Kids don't like facial hair

So, about 4 weeks before the boys were born I decided to stop shaving. I liked the superstitious angle to it. As if somehow me growing what amounted to a scraggly beard would somehow ensure a safe birthing experience.

Well, everthing turned out fine in the end and the kids were born healthy, but after that I was stuck in an endless loop of superstition. "If I shave now then something will go wrong" or "If I shave now, maybe they won't recognize me".

Or maybe I was just lazy.

Anyway, I finally decided to shave the darn thing off before the naming ceremony so that many years from now Lachlan and Finn won't be subjected to the horror (or the humor) of having to look at me doing my best Grizzly Adams. I can recall looking at photos of my father when I was a child with his big ol' handlebar mustache, and although it probably seemed like a cool idea to him at the time, they would just sent me into peals of laughter.

Me: "Dad! Check that out! That thing is sooooo seventies!"

Dad: "Shut up kid."

Plus, I don't think Heather was so keen on the beard, and I noticed that everytime I would go to kiss the boys they would get fidgety and uncomfortable. Both of these factors created a powerful index for cutting the whole business away.

So, it's a bit anti-climatic as I've already razored my face, but I wanted to pay homage to my one manly attempt at sporting a beard.

Paying homage to a beard? Weird. Ah well......

All hail facial hair.

Naming

This past weekend on April, 15 we held a "naming ceremony" for the boys. As Heather and I belong to a local Unitaritan Universalist church, it made sense that we hold something like this event there. The ceremony went fantastic. The godparent's speeches were all very complementary, and dare I say, touching. Our minister did an excellent job of bringing everyone into the moment, and injected sincerity into a ceremony that can often be dry as dirt.

I am not a Christian. Although I was raised one, somewhere along the way in my life Christianity's tune no longer caught my ear. I don't decry it. I don't look down on it. It's just not for me any longer. However, I have an undeniable belief in what I can best describe as "the great mystery" or "the divine". In the most convenient terms, I believe.

At the risk of sounding pompous, I have found my own way and am comfortable in my own faith. Therefore, it was important to mark my son's birth with ritual. In a Joseph Campbell way, I believe in the power of ritual within society. It seems to be fading away within recent years and anything that smacks of spirituality or religion seems more like a hobby nowadays. It is a loss lamentable and consequently drove me to incorporate it within my own life. So, we had our ritual.

The foundation of baptism or christenings is to wash the sin from a baby. I can not give myself to believe that a newborn has anything sinful attached to it, so our ceremony, our ritual, was merely one to recognize these boys as they are, and to celebrate love that brings us all together. If only briefly.

The party afterwords was fab as well. We are blessed with friendship.

Heather pouring the champers.

Derek and Kate. Derek had the best line of the day when after holding a very sleepy Finn for a while, looked up and said "This baby is boring". Brilliant man. Truth be told, at 2 a.m. the babies are not so boring, and very different adjectives apply.

Beerage. It helps with changing diapers.

Misty, motherhood becomes you.

(Thanks to Ted L. for all of these photos. They rock pal.)

Hibernation.....

Time has passed enough for me to write and think about this in a more settled way.

About 7 weeks ago, just two days after the boys were released from the hospital and sent home, Heather and I had to put Finn back into the hospital. It was bad. Real bad.

When we first brought both boys home initally all was well. Yeah, there was the expected "freak-out" of suddenely being completely in charge of these two babies on our own and without the constant attention of nurses, but we actually felt more relieved to be away from all of that. Hospitals are fairly intense places to begin with, and it was more comfortable to be at home surrounded by familiarity.

On the following Tuesday we were scheduled to meet with our doctor for a regular check-up. The boys up to this time seemed fine, so we loaded them into the car and off we went.

Arriving at the doctor's office we went in, and it was all smiles and "Getting any sleep?" kind of good-natured banter. We had met with him everyday in the hospital previously so this was meant to be just a routine visit.

As he began examining Finn he suddenely became very quiet, and very serious. The mood changed on a dime.

"This boy is very cold" he said somberely.

He quickly took off Finn's clothes and felt his chest. He asked me to feel it as well. It was like ice. A thermometer reading was taken and it couldn't register a reading.....at all. Finn was breathing and moving a bit, but he didn't look good at this point. Heather and I exchanged anxious glances.

"I want to put him back into the hospital" the doctor said, and then added the parting shot of "Maybe we should call an ambulance".

There are moments in life when you are hearing words, and your brain takes them in, but the import of them is almost too much to process correctly. We listened, but did not believe.

It was decided that us taking him directly would be faster than waiting for an ambulance, so we loaded both boys back into the car and drove to the nearest hospital. It was a drive unlike any other I have ever done. I was behind the wheel, I was driving, but I was a million miles away. In a place I did not know existed. A place I never wish to return to.

They rushed Finn into Pediatric care. Nurses flew around us doing things I can't remember, but when they finally got his temperature I felt like the world had stopped.

He was 89 degrees. 89 degrees. The normal body temperature of a human is 98.

Clothes were stripped off, multiple blankets were wrapped around him, an IV was put in, and they placed him under heat lamps. They were able to stabilize him, but the aura of doctorly concern was thick around us.

For four days I lived with Finn in this hospital. I slept on a cot. I read him King Arthur. I cried a lot.

Heather would visit in the day as she still had to look after Lachlan. We moved through these days as if a blanket of worry was suffocating us. Every test under the sun was conducted on Finn. No conclusive answers were given. He didn't move much and rarely opened his eyes. Although his temperature was back to 98, he just didn't seem well. My heart was breaking with every beep on the LCD that he was connected to.

One day I went home to pick up Heather. I walked through the parking lot to the car and had to sincerely muster the strength to put one foot in front of the other.

Towards the end of the third day Finn began to rouse. He looked better. He was eating. He was pooping. When he finally opened his eyes and looked around for the first time for more than a few seconds I just cried and said to him "Where have you been boy, where have you been?"

In the end the official diagnosis was simply: "We don't know why this happened. It's just something that can occur with babies and especially twins." It seemed flimsy. We wanted to have something to point to. To say that it happened because of a definable problem, a problem which we will now fix. I guess life just can't be compartmentalized all the time, even when we want it to the most.

They took him off the heaters, and after he was able to regulate his core temperature by himself for a full 24 hours, we were given the OK to take him home. It was the sweetest, purest day. Even more than the first time we brought him home.

This little boy had knocked on death's door. It never opened and instead our parental love poured in. I discovered a burning love that took a near-tragedy to ignite. Strange.

I can certainly say that we watched Finn like hawks after that. Taking his temperature every few hours with the slightest deviation in a reading making us pause.

All is well now. We'll never really know why this all happened. All we know is that our son is safe, and for a few weeks afterwords we probably had the warmest house in the state. I don't think the thermostat ever went below 70 degrees.

Photos.........

Future philosophers

Some very suspicious looks from the crib.

Nana Gail bathing young Finn. His first bath.

Grandma Joan with the boys while still in hospital. They look incredibly small compared to the Michelin Men they've since become. This photo is only 7 weeks old. Incredible.