When I found out I was going to be a dad it was the first time in my life that I had no words. There was a silence in the room like our home had never felt before. It’s usually at this type of moment that I feel the need to make a joke, or at the very least a comment of some kind.
Not this time.
I wish I could romanticize the moment for you. Tell you I was silent to allow time for the right words to come out in a moment my wife and I would never forget. That moment should lead to a fancy dinner where we plan the rest of our lives as a party of three. But instead…nothing. There we were, a peed on stick in hand and tears falling down the cheeks. I won’t say who’s cheeks. I probably just had something in my eye.
After 2-3 minutes of silence, the quiet was broken by the most romantic thing a man can say after being told he was going to be a dad. I looked my wife straight in the eyes and said “hmmm…” before returning to speechlessness for a bit longer. Oh yeah guys, I was a regular Shakespeare (For the record this was not one of my proudest moments).
I was as excited as I was terrified.
But as thrilled as I was words completely eluded me. To my friends and family a silent me is a broken me.
Only this time the broken me was only a broken version of the old me. The old me was a fun, always on the move, overly loving, sometimes a little judgemental guy. These breaking parts needed to be broken. Negative pieces needed to break in order to build the new.
I had moved around the country a few times.
Every-time I told myself it would be fun because I could start new. Be a better version of myself. With each of those moves I didn’t change who I was, but I grew. I grew in maturity without losing my sense of play. I grew in acceptance of others without losing my ability to steer clear of the bad influences. And above all I grew in my ability to understand right from wrong while maintaining the ability to still mixed in a little wrong here and there to add character.
I have done this growing over a handful years and each new move felt bigger than the last. But nothing had created growth in me more than the nine months between finding out I was going to be a dad and the day I held my little girl for the first time. Then all at once I realized those moments of moving around, meeting new people and living in new places – I had only ever really been responsible for me. That was no longer the case.
I was now responsible for the health and well being a tiny little girl.
A little girl who will look to me for advice someday. A little girl who will follow in the actions that I take and not necessarily in the words I have to say. I instantly become aware of my role in the world and that was to be the world for this tiny human. With all this new found responsibility, it should seem as though the world was weighing heavy on my shoulders.
But when you hold your baby for the first time you welcome every new responsibility with open arms. You no longer feel the weight of world because suddenly you’re walking on air. No words needed.