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As my wife and I try to work out the correct work/baby balance in our lives, we are experimenting with different shifts of baby care. Sometimes one of us does the morning and the other the afternoon, or we fit in around each other’s schedules. Luckily we get a day or so’s help from Catie’s mum. It’s not something we can be totally equal with as at the moment I have a bit more work to do (not that I am getting it done) and gigs take me away from home, but I also don’t want to miss out on helping bring up my daughter. So we’re going to try and see if it works with one of us taking charge for the whole day on some days and letting the other work and it makes sense for me to do that on the day after the podcasts when I am a bit too tired to be creative and don’t usually have much on.
So today (apart from the rather vital bit between 5.30 and 8am when my wife kindly let me have a bit more sleep) it was another daddy/daughter day and I got lucky because Phoebe was almost entirely delightful and smily all day long (though it nearly all came crashing down at bed time when unusually she started to cry quite hard rather than falling straight asleep).
Doing an 11 hour day of baby care is important for lots of reasons, mainly to show how hard that is, even when things are going great. But it’s also wonderful for bonding. There are times when the baby sleeps and I got a few bits of admin done and there are times when I let her bounce in the chair and look at the trees or entertain herself. But other than that there’s a lot of chatting, singing, face pulling and smiling to do (as well as feeding and nappies) and the more of this stuff you do the more the bonds grow. I thought we were pretty tight already, but I could feel us getting even closer throughout the day. We’re both trying to get each other’s approval and it’s so both lovely and terrifying to see her gazing up at me with admiration. I have to live up to the belief in those innocent eyes. I can’t possibly do that but I am very keen to try.
And as usual I realise what an idiot I have been for spending my life working (or worse sitting inside trying to work but failing to get anything done), because I could have been hanging out with babies and having the time of my life. That came out wrong.
And you know, I am aware that this is boring for a lot of people, but it’s weird, because the vast majority of my writing life I have been writing about being single, fancy-free and irresponsible, but I don’t recall parents commenting how dull all that was, but after just four months of occasionally writing about being a father (something I have little choice about in this blog, because on a day like today there has been nothing else to write about) I do comments about how dull this is from non-parents. But I think you’re forgetting all those poker blogs. Count your blessings.
There was a big laugh last night when Johnny said he hated comedians who did stuff about their babies as if they were the first person to have a kid, but I did pull a bit of a face intended to heighten that joke. I am hoping the stuff I do as a comedian about having a baby will be less "here’s some funny stuff my kid has done" and more "here’s all the terror and weirdness and the stuff that people don’t talk about - like the way my brain keeps reminding me of all the ways I could harm my child. Unnecessarily as I am already aware." And hopefully also about the more philosophical side of reproduction, about how it roots you in time and space, makes you god-like and insignificant and make you consider the eons of time that have gone before and the eons that are to come after. How here we are today with a tiny baby, but before we know it she is going to be a independent woman and then a skellington and then dust on the breeze. I don’t think it’s the sort of stuff that Paddy Mcguinness will be doing on his tour.
And doing these 12 shows this summer is about the journey I have taken this millennia and I think that it is mildly interesting becoming a dad at this late stage and having to reassess priorities and compartmentalise regrets (as well as the things that I am pleased that happened to me as a result of my refusal to take on any commitment). I have been in love before and I love my wife more every day as we take on this challenge together, but never have I felt a love like I do for my daughter where each day invisible tendrils in our hearts knit themselves together ever tighter. She calms me down and she freaks me out. So forgive me as I struggle to find a way to process this and then express it in a comedic manner. Or decide to stop trying to express it any more and just enjoy singing “We Are The Champions” in a loud silly voice and trying to work out what Phoebe is finding funny about that.
I don’t think that contentment is the enemy of comedy. I hope that I have been just as funny in the RHLSTPs and Metro articles I’ve done recently, though it’s true that I haven’t really written much new stand up yet. Johnny Vegas was certainly still funny in spite of his worries about the same thing.
For me it’s more that I am feeling that I don’t want to live to work any more, but I still have to work to keep my baby shod (though eventually those shoes will be part of an art exhibit worth millions of pounds so it’s a good investment) and I like my job so don’t want to give it up. But when I look at how hard I was working this time last year, it’s probably a good thing that this tiny troll is here to make me slow down and enjoy a family day that’s about nothing more than having fun with my daughter.
Some artists claim that the pram in the hall is the kryptonite of creativity. That’s why I keep our pram in the lounge.
And a further impetus to at least work on my new stand up show is that the poster image is now ready and lots of dates have been put in. There may be some more added (I know for sure that we’re just trying to sort out the details for a Bristol gig), but it’s going to be a shorter tour, mainly at places that I do well at. So you might have to meet me halfway (or more likely 200 miles from my house and 10 miles from yours), but wait and see. Not sure how many of these venues have tickets on sale yet, but contact them to find out. And given that I am not doing the Fringe with this show there might be more demand for tickets on this tour (it will be interesting to see if I can sell out the tiny Edinburgh Stand after having not done the Fringe) - we’ll see. Seeing the poster image has given me a much needed jolt of terror that I have to get a move on. Until I look at Phoebe on it and realise that I should stop working forever and just sing "We are the champions" to her instead.
