Allison and Rebecca,
Today is New Year's Day, January 1, 2014. It is fitting that, on this day when it is customary to reflect on days past and resolve to live a better future, I begin this blog to you, my daughters of the future. I have been thinking about this for some time, and now I have officially created this electronic memoir, this space for me to reflect on our present (now your past) and to write you messages of hope, praise, fatherly wisdom, and deepest love as well as to chronicle moments of loss, sorrow, regret, or frustration. My intent is to write to you, as sincerely as I can, of what we are experiencing together now and what I want to make sure you know when you are old enough to understand and appreciate it.
This blog is a time capsule of sorts; I will need to create reminders to my future self to share this with you in fifteen years and to provide instructions in my will for you to be given access to this site in the event that I die before then. I envision us reading this on New Year's Day fifteen years hence, when Allison will be 20 years old and Rebecca will be a young woman of 18. I'd like to think that we'll be able to laugh together at my poor writing, dorky turns of phrase, outdated expressions, and memories of fond days past. Cognizant of my own mortality, I also accept the grim possibility that what I write now will come to you instead as a sad reminder of a loving father who is no longer around to share in your joys and your sorrows. In that case, I hope that this record of our days together will serve as a link to your past, a reminder of the man I am, and a vehicle by which I can pass along some advice to you.
I write this as a 35-year-old man and the father of two beautiful, creative, intelligent, curious, stubborn, loving, kind, sometimes mischievous, and always remarkable young girls, ages 5 and 3. We currently reside at 25090 Graham Road in Redford Michigan with your mother Tiffany and our three cats, Kali, Oliver, and Rafferty. Allison is midway through her first year of kindergarten at the American Montessori Academy, and Rebecca spends her school days either with Nana (Lynne or Grandma Baron) or at the Child Development Center at Henry Ford Community College, where I am in my eleventh year of teaching English and my tenth as a full-time faculty member. Your mother and I have been married for seven and a half years and have been together for a total of almost thirteen; she is currently teaching at the Detroit Service Learning Academy, where she works as a Reading Interventionist trying to help struggling readers develop their reading skills. My parents (your Meme and Poppa) live in Rogers, Arkansas, where they've been for about six years now. Your mother's parents (Ba and Nana) are about a mile away from us in a house on Lyndon.
How much of this will have changed by the time you read this? Will I still be in the same profession? Will we still be living in the same house? the same state? What pets, if any, will we have in fifteen years? From your perspective, the previous paragraph may have given you a sense of nostalgia or memories of the way things were, but for me, what you now take for granted as the current state of your lives is something I can only imagine. What will be your post-high school lives? Will one or both of you go to college (I sincerely hope so, but perhaps your path in life leads you a different way)? Will you have solid career plans, or will you be setting off in search of your vocation? When I entered college, I thought I would become a physicist and work in a laboratory wearing a white coat. Your mother graduated with a degree in Fisheries and Wildlife and had aspirations of working as a park ranger of sorts. Life has a funny way of taking unexpected turns.
When you read this, perhaps on New Year's Day in 2029, you will be much wiser, stronger, and mature--but you will still have much to learn and experience, too. I hope that I am still a strong part of your lives and that you can come to me for advice or just an ear to talk to. You are my special, wonderful daughters, and I will love you always. Happy New Year, girls.
