THE END OF THE BEGINNING

It was one week ago today that my wife and I went to the hospital to have our baby girl.  Last Tuesday, my wife and I had our last quiet steak dinner, marking the end of the beginning of our family.  The next day, Wednesday, we were admitted for induction of labor, and 56 grueling hours later we met the little one whom we'd only known through ultrasounds and the constant kick-pushing she'd been doing in utero, and now here we are, lying awake nights, eyes wide, wondering if those noises she's making are normal or not and blaming each other for what must be the baby's genetic fartiness.

What occurred to me tonight, a thought that occurs to every adult now and again, is that I will never be able to finish everything I have on my list of things to do, that it turns out that the checklist is written on a Moebius strip - well, a Moebius strip that keeps regenerating... okay, well, you get the poetic point.

That thought (that I wouldn't finish everything, not the Moebius metaphor) came to me when I laid a folded onesie down on a stack of unread New Yorkers on our bedside table, and I realized that I was now back to being a year behind on this reading, and that I'd have to struggle to catch back up, if I were ever able to;  don't get me started on how many issues of Harper's I'm behind on.  I have an e-reader that isnt going to read itself.  Recently, I'd started watching Anthony Bourdain's No Reservations show streaming online, but the childbirth thing put that diversion on hold as well.

I've also been meaning to write a book, or perhaps books, a novel about medical marijuana set in the 90s, a book about the history of emergency medicine, about the history of medcine as a whole even.  There's the promotions packet for work that I have to put together, and although I'll undoubtedly get that done (gotta get to associate), there are a bunch of other things that'll get placed on back burners that apparently are arrayed like a short-order cook's version of a Sartrian afterlife, stretching on and on past an event horizon of indifference.

And this thought, this next one, is still unformed, but I'm beginning to realize that being around for my child, just being around, is what's called for, rather than making it the checklist sort of an action that so many other parts of life

Which sure takes the pressure off of actually getting anything done when it comes to my kid - am I right?

When you're this incompetent, there is no pressure at all.