State of Panic

It's been almost 2 years now where I have gone to bed with the possibility of being awakened. The fall of 2007 is when I officially began moonlighting at a local hospital as their on call psych emergency guy from 12am to 8am couple nights a week. After a few months, Babygirl arrived.

Often times I'm confused or just simply pissed when I wake up to the pager going off. There was a time when Babymamma thought an ice cream truck crashed into our place due to the ringtone of my pager. These days, I grab my pager instinctively, and wake up with pager in hand wondering how I woke up without remembering hearing the pager ringing.

After more than a year, the shrill of Babygirl crying still jump starts my slow beating heart to full on panic. Not sure what I'm scared of or panic-ed about, usually Babygirl just needs her pacifier, often times milk, or is just letting out some cries while she's sleeping.

Babygirl is safe, we lock doors and windows, she's healthy, we're past SIDS stage- not sure if Babymamma ever awakens in a panic due to the cries, but I still do.


No worries, Babygirl is really not a Buckeyes Fan.

Where's Your Nose?

As Babygirl continues to grow and hit her developmental milestones, it's just been fun to sit back and watch her pick up new words and new concepts. She's really into figuring things out, and likes to hide things and come back to them seconds later just to know that they are still there.

I think in a few years we'll be strapping Babygirl into harness so she can go rock climbing with us. She just loves to hook that heel and pull her self up on to boxes, shelves, chairs, etc.

Another thing we've enjoyed is getting her familiar with her body parts. Babymamma and I are not progressive enough to read to her Spanish and Korean, but at least we can help her learn some body parts in English. Most days she can point to her where ears, nose, mouth and belly. Although lately, she's getting some things confused or not playing the game at all.

The funniest thing is that when we ask her, "Where's your nose?" She'll take her right pointer finger right up her right nostril, and say, "No, No-se." How she learned how to stick her finger in her nose, and why only her right nostril beats me, but it's a sight to see. What a funny gal. Fatherhood is full of fun times, I can't wait until she's saying the most hilarious things.

Fragility of Life

Becoming a dad has definitely led me to be more in tuned with the fragility of life. Perhaps one extreme form of this realization is signing up for life insurance. Not that I'm headed to Iraq, nor do I have a high casualty job, but I am the head of household that works to provide for the family, so my absence would definitely put Babymamma and Babygirl in a tough place.

Anyways, as my 30th year of life approaches, I've noticed the themes that I'm surrounded by at work, at home, on TV, on the radio- it happens to be about the fragility of life. How things can seemingly change in a blink of an eye. It all started when I was watching TV, perhaps it had to do with being up for more than 39 hours straight, but the characters the plot lines, all were eliciting a range of emotions of frailty, and the uncertainty of what happens when a loved one passes away.

Thoughts of what it would be like to raise Babygirl as a single dad, the various things that Babymamma would have to encounter if I was on "life support." What if Babymamma passed away, would I go into a deep depression, and have an unquenchable yearning for my wife which leaves Babygirl in the unfair position of having lost her mom, and an emotionally checked out dad? Surprisingly I am more at peace with the inevitable passing away of my parents, of course it will be sad, but in many ways I think the loss of my wife or child will have a greater impact on me.

I have encountered or been exposed to a multitude of losses this week, sometimes it's a death, sometimes it's been neglect that results in a loss for someone else, sometimes a parent is coping with the loss of their boy who is now a teenager, sometimes it's a mom who's struggling to keep her marriage and family alive, loss is all around.

Of course Love is all around us as well. The problem is that it's more gripping to report/share about loss than it is with love. Perhaps this next decade of life, the new frontier into my 30's should really be about exposing the love that already exists within us and within others.

Being a dad, a husband, and husband has already increased my conceptions of love, but there can never be enough of it, and I can only hope that through the understandings of God's love for mankind will I be able to greater share love with others all around me.


A moment of balance and love