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It’s been 9 weeks now since I relinquished my job to become a full-time stay-at-home dad. I felt euphoric in week 1, but a bit anguished in week 2 and 3, the question that weighed on my mind being whether my leaving wouldn’t come back to me like a boomerang when one day having to re-enter the (tough) labor market. After all, long-term freelance project management positions (which is what I was doing before) are hard to come by. Week 4 to 6 were just great, week 7 the week he had to start going to a nursery, where in the end he only stayed three half days before we pulled him out for good. He suffered through a week of diarrhea in week 8 (last week), the aftermath of his brief stint in the nursery, and I suffered with him, one day even running out of clean clothes.
This week, week 9, we’re completely on track again, solid sleeping, solid eating, all smiles.
Next week is looking good too, a ski trip to Morzine (French Alps) together with my sister (his godmother), my sister’s husband, and her kid (my godchild). Last year there was almost no snow, this year there’s supposed to be plentiful – you don’t even have to bother looking up snow reports.
Ps. The idea was for me to start looking into a few other options as of week 7 (with him in nursury) but all that has been temporarily suspended, or will be second fiddle to the kid.
The lady gave him his first bottle this morning (7ish) before whisking off to work, which in turn allowed me to ease into the day as in lockstep with the first bottle comes another nap, the last certain nap of the day, and the perfect time to get a few things done already, a grocery list perhaps, the perfect time for anticipation as well, which as all experienced parents know is the key to good parenting. Failing to prepare is preparing to fail. Coach Wooden would have approved of me.
A beautiful spring day it was, full bloom daffodils in the lawn in front of the village church like so many stars in a milky way, and when Bodhi woke, I took him for a short walk, merely for fun – let it be clear I walked him many a times because I had to. We walked, getting ready for his daily mash, cauliflower, potato, a dollop of olive oil, which went down well, a sigh of relief, a mash gone down well usually means smooth sailing for the rest of the day.
I met up again with the lady at noon, the three of us, hidden somewhere at the back of a small mom and pop restaurant close to where she works, I won’t divulge the address here. Rarely do I savor the warmth of a small close-knit family unit more than when we sneak off for lunch, at least once a week, and sidestep society’s business for a wasted hour, splendid isolation, le plus beau temps c’est le temps perdu.
He slept long when my boy and me got home, and woke up ablaze with anger, the unexpected tantrum, which I only succeeded in dispelling by manning up for yet another walk and delaying his next bottle with half an hour. In the meantime word had come from the post office, confirming the arrival of his (second-hand) first ski suit (we’re off to Morzine in February), which I subsequently collected and brought home unopened, as I happily defer this small pleasure to someone who cherishes it more than I do.
I then showered, shaved, cut a pineapple, watched some television (all while keeping him cool), eagerly listening for a sound, the sound of a car driving up our lot, the sound of a key turning, the sound that signifies changing of the guards for me, treats for the cats, the arrival of primary care giver-1 for Bodhi (and another bottle), the sound of the lady getting home. All is well.
2011/27
Scott Young: Neil and Me (379p.)
Scott Young’s Neil and Me is a rare case of a biography written by the dad on the son, the dad being Canadian sports journalist Scott Young, the son being Neil Young, rock ‘n roll’s creative genius who over 50 years has built himself a career in rock only equaled by Bob Dylan, and this without compromising himself once. With his falsetto voice and acoustic guitar, Neil Young might come across as outdated to the younger generations, but I have listened to his music on tape, vinyl, CD, and MP3, and I would through streaming too were it not that accessing Spotify requires a Facebook account. His Live Rust album really got things going for me back then, a quarter of a century ago – I’m getting old.
Neil Young has three children, two boys and a girl, and while there is no genetic component to cerebral palsy, both his boys suffer from it, Zeke mildly, Ben strongly. Amber, his girl, has epilepsy. There are a lot of nice passages in Neil and Me about what it means or can mean to be a father, but otherwise, I’d say Neil and Me is for the fans really, which I am. The front cover says ‘A gem in the library of rock’ – I’m still hoping to discover that gem one day.
Get his Live at Massey Hall album (1971).
(Rumor has it that Neil Young is in the process of writing his autobiography. Panic among the Young fans as it might detract him from working on his Archives series – the definitive, comprehensive, chronological survey of his entire body of work.)
NY holding Zeke at a 1974 San Francisco Crosby, Stills, Nash, and Young gig.
9kg for the carrier (the mean Charriot Cougar, which can be used for strolling, hiking, running, cycling, and cross-country skiing), and 6kg for Bodhi equals 15kg in total, and a good work-out along the banks of the mighty river Schelde, especially when not having slept much. Please ignore my very 90s Saeco cycling tights.
Maybe the birth of my boy wasn’t so much the best day of my life (or it is only becoming so in hindsight) but the most intense day, between skipping a night of sleep, the hours-long near-crisis that was Bo’s delivery, and the sheer existentialism of his long-awaited arrival, the bluish and bloated skin of a – thank the Lord – healthy kid.
At its peak too, life is a lesson in humility, in gratefulness rather than pride, especially in the face of those parents not only having to deal with the emotional turmoil of a delivery, but with a kid with health issues to boot, born at 1.2kg at 26 months, and locked away for 130 days in the neonatal unit.
When I walked out of the hospital on my way to bringing Bodhi home, I made up my mind to start giving back, in short bursts to begin with, while in parallel pondering ways to engage in charity in a more structured manner.
Through my company (a sheet of paper, a pen, a VAT-number, and me) I have in the meantime donated sizable amounts of money to both Animal Trust, a local cats and dogs shelter, and to Kinderkankerfonds, the paediatric cancer fund associated with Ghent’s University Hospital. For 2012, I’m eyeing World Bicycle Relief, a great program co-chaired by the affable Johan Bruyneel.
I fed him bottles at 6pm, 10pm, and 2am yesterday/this morning, hoping to somewhat alleviate the load which has been resting more on the lady’s shoulders than mine, as I also have been working full-time the last few weeks – luckily work is not too busy for the moment. He’s a great little feller and when you take the time, it’s really rewarding to feed him and to clean him. The tiredness can be a bit of a dark cloud, but dark clouds always drift off, and the time will come when he sleeps through the night, which is what 80% of the babies do at 3 months/5.5kg. With every bottle fed my feelings for the baby grow – I guess you could say we’re developing a love affair.
The cyclocross season is getting underway, and so we took Bobo to his first race yesterday, in the park around Laarne’s (Belgium) castle, about 500 meters from where we live. In the fore Bobo, in the back former U19/U23/elite world CX champion and current elite Belgian national champion Niels Albert who finished second, behind the legend (and Flemish folk hero) Sven Nys.
To Bodhi’s birth announcement I added a small and simple poem (in Dutch), which evolved out of a conversation I had with a colleague and which touches upon the idea of a child as an anchor (just one aspect of becoming a dad), or conversely, upon the idea of the childless man adrift.
In English it would be:
————–
From the bank into the river,
from the river back onto the bank,
a great man feels forlorn;
a short rapid,
calm open waters,
a little man is born.
I got here (Ghent, Belgium and its perimeter) 20 years ago as an aspiring student in chemistry and I have lived here ever since apart from a sabbatical (with loads of travelling) in 2000, and a 4-year stint in the US of A (NC + OR) between 2001 and 2004. I lived in Ghent when I bought my first mountain bike, I will forever remember my Ph. D. years as some of the best in my life, the lady was in a lab across from mine, I own a house in the green belt around it, and so it was with great joy and pride that in the late afternoon of September-2, let’s say dusk was budding over Ghent’s historic spires otherwise the story doesn’t make sense, after the tough delivery that was Bodhi’s, I proudly pushed the big red button in the maternity ward of Ghent’s University Hospital (UZ), a button that together with other similar buttons in the few more hospitals embedded in the city, links up with the lanterns of the Sint-Veerleplein (a small square downtown Ghent, near the castle), and that makes these lanterns blink softly (when pushed). When the lights blink, the people of Ghent know a new baby is born in their midst, as such the idea behind Ai Nati Oggi (‘To who is born today’), the interactive art installation produced by Alberto Garutti, and bought by the city council.
A tough delivery it was, in that place of derelict buildings but great people which is the UZ, great people whose diligence, warmth, and expertise stole my heart, in the city for the city, I pushed the button and now became a father in Ghent too – full circle.
You gotta have the sticker. (Scenes of domestic bliss.)
