So I get back in my black VW golf, put my hands on the steering wheel, and take just a few moments to try and figure out what the hell just happened. A kiss I can take… a hug means there’s a 50-85% chance she likes me… a handshake means she’s either interested or is going to wash her hands with antibiotic cleanser in the next 30 seconds… and a “It was nice meeting you. Take care”, well, that means “Don’t call, like, ever.” But what the heck did two hugs mean? If I went by my usual formula that either meant I was entering dating territory (100% interest) or I was entering stalker territory (100+% interest). There was one time I actually had a girl show up at my apartment and demand that my roommate’s girlfriend let her in to verify that I was, in fact, sick in bed. Needless to say, she didn’t get buzzed in, but I did have a 102 fever. What might also throw this further into the crazy column was that we’d met once at a party and talked twice on the phone… and the museum – The Museum of Tolerance… but that’s another story.
So after settling on the idea that the only way I would figure out what the hell just happened was to call Kim again, I started the car and drove home. A few calls to some buds revealed similar conclusions by them – “Yeah, dude, no clue” and “You sure she wasn’t trying to give you a kiss on the cheek and chickened out the second time?” were some of the ones I remember.
So I called Kim a few days later to set up the first actual, pick-you-up date. And in an effort to test her culinary tastes and also come off as a guy who’s idea of eating out isn’t just Fatburger (don’t get me wrong – Fatburger served it’s time in my rotation of restaurants), I offered sushi. When she got in the car, I gave her the option of run-of-the-mill sushi or something a little more adventurous. And she got the five bonus points for going for the adventure. So when we got out of the car, I remember asking, “so I don’t want to be presumptuous, but if you were planning on going dutch, this place is a little on the expensive side, are you okay with that? It’ll probably be about $45 per person.” A statement which has received mix reviews from friends (on her side and mine). I was planning on paying, but growing up in a house with an ultra-feminist mom, I really didn’t want to argue about a check at the end of the night. Kim said she was fine with a little expensive, btw.
So anyway, dinner was great. I took her to Sasabune, when they were still on Sawtelle in Los Angeles. The restaurant basically looks like it moved into someone’s home and you’re eating in the living room. The fun part of Sasabune is that you don’t get to choose what you eat. You can only order the chef’s special at first… and you get pretty much whatever’s freshest or whatever the chef feels like making. So Kim was a trooper at this point, but I made sure to mix in a little sake to calm the nerves (she later confessed to being a largely “California Roll” sushi person). Can’t tell you much of what was said, but I know I had fun. But when the check came, I opened it up to find out that my estimate for food was way off. The total bill without tip was up around 180. “I totally underestimated this; there’s no way I can let you even think about paying for half,” I told her. I think she finally found out the cost of the dinner after a month or so of dating.
So by now, it’s about 9:00 and we were in need of desert. Back in the car and heading towards the beaches of Santa Monica, she suggested a gelato place located just off the Santa Monica Promenade. That was totally fine with me because it would let us walk in the park along the bluffs afterwards… to chat, of course. So we walked and chatted for about two hours again – reminiscent of the first date, before we got to that awkward hand-holding part. I think my interior monologue at that point went something along the lines of this:
“Hold her hand?”
“Yeah, go for it”
“What should I lead with?”
“The pinky! always lead with the pinky?”
“Just the pinky? like a frickin pinky-swear?”
“Just do it, you pansy!”
(1812 Overture ensues)
Anyway, after a few more minutes of walking up and down the park, I drove her back to her place in Brentwood. I tried to do the chivalrous thing and walked her up to her door… and okay fine… for a goodnight kiss.
… now I’m willing to face facts… most if not all of the people reading this blog are a) female and b) people who follow Kim’s blog… so I’ll share this little tidbit that still befuddles me… Kissing a girl who is as tall or taller than you (if she’s wearing heels) is just plain wierd. Or at least it was for me. Being 6’2″, I’m used to being the taller one… looking down a little bit… and just generally relaxing. So Kim threw all that for a loop. I felt like I was back watching “Pretty in Pink” as a 9-year-old boy trying to figure out how sucking on a melon would make you a better kisser. But something must’ve worked, because we’re only 9 days from anniversary number 3.
So lately, the women of the house have been shunning the daylight. The house is currently home to two sick ladies, one pissed off bunny, and a needy dog hanging around the house. Yep, both Momma and baby have decided that they are fans of phlegm. This was the scene a few days ago…
Now, while there is definitely some concern on my part about the general health of my baby, there are a couple of revelations (good with the bad) that I’ve had since this week long episode began. First, since Lena’s in daycare, she’s exposed to a lot more in the way of germs, and if one kid gets sick there, well it’s pretty much a house of cards. But she gets socialized in this environment… which I hope will be a good thing later down the road. Second, she sounds like she’s purring when she’s stuffed up. And it’s pretty frickin cute.
Being sick also doesn’t seem as though it’s really affected her mood, either. It may have cut down on the number of squeaks, and maybe she’ll end up with a sultry alto 2 voice or something… but who knows.
So while I’ll be glad when she gets well, the purring kitten aspect of my baby girl will be missed… just a little.
Kim, on the other hand, seems to be suffering through this a bit more… especially with my evening TV choices of late. I tolerate “The Biggest Loser”, “Design Star”, “Project Runway”, Season #3,850,001 of “Survivor”, and the occasional episodes of “The Bachelor” and “America’s Next Top Model”, while Kim suffers through “Chuck”, “The Good Guys”, “Wipeout”, and “Merlin”. Okay, maybe I’ve got a few more than that, but someone’s got to win the battle of the Tivo queue right?
BTW, not a fan (and Kim isn’t either) of “The Gates” – It’s like Twilight on Wysteria Lane (although it’s not all about vampires, just one of the main plotlines). I’m normally a sucker for all things vampire (no pun intended)… but ever since the Twilight books came out, I’ve been a bit disappointed in the way vampires have become super-popular. Vampire Diaries is alright… nothing special… True Blood is awesome… but I miss the type of stories that we got with “Blade” (let’s pretend Blade 3 was never made), “Let the Right One In”, and “Interview with a Vampire.” Those, at least, weren’t filled with “No I love you more”… “no I love you more” that caused me to skip 20-30 pages at a time when braving the Twilight books two years ago.
1) My baby likes to sing. Or rather just talk. Not sure which she thinks it is, but either way, I found it pretty entertaining. She also responds well to the A-Team theme song (I think Kim is secretly praying that Lena will suddenly switch to Sarah McLaughlan – sp? or New Kids on the Block, but I’m pleased as punch with the A-Team). Anyway, here’s a sample:
2) Lena likes to be tickled… but only in certain ways. Gently blowing on the back of her neck/pseudo-mullet seems to do the trick.
Other thing that surprised me. These videos were all taken with Kim’s little blue iPod. First the quality is pretty damn impressive and the sound isn’t half bad.
I was also lucky enough to get a couple of grilling cookbooks, compliments of Lena and Bobby Flay. We tried them out last night with a grilled new york steak with rosemary-balsamic butter (seriously delicious) and some grilled asparagus with olive oil/freshly ground black pepper/sea salt that we mixed with some French Feta. The butter was the big winner of the night, but it was pretty damn tasty all around. I think I may have to kick my FIL off the grill when we go up to Tahoe for the 4th this year. :P
…of bachelor-dom. Not a bad thing, but I thought it could bare a post, or two. Plus Kim has saved any and all correspondence that she and I had initially, including the very first thing I ever wrote her.
So here goes, in 2005, I had the pleasure of being dumped by my girlfriend at the time (let’s call her Nature Girl) at my previous girlfriend’s family house in Vermont over Valentine’s Day weekend. That definitely gets ranked up there in the top 5 of crappy life moments. But while sitting in the Manchester, NH airport for 6 hours waiting for my flight to board, I came to one conclusion… $#%^ it. I wasn’t about to sit around and mope. So shortly after I got back to LA and had once again realized that meeting a girl at a bar has next to no chance, I wound up on Match.com. (about the bar thing, I have yet to meet/know anyone that found their dream date over Washington Apples shots and sandwiched in between sweaty hairy guy and greasy cigarettes in the rolled up shirt dude.)
So yeah, Match… initially, I was against online dating websites, but figured what the heck. From what I’d heard there were different strokes for different folks… If you wanted to go straight down the aisle, try eharmony.com. If you wanted a booty call, true.com was your thing. If you wanted just booty, try adultfriendfinder.com (I know someone who tried that… and it wasn’t pretty – not the friend they “found” but the situation following thereafter). Or if you wanted to something not to serious and not to … well, dirty, try Match. And I gotta admit, it was kinda fun. There was the initial excitement of sending a message… then the “oh crap, she wrote back” moment… then the “so how many messages do I send before I ask to meet”… and finally the “now wtf do I wear to meet this girl?” Again, wasn’t looking for anything super-serious (heck, my profile name was “Rodeo Clown” – after my favorite song, the G.Love and Special Sauce w/Jack Johnson version – not just the Jack Johnson version), so I fell into the whole meeting people online bit. And somewhere in the middle there… during a search for “My Match”, a 24-year old Californian named bruinchiq popped up.
Alright, let’s see. Blond hair… 6’1” (damn she’s tall)… went to UCLA (I guess that’s okay :P)… teacher (I thought about doing that)… majored in public policy (hey! I did that). So I wrote her… and to this day, she’s still got the email. I think we wrote back and forth about 10 times in 3 days before I finally got up the courage to write the words “So… should we meet?” By a stroke of luck and my aversion towards anymore Starbucks/Coffee Bean meet-cutes, I suggested Diddy Reese cookies in Westwood. I showed up at about 8:15 to find a 6’1” blond with boy-short hair (there were many tears on her part the day that happened – I found out later) already munching on an ice cream sandwich.
There were definitely a few smirks from other patrons in-line as Kim and I made our first introductions… But after I bought my 2 cookies and a milk for a dollar, we headed off on a walk. And we walked almost the entire UCLA campus, minus the student housing in the northwest. So anyway, we wound up back in Westwood and despite my stomach’s pleas for no more lattes or frappes, we sat down at Coffee Bean. Now, I’m pretty adventurous when it comes to trying new things and they were advertising their brand new Jasmine-Mint latte, so I gave it a shot. Worst… idea… ever. So in the midst of choking down an adult interpretation of bug juice, I heard Kim remark, “I think you’re parking lot closes at 12, so we’d better get you back to your car.”
Now up until this point, everything in this date had just sailed. Everything was easy… but then Kim threw in the curveball… and I still contend that it’s what got me hook, line, and sinker. So, we went to say goodnight, and somehow body language dictated that it was to be a hug. So Kim steps in, gives me a hug, steps back, then steps in again, and gives me another hug… WTF?!?! Who double-hugs? The little old man in my head tending the mental encyclopedia of dating looked up furiously from his desk and, with arms flailing over his head, exclaimed “I ain’t got a clue.” Seriously, no one… but Kim… had ever done that. So I returned to my car, completely befuddled… unsure where this move came from. And that planted Kim firmly at the front of my mind for the next few days… until Part 2.
Well, there was first maternity leave, then paternity leave… and now there’s a montessori school. I know that my parents paid a babysitter for many years, and I found out, just recently, that I did in fact have a nanny. That one still shocks me when I think about it. I find out 30 years after the fact that someone besides my parents held me for those first few months… and I have no clue who she is.
So when I went to hand over Lena for the first time, along with a check, I definitely had “clamped hand” syndrome. Mentally, I knew I had to let go, but my mind and body weren’t getting along that day. I also think I probably hovered for about 5 minutes more than I needed to. The caregiver finally had my child say goodbye to me in an attempt to show me the door. “Say bye to Daddy!”… And then the lightbulb went off and the fog cleared. “Oh, she’s telling me it’s okay to go…” Must’ve looked like a zombie or something. I still contend that’s why Kim has me drop off Lena in the mornings – because it’s easier to just dismiss me leaving with the baby in the morning as daddy taking the baby… and then she gets happy baby pickup time. Meanwhile, I get the “where the #$% are you going?” look every morning from Lena. … yes, little girl, daddy’s paying someone to take you off his hands for a while so that he can afford to keep you in diapers … silliness, I know.
But from what I understand, the little girl is having fun and is quite the talker at school. More like, gurgle-r… but it’s some form of rudimentary communication. She even had a “my hand tastes better than your hand” competition with another baby girl at school, from what I’ve heard. Her latest trick is pitch matching. I hum or hold a note, and she tries to match it. She can keep it up for about 3 minutes or so before she gets bored, pissed, or I hit a note that she doesn’t like.
So it seemed like a normal day on February 24, 2010. I went to work the same as any other day. Came home to find Kim hanging with her friend, Michelle. I decided to give them some “girl time” and went off for yet another bulk purchase of paper towels (As a kid, I don’t think I ever fully realized how many of these things I use – bad environmental dude, I know.) Anyway, when I got back home and unpacked the car, Kim shoved a bowl of black bean chili in my hand. Standing across from each other in the kitchen, we each took a bite. One of us frowned. “Crap” she said, “I just peed myself.” After a few more minutes and a few more bites of black bean chili while waiting for Kim to come back, I hear the words “I just keep peeing little by little.” Somewhere the little elf standing next to the gong in my head chugs a red bull and kicks his act into high gear. After a quick check on google, it appears that Kim hasn’t lost control of her bladder, but her baby. And there I am, thinking that delivery dates are pretty much an exact science at this point. Dumb dad, I know. (Kim later told me that only about 10% of women deliver on their due dates – but I think that like Cosmo, many of her statistics are self-concocted :P)
So after a 20-minutes packing panic fest by me, we’re off to the hospital. But in the midst of my panic, Kim decides that her last pre-mommy meal should be McNuggets. Seriously? why not something like chocolate lava cake or the biggest sundae known to man? But no, we got nugnuts. And they were promptly devoured by the mommy-to-be. Don’t worry… you’ll see them again, real soon.
And then off to the hospital we go. Now, I had some reservations about that whole epidural thing, so I asked Kim to see if she could do without it. But didn’t say she couldn’t have it. In an effort to assuage both of us, the nurses suggested some IV painkillers that might do the trick. One nasty side effect of the IV meds that I didn’t hear mentioned – nauseau and general loopiness. So Kim (and she forgets this part) would stand up from the bed, say she had to pee, then her eyes would roll back in her head, and she’d give me a gift of partially digested McNuggets. … because I had the duty of holding the bowl under her chin. To be fair, a good part of this situation was my fault by initially expressing displeasure towards the epidural. After 4 hours of “Living Dead Kim” during the wee parts of the day, both she and I resorted to the epi. Seriously, folks… it was like someone hit a switch. My wife was back. No longer was I alone in watching women’s downhill (the olympics were on) for the third time that night. And I wasn’t on puke patrol.
So things got easier after that, I didn’t have to do very much… just the occasional “you’re doing great, Kim.” That is… until Kim got to 10cm. At that point, it was like I was part of the hospital staff… and I didn’t want to be. “Hold her foot, Chris! Help her push!” … yeah, that’s not really my thing. But when your options are do it or face a potential Exorcist moment when your wife decides that you are as useful as a pet rock… I’ll choose option a. So witness the birth I did. Do I remember it all? That whole cutting the cord thing and declaring the sex of the baby are somewhere in my consciousness, but I’m not sure my mind was moving fast enough to process the whole thing. Here’s what I do remember:
1. Doctor H: What is she, Chris? (as the doctor holds my baby girl up by one leg)
Me: Uhhhh… She’s a girl?
2. Cutting the umb cord reminded my of trying to cut through a cord of rubber bands.
And that’s about it. But the end result was pretty undeniable. Born at 5:56 pm on February 25, 2010. Only 21 hours of labor.
Alright, so this is a brief overview… there may be more looks backward, no guarantees. But here’s the nuts and bolts about how I got to where I am.
32 years ago, in a state far far away (okay, only 3,000 miles), the parental units started the monumental task of raising me. Being sandwiched between two English professors didn’t make for a very difficult childhood, although English/Literature was my least favorite subject. Growing up as an only child, I had pretty much everything I needed… well, okay, I had everything I needed plus almost everything I wanted. Although, I’m still miffed about that original Voltron set that got away.
Went to private school for the elementary years and then transferred to public school when the cost/benefit ratio of a private school education started to make less sense. And well, I’m glad I did. Or rather I’m glad my parents did. Because it immediately opened up the realm of girls. I still remember my first date with a girl named Kristin, who unfortunately would turn bright red when embarrassed, which earned her the nickname “the Raunchy Apple” in 6th grade. Mom drove the Honda 626 to the local movie theater and picked us up afterward. Couldn’t tell you what we saw though. But throughout those early years of co-ed parties, sweaty hands during games of spin-the-bottle, and a girl named Kathleen who decided that the best way to get two people to have their first kiss was to push their heads together, I actually had a ton of fun. And one thing that always stuck in my head was a quote from my dad in 8th grade, “I hope you’re not getting serious about this girl; you’re way too young to be having serious relationships.” (Picture a 13-year-old furiously writing on his mental scratchpad that “Serious = Bad”) Well, dad, you never told me when that whole “way too young” thing was supposed to end. … … so I carried it through to the age of 26.
But before I get too ahead of myself, when I was 17, I happened to watch the movie “Free Willy”… silly, I know… but immediately, I wanted to be a marine biologist. Then I found out that pretty much everyone goes through a marine biologist phase in their life and so I settled on biochemistry because nobody wants to do that, right? Well, yeah, neither did I. The mere mention of a year full of organic chemistry during college sent chills down my spine. So I settled on a mix of public policy and wildlife biology. And then after getting pulled into a one-year lease in a small 2-bedroom in Santa Monica by a “brother” (yes, I joined a frat – the only national one on my college campus), I fell into environmental consulting. And I’ve been there ever since.
But back to that whole relationship thing… so, I dated a fair amount during high school, college, and after… always heeding the wise words of my father, I concentrated on having fun… and moving on when things got either difficult or a little too serious. In retrospect, not the best plan. I should’ve probably dropped my dad’s 8th grade line before I hit 18, but ah well. Hindsight is 20-20. And if I had, who knows, maybe I’d never have met Kim, and never would’ve had Baby L. So… I guess in that respect, sorry to those I hurt along the way, but thank you for getting me to where I am.
Okay, so on to the Kim Chronicles… but I’ll save that for another time.
Well, yes. Kim’s been doing it for who knows how long, and maybe I just need to understand her world a bit better. That and I love to write. And since the baby came around, I seem to have a lot to talk about. So this will likely be a bit of an adventure into daddy-hood for me. Hope you enjoy.
