Cooper's Latest

Cooper James Hill

Hola, quesolitos! I know...it's been a while. But before you get all angry and preachy about me not being around enoguh, just know there were good reasons. Namely, there was one reason...the most incredible woman in the world had a bu nin the oven, and this last week on monday, the most incredible kid in the world was born: Cooper James Hill.

Here are the facts and the pics to back them up:

Birth date and time: 29 January 2007, 4:01p

(for the record, yes its gross, but wonderful gross, so let it go. second, no that is not me delivering my own child...i am fantastic, but not that good...that is our doctor.)

Weight: 8 lbs 15.8 oz.

(personally, i like the way the leg slings over the edge of the scale letting the world know he means business...and pleasure!

Length: 22.5"

(no really, this picture is actually a really great shot. i am proud of myself.)

Here are some more pics to enjoy:


(this is him wrapped up as a cooper burrito and sleeping it off in a stocking cap.)


(this is him sleeping it off the day after.)


(this is him angry at not being able to sleep it off on his mom's shoulder.)


(this is him midyawn nest to a stain of his throwup on mom's shoulder right before he sleeps it off.)


{this is him about to be sleeping it off.)


(these are my two favorite people in the world. my wife is tired and rightly so, and my son is obviously relaxed.)

Well, enough for now. We love y'all.

Part 1 (cont.)

"Megan, don't hang up, I need your help!" He urged clutching the payphone close to his mouth.

She did not obey. She actualy did not even hear beyond the don't hang up part. He didn't try back. There was no use in it, and the truth was he deserved it and he knew it. Another screwed up victim of the commitment conundrum.

Still, Megan made him smile. Even hanging up on him was perfect--she was always perfect. Megan always did the right thing. In reality, even when she made mistakes she made them so healthily and so passionately that you could hardly call them mistakes.

For a little less than a year, Megan was home to his wreckage. She was his spiritual comfort, his emotional harbor, his social opposite, his physical equal, and most of all her voice was like the morning mist burning off of a gentle river pouring itself centuries long through two patiently surging mountains--at once both pure and clean, but so fragile that if you listened too long you began to worry that she would break under its shimmer. But now, Megan was mad, and rightly so, and that was over.

Oh God, what now. He lit a cigarette--smoking was the one thing he had never been able to un-commit to...god bless addictions. Actually, he wasn't sure he wanted to quit--it reminded him of his mother. She used to sit in a rocking chair beside his bed and smoke long slender cigarettes and drift off into another world, maybe even channeling another voice or spirit, and tell him stories at night. These stories weren't bedtime stories; they were much more real than that. They had depth and pain and joy and angst so much greater than bedtime story fluff.

Once she told him about a young man who learned that he could fly but did not tell anyone. No one else knew about it, and he thought it best to keep a secret. Often he would dream of flying to the rescue of some person in trouble--being the hero of the damsel in distress, or maybe his brother falling off of a cliff, or a cop shoved off a building by a mobster...anything and everything. Eventually, of course, the young man went mad. He could neither share his gift, because of his fear of the spite of those around him--even his family, he feared, would resent him--nor could he keep it a secret because he knew he had a gift for a reason. As the story went, his sister ended up falling from the second story of their home, and the young man watched her fall and did nothing to save her as he was convinced that he was dreaming again. Having been so trapped, so special, and yet so uselessly special, he had lost connection with what was real, which him was even the real him, which life was actually alive.

He never learned what this story fully meant. She died before he could ask. But even if he had asked, she would have smiled and said, "Was it beauty or selfishness that makes you ask?" and then followed up with, "What does it mean to you? This is probalbly right."

This is no time for stories, now stop thinking. He threw down the half-finsihed cigarette and pulled his unzipped hoodie closed by jamming his hands hard into the pockets up front. As soon as he did it he realized that something was out of place. From his left hand pocket he withdrew a small envelope with something very hard in it. He certainly had not put it in his pocket. His mind was racing. Oh god, they 're following me. He looked closely at the small envelope and on the front was written a single word: HOPE.

What did that mean?

He opened the small envelope and inside was a newly cut, still on the cardboard shelf hanger, brass key. He took the key out only to see that on the cardboard backing was written: Jackson's #214.

Part 1

He half-ran half-stumbled out of the stairwell. What had gone wrong? His thoughts came in questions and never answers. The answers he did get were no answers at all. Why had he just stood there? Where was his courage? Who was he? What was he afraid of?

Sometimes, if he let himself get away with self-deception, which he supposed everyone did from time to time, he would conclude that he was afraid of people hurting him. But this wasn't really true. People hurt people. Everyday. That was normal. Such fear was irrational and escapist. It was weak, and more it was a lie. What he was more afraid of...and he knew it...was having to rise. His fear was not having others let him down, but that he would become the let down himself. He feared ever truly committing to anything--sports in highschool, a major in college, any number of failed relationships with women, every friendship he had ultimately sacrificed and ran from, and, of course, his family. The great fear was that if he committed, then he was hopelessly beaten.

To most people commitment was not really commitment. To most guys he knew commitment was something like love--a word used far too often, and most often used to get something for the user. It was manipulation. It was a tool to get what you wanted. And after you got it--a toy, a trinket, a one night stand, whatever--you were no longer necessarily committed. Once you got what you wanted--or thought you wanted--you could weigh it as an end against whatever means you construed to get to such an end--be it love or commitment or anything else.

But not so with him. He believed that life was rooted in commitment, and commitment was not manipulation...it was the manipulator. Commitment moved him from subject to object. Once committed, the commitment became the master and he the servant. And would he serve faithfully? Could he? Was he willing to commit? He knew he would fail. Sure, everyone fails, but this would be different. He knew better. Everyone else failed innocently, but he failed knowingly.

Sure, he thought, everyone else is either stupid or crazy, and they all need you to save them. You are the one right-thinking hope in a world of darkened idiocy. Nice thinking. He hated when his undeniable egotism.

But not more than he hated his father.

He needed to find a phone, and fast.

Question of the Day

Okay, a little contest...

Without looking it up, name as many characters as you can of the members of the Cosby Show family.

The winner will have their wildest dream come true.

Babies-R-Us and Fisticuffs

Hola quesolitos. Life ain't so bad, y'know.

Well, the most incredible woman in the world and I registered our bouncing baby boy to be at everyone's favorite commercial exploitation of expectant mothers and fathers...Babies-R-Us. Now let me explain that this is not simply a fun time with a scanner gun and all the toys you wish you had but never did. In brief...that is the first three minutes. After that it is all about sizes--everything on this planet comes in staged sizes 0 - 1 - 2 - 3 (diapers, pacifiers, onesies, bottles, bibs, spoons, bowls...everything). And after the second hour, as I found myself meaasuring the pros and cons between three of the eight (no lie!) different bottle brushes, I knew that I was not ready.

No really, I couldn't do three and a half hours of registry without being decimated in spirit and body...what makes me think I can go a lifetime with my kid.

Maybe, I will care more about it than bottle brushes, but it is still a decent question.

Either way, I will say that I made sure not to register for hardly any crap that makes noise or sings or can get real annoying. So if you buy me some loud obnoxious toy, just know, it will be burned...with a small doll made of hair that resembles you. I am not afraid to go santeria on you.

Well, I survived and I am actually really excited. (Cue cheesy music for stupid dad-to-be story)

The other day, Cooper and I got into our first fight. See, he was kicking really hard inside the most incredible woman in the world and she grabbed my hand and said, "Feel this." So I put my hand on her stomach and he wailed on me. Naturally I pushed back--just a small light jab. He kicked again. I jabbed. He kicked again. This was amazing. Jab. Kick. Jab. Kick kick. Jab jab. Kick. I was scrapping with my unborn boy. Here I was reveling in our fisticuffs--jab, kick, jab, kick--when the most incredible woman in the world says, "Guys! I'm a person. It's me that is getting kicked and jabbed. Cut it out."

It is amazing the things you become oblivious to when you are fascinated by something.

Okay, enough kid talk. Have a great day.

God save the Cheese.