My Two Lives

This post is not to say I'm leading a double life, or that I lead two different lives concurrently. Actually, I simply survived my first life. I lost my parents early, with my Mom dying when I was 13, and my Dad contracting leukemia seven years later, and then dying just after I had turned 28. I was not a responsible parentless child. I lived the life of a rock star without ever having really been one by 'living hard' on the road with my band, and then continuing the lifestyle long after I gave up on the music career. I never really lost the chip on my shoulder over not making it to the level of success that I (and the other very talented musicians in the band) felt we should have achieved, had we had an honest management company who was looking out for us rather than themselves. I carried that into my next job, and had plenty of attitude to go around for my second attempt at success, this time in radio. (Luckily for me, I found a book called Late Bloomers, by Brendan Gill, about many people who had found great success in the 'second half' of their lives.) The radio career went very well for a while, partly because I approached it with great passion, and because I acted as if I would not be denied - but it seemed nothing was good enough for me, and I believe the people (both) with (and for) whom I worked sensed that from me, and I was sent packing. I really didn't deserve to lose my job, because I worked very hard and tried to do everything right, but my aggressive must-climb-the-ladder-constantly attitude alienated me from my co-workers, and I was ostracized for my acute focus on perfectionism, and "wore out my welcome with random precision", as a great rock band once wrote.
Turned out to be the best thing that could have happened to me, though.
My hometown was a small enough place that there was really no staying there for me after losing my job, if I was going to get back to making a decent living in the same profession. Maybe part of my intent to stay in pursuit of a successful radio career was partly because my brain had gotten too lazy to think of doing anything else for a living. However, I was coming up on 40, and I hadn't found any books with evidence of people having successful third careers, so I packed up and moved everything from my first 40 years westward about 1215 miles (according to mapquest) or so...and met my wife shortly after setting up camp in my new city.
...Looking back, that marked the beginning of my new - second - life.
I didn't recognize it as such at the time, even though I've told her many times since we met that she saved my life. Certainly, as happy as I was that my old friend Jim MacLeod had given me a job here to move toward, it wasn't the job that saved my life. A few years after moving here, Jim moved on from the station, and I was laid off from that job, replaced by a satellite feed. That moment was the only one since my move that gave me pause to wonder if I had made a mistake by uprooting myself from a home that I loved, and at a time in my life when few would dare try to start all over again if they could avoid it.
A moment later, I remembered Janne, realizing that if I hadn't moved, we wouldn't have met, and it was then that I knew I'd somehow work out this new problem. Still not recognizing that every breath I was taking was indeed part of my new life, God decided to step in, and gave us children. Janne would argue that medical science had more of a hand in it than God.
She had always wanted children. At least, after she saw what a joy they were for many of her friends, it was her deepest wish. In my old life, I was too selfish to have children. They would have cramped my style. Spoiled by having been able to spend every waking moment for too many years doing whatever the Hell I wanted, I knew all too well that children would dramatically change that. I knew what kind of a commitment they would be, and I was never ready.
Certainly, losing my job changed our immediate plans, because it would have been irresponsible to bring children into such a situation - but about six months later I returned to work under the new ownership of the same radio stations I had moved here to work for. It felt like a tenuous relationship for the first few months back, but I just kept at it, and I think I'm in a good place now.

...But back to my new life.

We - and I say we, because Janne was the first person to ever make me feel comfortable with the idea of being a father - tried and failed a few times to start a family, so we found the reasons why it wasn't working, and got some help from medical science. (You already know most of that if you've read this blog from the beginning.) There were scary moments at first, but I always knew in my heart that the babies would be okay...and, of course, they're far more than just 'okay'.
Liam and Morgan are the people who finally made me realize that this is my second life, and my chance to have a kind of happiness - after many years of bitterness and disappointment - that you simply can't know unless you have children. Sadly (and some parents who read this will understand), there are even some parents who still don't know the bliss of being a parent, because they haven't given themselves up to it. They're still thinking of themselves first.
This realization of this second chance at life gets stronger every day for me for a variety of reasons, but most recently, it was the first time my little girl hugged me - full on, and unprovoked. I hadn't asked for a hug. She just took it upon herself to wrap her little arms as far as she could around my neck. It was a beautiful, breathtaking moment like nothing I've ever experienced.
People can tell you over and over that if you put love out there, you will get love back, and many times over you may try, and get nothing. You could even get to the point where you might stop believing that the idea has any truth in it. Well, anybody who has read anything I've written here knows how I feel about my children, and I will guarantee you - that if you have a child, or are even luckier, like us, and have two at a time, and you dedicate yourself to loving them, you will get love back like never before. It will overwhelm you, and it will be like nothing you have ever experienced. And no matter how old you are, you will feel like your life has begun again, and you've been given a second chance.

On top of all that, (try to disregard the mess on her face, and) check out the way my babies look at me. How can you not be lovin' life when you get ogled like this?
I love it when either of them get in my face, of course.
Although Janne and I initially planned to not shower her with this colour when she came into our lives, Morgan had plans of her own. She's definitely a 'pink' girl - and has converted us.
I call this one "Bobsled team"...
I catch Liam doing this all too often. He thinks the rocking chair is a surfboard. As a parent, you can only tell a 1.5 year-old child so many times that he or she is going to hurt themselves if they're not careful, then spend the rest of the time agonzing and hoping that you'll be there for them the first time they fall.
...and I don't have words for this one.