Becoming Daddy

Well, it’s officially been months since I’ve written you.  I can’t even begin to tell you all the cool stuff that’s been happening over the last few months.  We have a new house, we went camping, we survived June-urary, I got what was considered to be a promotion and turned out to be punishment, and now summer is already winding down.  Crazy!

And we’re not going to talk about any of that.  Instead, I’m going to tell you a story about a door.

A couple weeks ago, your Papa bought us a front door for our new house.  Then, he and I worked all afternoon one Sunday to put it in.  Now, I say “he and I” but in all reality, I was absolutely no help at all, and quite possibly contributed to the installation process taking much longer than it should have.  When it was all said and done, the door was in, it was lockable, and everyone was happy.

The next day, however, your Momma noticed that there was still a small gap in between the trim and the door.  So, we asked our good friends Matt and Erinn to come over (and bribing them with food) so that Matt could help us figure out how to help us fix the gap.  Well, when they came over (to offer advice, remember), I realized that Matt had actually brought his tool kit, some spray insulation stuff, and pretty much everything he would need to actually fix the problem, rather than just tell us your Momma what to do.  He got it almost done, but in the process, we realized that the nails for the trim weren’t long enough (a fact that Papa had already noted), so he couldn’t finish the job like he wanted to.  He felt bad, but of course, your Momma and I were so surprised and grateful that he had come over and done that after being so surprised and grateful that Papa had also done it that we obviously told him not to worry about it.

The next day, Matt called me to say that he had some extra trim in his truck and time to run over and throw it on there real quick.  You and I were heading out to see Pastor Dean, so I told him not to worry about it.  He said it was no problem — he could do it while we were out and that it would only take a couple seconds anyway.  I figured as much, but at this point, I felt so bad that so many people had spent so much time on this (we’ll leave the discussion about how shrunken I felt about my manhood at not being able to install a door for another time) that I still almost told him not to worry about it.  But, I knew it would make your Momma happy to have it done, so over he came, and when we got home, it was to a door with beautiful new trim on the outside.

All in all, it was a very humbling experience for me, but I realized that it shouldn’t have been so.  See, we’re trying to teach you to be exactly the type of person that will happily go help out your neighbors and your friends whenever you can.  It’s something that your Nana and Papa taught your Momma and your Grammy and Grampy taught me.  However, what didn’t need any teaching at all was my pride.  That grew up all by itself, and it nearly prevented us from getting a shiny new door.  But part of being someone that’s willing to help is being someone that can graciously receive help too, which means you also have to be the person that is willing to ask for help.

That’s the hard part.

Love, Daddy

You’re 14 months old.  What do you think about that?  Every time I consider that statement it makes my head spin just a little.

You, on the other hand, are far too happy to worry about such things–usually.  You’ve started to reach for things that you want, and if they’re too high, you will stand on your tiptoes.  If they’re still out of reach, you tell us. And our neighbors.  And the people that live several blocks away.  You have started to say “Ma”, “Dad”, and “Da” (which we’re choosing to believe is “dog”), with more clarity and context.   You are starting to grasp the idea of  ”Hide and Seek” and you’re starting to interact more with the rest of your toys.  By far, though, your favorite thing to do is to put things into other things.  You’ll dump your Cherrios out onto the floor and then dutifully put them one by one back into your cup.  Of course, you also will try to do the same thing with Sally’s food, too.  You love to take everything out of your drawer in the kitchen (the one that used to have metal measuring cups and spoons and now has rubber spatulas and other quiet things) and then fill it back up with other stuff . . . like the TV remote.  Or Momma’s phone.

This actually is about my favorite thing that’s happened over the last few weeks.  The world is now your toy box.  You still like your tow truck and you love your little music station, but you have helped me realize just how arbitrary the concept of “toy” is.  You refuse to limit yourself to your stuff.  there’s so many other things that are just as fun, if not more so.  Books, DVD’s, socks . . . they’re all fair game to you.  But, you’re also starting to listen to when we say “No”.

Well . . . about half the time.  The other half, you just grin at us like you’re fully aware at how much power your smile and the sound of your laughter has over us.

Love, Daddy