You can probably count the number of truly life-changing decisions you’ve made on the fingers of one hand.
And no, I’m not talking about the moment you realized double-taper fly lines simply made more sense than weight forwards.
I’m talking about the lifestyle equivalent of picking up a brick and tossing it through the plate glass window that defines the limits of your neat, orderly life.
As in smashing it.
Something like that day in college when you realized words were cool things, and that perhaps you could make a living arranging them.
Or the decades-later realization that your clients had email addresses, so maybe you could hunker down near a good trout stream instead of living in the alternate universe known as the Silicon Valley.
Then there was the afternoon you realized life without a certain woman looked a lot less appealing than life with her, and maybe it was time to make this whole thing permanent.
Every one of those decisions seemed huge at the time – and each created its fair share of anxiety – but all worked out beautifully.
It appears the L&T and I have just thrown another brick.
In about two weeks, we’re saddling up a Boeing 777 jet and flying literally halfway around the world to meet our little daughter.
Our new little daughter.
Holy shit.
I’m about to become a parent.
The New Reality
I’m going to be right up front here; in the past, I have had doubts about my fitness as a parent.
And yes, since this process started a year ago, I have often huddled in bed at 3:30 in the morning, eyes wide open, mentally bulleting the ways I could emotionally (and physically) scar a kid already facing the challenges of adoption.
The good news? While adoption rules forbid me from posting her picture or name here, the pictures we’ve seen clearly indicate Little M (my clever code name) is not only cuter, smarter and just plain better than all the other kids on the planet.
In fact, it’s likely she’s a world-class athlete and natural-born fly caster.
I just know it.
You can tell by looking.
Plain as day.
(And yes – I already have the whole Proud Poppa thing down pat.)
Allow Me To Brag
The L&T has cleverly bypassed the “no public displays of photographs” rule by emailing Little M’s picture to approximately 80% of the planet’s working email addresses.
The overwhelming consensus is that she’s gorgeous beyond belief.
I believe they’re right.
Little M will be just over 11 months old when we bring her back home to the mountains of Northern California, where she will no doubt adapt immediately to her surroundings, sleep through the night, eat whatever she’s given, and spontaneously toilet train herself a good 12 months early.
And if she doesn’t do all those things, well, she’s still got that seriously cute thing working.
I mean, seriously cute.
The Parent Trap
I suspect I’m not entirely alone in this, but as parent-to-be, I’m already excelling at the bit where you cycle hourly between excitement and sheer terror.
One minute I’m convinced I’m going to be a great dad, teaching my daughter all the really cool, important stuff while driving her to her next athletic triumph (track/tennis/soccer/etc – I’m easy).
The next minute I imagine falling prey to one of my absent-minded fogs, forgetting to feed my daughter, wandering off, then coming home to find her swilling drain cleaner from the bottle I left on the floor next to the gasoline-soaked rags piled on the accidentally left-on stove.
Clearly, anticipation is a two-edged sword.
Even Wally the Wonderdog knows something’s up – alerted by the steadily growing piles of kid stuff now taking over the house.
The Wonderdog’s not brilliant, but he clearly possesses an animal cunning, and he knows that diapers and brightly colored plastic toys can only mean one thing: A new source of dropped or spilled food is about to enter his life.
I have a feeling that the Wonderdog will become extraordinarily protective of Little M.
I already have.
Of course, stepping beyond the glass window that defines the limits of your “normal” life means picking up a brick and creating a little chaos.
Life changes, you sweep up the broken bits, your view is clearer and your range is expanded, and you can’t really complain.
I mean, it’s what you asked for when you picked up the brick in the first place.
See you at the glass shop, Tom Chandler.
