Notes of a Sexist Stay-at-home Father

Las tres amigas y su primo Elliot.

EMPTY SPACES: Our daughters, Ava and Gia, like to help dad find a parking space.  While circling outside a store, as I pass an open space in front of the entrance, Ava and Gia will start shouting, “There! There! Daddy, I see one!” They don’t understand the concept of handicap spots. I drive by and they get amazingly agitated, shouting, “Daddy, daddy…why didn’t you park there?” When I explain, they seem perplexed. They’ll learn.

PETTY AND FIBE: I recently discovered our neighbor’s name is Petty. Pronounced like “Patty”, but spelled “Petty”. She happens to be Taiwanese, and I have lived and taught English in Taiwan. I know English is a difficult language to learn, and phonetics are not that simple, but c’mon. Why call yourself a word that signifies “mean and trivial”? But that’s how it is with second language learners. Petty is not the only misnamed Taiwanese. In Taiwan I read role call in one of my classes, and saw a name listed as “Fibe”. So I rhymed it with “vibe”, and shouted the name. Silence. Then I spelled it on the board and asked who it was. The class pointed to the girl in question, and shouted, ”That’s Phoebe.” So I crossed out her name, spelled correctly, and told her that her name should be this way. The little girl started bawling. Thus I let it be Fibe. Those nutty Taiwanese.

¡Feliz cumpleaños!

MORE FASHION COMMENTS: As clueless husband, my grooming is a target for my wife. I often receive darts like these: “Your clothes are beginning to walk on their own.” “You’re not wearing that shirt, it’s wearing you.” “The 1980′s are calling, they want their T-shirt back.” Since I’ve been married my wife has bought or chosen all my clothes, and so whenever I look presentable it’s due to her, but somehow I still ain’t doin’ it right.

COMMUNICATION & RHETORICAL QUESTIONS: My wife is one of those women who communicates with rhetorical questions and statements. Usually they are directed towards our daughters, or other people, but meant for me. For example, she’ll tell Ava and Gia (and sometimes baby Kaya), “Wow, what a mess, the living room sure needs vacuuming, Ava, do you think you can take care of it?” “Gia, will you please mow the lawn?” Then there’s the rhetorical questions directed my way: “Are these dishes dirty?” “Are you drinking a beer?” “Is tomorrow garbage?” Or the famous and all too common query that happens every time I’m sitting on the pot, “Caleb, are you taking a sh*t?” My response is always: “Are you asking a rhetorical question?”

POO BY A HAIR:  As much as I think poo stories are cliché for a parenting blog, my wife’s cousin Susy had some poop that scored high on the gross factor, and thus, what the heck, here goes. Evidently, when Aunt Susy’s daughter was in diapers she’d often eat hair, and somehow, in mid-change, the poo would cling by a proverbial thread. Susy would often fold up the diaper, and discover, as she pulled it away, that the poo would still be hanging on by a snake-like strand out of the ol’ behind, and she’d watch it out spaghetti out of the you know what. You get the drift.

GIA TURNS FOUR! Gia turned four in June. Happy Birthday Gia!

PHOTO of the MONTH: Summer Solstice at Stonehenge