January 25 - Unplug

Parenting is all about routines (which is exactly how Red describes prison life in The Shawshank Redemption...I haven't actually crawled through a sewage pipe, but many of Ellot and Eleanor's diapers have been close...).  We've gotten into a morning routine where I get up and get ready for work, then I get Elliot up and ready for school.  I try to prep Elizabeth's lunch and Eleanor's bottles, so that way all Elizabeth has to do is get herself and Eleanor ready to go to work and school respectively.  It doesn't always work out that way, and more often than not Elizabeth has to bail me out if I'm running late.  But we're making it work with two, and I'm confident we'll get better at it as the years go on.

Our evening routine is also fairly regimented.  Elizabeth picks up both of the kiddos from school, and I get home and start on dinner.  We all eat around the dinner table (unless it's Friday, and that's movie night in the living room).  Then we alternate between who puts which kid down to sleep (when it's my night for Elliot, Elizabeth gets Eleanor, and vice versa).  Again, there are some variations to this routine, but for the most part, that's what we've worked out.

Something has been creeping into that routine, however, and I've noticed that it's become a bad habit. When I'm cooking dinner or cleaning up afterwards, I end up putting on a video on my phone and zoning out from the rest of the house.  It might be an episode of a show I'm watching on Netflix, or it might be a recap from the news throughout the day, or it might be something from RedLetterMedia's vault of film reviews.  What it definitely isn't is inclusive of my family.

I find that this disconnection extends beyond the videos I watch while I'm in the kitchen and my family is in the playroom or living room.  I'll check emails at the dinner table, or scroll through Facebook while I'm on the couch with the kiddos. It's not something I mean to do, and I am not uninterested with them. However, what starts as a quick glance turns into a distraction.

It's something that I'm sure most of us are guilty of in some way or another.  Having these amazing mini-computers in our pockets means that the entire world is always at our fingertips.  But I think we need to do a better job from time to time on focusing more on the world that is right in front of us. At least, I know that I do.  These habits I've gotten into are cutting me off from the most important people in my lives, and while we all deserve some alone time, there's better times for me to get that.

So last night, I turned off my notifications and signed out of Netflix.  And I just spent time being present and focusing on what the kids and Elizabeth were doing. I'm glad that I did, because I got to witness moments like this:

I didn't get all of the lyrics he was singing (something about an alligator knocking a monkey out of a tree) but Eleanor thought it was hilarious.  He started off his concert by bringing her the two monkeys while she was lying in his bed, and the joy that I saw in her eyes was tremendous.  I could hear her thinking, "I have the coolest brother, and he brought me this monkey, and I will love it forever."

Routines are good to have because they can keep us sane.  But they can also lead to ruts, and I don't ever want to feel like being a dad is equivalent to being stuck in one of those. Not everyone gets the opportunity to be a dad, and I’m the only one that’s gets the opportunity to be a dad to Elliot and Eleanor. That’s something that I don’t want to miss out on because I was too busy watching a video or checking on a Facebook status. Habits are hard to break, but this is one that I’m going to tackle head on.