Diary of a campus dad

Dear Diary:

I wonder why they insist I call you ‘diary’ when in high school they called you ‘personal journal.’ Why is the counsel on this side of hell different?  The denizens of hell act as if it is not scary enough to be here. Have they grown lazy over the years, so that now they find it convenient to simply brand you ‘diary’? I guess we will never know. These short-cut-loving sons and daughters of the soil are not for us to understand.

I hate diaries. The very idea behind keeping one chaps my shorts. I have come to this conclusion after several failed attempts to stay loyal to my diaries.  Right now, the way passion diaries arouse me is not any better than the one I reserve for failed political systems. This is for the simple reason that diaries simply disorganize me. I long fell out of love with the very idea the word carries: planning my day. I love to do things my own way, uncontrolled. Untamed. By rules or person.

So I will call you ‘Personal journal.’ 

What’s there to tell you, really? Haven’t you witnessed it all ever since Seanice came along? Was it not you that reminded me of her first birth a week ago? Weren’t you the one who suggested I skip the group meeting, or better yet ask the leader to reschedule it? If to see is to believe, then to retell an obvious tale is to preach. Unfortunately that is for pastors, not campus dads.

But I will tell you regardless. I will assume you have seen nothing. Maybe that’ll be a chance to gauge if I lie truthfully. It is easy to tell fibs, you know. It is even easier to be caught. Take a case where you (assuming you can) steal a plane, fold its wings and insert it in your pocket. Will it be difficult to see through the narrative that you were only testing it? So, because I don’t want to entangle myself in my own web of lies, I’ll endeavor not to stretch the truth.

Now, I wonder why I even talk about lying here. No one truly ever lies. We simply tell different truths, truths which collide with those held by others. And the political class in every state has these truths in abundance.

I hope Seanice doesn’t look me in the eye one day and tell me in her shrill voice; ‘daddy, I am considering joining politics.’ It is hard to tell the truth and win in a political contest. That’s just about what her mother and I intend to teach her. We will emphasize the need to be truthful in her pursuits. The dilemma is that it is easy to lie for a living.

But, dear diary (here goes the cursed word again!); I fear she’s going to be one. She’s going to be a politician! A good day is judged by the morning that precedes it. Haven’t you noticed how she gazes at her mother as if to thunder, ‘point of order, Ma’am Speaker!’?

She’s only a year old and she already fusses about everything. Last night, she nearly drained her lungs when I gave her sick mother a fatter share of attention. She must have thought we were deliberating on how to dispose of her, like they do firebrand politicians in a dictatorship. I have a feeling this kid will lead a massive walk-out when she eventually becomes a (dis)honorable member of the August house.

That is the more reason I will leave these musings on these pages. When she gets to that age when she can read, maybe she will reconsider her ambitions.  I won’t interfere if she remains determined. When a person is determined to lie for a living, what do you do?

And that is the thing about parenting. Sometimes, you do things against your wish for the sake of your kid. You won’t live their life for them however much would wish to. But this is a lot easier, because here, you are talking about a person who has already grown wings and can fly on their own.

The hardest part of being a first-time parent. A first-time dad, on campus. Often, it finds you clueless about a lot of things. I am now doing well. I am a fast learner. Or perhaps Seanice is the good teacher here. She has taught me a lot about baby-speak. I am not as fluent as her mother, but I am not as badly off as when she first came on.

Nobody needs a college degree to be a parent. No school teaches you how to handle the new member of your equally nascent family.  No one was born parenting. It is not a job we know. We just learn it as we go. Trial and error; a very costly affair. Seanice nearly choked to death a few evenings ago when I accidentally dropped milk in her nose. If it wasn’t for her mother’s first aid skill, I would be writing another story.

Wait a minute. Isn’t that her kicking the lampshade? I have to go check her out. Don’t move an inch.