have kids.

My dad died 10 years ago on this day. God, I hate fucking typing that. I hate reading that. It still shocks me. I hate it even more when you read it. Feel bad for me, give me attention, my life is so hard…blah blah blah. We all suffer as our collective consciousness grows and grows. Spare me your pity and your sorry. It is okay. I am going to be okay. We are going to be okay.

Yet, I still miss him every day.

Ten crazy years later, my son was born. July 20th, 2024. Time is a flat circle. As my father passed away, the sun shined on his face, and the warm wind blew strong. My mom, sister, and I held his hand, and that was that. One more breath and then a legend was gone.

As my son was born, the summer sunset pierced the hospital windows, and the wind howled. I held my wife’s hand, and then that was that. One new breath and my beautiful boy was here.

Just as I was writing this, my wife came up out of nowhere and hugged me. I stopped writing. I closed my eyes and embraced her for a few minutes. We both cried. Childbirth is an incredible undertaking. I am so proud of her.

I am so proud of my mother and have a newfound appreciation for her endless sacrifices. As I stared into my son's eyes for the first time, I felt pure love. I felt my dad's love for me—that Intense and eternal love. I am crying thinking about him seeing me for the first time and what he must have felt. I find so much comfort in that. It was his beautiful new chapter with my mother. It was his transition from husband to father.

10 years later, a new chapter began for me. You become a man when you lose a parent and also become a father. You see life in its entirety. Death and re-birth. Death and re-birth. Over and over again as the universe keeps expanding. We have so many stupid problems and a short gratitude list. When you experience these two moments, gratitude and love wash away the small stuff. You realize we are just little ants on a spinning plant, happy that a leaf gives us shade in the beating sun.

These minor problems give us anxiety, and we look too far into the future. As young adults, we yearn for the future—we look to the future. But as we get older, we look to the past. For it is in the past that we find the future—the right way to live.

As Steve Jobs said, you can only connect the dots by looking backward.

Too much time is spent in the future. Too much time is spent thinking of our own impending death. Death…What an interesting and scary thing. The absolute unknown. I definitely spend too much of my life worrying about it, especially after watching my own father die. It is scary shit.

Today, I had a different perspective. Today, after holding my son, I was more okay with death because I knew he would be there with me, holding my hand, and I would be watching over him as he wrote his own story. I found intense comfort knowing that. Comfort, after watching my father die and my son born, that it would all be okay. Life will keep marching forward, but his love and my love for him will be eternal.

Honestly, I don’t know what the point of this blog is. I just wanted an outlet to pour my heart out on the page.

Let’s end it with:

Have kids and write a great story with them because you’re going to die one day. You can’t escape it. That is not a question. The question is whether your kids are going to have a good story to tell about you when you’re gone.

Okay, one last thing. After this baby was born, I looked at my endless, unread text messages.

From a friend & father of two:

“Now the trick is to continue to put as much energy into your relationship with each other as you do Beau. If you want to do one thing for your kid it is have a great relationship with each other. Probably the hardest thing you’ll ever do. Just remember that you don’t have to be perfect parents. There isn’t such a thing. Ok, I’ll stop preaching now.“

I will stop preaching now.

Much Love,

-Molesy

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