Les Singes: The Life of Monkey Boy

Riding the Light Rail with Baba

Here she is, Miss Bota. That's Albanian for Miss World or so I've been told by one of her daycare teachers. I just have to say the past few weeks have been nothing short of magical watching her discover the magic that is the holiday season. I'm not going to lie, I will be sad when the lights are removed from houses, when the inflatable Scooby Doo disappears, and when there are no more holidays songs blaring in retail stores. I will have fond memories of Christmas 2009.

Time Changes Nothing

The weather outside was delightful, the discussion inside wonderful.

I hung with my friends for the weekend in Bend, Oregon. It has been fascinating to learn what our friend Tod did during his two years in the Dominican Republic serving as a Peace Corps volunteer. Whether it was bolstering hurricane weakened aqueducts, youth AIDS awareness, building wood stoves in the mountains, or his work with the local youth groups. It has been fun learning about culture and life the Dominican Republic, more commonly known as "The DR".

We booked our second mancation of the year for Central Oregon so we could catch up with our friend. The drive to Bend, Oregon from Seattle takes about 6-7 hours through scenic areas of Oregon. Seeing Mt. Hood with the full moon shining on its glaciers is awe inspiring. It was one of those amazing late night drives I will always remember.

I'll cherish this specific drive to Bend not only for its scenic goodness. The marvelous HD radio in the Subaru never got used, Tod and I had much catching up to do. It was fantastic and something I've missed amongst friends in the last two years. As a parent it's rare where/when I have a deep uninterrupted serious talk these days.

With a yellow line to my left and a white one to the car's right, I listened to how his life had unfolded in The DR. I discussed the joys (and heartaches) of parenthood while hardly noticing vast amounts of miles ticking away. We discussed relationships, friendships, triathlons, parents, and everything in between.

To me, this is what friendship looks like in the dictionary. The talk we shared reminded me of a car ride I took with Mrs. Lessinges in 1998 when we drove together from Chicago to Seattle. A ride so pleasant the radio wasn't needed as a social crutch. You just go from one topic to the next until you finally arrive at your destination, puzzled how you got there as fast as you did.

This my friends is what defines friendship. You can pick up where you left off as if nothing has been lost. Two years away from home, aw.... no big deal.

Bumping fists is for the emotionally weak

I reflect often. If you ask Mrs. Lessinges, she'll tell you I love the expression "guess what we were doing two months ago?" more than life itself.

2 years ago = November 2007 - my Best Man Tod is settling into his Peace Corps assignment. He will spend the next two years helping youth in The Dominican Republic make themselves healthier. Believe it or not, he returns to Seattle this Friday evening and I couldn't be happier.

3 years ago = November 2006 - miraculously conception occurs after wearing bike shorts for half the year. It was a nervous time as my wife and I learned she was pregnant. We couldn't tell anyone other than a few close friends. I wanted to tell all my friends and family, but it wasn't appropriate. I was so anxious to share the news with everyone reading my blog. However, there are rules about sharing things of this nature. To me, fall of 2006 seems like ten years ago.

I've never had a close friend spend two years away for humanitarian reasons. I'm so very proud of my buddy for his charitable acts. Deciding to spend two years away from family and friends to selfishly help others is most impressive. My friend may not return home the same person he was a couple years ago. He may return a changed man in many respects. Think about the sacrifice it takes for someone to join the Peace Corps. I can hardly find two free hours to read/comment/type blog entries these days. To take two years out of your life is inspiring. And by "out", I don't mean it in a negative sense in the least bit.

Tod - I can't wait for you to meet the girl who was conceived three years ago. Two years ago she barely fit in your forearm. Your mother deemed purple to not suit Baby Singes well. I've bragged about you since the day you left. At the age of 36 you've accomplished many things in your life. I look forward to hearing if you were lovestruck in The DR and what truly happens in the Peace Corps. Welcome back to Seattle my good friend. Your presence in the Pacific Northwest has been missed. Leaving the island of Hispanola will most likely be bittersweet so let it be known Téo, wherever you go hombre...you're loved.

Un abrazo fuerte...

Brussel Sprouts Do Scare Me

Certain things do scare me: Mary Hart, not completing a blog post, brussel sprouts, knives, guns, little boys with red curly hair, and men who clip their fingernails at work... to name a few.

A couple years ago I'd be hard-pressed to create a legitimate fear list. However, I'm pretty sure this has changed. A couple years ago I become a parent and so it's fair to say I have new fears. Last week I turned on the TV late at night to unwind. Sprawled out on the couch, I found myself glued to an HBO documentary called Boy Interrupted. The documentary is about a mom who chronicles the life of her bipolar son with a video camera. It unfortunately has a tragic ending when the boy commits suicide at the age of 15.

I know, this isn't a fun topic. It did get me thinking about the fragility of life. I'm honestly very thankful to never know anyone to personally take their own life. I can't imagine how hard that would be for the victim, surviving family members, and friends. I've definitely experienced death first-hand having lost two siblings, but suicide is different.

In the two years since my daughter was born, I can tell you I have new fears. They're no longer simple fears about celebrities or food. The thought of something going wrong with my daughter's health or something more dramatic is unappealing I just don't want to think about it. Yet here I am blogging about the topic. She means the world to me. I've learned so much about myself as we raise our child. Last Friday night she threw up a few times when we got home from work. Saturday morning she turns to us and says, "mommy, I need to spit". The spitting action refers to her vomiting into a bucket. She took the whole being sick episode better than I would.

If you watch the news the headlines are inundated with horrible stories about children losing their lives early. Kids drowning, suffering a dog attack, getting lost in the woods, having a predator touch them, etc... these are things you hear about and hope like hell never happen to your own child. That shit freaks me out. I don't want my daughter locked in a cave. She loves all the people she interacts with at daycare, but I can see where a parent might want their child to never leave their sight. I'm not a parent that subscribes to the isolation theory. I want her to see as much of the world as possible since I think much of her growth hinges upon the people she meets who aren't her parents.

I would love to try and wrap this post up with a shiny bow, yet I haven't a clue where I'm going with this entry. I guess watching the documentary and seeing the family's raw emotions made my stomach sick. The stuff this family went through in hopes their boy would have a "normal" life is gut wrenching. I say compassion is key.

It Only Happens Once a Year

We've made it two years! Will I always remember her birthday as if it were yesterday? The smell of the hospital, the temperature that Sunday morning, things happening the weekend our daughter was born are still as clear as if they happened last week. You can see our bundle has grown to be quite the toddler. Heck, she's not even a baby anymore. She sings, she dances, she knows the difference between coffee and milk, she copies the actions of her parents, and most importantly she delights.

Baby Singe's arrival to this world wasn't smooth. My wife had to have a c-section to get our girl out of the womb. Her head was cone shaped, she weighed slightly under six pounds, we had to stay an extra day at the hospital, yet she was ours to take home. We took care of her during those first fragile weeks. I took a month off from work while my wife took off five to learn more about the girl who spent the previous 9-10 months growing inside her. We made it through the first year with a collective sigh.

Jump forward to August 5th, 2009 and I couldn't be prouder. I love our daughter so very much. She's already teaching me many things about myself much like her mom did when we first met. Well, I continue to get schooled by Mrs. Lessinges, but that's a topic for another day. Becoming a parent has been quite an eye opening experience. Every day evolves. Let me tell you this, I've had a blast this summer. The weather has been most remarkable in Seattle. We've spent the weekends learning and discovering all that our city has to offer. Many days I feel like a tourist in my own hometown, seeing many things for the first time such as the Filipino Festival a couple months ago.

In my college days I listened to a shock jock named Tom Leykis. He loved to rail against parents saying they have kids for egotistical reasons. While there may be some truth to his claim, there is a flip side... the payoff. Raising a child is not easy work, but I will say the work is definitely worth it in the long run. The first year was grueling. The second year has been a bit exhausting and trying. Watching an infant grow into a little person is one of the true wonders as they discover the world around them.

While I wrap up this post around 1:30am, I reflect back to the critical final hours in the hospital. I peered out the window, putting my hand in a box of Wheat Thins. Anything to calm my nerves and stomach as my wife endured very painful contractions. Out the window I could see the lights of the university's football field in the distance. It was a foggy night. In four short hours I would become a parent and my entire world enhanced. Baby Singes, we love you!

Alarm set for 5:18am on my cell phone.

Kermit Won't Like Me

Earth Day is a lovely day. It is made even cuter since it shares my brother's birthday. Yes, he's older than the actual Earth Day event which means I'm getting wiser in the process. Green is great. The environment is very important and something I value tremendously. I do my part to live a green life, but there's always room for improvement.

Having said this and maybe not selling you on my pursuit of green... I'm unwilling to compromise on a few things when it comes to saving the planet. First on my list is recycled paper facial tissues. Seriously, my nose would probably feel better if I used sandpaper instead. There's a damn fine reason they invented facial tissues with lotion. I know the recycled paper ones are stellar since they don't use dyes and comes from recycled paper. My office uses these and I swear it's so people won't steal boxes of facial tissue to take home.

Next up, another paper product... paper towels. Same sort of thing here except the recycled paper towels just don't do the trick. It takes about four squares of a recycled paper towel to do the trick of one Bounty sheet. Nobody is paying me to say this either. I'm not really sure the benefit of wasting towels. It comes down to dying the paper. In my fair city I can put paper towels in the food waste bin. This means I have very little guilt about using the quilted towels with a lumberjack as a mascot.

Now to be fair, I will offer up a couple green products that totally rock my world.

1. Our Prius. Call it a wimpy car if you want. Continue to believe the car is unsafe in accidents. Fine, but the car is neither wimpy or unsafe. I've been in a lot of cars in my life and I will say it's a fabulous car. I'm very pleased with our Prius. We've owned it for 16 months and the car teaches me new things about myself daily. The great part about the car is it values my safety with gentle reminders to buckle my seat, the car is in reverse, and to "add fuel" when low. The Prius is looking after me so other folks don't have to. Prius, I love what you do for me.

2. Any Seventh Generation brand product, minus paper products. I am a fan of their goods including the laundry detergent. Washing clothes in cold water is fun for the whole family/planet.

3. Biodegradable "styrofoam" packaging peanuts. This is more of a love/hate item since I severely despise styrofoam. I avoid styrofoam at all costs and would like to introduce legislation requiring all products packaged in styrofoam to be labeled as such on the outside. As consumers we shouldn't have to buy crap bundled in styrofoam. The biodegradable peanuts dissolve in water. How cool is that? The only issue is they're not as rigid as the bastard styro-nuts which stick to your body until you quickly flick them away. I wish more things dissolved in water because we have plenty of water in my part of the world. Poof!

** Egan knows there are a lot more green products not mentioned here. However, no companies stepped forward to endorse this post. Egan is a cheap blogger these days. **

Acquired Information

It was a new word to me. The term was thrown around as an immature joke by neighborhood kids when I was an early teen. "you have AIDS don't you?" I had no clue what it was so naturally I denied any association.

In 1989 I truly learned what lies behind those four letters and how it can impact a person. I was 15 years old at the start of 1989, completely unaware what would unfold in front of my young eyes. Things in my family had started to change as my parents had been divorced for a couple years. We stumbled through the heartache and couldn't prepare ourselves well enough for what was ahead.

As most of you know I'm the second youngest of six boys and one girl. My oldest brother Emery was a great role model during my formative years. My respect for him only intensified after my parents separated ways. He did his best to keep the three youngest boys distracted via various means of spoiling. He worked all sorts of odd jobs, most of them centered around food. He was a gifted cook. That much I knew.

What I didn't know is why his health suddenly plummeted in 1989. He was missing work often and one day while driving to my sister's house, his 28 year old body cracked. My sister discovered Emery slumped over the steering wheel in her driveway. Given the circumstances, it was fortunate timing.

After my sister's driveway discovery, Emery stopped working. He took prescribed drugs to combat his ailments, however these didn't slow his body's rapid deterioration and the drugs didn't pay for themself. As I remember, my brother was a permanent resident in the hospital during the months of May and June, losing weight at an alarming rate. At his worst he couldn't walk or talk. I was told his 6'7 frame had pneumonia and wasn't able to shake it. To be honest, I was spared many of the gruesome health updates because of my age. Looking back, it was probably a wise decision on my mom's part.

My brother made a slight recovery in mid July. News spread stating he'd be able to walk on his own again. Our family was excited to hear the news. Maybe he could fight off pneumonia afterall. There was hope. A few days later the hope was crushed; he wasn't able to get off his feet and was thus bed ridden in the hospital. Final arrangements were made and an unfamiliar pastor made an ominous appearance.

His final hours happened on July 29th, 1989. A week after celebrating his 29th birthday, my brother Emery passed away in his sleep with my brother Eliot at his side while watching the evening news. The rest of us were in the hospital cafeteria when we heard a page over the intercom. My brother's heart and immune system finally gave up its fight. I learned shortly after his death that he died of AIDS. The disease I didn't know, now had a face... my brother's. A permanent and personal association to AIDS was born.

Pink Parade

It's her day to shine. Actually, it's more like it's her three days. Friday through Sunday my wife will walk 20 miles each day as part of her commitment to fight breast cancer as a walker in the Breast Cancer 3-Day. She hasn't trained as much as she'd like, yet I'm certain my wife will do just fine. Over the next few days there will be plenty of tears shed as a parade of walkers weaves through the Seattle suburbs before finishing downtown.

I'm taking the day off tomorrow to show my support. Anna and I will be roadside giving mom, and the masses, all the props she/they deserve. It will be awe inspiring to say the least.

Personally, I'd like thank all of you who contributed to my wife's efforts. Through everyone's support she raised nearly $3500 and her team pulled in $90,000. Most importantly, this means the world to those diagnosed with breast cancer. Someday, someday it might be possible to eradicate breast cancer forever. Wouldn't that be nice? Even if you weren't able to donate money, I know you're right there, stride for stride, with my wife. I've been very happy to help my wife in her fundraising efforts and once again can't thank you all enough. Take care everyone and have a fantastic weekend!

Holy Emotions Batman

Somebody save me! Damn this Facebook nonsense and catching up with people of the past. I stumbled on a page yesterday which highlights students who passed away from my high school. I was caught by surprise when I stumbled on a picture of one of my brothers. A wave of emotions ran through my body I wasn't expecting. It has been nearly 17 years since his passing, but the feelings are still quite raw. I'm pretty sure it's because I see a lot of him in my daughter's facial expressions. It saddens me greatly she'll never get to meet him.

It probably didn't help when I read nice comments left about my brother by his classmates. Maybe I'm just in a sappy mood. Let's go with that. Learning about people who passed away who are your own age is rough. It really makes you think about the impact we leave on others. It's interesting what people remember about others from the formative years of our lives. Is it odd that bloggers who have only known me for a year might even know me better than classmates who went to school with me for 12 years?

I spent a good portion of yesterday reading how students lost their lives due to car accidents or cancer. Combine this with planting ourselves in front of the tv last Friday night to watch the Stand Up to Cancer fundraiser. I suppose it's safe to say I'm in a melancholy mood.

I'll Buy a Bowel

(updates to this post below)

Sunday oh Sunday! 24 weeks old she is and this means Anna is 168 days old. The past couple of days our daughter had been abnormally fussy in the afternoon. After waiting a couple days for her to get better, we caved Sunday and called her pediatrician.

"that's what we're trying to determine. She's had bowel movements after every feeding. This isn't normal for her at all. She also has some blood in her stools and is uncharacteristly fussy. Typically she has one or two bowel movements per day at best. "

This is how I explained it to the doctor over the phone also mentioning her other symptoms, hoping to narrow down the culprits. With Anna screaming in the background the voice on the other end suggested going to the hospital right away. We packed our belongings and made our way to our local Children's Hospital as fast as possible.

We spent seven gut wrenching hours in that hospital Sunday. I can't even tell you the range of emotions we went through as we had our young daughter examined. Our main concern was her frequent pooping and blood in her stool. Anna had a few x-rays performed, an ultrasound, and [drumroll please] an enema. I've never had an enema, but now my daughter has. The hospital thought she might have "telescoping bowels" which basically means the bowels are inflamed and not passing food well.

Seven hours and many tears later we were able to rule out the intussusception, the bowel thing, but we still don't know exactly what caused our daughter's discomfort over the past two days. Sunday was hands down the hardest day as a parent. Of the 168 days Anna has been in our lives, none have been more difficult than our visit to the emergency room and holding her down as they give her an enema. My wife and I shed many tears after the final ultrasound encouraging Anna to get an enema.

There was a slight chance she'd have to undergo surgery if things didn't go well with the enema. The results from the enema showed she didn't have the bowel problem, but didn't figure out the root cause of her discomfort. Our daughter made us so proud today. She was such a trouper with her tiny IV in her left hand and her ability to take all the poking and prodding. We love you so much sweetheart. Just when you think you can't possibly love your child anymore than you do, something like this happens. She's soundly sleeping upstairs while I fight back tears typing out this post. The embrace I gave her before putting her down to sleep was so tender and special. 24 weeks old and the bond as a parent continues to intensify.

UPDATE: Anna seems better today, but that could be in my head. We've stopped giving her milk-based formula and are using breastmilk. We're not sure if this is the cause, but it can't hurt to try. We have an appointment scheduled with her pediatrician later today. No fussiness yet today, but she still has frequent watery bowel movements.

UPDATE II: the pediatrician confirmed Anna's bowel issues are likely the result of an allergic reaction to milk-based formula. Therefore we've switched to a lactose-free infant formula that's almost twice as expensive as the previous version. Better yet, the formula smells like cat food, no joke. Hopefully once Anna no longer has blood in her stools we can switch to a soy-based formula which is much easier on her bowels and our wallets. Thanks to everyone for your kind thoughts.

UPDATE III: the formula sampling continues. The very foul cat food-like tasting formula isn't a favorite, but has shown marked improvements as her bum rash has almost disappeared. We've moved on to soy formula and are keeping our fingers crossed she's not too fickle. This timing of the weaning kind of sucks and pumping may be re-established.