Bedtime stories

A young boy could barely finish his applesauce. He half heartedly scooped it up with his spoon and raised it up toward his mouth. When he thought his father had turned away, the boy slowly rotated the rubbery black handle until the applesauce leapt onto the tray below with a splat. "All done," He said. "I am all done."

That boy's name was Charlie and he was about to depart his home dressed as a Hooded Capuchin monkey with a banana in his pocket. He made a discovery the day before that was to alter the course of his consciousness forever. For that was when he discovered Skittles. He was tentative at first observation of the candy coated rainbow of flavors. But there was a letter on each one of them. It was an "S". S is a good letter. Perhaps it is his favorite. S stands for snake and seahorse and Spokane and Silky and strange and of course splat. After he tasted the first one, he abandoned caution. He took another and another and another. He danced in a circle. His father and mother called him Circle Man. He felt as if his tiny feet could leave the floor, as if sugar was lighter than air. He wondered what the old ladies at the nursing home had given him. Why had they doted over him so? He spun around more. He tried to remember the hands of those old women. Thin, bony hands with brown and purple spots. His mother had told him to smile and say "Trick or treat" but all he could do was stare at their faces that looked wrinkled like the raisins he extracts and studies from his breakfast bowl of oatmeal. But the women smiled and they seemed happy mostly. And it didn't matter if they had purchased the Skittles or if the head warden had gone to the store herself and bought them and gave them to the women who then gave them to the children. It didn't even matter if they had teeth. For it wasn't tool long ago that he didn't have teeth.

He did try to fly, but he fell down. "What happened, Charlie?" He wondered out loud. "What happened?" The magic of the skittle was fading. The high was rapidly deteriorating. "Want more!" But the answer was no. At least, not until he finished his applesauce. But Charlie knew that all he really had to do was make it appear that he had finished his applesauce. For that reason, he took scoops, huge ones, from his bowl and began the great deception. The first scoop went on his bib. The next on the tray. And another. A small amount fell to the floor. The final bit of convincing came in the form of two large drips, one on each corner of his mouth. That is when he said "I am all done."

Charlie changed into his costume after dinner. Not long afterward, there came a knock at the door. It was a black and white dog and a fireman. But there was no emergency. Even so, he remembered 9-1-1 as the exact sequence of numbers to push on the phone in case a real emergency were to happen. The dog and fireman were carrying candy. Had they gone to the nursing home, he wondered.

That's when they left the house, he and his Dad. The sidewalks were cleared of snow, but they were wet. The monkey costume made his feet appear larger than they actually are. Big or little, man or monkey, feet love puddles. He splashed around in one until his father carried him half way to the door of an unfamiliar house. There they stopped. There they stood. "Go to the door and knock." His father said. "Say trick or treat and put your bag out."

And so that is what he did. He reached out, made a fist and gently rapped on the cold glass door with his knuckles. A stranger appeared behind the glass with a wicker basket. When the door creaked opened, Charlie retreated a few steps. He remained in lingo between his father who waited halfway up the walk and the stranger at the door. Two people approached up the walk, the brothers Ghengis and Shaka Kahn. Past Charlie they walked to the door. They said "trick or treat" and the man with the wicker basket put candy in their suitcases. That emboldened Charlie to do the same and to do it himself. He marched back up the walk, to the door, to the stranger, thrust out his bag and received his first candy handout. Oh the way it made him feel. He wanted to open it right on the spot and eat the candy on the porch. He wanted to feel weightless again and fly like the monkeys in the Wizard of Oz and share a smile with the women at the nursing home and listen to Willard Scott's voice. Those things made him happy. All at once he was happy and elevated. He made more stops like that during the night until he wore just wore out from doing it. His bag was full. "All done," he said, "I am all done."

Measured

As a first time parent, those growth charts are extremely important. So much meaning rests within a single point plotted somewhere on the grid. It is not just a dot. It is your child against the world. Where the dot falls is how your child measures up. Before they can sign and talk and rollover and play sports and read and go to college, the length, weight and head circumference of your child is all they have as a basis of comparison. It is surely to come up if you talk to other parents you meet. I can recall one conversation I had with a woman at the Denver Children's Museum. Our children were independently playing next to each other.

"How old is your son?" The woman asked.

"He's twelve months." I said.

"He looks tall!"

"He does look tall, but he's only in the 50^th percentile for height." I admitted. "How about your daughter?"

"He is a boy."

Charlie hated to be measured. He cried when the nurse laid him face up on a yardstick. He arched his back. His big head rolled from side to side, never staying on the inch-wide piece of wood. To me it seemed like the dark ages of medicine. In a world of artificial limbs and hearts, MRIs and sonograms, a yardstick is a crude tool. And it was rarely accurate. According to his chart record, Charlie actually got smaller between six and nine months.

I don't like to be measured either. Compared to societal standards, I feel extremely inadequate. Culture reinforces the picture of who a man should be rich, powerful, successful, fit, charismatic, independent, and tough. I am none of these. I am a stay-at-home dad. I am the anti-man.

The yardstick the world uses to measure a man is broken; extremely inaccurate and dependent on the hands of the inconsistent measurer. Often I try to be someone I am not in an effort to measure up. It is tiring to be everything to everyone. I am done trying to live up to a standard that is unachievable.

I watch Charlie make mistakes every day. He can't do things quite right. He makes a mess when he eats. He falls when he walks. He breaks valuables. He wastes untold gallons of water flushing the toilet. He tears pages out of books. He runs away when I chase after him. But he is more than a dot. His is greater than what he does. He is my son. At the end of the day, I take him into my arms and love him regardless. I am humbled by what being a father has taught me about God's love. I have come to know the absolute measure of a man is the length of God's arms extended in love for us which is not something we could achieve on our own. It had to be given to us. In that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. Rom 5:8.

Help us move

Charlie and I are moving. You can follow us to our new home at the Examiner by clicking the link below.

http://www.examiner.com/examiner/x-25353-Denver-StayatHome-Dads-Examiner~y2009m10d10-Stayathome-Dad

See you there!

Mark and Charlie

Say it again, Charlie

Charlie is beginning to string some words together. Here are some.

He recognizes when has strayed farther than Dad is comfortable and anticipates my response by saying, "Come here, Charlie." Other preemptive statements include, ""Put it back." and "I don't think so."

"Let's go Rockies!" "Nice hit." "Todd Helton." "Steeerike!" Phrases emitted when relaxing on the couch watching baseball and sharing a bowl of halved grapes.

"What happened?" He says this when he falls down, runs into something, scrapes, dings, bruises or bonks. It is both a question and a statement of innocence.

Never imagined him saying ,"Take a nap." Of course, when I say it, he says, "No, don't like it!"

Before. "Go bicycle ride." After. "So much fun!"

"It's delicious!" His favorite foods are prunes, oatmeal, Nemos (fruit snacks), eggs, apples, grapes, almonds, meatballs, noodles, meatloaf, chicken tetrazzini, corn, sweet potatoes and rice.

"G'out!" Get out. Not a medical condition. Get out of bed. Get out of the shopping cart. Get out of the high chair during dinner. Get out of here Dad. Just because I'm little doesn't make me a fool. There is no such thing as wateraid. I want lemonade.

"Go play outside." At any time of day, Charlie prefers the great outdoors.

"Don't want it." Last night he didn't want his bedtime water until I put ice in it.

"Poopy diaper." Soon it will be time to try potty training again.

"Read a book." He says this when he wants to read a book and when he's stalling before going to bed.

"Mommy be here soon."

My favorite. "I love you."

Hallelujah!

I woke up this morning to Charlie's chatter. It was already light. Yesterday the sky was ashen and sober all day long. It was a good excuse for us to remain in our pajamas in our warm dry house. The fireplace has sat cold and empty for more than a year. I only have a few logs stacked near the fence outside. They have fungus growing on them. Fire doesn't discriminate.

We are not quite prepared for winter. Now is the time to check the gutters and close the vents and change the filter in the furnace and inspect it for leaks and call the chimney sweep and unhook the hoses and bring in the patio furniture and mount hooks to hang the bikes in the garage and change the oil in the snow thrower and put away my razor and bring up the flannel shirts and the long underwear from the basement. It's also a good time to uproot some of the perennials in the front flower bed to transplant elsewhere. I'm thinking about relocating the red sage to the bare section of slope in the back yard. Charlie knows that area as "muddy!" The sage's flowers hold their crimson color well into the frost. There are bushy Mugo pine out there too. I haven't even moved them. But they are small still. Their growth is negligible. They are barely distinguishable from the weeds. "Too TI-ny!" Charlie would say, as in an ill-fitting shirt.

I thinned out the crabapple tree in front of the house after getting inspired at the botanic gardens. I really hacked it quite a bit. But now you can see the trunk. Where it splays out the branches meander and contort.

Charlie and I went on a walk and a neighbor close by was tending to her yard. We chatted for a while. Charlie was shy. He gets silly. He stood up and turned around in his stroller and began to shake the stroller and call like a howler monkey. We left with a trash bag full of iris tubes. I like the idea of planting a few clumps beneath the newly trimmed crabapple just behind the creeping periwinkle.

Charlie goes out with me when I water and walks up the hill and then runs down it.

"Up the hill!" He looks at me and exclaims. He takes deliberate bounding steps up the grade. Then he gets to the top and I pray that when I look away to drag the hose and reset the sprinkler head that our new neighbor's Chesapeake Bay Retriever doesn't lurch his giant head through one of the gaps in the fencing and bite Charlie. Because that could happen.

I had this grand idea of building a retaining wall out along the east fence to hold the earth back. Now I'm reconsidering. I have myriad ideas; a fountain, a pond, a bridge, a deck, a treehouse, living plants. That's what happens when you buy a house and know nothing about landscaping. You have to learn as you go. And pretend you have some kind of a master plan in your head when your wife questions your ability.

I promise her a vegetable garden. I point out where I will plot it. She says, "You mean where the bushes (Russian Sage and Blue Beard) are?"

"I'll move them," I say with a wink.

Same with being a dad. I sat up, squinted and checked the clock. It was 7 am. I strained to comprehend his words, but they were unintelligible. "Ado-ba-do-ba-do-ba-do-ba-do!" Based on his language ability or lack thereof, I picture him as a great leader or a landscaper, respectively.

We got up and made breakfast together –oatmeal. I asked what we needed to make the oatmeal. "Bowl." He said. I retrieved the bowl from the cabinet. I asked what we needed next. "Next?" He thought. "Brown sugar." He said. "What else?" I inquired. He walked to the pantry, opened the door and pointed up to a shelf. "That!" He said. "What is that?" I asked. "Oatmeal." He said. I added water and put it in the microwave and I told Charlie to go to his room if he needed a dry diaper.

He sprinted down the hallway toward his room screaming along the way, "Dry diaper! Dry diaper! Hallelujah!"

Morning Breath

It never crossed my mind that Charlie would get morning breath. He does. I just noticed it. I lifted him from his crib. The skin on his cheeks was the red color of a warm afternoon nap. His hair was matted down on one side and ruffled on the other. Snot had dried and crusted around his nose and across his cheek where he had dragged his forearm. Hard sunlight infiltrated the room around the edges of the blinds. I knelt down to shut off the oscillating fan. In doing so I shifted Charlie's body to a reclining position. From that vantage point Charlie could reach out and squeeze my chin and I could look at the bumps and lines and ridges in the chalk pink roof of his mouth. I inspected his teeth. I found no visible signs of decay. They are coming in nicely too; well spaced, proportioned, straight. I never wore braces. But I have pointy incisors. Charlie has those. And he gets morning breath.

At the breakfast table, Charlie waved a star topped magic wand while I read the newspaper. The wand was a party favor. He said it was beautiful. I agreed.

Rockies

The poll results are in. The majority of respondents are fat. All I'm going to say about that is stop eating so much. And one of you is a liar.

It was a cold October afternoon at the ball park. And windy too. I'm glad I took the time to layer Charlie. I had everything covered but his face and hands. He sat in his seat and didn't move except to turn his head occasionally in the direction of something novel; the concession man walking up the steep stairs with a tray of four dollar hot chocolates, a woman down below us chanting "Let's go Rockies", the enormous scoreboard with numbers and letters, the pop and crackle of fireworks and trash blowing in the air. At times, Charlie seemed more interested in watching the trash hover in the air over the diamond than the game.

This has been a milestone week for Charlie. Not only did he go to playschool composed on Tuesday, today also marks his second full day off the bottle. He's handled it remarkably well.

I picked him up from the church childcare this morning and I told him today was the day. On the way home I prepped him.

"We're going to go home and you are going to take a nap like a big boy and when you wake up we can go to the baseball game. Okay?"

I waited for him to say, "No way!" He says that now. It sounds more like a teenager's statement of disbelief than an adamant toddler's refusal. As in:

"Hey Charlie, your dad is cool!"

"No way!"

But he didn't. He looked out the window and fumbled with his car seat buckle. When he does that, I don't know what he's thinking.

I laid in him in bed. There was no fuss. I put his baseball glove on the nightstand so he could see it. Charlie rolled over on his stomach and lifted his head.

"We'll need to take this with us to the game in case we have to catch a ball. Be a good boy and go to sleep." I said pointing to the mitt. "Have good nap."

He said, "Nap," laid his head on his forearm and fell asleep.

After the game I told Jill about this.

She responded. "You mean we can tell him to go to sleep and he'll do it?"

So as I promised we went to Coors Field. Someone handed me a free ticket at the gate and then we climbed the tower of Babel to arrive at our seats only rows from the top in the upper deck behind home plate. The whipping wind made Charlie's eyes water the entire game. His hands were frozen. They felt like little ice packs. I sat him in my lap and put my arms around him to keep him warm. We sat like that for almost two hours, but he loved it. So did I.