Category: Fatherhood

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America Fatherhood Life Opinion

Fireworks Suck

Why are you recording this?

“Remember the last new firework you saw? I’ll save you some time — you’ve never seen a new firework. Same show every year, and every year you all act impressed.”

—Danny Jolles

I fucking hate fireworks. 

I don’t hate them because of the environmental cost or how they scare animals and people with PTSD or how they celebrate things that don’t always deserved to be celebrated. 

I hate them because they’re completely overrated. I hate them because they’re dumb and pointless and redundant. Most of all, though, I hate them because of everything that is involved in experiencing the supposed magic of colorful explosions. 

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Christmas COVID Fatherhood Health Life Parenting

A Very COVID Christmas

via

“I ruined Christmas!”

The tears burst from my nine-year-old’s eyes as she blamed herself for the ramifications of a global pandemic that has lasted for three years. All kids go crazy for Christmas, of course, but my daughter is certainly in the highest percentile of Santa fanatics, so having her holiday plans dashed was especially difficult.

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Career Children Fatherhood How I Work Life Parenting Work

Children Are the Best Time Management Tools

via

I thought I was good at managing my time, but having children has made me so much better at it.

That may seem counterintuitive. After all, children suck up all of our time. The moment they finish eating a meal, they’re asking for snacks. They need diaper changes and baths. They’re constantly pulling you somewhere to color or play or read to them. They need to be driven to practice and doctor appointments and friends’ homes. They create an incredible amount of dirty dishes and dirty laundry. They make the house look like it’s been ransacked and looted. They are agents of chaos.

They also want all of your time all of the time.

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Books Children Fatherhood Parenting Reading

Our Nightly Family Reading Time

“Children reading by lamp light” (Oil on Canvas), by Knud Erik Larsen

A household with two working parents and two children consists of many things but is largely defined by two: routine and chaos.

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Children Fatherhood Life Parenting

A Return to the Terrible Twos

A Dispatch from the Trenches

via The New York Times

“Having a two-year-old is like having a blender without a lid.”

— Jerry Seinfeld

This is a dispatch from the war. I’m writing this from the trenches, in the heart of the conflict.

After what has felt like hours of intense battle, the rebel soldier has deployed her ultimate weapon, the one that is unleashed when all else fails: standing in the center of the kitchen, screaming at the top of her lungs as droplets of saltwater jump from her eyes.

What could have caused such a reaction? What did the oppressive totalitarian government do to the people to cause this emotionally-charged attack from the rebel?

Dinner was served.

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Fatherhood Knowledge Learning Lessons Life True Story

My COVID-19 Vaccine Experience

I received the second dose of the COVID-19 vaccine yesterday.

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America Children Fatherhood History Life Politics

A Moment for Women of Color – Including My Daughters

Amid all of the reactions and gifs and videos on social medial today, it was a single tweet of thirteen words from a man and writer that I respect that struck me the hardest.

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Children Fatherhood Life Parenting

Thoughts on My 2nd Child’s 2nd Birthday

My second child, my second daughter, turns two today.

My first, the oldest, is an eight-year-old that acts like she’s 14, and since there is such a large gap between number one and number two – for a very, very, very, very good reason – the past two years have been a refresher course in infant and toddler life.

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Career Fatherhood Life Parenting Work

The Other Essential Workers: Parents

via The Atlantic

One question that COVID-19 has brought to the forefront of our societal conversations is, Who are the essential workers?

The first professions that immediately spring to mind are obvious: doctors, nurses, firefighters, police officers. However, the pandemic has proven that there are additional tiers and classes of essential workers, including grocery store employees, delivery drivers, warehouse employees, non-frontline healthcare employees, and teachers.

My wife and I are in these last two categories.

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Fatherhood Life Writing

I’m Keeping a COVID-19 Journal

I’m not a journaler by nature. 

Yes, I have written down my innermost thoughts on occasion, but generally I jot down short quick notes on almost everything that pops into my brain that I then compile to use later for writing that I will publish, either here or in my newsletter.

Yet I felt that living through a time when a viral droplet infection — a silent, invisible killer — raced across the globe and was documented in real time was as good an occasion as any to keep a daily record of my thoughts. 

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