Post Office

A couple of horribly (yet delightfully) blurry images of
Dear Alex in motion on her new favorite thing.

We live a couple of blocks from a really grand post office - the kind of thing the government built when mail was king. A vast space with marble floors, high ceilings, banks of P.O. boxes and best of all a two-story open lobby with working escalators. It's a public space, and of late Dear Alex and I have been going to the post office every day to go in the "door that goes round and round and ride the moving steps up and down. okay!" I can't take credit for discovering this marvel - Beautiful Wife took her here on a real postal-related mission, and it kind of blew Dear Alex's mind - I'm not sure what it is, but she dearly loves her "eskalaterrr - moving stepss". Of course writing it does no justice to the delight of listening to her get the word "escalator" out. A couple of days ago, Dear Alex came to me when I got home from work to ask if we could go outside and walk to the post office, go in the revolving door and ride the escalators up and down. It made me stop for a moment - she'd made a pretty completely thought out plan of what she wanted to do, found the right words, and asked to do it. I'm impressed, and more than happy to oblige. This is the stuff I live for right now - being able to understand what Dear Alex wants, and give it to her. I'm quite sure that there will be a time when those requests will be more complicated and less charming, but for now it's a lot of fun.

Happy birthday Dear Alex

...Happy birthday to you. Two years ago today Dear Alex came into the world a week or so early and perfect. The world is a much happier place with the kid in it, and it's enough to note that she seems to be having a lot of fun.

Pictures of Alex

It's been a while since I've had the will or inclination to write about Dear Alex - It's summertime and the living's been busy - not so easy, and there's been so much to do both in work and in life that it's been very hard to find that small quiet place that it takes to wax philosophical about being a daddy and the awesome responsibility of marshalling the force that Dear Alex has become - so instead, I take pictures.

In the way back time before there was Dear Alex (and even before Beautiful Wife) I took a lot of pictures, pictures by the thousands from the early days of digital photography - I have a box somewhere of hundreds of floppy disks from my first (and second) Sony Mavicas and more from smaller, sleeker, faster cameras that came next - I pride myself on being able to not only identify the place and time and even my state of mind when I took the picture - I'm mostly a visual person, and it does work - mostly. BW used to give me a hard time about the pictures, my "art director shots" as she rightfully called them - and I certainly did take a lot of random pictures, mostly of things that caught my eye, or in some way reminded me that I should always remember to look - because in life it's rare that we ever pass the same way twice.
Dear Alex has given me the perfect excuse ( and BW no longer coments on the ever-present camera) to take pictures madly, exuberantly, and without a care as to what it looks like. Secretly though, I take pictures in the hope that I'll remember the little things and important things in equal measure as Dear Alex becomes less cute and novel and becomes more and more a child, and that magic and wonder is lost to the day-to-day realities of pre-school and education and potty training and...

So, at least once a week - even whan I haven't had a word to say, I've been adding pictures regularly to the flickr photoset (hoping, of course, that each one will be worth a thousand words), and I'm hoping that really does capture what's new and important to daddy and Dear Alex - the analysis and philosophy will have to come later, as there's way too much to do before the summer's over to think about it too hard.

Stuff of dreams

Dear Alex has been growing by leaps and bounds, and she's been having a lot of wonderful experiences lately - but even the day-to-day stuff is very important to her, and it's coming out in her monologues and dreams. The monologues have been going on for quite a while - for a few months Dear Alex almost always started the day early (for us - say, 7:30 am or so, but she didn't demand that you participate - she would simply talk to herself and her friends in the crib for a while before she noticed that she was wet, hungry or alone. She would have a great conversation with herself and her stuffed animal friends, mostly unintelligible, and punctuated with a laugh or squeal, and a recitation of the things she's done recently - "Alex up and down, bunny bunny mmm,waaah! (that's an Alex air kiss), it's okay, walking sandbox fountains! Tricycle shoes daddy!
It's almost as though she was rehearsing the words and language that she was going to use during the day, and experimenting with the sound and feel of saying things. It was kind of a fun game for Beautiful Wife and I to figure out what she was talking about, and what those murmurings over the baby monitor meant. She certainly was having fun, and it's been delightful to listen to.

Fast forward to the past few weeks - as her verbal and cognitive skills have increased, the dreamy delight of her morning conversations have given way to more urgent and specific calls for "mommy and daddy! change diaper cup of milk! change diaper! cup of milk! Mommy here daddy here!" It begins as a murmer and builds to a tirade of angry need - that sounds a bit negative as I write but that's not my intention - Dear Alex is nothing but sheer delight, and it's been interesting to listen to her find and use the words for what she needs. As the words come easier and more clearly, it's been gratifying to listen to her remember and talk about the things BW and I do with her, and how much of it sticks and gets played back as she grows.

The haunting

I've gone on a great lengths about the intelligence and wonder of Dear Alex, to the point that I'm almost sick of writing about it myself (hence the sparseness of postings of late), but more and more of late Dear Alex will do or say something that completely surprises me, and gives me a clue that this being a father/parent thing - while rich and rewarding - will also have moments that truly humble me and break my heart.

On Wednesday morning of this past week, we had the usual bustle of getting Dear Alex up and Beautiful Wife dressed and out the door, and for some reason on this day I was moving a little slower - BW got out the door first after nanny J. arrived, and I did my usual walking back and forth gathering things and finding wallet, keys, phone, computer accessories, etc. . The kid was a little on edge anyways, asking for "mommy, mommy, mommmmmmy", and accepted only sketchily that "mommy went to work". That was okay, more or less, but Dear Alex saw my briefcase - "daddy work, daddy work" - and me getting ready to go, and she kind of lost it, and came out with the line that's haunted me for days: "Daddy (snuff) work Alex crying daddy (snuff) work Alex (sniff, sniff) crying". It stopped me in my tracks: Daddy work = Alex crying.

Yeah, I guess she wanted me to stay and play with her for a while, but I had some storyboards that needed finishing, and a print ad to revise and I was already late - and what's a daddy to do?
I had to go, and had to hand this beautiful child off to Dear nanny J. despite my desire to stay and hold her and comfort her and let her know that there was nothing else in the world that I would rather be or do than be her daddy always, now and forever and that I'd never leave her.

Guess what? I left. The ugly reality of life is such that I did indeed have to go to work, and unless I hit lotto big time that's not likely to change...

I wondered and wished for the longest time that Dear Alex could tell us what was bothering her when she was upset by something, and I guess my wish came true, but the first instance of her new associative skills really got to me - I've been thinking about it for days, in fact. It turns out that all was just fine when I got home, and we haven't had a repeat of that particular complaint, but I know now that I do wish I could spend more than the the three or so waking hours a day that we do have together. It all counts, and I do try to make the most of it, as does BW. I wish it weren't so hard, and I wish we could make every day a Saturday.

The name is Alex

This started a few weeks (maybe a month?) ago, but Dear Alex finally figured out who we were referring to when we said "Alex" - none other than the dear girl herself. It started around the time I started putting more pictures of her up on flick'r, and playing them for her on-demand, as in her sitting in the high-chair, pointing at the computer, and saying "picture picture". That's what she knew the computer as, as really that's all it was for in front of her - her generic term for computer for the longest time was simply "picture picture" - but it's since evolved*. We'd show her pictures of Alex, and pictures of mommy and daddy, and pictures of things, and a dumb little powerpoint alphabet that I made - but one day she asked for "pictures of Alex" - Now she narrates her life in the third person - "Alex goes for a walk outside, Alex hiding" - and rushes me when I take out the camera to see "pictures of Alex". It's getting harder to take her picture.

So, the newest challenge that I have is how to teach Dear Alex the difference between "you" and "me" when she's referring to herself - It's something I've never really though about before - when do we come to that distinction, and how do you teach it? ( I tried Strunk and White, but they presume a more advanced reader) When she's tired of walking, Dear Alex will say "daddy pick you up? mommy pick you up?" - of course we pick her up without fail, but just exactly how does one explain the difference between "you" and "me"?
(cut to daddy gesturing - "I am you, you are me, when you are referring to yourself" - Dear Alex stares blankly, sucking her thumb. )
(cut to daddy gesturing - "you should be me when you mean you" - Dear Alex stares blankly, sucking her thumb. ) it goes on.

*Dear Alex now refers to computers (at least the ones in this house) as "apples" - for the never ending little grey (platinum?) apple with a bite out of it that she sees as she waits impatiently
for the pictures of Alex to appear.

Looking out

Sometime over the last few weeks or so, while I wasn't writing, but mired in work and the usual day-to-day of getting by, Dear Alex crossed some kind of oh-so-subtle line in her growing awareness of the world. I don't think there's a word or classification for it, but there's been a change that happened so slowly that there isn't one thing that I can point to and go "aha!"
It's another subtle shift in her intellect, her curiousity, and her take on the world. I have no idea if this is something that's codified as a growth stage, or if it's just something that I'm getting hung up on - the kid switched from inward-looking sponge to outward-looking person - I'm doing an awful job of explaining it, but it's like this:
Walking down the street used to be an exercise in her gesturing madly - "this?, this? this?" as you patiently explained that that was a "building, tree, flower, garbage truck," etc., ad infinitum, as there are a lot of things to name in the city. - Dear Alex suddenly seems to know she knows things, and is more than happy to point things out with glee, and tell you: " bus, truck, people walking on the sidewalk" and everything else - but this goes beyond that - the kid will look you in the eye, and tell you something, seriously - no matter that I can't understand what she's saying, it means something to her - and she's earnestly trying to share it. ( Beautiful Wife is actually much better at deciphering what she's saying than I am, much to my chagrin ) All I can do is smile and nod. But the sponge that was Dear Alex is finally over-saturated, and the knowledge is leaking out in words and phrases that I know she's taken great care to form and share. It's exciting, and (sorry) heart-warming because the all-absorbing-sponge is also starting to give back affection and interest in mommy and daddy. (as opposed to being aware of only Dear Alex) This is an incredibly lumpy post for a truly amazing on-going experience, but It kind of came to me as I came home from work tonight and ran into BW and Dear Alex outside, and the kid stopped what she was doing, and ran to me (in that funny bouncy toddler way) and gave me an expert hug. Welcome home.

We're okay, daddy's just lazy.

I want to assure anyone who happens to find this dusty back-water of the internet by accident or on purpose that Lil'screamie hasn't been abandoned - It just seems like the "daddy story" post, some ugly advertising business and spending almost all of my waking hours at a computer screen - not by choice but of necessity, has taken a lot of the fun out of sitting at this computer in the wee hours trying to think of something new to say. It turns out that it's easy to find things to say with Dear Alex and her amazing progress in the world, but how many ways can you say "She's so cute" and "she's so smart" without boring yourself and any reader to numbness?

Perhaps it's simply to write as I originally thought, about what it's like to have this incredible responsibility and love that simply overtakes everything in your life and teaches you humility and patience and how to be amazed again by little things. I wrote about "mindfulness" a while back and why it's important to keep track of the little things about her development (oh, such a clinical word for such a miraculous thing) and the things that Beautiful Wife and I do with her and for her amusement and delight, (and ours, too, as it turns out) and I didn't keep up with my own hopes for that - there will be some gaps, and I'm feeling as though if it's not written somewhere, it's lost in the ever-changing now. I want to make note of the sweet moments, and the odd stuff that we do to keep Dear Alex and ourselves entertained and educated, like this:

We came back from the country early on Sunday, mostly because Beautiful Wife and I were feeling guilty about taking Friday off and we wanted to get a head start on worrying about the week to come, so we had a bit of the afternoon to kill. BW suggested that we take Dear Alex to visit a firehouse so that Dear Alex could see a "firetruck" up close. It's an amazing thing to do with a kid. All our child knows of firetrucks is the loud siren and horn and lights as the great beasts roar up the avenue past our apartment, all thunder and light - she never fails to shout "firetruck!" and point as they pass - so, we put the kid in her stroller and set out to find our local station, and found it easily. Holding her up to the windows in the great red garage doors made her point and squeal with happiness - "two firetrucks in the garage". It only got better when one of the firemen invited us in - It stuck me that the fireman was more than happy that anyone took an interest in them and what they did, and he was more than happy to open a door for show and tell. (The NYFD guys are truly great, and I am in awe of their service and how genuinely nice they are.) Dear Alex was stunned speechless. Two sleeping giants in this great garage, up close and shiny and red and real. She loved it (and recovered her speech later - "two firetrucks in the garage!!") - this is one that she'll remember.
I'll remember it, too, because having a toddler with you can open doors and give you a point of view that you would never even think to think about - what other reason on earth would motivate anyone to visit a firehouse in New York City on a late Sunday afternoon, and feel so good about having done something so simple, yet so grounding?

A daddy story

I took a break from lilscreamie - both mentally and physically - to take a trip to Florida to more or less close a chapter in my life that's been the hardest to deal with for the longest time. After almost two years of waiting and some inneffectual attemps at "getting something done" - my sisters and I are finally getting around to settling the matter of my father's very modest estate.

My mother passed away in early 2000, leaving my dad alone. It was an extraordinarily sad and difficult time, but we all got through it, as families do. My father lived quietly and well and finally came to enjoy himself again, walking on the beach and driving his convertible and occasionally making trips up north to visit me and the always Beautiful, but not-yet-Wife. He did get to see me married, and sometimes I think that was one of the happier days of his life - he loved talking about it, and loved Beautiful Wife. I visited occasionally, too infrequently, but when the timing worked, I'd take him flying - usually someplace relatively far away, for a breakfast in Sebring, FL or a lunch someplace north, just to get the hours in and share the delight with him, - he was proud of me, and it made me feel proud to make him happy. My father came from a time when men had short hair and nearly everyone (who was serious) wore a suit - I have a ponytail, and dress (for the most part) as though I'm getting ready for yard work or going into battle - and I work in advertising so I was always a little suspect. Over the years, we worked that out, and he really did get that I was doing something (he was never quite sure what, exactly) that would keep me and mine safe in the world. Once he figured out that I was going to be okay, we got along better and better - to the point that we actually enjoyed each other's company. I'm glad to be able to say that.












After several scares and some diet changes and my wedding and a visit or two to the undisclosed location, my father's heart finally failed him - he passed away in June of 2005, but not before he got to see an ultrasound movie of the squirming black and white blob that would be Dear Alex. I would that he had lived to see the wonderful child that she's becoming.

I write this because even though the grief has passed, it can be sad and hard to realize with certainty that this is the end of someone else's story, Cleaning out your parent's house - the accumulation of 50-plus years of life together, is an object lesson in the importance of living, and a cautionary tale about the relentless accumulation of things. All of it meant something to them, but it means nothing to me (save a nod to whatever significance it held for them) so what, objectively, am I to do with it? Let it go, I think, is the real answer. The artifacts that I've taken so far are simple and small, and will fit into the very different life that I expect for BW and myself. The largest and heaviest item by far is my father's toolbox - a bulky red craftsman thing with lots of drawers full of well-used hand tools - The sheer density of it, and it's weight say everything about how it feels to have it - I lived in awe of his ability to make and fix things, and I know now that I truly am my father's child by my constant urge to do the same. The toolbox, and a few other things I'm keeping don't begin to do justice to the life my parents led or the fun they had or the things that meant something to them.


I'm tempted to start labeling the boxes of things that BW and I have collected in our (relatively) short time together - "this box of maps and these rounded rocks are from a time before you when we were young and in love and we travelled British Columbia and walked on glaciers and rode in convertibles and rode motorcycles through rainstorms and flew airplanes for the joy of life and sharing our passions and this is how we lived - and we did, and this proves it."

That narrative and context is what's missing for me now, though it's possible to piece together a lot of life and little adventures from what my parents left behind, things I remember (the green caddy convertible, endless days at the beach... ) and the stories they told. but mostly it's a sad business, and the opressive heat and relentless humidity and the fecundity of south Florida takes it's toll - their once well-kept home is overgrown by vines and mold and it's pretty clear that there's really no one home, ever again.

Happy mother's day

To any and all that might check in. Dear Alex has the best and most caring mother, who keeps surprising me with the deep love and joy she takes with our wonderful daughter. She makes it look so easy, and she really makes me laugh. Special thanks to Grammy for raising such a wonderful daughter, and for having such great love and care for our Dear Alex. I would that my own mother were still alive to know this great kid, and to know that she taught me well - and I hope to do as well for my delightful daughter as she did for me.

Mommy motorcycle

Recently I've been putting up a lot of photos on Flickr - new sets under constant revision - not pix of Dear Alex, but pictures for her. It's a great entertainment for her, and she has a real fascination with the world and things in it - and it's even better if mommy or daddy are in the picture. So, for her delight I've been adding images from our collective past - a time before Dear Alex - for her amusement and delight. The "mommy motorcycle" picture is the one she asks for by name, and I have to admit that it's one of my favorites as well - though it bears no relationship to our everyday lives. Dear Alex loves the pictures, and for some reason, I love them too - it's a reminder, of sorts, of how we got here - and what we hope to share with this beautiful child. I haven't flown a plane since she was born, and BW hasn't been on a motorcycle since we were married - but I will, and she can, and we have pictures to prove it.

Producer in training part 2

Just like Beautiful Wife, Dear Alex loves her telephones -
And what could be better than one phone? Two telephones!
A scene I've witnessed many times on the job with BW.

Producer in training

Dear Alex had a busy Saturday - A long walk down Park Avenue, and a visit to Beautiful Wife's office ("mommy office mommy office steps") where she had the chance to wander about, turn the lights on and off in the conference room, and sit in the seat of power - she's a natural on the computer, and she certainly knows how to get people to do things for her - immediately.

Beautiful

A moment of Dear Alex and Beautiful Wife together.
The little black ribbon just kills me.

2:00am

Dear Alex woke up in the middle of the night tonight, Something that she hasn't done in a long time, and as I was awake and working (the work thing again) I sort of tried to ignore it, but at the same time, her apparent dissatisfaction with the world matched my own, so I kind of felt her angst - and felt compelled to respond. It's a rare thing to be able to so surely comfort someone as a crying child in the middle of the night - I took her out of the crib, and held her and changed her diaper and did nothing more than rock for a while, repeating "It's all okay, I love you and mommy loves you and the world is yours" - Ten minutes later Dear Alex is asleep on my chest, and I have to conciously tear myself away to go back to work. I would that I could have done a repeat of the early months with her and simply fallen asleep to wake in the morning with the wonder that she hadn't fallen out of my arms to the floor. It was a moment of remembering the sleepless care and love that we all could use every once in a while. I needed that hug tonight, and without even trying Dear Alex came through.

Alex at work

Work: It's what we do, and some days it's harder than others, and some days it's pure joy - a concept clicks and an idea sells and all is right with the world. Every day, though, it's harder to leave Dear Alex - even in the capable and loving hands of nanny J.
Recently, Beautiful Wife took Dear Alex to visit at the office - a nice day for BW and the kid, with pizza in the boardroom and lots of new things to see and do and people to interact with, and even a baby friend born of a co-worker of BW at around the same time - Dear Alex had a good day at the office, and came back with the words "office" and "steps". She loves the challenge of stairs - always has - and the office in question has a grand internal staircase spanning three floors - that she climbed repeatedly "up!" and "down" - surely exhausting for Dear Alex and BW, but somehow apropos to the endless ups and downs and the true nature of work, especially in advertising.
What this is all about really, is assuaging the guilt that goes with working for a living while wanting to celebrate every waking moment of your beautiful child - we go away for most of Dear Alex's day - to do what she can probably only imagine as endlessly climbing stairs.

Sooooo right.

Smile

A much nicer day than it looks, a great time playing in the sandbox and trying out new ways to delight. That smile says it all.

Moon motorcycle airplane boat

Lunch outside - smiles all around.




Some of the words from Dear Alex this weekend, that truly surprised and delighted - it's as though she knows all about me, and which buttons to push (in a good way, of course) to get even more love, affection and attention. Every once in a while you have an experience that transcends your expectations, and the genuine surprise and delight that goes with that can transform your outlook.

Moon:
This weekend was like that - low expectations and energy at the start, with both Beautiful Wife and I having had some long weeks, this weekend was an unexpected delight. It started with the trip to the undisclosed location on Friday night, with the usual ritual of bath and bedtime for Dear Alex then the quick trip to the car for the night drive to the house. She didn't really do her usual fall-asleep-in-the-carseat, but instead stayed awake, to watch and comment on the drive and the beautiful crescent moon following us as we drove. Dear Alex was delighted to point out the moon as it came and go behind buildings as we drove. - "Moon, Moon, bye-bye Moon!" BW and I took joy in telling Dear Alex that the moon would follow her wherever we went. There was the usual flurry of activity as we got there and put her in her crib at last, to sleep, then a remarkable peace. It hit me that the house wasn't cold, there was no desperate rush to get the place warm enough for the girl or ourselves - maybe winter is over.
On Saturday, we stayed outside for the whole day, aside from the two hour nap - Dear Alex loves being outside - to the point of calling "outside, outside" at every opportunity, and rushing the door at every chance. I'm more than happy to oblige - the outside thing is my world with Dear Alex, and it makes me feel like I'm actually doing something for her development - the intricacies of navigating uneven terrain, the textures of dirt and leaves and trees and stones and the pointing out of the obvious and subtle cues of nature - things that I love and want to share with her - It's my own way of giving her the world.











Daddy's oooowotercycle, wow.

Motorcycle:
I had the chance during naptime to take the motorcycle out for a bit of a ride and I surely enjoyed it, though I must say that it's been so long I forgot a lot of the "muscle memory" that makes it easy - it was akward at first, but I do remember the laws of physics that make it work
and after a trip around the lake, I was ready to go - the ride was short, but it did remind me a lot of other times and other rides and the way it feels to just go as though there was nothing else in the world - but always, of course with the ever present now of Dear Alex, and how and when I could share it with her -
Dear Alex has a morbid fascination with daddy's motorcycle. It's the "oooowootor cycle! wow! She likes to look at it, will say "motorcycle" (in her funny way) but she won't go near it, or let daddy get on it. If you put her down near it, she'll go up to it and touch it, then scamper away as though she's daring herself. Kind of funny, but of late she's continued the fascination, and will notice a bike parked on the street with the same fervor - I wonder what she thinks.
Airplane:
Another Saturday afternoon treat, that started for me as a low rumble - the sound got my attention, and it was the familar and unexpected sound of radial aircraft engines that grew louder and made me and Dear Alex look up for the source - three WW2 era twin-engine planes in close formation flew low overhead, prompting an exclamation (uncoached) from Alex - Aaapane! aaapane! Who taught her this? She now knows what an airplane is, and will point one out whenever she sees one, without prompting - "aaapane!" This causes me great joy, and I dearly hope I live well long enough to take her flying someday.














Dear Alex tries on the fabulous lifejacket -
or, "ifeacket" - Like me, she likes any sport that requires an outfit.











Boat:
Another new Alex word, and something that we could readily demonstrate - after a trip to the local Wal-Mart where we scored a perfectly wonderful toddler-sized life jacket, BW and I debated whether we should take her out in the boat, and of course, delight won over our better judgement - On Sunday morning we should have been packing to travel home and/or cleaning up, but instead of doing responsible things we went for the immediate gratification of taking Dear Alex out for a ride in the boat - a canoe, really - plopping her in the middle, with daddy rowing as best as possible - Dear Alex was skeptical at first, but she really enjoyed wearing her lifejacket with flowers and took great joy in being on the water with mommy and daddy.

So, a transcendent weekend. The girl is a joy.

Upside down!

Dear Alex has a lot of new words - and she gets things very quickly. As part of her newfound understanding and experiments with the world around her is this exploration of the concept of the orientation of things - She really likes to turn her special Alex chair over, with the delighted exclamation "upside down!, upside down!" Then she climbs up the back - this has a visit to the emergency room written all over it, yet it's truly fascinating to watch. She already has the ability to turn the most-ordered room into a disaster scene in a matter of minutes, and this is one more skill in her portfolio of wanton chaos.

Gratuitous bath time pix

Dear Alex really does enjoy bath time.