The Making of a Bad Father?
Mentally preoccupied with my upcoming contribution to the world population, I've been paying closer attention to the swarm of previously unnoticed crum-crunchers in my immediate vicinity. There seems to be no shortage of these coughing, pint-sized snot factories.Kids were always a very distant concept for me, something I wanted, perhaps now, perhaps later, but something that was far from imminent. Without the pressures of a long-term relationship (or a short-term one, for that matter), I could think about this issue without having to confront its reality.
Now that my fortunes have flipped, I can't get over one simple thought that keeps jumping to the top of the print queue that is my consciousness, ...God help me, but I don't think I like kids very much.
What does that mean?
I don't know exactly, ...but I find myself forcing a smile when I see a child blatantly disobey his or her parents. I feign a "isn't that cute" smile when a child operates as if there are no morays or societal rules to which he has to abide. I pretend to think that a baby's blank, round-faced stare, complete with a fountain of snot, a stream of drool, and a diaper full of you-know-what is cute.
I'm sorry, but it's all I can do to keep that open faucet of germs away from me. Will this make me a bad father? Will I feel a stronger connection to my child after he or she is born? Why am I beginning to dread this birth? It's starting to worry me.
I'm a dog person through and through, but maybe that is a lesson for me.
While I used to cringe at the thought of being licked on the face by a dog, it now happens all the time and I hardly think about it. I used to be grossed out by dog crap in the yard, but now it's just another chore like dusting or changing the toilet paper roll. I used to hold my nose when face-to-face with dog breath, but now I regularly check my dog's breath just to see how bad it's gotten.
Will a doughy, diapered, leaky squawk-box transform me into a diaper bag holding, formula-mixing, bath-giving "dad"? I don't know, there's something wrong about a guy contemplating the idea of becoming a dad while simultaneously counting the days until the next Splinter Cell game is released for the PC.
<< Home