Today, when Anique arrived home from Brandeis, I was baking zucchini bread and sauteing onions and summer squash, all from our CSA. Isaac was sitting at my feet in his bouncy chair, chewing on his "lovey"* On a happiness scale of 1 to 10--10 being "I found my hands and I never want to stop sucking on them!" and 1 being "I just woke up in my car seat"--Isaac was about a 4: tolerant. It had been an up-and-down day, filled with short naps, lots of fussing, and a few smiles thrown in when I stumbled upon the right combination of singing, bouncing, and general tom-foolery (Example: Isaac seemed particularly partial to my version of Beethoven's 5th, in which I sing (forte) "Isaac my BOY (hold) Isaac my BOY! (hold, then pianissimo) Isaac my boy, Isaac my boy, (falsetto) Isaac my boy ..." etc.). In many ways, it was just an average day. And yet looking back on it, with one eye on this coming Thursday when Isaac is to begin daycare, I see how much he and I have grown up in these past weeks since Anique went back to work.
On our second morning together, I called Anique in tears. "I can't do this," I told her. In the background, Isaac could be heard howling, while he flailed his little fists at the injustice of having his diaper changed. Since then, I've grown harder. Yesterday, when Isaac woke up during my drive to pick up Anique at Brandeis, I talked to him. I sang to him. I turned up his favorite radio station--Jammin' 94.5-- but even Usher's smooth tones ("Isaac let me love you down") failed to soothe him. So, I kept driving. When we got to Brandeis, I picked him up and held him and he stopped crying. That was it. Seven weeks ago, I might have pulled over on the side of Route 117, hazard lights flashing, pacifier in hand. Certainly, I would have felt sick to my stomach. I hope I don't seem like a monster, because I hate it when Isaac cries, but I think for me to be a good dad, and to be a good PCP these past weeks, I needed to man up a little. To be attentive to his needs, I had to put my own aside, to stop taking his cry as a personal rebuke: "You are a crappy daddy! Where's Mom?" Now when Isaac cries, I'm less shell-shocked. I hug him, offer him the bottle, check his diaper, run through my bag of tricks ("Isaac my BOY") and usually that does it.
Just after Isaac was born, I was frequently asked the question, "What does it feel like to be a dad?" and I always struggled to come up with an answer, usually settling on the accurate if underwhelming "it's pretty awesome." If someone was to ask me that same question now, I'd say that it doesn't feel like anything. It's like asking a dog what it feels like to be a dog. The dog can't pause, step outside of itself, and provide you with a thoughtful response, before returning to its dog-identity and sniffing your crotch. The identity "DAD" has become similarly ingrained for me. I'm in it. All the time. Even calling this post a "reflection" seems a little disingenuous. While I can compare the kind of dad I was when I started staying home with Isaac to the dad I am today, I have trouble remembering what it felt like to not be a dad. And when I think of what Thursday morning will feel like, when I sit down to the work I've been putting off for two months, and Isaac spends his first day in the company of total strangers (albeit caring ones who seem really nice) I hope that the lessons he's taught me stick. I'll need to man up a little.
*A half-bear, half-washcloth thingy that Anique wears under her clothes and which we intend to place with Isaac in his crib during nap times. However, I'm a bit alarmed by the speed with which Isaac manages to cover his entire face with the "lovey." Though Anique demonstrated that it's impossible for anyone to suffocate while playing with his lovey (but can he go blind? HA!), spreading the wash-cloth part tightly over her mouth to prove its breathability, I'm still not-quite convinced. Why are babies so prone to suffocation?
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