The Proving Ground

 

     It's an exciting time in my family. My cousin and his wife just had their first baby! I remember the moment when I became a Daddy - not when I became a father, for that happened some two years earlier.   It was the middle of the night and I was awoken by my first born's little voice coming from down the hall. She was calling to me, “Daddy!”               

     Calling for me was significant because it was the first time ever that she called for me before calling for my wife.  “Daddy” was in fact a newer word in her vocabulary, I'm convinced that she knew how to say it, but she preferred to call both my wife and I Mommy.  So there I was, three o’clock in the morning or thereabouts, hearing my little girl calling for me for the first time, needing ME!  What a moment.  I snapped into action.  With a glance at my wife I told her, “I’ve got this one,” and with a goofy smile plastered on my face and pride swelling up within me, I made my way down the hall to her room.  She had only recently moved into her own room so I figured she had woken-up, realized she was alone and simply needed a little back rub to fall back to sleep – and on this night she wanted me, Daddy! 

     I turned the corner into her room and stopped in my tracks.  There she was, my precious little angel, kneeling on her bed, tears in her eyes, arms uplifted, needing her Daddy, wanting a hug… with puke blanketing the front of her jammies.  Instantly taking in the scene and processing the ramifications of hugging my puke-covered angel, I made my decision. Without hesitation (okay, maybe a little hesitation) I bent down, scooped her up into my arms and held her tightly to myself.  Then and there, with puke sandwiched between us, our bond as Daddy and his little girl was cemented.  I fought back a tear brought on by the knowledge that my little girl needed me…wanted me…and maybe the pungent smell of that night’s dinner…but mostly the former. 

     Perhaps that was a way of testing my devotion to her as a father -her way of seeing if she could count on me through the harshest of conditions.  I like to think that I passed.  After a very brief moment cherishing our embrace, I called to my wife, “Honey!  I’m going to need some back-up…”