Contrast

I’m biased. I know it. I still believe that my kids are really, really, ridiculously good looking. But I’ll be the first person to admit that at times there are slight differences in their appearances, often dependent upon their demeanor at the time the photo was taken. The differences are tiny, but if you look closely enough you may notice them.

Tolerance

I know it’s far easier to see in hindsight, but what a mess of bigotry and intolerance existed in this country. Thank you, MLK. Thank you protesters. Thank you people who didn’t bow to traditional views on a minority group.

Unfortunately, there is still is a great deal of bigotry and intolerance. I hope we can all move towards a society based on love, acceptance, and understanding.

While Meghan and I were off in Monterey…

Reese and Zoe were whisked away to Happy Hollow. Photos by Baldy.

A brief lesson in statistics

This is what Fox News showed:

See how glancing at that chart could lead you to believe that unemployment in November is higher than the 8.8% in March despite actually being less?  Maybe this makes it more clear:

23.5 Hours

What is the best preventative medicine in the world?

Villa Viscaya

We recently went away for a weekend to an amazing house on the coast with the rest of the nearby MacAskills (and some Beans).

Armageddon

Meghan likes to sleep in.  I’m fairly certain that without kids or responsibilities, she would rarely wake up before noon.  While some people call it laziness, I just view it as daily procrastination.  Meghan gets an incredible amount of stuff done every day, she just prefers to get started later than most people.  She also sleeps better and more deeply during the morning hours.  An errant children’s cough in the middle of the night wakes her immediately, but she is usually unaware of any morning chaos from our three small children.

I am an early riser.  Even when given the chance, I am rarely able to sleep past 6 AM.  There have been numerous occasions when I stay up until 3 or 4 AM working and then rise with the sun.  It’s both a curse and a blessing, but it’s certainly not a choice.  And unlike Meghan, I sleep like a log during the night.

Many years ago, we made a pact.  A dark pact forced on me by the situation at hand, our proclivities to different sleeping schedules, and her ability to feed babies without a bottle (she has breasts, I don’t think that’s a secret).  She is responsible for night-time feedings and I wake up early to handle the daily morning armageddon.

I don’t use that word lightly, either.  While Reese can be loud, she is usually a mild-mannered and relatively quiet child.  Zoe and Penny, on the other hand, could wake the dead.  Their combined screams would no doubt cause a deaf man to question his lack of hearing.  While Reese has an almost clockwork-like sleep schedule, Zoe and Penny are erratic.  I simply cannot predict which child will wake first or when they will wake up.  But here is what I can predict: chaos will ensue as soon as the first one does.  Armageddon.

Zoe and Penny both sleep with very loud white-noise machines inches from their heads.  That choice may come back to haunt us later on in life, but for now it prevents many unwelcome problems.  Unfortunately, at around 5:30 AM every morning, those sound machines stop functioning.  They still produce white-noise.  They just no longer prevent unwelcome problems.  One squeak, one sneeze, or one small sound of a door creaking open by Reese is all it takes.  Armageddon.

Zoe currently sleeps in a closet.  Literally.  There is barely enough room for her pack-n-play.   It’s also the most quiet, distant “room” in the house.  Between her and Penny, there are multiple doors and walls.  It doesn’t matter.  None of it matters.  Zoe could be in Europe and her first sound in the morning, always an unimaginably loud shriek of pure agony, would wake Penny up in California.  Armageddon.

Penny’s cries cannot yet match Zoe’s in terms of volume, but they have a piercing quality to them.  I can hear her just as clearly and loudly through a wall as through thin air.  Her screams also tug at your heart strings.  They are desperate pleas for assistance/help/attention.  In the morning, they never fail to reach Zoe’s ears.  Armageddon.

Reese is frequently the first to wake up.  Unfortunately, she would also be an absolutely terrible ninja.  She has no idea how to sneak.  Her natural gait on our wooden floor brings to mind a stampede of buffaloes.  When she opens or closes doors, she takes on herculean strength.  Armageddon.

And so every morning, when I am lucky enough to wake up before all three, I wait in silence.  On padded feet, I stalk the hall in preparation for the first sign of trouble.  Some days, I can get to the first child before she wakes the house.  Other days, I fall inches or milliseconds short.  The real problem is not having them all awake.  I love my kids and I cherish the time I have them to myself in the mornings.  The problem is that they are very demanding, not-very-patient children.  They each have their own desires in the morning.  Nobody dying of thirst in a desert has ever sounded so thirsty.  Even a robot would weep at Penny’s pathetic cries when I put her down for a minute in order to get Zoe.

Inevitably at least one of them has feces and it is never a nice, solid nugget.  No matter what size diaper or how tight it is, my kids have mastered the art of wiggling around in their sleep until that porridge-like-poop has climbed their spine and escaped the diaper’s safe embrace.  Creators of hazmat suits should study my children to find potential flaws in their designs.  I guarantee Zoe and Penny could wiggle poop out of a hazmat suit in their sleep.

Armageddon.