These are a few of my favorite things

Here's the part of the show where I highlight some of my favorite books, cds, movies, and what have you.

Jem's cd "Finally Woken" keeps coming back to my stereo and ipod. It's one of those just laid-back, interesting, and comforting cd's. Highlight tracks for me include Wish I, They, and Just a Ride....and newly important to me it is kid-friendly. If your kid starts singing along at daycare you won't be completely moritifed.

Slap Happy

Chatting with some parents at the park I notice E walking over to greet another child sitting in his stroller. Aaaw how cute I think, he’s going to say hi. E then raises his hand and slaps the hell out of the little kid. The slapee’s mom rushes over to push E back saying something like “I’ll let daddy take care of you until you hit my child.” This seems totally reasonable and understandable. If I’d known he was going to whack your kid I would have intervened I promise. The other kid was 2.5 to E’s 13 months so I figured she must be able to defend herself.


Of course later that evening this triggered a novella of internal dialogue about how did I raise an abuser? Where did this violence come from? Fast forward a few days later and daycare tells me “he’s been hitting other kids.” I promise them that I’m working on it and I don’t know where he got it. Inner voice: well there was that high five game you were trying last week.

Sob. Well at least he’s not biting.


Uh-oh. He’ll probably be biting next week.

Beachin

All next week we'll be at the beach!




Have a great holiday everyone. Cheers.

Soul Patrol!

Were Taylor's cries of Soul Patrol an attempt at assembling a Soul Patrol or spontaneous "I feel the music" I can't hold back "I'm the Soul Patrol!" outbursts. Was it a call to action, an exclamation or Tourettes?

At any rate, I didn't like Joe Cocker the first time.

Throw the ball!

We had a Dads' picnic for our local Gay Dads’ group on Saturday and I found myself playing softball with some of the kids and you know I really didn't like it so much. I predict though that I will have lots of ball tossing in my future. Knowing my luck E will be a jock and I’m going to have to sit through countless games and practices and feign enthusiasm. I think one of the advantages to being a gay dad though is that E is free to be pretty much whatever he wants. We were trying to think of what the worst possible, most shocking thing he could do and all we could come up with was Republican.

It's better to be a dog in a peaceful time than be a man in a chaotic period.

We’re frantically packing and organizing to get our house ready for the market. Having a toddler around certainly complicates matters. Plus he’s let’s just say “active” for his age. Being a new parent I really have no basis of comparison but other one-year-old’s at the park certainly seem a lot slower than E.

Complicating matters we have a week long vacation out of town coming up. Plus I had jury duty this week and I got a sinus infection. Cue the violins. I felt the sickness hitting me as I waited in the jurors’ lounge. On the bright side what attorney would pick the red-faced sweaty guy to be on his or her jury panel.

It really seems like I’ve gotten sick more often since the little guy has been around. I don’t know if it’s because I just have so much that I have to do and I notice it more or if I truly am getting sick more often. Ah well I’m on the mend now. The pressure is starting to let loose.

Be well.

positive thinking

You know I can actually tell that I've been a parent too long because I find myself thinking all these encouraging thoughts for random passers-by. Internal monologue: "Look whose hair is combed so well. You're walking so fast big man. Picking up trash! Aren't you a good boy. That's a pretty skirt you've got on young lady!"

I guess there are worse mental spaces to occupy though. I'm afraid I'm going to slip one day though and try to motivate a friend "You're driving so well!"

Happy birthday little turtle

Happy Birthday E! You're one today!

The day that I first held you will probably be the best day of my life. You were such a tiny little thing and I was so nervous, afraid that I was going to hurt you. One of the nannies handed you over to me and she was confident and I think a little amused at my fear. So you looked up at me and grinned that mischievous little smile and my heart grew like the grinch at xmas.

I’ve watched you learn to crawl, take your first bite of peas, take your first step, laugh when I tickle you, hug you when you were sick all night, and chased you around a playground.

I don’t know what happens next but I know you’ve made me a better person and I’ll do my best to protect you, care for you and love you.

Dad

We’d been looking for a house for about the past 2 years. You know the drill, scanning the real estate ads, and going to open houses… It was sort of a hobby for my partner. I’d catch him late at night at the laptop clicking away at the homes database.

Well it finally paid off last weekend. We bid on a house and won! My head is still reeling from the numbers and the paperwork. The DC market is so extreme in prices and competition. It’s not like our first house hunt at least. In one war we were competing against 10 other offers. (We lost.) This house only had a couple other bids.

The next two months will be insane as we now have to get our current house ready to sell. It’s all still sinking in. I’ve had this hammock dream for a while and when I stepped onto that screened in back porch and saw my hammock strung up, it was love. I know as those future late nights packing are staring at me I’ll need to retreat to that perfect summer afternoon with the birds singing, bugs hopping, book in hand and the perfect nap. Aaaaaah.

This has been a test of the Emergency Broadcast System

Daycare I think has amped up his volume level. I think there may be a Survival of the Loudest thing going on with each kid learning that the loudest lungs gets his way. This is just a theory mind you but judging by last night's I want out of the high chair banshee wail, it appears valid. I'm sure further evidence will be screaming my way shortly.

Is he adopted?

It seems on average about once a week that someone asks me if my son is adopted. You see my partner is Hispanic and my son is very obviously Hispanic as well. Consequently, he never gets the question when we’re out and about and he’s holding E.

If I’m in the grocery store, restaurant, park, wherever, I get the question “Is he adopted?” Friends also tell me how much E and my partner look alike. At a rational level all this makes perfect sense but to be honest, it bugs me.

Having a child, especially adopted it seems, put your life out there in ways I hadn’t anticipated. E is loud, messy, friendly, and fearless. Dining out usually involves meeting half the people in the restaurant.

I wonder if a straight couple would get the adopted question as often. Hmmm.

Tagged

Steve over at The Hygiene Chronicles tagged me with this Six Strange Things/Facts/Habits About Me thing so next you will find my attempt to be strange, factual, and/or habitual:

1. I'm a vegetarian! What is it with this strange confluence of blogging and vegetarians? Apparently an uptick in vegetables drives people online.

2. Growing up my favorite movie was Broadcast News. I don't know why exactly. Was it Joan Cusack and her obstacle course run through the newsroom? Could be but it led me to this:

3. My first job out of college was working in a newsroom! After a year and a half and a lay-off I realized that I really didn't want to work in Broadcast journalism. The pluses are I found out what my dream job was like. Unfortunately the newsroom is filled with lots of people making very little money with lots of stress.

4. I'm addicted to reality TV. I get that some people find it horrid but I love the unscripted drama of regular people put into extraordinary circumstances. Also I think that reality TV has on average really helped gay people. It has humanized us and brought us into Joe Midwest's living room.

5. In middle school I won the County Spelling Bee! This means I'm a fantastic speller or I grew up with illiterate people, you decide.

6. At the state competition, I lost on the word thermostat. Can you believe it? It's not even a difficult word to spell. Freakin thermostat.

adoption.com

I wanna pass along this info I just learned about from Peter's Cross Station that Adoption.com has been discriminating against gay and lesbian parents. More info here:

http://www.potentialparents.com/adoptiondotcom.html

- Brian

Well next time I feel shunned by the Moms at our local playground I'll think on this story and realize it could be much worse:

Mie Taniguchi, 34, stabbed to death two five-year-old children who were playmates of her daughter last month after being ostracised by the other mothers at her local school. She had not fitted in and nor had her daughter, she told police.

Judging from her family's accounts of strange behaviour before the murders, Taniguchi was probably schizophrenic. But reports have pointed to a motive tangled up with the way other mothers treated her.

"The mummy clique is unique [to Japan]," the manager of an internet discussion board for young mothers told the newspaper Asahi Shimbun. "You suffer if they don't let you in; you suffer if you join."

The mothers' groups are mysterious, controlling and mean. Young mothers talk of the importance of the "park debut", in which a mother and child go to the playground and wait for an invitation to play from other assembled mothers.

At the school gate the signals are very clear. To be accepted into a superior mothers' gang, the clothes have to be right.

A navy dress, with short sleeves under a jacket that is buttoned from throat to hip, is worn like a uniform. No one escapes the tradition, and the higher up the scale the kindergarten is, the more essential the clothes.


http://www.smh.com.au/news/world/mothers-group-outsider-snapped-and-killed-children/2006/04/14/1144521504024.html

I don't know if this happens to everyone but I've developed this strange ability to hear phantom cries. In the background there will be this little echo of a cry that forces me to stop and strain to listen for a mewling or wail. My partner L says he does the same thing so I don't feel entirely crazy. The problem is in the middle of the night I find myself waking up thinking I hear something. Usually I can lay there for a few tics and go back to sleep but sometimes I need to get up creep into his bedroom and check on him. Logically I know there's nothing wrong but there's that little niggling that won't let go.

Stepping out 2

Last night I saw E walk halfway across the living room. It was a bit surreal watching him take all those little steps. He had this big smile on his face the whole time.

Meanwhile at the dog park, our dog seems to have gotten very humpy recently. My theory is that as he's moved down in the pack at home he needs to be more assertive of something at the dog park. Yeah I know it's all natural but it's just not much fun to look at. Oh yeah that's my dog again sorry. He's got 50 lbs. on your dog but good thing he's showing him who's boss.

Stepping out

I've seen E take 4 steps on his own! It's so cool. He still has the drunken swervy quality about it but I'm sure that will go away soon. Wow, he's such a climber too. He's discovered that he can use a pillow to get up on the couch. The nannies at daycare tell me that he's very active. Good to know that it's not just me. As I was coming in one day I also heard one of the nannies tell another that "E is so rough." Oh yeah he's a scrapper.

One of the things that melts me is E's smile. He has this big goofy grin that takes over his entire face. It's like your dog's wag in its joy. It's funny how we start life with no middle ground it's all wailing or laughing it seems.

E is now taking little steps on his own from off the furniture and table. It's pretty cool to see. Also he's discovered making this little clicking noise with his tongue. Thank you lord, much easier on the ears than the random screeching. He's still working out this whole language thing.

You know it strikes me as really developmentally odd that we as humans learn to crawl and then walk before we can understand stop and danger. Who planned this thing?


Meanwhile on American Idol:

Mandisa's hero is a conservative bigot who supports the ex-gay movement. This explains her odd "lifestyle" comment last week.

My little guy is feeling much better now too and back to his old firecracker self.

Weather is getting nicer too finally!

From this morning's Washington Post:


"Meanwhile, interest groups on the left and right are preparing for showdowns over flag desecration and same-sex marriage in June, when Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist (R-Tenn.) has scheduled floor votes on the always-controversial issues. Both efforts call for constitutional amendments, which require a two-thirds majority vote in the House and the Senate, followed by ratification by three-fourths of the states.

Frist, who is weighing a 2008 presidential bid, often touts the proposed amendment to define marriage as the union of one man and one woman. The effort failed in both houses in 2004. The Senate fell 12 votes short of the number needed to cut off debate, and House supporters could not muster the two-thirds majority they needed in their chamber."



Great to see that Frist is relying on the old scary homosexuals tactic to rile up his base. It's not like there's anything else going on in this country.