So, hey, I'm a father now.

So, hey, I'm a parent now. It's odd. One moment it was just Elizabeth and I and the next moment there was this whole other person. 

There are about a billion thoughts going through my head about having a baby. A son. A, you know, member of the future generation. Don't expect this to be all coherent, but these are my thoughts. 

When I first started dating Elizabeth something strange happened to me. The best way I can describe it is that a dam burst inside me somewhere releasing all these here-to-for unknown emotions. the concepts of love, happiness, satisfaction- all that- ballooned into something far larger than I thought they could ever be. That is how I knew she was different. That is how I knew this wasn't a girl I could live without. more than 10 years on, and things are going well. Down right awesome actually. 

So, now this baby shows up. Throughout Beth's pregnancy I felt love for the little boy growing inside her, but when I saw him come out, when I saw him laying on his mother's chest- minutes old and still wet and a bit...say... cheesy- it was like an all new dam burst inside me flooding me with a whole new batch of emotion. The love I feel for him is so much more than I thought it would be. 

It makes me wonder how many more dams are waiting inside my emotional center. I'm pretty thrilled to find out. 

I was in the room when Beth gave birth. More than that, I was part of the primary decent team. I was called by the captain, told to put on a red shirt and then given a duty. If I was any more involved with the  process they would have given me a catcher's mitt. 

In my grandpa's day, the men were forced to wait outside, smoking cigarettes with a dozen other worried and impatient fathers. In my dad's day, they could go inside the delivery room but were then forced to leave after visiting hours. Today, the tell the fathers to grab a leg and get going. Cutting the umbilical cord was the least of it. Still, I got to see him come out. I saw the hair, the top of his wrinkly little head and finally his whole head- including detached earlobes. It was a crazy, scary experience but it's also the best experience I've ever had. 

Newborn baby poop is like... horrible. I thought I knew what poop was like but this stuff... black and sticky. Like an alien symbiotie about to turn into Carnage. I think babies absorb all the world's evil while they are in the womb only to poop it out in a tarry, viscous ooze. 

I just don't care if people are annoyed. I'm going to show off pictures of my baby. He is a good looking kid and I'm gonna get his face out there to anyone who can see it. Will I lose friends? No. Besides, I got all the friends I need. 

Being a new father is like being in a cult. There is sleep deprivation, a lot of singing and chanting, wearing robes and you are totally dedicated to a person you've only known for a few days.