Date:
August 2005
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It looks like it’s been a while since I’ve written, and you’re almost the size of a lime. Since the last time I wrote you’re existence has been announced to the world … well ok, maybe just close friends and family. You’re mom and I were on the phone for a couple of hours last Friday night. Everyone is very excited … especially my parents and step-parents. Grandpa Mike had a pretty big smile when he got to work on Wednesday after his and Nona’s trip to Europe. Grandma Paula is also very excited. Anyway, not to use the word too much, but everyone is very happy and excited. I have all of these weird feelings about the prospect of being a dad. I really want you to love me as much as I love you. We haven’t even really met yet, and already, I don’t think there is anything in the world that I love as much as I love you. And at the same time, I’m really freaked out that you’ll think I’m the biggest goober in the world, which I can be. I want to read you a story, a really cool story, even if your mom doesn’t like it. But I want to read it to you in Latin. I have to learn it first, and I’m hoping that I’ll be able to teach it to you so you’ll understand what I’m saying. Although I’m sure that for the first couple of months you won’t really understand anything I say, and you’ll be focusing more on eating and sleeping and soiling yourself, but I think we can have some fun with the story at any rate. Anyway, time for me to go to bed. Even when you’re all grown up you’ll see that you have a bedtime. The only time that really isn’t the case is college. But that’s for another time. Love you.
A couple of odd things have happened since I last wrote: Iran has decided to go back to developing nuclear technology for peaceful purposes, and the Global War on Terror has been rechristened the Global Struggle Against Violent Extremism. I hope that by the time you’re old enough to read and understand this you won’t be faced by such stupid PR stunts as the changing of names of wars. Anyway … I’m really exited about an idea that I have, and I really have no idea how to make it happen. Any ideas? The astronauts on the Discovery have performed the first underside repair of a space shuttle while in space this week. Hopefully when they come down next week it’s not a repeat of the Columbia disaster. Hopefully in 10 or 15 years we’ve once again made manned missions to the moon and are making our way to Mars. It seems like the most natural thing to do. We seem to be explorers by nature, and it just feels right to want to go to other places outside of the earth. I hope that you will share my love for science fiction … your mother isn’t really into it. She still hasn’t seen any of the Star Wars movies. And those are freaking huge. I had a physical yesterday. It turns out I’m fit as a fiddle. I’m hoping to get my blood work done next week so they can check my cholesterol, and then it will be really official, but after yesterday I’m feeling pretty good. It seems like I had more I wanted to say, but none of it is coming to me now. Sorry … I really didn’t want this to be just a running diary of mine for you to read, but more of a history from dad’s point of view while you are in the womb. That’s something else I hope you have an appreciation for, History. I don’t think there’s a single subject more important to learn from than history. It tells us where we’ve been, and gives us sign posts to follow so we try not to repeat the horrors of the past. I seem to be much more interested in the macro level of your history, not so much the specific people that did certain things, but how their actions affected something else, which affected 10 other things, which affected 10 other things, ad infinitum. Well, its bed time for your old man. I love you.
Your mom and I still haven’t told anyone about you, except for Uncle Tom and Aunt Melanie. Your Grandpa Mike and Grandma Nona are in France right now, drifting on a Barge through the Burgundy region of France. Grandma Paula and Grandpa Dwight just moved into their new house and are really excited. Your Uncle Doug just got back from his honeymoon with Aunt Michelle a couple of days ago. They said they had fun. I wish I had something a little more insightful to write, I really do. I guess the only real big bits of news from today are the appointment of a man named John Bolton to the United Nations as ambassador and the planned spacewalk to repair the underside of the space shuttle Discovery. Not the most interesting things, I know, but it’s all I’ve got for today. I think one of the first things I’m going to teach you is how to score a baseball game. I think that’s a really important thing for a person to know, even though I just learned about a month ago. I really want to tell everyone I know about you, but we’re waiting until Grandpa Mike and grandma Nona get back from Europe. I really can’t wait to tell them and I really can’t wait until next March, not just because it will be my birthday, but because it will be yours too. I love you.
