Day 2

The chaos continues…but today was not quite as fiery. The cluster feeding overnight was a huge burden on my wife. I felt pretty useless as she had to feed every hour to 90 minutes through dawn. I do what I can to keep up around the house, placate the dogs, and change diapers but it still seems insufficient.

After an early morning feeding and some coffee, I took the girl in my arms and walked around the house with her. This is the most she has calmed and bonded with me so far. She’s so sweet and adorable and the cute noises she makes are just angelic.

This afternoon, my dad came into town via a 4 hour road trip. He had what could have been a cold judging by his hoarseness so he didn’t want to hold the newborn, which I do understand.

We sat down in the living room and I attempted to engage in baby-related conversation given that it’s kind of my life right now and the reason he came. I didn’t have much luck…I first asked “So, dad, do you remember the first days of me being home from the hospital as a baby?” He responded, “No.” I said with a surprised reaction, “Really? Nothing?!” He reiterated, “No I don’t remember anything.”

I then attempted to provoke a memory by saying, “Oh, well there’s a picture of you and mom arriving home with me for the first time among the scanned images I’ve recently seen.” My dad, “Oh yeah..” I anticipate what emotional memory my follow up had conjured. “…yeah, back then I had a Ford Ranger and your mom had a Bronco.” “Oh,” I inquired. “Actually it was a Bronco II,” he said. In a self-deprecating tone I responded, “So it’s not the length of time that’s the problem here. You remember the cars and not me?” He said, “Well you don’t want me to lie, do you?” To be honest, a little white lie or some exposition about my cuteness or the love he felt would have been more than welcomed.

We sat for a minute and he offered another anecdote (from the day I was born), “All I remember from that day was while your mom was in there (laboring), my brother and I went across the street to Kroger to eat sub sandwiches for lunch.” Not the most storybook birth story.

Following this revelation, I ceased my line of questioning. Deposition ended. He scrolled his phone for about ten minutes then announced he needed his laptop to do some work. Now that’s a story I remember crystal clear.

I don’t mean to bash my father. I know we have different ways and levels of comfort of expressing love. I guess I was just hopeful that my becoming a father and him a grandfather would bring new perspective and shared love to our relationship. But that was perhaps an order too tall, and an expectation too optimistic.

I’m just glad that if and when my daughter asks about the days immediately after she was born, I will have countless stories to tell with strong emotions woven into the fabric of those memories.

So long for now.

-Felix