My Baby Is Not Mine

My baby Abby. How easy it is for me to say, "my baby." And she is isn't she. Four and a half months old. I go in pick her up at 2:30 in the morning, exhausted, change her, bring her in for mama to feed. Abby smiles at me, happy to see me. Lovingly I smile back at her. She is mine. I hold her and feel her little body against mine. Her tiny arms and hands wrapping around my shoulders, her head nestled into my neck. I love it and her.

In the morning, I'm so happy to see her, to lie next to her on the floor and hold her up over my head and see her laugh and smile back at me. My baby is mine. Abby is mine. My daughter, my sweet little daughter. Our eyes are locked. Her beautiful grey blues staring into my browns melting my heart. Our smiles mirror. And then, she looks away.

She's bored with me. What's she looking at? What's more important than her Papa? A light, the wall, a picture, her dresser, the floor? Abby I'm here, here, here I am, I think. Look at me. But she doesn't. Her face glides by me to look at the light shimmering in, peeking in from beneath the blind, then up at the ceiling fan.

And I get it. I see it, clearly. She is not mine. She is the worlds. I know in this moment that I don't own her. I can't control her. She is the worlds and I am here to only guide her. To get her on her feet so she can fly by herself. She doesn't and will never belong to me. She is her own person even at just four months old.

Wow. There's a selfish feeling squirming around inside me and I have to say it out loud. I'm jealous? I'm sad? What is it, I'm both. I'm aware and that's good, I guess all my self help therapy would tell me. I recognize that I'm just the father.

I can't help but to think of my father and what he thinks of us, our relationship. Who are we? I feel sad. I could cry. My daughter will up and move out, move to the other side of the world and through 2 misscarriages with my wife, and three years of trying and stopping and talking and crying and biting our teeth, she'll move away. Just like that.

She'll be looking at the light creeping into her room. The light of a college in New York, Europe, a boyfriend, a calling, a passion, a something calling her to pick up and be her own person. I see it already and through the insecurity, through the selfish thoughts, I am amazed at the power of life. I'm blown away by the power of spirit and our humaness. The basic life driving makeup we all share, to be our own person.

Today part of the piping in my house needed to be replaced. The main pipe that leads out of the house towards the sewer. I got it done, had someone come out, but still, I had to call my Dad. I had to call him and tell him the details, looking for a, you did good son or something. To share life with him. No matter what we've been through either apart or together and no matter my feelings toward him whether good or bad, I've never been able to say these weren't my parents.

Sometimes I wonder why can't they just be regular people that I can just forget? I've not lived with both of them for so many years now. My eyes focused on the light of a career and and life in California and on traveling and on surfing and on my wife and now my baby. I am all these things. A Dad isn't an end to end all for my child, the world is there for her to explore for a reason I guess. I know I enjoy it in my life. My Dad did it, I did it, and I know she'll do it. I have to give her to the world.

Now she's turned her head back to me and is smiling at me again. She holds her stare again and gazes deep into my eyes. I try not to count the seconds before she turns away again. I try and just breathe her in and enjoy our moment however long. Her silence speaks wisdom to me as if she could hear the words writing in my head. As if she could hear my insecurities. And her calmness, her stillness, her unflinching stare seems to say, You are okay, Papa, she says. You are okay. Then she looks away.