June 16, 2019
Dad Time
I used to measure time in seasons. Summer and winter mostly while guiding one adventure or another. I rarely tracked the weeks, days or hours, let alone minutes or seconds. Back then, if you asked me what day it was 'Tuesday' was usually the closest I could muster. When the snow started melting, I packed up my car and drove west. When nights grew crisp and frost blanketed the high mountain meadows, I dug out my winter gear out and drove back to northern Minnesota for dog sledding. I lived in direct concert with the orbit of the Earth around the sun, a pace more on par with the tectonic movements of continents than the internal combustion engine of my car.
When my son was born, everything changed. A bit cliched, I know, but true nonetheless. Now, nearly seven years has passed in the blink of an eye. Another snap of the fingers and both my kids will be adults. To their growing six and four year old minds and bodies, one month is a quantum leap of change. For me, it is a minute fraction of all my years.
And in my opinion, this simple fact is simultaneously the blessing and curse of fatherhood. Every day I am witness to wonderful array of little and big moments. New discoveries. A joke. An ability refined. A risk taken. Inquiring. Riding bicycles. These things are so meaningful to me that I feel like my heart could break (in the good way). I can't wait for the next and the next and the next. It just keeps getting better. Of course, being a dad is also exhausting and stressful (at times) and I have been long counting the days until both kids can do something as simple as 'share' (I know, I won't hold my breath). But as precious as these moments are, they are equally as fleeting and equally as heartbreaking. I sometimes wish I could freeze time and hold on to a specific second forever. But I can't. It's wobbly teeter totter, fatherhood.
My own dad died nearly two years ago and being a father to my kids is just as much blazing a new path as it is reconciling with my own past. Of course, I can't help but feel that I understand certain aspects of my dad much better now that, I too, am a father. And I think about my dad a lot more now that he is gone. He died two years ago. I wish my own kids could benefit directly from his knowledge and wisdom. He was light-hearted and serious much like me. His mind contained an encyclopedic knowledge of every bird, plant, rock, insect, amphibian, or reptile on the planet. Unfortunately, because of Parkinson's Disease we weren't able to connect more as adults. But we appreciated many of the same things - a huge bon fire, trout fishing, the feeling of a canoe paddle, red pine trees, making maple syrup... A lot of who I am comes from my dad. My kids will inherit and adopt many of my traits (my dad's) as well.
I do hope that the family legacy of chasing bears in our underwear ends with me. Let me explain: one of my earliest memories of my dad wasn't a specific moment but from a variety of camping trips. Waking up in the morning and eating breakfast around the camp fire or in our Bayfield camp, we were often regaled with stories of the previous night's bear encounter. I can remember three or four specific bear stories -- the climax focused around my dad chasing away an unruly bear in his underwear. The two components of the story were always 'bear' and 'underwear'.
Fast forward to sometime in the late 90's camping with my parents in northern Wisconsin. Both my dad and I woke at a sound in our camp kitchen. A bear had eaten some of the food. We walked through our lean-to picking up the strewn remains and found a young bear cub in a tree. We shined our lights upwards at the cub while trying to process the situation. 'Where did this cub come from?' Suddenly from outside the circle of light, we heard a loud, 'woof'. The mother bear. Instantly, we both realized that we were between the momma bear and it's cub, a fairly serious situation. We turned and bolted. Somewhat farther away, I looked at my dad standing there in his underwear. Then at myself. Also in my underwear. The apple, or in this case, the underwear, doesn't fall far from the tree.
Skivvies aside, dad life for me is not necessarily passing along all the skills that I already know. Instead, my goal is to help guide my kids to find their own interests and passions. Some of those will be based on the interests of several generations of Larsen's: photography, camping, snow, etc. Others will be... I don't even know what yet. Playing the trombone maybe? Dancing? The list in unlimited.
Possibility trumps time. My lament over my own life's pace pales in comparison to the potential future of my children. Even to just be a spectator in their amazingness fills my soul with joy. There isn't a day that goes by that I don't feel luckiest guy in the world to simply be a dad.
Just the other night, we checked out a telescope from the library in Crested Butte. A little past his bed time, I roused my son to come take a look (my daughter too long zonked out to get up). It was nearly a full moon. We tried to identify specific craters and talked about how they formed. We kept staring through the eye piece in awe. Time means nothing to the moon.
Me, my dad, his dad, his dad before him... Happy Father's Day.
Image: Left - My dad and I. Right - Merritt and Ellie in Crested Butte.
When my son was born, everything changed. A bit cliched, I know, but true nonetheless. Now, nearly seven years has passed in the blink of an eye. Another snap of the fingers and both my kids will be adults. To their growing six and four year old minds and bodies, one month is a quantum leap of change. For me, it is a minute fraction of all my years.
And in my opinion, this simple fact is simultaneously the blessing and curse of fatherhood. Every day I am witness to wonderful array of little and big moments. New discoveries. A joke. An ability refined. A risk taken. Inquiring. Riding bicycles. These things are so meaningful to me that I feel like my heart could break (in the good way). I can't wait for the next and the next and the next. It just keeps getting better. Of course, being a dad is also exhausting and stressful (at times) and I have been long counting the days until both kids can do something as simple as 'share' (I know, I won't hold my breath). But as precious as these moments are, they are equally as fleeting and equally as heartbreaking. I sometimes wish I could freeze time and hold on to a specific second forever. But I can't. It's wobbly teeter totter, fatherhood.
My own dad died nearly two years ago and being a father to my kids is just as much blazing a new path as it is reconciling with my own past. Of course, I can't help but feel that I understand certain aspects of my dad much better now that, I too, am a father. And I think about my dad a lot more now that he is gone. He died two years ago. I wish my own kids could benefit directly from his knowledge and wisdom. He was light-hearted and serious much like me. His mind contained an encyclopedic knowledge of every bird, plant, rock, insect, amphibian, or reptile on the planet. Unfortunately, because of Parkinson's Disease we weren't able to connect more as adults. But we appreciated many of the same things - a huge bon fire, trout fishing, the feeling of a canoe paddle, red pine trees, making maple syrup... A lot of who I am comes from my dad. My kids will inherit and adopt many of my traits (my dad's) as well.
I do hope that the family legacy of chasing bears in our underwear ends with me. Let me explain: one of my earliest memories of my dad wasn't a specific moment but from a variety of camping trips. Waking up in the morning and eating breakfast around the camp fire or in our Bayfield camp, we were often regaled with stories of the previous night's bear encounter. I can remember three or four specific bear stories -- the climax focused around my dad chasing away an unruly bear in his underwear. The two components of the story were always 'bear' and 'underwear'.
Fast forward to sometime in the late 90's camping with my parents in northern Wisconsin. Both my dad and I woke at a sound in our camp kitchen. A bear had eaten some of the food. We walked through our lean-to picking up the strewn remains and found a young bear cub in a tree. We shined our lights upwards at the cub while trying to process the situation. 'Where did this cub come from?' Suddenly from outside the circle of light, we heard a loud, 'woof'. The mother bear. Instantly, we both realized that we were between the momma bear and it's cub, a fairly serious situation. We turned and bolted. Somewhat farther away, I looked at my dad standing there in his underwear. Then at myself. Also in my underwear. The apple, or in this case, the underwear, doesn't fall far from the tree.
Skivvies aside, dad life for me is not necessarily passing along all the skills that I already know. Instead, my goal is to help guide my kids to find their own interests and passions. Some of those will be based on the interests of several generations of Larsen's: photography, camping, snow, etc. Others will be... I don't even know what yet. Playing the trombone maybe? Dancing? The list in unlimited.
Possibility trumps time. My lament over my own life's pace pales in comparison to the potential future of my children. Even to just be a spectator in their amazingness fills my soul with joy. There isn't a day that goes by that I don't feel luckiest guy in the world to simply be a dad.
Just the other night, we checked out a telescope from the library in Crested Butte. A little past his bed time, I roused my son to come take a look (my daughter too long zonked out to get up). It was nearly a full moon. We tried to identify specific craters and talked about how they formed. We kept staring through the eye piece in awe. Time means nothing to the moon.
Me, my dad, his dad, his dad before him... Happy Father's Day.
Image: Left - My dad and I. Right - Merritt and Ellie in Crested Butte.