I’ve Been A Father For Nine Years – Petra’s Birthday

The birthday of your first born on isn’t just a celebration for them but one for yourself as well, as this is the anniversary of the day that you became … a parent.

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While Rivka was the product of pregnancy by planning, Petra, my first kid, was not. When I call her a little squirt I’m not being hyperbolic.

A gentler, more sensitive parent would describe her conception as a suprise; for us, it was the biggest what the “fuck do we do now?” moment of our lives. We had just gotten together in Brooklyn mere weeks before — I’m not sure if we even knew each other.

It actually worked out, and ended up being without a doubt the best error of judgement that I’ve made yet. I know have a difficult time imagining what life would be like if it didn’t happen like this. Where would I be without Petra? Would I still be with Hannah? We probably wouldn’t have gotten married when we did. Would we have gotten married at all? Rivka wouldn’t exist. What would have happened without the need to be more calculated, without needing to walk slow, without sensible Hannah around to even out my flagrant style of decision making? Would I have gotten my first book deal? Would I still be traveling, writing, filming?

Life is a series. It’s a series of situations, states, and eras that rarely begin or end on our terms, when we plan them. Life is a series that just kind of happens — we don’t control this — but it is how we respond that is the building blocks of what we become.

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Petra had a real birthday party. This is what she had to say about it on her blog:

We sometimes worry that we won’t be able to stock our kids with an adequate amount of birthday memories because we travel. I, for the most part, grew up in one place in one home. My parents gave me massive birthday parties. I remember these. The birthdays of Petra and Rivka, on the other hand, can sometimes be a little meek. When you’re in a city where you don’t really have any friends it’s a little tough to put together a birthday party with much more than the family unit. But we try hard.

For Rivka’s birthday last year we invited over some friends that we knew on Kinmen.

For Petra’s birthday last year we surprised her with a trip to Australia. She thought we were on a flight to another city in Taiwan or somewhere boring like that.

For Petra’s third birthday we had a massive party with her school in China.

On Petra’s first birthday we were in the jungles of Guatemala.

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Petra is nine and she’s doing fine. She’s grown accustomed to the traveling life — she’s been going since she was born — and has become adept at making friends on the run. She wants a home though … and a school … and friends that she can meet with every day. But she’s fine with what she has.