The Bug

My son turns two in three days and right now he can spell about twenty words and counting. My favorites from his list have to be: mom and dad, friend, park and GO! Everywhere we go he is spelling whatever he sees. The real estate agents name on a for sale sign, the emergency lever on the bus or if you happen to be on the Q-U-E-E-N O-F A-L-B-E-R-N-I ferry – he’ll spell it all for you. After he knew his alphabet we just started making flashcards with words he already knew and used. Now I introduce new words in the morning and then repeat in the afternoon. By dinnertime he usually can spell three new words from memory without seeing the flashcards. I’m amazed with the retention level of children. Speaking of retaining, potty training was the topic at the playground today. I spoke to one nanny who takes care of ‘Jordan’ and he’s in his fourth week of ‘training’, as she put it. You really have to stay consistent with it and see it through until he graduates to le potty magnificent! I can’t say we’ve been ‘training’ yet but we’ve definitely introduced the idea a few times. So far he’s comfortable with just farting for now but real training shall commence very soon. Potty training, man how life has changed now that I'm a stay at home dad. There’s another word for my flashcards, potty.

So I picked up the Writers Market book to help me turn this writing passion into a career. Lots to do and only so much time. I’m starting to fire up that networking bug and talking with other writers and creatives again. Feels good after not working with anyone since the lay off. I’ve been checking out this website my friend Sammy put me on to called dooce.com. Basically she is a Stay at Home Mom (SAHM) who started this blog back when she was a single, successful web designer in Los Angeles who was fired for writing about work at the time. Since then the blog took off and she got married, had child, post partum depression, mental health hospital and became so popular that her husband quit his job to work on it too. Something like that – check out the site. Maybe I’m the SAHD with the blog who supports his family. Dare I say I love the sound of that? Let’s bring you up to speed.

In my past lives I have worked in the real estate, music, financial and film industries but as of my first day back to work in 2009, I was now in the employment insurance industry. It has now been four months without work but four amazing months raising my son. My wife thankfully found some enjoyable work a couple days a week and now our roles have reversed. Now she is back in the company of adults while I embrace my extended time teaching our son, building train sets and developing my writing during his naps. As I continue to write and create a build a career from it, I share my passion for words and writing with my son. I tell him how I dream of publishing a book of daddy’s writings but in the meantime I still look for other writing opportunities for websites, album reviews and creative writing. (My shameless plug for anyone needing my services, like directing you towards this website that I wrote many of the articles for www.bestinsurance.ca - great idea son).

I feel like I’m starting some fires under my own ass today now that I’m not on a ship headed to Alaska. Taking a cruise has never been on my list of things to do but because of family and friends rate there was a chance we were sailing tonight on an Alaskan cruise for seven days. Unfortunately it sold out and we are stuck in gorgeous Vancouver. It’s funny, while we were anxious to find out if we were going we were also having second thoughts about what a cruise represents to us in today’s world. Opulence of such magnitude, everything larger than life, more than you’ll ever need in a time where the needy out number us all. Who knows what damage they cause to our seas and the high levels of waste it creates daily. Although it’s a consumer’s paradise on the ocean, I was definitely looking forward to the writing it would have inspired.

Instead, writing on this sunny patio continues to contain a powerful creative vortex that I am consumed by. Right now the last inches of sunlight are quickly escaping from our sanctuary. My son is busy inspecting the different bugs in the garden and practicing his writing skills with some pavement chalk at the same time. As for the cruise, easy almost come, easy go, no big deal. Except we were dreaming along and thinking we’d be celebrating our sons second birthday in Alaska. Now we have two days to put a birthday party together! S-H-I-T.