Ira's Interdimensional Push On Waiting #10

Dear All, Tonight I wait for Dolphy. Dolphy is one of the, quite possibly thousands of, names that I’ve given my unborn child already. I was raised to believe that nicknames are a sign of love so I’ve been having at it. While we still don’t officially know their sex I (know he’s a boy and) call Dolphy Redolphutsaltinaltando which comes from Renaldo and has become everything from Rudy to Chad… I’m excited to meet Dolphy but also not quite prepared, which is why I keep telling Talja to be patient about the birth - that Dolphy just needs time…… They were due yesterday according to the corrupt add 40 weeks from the last missed period which varies by a week from my calculations that add nine months from the height of the last cycle……… In any event, each day that passes is one day closer to vindicating my calculations of November 22nd and one day further from the corrupt November 15th medical industrial complex insurance billing bullsh*t………… This is how I’ve been spending the time since the deafening roar of the last wedding guests cleared out two weeks ago…………… 1. Cirumsicatie unmitigatie: Pronounced "circumsatsie unmitigatsie" this little deviatie represents the over-looming and still un-resolved hardline that is circumcision for Talja and I has become. It symbolizes a pillar of Judaism for me and barbarism for Talja in the simplest terms, if you want more details let's block out out a week or two to review. The whole conversatie has become inextricably linked to the other differences we are navigating and can no longer be separated from choices that have already been made - how to navigate such a binary question. Does my having a dick make a difference? Does her carrying give her some kind of veto power?? And much much more. The question of circumcising or not is not actually the interesting part for me - it's the difference of a few millimeters of foreskin that may not even need to be removed if Dolphy is a girl. The way we meet at this divide is the interesting part - I with my mind and she with her mystical mysticism. If you haven't figured out a decision like this by the due date than it's *not* going to happen but the way that we finally close it is the way we will ultimately feel about each other. I find myself meeting myself in this question too. Does his penis need to look like mine? Does his Jewish identity affect mine? If he can look different in this way how much different can my next child look and still be mine? What does it even mean to be *my* child?? These are all questions that have and will continue to echo until I become silly or demented enough to think I can answer them conclusively. 2. Scrambling to “plan” ahead at work: Paternity leave, or vacation for that matter, is a farce. Talja's job gave her 16 weeks off which is long enough that you can really leave and somebody else will take over whatever the hell it was that she was doing. I, with my American gig, got one week off which is just dog - it's too short to have someone actually replace you and just long enough to make a mess to plan for and clean up for afterwards. Each day I tell myself that I'll get all of my ducks in a row so that when the baby comes I can just send one Slack message and everything will fall into place like an elegant ballet but each day that doesn't happen... Whatever, one of these days Dolphy will come and one of these days I'll blast off some half-baked instructions for a lesson the following week and pick up the pieces the week after. 3. Honeymoon: Taljakis and I took off into the night for something between a mini-moon and a baby-moon to somewhere between celebrate and observe our somewhere between love and last drops of freedom... We went off to a castle in Zeist for one night and then to this shmancy hotel downtown, in both cases largely because they had fine breakfast spreads. The weekend was replete with loving walks and the kind of meltdowns you might expect from a couple that was having a baby and still not rock-solid on their circumsatie plan……………... Be all that as it was, one day we'll get to Rome as we should have all those years ago and hopefully by then we'll have understanding about each other the likes we can't imagine right now which will make for the kind of escape that every happy couple deserves. [Photos](https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1NiiTRbyp07TFpkphtj-s90mcRIu0aC6Z?usp=sharing) for the photo-visual and a little [something something](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JiETLLsXzFI) for the audiophiles too that I’ve been delving into recently. This week, next at the latest, I’ll slay the bachelor as Coach K so valiantly challenged me to do last spring. It will be intense - to let go of so much freedom and possibility in pursuit of fatherhood, but to a large extent it is already done - I’m here, I have the two bedroom, the wife, and I love Dolphy with all my heart. From the palpably last couple-few days of bachelorhood, Ira