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This is a slow period for news at my house. I get up, putter around, eat a meal and go to bed. What a life! (What? A life?)
One piece of news: Dorothy Hatch (Aunt Dot) passed away Thursday morning (2-11-16). Her funeral service will be held Dot is the wife of my father's brother (Leonard). During the Allies WWII landing on Normandy Beach June 6, 1944 (D-day), Leonard sustained a shrapnel wound to the head. He recovered, but became a diabetic, a condition that contributed to his early death at age 52. Dot and Leonard were both school teachers (at San Simon, Ash Fork, and Holbrook, among other places) and, perhaps because they shared that vocation with Daddy, they were the only one of my fathers siblings to visit our house (at least that is the way I remember it). I still have a vivid mental image of their arrival in a Volkswagen Bug. Dot and Leonard got out, followed by six kids, a dog, and a skunk. It would have made a great commercial. You may remember that Barbara and Aunt Dot took a genealogy trip through several midwest states a few years ago. |
| Since AJ is an expectant father with many adventures awaiting him, I thought I might take this opportunity to enlighten him about a few of the facts of fatherhood. |
This is what you will look like after helping out your wife by walking the floor with a crying baby four nights in a row.
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People are different when it comes to choosing a name. I couldn't name my kids until I saw them... Fortunately my wife wouldn't let me call them, "Hamburger."
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As a parent there are only a few basic skill you will absolutely have to master.
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While different generations face different challenges, humans are basically unchanged since Adam.
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Luckily for you, kids usually don't disparage their parents for their first 12 to 13 years... Enjoy!
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Developmental milestones don't differ much between generations...
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So, if you experience difficulties finding a job right out of college, maybe you can think of some other way to generate income...
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And all those nursery rhymes you memorised? You are going to find that many of them don't make sense...
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While kids aren't indestructible, they are close. But it usually take multiple kids to figure that out...
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And you may find yourself modifying family traditions...
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Kids don't come with instructions, but most new parents develop a knack for filling in the blanks.
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Life has a certain symmetry to it and what goes around tends to come back around later. I have to admit responsibility for some of the grey in my mother's hair, so I don't have a lot of room to complain. But take a moment to think of the trouble you caused and you might glimpse a tiny hint of what your future holds. In the end, you (like generations before you) will probably find that your kids were absolute terrors who stretched your patience, endurance, and compassion to the limit, but your grandkids made it worth the effort.
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Been There--Done That--Lived to Tell about It
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