I spent the last few days in Vernon, at my brother's in-laws ski house at Silver Star. Since my brother married their daughter, our families have grown quite fond of one another, and they opened their Christmas to us. Only a few of us were able to make it -- the kind of effort it would take to mobilize a family the size of mine based on the East coast out here was monumental, trying to coordinate scheduling and whatnot -- but those of us that did, namely, three of my brothers, two of their wives, and my oldest brother's three children, had a wonderful time.
In the spirit of trying new things, I went for a snowboarding lesson on Christmas Day. I spent most of the two hours on my ass in some form, but by the end of the lesson i was actually starting to get it. conversely, my ten year-old nephew was whizzing around by himself in half the time. He's 10, I'm 31, that's really all there is to say about it. in any event, I had a ball, and even considered taking a second lesson the next day. Considering I have gone on record as saying that I would abolish snow if I could, this is a huge deal. Instead, the next day I spent indoors with my oldest brother, his wife and twin daughters.
My oldest brother is a good dude, full of pearls of wisdom from his varied experiences. It's like having a family Yoda. We had a conversation, mainly shooting the breeze while I played upsy-daisy games with his daughter, and we started discussing adulthood. I told him that I could absolutely never be a parent. Not that parenthood is impending for me, but I am getting to the age where you think about -- and deathly fear -- becoming a father. So having thought about it, I explained that I was in no way ready to be a dad. I'm a child -- I sleep in on Saturdays. I watch cartoons. I play video games. I'm impulsive, and enitrely defined by emotion. How in the world could I possibly be expected to guide a life?
The man looked at me with a huge wide grin, and told me that when his son was born and the doctor placed him in his hands, all covered in that goopy newborn stuff, he cried like a baby. Mind you, my brother is a big, tough looking guy, all of 6 foot 2 and 240 pounds, and I honestly don't remember him smiling very much before ten or twelve years ago. He tells me that he loves his kids -- all parents love their kids -- and he's in love with his kids, that his twin daughters have a tendency to cry all hours of the night, until he and his wife both beg them to please, for the love of God, shut up. But then he wakes up in the morning and they smile, gurgle and drool at him, and all is forgiven. I chewed on that thought for a minute, about being in love with one's own children.
My ten year-old nephew, a very intelligent and observant youth, still believes in Santa Claus. He assisted in the baking of cookies and leaving of milk, and on Christmas morning, he found the cookies gone, the milk drank, and footprints leading up to his newly full stocking. He was over the moon with joy. If he had gone into CSI mode, however, he would have found his uncles' breath smelling suspiciously of gingerbread, chocolate milk droplets on his dad's goatee, and footprints not made of snow, but of powdered sugar. The reindeer droppings outside would have looked a bit like hershey's kisses. My older brother participated in -- encouraged, even -- this delusion to spare his son the disappointment of a dispelled childhood myth for one more year. A selfless act from someone in love.
I thought about that as we were talking, and my brother also says that to forget being a good parent, being a relatively good person will compel me to switch my instincts from self-preservation to the defense and nurture of this life. And in the very next breath, he tells me that there are elements in my own personality that would lend themselves to me being a very good father. I looked at his beautiful toddler daughter, bouncing happily on my knee, laughing, babbling and drooling as she grabbed at my nose, and thought that rather profound statement was quite insane.
My sister-in-law loathes the winter as much as I do, and even she was having a great time. She did much more snow activity than I thought she would, and took on a very "When in Rome" mentality, so much so that when she decided to go snowmobiling with her son and my brother, I happily volunteered to test out these alleged "fatherly instincts" and babysit my nieces. Alone. It was a wonderful, fun, and amazing experience. Then they woke up, and I found myself chasing around eighteen month-old twin girls. And then, of course, one of them dropped a diaper bomb. Fortunately, my other brother's in-laws had come back by then, and their love of children got me off the diaper-changing hook. I used this newfound freedom to find a corner in which to curl into the fetal position. i do believe some thumbsucking may have been involved.
The week was spent mostly laughing and trading insults with my family, my favorite people in the world. there were highly competitive card games and beer, and food, and beer. It was a fun week spent with the people who make me interesting. It helped me reevaluate the impoprtant elements of myself. I'm a family dude. I have an amazing support structure. I've got the respect (even if its in a backhanded way) of the people I respect and in most cases admire most in the world. And I've got my writing. And if I somehow end up with a child... well, i'm screwed, but it won't be SO bad. As long as someone else changes the diapers.
