Earlier Chapters
Before the Journal, there were waiting rooms, birthday letters, ordinary walks, and a lot of learning how to be Dad. These are a few stories I still carry with me.
Day 21: This Room
After the hugs, the kisses, and the moment they take your child back, the room goes quiet. This is what that quiet felt like to me. Fear. Love. And trying to find enough strength to stand up and walk into the next room.
Read This Room on Tumblr ↗
Becoming Dad
Beginnings & birthdaysWhere to begin...
I was going to be a dad. I kept saying it, as though repetition might make me understand what it meant. Before the hospital rooms and the words I would have to learn, there was joy, fear, and a very small idea of the man I hoped to become.
Read the story on TumblrA letter to my son, on his first birthday.
Jacob had been here a year, and somehow our family already felt different because of him. A letter about growing together, carrying each other when we fall, and trying to become the dad my children deserve.
Read the story on TumblrWhat we carry
Objects & wordsDay 14: An Item That Gives You Confidence
Buffy was my stuffed dog long before I became Dad. Then Zoey needed her more than I did. This is the story of letting something go so a piece of me could stay beside my daughter.
Read Buffy’s story on TumblrDear Craniosynostosis: A renewal of a letter
There was a time when I could barely say the word. Years later, I returned to a letter and tried to explain how fear, anger, love, and gratitude had somehow come to share the same space.
Read the story on TumblrMore than the hard days
The ordinary & the extraordinaryThe Little Moment: A tale of realization as a dad.
A walk with the kids. Nothing enormous. Nothing that should have needed a whole story. But fatherhood has a habit of handing me something worth remembering when I finally slow down enough to notice.
Read the story on TumblrDear Zoey: A Long Overdue Letter For Your Birthday
Five years of being your dad. Worry, yes. But also stories, laughter, stubbornness, and the privilege of watching you become yourself. A letter to my daughter, who has always been more than the things she has had to face.
Read the story on TumblrCraniosynostosis: A Response From A Dad
Looking back can bring the hard days right into the room again. Then I look outside and see my daughter climbing a tree. Both things belong to our story. So do the ordinary days, and everything she has taught us about strength.
Read the story on TumblrStill learning. Still Dad.
The kids kept growing. So did the questions. I’m still writing about the work of being here for them, and the ordinary moments that turn out to matter.
The selected stories keep the words and dates of their time. Some photographs and older links may no longer work. The narration is a related telling; the historical written versions remain distinct.