As I look down at your beautiful face, I am struggling to maintain my dad face. You are very, very angry with me, your brows are furrowed, and your amazing dark brown eyes are glaring up at me.
You are laying face up on your bed with a single blue sock halfway on one foot, with your favorite dandelion shirt on but it is inside out.
When I reach out to touch your hair, to calm you down, you give me one last glare and roll towards the wall. I can smile now, because I no longer have to have my firm dad face on anymore. I would love to unlock the secret to getting you dressed to go out in less than 30 minutes. You are the amazing love in my life, and I am always trying to solve how I can navigate the passionate changes in your mood."Honey, I am going to get another cup of coffee, we will finish getting ready when I come back" I said, and I walk around the corner to the kitchen to pour a cup of coffee and try to figure out how I can reach you today.I have to call Grandma Mary and let her know we are going to be late for lunch. I am not going to tell her that the reason we are going to be late is that I cannot dress you in less than 90 minutes. We come from different eras. I am the second oldest of 5 children. We did not have the latitude to object to where we were going, how we were dressed and what we were going to eat (and like). Like my brothers and sisters, we complied without raising any questions or concerns. Punishment for noncompliance was swift and definitive.I waited a long time to have children, and I do not feel the need to make you obey in the way I learned when I was going up. I really want to learn who you are.I am almost done with my cup of coffee, when you walk out of your room with a large smile on your face. You are wearing a pair of shorts, a blue sock and a red sock, and your dandelion shirt is still on inside out. You look beyond happy, and I can't help but smile back at you as broadly as you are smiling at me now.I am stunned that the answer that I have been searching for and trying to figure out is standing right in front of me.The first 18 months of getting you dressed and ready was so easy and straight forward. I would pull out the cute matching clothes, and get dressed in a wonderful, non-hurried way. I would talk to you, tease you, and try to make you laugh while I was getting you dressed. I did not then (or now) have any sense of style but everything I put you in looked amazing. I loved parading you around to my friends, family, and absolute strangers, telling them how I picked out your outfits and dressed you.When you turned 2 years old, your compliant demeanor changed dramatically. I tried to figure out what I thought was causing the change. Every person, I talked to had a definitive reason for the change in your demeanor and none of what they told me made sense. You were a completely great kid. I did not have a frame of reference for 2-year-old girls, you were my first child, and I was in awe of you. I was then (and now) so crazy happy to finally be a dad.When you wait so long for a milestone in your life, you are never in a hurry to have things move quickly. I thought this was part of you growing up and testing the boundaries of being a kid. I did not yell, threaten, or punish you for not getting dressed in a way that would let us be on time for family events. Even today, I am trying to learn who you are.All you needed was to dress yourself and let the world know who you were. It was never (and should have never been) about what I wanted people to see about you. Turns out it was about who and what you are, even at the tender age of 2.
I am never going to admit that this was the point in time that I understood that you were going to train me on how to become very good father. After you walked out of your room that morning, I understood that I was going spend more time watching and listening to you more closely. The boundaries that I was going to have for you were not going to involve cute matching outfits.When Grandma Mary saw you, she scooped you into her arms and gave you a giant hug. She looked at me and raised her eyebrows but did not say a word. I would love to tell my mom that I have solved a great mystery about raising kids, but the truth is the great mystery was solved when the answer stood directly in front of me in a very badly put together outfit.When I think how long the answer was in front of me, I cannot help but shake my head. I am like every other guy on the planet; I always think I solve problems through my amazing ability to process and interpret the information that is presented to me. In truth, most of my amazing solutions to what I think are complex problems, fall from the sky and hit me on the head.The lesson my badly dressed daughter taught me has stayed with me through my Firefighting and Hospice careers. When something does not make sense to me, I am inclined to spend extra minutes listening and looking for the clues that are right in front of me. It also reminds me that not every solution is complex and full of twists and turns.A side note, a lot of people who saw you then did not think there was anything wrong with you, they just assumed that something was wrong with me as a parent because I took you out dressed like that.I am sitting in my office at the station, thinking about you and your Picasso style of dress when the familiar green light comes on overhead."Engine 3, Paramedic 4, respond to a rollover injury accident Weld County Road 5 and Highway 66" the familiar voice says. I can hear the TV shut off upstairs and the crew start to walk down the stairs to get to the Engine in bay 1.Tom is my engineer today; Chris and Gary are in the jump seats in the back. I tell the dispatcher that Engine 3 is enroute status 4 and wait to hear if there are any additional updates from dispatch that will give me a clearer idea what we are going to find when we arrive."Tom, you and Gary get the cutters, spreaders, and the hand tools, make sure we have window punch, Halligan, and flat headed axe" I hear Tom acknowledge what I have asked for. I ask Chris to get the backboard and the jump (medical kit) with the O2 bag. Chris also acknowledges what I have asked for and I remind Tom to not speed and drive carefully. The engine is quiet, and we are waiting to hear an update from the State Patrolman who will arrive ahead of us on scene."Engine 3, Paramedic 4, State is reporting roll over with driver pinned in the car, they are unable to determine the extent of the injuries" I acknowledge the radio transmission, and I am studying the road ahead, it looks like traffic is starting to back up and I remind Tom to drive slower and more careful.When we arrive, we find a late model 4 door car with heavy roof damage and a windshield that is shattered and partially folded forward on the hood of car."Engine 3 arrival with one vehicle roll over, heavy damage to the roof and hood of the car. This will be 66 command we will be investigating" I am still sitting in the engine talking on the radio and I see Tom and Gary start to set up the tools to remove the glass from the door and windshield and force the door open.Chris is bringing the medical gear and I am walking over to the car, Tom has started to portable hydraulics and is hooking up the spreaders and the cutters. Gary has his hole punch out and is setting down the Hallagan tool and the flat head axe by the door that we will force open.As long as I have been working with these guys I am amazed at how quickly and completely, they can be ready to perform what could or could not be a complex extrication. As Tom puts the blade of Halligan in the crack of the door and Gary picks up the axe to hit it, I reach out and touch Gary's arm."Wait" I said, and they both turn around to look at me. I lean over and lift the handle on the door to open it and to everyone's amazement it opens wide and easily. We tie the door off, remove the glass from the door and window and remove the door with the spreaders.Paramedic 4 arrives and with the help of Chris and Gary, gets the patient on a backboard and prepares him for transport. We have the patient in a much shorter time frame since we did not have to remove.When we get back to the station and we do the debrief of the call, the engine crew asks me how I knew the door was not locked or damaged to the extent that we did not need extraction.I spend the next 10 minutes talking about how they all should take an extra minute to access a situation and interpret what they are looking at and not assume what they have walked into before. They tell me that I am a solid command officer because they see me do this a lot.I smile broadly, today I am again wearing my own blue and red socks...
