The other day my wife made the best crack ever. We and our friends have been planning a movie night where the women go to see What to Expect When You're Expecting, and the men go to see Prometheus. So she says, "I guess we're both going to see movies about motherhood." Zing!

I don't actually know if Prometheus actually propagates the whole mother-as-disgusting-mechanistic--evil-bioalien fear that unconsciously pervades many films, but everything from the Matrix (which actually means womb), to Alien, to Independence Day portray the ultimate evil as a thinly veiled, misogynistic version of the woman's body: an unthinking, mechanistic, pile of goo made solely to propagate control over masculine heroes whose greatest talent and contribution to the world is blowing shit up.

On the flipside, I've noticed that movies targeted at women represent the ideal male as a compliant, mindless drone, whose sole desire in life is to become the perfect accessory for an emotionally defunct set of neuroses posing as a woman. If you need an example, take nearly any romcom (Oh Bridget, I see you  through all of your jealous, obsessive stalking and total, absolute mistrust of my every move). To be honest, I don't think that either version of reality is all that flattering a representation of the human spirit, though if you tune out all the critical thinking, I'll admit they can be super entertaining.

The fact that the men go to watch the evil body movies while the women go to watch the emotionally neutered ones is more than a little hilarious. Hollywood sucks. I know that producers would say they're just giving the public what they want, but look at the oppositions they set up. For men to escape, they go watch the destruction of women's bodies, these evil, unthinking forces that want nothing more than to enslave men and eliminate individuality. For women to escape, they watch pale, emasculated parodies of supposedly emotionally mature men. Then both men and women go home and they're supposed to get along. That's when the comedy really ensues!

Gawd, Freud would have a heyday with this stuff. Either way, I think that in most cases the real enemy of Hollywood is not men or women. It's thought itself. Now if you'll excuse me, I need to go buy my tickets for Saturday's movie.

Since I started this blog a couple of weeks ago, I've suddenly noticed a proliferation of public dads on the web and in the general media. They're on the news. They're in the movies. They're releasing books all over the place. More than a dozen of these media/publishing dads have added me on my extremely humble Twitter account. I'm one of these media dads myself. So, where did we all come from? As I see it there are several possible causes for this phenomenon:

1. These media dads have been there all along and I'm just noticing them now because it finally matters
   
2. Suddenly clever marketing teams have discovered that the media-dad market is WAY under-tapped
3. There are suddenly more young fathers with more time on their hands, because they're all unemployed

To me, the third possibility is the most interesting, and I think it probably because it matches up best with my own story (Clever marketers take note: I'm broke! Sorry, lol). I'm blogging because I have a lot of time on my hands, and I want to do something productive and relatively meaningful. I figure that, if nothing else, this blog will provide an honest record of my thoughts during my kid's earliest days. It's the kind of thing I wish my own dad had done for me when I was floating around in the womb, unborn.

If it is the case that there are a lot of other unemployed or underemployed young dads out there, I also wonder how much of our increased involvement with pregnancy and child-rearing has to do with some unfulfilled biological need to do something useful with our time. In general, masculine roles in society have changed a lot since I was born 35 years ago, and these days I don' think a lot of men know exactly how to be a beneficial force in the world. It wasn't so long ago that you'd never see a man taking care of a baby, let alone writing about it, unless it was done in some kind of farcical, insincere way that underhandedly mocked supposed women's roles. Now it seems like a way to participate in one of the most important events in a lot of people's lives.

Please don't take me the wrong way. I'm decidedly not one of the reactionaries who laments the decline of a restrictive patriarchal masculinity. In fact, I think that regardless of the historical reasons for the shift to more public fatherhood, it could have a very positive impact in the long run. I just find the whole thing to be tantalizing food for thought. I'd love to hear others' stories on why they're involved with the mediasphere, or public parenting in general. Perhaps it can even give me a little more insight into my own reasons!

So for the past eight months, I've had the incredible privilege of being able to take some time off work to develop my writing career and several other entrepreneurial ventures. I've started a website, several blogs, a bunch of Twitter feeds, written a screenplay, learned two programming languages, read more than 15 books, and am about 1/3 of a way through writing a novel (a damned good one, I might add). While this lifestyle is basically a dream come true, at the moment my various endeavors have netted me a grand total of about $220, minus expenses.

Which brings us to the question of... $.

As anyone who's ever tried a non-traditional career route knows, these things often take time, but as many expecting parents know, those babies are a comin' either way.  Timing's rarely perfect. So this week, as I saw that ultrasound and that spectacular little heartbeat, shit got, as they say, real.

I've suddenly found myself once again contemplating the less-than-desirable, but deliciously stable world of the 9 to 5. Reid Hoffman, founder of LinkedIn, calls this situation "Plan Z": the stable, non-risky career path that allows you take the riskier one with the bigger potential payoffs. My Plan Z is to be an English professor (and, yes, I have the qualifications). I've known it was there all along; I've just kind of hoped it wouldn't come back to that. It might, we'll see, but the big thing is that it's suddenly popped onto my radar in a big way.

For the moment, it's just a question mark hanging over everything, but I don't imagine it getting any smaller for about twenty-five years. It's amazing how quickly the focus changes as the baby develops. My dad got stable job the day after I was born, and he kept it for thirty years. Will I follow the same route? Can I, given these shaky economic times? All I know right now is that one way or another, that baby is going to have the best life I can provide. I don't want to have to choose the road more often taken but if that's what needs to happen, so be it.

... but I think you know the rest.

We decided that, given our somewhat scary and emotional day on Friday, it was time to share the baby news with my wife's mom. It's not what we wanted at first, but with the uncertainty we've had, it was important for my wife to be able to talk things over with someone besides me (as brilliant and amazing as I am). It's still on the down low for the rest of our family, at least until we clear a couple of months, and here's why. I know that when we tell my mom, bless her, there'll be a huge announcement on the front page of the paper the next day. This is going to be BIG news. I'm going to be the first dad of me and my two brothers. She'll be singing it from the rooftops.

It's funny how all this works. It gets to the point where the news almost demands to come out. Every time we see our friends now, it's on the tip of our tongues. They ask, "So whatchya been up to?" and the immediate impulse is to say, "Oh, you know, procreating." Well, maybe not in exactly those words, but the idea of telling people and seeing their reactions is fun. It has definitely been great to keep it to ourselves for a while, and it almost feels like we've discovered a secret planet or something, but this news is HOT!

Anyway, I suppose this blog gives me a bit of a release mechanism, so here you go. It should be quite the day when our friends and family find out that I've been secretly sharing the news with a bunch of strangers the whole time. Looking forward to it all!

Did you ever have one of those days where nothing changes and everything changes?

Yesterday morning my wife came into the room and woke me up and said, "I think we need to go to the hospital." Not exactly the most pleasant start to the day. She was worried because she was spotting a little again, and we still didn't have a clear answer as to why. We packed up, hopped in the car, and headed out.

After about an hour's wait in the emergency room, they called her into the triage unit and decided to run some blood work to see what was going on. They also decided to do an early ultrasound, even though we're only at about five weeks and there wouldn't likely be much to see. They were basically checking to see if the baby was still there, which is a pretty scary place to be in for an expecting parent.

There I was, still in the waiting room, when I saw her poke her head round the corner and motion me to follow her. We made our way to a somewhat dingy ultrasound lab, where I was asked to wait (again) outside the privacy curtain while they did some tests. I remember staring at the wall, just praying that this turned out okay.

When they called me into the station, my gut told me it was good news (To be honest, I figured that they're not going to call you to come see your dead baby). I saw it on the screen immediately when I went in: the faintest little rhythmic flicker, right in the middle of the little black dot. It was my baby's heart beating. Holy. The first reaction for both my wife and me was immense relief. There are still no guarantees, but at least we know the baby's alive, and it's growing!

In a brief moment afterwards, I stood there outside the curtain and was overcome with an immense flood of happiness. I realized that the tiny flickering speck I saw on the screen was the heart of a person that I will care for and watch grow into a full-grown adult human being. This was definitely the moment where the fact of what's happening has felt the most real. Until now I've been excited in an abstract way, but now I feel so much more connected to the whole process. It turned out to be an amazing day!

So as I've mentioned we had planned to keep things on the down low until we were sure the pregnancy was going well and the first trimester was safely behind us. We are definitely looking forward to sharing in this with family, but the timing would ideally be right.

Of course ideals are just that. The smallest little events can be full of surprises.

Now bear with me for a sec. We ran out of coffee the other day. This meant that my wife was forced to rummage through our depressing drawer of forgotten caffeine products. In it, she found some decaf, and she felt pretty lucky when it actually turned out to be our regular brand. She puts it on the counter and that's when the huge gasp comes from mom.

"No! You can't have decaf coffee. It's full of chemicals that will hurt the baby!"

My wife, keeping her cool, says, "Yeah, we'll definitely keep that in mind when we start trying." Smooth, for sure, but I don't know how long the charade can go on for at this point. She's stopped drinking alcohol, she drinks power smoothies at every turn, the house is littered with pregnancy books. I don't think it would take a master detective to figure out what's up. I guess the best we can do at this point is to hang on to a bit of ambiguity. I'll take it for now, but I think that announcement is going to have to happen sooner rather than later if we want to be the ones making it.

One of the funny things about expecting is that once you're preggers, you kind of have to wait for a long time. There's the initial excitement, and then the afterglow, and then... pow! You're still there and the big day is still eight and a half months away.

I suppose it's kind of good in a way. My wildly impatient, and admittedly sometimes impractical self would be happy to just grab that baby and start running. By giving you some time to plan, the body also gives you some time to gradually ease into the bigger idea. Spontaneity's cool, and I sure don't want to lose all of it once our young one comes along, but could you imagine what the world would be like if this process was instant? Poof. Baby. Thank God the baby stork's not real.

In a way the process of gestation reminds me of the way that a life goal slowly comes into focus. Things may not feel real or all that special if they didn't unfold gradually over time. The mind has to carve out its patterns or make its little neural connections or whatever, so that by the time that baby finally comes into the world, there's no mistaking it's yours.

It's nice to have this biologically enforced patience, because from everything I hear, it's a rather important skill once you actually have kids.

Well, after the doctor's visit we're still in a mostly indeterminate state, but we have an early ultrasound scheduled for the 15th, and I'm very excited. I would like to take this opportunity to say that my baby is going to be a brilliant, amazing, talented individual, with a good heart and a knack for bringing people together. I may end up being totally wrong on that, but hey, one can hope.

I recently became an uncle, and that was one of the big things I noticed happened with the new baby. Everyone immediately started guessing and speculating on who he looked like, what he was good at, and what he'd someday grow to be. I loved it. It's such a warm, caring way of welcoming a young one into a community. Even if there's a bit of fantasy projection involved, I think it's a healthy, loving gesture at its core. Then there's those Toddler in Tiara ladies. I think that might be pushing the projection thing a little far.

So I had to ponder over whether to post this, and my wife and I decided together that it could be helpful to others going through anything similar. This is one of the fortunate parts of being anonymous for the time being. If things go wrong, I can share without having to feel overly exposed, and potentially help others in the process.

On Saturday, without giving too much detail, my wife said she noticed some spotting. We had to sleep on it, because it was later in the evening, but we went out and got a home test again yesterday, and according to that, we're still good. She'll talk to the doctor this week, and then we'll have a clearer picture of what's up, but as far as we know, it's still on. I will talk about it if things don't work out, but I'll stay anonymous if that's the case.

But let's be clear: we're still hopeful!

I think it's important to talk about when things go less than perfectly. Miscarriages happen to a LOT of families, and while you probably don't want to dwell on it too much, you also shouldn't have to feel ashamed or embarrassed about it. This is a very natural occurrence, and without some discussion, it's hard to learn or know what to do. I also always think it's amazing how families (and, let's face it, mothers) end up sharing previously unknown histories when such sad events occur. I guess you let sleeping dogs lie if you can, but you keep your well of stories available if they're needed.

After talking it over, my wife and I agreed that one of the saddest things that could happen in such a case would be to lose all of your enthusiasm or optimism next time you tried to get pregnant. She was so excited to go out and get a baby journal, and I was loving the idea of sharing my own perspective through this blog. What happens to all of that energy when a pregnancy doesn't work out? We both made an agreement that no matter what happens in the coming weeks and months, we'll do our absolute best retain all of our excitement and enthusiasm.

Oh the things you start thinking about when you're expecting a baby.

I realized today that I've seen dozens of a certain kind of blue or grey blobbly image in my life, and not once has one elicited a response beyond, "huh, wow, neat." People are rapturous about these grainy, indecipherable shots, waving them in your face as if they've discovered some previously unseen alien species that will revolutionize everything from Christmas to footwear.

Gawd, I used to say.

I'm referring, of course, to ultrasound images. I've even seen one of myself, in-utero, and for some reason it never once occurred to me how cool and bizarre it was that I was looking at an image of myself before I was even a self. Then I started thinking that I will soon have one of these images of my own kid, and I will gladly, vocally join the ranks of bizarrely ecstatic photo-wielding weirdos who will show it to anybody whose attention I can get.

That means you, too, so i think you should begin to prepare yourself to see the most incredible and beautiful thing you will ever see. We don't have an ultrasound scheduled yet, but you can absolutely count on me keeping you posted ;)