Poking and Peaking: Still stunned

I'm still trying to wrap my brain cells around the shocking news. I can't help but talk about it because that's all I've thought about lately, interspersed with the occasional blip about what to do with A,K in an SnG after someone puts you all in and their stack size is about the same as yours and its in the middle of the game as well as what my wife used to look like naked before we stuffed two Cabbage Patch Dolls in there (and I've already been cut off, so it's gonna be a long winter, spring and probably summer).

Mostly the twins though.

I was looking at non-baseball twins Web sites the other day, and for the first time, the news really hit me, like it blasted through beneath the protective layer known as denial and dug into a small portion of my gut.
This is the kind of news that you read about but don't ever expect it will happen to you. Sort of like winning the lottery, losing a family member to a car crash or winning more than three times your buy-in at a poker table. News like that might as well be written by Stephen King or E.B. White, as the people it happens to don't even seem real (even though I've interviewed several crash victims myself, even done projects on them).

And now this news!

I'm excited about it too. Don't get me wrong. Seriously, the other day I had a vision of two little ones crawling around on the floor and thought about how much fun it will be. But what I feel at one moment is not what I feel the next. Guilt (about the environment, about Jayden, about our own marriage) gets replaced by excitement and wonder, which gets replaced by fear, which gets replaced by a thousand other feelings, including a sudden urge to plan out my life for the next five years.

I know I can do it. I know I'll be fine. I think I've proven that I have a lot of determination. You don't climb 54 14ers over five summers if you don't carry a little bit of bullheadedness. But the thing that frightens me about this is eventually the trip ends. The longest one trip lasted was 24 hours on a single climb. But that was just a day. I have been on climbing expeditions that lasted several days. But that was just a week. I have spend summers climbing every weekend and sometimes during the week. But that was just a season.
Raising a child, especially when they are younger, requires constant energy, almost constant movement and constant, consistent and caring patience. It is not just a day, a week or a season. That's almost the most challenging part of raising my 2-year-old is matching his almost atomic energy step for step, regardless of if we're tired or sick or just a little fed up with it all. And now we've thrown two babies into the mix. I remember when we spent 10 days with my Mom and then my Dad in Kansas over the holidays, and I remember saying to Kate as I was chasing Jayden, "We're on vacation. When do we get a vacation from being a parent?"
You don't.
Yes, it's a joy, and I can't imagine my once-full (or so I thought) life without Jayden and now these two little girls who will soon enter my life. But it's also the hardest thing you'll ever do in your life. At least that's what I thought before this news.

I'll try to leave some of those concerns on the slopes this weekend, when I finally get to go skiing for the first time this winter. It will be me, my thoughts and my iPod shuffle. And Friday I'll be spending some time with a longtime poker buddy, whose home game is responsible for hooking the poker needle into my arm in the first place.

Oh, and here's where I'll be Thursday (I will Mookie next week):