Father's Day

It is Carl's second Father's Day.  It has become difficult to imagine life before him, and life before Layla.

Those free days, where my life was completely my own, where I could pack up my car and drive for hours on a whim, or spend the night watching a meteor display, are hazy, distant memories.  It seems a life time ago, when I was the gypsy, wandering through life alone and unattached.

I had barely enough time to be a wife, to be with him, before I found myself the wife of a deployed soldier.  I had not come out of the first few wrenching days, when I spent an afternoon peeing on test strips and staring, wide-eyed at the results.

To say that I have come into this chapter of my life, as wife and mother, with grace, poise, dignity, all those good words that equal grown-up to me, is an outright lie.  I have screamed, thrown things, stomped around, swore I would not survive marriage to a career man, I pouted when things didn't go my way, cried and in general made things ten times worse than they really were.  (That drama queen thing again.)

But here I am... wife, mother.  Comfortable with the person I see staring back at me, accepting of the flaws and faults, although I wince when I see another gray hair.  Although the changes were painful, becoming this person, a better person than I was, was worth it.  Somewhere along the way, as I labored to have my child, I labored in a different way, changing into who I am now.

I felt it, the first realization that everything was different, that life was different, the very first time I watched him hold her.

For the past 15 months (where exactly has the time gone??!!!), I have watched Carl parent, learn how to change diapers, juggle a screaming baby while making a bottle, hold Layla up to teach her how to stand, how to walk, make her giggle like I can't, I've watched him grow into Daddy.  And I realize that for him, the change has been as abrupt, as difficult, as it has been for me.

He has gone from free-wheeling, single soldier, to a man bearing the weight of his family, the responsibilities of two lives (three now that my Mom is with us), dropped squarely on his shoulders.  As painful as the transition was for me, I can not imagine how intense it must have been for him, and he made that transition mostly while he was gone, watching his family through pictures, talking to us over a bad phone connection, with a pair of baby socks tucked in a pocket against his heart.

When I thought I could not love him more, he proved to me how strong he is, when I thought I knew how tough he had been, he proved to be tougher.  And from the moment he held her for the first time, I knew how good he was going to be at this whole parenthood thing.

Happy Father's Day, to the best Daddy, and husband, in the world.

~Jennifer

My little girl, conquering hearts, starting with her Daddy's.