Looming

So, you only get a few massive, rather unsettling, yet still exciting changes in your life.

Many of them, well, you can't really plan for them, they hit you like a wayward brick at a rather shoddily managed construction site: having your kids visit you with brochures for an old age home, winning the lottery, your bestest friend in the whole wide world moving away even though you promised to be like the two musketeers in the sixth grade.

Others are well planned, expected, yet no less, or perhaps even more life changing: marriage, graduating, bringing your aging parent brochures for the old age home, a new baby.

It's a looming event. An event so massive and altering that your brain shuts down trying to comprehend how your life will be different (hopefully better).

I guess I take the 'glass half-full' theory. For many reasons.

One, I quite despise those super happy new agey touchy feely sort of people who insist that the birth of a new baby is the 'adventure of a lifetime' and 'children are such a blessing' and then go off about crystals and indigo children and all sorts of scientifically unverifiable crap that just makes one feel good about being an assistant manager at Kinko's with crushing student debt and three children in Montessori classes you can't afford.

I mean, yes, they are, absolutely, great, fantastic, funny, LOVE LOVE LOVE etc.

But there is the other side, y'know. The side that's made of so many poorly conceived Steve Martin family movies with sappy endings that have no relation to financial realities in a recession economy and the inability for a middle class family to save for post-secondary education.

The chaos, the tears, the meltdowns, the BATTLE OF THE WILLS, the screaming because you had no idea what you're doing before with one kid and now you have two and OHEJESUS WHYDON'T THEYHAVE AHOTLINE FOR THIS (or at least a small SWAT team at the ready)!?

I guess I don't want to delude myself into an idyllic life.

I approach the new baby about to enter our lives as, number ONE, a towering responsibility. Shit don't get more super serious than raising a child. I make light of most things. Anything. But the whole raising a child so he's a somewhat productive member of society is the stuff that adults are made of. Or stuff that crosschecks you into adulthood.

And I suppose I'll cede, yes, children are pretty awesome. They're ALL ABOUT THE FUN. Party times, 24/7 . They're like comedians without any routine. Did I just liken parenthood to raising comedians without routines into being productive members of society? As far as I can tell, that's not far from the truth.

I just hope they pick a good retirement home for me.