When my first son was born, my life was massively changed.  I wasn’t just a man or even a husband anymore.  I was a father.  It was huge.  It completely changed the way I thought of myself because I wasn’t just responsible for myself now but also this little creature (well, and my wife, because post-partum is like all the ‘fun’ of pregnancy but without a good excuse to eat whatever you want).  It wasn’t just me anymore.  I wasn’t just a… guy anymore.

I was a dad.

So I’d have to be mature.

Therefore, my writing had to be mature.

This was my thought process during those first few weeks of my newly-minted fatherhood.  Eventually, the strength of the notion began to subside and, as we got into the swing of having a newborn, I realized I didn’t have to become Nabokov or Hemingway (serious men!) overnight.  I could still be me.  I went back to a few projects I was working on but as the weeks turned into months, I started having this nagging feeling in the back of my head: I wanted to write about being a dad.  I’d never really written about something so specific before.  I’m the kind of writer who unconsciously blends himself into his fiction.  But, right then, I wanted to try and make sense some of my murkier thoughts about fatherhood on paper in the way of fiction.  Of course, that meant that I needed to come up with a story that would let my thoughts have a place to stretch their legs and run around for a bit.

Thus, my novel Better Together was born.

Literally.

Over the course of 24 hours, all my thoughts about what I wanted to write and the novel’s plot just came together.  I knew that I didn’t just want to write about a dad who steps up the plate and gets deep in the thick of things (and not because that shouldn’t be celebrated, because it should!).  I wanted to write about a dad who takes it all on himself, who becomes the primary!  I wanted to show that a man can do it.  I wanted to write about a man who sets out to be a boy’s father not because their blood (they aren’t) but because he loves the child.  To be a father not because you have to be.  But because you whole-heartedly want to be!

I wanted to write something about fatherhood… that might piss some people off!

And, thus, my dilemma, was born: how do you write about children when the actual act of writing in the presence of children is impossible.

At the time, I had no idea how hard it would be.  During those salad days when my son slept, ate, slept, ate, and slept some more, writing was a cinch.  I’d put him in his car seat, rock him to sleep, crack open my laptop, and write away.  Even when he was older and not sleeping as much, there was still two naptimes when I could put him up in his crib, come downstairs, and write.  At that time, this ‘writing and having kids thing’ was going to be a breeze.

Oh, ignorance is such bliss!

Now, a few years and another child later (with yet another on the way), things are… interesting.  It’s hard to try to string two words together among the rumble of their animal-shaped riders on hardwood floors, the screaming and yelling when one steals another’s toy, and the constant crash of objects that were once upon counter tops but now are on the floor.  Even when naptime arrives, it’s a battle to achieve sleep and the duration is short.  So what’s a writer to do?  Right now, it’s ten at night and I’m writing at the kitchen table, enjoying the quite sounds of a house asleep.  My writing time is short, though, quiet.  Although, it cuts into the time I would spend with my wife, she understands.

The funny thing is, though, I wouldn’t change a thing.  I wouldn’t trade the chaos in for silence and full nights of sleep.  Why?  Well, first, I love my children and they are a part of me now like my spleen or liver.  I cannot function without them.  And, secondly, my life, and, therefore, my writing is richer.  Every day they inspire me with their enthusiasm, their inquisitiveness, their sure sense of wonder.  I want to shower the world with my best work as a way to thank my children in some small way for the inspiration that they provide.  Does it sound hokey?  Sure, it does.  I find myself saying ‘cheesy’ things all the time when I talk about my kids.  It seems that the cynical bastard I used to be is hidden somewhere beside the guy who was unable to function on less than eight hours of sleep.  As I said, children change you.

My kids make me be a better man and, therefore, a better writer.

But I can’t get a frickin’ thing done when they’re around

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If you liked the post, check out my novel Better Together available from Amazon and Barnes and Noble.