Fatherhood

Jennifer and I woke about twenty minutes ago to Patrick crying ... nothing unusual. I asked her to get him since I have to start getting ready for work in about three hours (yes, I have to work on a Saturday). Where things became unusual was the loud, sustained crash, and Patrick's cries rising to a hefty scream. Being the concerned parent that I am ... with visions of his changing table collapsed on top of him, I rushed to their aid. "What was that?" I cried. Jennifer, weakly replied, "I fell down the stairs." With Patrick screaming at the top of his lungs, I think I actually asked her to repeat what she said. I found my wife sitting, with her legs out and my son in her arms, at the bottom of the stairs. Asking if she and Patrick were OK was mixed into confused questioning about what happened. Somehow, her feet went out from under her (we suspect a couple of the leaves that Patrick likes to play with were on the steps). While my real concern was i...

Revenge ... that state we get to when things do not go the way we want. With my son, I am learning that this is almost a daily event. Yesterday, I got upset when he turned the computer off while I was working on it. I was more upset that the work got lost than anything else, and I am learning to manage how I respond when upset. Patrick, on the other hand responded as you would expect a sixteen month old child to. He headed to the bookshelf and started ripping books off the shelves (I've got to move the First Edition and Signed books onto higher shelves). Today, when I took the clicker back, another book got tossed across the room ... the one I was reading at the time (John Carter in flight) ... I have got so much to learn.