blog interview

This seems to be going around from blog to blog these days. It's kinda fun. So... here are the questions that ImmuneGirl had for me. You can find her blog here.

1.What story about yourself do you most want to narrate to your future grandchildren?
Man, that's a tough question! Well... one story isn't entirely about me but includes their dad, their uncle, and their grandparents. Weird to think of my kids being a dad and an uncle...

Anyway... when the younger of the two was born, we thought we were going to have plenty of time to get to the hospital. The oldest child was a 37-hour labor, so we thought this was reasonable. Nope. At the time, I was sleeping downstairs with my dog (man, I miss that dog) and wife was upstairs in master bedroom and first son was in bedroom across the hall from her. I had about a two-hour commute every day, so I got up really early. Wife didn't. Which was part of the reason for the seperate rooms. But I digress.

About four in the morning, I heard screaming from upstairs. I ran up there. Wife was in labor. She'd already called her mom, who was on her way to sit with first son while we went to hospital. It was about an hour drive for MIL. I helped wife to bathroom, which intensified labor. She was yelling something fierce. I thought it was back labor (which is very painful, but wildly ineffective) since that was what she'd experienced for much of her first labor, and the time between contractions seemed similar. Nope. It was real labor.

Wife asked me to call 911. I did. Now, I'd always thought that you were supposed to stay on the phone with them until help arrived. But this operator seemed very insistent that I hang up. Little did I know that her "don't's" were in perfect synch with wife's screams. So what I heard was, "AUUUUUUUGH! Hang up the phone. AUUUUUUUUUGH! Hang up the phone. AUUUUUUUGH! Hang up the phone." So I hung up the phone. She was very insistent. (Later, I found two messages on our voice mail from said operator asking me to pick up the phone. Wouldn't you think a 911 operator would know the difference in beeps between voice mail and answering machines?)

MIL arrived finally, followed within about 30 seconds by EMT's. One of the crew was actually just on a ride-along. I've never seen anyone look that green. It was like wife's vagina was a giant bloody train crash and no matter how hard he tried, he couldn't NOT look at it. I thought he was going to vomit. Profusely. Poor guy.

The delivery actually went very well. Second son came out VERY fast. Well, there was one scary moment. Lead EMT said, "We have a grey baby." Now, I didn't know EXACTLY what that meant, but it didn't sound good. Basically, he just had a little something that needed to be cleared from his mouth and nostrils to let him breathe better.

Second son came out so fast that he never had that baby conehead. To this day, he has one of the roundest noggins I've ever seen. First son did not wake up until wife was being taken out to the ambulance on a stretcher. Was he concerned? No. His comment? "Firetruck! Firetruck! Firetruck!"

So that's probably the story I'd tell my grandkids (when they were old enough to appreciate it anyway).

2.What is your favorite Ben and Jerry's flavor?
Oh, this one is much easier. Cherry Garcia.

3.Out of all of the books that you have ever read, which one do you most wish that you had written?
There are a few. One that expresses my spirituality very, very well is David James Duncan's "The River Why." It could be argued that it's a Christian book, but it could also be argued that it's a Buddhist book. I think it's just an amazingly spiritual work. Haruki Murakami's "Norwegian Wood" is one of the most brilliant novels I've ever read, and I envy his ability to weave magic realism into a very modern and capitalistic world. I've yet to come across an American author who handles this as well as he.

4.What is the one thing you know the most about?
I think I know a little about a lot of things, enough to be dangerous. I'm conversant enough in many subjects to make people who aren't believe that I know a lot, but not enough to persuade people who are experts. Realistically, and I hate this, I probably know more about coding web pages than just about anything else, but even in that, I'm not nearly as adept as the true wonks. I'd much rather be brilliant in some area of the arts.

5.If you could wake up tomorrow having gained one quality or ability, what would it be?
It'd be pretty great to have a Seminary education under my belt. Religion is fascinating, and I'd love to know more than I do now, largely because I think so many of the loudest Christian voices today have misinterpreted so much, whether out of ignorance or malice. I'm a fairly recent convert to Christianity myself, and it's not something I proclaim very loudly, primarily because the image that is reinforced of Christians by folks like Dr. Dobson, Pat Robertson, et al is so utterly horrifying to me.

Thanks, Iggy! Good questions!

Rules for those of you interested in further interviews...
1. Leave me a comment saying, "Interview me."
2. I will respond by asking you five questions of my choosing.
3. You will update your blog with the answers to the questions. If you don't have a blog, you can post your responses in my comments section.
4. You will include this explanation and an offer to interview someone else in the same post, folowing the same rules.