You Better Not Pout

Is it odd if a child sits on a strange man's lap? The answer is yes, but only if we’re talking about a normal, everyday occurrence. But around this time of year, when large, white bearded men with booming voices and jiggling waistlines begin to take over shopping malls and local libraries, all natural fears about who a child associates with are thrown out the window, or in this case, off the sleigh.

But why is this so? I don’t have any solid, factual answers, but I can offer one theory. First off, there are photo ops. When a parent has a camera in hand, everything changes. And none more so than around the holidays.

Some parents go to extreme lengths to capture a perfect picture of their child with Santa. They’ll wait in lines for hours, while the highways freeze outside TJ Maxx and their children's stomachs turn from the last round of Hot-Dog-on-a-Stick. These parents will wait forever, continuing to tell their kid that “we’re getting close,” or “we’re next,” all the while cleaning their ridiculously expensive camera lenses with special wipes, lenses so large you’d think they were about to shoot a satellite image from space.

Let’s diverge with a recent example, where I, myself, was somehow caught in a similar line with an all too inferior camera.

Case in point: story time at the local library.

Now, I like story times. It’s good for kids to read, eventually get a library card and learn responsibility by respecting others property. It’s important for children to discover and have fun doing it, blah, blah, blah. Plus, the library is a nice way for parents to get out of the house on a rainy or too hot of day. You don’t have to keep asking your child, “What should we do today?” The county has answered the question for you—story time. Sometimes you might be able to steal a nap on one of the oversized stuffed bears and elephants every kids section seem to have. Some days your kid might actually allow you to read books you want to read. But those are special, sun eclipsing the moon types of days.

It’s all good and fun, almost relaxing. Then Christmas comes along.

It’s amazing how many parents don’t take their children to libraries on a regular basis. I’ll drop off the plank and even call myself a regular to our town’s branch, holiday or not. Being a regular, I should know when and when not to go. But for some reason, this was the second time I’ve been caught surrounded by holiday clad soccer moms and overenthusiastic librarians. The first go-round didn’t seem as bad. Then again, maybe I just like Halloween better.

So we show up on time a few weeks before Christmas, book bag around shoulder, a bag of trail mix and organically popped popcorn bulging out of my jacket pockets. We have the usual “Rowan, go pee” argument once we get through the library doors, but he’s not as determined as usual to tell me that he never has to go to the bathroom again. Actually, he doesn’t even seem to hear me, his entire body craning to look around the shoplifting detectors standing a few feet away from the checkout desk. Then we hear something, both of us noticing the sound at the same time. He flinches when the noise comes again, sneaks behind me and wraps around my upper thigh.

“Daddy?” he says, and I can feel the fear in his voice as the next Ho-Ho-Ho echoes towards us. Being born in September four years earlier, this is my son’s fifth encounter with the same sound, and I can’t say that I blame him for reacting the way he does.

“It’s okay,” I say, and walk into the main room of the library, the sirens of the shoplifting gates blaring as we move into the children's section.

Now I know that all Santas aren’t Billy Bob Thornton or whoever the maniac was who played the same character in Silent Night, Deadly Night, but there is something off about a lumberjack looking man sporting rouge and wearing nightcaps. But damn does he draw a crowd. And he’s got something working for him to. Ninety-nine percent of the adults lined up to see him are women.

Once again I become tricked that my son actually wants to see this wintry icon. Or maybe I pushed the idea on him. We were there, standing among the others. He didn’t drive himself to the library. He can’t read the flyers advertising Santa’s “visit” to the library, which I later noticed posted to most every light post and pinned to every tack board in town. He can’t say no to the chance of going to a place he loves so much, filled with books and computer games and the opportunity to corral his dad into reading everything within reach. For the most part, he still does what I do, goes where I go. For the most part, he’s still just a baby.

I’m no longer a kid, and most of my youngest memories have been washed away, but I guess I can see the draw to Santa, in one way or another. The beer gutted man with a James Earl Jones voice is promising each kid not only the ability to fly with him in his reindeer guided sleigh but also presents, for the small price of being a good little boy or girl and sitting on his thigh.

In hindsight, though, Rowan probably wasn’t waiting in line just for the guarantee of presents. Sure he might’ve overheard some of the other kids saying that they were going to get everything they asked for because they have been good since the day they were pulled into the world. He was probably watching all of them clog the “reading carpet” in front of Santa, faces we don’t normally see on our usual Friday’s at the library. He could’ve been studying the way they pushed and shoved for position, against their own mothers no less, to get closer to Mr. Claus. Or he might not have noticed any of those things. Maybe he simply wanted to see if the man in the big red suit scared him anymore.

So we waited, not as long as others but not as short as some. Eventually we made it to Santa. My son didn’t sit on his lap. He didn’t even look at him. He sat on a chair next to him, looking at me snapping pictures of him. Santa got mad at me, actually raised his voice a little in opposition when I told him Rowan has always been a little unsure about others like him. Then he handed my son a bag filled with candy, a pencil, and a bookmark, doing so without a smile until the next kid was forced onto his lap.

Rowan led me through the remaining crowd and headed towards the books. I might’ve read a dozen, maybe more, both of us sitting within the outspread arms of a giant panda. He asked me if he was a good boy. I asked him what he thought. He said yes, and then handed me another book.

The same every year.

Land of the Living Dad

Lately I've been dreaming about zombies. Not the slow, George Romero type, or even the modern zombie long-sprinters who'll stop at nothing to eat your flesh. Nope. The undead in my sleep are just like you and me. They walk normally, without any sort of limp or leg drag. They don't groan, not much, but when they do, they have reason to. Like when you get caught at a red light with no sign of any other cars around. Oh yeah, my zombies can drive too. Some even hold a decent conversation. As I said earlier, they're just like you and I, a bunch of regular John and Jane zombies. And they're everywhere.

So, I've been thinking--why am I dreaming about zombies? There are a few logical explanations: 1) I watch too many movies; 2) I have a deep seeded want to sample human flesh; or 3) I am one.

Although these are all interesting theories, I think #3 is the winner. I have become non-living.

But let's figure this out together, because I have a feeling there are others out there who have come down with the same affliction. (Note: I am not yet a full-blown zombie. Why you ask? I sleep. I try to sleep as much as I can. And, as we all know, zombies don't sleep. Ever. So I still got a chance.)

Now here are a few areas, let's call them points of classifications, of where I've noticed this quick slip into zombie-hood. I'm going to begin writing scientifically now, completely objective, as if I am a specimen splayed out and stuck to one of those rubber, tar coated pans we used to dissect frogs in during high school biology.

Day 1: Testing for zombie-hood.
Subject: Male. 31 years old. Caucasian.
Time: 7:00 a.m. (note: time to begin analysis specified by subject. Wants natural environment intact for duration)

Begin log.

Appearance:

-The subject's eyelids appear heavy, slightly puffed. Beneath the eyes dark. The whites of the eyes are scribbled with veins. The whites themselves tinted yellow. (note: subject may drink too much).

-Although somewhat slight of frame, the subject appears well nourished. Its mid-section, especially the outer abdominal area, seems to be protruding. (note: ask subject its normal dieting practices).

-Not of utmost concern, but the subject needs a shave.

Smell:

-Pungent. Suggest bathing more?

Motor skills:

-When manipulated, the subject's reflexes are quite impressive. Fast, actually. (note: during experiment, when a plastic doll and a bottle of beer were placed on the edge of the simulated swimming pool and were pulled over the edge by our lab assistant, the subject moved at lightning speed to grab both before either touched the water).

-Subject can walk but tends to be more at peace sitting, especially in front of the simulated television.

-Subject turns head in opposite direction when spoken at.

Speech:

-Raised. Tonally deep, almost growl-like. (note: several sighs and slight whimpers recorded when our lab assistant spilled his glass of milk all over the autopsy table).

-Words of encouragement, even praise when our lab assistant cleaned up his own mess.

-Tone softened.

Social skills:

-Loving at times, especially during hectic periods. (note: during simulated crying, subject picked up plastic doll in corner and began cooing it).

-Grumpy at others. (note: when plastic doll was performing simulated poking and jabbing into subject's face and lower abdominal region, the subject swiped at it and rolled over to face the wall).


Final notes: Nearing the end of testing, subject broke through restraints and sat straight up, as if frightened by something. He then spoke. Although unclear, our recording system was able to verify his remark. "Please, please, somebody tell me what I've become." Subject then curled up in a fetal position and whimpered himself softly into a state of relaxation.


Results of zombie testing: Inconclusive.

Day 1 analysis: End.

The Switch

All of us were born unaware of who we were. Some of us had names before we were conceived. Some were given nicknames right after. Others might've had to wait a few weeks after we were born, parents trying to figure out just how to put a human title to the thing they now held. Honestly, I can't exactly remember how it went with our son.

My wife mentioned names but I cast most of them off, remembering someone, anyone, distant faces of my past having the same surname. None would do. Every suggestion blended the blurred image of my unborn child to the people I'd once known, or still knew. It was as if the mentioned names had already conjured up the personality of our son, placed him in the same body of all the Mike's and Bob's and Chris's I'd grown up with. Already set him in the path of overdrinking and vomiting in pillow cases and thinking that he, in one way or another, was going to be the next great thing. And nobody could stop it from happening.

After some type of deliberation, we finally decided on a name that I didn't associate with anyone, not personally at least. We came up with something we, or most imporantly he, could live with. The name's part tree, part silly looking British actor who made a career of staying silent and letting his face do all the talking. It can be sung in a childhood song we all know without changing a crucial vowel. It can be said over and over again, at least in my mind, and never get old. And if it does, please punch me, because I don't want to become one of those dads. So, after what seemed like little thought, three cities ago now, four or five jobs earlier, a college or two (I can't remember) between that, Rowan was finally born before actually being born.

You'd think a name is sacred, or at least memorable. But, this wasn't the case. At least not in hospitals.

Rowan wasn't more than three or four hours old when the nurses strapped a bracelet around his wrist, his given family name typed out under the plastic casing. I remember looking at the name before he left us for the first time: Landers. By now he'd already spent his entire life with us. He was already a part of us, and I wasn't sure if I wanted him to leave or not. He wasn't yet an annoying relative but he wasn't someone you could exactly have an approaching dawn conversation with either. He just was.

The nurses, or maybe the doula or midwife, said he would be right back and wheeled him away. He didn't cry. I didn't either, and I don't remember either of us making a sound since he'd wailed the fluid from his lungs. They took him away, in a sort of lifted lettuce crisper-heat lamp combo on wheels, and he looked up at them with a look on his face that said, "Can't this wait?"

For the next hour he went through routine tests. My wife and I might've slept, but I can't be sure. After a while I got up, stared out the window at the view of other hospital buildings, the look towards other windows that were looking back on me. Before long the door opened and one of the doulas wheeled Rowan back in. She set his plastic vehicle next to our bed and I looked down at him.

A few hours earlier I'd watched him squeeze out into this world, saw the gore that had kept him alive for nine months get uncurled from his neck. I even cut the lifeline, in a sort of nervous diagnoal, which I know he'll later blame me for his upper ridged outie. At that time he wasn't yet my son. He seemed more of a thing to study, to poke and prod. His arms and legs were splotched, a strawberry and cream complexion. His head was too round, nose too small. He was long, which seemed one of the attributes he'd gained from me, hands fisted in "the world has always wronged me" sort of way. His ears weren't perfect, like mine, and when he finally focused on me, not looking too happy, I knew this was my kid.

The doula said we could sleep with him, and it wasn't long before my wife and I decided to pick him up and lay him between us on the bed and get the most sleepless night of our lives.

A few days later we left. My wife was ordered into a wheelchair, a procedure I wish was used more often for everyday activities. I got our car, drove it around to the ambulance circle and picked my family up. Don't tell my family this, but I felt important putting Rowan into his car seat for the first time, like no one else had ever done the same thing before. And now, after performing the same act over thirteen thousand times, it's amazing how things change.

Anyways, somewhere between the hospital and whatever home we lived in then, one of us clipped off Rowan's hospital bracelet. We wanted to keep it, his name, his first link to an outrageous bill. One of us held it up to the other. We smiled. One of us read it.

"Cisneros."

"What?"

"Cisneros."

We looked at each other. We glanced at the sleeping baby behind us.

"Our son's last name is Cisneros."

In the rearview, I stared at this child. His head was sunk deep in the extra padding of the carseat, ears bent forward, his arms and legs already seeming too long for his yellow onsie. He twitched, maybe already dreaming. I held the bracelet between my fingers, read the name again. Behind me I heard a squeak, a couple of airy puffs, and looking back I saw the baby's legs kick straight out, his hands flare and grip back together into dimpled fists. He farted again and I tossed the bracelet to the floorboard.

"Nope," I said, and smiled. "They made a mistake. He's a Landers through and through."

Overeducated, underemployed

All right, this is my first post. First off, let me introduce myself. My name's Josh. I'm 31 years old. I have a four year old son. I'm married. I'm a writer with minor successes in minor places. For the past three years, I've been earning my M.F.A. in creative writing from the University of Arkansas, Fayetteville. I taught there too, composition mostly, for the sole reason that the grad school agreed to pay my tuition if I did. I'm glad it's over, thrilled actually, gone from the chalk boards and stained dry eraser boards I never used. Away from the talk of literature and the literature that failed to speak to me. Don't get me wrong, I enjoyed my time there and miss some of the fellow writers . And I even sometimes miss the false bravado of teaching "eager" minds, but what I often reminisce most about, I'm finding, is the half-pints of Jim Beam and Early Times I sometimes poured into a 44-ounce cup before the classes I was taking. That, or downing tall cans of Coors Light before fiction workshops, the one thing that could, and did, take away the pain. But that's all over now.

So where am I today? Back in California. Gold Country, to be exact. Somewhere between Tahoe and San Francisco. A place where white men with beards and river grit beneath their nails had once hanged a lot of other men. I'm back in California, one of the few places I've failed and will probably fail again, a place I like to call the Land of Misopportunity.

But this blog isn't just about me or California or my subtle want to drink a Boulevard while listening to the sweet twang of a Southern belle in the next stool over. No. This is what moving back to California has offered me--the opportunity to stay home and take care of my son, Rowan. This is about him mostly, our daily activities together, what he calls "adventures." This is about the growing phenomenon of stay-at-home dads, the men who "take care of their kids," as Chris Rock once stated, but in a much different context. This is about being a father, a good father, the lunch making, snack giving, booger monitoring, butt wiping, underwear straightening, shoe tying, story-telling, dinosaur stomping, snuggling protector.

Let's just say this blog will be a type of homage to other fathers, a detailed account of what it is to be and not be one of the most important people in the world, if only for a little while. So I hope at least someone will read the upcoming posts, fathers and fathers-to-be, mothers and those expecting, and anyone else who wants to see the ridiculousness and beauty of trying to raise a decent human being in a world filled with a million opposites. And yes, for a certain other group, I will talk about the hot young mothers who are willing to flash their breasts in public places, if only to give their kid his or her hourly feed.