On the second day of this year, our little family changed forever. Our little crew grew by one and overnight, we were thrust once again into a whole new wave of having our lives hijacked by a new tiny person whose schedule governs every one of our waking moments.

There are times where it’s a lot but we’ve done this once already and I like to think that we’re more prepared for it this time around. This time, we’re not spending all of it in abject terror. This time, I can better identify when I’m close to burning out, I try to communicate that feeling better, and I have a deeper trust that Stephy will help me out when 我快不行了. A lot of the feelings in this season ring familiar. However, being a father of two is different. It feels different. I mean, duh. What I mean is that I think there are some things I didn’t expect to be grappling with.

This time around I can feel myself wrestling with the hard truth that our time as parents is finite, our attention is finite, and the sum total of our energy is limited and ever decreasing with time and age (not Stephy, she is an ageless beauty). While I have experienced the love and joy in our family grow in exponential measures, I can feel my focus and affection being stretched and divided. It’s different from what it was like with just Shelby. With just Shelby, we had our limits but the path was simple–it might not be much, but give her all I’ve got. Now there’s two that deserve it, but I still only have what I have.

In the middle of this, there is a temptation to minimize Shelby’s needs in light of Soren’s since hers are iPad, snackie, and Barbie-based while his are essential for survival as a new helpless human. His benchmarks are monumental like saying, “mama” or “baba”, rolling over or embarking on a lifelong journey of solid foods. Hers are smaller and incremental like being able to add numbers whose sums are bigger than her fingers, reading four letter words instead of just three and waving hello to people instead of awkwardly standing in silence (we’re still working on this one). 

I have to remind myself that her benchmarks may not feel as huge and sweeping, but they are just as fleeting. She will only be this age for this moment and just like him, she’ll never be this age again. Soon enough, she will stop asking us to play with her and all of the hours we had doomscrolling on our phones can’t be given back for more time with this special version of Shelby. I can’t neglect one in favor of the other.

But it’s not just as simple as time and attention. I find myself struggling with the weird paternal instinct to pass on a little bit of who I am. With Shelby, I have to admit that she has not taken to any of my interests outside of 牛肉麵 (which admittedly, is as core as it gets). Much like her mom, she hasn’t shown much interest in the things that I enjoy. I was hoping my kids would enjoy things like Pokémon or basketball or adventures of all sorts, but outside of Jigglypuff, she’s pretty lukewarm about the idea of checking out stuff dad likes. She’s not really into reading or exploring or unmitigated chaos. She’s more reserved and thoughtful, cautious and sensitive.

I can feel something in myself – the anticipation of sharing these things with the little baby chunkster instead. After all, he is a gigantic monster baby in the image of his father, climbing to 2/3 the weight of his sister at six months old and quickly closing the gap with each mega bottle he puts down. He’s got a body built for team sports and thighs like a D1 softball pitcher. I find myself looking at anime-themed onesies or trying to decide when to dig out the Little Tikes basketball hoop from the garage. He’s the one named after an author, and in my heart–in the telepathic bond that a father shares with his son–I know that he’s gonna be a little reader like his dad and his grandpa and his great-grandpa too.

There is an excitement bubbling within me for the potential to share some of the things that the girls in our family are wholly uninterested in– that I will have a chance to share a part of myself to someone in my family. There’s a hope that some aspects of my life that I have committed my time and energy to will not be lost in me, but passed to someone else. Maybe it’s a function of the girls not being interested combined with the demands of work and fatherhood that have systematically limited my ability to share any of these interests with friends and people outside of my family unit, but I’m not gonna think about that right now

Somewhere inside is a feeling that I have another shot at having a buddy to do stuff with. Then when I stop to think about it, I am convinced it’s a stupid feeling. It’s stupid because within it is an acquiescence–a subtle concession and the seed of something gross and destructive. It is the seed of some kind of favoritism.

And so for the past couple of weeks, I’ve fought that feeling and I’ve fought to make sure that the wee baby Shelby never has a reason to think that she’s any less my daughter than Soren is my son. By taking advantage of the gaps in her childcare over the summer and burning through the last vestiges of my family leave, we’ve gone on adventure after adventure. We’ve explored new places, tried new barbies, accrued a drawer full of Yogurtland spoons. She stole my phone and used my Masterball to catch a pidgey (real PokemonGo people know how devastating this is). We braved a dentist visit that had her going under and filling 11 cavities, including two root canals. We jumped on a train to visit grandma and grandpa. We’ve gone swimming and ice-skating and read new books and watched Hilda together. We’ve gone on bike ride after bike ride all throughout the neighborhood. We write a little story about our day every night before we go to sleep and we’re getting ready to go camping next week. I just love her so much, my head’s gonna fly off.

In the end, I know it’s not about making a kid in my own image. I mean, what have I inherited from my own folks besides and a passion for 80’s action movies and low-stakes gambling. I know in my head that pretty soon, my own influences will pale in comparison to their own (in fact, I’m counting on it). When that day comes, I’m planning on being right there with them. I hope that the core of who I am is not a collection of interests but an interested person, someone who is curious and enthusiastic, eager to learn and encourage. I hope that’s who I am and I hope that’s something they find worth inheriting from their old man.