I'm going to be selfish, and that's OK.

I had an "I'm a bad, selfish dad" moment on the walk home from dropping Theo at his 2-morning-per-week school.

It was supposed to be school pictures, but because they take the pics outside and the weather was threatening, we found out when we arrived that they rescheduled. Then it hits me ... they rescheduled when kid and I will be on a roadtrip west for him to spend time with Grandma and Grandpa while I get a long weekend of R&R and booze with college buddies.

In addition, I realized that this Monday is Columbus Day, and therefore he'll be missing school for two full weeks out of this month when it's all said and done.

So on my walk home, I started wondering to myself, is it really fair of me to make him miss so much school just because I want some time to myself and I don't like to fly? He loves going to school, we're paying for it, and the class is so small that he'll probably be missed by the other kids. We already missed a week last month so I could help some friends while one of them had surgery.

Plus I was really looking forward to having the school pictures of him. I love the shirt he was wearing and can't get enough pictures of him in it. I started thinking, maybe I can still get a flight for that afternoon AFTER school. Heck, that way he'd only have to miss one day, because I could get home quicker than we could driving. And sure, It would cost a whole lot more than the car trip will, but why waste the day and a half in the car, when he could have that time to be with his friends... and ... and ... and...

And then it hit me: WHAT ON EARTH AM I THINKING??? When exactly did I lose my fucking mind and turn into the guilt-ridden parent who can't keep the needs of his family versus the needs of the individuals in the family in the proper perspective?

HE'S TWO. HE'S TWO. HE'S TWO! He goes to school SIX HOURS a week and mostly it's just playtime. I myself have one or two memories, tops, from that early in my life and from talking to other folks I suspect I'm above average in that department. If his two-year-old, two-day-per-week preschool ends up being a long-treasured part of his life or mine, then that isn't cute or sentimental, THAT IS A PROBLEM.

Plus, as a two-year-old, he's still about the most perfectly selfish being on Earth. He doesn't know "fair" any better than he knows how to take a crap in the toilet. I'm the one in charge of enforcing "fair" around here, and it isn't very fair that it's been two years since I had a break from him of more than a few hours.

He'll never know he missed a thing, and even if he does remember, he should remember that his primary role model wanted to do something other than cook, clean and read Dr. Seuss all day, every day, for months at a time.

So I'm going to be selfish and not apologize. I'll take a picture of him in his cute shirt when he gets home from school today.

Teach your children well...

Theo and I spent most of our afternoons in August at the pool around the corner from the house. Theo has always loved being in the water and there's always tons of little kids there - even if I have the occasional heart attack when his seemingly boundless confidence gets way ahead of his abilities.

One day we were playing in the shallows of the adult pool, where Theo's favorite game was throw himself in headfirst so daddy could drag him off the bottom. Theo started playing with another little one who couldn't swim yet, and that boy took a liking to me-- talking, jumping on my back and whatnot. I played with him as much as I could, but explained to him that keeping my boy from drowning was kind of my top priority.

His mother apologized and explained that be tends to latch on to men in the pool, because his own dad won't get in with him. Hey, whatever; it's obviously not the way I roll, but everyone has their way of doing things and I have no issue hanging out with kids.

In talking to my new pal, the conversation did eventually turn to that daddy.

"My daddy isn't here. He's at work."

"That's too bad. But we understand. Theo's Mommy is at work too and sometimes she gets home late."

"Noooooooooooo!" he said this to me in that manner perfected by all kids, combining "I don't believe you" and "you're crazy" into a single long syllable.

"Yes, she's at her job."

"No, only DADDYS do that!" Obviously, I missed the memo on this one.

I think I eventually convinced him that yes, some mommys work too, while some kids have daddys who stay home.

And as tempting as it would be to ramble on about how even a 3-year-old has been hopelessly indoctrinated into the dominant patriarchy by a distant father who refuses to frolic in the pool, I know that this is just a kid who has made a incorrect assumption about the rest of the world based on his own family and the people he knows well.

But oh, my, did be give me a good laugh that afternoon. I am pretty proud of myself for just laughing, instead of breaking into my usual sarcasm and asking, "Oh, really... So, what does that make me, then, if I'm a daddy who doesn't work?"

Warning, cute kid story ahead

So it's been a while ago that we transitioned Theo to a full-sized bed. He started asking to sleep in the guest bed one day, so we gave it a try for naptime and by the end of the week his crib was sitting lonely and unused.

For the most part he has been very good about no longer being caged -- that first week, when he would leave the bed at naptime to play, a couple threats to return him to the crib put him in line. Since most of the time he wakes up making some noise, the baby monitor has always told me when he was ready to get out of bed.

So two mornings ago, at about 5AM, I woke up to the sound of footsteps on the landing. I thought "huh, he made it out of the room without me hearing it in the monitor. Sneaky." In a second or two, our bedroom door was open and I heard a familiar little voice say "Daaaaaddyyyyy..."

"Theo, go back to bed," I said just before Ruth could chime in with "Theo, everyone is still asleep." As usual when he knows he's wrong, I heard little footsteps run into his room, his door close and latch, and the little steps continue into his bed. I dozed off in a couple minutes, waking briefly as Ruth left for work a little while later, and only woke up for good when Theo started making noise again after 7. This was a FANTASTIC surprise, because he's been getting me up at or before 6 most mornings lately regardless of when he goes to bed.

So Theo and I went downstairs, where I found one of my containers of yogurt that I'd frozen for myself sitting on the kitchen table. Peculiar. "Ruth must not have realized we still have yogurt for Theo in the fridge. She was trying to help out. How nice!" Then I found a half-bag of half-thawed frozen strawberries in the sink. "Well, it is plain yogurt. He'd want some fruit in it. Good idea, dear."

... A very small voice in the back of my head thought "Ruth doesn't usually presume to do this stuff..." but since the frozen cup of yogurt had been thoughtfully arranged on a neatly folded towel, I figured it MUST have been Ruth.

When Ruth came home from work that night, I told her, "Hey, thanks for the yogurt, but we had plenty for Theo in the fridge."

She replied, "THAT wasn't me. I found it sweating all over the table, so I put the towel under it. Then I found some strawberries that I moved to the sink to thaw. What was up with that?"

I looked at Theo enjoying his dinner, and finally the little voice that had been whispering that morning was screaming.

"Well dear, I think Theo came downstairs this morning before he woke us up to get himself some breakfast. He opened the freezer, pulled out a cup of yogurt and a bag of strawberries, then put them on the dining room table. I'm guessing he came upstairs to get me when he realized he couldn't get the foil wrapper off the yogurt container."

"Theo, did you come downstairs this morning and try to make yourself breakfast?"

"YEEEEAAASS!" Of course, this reply is meaningless, as I've asked Theo before if James Dean and Elvis visit him at preschool, and he's given me the same hyper-enthused positive response. Still, it makes a lot more sense than Ruth's theory that someone broke in during the middle of the night to help himself to some yogurt before the cats scared him off. Sorry dear.

I COMPLETELY expected the day to come when Theo would be wandering the house while we slept, but I never figured he'd be doing it at 2.5 years old, or that he'd be halfway to making himself breakfast in total darkness while we slept. We laughed until our sides hurt, and I asked Theo to not go downstairs anymore until he checks with me first.

I guess it's time to see if doorknob covers will work on the glass doorknobs the old owners installed all over this place...

Theo gives his opinions...

Just wasting time...

Just dropped off Theo for his first day of preschool. He's going to a small school in the neighborhood, just two mornings a week. He's been ready for a long time to start spending more time around other kids and less around his Daddy. I'm MORE than ready to have six hours of my adulthood back every week.

've been trying to figure out lately why I haven't had the urge to do any blogging or longer-form writing in general. In part, I know it's the amount of time I've concentrated on running, to the exclusion of other hobbies, but I think 'm also getting tired of being identified just as "Daddy," to the exclusion of other roles. I love my kid. He's a lot of fun to be with an I wouldn't trade the past two years. But having to be "on" pretty much every waking hour and parts of the sleeping ones leaves me without the mental energy and concentration for blogging.

Call me a whiny bitch or whatever, but I'm learning my limits.

But anyway, his first day: I was running a few minutes late, as usual -- we had to walk a neighbor's dog -- and then we managed to walk a block from the house before I realized I'd forgotten his extra clothes and diapers at home. At least it was only a block, right? That ate up all our extra time, so I carried him most of the way there so we could still be there with some time to spare. I figure I'll work on leaving earlier in the future, so he can walk on his own.

As we approached the school, I realized that it was the first day not just for the Monday/Wednesday 2-year-olds, but also for the older kids who attend Monday/Wednesday/Friday. The entrance was like a red carpet paparazzi lineup as people photographed and filmed their little ones arriving for their first day. I didn't bring a camera -- I really wanted to avoid making a big production of things -- and I just walked him directly inside to his classroom.

When we arrived, the teacher greeted him, introduced herself and pointed him in the direction of a box of matchbox cars...and I might as well have disappeared at that point. I handed over some paperwork to the teacher, loaded his cubby with extra clothes and diapers ... and it was time for me to go. I said "High five, buddy, see you later," and he barely looked up to raise his hand. Not even some crying from a couple other kids could faze him.

So, pretty anticlimactic, really. I look forward to seeing how he's doing in an hour, seeing what he's bringing home and what he has to say, but in the meantime I'm just happy to be alone, sitting on the patio at Starbucks and pretending that I'm an irresponsible layabout with nothing on my mind and nowhere to go... my future plans while he's in school include a return to brewing and finishing a few things around the house.

And if a mere two hours of relaxation can lead to a long blog post, there's no telling how much I can accomplish...

And a not-so-stereotypical Daddy moment...

Most of our previous attempts to get Theo to clean up his toys resulted in Ruth and I scrambling all over the living room to put stuff away while the kid either stood around and laughed at us, or foiled our attempts by spreading puzzle pieces all over the floor.

After a while, we just gave up; easier to put him to bed without fighting that particular battle and we're both so beat by the end of the day that a room littered with toys just isn't our highest priority.

So tonight, Ruth was even later than usual, dinner for Theo was leftovers and whatever I thought he'd eat and afterwards I was facing the prospect of putting him to bed by myself.

As we walked through the toy clutter in the front room, I threw a couple blocks into their box and said, "Wish this stuff would get put away."

And the craziest thing happened -- Theo stopped, picked up a toy and put it in the toy box. Opportunist that I am, I JUMPED on this development and started talking him through the full cleanup. "Theo, can you put all your toy cars in this box?" He suddenly became a toddler WITH A PURPOSE, something that I never knew existed.

Ten minutes later and the room was fit for company.

I realize this sounds weird and desperate, but hot damn, anytime some of the work around here can be transferred from me to him, I'm a happy guy.

The moment every Daddy looks forward to...

I realize that it's too early to make any assumptions, but...

Tonight, Theo picked up his little foam football and started throwing it back and forth across the living room.

LEFT-HANDED.

That's right. Looking forward to the Fighting Illini National Championship 2028 and the Chicago Bears Super Bowl Dynasty of the 2030s. BANK on it.

Wherein I get serious about cross-training

Just a running update: The good news, I ran the CHKD 8K Run-Walk for the kids on June 13. I was pretty happy with my time, 48:19, considering the weather was terribly hot and humid, even for the morning. I probably tried a little to hard to keep up with some friends at the beginning when I should've taken it easier all the way through the race.

Which leads to the bad news ... I started feeling some pain just below my knee in the days after the race. Knowing that we were a few days from a long weekend to DC that would mean many miles of walking each day, I stopped running. But lots of walking in DC, most of it with Theo in the backpack, probably helped get my legs stronger and definitely burned a lot of calories.

It seems pretty clear that any increases in my speed or mileage beyond where I'm at now will take quite a bit of time. Runner's World described the problem that fits my knee pain, and it sounds like my weight and lack of quad strength are likely culprits. I've decided that if I'm going to finish the Virginia Beach Rock 'n' Roll Half Marathon in a time I'm happy with, I have to do two things this summer -- lose a bunch of weight and improve my leg strength, especially my quads.

So my new program is going back to running only three days per week and not pushing the speed work for now, but hitting the bike hard at least three of the other four days. I'm also working on the Hundred Pushups and Two Hundred Squats programs of Tidewater local Steve Speirs, in addition to doing sets of planks and other core strength every day or two.

Yesterday I strapped Theo into his bike seat and set off. My first stop was the downtown Norfolk YMCA, just to see how long it would take to bike there -- looks like 10-15 minutes for me to cover the 2-ish miles, even with all the construction going on in that direction. I'd say there's a good chance we'll be joining there soon.

After my test ride to the Y, I set out for Norfolk's 5 Points community farm market. It's absolutely a treasure to have a source of local farm raised food available year-around, but I haven't been going there nearly as often as I'd like -- I don't have the car during the day and I favor destinations I can reach on foot. Now that I know how quickly I can get there and back on the bike, I'm likely to start visiting with Theo a couple times a week.

One more quick stop at Azar's to get Theo some Hummus (OK, I admit Daddy's eating it too) and we were on our way back home.

Of course, it figures...because of a seat malfunction and forgetting to restart my GPS watch after Theo stopped it, I don't have an exact mileage. I know it was at least 7.75, so I'm going to put a guess at 9.5 - 10 miles covered. I'm very happy with that. It made me tight enough this morning that getting started on my run was a challenge, but once I worked out the kinks I ran as well as I normally do for five miles with the stroller.

I figure a week or two of regular bike riding should get my body accustomed to the new work I'm giving it and with any luck, I'll start to show improvements in my run distance and speed as I hit muscles that haven't been working so hard up to this point. Next I have to find out if MacArthur mall has bike parking, anyplace where Theo can run wild in the morning is a prime destination...

Lies we tell our children

"No no no, Theo. That's Daddy's penis. You can touch Theo's penis, but we don't touch other people's penises."

I'll get into the exceptions to that one later, I guess.

Yes, this is an ongoing theme.

Gender stereotypes, two for one today only

Do I just not leave the house enough?

Monday morning, couple weeks ago now, I still had the rental car I'd used to drive Theo and I to Pennsylvania for the weekend, so I decided to take advantage and run to the commissary.

It was one of those perfect grocery trips. No crowds, lots of other kids for Theo to interact with and he actually walked with me and listened to me when I told him not to pick up glass jars from the bottom shelf.

Our bagger had a great time talking with Theo on the way to the car, but then came the question that every stay-at-home dad gets at some point: "...and Where is your Mommy?" The way she asked, her meaning seemed clear ... but I don't assume anything, and I'm polite even when other people aren't, so I gave the honest answer: "She's at work on the big ship, right Theo? We'll see her this afternoon. (Deep breath)"

"OH!" ... and then silence. I've heard this dozens of times -- The sudden realization that I am the stay-at-home spouse of a female sailor, followed by a fruitless attempt to find the right cliche or canned comment to make about our situation.

I'd forgotten about it by the time the car rental rep was driving us home. We were talking about our trip and I mentioned that we were both ready to be out of the car, after spending so much time together there over the weekend. She told me, "Well, you'll be really happy for that Daddy bonding time later ..." I didn't think anything of it, I just told her, "Oh yeah, we spend all day together, I stay home with him."

"OH!" ... and then silence.

I never let this bug me before I had kids. There's so few of us civilian male spouses, we just never make it onto most people's radars, so why would they have anything to say?

I try very hard not to feel slighted and I'm not playing the victim card here. After all, we're outside the norm and I just get an occasional silly question; my wife and other military women have had to deal with far worse stereotyping. And this isn't something that's unique to the military, I'm sure most stay-at-home-dads hear it from time to time.

Still, why would anyone still believe the underlying assumptions? They're either saying that Mommy SHOULD be at home, or else they're assuming Daddy wouldn't spend his days buying groceries, changing diapers and making dinner.

I guess I should be happy to be out there breaking down stereotypes, making it clear to the folks with preconceived notions that I'm happy my wife is in a career she loves and what's more I ENJOY spending all day with Theo and being the support system for a talented and driven Naval officer. I'm basically a 230 lb. kid, why wouldn't I love it?

Still -- not to beat a dead horse, since friends and I have been over and over the Mr. Mom thing -- I don't think I need to be happy about having my role minimized, as if somehow a man is missing the skills to be a good full-time parent and housekeeper.

In the end, my wife and I aren't out to make any grand feminist statements and we certainly never planned our lives to intentionally undermine traditional gender roles. We just feel lucky that we live during a time when each of us can have the job that suits our skills and temperaments. It's a wonderful feeling to know that even if I get a few weird questions and funny looks, no one thinks twice anymore about a woman in my wife's position.

Military spouse appreciation day

I hope both my readers spent today appreciating me -- today has been declared "Military Spouse Appreciation Day."

I guess I always have to be the contrarian, but I'm really not much for these sorts of observances. I know I'm appreciated by the folks who matter -- my wife, the rest of our family and my wife's shipmates/chain of command. I'm grateful for the sentiments of outsiders, but from my point of view there's nothing notable about raising our kid, supporting my wife and enabling her to achieve her ambitions. It's really just the bare minimum any responsible, loving person would do for their spouse.

No matter how difficult it might be to be separated, I'm not the one living in an enclosed space with 3000 strangers and not touching land for 6-9 months while being shot at. I know civilian couples who work more difficult schedules and endure weekly or monthly separations for business-related travel, some of them for less money than Ruth makes. I feel like we've got it pretty good: I make no money whatsoever, but she has a secure job that pays well enough (with some budgeting and planning, of course) for us to live out our values and she still comes home 7 nights out of 10 saying "I have the coolest job!"

I know not every military spouse feels this way and we are far happier about our situation than a lot of people in the military community -- so a happy Military Spouse day and THANK YOU to all those spouses for whom the military lifestyle is one of endurance, rather than enjoyment.

For those outside the community, wondering what "Appreciation" might mean in practice, beyond just one day of words, Leanne at MilitaryAvenue.com has 101 great ideas that don't neglect the male spouse.

My own thoughts about meaningful, ongoing ways to recognize the sacrifices of the spouse:

If you run a business that offers a military discount, offer the same discount to dependents. Her money is my money, so it's frustrating when a discount is only available to my wife who is so often away. Kudos to companies who DO recognize this reality and give the same treatment to servicemembers and their dependents, like USAA, Choice Hotels and Southwest Airlines.

Give of your time or money to the organizations supporting wounded soldiers and their families. They are the ones who have really had their lives turned upside down as a result of military service, and all indications are that the unconventional nature of this war and advances in battlefield medicine will leave our veterans with thousands upon thousands of permanent injuries that no one expected.

...and if you could do one thing for me today, stop asking my son where his mommy is at, as if I'm a stranger he was abandoned with. A post about this coming up later in the weekend...