Lost In Translation

I've never been on a true 'international' vacation. Sure, my Senior year of high school, I spent spring break on a drunken boat ride through the Caribbean. And my then girlfriend (now wife) and I took a trip to Mexico a few years back, but 'cerveza' was the most extensive Spanish required during our stay. Despite my lack of experience when it comes to traveling abroad, I've got to believe that tackling a foreign language barrier has to be equivalent to deciphering a child's words when they first start talking.

Although you could say Ava has been 'talking' for months now, it's just been the past couple where she has really started to become a motormouth, offering jumbled commentary on pretty much everything she can. At times it can be like dealing with a drunk friend at 3 AM.

"You need what?"

"I'm sorry, can you repeat that? You're slurring again."

"No, that's not a puppy."

"Okay, hold on a second, did you just poop your pants?"

And sometimes, even if we can't figure out specific words, we have to resort to using context clues to help us figure out what message she's trying to relay. For example, when she's pointing at the coat closet, jabbering quickly and nervously, it essentially means: "Hey, that's where you keep that loud, floor-sucking machine right? Right in there? Yeah? Do you think you could open that door so I could look at it? JUST LOOK AT IT THOUGH. Because I SWEAR, if you turn it on or try to make me touch it, I will FREAK OUT!!!"

But as time goes on, my wife and I are gradually developing our own "Ava Dictionary" for certain words and sounds that come out of her mouth. And believe it or not, it's harder than you might imagine. Some words mean different things depending on the situation. And much like Mandarin Chinese, some words require close to attention to the inflection in her voice. So this morning, I scribbled down some notes on some of the words that might be misinterpreted by the common individual. In case you ever come visit, here's an introductory translation dictionary for our daughter:


Cock - Quack or Jayhawk. Yes, don't be alarmed if she yells out 'Cock!' randomly. She just sees one of these birds.

Cawcock - Jayhawk (formal).

Otch - Watch or Ouch. Is she pointing at that shiny thing on your wrist? Then it's probably the former. Did she just fall off the rocking ottoman after trying to scale it, YET AGAIN? Then the latter is a safe bet.

Pay - Play. So if you're out at a restaurant and she's telling you she wants to 'pay', don't think she's about to whip out the plastic any time soon.

Momo - Elmo, as in the red furry one. Don't talk smack about Elmo around her, because you're liable to get a size 5 Circo sandal up your ass.

Boo - Boo or Blue. Note whether she is yelling it or if she is pointing to the ball on page 8 of 'Baby Needs A Hug'.

Sorry KU fans, my daughter thinks you're all cocks.

Awsh - Wash. Not to be confused with 'Otch', this is generally heard during bathtime or right after an especially messy meal.

Popeye - Happy. Makes sense, I mean Popeye always had a half-smile on his face, right? Granted, it was probably due to a neuromuscular disease caused by contaminated spinach, but let's look at the silver lining here.

Beebee - Baby, bye bye, or blueberry. This can be a real tough one. First, try to tackle this one contextually, but you have to also understand that Ava tends to reference babies even when they are not present and don't pertain to the subject at hand. If stumped, feed her a blueberry, pretend to be an infant and wave goodbye simultaneously.

So there's a sampling of what you can expect in the Ava Translation Dictionary. Of course, this is just a starter's guide, the free version, if you will. I'm still trying to pitch a full-blown, paid version to Rosetta Stone, but for some reason, nobody has returned my calls or e-mails. What a bunch of Jayhawks.

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The Mother's Day Paradox

I know, you are sitting there thinking "Come on Pat, Mother's Day isn't until Sunday!" Yes, I know. But, like so many of you out there, I don't anticipate having a single free minute this weekend, let alone time to sit and commiserate over a well-thought Mother's Day blog post. And for those of you sitting there thinking "You can write it ahead of time and schedule the post to go live on Sunday!" well you are just a smart ass and can shut that mouth of yours.

Every February when Valentine's Day creeps up us, there's a dedicated group of individuals that cry foul and make sure to broadcast their distaste for the holiday.

"It's a fake holiday!"

"It was created by the greeting card companies!"

"It's a crappy holiday if you aren't with somebody!"

"Why can't St. Patrick's Day just be moved up a month so I can get wasted and have Shamrock Shakes sooner!"

Totally valid points. But really, isn't Mother's Day the same sort of contrived holiday? Now before all you Moms out there form a pitchfork and torch-carrying lynch mob, let me say that I feel the same way about Father's Day. And for legitimate, heartfelt reasons, believe it or not!

The history of Mother's Day in North America is actually a pretty strange one. It was first conceptualized by Julia Ward Howe in 1870, who wrote a 'Mother's Day Proclamation' calling for women to join together in a peaceful movement to stop their sons from killing one another in wars.

Now Mother's Day as WE know it was started in 1908 by Anna M. Jarvis in honor of her mother and later signed into national observance by Woodrow Wilson in 1914. Interestingly enough, as time went on and commercialization of the holiday began, Jarvis fought it tooth and nail. She even sued to stop a Mother's Day event in 1923, and was arrested in the 1930's for protesting the sale of flowers at another event.

But here we are, almost 95 years after Jarvis' first Mother's Day, and it's nothing BUT commercialization. Mother's Day cards, Mother's Day flowers, Mother's Day restaurant specials, the 93% off-plus-$20 bonus bucks-and-a-free-tote-bag Mother's Day Sale at JC Penney; it's all a bit much, and probably has Anna Jarvis steamrolling in her grave, ready to send Gloria Allred after all of us.

My other qualm with Mother's Day is the sheer emotional, mental and physical logistics of it. As a kid, Mother's Day is easy. All you really have to worry about is your mom. You slather some rotini in gold paint in Art class, thread it with some yarn and BOOM! you are about to make your mom's year. Beat THAT shit, Dad!

But as you get older, it becomes so much more. Once I turned 18 and as I grew up, I REALLY learned what it meant to appreciate my mother and the many years of love and lessons that she bestowed upon us. Suddenly a spaghetti tennis bracelet just doesn't do the trick anymore.

Not only that, but it stops just being your mom that you think about. For those of us who have children, the amazing work our wives/girlfriends/significant others do as mothers is insanely important. Plus, our mothers then become grandmothers and deserve dual appreciation. And then there are some of us that also include our grandmothers, godmothers, etc. into the mix and it suddenly becomes a struggle to show heartfelt appreciation for multiple people in a 24 hour period (and that's if you don't sleep). Yikes!

Anna Jarvis bout to get legal on yo ass.

Look, don't get me wrong. I love nothing more than showing my wife and mom signs of appreciation and letting them know how special they are to me. But I almost look at it as an injustice to THEM to try to cram it into a day or half-day's worth of events that has to meet the Kay Jewelers commercial standard of what Mother's Day is.

My wife is an absolutely incredible mother. I look at her like the LeBron James of parenting. And by that, I don't mean I anticipate her announcing that she's going to be taking her mothering skills elsewhere. But as someone who became a mother fairly young, it is truly jaw-dropping how great she is at it. From day one, she has shown the most impressive display of nurturing and care. It's an amazing feeling being 100% confident that my daughter will grow up to be a caring, loving individual with strong morals all because of the perfect role model she has in my wife. She approaches motherhood with simultaneous senses of seriousness and humor, determination and humility. Seriously, it's like she drops a motherhood triple-double every day of her life.

And when it comes to my Mom, what can I say? I think we could celebrate 'Mother's Day' every day of the year for the next 25 years and it wouldn't make up for all that she's done for me since I came into her life. As an adopted child, I've had people in the past ask me if Mother's Day and Father's Day are 'weird' holidays to celebrate. Typically, after I've resisted the strong urge to punch these people in the jugular for being idiots, it's an easy answer: ABSOLUTELY NOT. My Mom is my Mom. She's taught me so many incredible things in my life time and I owe her so much. Whenever I'm being stupid or obnoxious, my Mom always jokingly says 'I tried to raise him well, I really did!" Well you did, Mom. More than well.

Last month on my birthday, my Mom told me that her proudest moment of me so far in my life was one time when I bought a homeless guy lunch at Wendy's. That was it! Not graduating college, not this accomplishment or that, but something that represented values. And I hope she realizes that those values have been bred from the impeccable job that her and my Dad have done raising me.

My wife and Mom may not even read this, but if they do, I hope they really realize how much they mean to me, and how much the people they ARE mean to me. Will I do everything I can to make their Mother's Day special and show them that I care? Of course I will, because I love them. But will it still feel like 'not enough', and a poor compensation for the spectacular things that they've done as mothers every day since they had children?

Absolutely, and I think old Anna Jarvis would give me a fist bump on that one.

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Sidewalk Chalk - How Does It Work?

It shocks my eyelids that Insane Clown Posse didn't include sidewalk chalk in their list of magical mysteries in the smash hit song 'Miracles'. Granted, yesterday was the first time I'd touched a piece of sidewalk chalk in what I'm guessing is at least a dozen years. But something weird happened when I came home to find my wife and daughter drawing on the sidewalk in front of our home. As soon as that chalk tickled my hand, it's like I had a reverse-Tom Hanks-in-Big, Freaky-Friday-except-without-Jamie-Lee-Curtis moment where I regressed to a carefree child. Fortunately, not to the extreme of uncontrollable bedwetting, but enough to have an amazing time with some colored pieces of calcium sulfate.


I should note right off the bat that as a general rule, I HATE the feeling of chalk in my hand. In school, I always counted my blessings when I had a classroom with one of those new-fangled¹ whiteboards and dry erase markers. For some reason that initial touch always sends a weird shiver up my spine. But something about sidewalk chalk brings about an exception to the rule.

Stop for just a minute and think about your childhood experiences with sidewalk chalk. Is there a single bad one? I'll bet you a Cheesy Gordita Crunch that there isn't. Meanwhile, other childhood sources of entertainment probably caused you some pain or grief at some point in your days of play. Falling off a bicycle, taking an aggressive bubble to the eye, getting strangled by a Skip-It²; few things provided pure entertainment and fun without risk of injury or strife, but sidewalk chalk was one of them. And not only that, but if you think about it, chalk could very well be the OLDEST children's toy around. Hell, little cavetoddlers were using chalk in prehistoric days to draw pictures of their friends getting eaten by woolly mammoths.

So when my wife went inside to get dinner ready, it was ON. I didn't even mess with changing out of my work clothes, I wanted to dive into this chalk action. As Ava dutifully drew her straight lines, I stared at my canvas with a complete lack of vision. How does one conquer over a decade's worth of chalk block? I decided I'd start with a circle. Ava looked at me and gave an approving fart. Or maybe that was me. It's not important, I was too caught up in the moment to pay attention to details. A few more well placed lines here, a little shading there. IT'S A SUN! FUCK YEAH! I was on a roll and wasn't going to let it stop. Now here's a moon to go with the sun! What a minute, forget celestial bodies, I'm switching it up: A MONKEY! Finally, after a sad attempt to draw a hopscotch court (is it called a court?) and show Ava how to play (you're welcome for the show, neighbors), my wife was back outside telling us to come in and wash up.

I nearly had an old-fashioned 'AW, DO WE HAVE TO?!' moment. I walked in a little dizzy, a little confused, and as my eyes adjusted to the dimmer light in the apartment, I realized just one thing: Sidewalk chalk may very well be one of the greatest sources of natural entertainment that God³ has ever graced this Earth with.

So whether you've got a child or not, I will make this one recommendation to you: Go get yourself a $3 bucket of sidewalk chalk and have a blast now that the weather is getting warmer. Even if you just use it to draw fake dead body outlines to freak out your neighbors, I'll still applaud you for bringing back a 'lost art'. And maybe if you're lucky, you'll find the magic piece of chalk, and all of your drawings will come to life in the ChalkZone (will anybody get this reference except me?).

Draw on!
_______________________

¹ I swear, I'm only 26.
² This statement is not representative of any former or pending lawsuits against Tiger Electronics and its subsidiaries.
³ Allah, Buddha, Krishna, Ram, whatever you're down with. I say God though. 'merica.

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I'm Baaack!

It’s ironic that my last post on this blog was just before Ava was born, and now I’m returning to write again at a point in fatherhood where I feel like I’m finally starting to figure it out. Now, I can hear the collective “HA!” ringing out from anybody reading this right now, and yes, I understand that I will NEVER completely figure out being a parent. But I do feel like I’m finally at a certain comfort level. While I spent so many of those first months scared shitless, I now feel much more at ease and get to watch my beautiful girl develop a personality and learn rather than worry constantly about the minutia of newborn necessities.

As tempted as I am to give you a 50 page, in-depth history of where the last 18 months has brought my family, I’ll spare you the awesomeness and just say that I am incredibly excited to start blogging again and have a good feeling I will be providing plenty of content. Somehow, not even Twitter and Facebook are enough to contain my diatribes anymore, so I expect this to be a great forum for me to spew my virtual verbal diarrhea on any topic that enters my ADD-riddled brain. Of course, the main focus will be on family and fatherhood, but let’s face it; I’m too much of a hip-hop head (see the new Tech N9ne song in the video window to the right) and beer geek (note the ‘Imbibing’ links above) to not include commentary on those as well. And chances are, every now and then something will piss me off enough to the point of ranting about it here.

So needless to say, you are all in for a treat, if you don’t mind me farting in my own tuba (that is the phrase, right?). This is just a sort post to say I’m back in action, so stay tuned because there’s more to come soon (I’m working on a riveting piece on sidewalk chalk).

Also, if any of you have some super exciting blogs you want to have placed in my blogroll, let me know!

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What do you get...

when you cross a pineapple with pressure points and a mile long walk?

I wish there was a hilarious knee slapper of a punchline to this one, but there's only one answer: a couple nearing the end of their pregnancy, desperate to try anything to naturally induce labor NOW.

Our due date is on Tuesday..as in 5 days from now. As in, it is baby time, and there are many many people waiting on pins and needles for Ava to come out to meet them. Our hopes are to induce on Monday, but that all depends on how our appointment goes tomorrow, so you'll have to stay tuned for updates on that.

I'm an impatient person, and I'll fully admit to that. I'm very much an 'instant gratification' kind of guy and typically want things right away. When I buy stuff online, I get annoyed having to wait for it to be shipped. My road rage stems from the fact that I can't stand it when someone even dips under 60 when driving on the highway. I don't even like waiting 15 minutes for a pizza to bake in the oven when I come home hungry. Yeah, I'm impatient.

But with all that being said, I think I have done damn well waiting for a baby, and I would hope that my wife would agree. But I'm at the end of my rope, and am really, truly READY for Ava..so why won't she just come out already?

Yes, I know..baby's come out when they are ready...they never come out when you want them to...blah, blah, blah. I've heard them all, 100 times each, forwards and backwards. I get it. But you know, taking a really deep look into it all, this lovely series of episodes of frustration, anxiety and eagerness are a nice little training session for the parenthood that lies ahead. After all, isn't this patience-testing repeated throughout the process of raising a child? Whether it be waiting for a certain stage to end (pacifiers!) to waiting for a certain accomplishment (potty training!) or even waiting for a certain level of respect (teenagers!) isn't this waiting essentially a mini-boot camp for us to hone our skills of coping?

Yep, patience is definitely a virtue, and it's not one that I can say I have a firm grasp of. But I'll say this much; preparing for a baby has helped me to begin developing my grip on it, and soon enough I'll be crushing patience in my fist, delivering spinebusters to serenity, and chokeslamming composure through the ring. I'll be like Shawn Michaels at the 1995 Royal Rumble, tearing through virtues like there's no tomorrow. Watch out, diligence! Meekness..your my bitch now!



Okay, I'll finish with that analogy because quite frankly, I don't entirely know where I'm going with it. To sum things up, as hard as it is to be patient and continue waiting, I know I should for multiple reasons. Not only am I simply bettering myself, but ultimately by learning to cultivate my ability to be patient, I'll be much more likely to pass this capability down to Ava. And if there is one thing that is worse than an impatient Pat, it's an impatient child..I don't care whose it is. Impatient children are the ones who throw public tantrums (please see rule #13 in my previous post) and have to get hauled out of restaurants, stores, etc. with snot dripping down their face, screaming because they aren't getting what they want right away. Not okay. And of course, this happens to even the most patient of children/parents; everybody has their bad day. But when it becomes a habit, that's a child who was never taught this simple lesson: sometimes you have to wait, and sometimes there's nothing you can do about it.

Of course, allow me to momentarily look like a hypocrite as I segue back into our latest attempts to bring about labor. You know, the Internet and I have a very love hate relationship. Given my job, and the things that I enjoy doing (I'm talking about fantasy football and downloading music, pervs), I love the Internet. What's a better way to find what you need, right when you need it? But that blessing is also the curse. If Amanda and I were having this baby 50 years ago, there wouldn't be any Internet for us to be searching for labor signs, methods of inducing labor, foods that induce labor, etc. Then again, if we were having this baby 50 years ago, Amanda's name would probably be Ethel, and we'd be listening to 'Ram-A-Lam-A-Ding-Dong' in my Studebaker on the way to the sock hop.

My point is, as nice as having a plethora of information is, having an overload of information (and especially MISinformation) is incredibly overwhelming in the worst way. Do you have any idea how many website, message boards, forums, etc. are out there for this kind of stuff? No really, do you? Because there WAY TOO MANY. Reading about all these 'signs of labor' is like reading Buddhist philosophies. This sign may exist or it may not exist. If this happens, it could mean something or it could mean nothing at all. The baby could actually there, or it could simply be a physical manifestation of our inner child wishing to come out. There's part of me that thinks pregnant women should be banned from the Internet for their own good. All these women come online and post absurd things that they think put them into labor, and then curse pregnant women of the future by causing them to assume it will work for them.

"One morning I decided to brush my teeth with my right hand instead of my left hand, and sure enough, 4 hours later I was at the hospital. That must have done the trick!"

"I was shaving my legs, and as I was shaving my left calf, my water broke. Must be an ancient secret pressure point!"

"I ate some yogurt that I realized was 3 weeks expired. A couple hours later, the contractions started booming. Let that yogurt sit, then go to town ladies!"

"I was playing track 9 on my Eagle Eye Cherry CD when I accidentally hit the reverse button instead of forward. There must be some labor-inducing backwards message, because little Randall pushed his way out that afternoon!"

Ridiculous.

In our search to find things that might get Ava moving a little sooner than her due date, we did our best to find things that seemed to have somewhat reliable backing or multiple sources saying that it had the potential to work. So are we just as guilty of encouraging the endless cycle of passing down labor induction techniques? Maybe. Does it seem kind of silly to have Amanda scarfing down pineapple in hopes that we can have Ava a few days sooner? Maybe. Do I look like a dumbass trying to hunt down pressure points on her hand and ankle and doing nothing but injuring the webbing between her fingers? Yes, there's no maybes about that one. But 9 months is a long time to wait for a lot of things, especially your daughter that you already love so much and just want to hold. I've literally daydreamed since March about what it's going to be like to have this new member of our family, so I can't help but be a little overly eager.

So I'll do my best to be patient, Ava, but it sure is hard. Tell you what, I'll make a compromise with you: I'll be patient right now if you promise to be patient with me the first few times I change your diapers. Deal?

See you soon little girl, I love you!

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