Anyway, back to my one shining moment...It was magical, I didn't see it coming, and I definitely did not set out trying to be heroic - after all, my mother-in-law was already spending the night upstairs and ready to help at the first sign of trouble. But at some point something majestic unfolded and I somehow fell "into the superdad zone". Everything came together and suddenly made complete sense, it was like the nature of the baby-feeding universe took over and I became one with it. While yes, some luck played a part and some pieces of the puzzle fell into place at the right time, I had to successfully orchestrate the effort and put all the pieces in place (or back in place as was the case at times - i.e. pacifiers, bottles, entire bodies that had fallen out of position in the bouncy seats).
What is that cheesy motivational saying about how "success is when preparation meets opportunity"? Well I guess I can kind-of identify with it now, although I still don't like the quote. Being able to "get 'em up and sit 'em down" was more about doing my scouting report and putting all the right parts in the right places to start making plays when the time came. Yes, there was a lot of "read and react" in my performance (i.e. which baby do you pick up to feed first), but none of it could have gone as smooth had I not done various advance preparations like having both bottles warmed and ready, burp clothes and bibs already hanging on the arms of the chair, and bouncy seats with pacifiers in them at either bedside as a just-in-case to name only a few.
But this is not to say it was without suspense, I had to work my way out of several jams - some of which seemed like with bases loaded no outs and the crowd, particularly the manager (Catherine) and relief pitcher (mother-in-law) on the edge of their seats (or top of the dugout steps) ready to bail me out. It was by no means a two-up, two-down (get it?) situation the whole way through, the opposition definitely made some noise and took their best swings at times. I did have to go to delivering out of the "stretch" a few times by feeding one while leaning over and consoling the other.
Several times the "manager" came out to the mound, looking to take me out in favor of rested relief (a.k.a. my mother-in-law laying down upstairs). At one point, in a very unorthodox move in baseball terms, the relief pitcher even came down out of the bullpen to check on me expecting to get the nod, but I was able to hold her off and send her back to the bullpen. And then in second unorthodox move, she decided not to walk all the way back to the "bullpen" but rather take a seat on the bench right next to the field (i.e. laying on the living room sofa downstairs in ready position to chip in or to just stay there until the next feeding). But despite all of this commotion and building pressure I was able to finish the job and get them both fed and back to sleep...and even better, at a good enough pace (< 1 hr) to allow me to go back to sleep before the next one (not always the case, sometimes it's hardly worth falling back asleep for 45 min hour before you got to start prepping for the next one).
So after this performance I was allowed to retire for the rest of the night uninterrupted...But the morning after it was all the talk in the local media, Catherine and her mom kept asking me exactly what I did and when and how I did it. But as I likened this to being "in the zone", I couldn't really describe it all to her much - it was just a blur of bottles, burps, paci's, and poots. Back to that saying about success being when preparation meets opportunity, well this was some hybrid of that where the perfect storm of timing, preparation and luck came together to calm the stormy seas of midnight feedings at the Walters house - at least for now.
Like any big breakout performance, the manager will now come to expect this out of me every time going forward. Wait, damn, what have I done to myself?...Maybe I should have taken the relief when offered, saved a little of myself for later in the season, and hit the showers early. Oh well, we'll see what I have left when I get the next call in the rotation...
(NOTE: I hope everyone is having a great holidays...I had intended to get a more comprehensive "what have we be doing, how are the twins" blog up by Christmas, but as you can see that didn't happen. So I figured I'd at least put this one from the other night out there for now and promise to have something else by New Year's - careful what you wish for though, I got a lot of material to report on since the last one)
