I sit in the dark with just the low glow of the fish lamp in the corner of the room. Our daughter has been crying for over 30 minutes. The experts say that you should let them just cry it out and soothe themselves to sleep, which I was skeptical about at first- but now I understand that it isn’t cruel, it’s just the first step in them learning to cope. The baby will play you, exploit your parental weakness and have you wrapped around her little finger in a snap if you aren’t careful. Some are easier than others and Lindsay and I created a baby in our spitting image which means she is a ferocious one.

Just as I finished that sentence she actually fell asleep and I can finally hear the inside of my head again.

Love letters. I wish I could say I write one a day for my wife, there was a time when we did. We’d talk on the phone for hours, mail things across the country, surprise each other, and now we are together. We share a home. So the courting isn’t quite the same, but that makes me think- maybe it should be? She is stunning. My dream. We are real friends, the kind that confided in one another for years and years before romantically falling head over heels. We’ve had adventures. Our relationship has been exciting and storybook-like, brilliant- and often times disgusting to others around us (I don’t care). We’ve been there for some of the toughest times and been there for some of the worst days we’ve ever had. But we have also been there for the best ones.

I love her so much.

Once a baby is brought into the world it’s easy to get filed in line to this parental structure “eat” “work” “feed” “sing” “eat” “drive” “shop” “eat” “work” and so on, (I left out “sleep” on purpose). The outwardly exciting adventures take a break and we are on this much longer adventure of creating a family. This is mostly great but tends to get frustrating for us rolling stone types. Mo•not•o•ny, It can be a dirty word. Luckily for us, we were raised well. We know that family is the most important thing. Our daughter sees how much we love each other and will be a better person for it (*fact). We laugh a lot, we also pull out our hair. We get to see the most beautiful girl in the world growing up before us, but sacrifice so much of ourselves in the process. Being a parent is a very strange sort of mental push-up you perform constantly every day.

This upcoming month will mark our two year marriage anniversary (2 years going on 10).

I love you, my wife. You’ve given me the best gifts. You and Olive. We’re getting to reinvent what life and family is all about and that is the best thing I’ve ever had the opportunity to do. I give you my all.