Foreign phenomenon

Andrew Hicks

My 4 a.m. wake-up was short-lived. I thought maybe it was the start of a revolutionary body clock adjustment. Get up at four, stay up all day with the kids, have a nutritious Crock Pot dinner that makes the whole house smell beautiful and domestic, and go to bed while the sun’s still up in the summer. This idealism lasted about four hours. I was drinking coffee, being productive, I got Sarah up early, and then the problems began.

I don’t know if it was from her waking up early or because she was sick and barely ate anything the past couple days, but Sarah was having episodes where everything merited a heaving-sob scream reaction. It wasn’t quite a Terrible Twos fit, but it certainly wasn’t normal behavior, and it got worse when Sarah realized she wouldn’t be having cookies for breakfast.

Generally speaking, I don’t do well with crying. More often than not, I stand my ground if Sarah’s throwing a fit, and we reach a mutually agreeable conclusion. When her mom cries, it’s a different story. Tiffany, when she’s crying, can get whatever she wants from me. Luckily, she doesn’t seem to take advantage of this fact. That I’m aware of.

Being around a crying woman is still a pretty foreign phenomenon to me. There wasn’t a lot of crying in my house as I grew up. Present-day Andrew doesn’t really cry, either*. I’m not counting all those half-drunk times when tears would well up during the satisfying emotional payoff of a movie. I think the part in Jerry Maguire where Cuba Gooding Jr regains consciousness and celebrates his touchdown is probably the most archetypal example.

A crying wife gets whatever she wants, and so does a wife who’s ready to put out. One of the reasons I didn’t have an initial problem getting up at 4 a.m. was because Tiffany got me to bed way early with the lure of married-people sex. It was like ten when she said, “Don’t you want to come to bed now?” And I was like, Nooooo, it’s only 10 o’clock. I have a blog to write. I don’t want to have to backdate it just so I’ll make my daily quota.

And then she said, “Are you suuuuuure you don’t want to come to bed now?” And that’s when I was like, Ohhhhhh, you want to $&#@ me. Okay, then, let me turn this computer off. Nah, forget it, I’ll leave it on. Don’t wanna miss the married-people sex window.

So this morning, I put Screamin’ Sarah back to bed, Silas fell back asleep, and I realized it was still only like 8:30. My brain was confused and barely functional, so I thought, Why not just relax with a little Season 4 “Weeds” on Netflix Instant? It was a great way to find myself falling back asleep until noon, which is something my brain and body have become very used to over the years.

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Pugsley, 1994.

*The only time I can remember really having tears and sobs in recent memory was in June 2007, when I went with my mom to euthanize Pugsley, our family dog of fifteen years. I went along as stoic support, because my mom knew she was going to lose it. That dog was her baby and companion, but I really loved Pugsley too, and I lived with him for half my life. When the moment of truth arrived, I bawled like a child. We both did. I’d even broke down and sobbed the night before, when I was telling Tiffany — my girlfriend, not yet my wife — old Pugsley stories. That I felt so comfortable around and comforted by Tiffany while I was having this emotional episode only further cemented my thought that she was The One.

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BABY PICTURE OF THE DAY

Silas sleeps on Christmas.