Because I have an amazing wife, the second Aline returned home from her girls outing a while ago, she began pushing me to get out with a friend of mine next. Granted, that may be in part because she was anxious to go out again, but it didn’t matter because she was sweet, supportive and patient and insisted that I have a good time, and I thank her for that. I took her up on her offer and, yesterday, enjoyed a round of golf with one of my best buddies of 32 years.

I don’t have any particularly funny stories to tell, or any deep, emotional discoveries to talk about. What I can say is that I learned, after I returned home, how much I needed a day like that. The weather was absolutely beautiful; it was one of those days where I actually admit to myself that there are things I still love about Los Angeles. There was cold beer, a lot of laughing, cigars and conversation. And it was the conversation, I think, that I found to be the most refreshing. For some reason I expected our entire round to be dominated with talk of the economy, poor investments, rising costs of living, loss of bonuses and the like; I believe my buddy’s financial situation to be very similar to my own. Surprisingly, aside from some light small talk, it barely even came up. It’s almost as if, sometime after I dunked my first ball into the lake on the fairway of the third hole and we had a good laugh, we both realized that this wasn’t about those things. It was about escaping them. And it worked.

The entire day we just joked, relaxed, hacked away and let the sun shine lazily down on us as the breeze blew the smell of fresh cut grass under our noses. It was more therapeutic than I ever imagined it would be; god’s prescription for what ailed us both, I suppose.

My friend and I used to be pretty damn good golfers, believe it or not, back in the days before children and mortgages. Back when we had the time to spend hours and hours on a course, honing our skills. Yesterday, though, we hit balls into lakes, off trees, into sand traps and cart paths, over fences and even into other golfers. But you know what? I think it was the best game of golf I have ever played.

-Matt

We have some cool baby golf-inspired clothes at our online boutique, RedSparks. Play through and check it out!

That’s why I have decided that my children, come rain or come shine, will not only know what the following 10 items are, but will love them. I do not care if their friends laugh and poke fun at them, or call me a fossil. Knowledge is power, and that works with the past as well as the present and future. Here we go:

Matt’s Kids’ Retro-10 Checklist

1. Chemistry Set. I haven’t seen a (real) chemistry set on a mainstream toy store shelf in over two decades. Probably because legal weasels got ahold of the companies that made them, waited for some kid to singe his hand on a Bunsen burner trying to see what burned sulfer smelled like, and sued them out of business. Stupid. I learned so much from my chemistry set that, even with the occasional “incident,” I still utilize a lot of that knowledge today.

2. Kick the Can. Pop quiz: How many hours a day did I sit in front of the TV and play Xbox when I was eight? Answer: None. Instead we played active, social childrens’ games like hide and seek and kick the can. Not only were they a blast, but we made new friends playing them and ran all….day….long. And, unlike Atari 2600, these games are still fun when you play them now.

3. Chess. OK. Granted, this is not so much a retro throwback and is still very much alive today, but I’d bet there are less kids playing it, even knowing how to play it now then when I was a kid. And in addition to sharpening a child’s ability to think strategically and apply logic, it allows them to spend a solid block of uninterrupted time with their father or mother, which is a very, very good thing.

4. EASY-BAKE Oven. No, not necessarily for Frankie, but for my son, Dominick, as well. Boys need to know how to cook, so they can get chicks in high school and keep them in marriage. The EASY-BAKE is still very much alive and well, and isn’t quite as gender-biased as it used to be. I LIKE the EASY-BAKE for both of them because it provides an actual reward for one’s efforts that can be shared with friends.

5. Big Wheels. I could be wrong on this one due to geographic limitations, so please correct me if I am. Here in Los Angeles, I haven’t seen a Big Wheel in over 15 years. This may be because there is so much traffic and a 45 minute car ride is required to play with one’s friends, but they are not here. If they have died out, I’m bringing them back. My Big Wheel provided me a tremendous amount of exercise and some of the best memories I ever had, even after the front wheel got old and got a flat spot on it.

6. Letters. I love paper. I buy really, really expensive thank you notes. It’s a vice and I actually think its kind of cool. After our recent trip home to visit my family, I wrote a whole mess of them to thank people for their hospitality and gifts. Not only was my hand killing me, but I made a ton of mistakes. I am forgetting how to write. And if I am forgetting, my kids aren’t even going to know how. Everything has a keyboard these days and, after a certain grade, they won’t ever pick up a pencil again. My kids? Are going to write letters. A lot.

7. Sockem Boppers. Pretty much faded away because they “promote unhealthy, aggression-based relationships between siblings.” But you know what REALLY promotes that type of relationship? My sister tearing up my ’58 Mickey Mantle All-Star card and then telling on me for stealing one of my mom’s valentine’s day chocolates. My sister and I would pop on the Sockem Boppers and go at it whenever we got mad at each other and had a lot of fun doing it. I see nothing wrong with it at all, and find it amusing that, in certain circles, grown adults pay $250.00/hr for this same type of therapy.

8. Shogun Warriors. OK, I don’t really think this is a great toy for my kids at all. I just wanted to talk about them because I had them and they were awesome and they were huge and Raydeen shot an iron-cutting fist and missiles across the kitchen at 80 miles per hour. Yeah, I was a little nerdy. Why do you ask?

9. Books. I have heard so many people over the last ten years, even people my own age and older say “I’m just not a reader.” Just so you know, when you speak that phrase to me, my mind automatically processes and translates it as “I big dummy.” I am ok, if my children read The Great Brain series and Harry Potter on a Kindle, I’m all about the environment. But, dad gummit, those kids will read.

10. Pizza Parlors. I will roam the earth until I find one. About once a month, my family would go out at night together, be it in the warmth of summer or the freezing snow, sit in Ken’s Pizza and enjoy ourselves some pie. There were little red glass candles, checkered table cloths, heavy dark wood and stained glass. It was about laughing, talking and connecting as a family, not about giant stuffed mice, germy rides and climbers, flashing lights and buzzers or tickets. These are some of my favorite memories when my family was all together, and I want my children to remember the same thing.

I believe all of the things I listed to be important (except for the Shogun Warrior, of course), but certainly have miles and miles more of things just like this. What are some of your favorite toys, games or activities from your childhood and, if you have children, do they enjoy these things too?

-Matt

I love Tim Burton. Not only did he attend my alma mater, which instantly makes me dark and cool by association, but his movies are terrific; Coraline is one of the best movies I have ever seen, hands down. One of my dearest blog friends, Barbara at TherExtras, is hosting a pseudo-carnival which, after finally figuring out the rules, I decided to enter. I never win anything when I post about poop, so hopefully this one will get me her cool Nightmare Before Christmas Collector’s Edition.

Children don’t play anymore. We, as parents, think our children play, of course, but the definition of the term has changed and this has serious developmental consequences.

It is no secret that active and exploratory play assists dramatically in social and cognitive development in children; research has supported this statement for decades. Think about what ‘play’ means to you as it pertains to your own childhood for a moment. Chances are you will remember some of the same things I do, Playdough, cops and robbers, cowboys and Indians; general make-believe imaginative activities. Our children, however, do not play in this manner. At least not as often as we used to.

According to the American Psychology Association and a report published recently by a non-profit group called the Alliance For Childhood, today’s kindergarteners in New York and Los Angeles (the geographical targets of the study) receive less than a half-hour of “choice time” per day. This term refers to unstructured, free play time during which the child can choose freely what type of activity to engage in. It extends out of the classroom as well. These same children receive an average of eight fewer hours of unrestricted play per week than did children 20 years ago. While children today do engage in developmental activities throughout the day, unrestricted play is lost to sports, video games and computer-based learning programs.

What is the difference? Simple. Exploratory play is better. This is not new thinking or aggressive avant-garde child-development theory, it is fact. Children respond better and more quickly to active, free and exploratory play than they do to instructor-based lectures or “edutainment” toys, and research has supported this since before I was born. In a study published in Developmental Psychology just last year, a group of preschool-aged children were shown magnets that would stick to a metal table. When the children were handed de-magnetized versions, they became very interested in why they would not stick, and played with them longer in an attempt to learn how they were different than the ones that would. Inversely, the group of preschoolers who had the de-magnetized versions explained to them beforehand by a teacher knew they would not stick before they were handed to them and lost interest in both types of magnets very quickly, also losing knowledge that would have been gained by playing with them for a longer period of time, such as physical properties, polarization, etc.

Why then, if we know that exploratory play is better, do we continue to push our children into framed educational environments, force feed them “edutainment” toys and structure their play? Fear. Child development researchers feel that this phenomenon stems from the basic fear of falling behind.

To me, this holds a great deal of water. Consider the advertisements we are barraged with on a daily basis. Two in particular come to mind. The first is a transitional segment that I see repeatedly on the Noggin network. It features a montage of clips from Noggin’s daily preschool lineup, and is voiced-over by a number of parents explaining how proud and impressed they are by their child’s knowledge. “…I pulled up to a stop sign and my three-year-old said ‘Look, Mommy. Octagon!’” gushes one voice. Another is that of a proud father explaining how his toddler knows the Spanish word for “red” and how amazed he is at this. The second example (the product shall remain nameless as I do not support it) is for an infant reading program that features one-year-old babies “reading” two and three-syllable words off cards. I remain skeptical as to whether the babies are actually interpreting the letters and not simply recognizing the shape of the word form, as they would with sign language, but the goal of the program is clear – get your child reading as soon as you can! As a result of this fear, LeapFrog, a company which makes toddler laptops and other so-called developmental toys (which, by the way, my daughter has never played with for more than 30 seconds) saw it’s annual sales quadruple from 2000-2006. Advertising has instilled a fear in us that, if we miss those precious early years during which our children’s minds are so absorbent and so thirsty for knowledge, our kids will fall behind, and we’re buying it up like tobacco.

“Hey! Matt!” you ask. “I thought you were gonna do some cute Halloween thing. This post sucks.” Hang in there. I will come to the point.

Halloween, and costumes in particular, speak to the exact opposite developmentally. The costume itself, while it may just seem cute and fun, actually benefits the child a great deal more than it may seem. Dr. Laurie Zelinger, a licensed child psychologist, states that dress-up “fosters the imaginative processes, and allows for play without rules or script. Dress-up allows for experimentation, role play or fantasy.” She also points out that it can reveal possible inner conflicts or trauma, based on how the child expresses the particular role he plays. Additionally, dressing up can assist in conscience development; when a child sets up and “follows” a set of rules he has created for himself based on his character (i.e. – “No, I can’t fly, but I can run super-fast and have laser eyes!”)

Dress up, along with other types of free-exploratory play, allow a child to “stretch” the way his mind works. It forces the child to set his own structure and his own “rules” and, in doing so, allows him to develop in a more gestalt manner.

Am I suggesting that sending your child out for one night in a bedsheet with two holes cut out of it will make him a genius? Not in the least. Children do need information and they do need the guidance of parents and teacher to help them receive it. I am, however, suggesting that a child will benefit from how we choose to provide them that information, and that the child who is allowed to experiment, discover and fail on his own will blossom developmentally more quickly than a child who is spoon fed the information by teachers or computers.

My own daughter proves this theory for me on an almost-daily basis. I mentioned that she hates her LeapFrog laptop. It’s not only that item. She almost immediately loses interest in essentially any item that instructs her or guides her. In contrast, she will sit on the edge of our porch and play with seashells, two plastic horses (that do nothing) and a handful of dish towels for hours. I don’t fully know the extent of what is involved in this particular game, except that all the items have names, talk to each other, and seem to take a lot of naps. Whatever she is dreaming up while the horses trample the dish towels and the seashells are sleeping is coming 100% straight from her, and she is growing from it.

In my opinion, Maria Montessori had it right, and most of the premises behind her method have become more important than ever. This year for Halloween, my daughter is going to be a witch with an orange face and pink hair (assuming she still wants to do that come the 31st) and I am certain that, in addition to having a terrific time and consuming large amounts of sugar, we will all have a very clear definition of what the orange-faced, pink-haired witch talks like, who her friends are, what she eats and what her special powers are by the end of the evening. My daughter will have created an entire “witch world” completely from her imagination rather than conforming to the pre-determined environments of Dora the Explorer or Wow Wow Wubzy. I believe that there is a great deal of benefit in this for her, both now and in the future, and suggest not limiting costume time to one specific day, rather allow it on any day. Use gloves, sunglasses, hats, towels, old shoes…whatever you have lying around. Doing so will help your child understand how they can build their own minds, instead of us doing it for them.

As the authors of The Scientist In The Crib so aptly put it, “”We want to understand children, not renovate them.”

-Matt
If you’re out of dress-up ideas, check out our online baby store, RedSparks!.

Every year, wildfires burn out of control here in Southern California and those of us who are fortunate enough not to be affected by them go on about our business with nary a concern. It’s a similar relationship that Midwesterners have with tornadoes and that I assume Floridans have with hurricanes. As long as it’s not tearing through my house, it’s chalked up to a simple fact of life.

As we all drove down the Golden State Freeway yesterday on our way to get free ice cream, Frankie noticed the billowing smoke and orange tongues of flame from a portion of the Station Fire, high up on the mountains just east of the freeway. The Station Fire is particularly bad. It has burned over 85,000 acres and, as of this entry, is only five percent contained. Our weather has created ideal conditions in which fire can thrive lately; triple-digit heat with very low humidity, and when I stand outside in the morning when the breeze is blowing west I compare the scene to the apocalypse. Smoky, orange skies with clouds of brownish smoke whisping by cast a spooky amber light on the city, even in the morning hours. Tiny pieces of white ash fall soundlessly down and accumulate on cars and shoulders like snow. The air tastes foul and at times it’s difficult to breathe. In point, there is no way to shield my daughter from the fact that something is wrong, so I simply addressed her questions as best I could with basic answers that one would usually give a four-year-old and moved on. Before long, we had passed it, had our noses deep in Strawberry Swirl and had moved on with our lives. We were content.

This morning I woke up and, as I sat outside with my coffee, was once again reminded by the coloring and odor of the air of the Station Fire. This time, however, it was Monday morning and my daughter was still in bed. My mind abandoned the fleeting thought and moved on to its own concerns; money, bills, job, kids’ school…typical Monday faire. I found myself forlorn at the thought of returning to work already, stressed out about the economy, annoyed that the Rams were going to have another bad season and generally pissed off at the world.

“I need a day off, dammit,” I said to myself with a scowl. “I’ve been working too hard. Don’t I at least deserve some time for myself? This economy just isn’t fair.” I got up and drove to work wearing a glowering mask of self-pity.

When I arrived, the first thing I did was check the news. There it was again. The Station Fire. I quickly scanned the article and was about to close the window when my eyes landed on one particular phrase.

The fire claimed the lives of Capt. Tedmund Hall, 47, and Spc. Arnaldo Quinones, 35, on Sunday, according to the Los Angeles County Fire Department. The two firefighters were killed while fighting the Station Fire when their vehicle went down a steep, 700-foot embankment Sunday afternoon.

I froze on that paragraph for a moment and my mind took over, immediately playing out a vivid scene for me in which two fire fighters, amidst towering flames, wearing heavy coats, pants, boots and helmets, dehydrated and exhausted from lugging huge amounts of gear through scorching heat went over the side of a mountain in a fire truck while working harder than I ever have in my whole life just to keep me, my family and others like me safe. Not for status, not for power or corporate ladder-climbing and, although I didn’t know them, I’d be willing to bet that it wasn’t for money either. It was so that my family and I could have ice cream, then go back home and sleep soundly in our home knowing we would be fine.

I then gazed at a photo I took yesterday of my son, now three-months-old, who has just started to do this

to me, thus closing the Baby Gap forever, and came to the understanding that while I was sitting there with my coffee this morning complaining about how bad I had it there were families of two heroic people out there who were sitting together in tears, the very first realization of a countless number of lasts just beginning to flit through their minds as their sorrow took hold and changed their lives forever.

I mourned for those firefighters, their families and so many others like them. And I created a new goal for myself right at that instant, or at least renewed my interest in adhering to an old one. It doesn’t involve money or cars or tuitions or vacations; it’s so much simpler and I am embarrassed for forgetting it.

I’m going to have a terrific Monday. I’m going to have a terrific life. Because, at the end of the day, if I can go home and wrap my arms around my wife and kids, laugh with them and wake up another day to do it again I truly do have it all, and to not love each and every minute of that would be not only inappropriate and disrespectful to those men and their families, but ungracious as well. And I am most certainly, humbly, grateful.

-Matt

My best guess is 1981. I’ve never been one to remember the years during which events happened. Some can rattle off the year for every little occurrence without batting an eye, and I am simply not one of them. I would have been nine, which seems about right, so my best guess is 1981.

I used to get a lot of sunlight in my bedroom when I was little during the summer. It flowed in brightly in the mornings and the whole room glowed a dazzling gold. When I think the nostalgic thoughts that sweep me back to the parts of my childhood I loved, I remember that light, and how it turned the darkness red when I had awaken but not yet opened my eyes. On this particular morning, however, I had been awake since the first sliver of grey-blue pre-dawn had stretched a lazy finger across my ceiling and the very first Cardinal had begun to chirp from far away on the neighboring farm. Today was a very big day.

As soon as I heard my mother in the kitchen and caught the first whiff of her morning coffee, I bolted downstairs to eat breakfast. She smiled at me and asked me to go up and put on my uniform so that we could all leave immediately after we ate. Happy to oblige, I ran back upstairs and burst into my bathroom, then paused and gazed for a moment at the counter. There, neatly and exactly where I had placed it so carefully the night before, was my baseball uniform. Number 23. White with red pinstripes; crisp, fresh and ironed, sitting in a prim folded pile next to my glove, spikes and cap, I wondered if Stan Musial had felt the same sense of pleasure, pride and excitement that I did when he looked at his uniform the morning of a big game. I decided that he must have, and got dressed, pausing for a brief moment to tip my hat in the mirror at an imaginary ballpark full of people following an imaginary home run.

It was the state finals. My team had gone all the way and we were squaring off against the very best the state had to offer. It was a team from the Jackie Robinson League, and they were better than us. We all knew it. We also knew we could win. We were that good. Following a long road trip north with three or four of my teammates piled into the sideways, pull up seats of my dad’s wood-paneled station wagon, we were addressed by our coach, given the batting order, and the umpire shouted the words that made my heart leap into my throat each and every game for eight years, “Play ball!”. As I trotted onto the field to take my position at second base for the first inning, I distinctly remember clamping my hands into tight, pale fists in a useless attempt to control their shaking. This was like no field we had played on before; it was huge. I don’t ever remember feeling truly intimidated before that game, but I was making up for it now. I fought the voices that told me I wasn’t good enough from my head, kicked the dirt, crouched down with my hands on my knees and we were underway.

The game was terrific. It had been a nail-biter through and through; in all honesty it was the type of game that baseball fans talk about 20 years after it occurred. The other team was bigger, stronger and oh so much faster than we were, but we had held our own and were teetering on the very brink of becoming the state champions. It was the top of the last inning, there were two outs, nobody on, and we were trailing by one. The crowd, which had tripled in size as word of the close score spread throughout the park, was on its feet. It was the stuff miracles of made of and it was my turn to bat. I rammed the knob of the bat into the paint of the on-deck circle, knocking the doughnut to the ground, adjusted my helmet, stuck out my jaw and walked to the plate. As I dug my cleats into the soft dirt of the batters box and moved my bat in slow circles I raised my eyes to look directly into those of the pitcher. He was a giant, and on top of the mound easily had a full foot of height on me. The noise from the crowd became almost deafening as he went into his windup. As he hurled the ball toward the plate I locked my eyes onto his release.

Curve Ball. Stay in the box.

The pitcher could throw a curve faster than most guys in the league could throw a fastball. Despite how I knew the pitch was going to behave I bailed out of the box in what felt like the split second before the ball struck my head.

“STRIKE!” I heard the umpire yell from where I laid in the dirt. The crowd moaned. He had scared me and my heart was now racing at an uncontrollable speed. I gave up trying to control the adrenaline that had overtaken by body and dug back into the box as the noise lever increased once more. Again, I looked directly into the pitcher’s eyes and he into mine as he started his motion. I locked in on his grip.

Fastball.

I dug my rear foot into the dirt and swung as hard as I could, my eyes riveted to the speeding baseball as it hurtled toward me. As my bat crossed the plate I heard a sound that has been, to this day, burned into the innermost depths of my mind.

“CRACK!”

It was one of those hits that you don’t even feel. The bat strikes the ball just in the sweet spot, so perfectly that the wood absorbs the entire impact. It’s the most beautiful feeling in the world. The crowd absolutely roared and, before I lowered my head and began to sprint toward first base, I caught a glimpse of the ball sailing deep into the outfield. I had clobbered it. Halfway down the baseline I looked up again and saw the first base coach manically circling his arm and pointing me to second. The ball had dropped and I was going to stretch a single into a double, maybe even a triple. I stole a peek into the outfield and saw the center fielder with his back to me crouching to pick up the ball. I grunted and pushed my legs to run faster. Everything became a blur as I rounded second base at full speed. I heard the second basemen screaming at the center fielder to throw it in and remember seeing a look of panic in his eyes as I ran past him on my way to third. We were going to win the championship.

With lungs burning in my chest I touched second base with the outside of my foot and bolted toward third. I looked up and saw the third base coach, jumping up and down from the excitement repeatedly giving me the sign to slide. The skin on the back of my neck tingled as I imagined the ball sailing through the air behind me and stared at the third basemen with intensity as I saw him raise his glove, eyes wide, to catch the ball and tag me out. A few strides from third base I extended my arms and dove head first toward the base, my body crashing into the ground in a fully extended slide right at the moment I heard the pop of the ball landing squarely into the pocket of the third basemen’s glove. As I slid through the dirt I stretched my fingertips as far out in front of me as I possibly could and prayed as I felt the impact of the ball inside the third basemen’s glove violently on my back. He was too late, my hands were already resting firmly on the bag.

“SAFE! SAFE! SAFE!”

The crowd erupted. My teammates were whooping and screaming, some crying, jumping up and down on the sidelines and smacking each other on the back. I saw my parents in the stands absolutely elated. I saw the pride in my fathers eyes and the happiness in my mothers. My heart swelled three times and I stood up to dust myself off as I caught the third basemen out of the corner of my eye dejectedly throwing the ball back to the pitcher. I was glowing as I stepped off the base to bend over and brush the dirt from my knees. It was at this very moment I felt once again, this time much more gently, the third basemen’s glove on my back. As I heard the umpire yell “OUT!” I realized what had happened as tears welled up in my eyes. The third basemen had faked the throw back to the pitcher and had held onto the ball, waiting for me to step off the base so he could tag me out. It was the oldest trick in the book and I had fallen for it. I looked up and saw the horror and disappointment in my teammate’s faces. The crowd had fallen silent and the only noise that existed now were the cheers of the opposing team as they ran off the field.

We had lost the game, and it was because of me. Although I had said “don’t worry, we all lost,” to practically all of my teammates at one time or another and meant it, this time it really was MY fault. Our entire season and, more importantly, our dreams, had been crushed in an instant by my stupid mistake. I had failed.

I haven’t talked much about my son yet and I have explained why. But as I was looking at him sleeping last night I started thinking about my own childhood and, although it was very pleasant, was not without its share of tragedy and disappointment. For whatever reason, the story I just told has been haunting me all day, and I wonder how my own father must have felt about that moment when I cost my team the championship. Clearly, it is an event that I will remember with a certain amount of shame for the rest of my life. But what about him? Gazing at my son’s tiny little sleeping body made me realize that my father probably had it worse than I ever did in that particular instant. Not only did he share my disappointment and embarrassment, but he hurt for his son as a father. Something I never really considered before last night. Its true, life can get pretty narrow sometimes and bad things happen to us once in a while. But I now realize that the worst things aren’t those that happen to us, they are those that happen to our children. Those events over which we have no control and can only offer encouragement as our children grieve or become heartbroken. I’m certain I will find a way to handle it but, to be honest? I’m not sure I’m ready for that.

-Matt

I try to be as open and honest as possible in my writing. I find that by lowering my guard a bit and being forthcoming with people I tend to deliver better content. At least I believe it to be better. The Baby Gap is just about as honest as it gets. The truth is, I don’t really have that much to write about my boy because I’m just not that into him yet. Now I am certain that if I had spoken what I just wrote in front of an audience I would have heard a collective “gasp” rise from the crowd. Perhaps even have been pelted by a few rotten tomatoes or old heads of lettuce. You’re not really supposed to say that you’re not into your kid, are you? It makes you cold and insensitive. A bad parent. One might even question your upbringing. But I do not believe myself to be any of those things.

To put a finer point on it, The Baby Gap is my term for the period of time from birth to around six-months-old where I feel completely disconnected from my children. I fell into the gap with Frankie, and I am in it again with Dominick. I watch my wife, Aline, sitting with our son on the couch, speaking to him quietly and looking lovingly into his eyes and shake my head because, as much as I would like to, I simply don’t feel it yet. I have not carried him inside me for the last nine months. I have not had to get up to feed him every two hours for the last one-and-a-half months. And I have not yet experienced any form of real interaction with him aside from changing diapers and cradling him in failed attempts to calm his crying while I wait for mommy to get into “feeding position.” We do not have a bond.

This might sound terrible and, to be honest, with Frankie I thought it was. I thought it made me an awful father and I honestly believed, as I read others talking about how much they fell in love with their children “the second they looked into their eyes,” that there was something wrong with me and that I would never really engage her emotionally. I was afraid that I would become one of those distant and hard-edged dads who never really become close to their kids because I just didn’t feel anything. I was supposed to feel something.

Then one day, out of the blue, Frankie looked at me and smiled. Not a faux-gas-smile, mind you. A real smile. Then she rolled over. Then she sat up. Then she laughed. Then she crawled. Then she hugged me. Then she walked. Then she made me a drawing. Then she made me laugh. And, last night, she said sweetly to me
“I love you, daddy. Sweet dreams. I’ll see you in the morning,” rolled over under her little comforter and went to sleep as I pulled the door to her room closed for the night.

It would be the understatement of the year to say I felt something.

Do I find myself in The Baby Gap because I am male, and require more visual stimulus to create an emotional response than my wife? Or am I there simply because six weeks isn’t really enough time to get to know anyone, even your own child? At the end of the day, it doesn’t matter. Because tomorrow I will turn around and catch a fastball from my son, tousle his hair and throw him up on my shoulders as we laugh and play in the sunshine, and I will feel something.

For now? I’m A-OK with that.

-Matt

Did you know my daughter was a preemie and that’s why we started our online boutique, RedSparks? Check out our preemie clothes. They’re cute.

1. Shin trauma. A particularly painful injury to the shin bone caused by placing all of one’s weight on the knee while attempting to drive the base of a child seat into the back seat of an automobile, thus ensuring a tight fit. While injury is suffered immediately, pain and discoloration will not set in until the following morning. Expected recovery time: 4 Days.

2. Ruptured Bushel Basket. Can be caused by a number of situations, the most common of which is a toddler making a sudden attempt to get up while sitting or laying on one’s stomach, forcing a razor-sharp elbow deeply into the unprotected groin area. Sharp, searing pain is usually accompanied by weird stomachache similar to what one might feel while suffering from diarrhea. Expected recovery time: 1 – 2 hours.

3. Shiner. Typically inflicted by younger children with underdeveloped gross motor skills. Caused by a sharp, unannounced blow to the cheekbone or eye socket from an infant seated on ones lap looking at photos on the computer. Expected recovery time: 1-2 weeks, depending on severity and strength of child.

4. Biceptual Asymmetry. More a chronic physical condition than injury, Biceptual Assymetry refers to the comical look a father develops after two years of carrying his child in his car seat in the right or left hand exclusively. Usually identified by hulking, enlarged bicep on one arm, typically 300-400% larger than the opposite bicep. Expected recovery time: Never.

5. Flop Toe. An inflammation of the skin directly between the large and middle toe of the foot caused by toddler repeatedly following too closely and stepping on the heel of one’s flip flop while playing “chase” around the house. In severe cases, lesions or abrasions may be visible, and can lead to much greater and more serious injury should victim be caused to fall. Expected recovery time: 2 days if flip flops are put away.

6. Stinger. A sudden, electrical stabbing or pinching pain in the Sciatic nerve or the muscles along the spinal column. Stingers are most-commonly caused by attempting an activity with one’s child that one was unaware that they could no longer perform. (i.e. Wiffle Ball, dancing or running). Expected recovery time: 1-2 months.

7. Bjorn Back. A dull, throbbing pain across the Latissimi Dorsi muscles of the back present in those individuals who attempt to “simplify” their daily routing by wrapping their infant in a cocoon-like device called a “bjorn” and strapping them to their stomach. May be treated with Epsom salt bath and heating pad. Expected recovery time: 4 days.

8. Legoscopy. Not a injury, but a medical procedure performed in complete darkness, usually while crying at 3AM on the corner of one’s bed that involves meticulously removing a razor-sharp Lego from the sole of one’s foot which had previously been deeply embedded into skin by putting one’s full weight onto said Lego on the way to the bathroom. Estimated recovery time: 5-7 days.

9. The Spins. An unexpected physical state of confusion, disorientation and nausea, usually accompanied by the realization that the little roller coasters in the children’s section of the amusement park are far more violent and back-wrenching than their adult counterparts. Estimated recovery time: May be treated instantly by spweing into a trash can and eating a baked pretzel.

10. Eustachian Obliteration. A temporary, ringing and painful loss of hearing in one ear caused by any piercing shriek of a toddler over 150db while holding child in arms. Other symptoms include dizziness and headache. In rare cases, canines may be affected. Estimated recovery time: 20 minutes.

-Matt

Cool kids Summer clothing on sale now at our online boutique, RedSparks.

It ain’t that easy.

But I also have met a lot of other really cool dads along the way, and knowing them has helped me understand that, not only am I not alone in my strife, but that most of my issues are no greater or more unique than anyone else’s. That really helps. There’s the dad that helped me out in the very beginning and that I promise to get a post to this week and there’s the dad that snuck me into his secret club. There’s a West Coast drinking buddy dad and the dad that makes me feel guilty when I do drink because I should have been working out instead of ordering an extra shot. (I had no idea that guy was all ripped and whatnot!) All in all some pretty cool guys.

Then there are those little events that happened this morning, where I woke up to find Grandma and Frankie making me this cool monster card,

I got a really nice gift and a beautiful card from my wife who somehow found time to get to the mall while sleeping less than two hours a night and I got to eat Burger King Croissan’wiches for breakfast. At the end of the day, really, does it get any better?

The truth is that the ageda, exhaustion, trials and tribulation are what makes being a father so great. If it were easy, no one would appreciate it for what it means. I love it, and want to wish a sincere and heartfelt “Happy Father’s Day” to all those guys who go out there and make it happen for their families day in day out. We’ve come a long way since our fathers’ Father’s Days, and I’m proud to be a part of such a great group.

Rock on, dads.

-Matt


There aren’t any real Father’s day specials on our site, RedSparks, but we have a few things with skulls on them. Check them out!

The problem with parents who attempt to “show up” the other parents by hosting gigantic catered birthday galas for every kid their child has ever known is twofold. First, and most obvious, is CPP’s main gripe. Expense. My daughter has around 25 kids in her preschool class. Not only is it expected that each and every kid attend each and every birthday party, but it is expected that the parents will provide a gift to each child as well. There also exists an expectation about what said gift must be. A five-dollar whoopie cushion from the corner drugstore won’t cut it. These kids wear Prada. I believe that, in addition to wiping out my 401K so that I can outfit some child I barely know in the latest UGGs, this sends a very negative message to the child themselves. No one I have ever known gets 25 gifts, fancy gifts no less, on their birthday, not including what they receive from family. It teaches the child to expect royal treatment throughout their life in addition to spoiling them and making it almost impossible for the child to learn the value of their possessions. A kid that age simply can’t play with a toy or put together a puzzle with any focus at all when there are 24 other presents waiting to be unwrapped. The puzzle ends up lost or on the floor.

The second reason has to do with the parents’ motives and their commitment to the life experiences of the child. I may get in trouble for saying this, but I actually believe that these children enjoy these parties less than they would if the parents took a step back, forgot for a minute about how impressive their kid’s party could be and started thinking about how fun they should be. Half of what I see when I attend these parties is for the parents and not the kids. Sure, they get to run around and play and have a blast. Kids can have fun anywhere. But typically the events are thrown in some rented venue where there is supervision supplied by the people who work at the venue. The parents generally congregate around an elaborate spread of food designed to impress while they discuss the 100-dollar centerpieces in their Burberry scarves.

Color me old school, but I think it should be about fewer guests and more about what the child truly loves. Forget the mini-quiches and the grilled eggplant with mozzarella cheese and roasted pine nuts. Have pizza and hot dogs and spend some time having a birthday blast with your child. There was one particular party thrown by my mother that, some 30 years later, I remember like it was yesterday. She sent out invitations that she had made by hand. Little scrolls rolled up with the edges burned so they would look medieval. She stayed up all night rolling up newspaper and painting it silver to make an entire armory of swords and lances. She made knights helmets out of cardboard, each one complete with a feathered plume form the craft store and its own unique face plate design. We had ourselves a tournament. There were sword fights and hammer throws, Guineveres and Lancelots. She wrapped it all up with a good old fashioned Big Wheel jousting tournament and to the victor went the first slice of cake. It was absolute heaven and I am fairly certain that, while it cost her a lot in effort and sleep, it barely made a dent in her checkbook.

People will do what they do, and I really don’t have any right to judge them. But I what I can do is make sure my daughter understands the difference between excess and quality. I want to give her the gift of blissful nostalgia when she thinks back to her birthday parties, and there won’t be any Louis Vuitton in sight, I promise you.

I think now I know why dear old mom gave me that article, and I’m glad she did.

-Matt

Would it be totally lame if I now asked you to click over to our online baby store, RedSparks, and spend all your money?

Everyone knows my son has been born, and that he is beautiful and amazing and perfect. The delivery was early and tough. I’m not going to lie to you, I found myself throughout the process thinking “Oh, man, we are NEVER doing this again…we just don’t do childbirth well. We have a hard time. We have bad luck.” It was an emotional process, to say the least.

Several years ago, after Frankie was born, I had a breakdown. Aline was at the hospital; it was late at night. I went out in to my backyard, worrying about my daughter’s survival. I leaned up against the back wall of my house, next to the bay window where no one would ever see me, even though there was no one there, and cried like I have never cried. There is something that guys do. They hold everything in and they don’t let anyone see that they’re hurting for fear of being viewed as weak or unsupportive. But they DO hurt. This particular time it just all came out. It needed to come out. I dried my eyes, took a deep breath, tried to make it look like I hadn’t just bawled my eyes out, and went back in to my empty house.

I thought I would make it past the breakdown this time. Dominick was born early, but not that early. He was 7lbs, 6oz, and was out of the NICU in less than 24 hours. This was EASY compared to Frankie. I was still freaked out, and worried about my wife’s health, but it didn’t seem like something worth crying over. I was A-OK and in control.

About a week after he was born, and had just come home with Aline, I was at the market. I had let the house go, and there was no food anywhere to speak of. A new mom and her family have to eat, so I was replenishing the pantry. I heard the text alert go off on my phone, and grinned as I pulled it out of my pocket, expecting to see another congratulatory message from friends or family on the birth of our son. As I stood in line at the checkstand, listeneing to the New Yorker checker making jokes, I read the following message.

“Diana passed away tonight. Please don’t text me or call me.”

Diana was the one-week-old daughter of a girl I know fairly well. I remembered initially feeling that this girl was far too young to have a child, and even admit questioning her decision to keep the baby when she knew there would be complications immediately following birth. But, throughout the pregnancy, I looked at the little ultrasound pictures she had all around, heard some of the things she told my wife and friends about her excitement and came to realize that this girl was ready to be a mother. She changed my mind, and I admired her strength and dedication to her unborn child. She proved me wrong.

I had the breakdown again. Right there in the market. I hid it until I got to the car, then it just flowed. So badly that when Aline saw my face when I walked in the door she panicked because she thought something terrible had happened to me or to the new baby. I just couldn’t stop it. It was less than manly for sure but, once and a while, I need to be less than manly.

Once again I have been reminded, this time through this girl’s terrible and tragic loss, how lucky I am. There are people out there going through things so unimaginable that they would probably kill to enjoy the experiences in my life I call diffucult. My life – my friends, my children and my family are beatiful and perfect…even with what I consider to be faults. I have absolutely no right to complain about anything, and will wake up tomorrow with a renewed appreciation for everything I have, the experiences I have been through and the incredible people around me.

Life is beauiful and terrible thing; the more I live it, the deeper my love/hate relationship with it becomes. There is one thing of which I have become certain. If you don’t take a few minutes every day to love every little bit of it, you are doomed to go through the tiny portion of it you have left missing every single gift it has given you.

Rest in peace, Diana.

-Matt