OK, so I'm not the best Dad, I'm realizing.

OK, so I'm not the best Dad, I'm realizing.

As I envisioned it, I would probably have won big-time awards by now; Dad-Olympic medals, Dad-Pulitzer Prize, Dad-Nobel Prize. Teague and I would be walking down the street abreast, proud father and strutting son, he uttering childish observations hinting at early genius (Da Da, why E=mc squared?) and I would be instructing him gently in matters of English, manners, mathematics, physics, even perhaps throwing in some Spanish instruction...you get the picture. Of course things don't ever work out as you envision them in your best-dreamed scenarios. Teague is not exactly breaking any age-related barriers or stunning anyone with his precocity. As I've mentioned before in this blog, he is even behind in some physical and, perhaps, language categories, all except for the category of "cuteness", where he is pretty far ahead at this point. OK, so, maybe he will have to get by on his looks, is what I've been thinking recently. There are worse things, right?

It's just, at this point, a parent has many misgivings about one's own parenting skills. Have I been doing the right things? Should I have been putting Teague through baby Pilates (baby-Yoga, baby-Tai-chi, or whatever), or language acquisition boot-camp, or perhaps music appreciation class, or infant violin lessons? Instead, Mira and I have so far simply relaxed at home with our boy, played with him, gone for walks, gave him hugs, meals, etc. So far it has always been a simple mix of interactive play (as much as an infant can play) and then, just letting him play by himself. I mean, I find it very difficult to be 100% engaged with him all day, and often I turn to work on the family finances, or fix the drain, or clean up a million blocks scattered about the house, or fix dinner for the family, and so I let him rampage about the house throwing books, CDs, blocks, toys, dishes, etc all over. But then I think, well, maybe I should have been doing flashcards or drills or therapeutic art or some other thing with him that I understand other intense, goal-oriented, parents might do.

So, I'm not the greatest Dad I'm realizing. Sometimes I ignore Teague when he is grasping at my pant leg and moaning for attention. Sometimes I forget and leave the basement door open, and I find Teague rapt with amazement, leaning out over the precipice of the dark and foreboding descent, on the verge of tumbling down into the subterranean depths. I confess, many times I don't wash his hi-chair tray between meals, and worse yet, sometimes I just let Mumi (the killer Spaniel) lick it clean. Sometimes I get enraged with this 14-month-old (how stupid am I to get mad at a toddler!) and we have some dumb standoff over food because he is basically throwing it all over the place and refusing to eat and so I am angry and remove him from his hi-chair and he screams, face all twisted and ablaze in red streaks and tears, pathetically trying to climb back into his hi-chair, just to be presented with the same food once again, which he throws back on the floor, repeating the cycle. Yes, and sometimes I know his diaper is soaking wet, but I delay changing it because of some issue of timing in my mind, or just plain laziness, and despite his discomfort. And sometimes I'd really just rather read the paper than play "push the ball back and forth between us" for another several hours. There are times when I put Teague down for a nap, and I just want a strong drink because, well, because I want one, and anyway I drink too much anyway, so why not start early? I'm gaining weight, and I can hardly control my eating as I eat constantly when I feed Teague, and all the time when I'm fixing dinner for the family, all of this in addition to the actual meals that I eat with Mira. So, soon I will be a chubby, lame, unshaven stay-at-home-dad, just as one might predict. One time, I set Teague on the couch, just for a moment, while I turned away, and of course he threw himself backwards off the couch, and we were only saved from a brutal concussion by the fact that he actually landed ON TOP OF the killer Spaniel Mumi, who was just too startled to even be vicious about it and just ran off with a yelp, and Teague was only frightened and cried for like 2 minutes. Sadly, I let Teague crawl around the house totally filthy, in dirty clothes and with feet and hands practically black from household dirt, and then don't even really clean his face really well after his meal, and so he looks like a truly impoverished orphan with crusted food and filth and dog-hair all over him....

I simply should be a better Dad. I know it and I know I can be a better man. I feel I've accomplished much in life and Teague and Mira are the best things that I could possibly have found in life, and they deserve my best. Maybe I'm just in a bad state of mind. Maybe I'll do better tomorrow. Maybe tomorrow we'll get the finger paints out again, head to the park, laugh in the sun, even take a bath. Maybe.