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I once believed that there was no high like live performance.
A stand-up comedian by trade, when I was starting out, I lived for the laughter and applause. It fed my ego like nothing before it in life had.
Then I became a father.
Now I understand that the stage is like a drug.
Yes, it can give you an incredible high, but like any drug the crash that follows is debilitating. If you have no foundation, no center in your life, no tether to something real… then the high of the stage is an illusion.
A false high.
My daughter Hilly was in the neighborhood of eight-or-nine months old. She had just started crawling, and—as most babies seem wont to do—went from “wobbly” to “race car” seemingly overnight. One day she was barely able to muster herself forward; the next she was scurrying around on her hands and knees like nobody’s business.
I had been off slinging jokes to the drunken masses.
When I finish my run of gigs, I generally drive home from wherever I am immediately following the final show. Instead of going back to my hotel and hitting the hay, I hit the highway and start returning home.
I prefer the open road of an overnight drive than the cluttered mess you find on a freeway lit by daylight.
At two a.m. there are fewer cars, fewer eighteen wheelers, fewer slowdowns… plus, the idea of waking up in the morning with a drive ahead of me is unappealing. Depending on the drive, I arrive home anywhere from four a.m. to noon the next day.
On the particular moment being recollected, I found myself pulling into the driveway somewhere around the 9 a.m. hour. This means all were awake inside my home. Unknown to me, was the fact my daughter and wife were playing on the floor in the living room.
I opened the door from the garage to the kitchen, and all action came to a pause as if a button had been pushed.
Hilly understood the noise of a door meant someone was home, and was curious to see who it was. As I entered the kitchen, I saw her gazing my way, waiting to see who would come around the corner.
Upon seeing me, her face ignited with the largest smile I had ever seen adorn her face. As if a referee had just fired a starting pistol, Hilly began furiously crawling toward me, the radiance of her smile growing ever-larger.
Before this, she had always lit up whenever I entered her room after nap time, but this was the first time she had actively realized I had been gone, and was now returned.
My heart dissolved.
A cliché, but true; there is no other way to describe it. My muscles turned to jelly and to this moment I am surprised I did not begin crying.
In a manly way, of course.
Lowering my body to the floor, I sat and awaited her arrival, something mere seconds away. When she arrived, Hilly stumble-dove into my arms squealing with joy.
I pulled her into me and breathed in her scent, kissing her. I held her as close to me as possible, trying the best I could to absorb her essence that we may never be parted again, even when physically separated.
The stage offers a temporary high; parenting offers consistency. Even when you’re not within the immediate presence of your child, you still carry love inside you.
That’s powerful because for the entirety of my life I thought I knew what love was.
I “loved” previous girlfriends, because I lacked knowledge of what a loving relationship was.
I love my wife because she is a wonderful person and loves me back.
But becoming a parent meant having a hole I never knew I had, filled. You never realize you are an incomplete person until you have been made whole.
And my children make me whole because for the first time I understand what it is to love.
Want more? I have an Amazon Author Page, yo.
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