On the Front Lines of Fatherhood and Deep into the Ridiculous
I think I’m too deep into fatherhood to notice the ridiculous anymore. Somehow, the ridiculous has become the expected and therefore no longer noteworthy. A brief but not entirely unrelated aside is in order.
There seems to be
an idea that you can go beyond the point of diminishing returns when it comes
to the number of kids you have. Basically, after X number of kids people assume
there must have been a mistake in the cost-benefit analysis or ROI calculator for
a family. The number of kids where you’re assumed to have crossed this
threshold varies, but from the things people say to me I can say, in general, seven
is considered well beyond the point of diminishing returns.
This isn’t a very
life-affirming point of view. My thoughts on this whole matter are, spoiler
alert, somewhat different. But we won’t go there today. However, the more kids
you have in the house certainly does impact how you view life. And I think my
sense of humor has taken a hit in the form of losing the ability to notice the
ridiculous. To whit:
I walked into the
house after work and was greeted by a paper sign that simply said, “FORT
POTATO.” That may or may not qualify as ridiculous, but the ridiculous thing is
I didn’t ask any questions or dig into this any deeper. As of this writing, I
have not inquired where this came from, what it was for, and if perhaps there
was an epic potato war in the playroom of which I was unaware.
I’ve lost sight of
the relatability of my daily experience to a ridiculous extent. I was casually telling
someone about finding cheese in the pocket of one of the boys’ pants after it
had gone through the dryer. Until I saw the look of shock and horror on the
face of the person I relaying the story to, it didn’t even strike me as a
ridiculous thing. The number of times food, hardware, or random items have been
found in pockets after they’ve gone through the wash and/or have ruined laundry
in our house is legion. Which makes me forget that laundered pocket cheese
isn’t as common as I think.
Ok, how about this
for ridiculous? When one of the younger boys approaches me with the question,
“can I eat this?” one of my most common responses is, “is it food?” And I’m not
making some point about non-nutritional snack “foods” vs actual food. Over time
it has just proven to (somehow) not be ridiculous to clarify this from the get
go.
Just like when I
ask a boy to pick something up, I’ll often add, “with your hands.” This
seemingly superfluous addendum is in no way superfluous when you have boys
seeing nothing but a challenge in picking up the baby’s pacifier with their
feet. Ridiculous.