see these two asian-american babes, innocently finding their way in a country and world that are legitimately in turmoil, and not be able to promise them that strong, positive values will undoubtedly be rewarded. When I combine that realization with E's growing awareness of the world around her, I'm reminded that the first and maybe only thing I can do is set the best example that I can for them.

Friends have asked me if I'll keep writing these monthly notes now that we're a family of four. Some have even asked if I'll be doubling them up to be fair to the younger child :). Writing these notes have been for E and to remember what she's like, but they're also for me to remember how common, but remarkable this experience is. So I'm going to keep it up on the monthly cadence marked by the day I became a dad - as I'll tell E and Gabba over time, life isn't all about them :).

[smallchou]

25 Months as Dad

E turned 25 months old yesterday. My own (annual) birthday is today, so she and I celebrated by heading to a get-together early and spending some quality father-daughter time before others arrived. I had a tequila-based cocktail and she drank (non-alcoholic) liquid from a glass for the first time. We split a plate of jalapeno pretzels. And yes, she did hate the flavor of jalapeno.

This month, E started a new session of her soccer program and I was struck by how much more comfortable she is the second time around. She takes part in all of the different drills now, furiously cycles her arms during the Wheels On The Bus portion of practice, and (dare I say it) is  actually having fun each week. And this after she was ready to quit for the first five weeks the first time. I hope we're always able to provide that extra patience for her while she explores her world.

The biggest story this month is how E's growing in independence, with her own personal narrative and direction on almost everything. Of course it happened slowly, but we reached a point this month when Ivy and I realized that we're now negotiating with and influencing her much more than we're directing her. A diaper change is now a debate instead of an order, and any choice in activity is now just a suggestion to her that needs selling. For instance, she now picks her own clothes every day and firmly tells me “No.” whenever I suggest something for her to wear. It's really fun to watch E grow this personal agency over her own life.

Of course it becomes a real pain in the ass when her independent plans conflict with some other schedule or need. So I find myself spending more and more time explaining things to her in thorough detail. She doesn't get everything, but at least twice a day I'm stunned by how much she absorbs from a few quick words. It is such a fun journey learning to communicate with her. 

E's taken to hiding things, though I think she thinks of it more as organizing her stuff. The various rooms of our home have  now become just a few connected spaces for her to hide and keep her things. Like a dogbones in the yard, E now tucks cards and toys and other items in random boxes, under floor rugs, and folded in convenient corners. She's doing this purposefully and intricately, and she doesn't like when I change up her plan by moving something. It's made it so we now have to ask her if she knows where things have gone when we can't find them - it's actually likely that she put them somewhere and can retrieve them.

It's not just her own independence that's taking off, E's steadily and happily spending more time with other kids. She's clearly reached a point when interacting with peers is intriguing and energizing. She even has her own best friend, a boy of similar age who she meets up with regularly at the rec center and local bookstores. Their interactions are adorable and hilarious, but most of all they just enjoy hanging out together. 

Watching her focus evolve from following around the adults in her life to setting her own agenda to now building her own independent relationships... it's all been much faster than I expected. Part of it is how quickly two years pass, but it's also because of how mis-framed childhood was in my own head. In the back of my mind, I'd always thought of parenting as 18 straight years of acting as a principal in her life, but I've realized recently that it's probably more like 4-5 years of that, followed by a dozen or so years of her transitioning into her own life while our support of her tapers off slowly. It makes the many moments of the day right now when she still really needs us all the more special.

And by this time next month, we'll be starting this whole process again with another kiddo. As I've said many times before, I've felt so much fulfillment in the process of parenthood that it's hard to remember life without her. And because that's been so great... I'm sure Karma says that our second will be total insanity :). Looking forward to year 36 of my life. And bracing ourselves for what's next :).

[smallchou]

24 Months as Dad!

E turned 24 months old today. We celebrated with a Five Dot Ranch rib eye, blistered brussel sprouts, and a few glasses of a '14 Morgon. E celebrated with a single slice of Kalbi,  chopped carrots, and room temp water. And we each had a slice of 'Puh pih py?' to finish the meal.

About that 'Puh pih py?” or, as it's better known, Pumpkin Pie. E has taken to asking for and consuming it at a pretty startling pace. Many days, the first actions upon waking up are a big yawn, a thorough stretch, and the hopeful words “puh pih py?” to no one in particular. I have yet to see a volume of pumpkin pie that she hasn't consumed when it's been put in front of her. Tonight she actually chomped down her slice while I was trying to line up the perfect Snap and then actually gestured towards my place. Basically a very urgent, “Hey dude, you gonna eat that?” She ended up eating half of it.

Her obsession with pumpkin pie is, to this biased observer, a really fascinating new change. It combines her own taste-driven likes, her new sense of memory, and her evolving understanding of language and objects. I've remarked before on how opinionated she is, but it's been striking to continue to watch how fully-formed her preferences are. She makes decisive judgements and is happy to stick with them over trying new things. I'm sure it'll be something to pay attention to in the future, but right now it's just fun to watch. She loved the taste of pumpkin pie last year when she was one year-old and that preference picked up right where it left off. Given how often she turns down new things, I was surprised when she immediately picked back up a food after not seeing it for a year and probably forgetting it.

I'm sure much of that is just taste bud preference, but I'm convinced that some of it is also Memory, because that's been such a change this month. She's really stitching together minutes, hours, days, and weeks now. A month ago at this time, each day for E was still a discrete experience, punctuated with some vague emotions and memories. For instance, I spent a lot of time reminding her what soccer practice was, how much she liked it :), and when it would be happening. She vaguely got it and I mostly figured that I could implant it into her brain just by reinforcing it repeatedly. This month? She's been asking in the morning and evenings, 'kick ball?' She remembers soccer practice, knows what it's about, and is looking forward to things. And I have to say, I find myself so humbled to be around her in this moment of her life when she's moved from experiencing every day as it comes without memory to stitching together moments by remembering and hoping for things. No place has this been more fun than seeing her process at every meal the simple thought “Wait a second... I think this is the point during this meal when I might be getting pumpkin pie!” You can imagine her range of emotions when she calls for it and is satisfied or disappointed. I don't mind, it makes me marvel in wonder each time.

Maybe the biggest contributing factor to her Pumpkin Pie Obsession though is that she finally gets what a pumpkin actually is. Last month we went to a pumpkin patch, from which we took home a few small pumpkins, which are similar to the pumpkins she's been seeing at the grocery store, which look like the plastic pumpkin-shaped trick-or-treat container she got for Halloween, which looks like the pumpkins everyone else was carrying around, which look like the things that Daddy has been reading to me about, which sound like the first word of the term 'pumpkin pie', which means... “holy shit, this word 'puh pih' means the same thing in each instance!” Tying those different items together as a consistent single word has been a huge change for her this month.

It was put to the extreme test when our local bakery was out of pumpkin pie and Ivy came home with an apple pie instead. I watched intently to see how she would react, seeing her stop and ponder why this different thing was called and 'apple pie'. After a few moments of thinking, she was able to connect it to the apples that Mom and Dad are always trying to get her to eat. I know I sound like a gushing dad here, but I was so proud of that small connection. No word on when she'll start eating apples though (see: snap judgements, above).

I've been lucky enough to have the opportunity to spend quite a bit more time with E this month by starting my own leave from work early and it has been pretty transformational for our relationship. At some deep level, I had hoped that her closeness with Ivy was based on something other than quality time spent together, mostly so I wouldn't feel so insufficient as a parent. And while there is undoubtedly a special bond between the two of them, I've realized that E and I are building our own special relationship just by me being around and supportive. It'll never be the same as what she shares with Ivy, but it can be so incredible in its own way. It's slightly embarrassing that it's taken me two years to really, deeply understand this.

E and I (OK, maybe just really me) were really excited about the prospect of the United States' first female president. On Election Day, Ivy and I took her down to the polling place with us and snuck a few quick photos of her holding our ballots. We were hopeful that some day the photos would serve as a backdrop to an incredible story, “E, did you know that in your lifetime there was a time when NO WOMAN had EVER been President?? See, here's proof.” What I've realized in the time since the election is that there was a laziness by me towards my own job as a feminist for my wife and my daughter embedded in that simple hope. As if I and we should be spectators or bit participants (“relative to Hillary's big role!”) in paving the way for E and all her hopes and dreams. After all, E has a big role coming up to play as new big sister. She's been diligently preparing, repeatedly reading her books about our New Baby and listening to me tell her how much help the baby will need from her. Tonight, she stunned me by insisting that she take her “I'm a Big Sister” book to bed with her, presumably so that she can study it more. She's on her shit, I should be on mine too.

Happy Birthday to our precocious, discerning, playful, and pumpkin pie-loving E! May her next years be as illuminating for all of us as her first two. :)

[smallchou]

23 Months as Dad

E turned 23 months old today. We celebrated with a whole roasted chicken, sauteed baby bok choy, and a welcome sight: the first pumpkin pie of the year. 

Every day, E walks down the sidewalk in our neighborhood pointing at every dog she sees (and there are many around here), real or photographed, from any distance (sometimes from 100 yards away), confidently stating 'whu whoa', her generic term for 'dog'. Recently she also started greeting the dogs as she nears them, cheerfully singing 'Hi, whu whoa!' and 'Bye, whu whoa!' while she saunters around the city. It sounds so trivial when I write it, but I can guarantee that when your two year-old does it for the first time, you will melt and want to show everyone you meet.

Today I realized that she was now regularly referring to her favorite stuffed animal (Sammie the Dog) as 'whu whoa' too. She has a whole gang of favorite plush toys now and she refers to them each by name, except for Sammie. So today I started the process of teaching her how to say Sammie's name. That doesn't sound like much, but it was something substantial - it was the first time that I identified a word that she (1) knows, (2) should know how to say, but (3) doesn't say. And maybe that's the thing that's most noticeable this month: E's so much more observant and mentally aware, that I know definitively that she already has the capacity to do things that she just hasn't started doing yet (after all, there are so many things that she knows just to call Sammie 'whu whoa'). It's a change that means she's moved, in my mind, from unlimited future potential to current learning and growth.

Speaking of her words, E's vocabulary is exploding. Of course from everything I understand I'll be writing that every month for the next five years, but most days this month I did double-takes realizing that she was saying something new. A month ago she didn't know what Cookie Monster was. Now she both knows the blue-furred Sesame Street character and also confidently named a new stuffed animal  lamb 'Cookie' without pause when asked. Her decision-making is always firm like that. Ivy and I regularly throw her two-option questions to help her learn to make decisions. It turns out indecision is not an issue for E - she always weighs the options intently and make a call within a few seconds.

It took her a few weeks, but E's really getting into soccer practice now. After a few weeks of refusing to participate and starting longingly at the neighboring playground, E now participates in all the drills with the other kids and seems to really enjoy it. Before I was a dad, I often wondered whether you could get kids to like things just through parental enthusiasm and excitement. I mean, if I have a two year-old and I tell her broccoli is my favorite thing to eat in the world, how could she know any better, right? It turns out that can't be the only thing (as proven by how few vegetables E eats), but it really does help. In the case of soccer practice, I spent every spare moment for weeks reminding her that she has soccer practice on Sunday and that she had such a great practice last week. After a while, her face lit up whenever I talked about practice and she's started really believing that she loves it. Some might call it brainwashing, but come talk to me when you've figured out a better approach :).

One thing that I've never written about, but I just really have to now: E is really cute, especially right now. It's not just her appearance, it's the whole combination of stumbling-bumbling toddler, self-assured cockiness, innocent joy, adorable imitation, and hilarious mannerisms. Each day I wish that there was a better way to capture what E at this age is like and keep it around forever. That is the irony - as a parent you're deeply committed to helping your child grow through all of these stages, but you can't help but want to hold on to what they're like right now.

[smallchou]

22 Months as Dad

E turned 22 months old today. We celebrated with a hearty meal of seared rib eye (bratwurst for E), pan-fried brussel sprouts (carrots and peas for E), and various refreshments (milk for E). I had a couple of glasses of a young '14 Bourgogne red.

We took E to Tahoe this past month, attempting to create a relaxing few days off in one of the common vacation spots of my youth. Bringing your own life full-circle to your own childhood place, but through the eyes of your own child is (honestly) amazing. It's nostalgia and the hue of 'new experience' blended in a single scene.

It's hard to wrap your head around having a second kid, though the disbelief is largely in the fact that you'll be somehow doubling the amount of work from the first time. A few coworkers are getting ready to have their first and the only way to describe what will happen to them is: “Your life will totally change.” You realize once you get into parenting that there is no succinct way to describe the experience other than, 'Much of what you thought of as your life will disappear, and will be replaced with new stuff. By the way, things you thought were important before will just vanish like a Tibetan sand painting.' I used to make fun of my coworkers who communicated this through sighs and rainchecks on random happy hours, but it's now the truth of my life. Having your second is different. For one, you are more mentally prepared for what will be coming. But, secondly, it is impossible to understand how in the world that much effort can be doubled and then fit into a single day. Like, seriously, how will it actually happen?! Instead of the, “What will be happening? I have no idea!” excitement of the first kid, the run-up to the second is a narrative of, “How is it possible for all of that to be happening while there's a 2-year old in the same house? Is there such a thing as Preschool Boarding School?!”

E has had a remarkable explosion of vocabulary in the past month. While she's already gotten used to hearing, processing, and casually ignoring my words, her own version of the English language has been developing steadily. I'd estimate that she has probably about 50-60 words, 20 of which she says every day. That's up from single digits a month ago. Logically, her five favorite words are 'whu whoa' (aka 'woof woof', aka 'dog'), 'wah beh' (aka 'strawberries'), 'yay' (aka 'yay'), 'uh-oh' (aka 'uh-oh'), and 'daddy' (aka 'daddy'). She also often says 'pooh' for her numerous Winnie the Pooh toys.

Like I mentioned last month, E definitely has large elements of my personality and it's actually helped me understand my own natural emotions much more clearly. She's so stubborn. And focused. And determined. And she always thinks she knows what's right before she gets started. And she often disapproves of how un-carefully I do things :). As a Dad, it's fascinating to learn how hard-wired into my own nature my flaws are, through observations of my uninfluenced child. It both provides comfort and personal self-awareness at once.

We started taking E to soccer practice a couple of weeks ago. To be clear, it should technically be called “soccer” “practice”, in very loose terms. I wish I could say that E naturally bounded out of her stroller and sprinted onto the field as the female Messi, but the honest truth is that she kind of hates it so far. We've been able to slowly coax her to participate with the other kids, but it has been work - and to be clear the coach is literally singing songs and teaching them to position soccer balls on top of colorful cones, not exactly USWNT type work.

We're in the mode of name-choosing for our second baby and it's just a bit too early for E to really contribute. When I ask her what her new sibling's name should be, she stares at me and casually ignores the question, not understanding it. 

I can already tell that it will be a special experience watching the relationship between the two of them - I imagine that it's one of the primary new things about having the new baby. I find myself mentally projecting forward their lives. Snapshots of: E verbally explaining some simple concept to a bewildered baby, them fighting over a small toy on a Saturday morning, E giving advice about starting school, high school, college, the “real world”. I'm just starting to see the haze of their future relationship, and it's quite a world to see.

[smallchou]

21 Months as Dad

E turned 21 months old today. Ivy was out at a dinner, but I celebrated with E by watching Elmo's World on Youtube and eating an ordered-in dinner from UberEats. I had a couple of glasses of a 2012 Frog's Leap Cabernet Sauvignon from Rutherford. In grand toddler form, when it was time to go to bed after her special Elmo TV treat, E got momentarily upset and refused to head to her room. #toddlerlife

The big news this month is that we're expecting again! In January, we're looking forward to becoming a family of four, complete with a little kiddo to get bossed around by E. Halfway through the pregnancy, we've taken to pointing at Ivy's belly and telling E that, “There's a baby in there.” E has then taken to responding by pointing at my (growing) gut and announcing, “Baby!” It's a good reminder that children are logical beings, capable of associating similar shapes with rapid velocity :).

E has really conquered our local playground. She quickly went from gathering courage to take on the smallest of amusements, to now climbing all over both jungle gyms and flying down the slides at will. On Sunday I took her to Dolores Park and we climbed to the top of the hillside slide, which is a couple of stories in height. She had never been down it before and, figuring that she'd be pretty hesitant, I explained to her that we needed to wait our turn before heading down. Without missing a beat, E ignored me, dodged a few older kids in her way, fired herself down the slide, and started climbing back up before I could break out my phone to take photos. Needless to say, she is braver than her father.

I've said this previously, but it is unreal how kids accelerate their learning. It seems every month I'm remarking at how much like “a real person” E is becoming and this one is no different. She eats what we eat, though with more loudly-voiced opinions now. She truly converses with us, processing our words and forming her own opinions. We probably understand half of her requests as she expresses them and that ratio is growing quickly. Maybe most surprising for me is how readily she listens to my guidance and advice - when I ask her to do something, 95% of the time she listens and does it. I may already be operating as Asian Dad in that way, because Ivy doesn't get the same treatment from E. Instead, E seems to know intuitively that she has more of an audience for requests, whines, and preferences with her mother. 

While E is acting more like a full-grown person, there are still the constant adorable and earnest behaviors that make your heart fill as a parent. In fact, as she's gotten more active, there are even more of these moments. She's running now... and falling. Often. And with a lot of drama. The other day, she attempted to climb up on an outdoor chair, tipped it over, and somehow scratched her nose on pavement without hurting a single other part. I'm still not sure how the omission of other injury happened. Or what she was meaning to get out of the chair climb. She's also very distract-able right now. Even when she's in pain or anguish (note: chair fall), a simple game of peekaboo or a totally unrelated distraction can set her mind right in seconds. I'll really miss that option when she's upset in her teenage years.

Maybe most adorable is the way that she now copies us. When I'm air-practicing my awful golf swing, I'm slapping my hands together during a sporting event on TV, or Ivy is rolling out her IT band on a foam roller, E watches intently and then she mimics us, often with a big smile of wonder and excitement. I know that there's lots of research about having kids not leading to happiness, but I struggle to come up with something that makes one happier than observing these tiny moments. She can make me smile and laugh from a total standstill, just by quietly observing someone and earnestly attempting to replicate the most innocuous of activities. It is mind-bending for a self-aware young dad. 

Her personality has really emerged and, as an extension of what I noticed last month, it is thoroughly similar to me. She so enjoys deconstructing things, examining them thoroughly, and piecing them back together in focused solitude. She can be stubborn and insistent about her opinions, declining to drop them until things are made right. And she loves the thorough repetition of going from understood to muscle memory, often asking us to name an object hundreds of times before she repeats the word herself - she really wants to get it right.

As we start getting ready for January, I find myself really wanting to savor these last few months of the three of us. In many ways, having one kid already just makes you infinitely more aware of how different your life will be in the next phase. A smart coworker once told me that, “Three family members mean three relationships, four family members mean twice as many.”

[smallchou]

20 Months as Dad

E turned 20 months old today. We celebrated by taking part in my sister-in-law's wedding (http://www.hemarriesiris.com/) - Ivy was the Matron of Honor and I officiated the wedding. It was a beautiful affair, albeit hot and sunburn-worthy. E and I left the wedding early right after Ivy's speech. As I write this, I can hear E singing and muttering in her  room, hours after her usual bedtime.

We had a romantic vision of E playing the part of perfect Flower Girl, adorably trotting down the aisle, carrying a basket full of rose petals. While she played that role well in rehearsal, the real thing quite different. The moment she rounded the corner and saw hundreds of people staring in her direction, she stopped dead in her tracks, squatted down into a catcher's position, and leaned back onto her butt. With Ivy and me both up on the altar, only her grandmother could save her, scooping her up and walking down the aisle with her hand-in-hand.

She can be reasoned with now. All month, we had been trying to get E to try on her white Flower Girl dress for the wedding, but she constantly resisted. This afternoon, as she woke up from her nap, I complimented the dress for a solid five minutes in front of her and then asked her if she knew someone who might want to wear it. She calmly paused and barely flinched while I fit it over her head. That goes for diaper changes, food, drink, walks, and time at the playground. It's no small feat! To be able to hear sound, process it as language, understand the words, internalize the meaning of them, and react to the suggestions.

This month E really started to get used to riding the Slide at the playground. Over the course of weeks, I saw her steadily gain courage and comfort, test the slide timidly, start to loosen up while taking it, and now rapidly fly down it and run back to the top to repeat the trip. Watching your own child progressively learn to take on a new act with confidence and familiarity is a special treat. And it's a simple reminder, when you see other kids bomb down new paths at the playground without thinking twice, that each of us learns and grows comfortable in our own way.

E's way of learning feels so familiar and so similar to my own, as do many reactions that she holds. Recently I took an extensive personality assessment at work. It was very complete and felt pretty accurate. I see many of those same dynamics in E's personality. Often I find myself watching her come across a situation and knowing (feeling?) exactly how she will react. As I looked out at the crowd of this wedding today, I somehow found myself knowing that E would react in exactly the “surprising” way that she did. I'm not a savant, I just knew exactly how she would feel in that moment because I would feel that way if I was her.

I used to watch the types of commercials that would play during golf tournaments on TV and laugh. Viagra, golf equipment, online brokerages, and insurance? C'mon.  It seemed so obvious and ridiculous. Last Sunday though, I was up early alone watching The Open Championship on TV and a Travelers Insurance commercial came on. I'm comfortable enough with myself to say that it actually made me tear up, and it's done that each subsequent time I've seen it, including when I showed it to Ivy to laugh at myself. It's safe to say that two years ago I wouldn't have paused to think while it was on, take a look for yourself: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7iZfaep_LS4 . Yeah, it is pretty absurd.

Being a dad affects you in unexpected, unlikely ways. For me, I've found new personal depth and emotions that actually make me uncomfortable. How do you describe the feeling when your child is scared, alarmed, reacts, stumbles, rallies, and then moves forward in her life, dressed in a little white dress walking down an aisle, while you and your wife stand at the other end around a crowd of people? I haven't found the words yet.