She already had quite a bit of hair when she was born and we haven't cut it since. We thought about it when it started to get in her eyes, but we couldn't bring ourselves to do it, her hair is amazing and she has such beautiful corkscrew curls!
I finally get why parents are so sad when their kids want to get their hair cut for the first time, and that it's not a matter of “It's just hair, it will re-grow”. The hair tips were there from the very beginning, they are the start of a new chapter in the life of a child's parents.
I guess this is one of those things you can only understand when you experience them.
She cried out last night and I went to check on her. She was still asleep, on her belly, her arms around her head.
I caressed her hair, my other hand on her back as it moved up and down just so slightly.
Then, for the first time, I felt the urge to hear her heartbeat. Weird that I didn't think of doing this before.
I pressed my ear on her back, and there it was, beating faster than I had imagined. Air, filling and leaving her lungs. We stayed like this for a few minutes, and she must have been aware of me, as her heart rate slowed.
I asked myself often in the past: Can I love? What is love supposed to feel like?
“Hyper-Parenting, Genders, not teaching to say thank you – this isn't my world (anymore)” he said and announced a relationship pause.
I totally get why parents of the Boomer generation parented differently than today. They learned it from their parents alone, and had no other information sources for alternatives. My grand parents' generation and people from the generations before had hard lives, patriarchy was more “blunt”.
Letting your kids cry themselves to sleep at night was an important training to make them independent. When they stopped crying after a few nights, the lesson was a success – why would one assume that they stopped only because they've given up having learned that, when in distress, nobody would come to soothe them?
I get it.
What I don't understand is why it is an affront to them when we do things differently today.
I wish I could share the deeply satisfying and rewarding feeling with them when I see my child on the baby monitor waking up late at night, looking around and saying softly “Papa? Papa?”, and the joy on their face when I go to them to take them in my arms.
I have a few unfinished drafts about friendship, and I'm not sure why I haven't gotten around finishing any of them, only that this seems to be a topic that is important to me.
I think of myself as being a good friend and a bad friend. Good in the sense that I'll always have the back of people I consider my friends. Bad in the sense that I'm terrible at maintaining my friendships.
Call me, and I'll spend as much time listening as you need. Try to get me to meet up and you'll wonder if I got lost between messages.
Perhaps one without the other is not enough. But I'm thankful for the few people where it seems that it is.
My parental leave is almost over, and after five months of being able to spend time with my daughter as much as I want, I will have to take a big portion of it for work.
I love my job, and until the last day of not being a dad I couldn't imagine not working for such a long time.
Now I find it difficult to imagine how to balance my time to do justice to both my work and my family.
Having a remote-only job helps, as well as my wife and I supporting each other, no matter what.
What I like is that my priorities have shifted since five months ago. We'll manage!
For the first time in months, I woke up early, but late enough, during a light sleep cycle when the baby had a fart across. Her mom and I helped her, had a little chat, and I felt refreshed and like not going back to bed.
Now I'm sitting with a coffee on the terrace, the weather and light are pleasant, and I actually hear a rooster crowing in the distance.
You're just one person away from being part of the “this only happens to others” group.
I finished writing a 30+ pages documentation to make my case to Airbnb against the host of an apartment in Palma de Mallorca last night.
For the past 14 days, I've been messaging back and forth with the host and with Airbnb support: one of the rooms was moldy and we couldn't use it. The apartment was in bad shape and hat partly severe water marks on walls and furniture, and rust on the appliances.
We did everything by the book – we immediately contacted the host directly, Airbnb support in parallel. The host promised fixes, and started by sending someone with a paint can. We were flabbergasted but, after four days, accepted that we shouldn't have trusted the photos, the assertions of the host or that Airbnb valued the guests more than the hosts.
Then came the day before our departure: heavy rain turned the terrace above the apartment into a sea. Water leaked into the apartment everywhere. We left, now understanding how the water marks came to be, and fearing to be electrocuted by the wet electrical appliances.
We reported this to the host and Airbnb. The host ended up filing a damage refund request of half the rent, accusing us to have clogged a drain with soda cans. (We had already paid a few thousand bucks for the horrible stay so far)
Now I'm hoping for the mercy of Airbnb, the self-proclaimed “neutral arbitrator to achieve an amicable solution”.
If I'm ever to use Airbnb again (I won't if I not absolutely have to) or if you plan on doing so:
Check the cancellation policy of a listing: if it's not cancelable until x days of the arrival, stay away from it
If the host has anything but stellar reviews, stay away from them
Document every. single. detail. of anything wrong with the place and let the host know. Show today's newspaper and a clock on each photo. Make videos commenting what you see.