baby daddy

and if that’s a truism, Little Dude, let me be the first to say: gross. And let me further qualify that by saying: thank god you’re a little dude, Little Dude. That’s altogether too Oedipal a thought to consider right now.

What I wanted to say was that your mom made a statment a few weeks back that she’d married her father. See, I was planning to head out of town to attend a bachelor party, and your mom joked that I’d “be out of town” on “some stupid trip,” being “all drunk” and “stuff,” and that that would be when you chose to make your entrance. This would make me just like her father because he was out of town for the births of each of his own children — ‘course he was working, but that hasn’t kept her mother from bringing it up whenever possible. And it hasn’t kept your own mother from iterating the thought that I, by choosing to go out of town in the 38th week of pregnancy, am “an idiot.” Or irresponsible. Or a something that rhymes with “whoosh bag.”

Before we go any further, little D., here’s my excuse: I had to go; the person to be honored was a guy who threw me a bachelor party seven years ago, and also served as one of my groomsmen. He’s an old friend, in town for a few days, and I hadn’t seen him in years.

So, I went, and took all the proper precautions: I did all the weekend chores before I left (so that no extra labor would send your mom into labor); I made sure the shopping was done (so that your mom could get some food for herself and for you); I made sure that her parents were coming to town, just in case anythig happened. They wanted to visit anyway — we’d just completed your room, and they hadn’t yet seen it. All this as I made my way across the state to visit with an old friend. Everything was hunky dory.

Until 1:30 in the morning when the phone rang — water had broken, bags were packed — and I began a harried four-hour trip in the direction of our favorite hospital.

Your mom was waiting for me in the lobby of the hospital, walking around in one of those silly gowns, and we stood a while rubbing the lump that was you, waiting for you to make the rest of your entry into this world.

Now that I have a few moments to look back on that day, it all seems to have gone by so quickly — the 250-mile drive, the anxious pacing around the hospital, the frequent checks from the doctors, the worries about dilation, the introduction of pitocin to speed up the process (and subsequently make things more painful for your mother), the fact that your mom had to stay in bed all day because every contraction she had while standing or sitting caused your heart rate to drop dramatically, the introduction of pain-relief methods that only caused nausea, the injection of fluids back into the uterus, the slowly expanding cervix that never quite made it past nine centimeters in 5 hours, and which led to the final straw — a cesarian section — and your entrance into the world at 7:54 on a Sunday evening, weighing 7lbs, 9 oz, and measuring 22 inches in length.

It’s been a few weeks since then, and every time I look at you I’m amazed you’re here. You’re such a wonder to me. And I hope for you the same things I asked for in my first letter to you:

• May you be kind.
• May you be understanding.
• May you seek understanding.
• May you continue to explore your surroundings.
• May you be happy.

Wait a minute — in the original story of Oedipus the King, Mr. Oedipus kills his father (*GASP!*) and marries his mother (*DOUBLE GASP!*), and turns out to be his own grandpa, or something. Guess I’d better amend that list there.

• May you not kill me.
• May you not marry your mother.
• ick.