The yang of parenthood.

There are a ton of things that nobody can properly prepare you for when you become a parent.
The sleepless nights, the OCD behavior.....have you any idea what it's like to listen to a toddler pointing at a stereo and saying "James Brown? James Brown? James Brown?"

Look, I like James Brown, but I don't want to listen to it 24-7, ok?
I know what you're thinking, " hey it could have been worse, it could have been Barney"
Well ...no, actually. On a cellular level Turbo is one cool SOB. So while I didn't have to listen to The Wiggles, I did have to watch my son point at the stereo and plaintively wail "the bluuues"
And then cry because I didn't want to stop listening to what I wanted to listen to so that he could listen to his favorite Taj Mahal cd for the Millionth time..

So while they can warn you about these things you can't really prepare for it.
The thing I am dealing with now that you can't prepare for?
Your love for your child changes. I don't love Turbo any less now. But it's...different.

He is not that adorable little guy anymore. When he was little he was the cutest thing you have ever seen. This is not fatherly blinders. I was stopped in the supermarket on a regular basis and implored by women to put the boy into baby modeling. When we lived in Portland, when he was a preschooler, anytime we took the train or walked downtown, somebody would stop and say hi to him, he was known in Portland. Random people would shout out "Hey Hopper!" It was weird. But he was that cute, that charming.

Then he got older, he got smarter and funnier and weirder.


And my love didn't change.

I don't know when it changed. I know it happened slowly .....

What got me thinking about this was a picture I have of him from a little more than a year ago....he was still %100 kid then.


He's not now. He's in that middle passage between man and boy. His voice is deeper, he's...growing hair in places ....and he smells funny sometimes....but he's still a kid in many ways...

and I feel differently about him.
I still love him but I feel this sadness sometimes because he's not my cute, cuddly, insanely adorable little guy.....

I don't have any answers at this point...I just noticed it recently and I'm a bit lost because I don't ever remember anybody warning me about this...It seems obvious that your love for your child evolves but...to not feel the insane adoration for the little guy like I used to...I'm sure it's a natural way to prepare for the kid becoming independant and eventually moving out and making his own life...but still, it's unsettling.