The Father I Married

This month the Blog Exchange is tackling “Dads” in honor of Father’s Day. You can read my post over at Simply Nutmeg. Welcome Nutmeg, who is hanging out with us today!

My husband is controlling. He refuses to admit it, because he's too controlling to accept somebody else's opinion. We dated for three years before we got engaged, and he managed to hide this side of his personality the entire time. He was all, "No, you pick the movie! Where would you like to have dinner? I'll listen to whatever music you feel like hearing."

Really, when you're young and dating, the decisions are all little ones.

And then I said yes.

Nathan has been Best Man at like maybe a hundred a few weddings and he always includes this little ditty in his speech:

After Einstein and his wife were married for thirty-five years, someone asked them what their secret of married success was, and Einstein answered, "Before we married we made a deal; she could make all the little decisions, but I would make all the big ones. So far there haven't been any big decisions."

We've had a lot of big decisions.

The problems started when we tried to plan the wedding. I wanted tradition. Nathan wanted to get married on Halloween, have a costume reception, and make "Love is kind of crazy with a spooky little girl like you" our wedding song. Can you imagine the mother of the bride in a gorilla costume?

Then came buying the house. The day our realtor showed us the house we live in right now, I thought it was so ugly and disgusting I wouldn't even look at the second floor. Did I already mention we're living in that house right now?

Then we started decorating. And picking paint colors. I think there's something soothing and clean about an entire house painted in linen white with bright white trim. Currently we have a dark blue room, a dark red room, a dark green room with darker trim, a bright green and blue room, a brown room, a purple room, a pink room, and let's not forget the clouds in the entrance hall.

I thought all husbands cared more about football than house wares and when asked to help choose the new dishes, all husbands said, "Whatever you want, dear. I just want you to be happy."

Nathan loves to choose dishware. And curtains. And bedding. Don't even get me started on wall art.

Then came naming our children. I could write volumes on this experience alone, but I'll keep it short.

Top two names on Meg's list: Emma and Samuel.

Top two names on Nathan's list: Akahana and Geronimo.

You may be thinking that I actually won that one if you know the names of our children, but then you clearly don't know all of their names. They have eighteen between them and Madigan's third name is Akahana.

Right now you might be wondering what it must be like to parent with somebody who has to stick his nose in every stinking thing, and I'm going to tell you:

I have never had to sit up with a sick child without Nathan either right by my side or taking his turn.

Nathan goes to every parent teacher conference, every back-to-school night, every play, and this year took off from work for a first grade Poetry Breakfast.

Nathan really wants to hear how my day went when he gets home from work.

Nathan took all four kids to Take Your Child to Work Day and they stayed the entire day.

Nathan reads books on how to raise strong girls.

Nathan asks other parents for advice.

If a toy breaks, my children turn to their Daddy to fix it.

Nathan has made a mix CD of special songs that each of our children listen to as they fall asleep.

Nathan will lie in bed at night next to me for hours discussing how we can best educate our children, how to handle Rowan's temper, or how to get Finn to take naps.

When Keira got hit in the eye with a ball this weekend at a neighbor's, she ran all the way home and threw herself into her father's arms. (I was with her at the neighbor's.)

Nathan once drove to twelve McDonalds to get the girls a specific Happy Meal toy they really wanted.

When prenatal testing revealed a very high likelihood that Madigan would be born with Down's Syndrome, Nathan said, "So what? She's still our baby."

My first three children are Daddy's Girls. Finn is not. He's a Daddy's Boy.

Nathan works two jobs and sometimes only gets two hours of sleep at night to make sure his kids make it to Disney World and can look forward to college.

Nathan and I take turns reading novels to the girls. Nathan knows what he will be reading for the next twenty years.

If one of the girls really loves a book, Nathan will read it himself after she has finished. Sometimes he will read it out loud to me.

When the girls say something funny or tell an original story, Nathan writes it down and saves it.

Nathan knows the names of every one of the girls' friends, where they live, the names of their moms and siblings, and a little bit of their likes and dislikes.

Nathan saves every piece of art our children make. He asks them to explain each piece to him, and he writes what they say on the back.

When Madigan was two, she ran a mysterious fever of 105° for seven weeks. Nathan never left our side except to keep his jobs.

When Finn had surgery at 28 days old, Nathan never left our side for a minute and slept in a chair holding his baby, tubes and all, for most of the first night.

When Nathan watches old videos of the kids, he cries.

When Nathan measures the kids and marks their height on the wall, he cries.

When Nathan sees a bride dance with her father, he cries.

And as I write this, I cry.

Nathan is controlling. I wouldn't change him for the world.

A writer, editor, teacher and mom to four little menches, Nutmeg takes life with a grain of salt and a little vodka. You can visit her cyber sitcom at www.simplynutmeg.com.