As most of you know, I am an only child. You probably think that once my parents got a glimpse of me, they decided not to have any more children. On the contrary, I was so exceptional that they wanted to have more. At least that is what they told me. Unable to have another, I did my best to work the only child thing as long as I could. My mother felt that I was perfect. Not so sure she understood the full picture, but it was always nice to know she thought I was pretty good. My dad usually didn’t agree with her assessment, but that is another story.
Although I enjoyed the fruits of being an only child, I also suffered the pain of being the last of the Churans. I wasn’t allowed to get a bicycle until I was in the eighth grade. Do you know how hard it was to learn at the age of 13? My curfew was always early and I was rarely allowed to leave the yard growing up.
As a result, I was certain that I would never be the father of an only child. I always wanted three. Not sure why, but it just seemed like a good number to me. It was never my plan to wait until I was 38 to become a parent for the first time, it just happened that way. Children were always part of the plan and I couldn’t wait until my first was born.
Unlike, my mother, who had to wait 17 ½ years to get pregnant, Julia was a quick learner. The very first month that we decided to start a family, she became pregnant. Boy, was this going to be easy.
I had read enough over the years to believe some of the propaganda that you should enrich your child’s time in the womb by playing music and talking to the fetus. Because we wanted a child that was mild mannered, I decided that Julia should be listening to New Age music whenever possible. We had become fans of David Arkenstone and decided that our child should also. We even played it at the birth.
Being somewhat old fashioned, we did not press to find out the sex of the child before the birth. We picked out names, Justin Andrew and Jessica Alise so that we would be ready for the blessed event. So as not to prejudice the result, we never called the baby anything but “Ralphie” after the star of the movie “Christmas Story” which had come out several years before but was a favorite of ours.
It seems that either Ralphie loved to dance to the David Arkenstone music we provided or he was just a maniac. He was behaving just the opposite inside Julia as our music intended. It was not unusual to see Julia’s belly bulge out from a stray foot or fist. It almost became comical. It seems as though Ralphie never slept, there was always something punching Julia.
The day before Justin was born was like any other. It was a Friday and Julia and I even drove over to the West side of town to eye a Christmas tree that we had been watching the price hoping that it would drop. The store was closed but we still admired it through the window. You would think in February, they would be paying us to take it off of their hands. We would eventually buy it and it still is the tree that we use for Santa to “drop off” as Justin would later say.
Later that night we fell asleep on the couch watching TV, needless to say, we were relaxed. Julia awakened around 11 PM and realized that it was time. She very casually took a shower, shaved her legs and made herself beautiful. I ran around in circles accomplishing very little. Thankfully she didn’t tell me that the contractions were progressing fairly quickly or I would have run into a guardrail on the way to the hospital.
The birth was pretty uneventful but I’ll be honest with you, I really wasn’t very prepared. All I thought about was how special it would feel when I held my child for the first time. I just knew it would be an instantaneous bonding. Yet despite that build-up, it just didn’t happen.
Justin came out looking like a boxer that had lost a hard fought 12 round match. His nose was bent to the side and when he cried, one side of his mouth dropped down about an inch more than the other. I immediately started looking at the warrantee to see if there was a chance to trade this one in on a new one. When we commented on the obvious defects, the doctor just laughed and said he would look normal by the fourth or fifth grade. What had we gotten ourselves into?
It didn’t get any easier after we got home. He was colicky and cried all the time. I would have to lay on the floor next to his crib just to get him to go to sleep at night. Sleeping through the night was unheard of. For three months, we looked like the “Dawn of the Dead.”
Thankfully, after three months he settled down but he maintained his main fault which was spitting up. You could not hold him for more than 10 minutes without him spitting up and soiling your clothes. When we put him on the floor, there had to be a sheet, or the carpet would be ruined. Despite this problem, he was quickly becoming a Suma-sized baby. He had more chins than I had debts. The kid could eat.
We always felt that he has half alien in that he always did things early. He could hold on to my thumbs and stand on his own at one month. He had teeth at about four months. He crawled for only a month because he walked 3 days after his seventh month. He could walk across the room on his own five days later. This kid had more bumps and scratches than you could count because he wanted to walk everywhere before he really knew how to control his body.
As he grew older, he had more energy than Lance Armstrong. He was running everywhere. He would do summersaults non-stop. After his brother was born he constantly did cartwheels just to get attention. There wasn’t anything tall enough that he didn’t think about jumping off.
Many years later, we found out that he liked to put metal objects into electrical outlets once we felt it was save to de-babyize the house. How he is still alive, I’ll never know.
Even though I did not feel that instant bond when I held Justin for the first time it certainly got there soon there after. I just don’t know what I would do without both of my boys. They have created more challenges in my life than I could ever imagine, but I wouldn’t change one part of the last 19 years.
Justin no longer does cartwheels every time I bring out the camcorder, but he still brings a special joy to my life that I cannot describe. In many ways we have become great friends without making it unparentlike. I still yell at him when he does something wrong and praise him when he does something right. We often see things with the same eyes, but there have been more than a few times we have been on the opposite ends of the spectrum. In many ways we are a lot alike. Despite that, I love him more than he will ever know.
Although I enjoyed the fruits of being an only child, I also suffered the pain of being the last of the Churans. I wasn’t allowed to get a bicycle until I was in the eighth grade. Do you know how hard it was to learn at the age of 13? My curfew was always early and I was rarely allowed to leave the yard growing up.
As a result, I was certain that I would never be the father of an only child. I always wanted three. Not sure why, but it just seemed like a good number to me. It was never my plan to wait until I was 38 to become a parent for the first time, it just happened that way. Children were always part of the plan and I couldn’t wait until my first was born.
Unlike, my mother, who had to wait 17 ½ years to get pregnant, Julia was a quick learner. The very first month that we decided to start a family, she became pregnant. Boy, was this going to be easy.
I had read enough over the years to believe some of the propaganda that you should enrich your child’s time in the womb by playing music and talking to the fetus. Because we wanted a child that was mild mannered, I decided that Julia should be listening to New Age music whenever possible. We had become fans of David Arkenstone and decided that our child should also. We even played it at the birth.
Being somewhat old fashioned, we did not press to find out the sex of the child before the birth. We picked out names, Justin Andrew and Jessica Alise so that we would be ready for the blessed event. So as not to prejudice the result, we never called the baby anything but “Ralphie” after the star of the movie “Christmas Story” which had come out several years before but was a favorite of ours.
It seems that either Ralphie loved to dance to the David Arkenstone music we provided or he was just a maniac. He was behaving just the opposite inside Julia as our music intended. It was not unusual to see Julia’s belly bulge out from a stray foot or fist. It almost became comical. It seems as though Ralphie never slept, there was always something punching Julia.
The day before Justin was born was like any other. It was a Friday and Julia and I even drove over to the West side of town to eye a Christmas tree that we had been watching the price hoping that it would drop. The store was closed but we still admired it through the window. You would think in February, they would be paying us to take it off of their hands. We would eventually buy it and it still is the tree that we use for Santa to “drop off” as Justin would later say.
Later that night we fell asleep on the couch watching TV, needless to say, we were relaxed. Julia awakened around 11 PM and realized that it was time. She very casually took a shower, shaved her legs and made herself beautiful. I ran around in circles accomplishing very little. Thankfully she didn’t tell me that the contractions were progressing fairly quickly or I would have run into a guardrail on the way to the hospital.
The birth was pretty uneventful but I’ll be honest with you, I really wasn’t very prepared. All I thought about was how special it would feel when I held my child for the first time. I just knew it would be an instantaneous bonding. Yet despite that build-up, it just didn’t happen.
Justin came out looking like a boxer that had lost a hard fought 12 round match. His nose was bent to the side and when he cried, one side of his mouth dropped down about an inch more than the other. I immediately started looking at the warrantee to see if there was a chance to trade this one in on a new one. When we commented on the obvious defects, the doctor just laughed and said he would look normal by the fourth or fifth grade. What had we gotten ourselves into?
It didn’t get any easier after we got home. He was colicky and cried all the time. I would have to lay on the floor next to his crib just to get him to go to sleep at night. Sleeping through the night was unheard of. For three months, we looked like the “Dawn of the Dead.”
Thankfully, after three months he settled down but he maintained his main fault which was spitting up. You could not hold him for more than 10 minutes without him spitting up and soiling your clothes. When we put him on the floor, there had to be a sheet, or the carpet would be ruined. Despite this problem, he was quickly becoming a Suma-sized baby. He had more chins than I had debts. The kid could eat.
We always felt that he has half alien in that he always did things early. He could hold on to my thumbs and stand on his own at one month. He had teeth at about four months. He crawled for only a month because he walked 3 days after his seventh month. He could walk across the room on his own five days later. This kid had more bumps and scratches than you could count because he wanted to walk everywhere before he really knew how to control his body.
As he grew older, he had more energy than Lance Armstrong. He was running everywhere. He would do summersaults non-stop. After his brother was born he constantly did cartwheels just to get attention. There wasn’t anything tall enough that he didn’t think about jumping off.
Many years later, we found out that he liked to put metal objects into electrical outlets once we felt it was save to de-babyize the house. How he is still alive, I’ll never know.
Even though I did not feel that instant bond when I held Justin for the first time it certainly got there soon there after. I just don’t know what I would do without both of my boys. They have created more challenges in my life than I could ever imagine, but I wouldn’t change one part of the last 19 years.
Justin no longer does cartwheels every time I bring out the camcorder, but he still brings a special joy to my life that I cannot describe. In many ways we have become great friends without making it unparentlike. I still yell at him when he does something wrong and praise him when he does something right. We often see things with the same eyes, but there have been more than a few times we have been on the opposite ends of the spectrum. In many ways we are a lot alike. Despite that, I love him more than he will ever know.
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