2: All Is Quiet On New Year's Day

So, it's the beginning of a new year, and I'm sure that many of you have made some resolutions. Maybe, it was to stop smoking, lose weight, get a new job, some ideal that will make for a better life. Hey, you might even have made and broken them already.

But resolutions aren't just for the new year. I made a resolution on the day my kids were born and I held them in my arms for the first time. I resolved to be the best father ever. Period.

Better than my dad, who wasn't a bad dad. Better than Ward Cleaver and Cliff Huxtable combined. The kind of dad that always has the right answer, the kind of dad that always shows the right mix of caring and discipline, the kind of dad that other dad's look at and say, "Wow, how can I compete with that guy?"

I broke that resolution about 48 hours in. Turns out they don't tell you how hard it is to be the best father ever.

How at 3am the last thing you want to do is get up and feed them. Just how disgusting some of those poopy diapers can be. How hard it is to keep an eye on them at all times just to keep them from chewing on an extension cord. How horrible it feels when they're sick and there's nothing you can do to help them. How selfish you feel when you wish they would just fall asleep and give you a little quiet.

Eventually you're broken. You begin to set your sights a little lower, just making sure that they're fed when they're hungry, changed when they're wet and held when they're crying. And you hope it's enough.

So, I have a new resolution. Rather than be the best father, I'm just going to do the best I can, and understand that I'm going to fall short.

Probably every day. And I'll start all over again.

And I'll hope that that is good enough that in 18 years, we'll have a couple of happy and healthy kids that can look back on their dad and say, "He wasn't Ward Cleaver, but he did alright."