The Finale

I made it. I took care of a human being for 9 whole weeks: From the 4th of July until Labor Day. Here I am 62 days and 49 posts after writing my first one and I feel many things. First, I feel a big sense of accomplishment. I must admit I was scared, I was heading into the unknown and completely out of my comfort zone. I also added an extra challenge which was writing this blog. I do think that, in the end, it really helped me to stay motivated and focused. Every time something bad or tough would happen I would think "at least this will make a good story for the blog" and that somehow put things in perspective.

Second, I feel grateful for having had this opportunity. I am grateful for having a job that provided this benefit that many people do not have. I am grateful to my friends, family and maybe some complete strangers that came in day after day curious about what happened next in this eventful summer. But, mostly I am grateful to my wife Alegna for her unconditional support and behind the scenes work that made things easier. To Lucas for making the summer interesting with his many occurrences and adorable naughtiness. And to the great Matias, the big smiley baby that was born to be the only person with the patience and good nature to forgive all of my many hiccups as a parent. Without his personality and good behavior I would not have been able to enjoy this summer as much as I have.

Finally, I feel a little uncertainty about what the future holds. Tomorrow, we will start a new routine. Matias is starting daycare, I am going back to work. So many questions come into my mind: Will I ever get to work on time? Can I actually afford daycare for two kids? How tired are we both going to be when we get home from work? But, here is one of the advantages that I think us immigrants have. We have been through so much uncertainty and sometimes so far out of our comfort zone that we kind of lose the fear of the new. I am certain that we are going to be fine. It is going to take some time to get used to it, but we'll be fine.

This has been by far the post I have struggled the most to write. I had promised it for Friday and I had not been late on any of the other posts. The excuse I kept giving myself was that I wasn't home. I was out of town, but I had written posts every day when I was in Florida. Is it something deeper? Is it fear that once I hit publish this part of my life will be over forever? As I said on my previous post, this has been the best summer of my life, but on the other hand, I can't wait to get back to work and gain some structure. I will be having predictable days again, days that will not depend or completely change because of a wailing sound. I'm sure I'm going to miss it a lot though.

So goodbye! This is really the final post. I have been asked to do weekly or monthly updates but I know that it is never going to happen. Part of the reason I was able to post daily was because it required discipline to sit down every day and write something. If I had done it weekly, I would have abandoned this blog a long time ago. I would have kept saying, yeah tomorrow I'll write my post, and that tomorrow would have never come.

Thank you again to all the readers. Seeing those site visit numbers go up every time I wrote a new post kept me going. You don't know how much it meant to me. And to future Lucas and Matias, I hope that someday when you are older you get to enjoy reading some or all of these posts. If you are reading this and you are anywhere near me, please go give me a hug and a kiss. That is all I will ever ask of you, the rest: all of your triumphs and failures belong to you. I will never dare to take credit for any of them. I love you.

The Soul Mate

When I had Lucas I was all by myself with a 3 week old baby. My mom came for 3 weeks, my in-laws for 2 weeks and Armando took some vacation time. Back then he did not have a paternity leave or a bonding leave.

I had a per-diem position so I took 8 months off from work to be with Lucas. I enjoyed every one of those months and cried (a lot) when it was time for me to go back to work and send him to daycare. With Matias, things are different. I now have a full-time position and could only be on leave for 3 months, however, he got to experience something Lucas did not: spend 2 months with Armando.

I feel that when you have kids your life goes by in fast forward mode. One day I was in the hospital giving birth, then I had to go back to work and leave Armando in charge and now I find myself preparing everything to send Matias to daycare and holding back my tears. 

Armando has done an excellent job these 2 last months. He kept his end of the deal: 2 months of no cooking, giving bottles, changing diapers, mid-night waking up to feed, loading and unloading the dishwasher. He has taken great care of Matias and even knows (and this makes me a bit jealous) how to put him to sleep without so much crying better than me.

Without a doubt Armando is an excellent dad to both Lucas and Matias. He was even brave enough to get on a plane with both of them! 

Now we are getting ready for a new routine, one in which both of us are going to be working and will have to organize our time to the last minute. However, we are not afraid of changes. We came to this country 7 years ago with our lives packed in 2 suitcases (like most Venezuelans) and have accomplished a great deal of things. 

Life with two kids is hard, but we are in this together. Right compañero?

The Movie

I have a little obsession. Since about 2002 I have been trying to watch at least one movie a day. In college this was very easy for me, you have so much time. At first I would keep a notebook with me where I would write down the movies I had seen and the movies I wanted to see. This eventually evolved into a database where I could play with the data. I can tell you how many movies I have seen of a certain director or year or genre or country.

Finding what movies to see has never been a problem. every time you see something you like it opens up about other 10 options that might interest you. My first real quest was to watch all of the IMDB top 250. I have at times seen all the 250 top movies, but it keeps changing and it is sometimes hard to keep up. At the moment I am standing at 243/250. I am missing 5 Indian movies and a couple of recent ones that can only be seen in theaters.

Eventually I also found a great website called icheckmovies. This is the IMDB Top 250 challenge on steroids. It has a very large variety of different lists and a very easy way to check them off once you have seen them. It has become sort of a quest to keep checking movies off these lists.

Having kids does not allow as much time to watch movies as before. So, part of my plan for this summer was to use the time to watch as many movies as possible. I did watch a lot, 52 to be exact. My DVR is still 70% full though. Most of the stuff on it are TCM movies. TCM is the best channel a film junkie like me can ever wish for.

But as the summer passed I realized that it was about something bigger than watching as many movies as I could. The movies were secondary to what i was really experiencing. A unique opportunity to be the most important person in someone's life. Matias completely depended on me for two whole months. For 8 weeks I was absolutely responsible for the life of another human being. And even though I spent most of this summer feeding him, cleaning, changing his diapers and mostly working to serve his every need, it has been the best summer of my life.

What did I watch?
Viaggio in Italia: Roberto Rosselini invented Neorealism with Roma Citta Aperta and then with this movie apparently inspired Truffaut and Godard to start the French New Wave. A single person responsible for two of the most well known film movements in history. Quite an achievement.

The Postponement

As I explained in a previous post, this year we applied to be citizens of the United States. For some unknown reason Alegna was approved for her oath ceremony a month before I was. I described my experiences as a spectator on that post, but today it was my turn to become a citizen.

The ceremony was mostly the same as the one I saw with Alegna. You could see that they have a script on how things should move. First they sit everyone on some predefined sections so when the time comes to hand you your certificate they know where to find you. This takes a long time. Today, there were 954 people getting their certificates. We got there at 10:30 AM and they were finally done with this process at 12 PM. The main difference between our ceremonies at this stage was the soundtrack. Someone put some effort in setting up the playlist for my ceremony. You could hear Don McLean's American Pie, Neil Diamond's Coming to America, Simon and Garfunkel's America many renditions of America the Beautiful and God Bless America and my personal favorite was the Animaniacs nations of the world song.

After that we heard some short speeches from the USCIS, Homeland Security and League of Women Voters representatives. Finally, the judge came in and we prepared for the oath. I cannot deny that saying the oath out loud is very different than just listening to it. I think the words are designed to evoke the seriousness of what you are doing. You are becoming a citizen of another country, this is a big deal. It was an emotional moment. Then we sat down and we heard a speech from the judge welcoming us as new citizens. I have to say that the only two times I have seen a judge in this country (both ceremonies), I have been very impressed by them. They have been charismatic and human, but you can also sense some sort of respectable aura that humbles you. This judge appropriately quoted one of my favorite thinkers, Alexis de Tocqueville about how the strength of the democratic institutions comes from the people from the bottom up. Unfortunately, I could not find the exact quote on Google to post it here.

Finally we did the pledge of allegiance, national anthem and all of a sudden I have a paper in my hands that says I am a citizen of the United States of America. The country of my children, the country that has given me plenty of opportunities to have a much better life than the one I would have been condemned to had I stayed in my own. Am I living the American dream? Every time I am mowing my lawn I somehow seem to think that I am.

I decided to register to vote so I filled the form and gave it to the nice women who were working there as volunteers. I also applied for my US passport. It was a little unnerving that they keep the original certificate. They said the would mail it in with my passport. Now I suddenly find myself without any kind of documentation that proves that I am a legal resident of this country. But then again, so does every American citizen.

The Bookstore

I used to read a lot. Like a book a week. I have two full bookshelves in my office of books I have read in my life. I have read from Harry Potter to Sigmund Freud, from Plato to Stephen King, basically anything that I could get my hands on that seemed interesting or that would expand my views on the world. There was a time, a simpler time, when the only thing that I would buy was books, not even clothes. Things have changed a lot.

A lot of people have asked me when reading these blog: "You have been using so much time on watching movies, why are you not reading more?". There are two parts to my answer:

First, every book in my house has been flagged. If you are not familiar with Seinfeld or have no access to the clip on that link, what that means is that most of my reading happened in the bathroom. When I had kids the privilege of reading in the bathroom completely disappeared. In fact, the privilege of closing the door and having some privacy disappeared. All I can do now is sneak into the bathroom for a 5 minute break while they are sleeping or busy doing something. Those days when I could sit and read an entire chapter are long gone.

The second reason is concentration. The books that currently interest me are dense in information and usually need a lot of my attention to understand. Sleep deprivation and the general stress of doing things immediately drains me of any energy and motivation to start reading something.  I still read, just a lot slower. I have been reading the same book for about 6 months now. I'm almost done with that one, but it is a terrible reading rate. Watching a movie is easier on my brain and also is something I can do while multitasking. I can watch a movie while feeding Matias. Reading and doing something else is impossible.

I think reading is the thing I miss the most of my old life. I hope that when Lucas and Matias grow a little more, I can take the habit again.

What did I watch?
Until the End of the World: I have mixed feelings about this movie. On one hand it was visually beautiful, the music was incredible and some of the themes are incredibly prophetic about today's society. The basic premise of images beating out words is very relevant today, it is even relevant to my current post. On the other hand it is 5 hours long. It didn't really need to be 5 hours long.

Ice Age: Collision Course: I saw this one with Lucas. The same statement I made yesterday about remakes could be made for sequels too.

The Nap

Matias's sleeping habits are changing. During these two months he would usually feed, play for about an hour and then sleep for about some 30 to 45 minutes. All of this in 3 hour cycles during the day, and then at night he would sleep the 5 to 6 hours. I liked this schedule, it is easy to keep and gives me frequent short breaks. This is changing to napping fewer times, but they are becoming longer, sometimes up to 2 hours. He is a very light sleeper, unlike Lucas who I could move anywhere once he was down and he would not wake up. If Matias falls asleep in his car seat or on the swing if you move him to somewhere more comfortable like his crib he will immediately wake up.  On his previous schedule it wasn't really a big deal because I would just let him sleep wherever he was at the moment. But now, I would feel guilty leaving him in a car seat for two hours, so now his naps require more planning.

Getting him to sleep when you want him to sleep is becoming a struggle. Specially at night. Before, we would put him down on his crib awake and he could fall asleep by himself. Maybe he would complain a little bit and you would have to pat him on his back a couple of times. Now he hates it, it is like the crib is made of sharps razors. As soon as we put him down he screams like we are torturing him. The past couple of days have been tough. We have tried many things but getting him to sleep on his crib has been impossible. He just wants to sleep on our arms and that is exhausting. When we feel him staring to get sleepy in our arms we will put him on the crib because we don't want him to get used to just arms, but then he just goes nuts. It took about an hour to get him to sleep yesterday, today it was a little better. The good thing is that once he goes to sleep at night he will last from about 6 hours, which gives us plenty of time to sleep.

On the Lucas front, he is starting to get into trouble for his language. Every once in a while you will hear him repeat a curse word that someone nearby (usually me and Alegna) has just said. In these cases we have decided not to acknowledge what he just said and remind ourselves that we shouldn't be saying those words in front of him. But lately he has been using some of them as if he has learned what they mean. He has offered a "coñazo" which means a big punch. He has also yelled "Coño" when something does not go his way. These are different situations and we have told him that those are words he should not be using. However, today was different. He cursed in English using the f-word ans the s-word when some toys fell from the table. We don't curse in English so he probably got this from somewhere else, probably some other kid. It was hard not to laugh at his perfect usage of his new additions to his vocabulary.

What did I watch?
Ghost in the Shell: I have mixed feelings about remakes. I always get upset saying why do they need to keep remaking all these movies, but then I go and watch it and realize that they keep making them because we keep watching them, even when they suck. That is the case for this latest remake. Just watch the original.

The Highlights

So the end is near. Next week is my last week of bonding with Matias. After that I will be returning to work and he will be starting daycare. What this means for my plans with this blog is that there are only 6 posts left after this one. One each week day next week by me and on Friday two posts: one by Alegna and one by me. For this post I wanted to do something different.

First, I wanted to thank you, the reader. If you are reading this post you are one of the few faithful that has lasted for almost two months. I know sometimes it wasn't as interesting, but every day I made the effort to post a little something because I kept seeing people coming back. If it wasn't for you I would have given up. Blogger provides stats for your blog. You can see how many people have been reading your posts and where these people come from. I was surprised that about 200 people started reading my first few posts. I didn't expect that to last, and it didn't but I'm pretty happy that I am at a stable 50 to 60 people reading my new posts every day. I feel fortunate to have 50 people that are interested in me and my family enough to spend a couple of minutes reading something that I wrote.

I have also been surprised about the worldwide reach of this blog. I was expecting most of my readers to come from either the US or Venezuela. I know people in many European and Latin American countries too. But when I look at the top ten countries all time reading my blog I was surprised to find Ireland and Japan for example. Here is the top ten if you are curious:

1. US
2. Venezuela
3. Canada
4. UK
5. Spain
6. Ireland
7. Costa Rica
8. Germany
9. Italy
10. Japan

Finally, I wanted to make this post a little interactive. If you are reading this go ahead and comment below what your favorite post was or just say hi or whatever comes to your mind. I will take the time to personally thank each one of you. My favorite posts to write were: The Serenity Now, The Vinciguerra Boys, The Seven, The Visa, The Revenge and The Airport. 

What did I watch?

Sisters: An early Brian De Palma film that was clearly made as a tribute to Hitchcock. It is a good thriller with some good acting. I really liked the split screen he uses for some scenes to show what is happening at the same time in two different places. The dream sequence was good too.