Happy Birthday, Tanner

My son was born 19 years ago today. Well, tonight, really. Although the visit to the hospital began around noon, he didn't show up until after 10:00 that night. I can't really complain, though -- his mom did most of the work.

But come to think of it, I probably did have the tougher job. After all, she got to lie down for most of it, while I was up running around, fetching ice for her, setting up the video camera, tracking down nurses, and doing all that breathing-coach stuff that I studied so hard to learn in Lamaze class. All she had to do was lie there and order me around.

Plus, she had drugs.

Oh well, I can't complain; it all worked out OK. Even though I had to stay up past my regular bedtime, and was on my feet more than I really wanted to be, I have to say that it was pretty cool to see my son being born and holding him for the first time.

Forgive me if I end up telling the same story every year...but my dad has done it every year on my birthday, too. I enjoy hearing about it. (Perhaps I can get him to be a guest columnist to share that story on MY birthday. Hmm.) Not a bad tradition, in my opinion.

Anyway, here's a brief summary of my main recollections from 1989:

• We videotaped the introduction to "The Tanner Heggy Story" (complete with scrolling titles and opening credits) before we left for the hospital. Of course, 1989 was before camcorders were invented, so I had a rather massive camera and a large tape deck to lug around. At that time, I still had dreams of becoming the next Spielberg, so my plan was to document the entire process in an entertaining and possibly Oscar-winning way. I didn't plan for the fact that I'd be busy doing other things during the day, nor for the fact that the doctor wouldn't allow me to videotape anything that might be used in a subsequent malpractice suit should things go sour. And though it became painfully apparent later, it didn't occur to me that nobody (not even the parents) really wants to watch a video of a kid being born. The process takes a dreadfully long time, there is screaming, cursing, and blood involved, and despite what shows like "Scrubs" would lead you to believe, there is precious little clever dialog and delivery room jokery.


• During the lulls between contractions, Tanner's mom and I watched "Risky Business" on the delivery room TV. For me, Tanner's birth shall be forever linked with images of Tom Cruise lip-synching in his underwear. (Shudder.)


• When the baby's heart-rate monitor showed an elevated pulse, the doctor decided to extract the boy with foreceps rather than let him continue his trek at his own annoyingly-slow pace. The procedure was successful, and he pretty much popped right out after that with no further medical difficulties...but his head was kinda squished in the process. It regained a normal shape after a couple of days, but I continue to wonder if that whole head-squishin' thing doesn't have something to do with the fact that he still doesn't have a job.


• Tanner was a tad jaundiced upon arrival, which means that he had a bit of a sickly yellow tinge to his skin. He was also covered with slime, in a foul mood from having his head yanked on with tongs, and generally ugly in that Popeye-esque way that all newborns are. Still, there are no words to describe the joy, love, and adoration that his mother and I felt right then. And we still haven't gotten over it, 19 years later.


• Within one hour of his birth, the kid had already demonstrated his tendency to show off. No, not with his musical talent -- that would come later...this was in the "feats of strength" category. To treat the jaundice, they placed him under an oxygen hood -- a bulky plastic dome that rested over his head. Within a few minutes, Tanner had reached up and flipped the dome off of his face. The nurses commented that they'd never seen such a thing before; babies aren't supposed to have the strength nor the motor skills to accomplish something like that. We knew right then that we had a physical prodigy on our hands. (Of course, when he still couldn't walk two years later, we realized that maybe the oxygen dome thing might've been more a fluke result of random thrashing rather than a pre-conceived bench press. Perhaps he wasn't the next Hulk Hogan after all. Oh well.)


• I couldn't spend the entire time at the hospital because I had to zip home to prepare the place for his arrival. His bedroom has just been painted by a professional, so I didn't need to mess with anything like that...but I had been ordered to assemble a crib. (Women can be SO unreasonable; I didn't see anything wrong with just spreading some newspapers out on the living room floor and letting him sleep there. But his mom had other ideas.) The entire "nursery" bedroom needed to be assembled and functional before we brought the baby home -- wouldn't want him to have a negative impression of his parents' decorating taste on his very first day in the family home, would we? Sigh. I didn't get much sleep that night.


• It snowed. I'm really rather surprised that the weather registered in my memory banks at all, since there was so much other stuff going on, but I do remember that it was a bit blustery when we took the kid home. The fee that the hospital charged included a carseat, which was good because I probably wouldn't have thought of it; we received a quick demo on how to strap him in and we were headed home.

Then the next 19 years are kind of a blur. But there are videotapes of birthday parties, baseball games, piano recitals, and various other childhood activities that seemed oh-so-precious at the time, but no longer make for compelling viewing. Still, I probably ought to digitize some of that stuff and use it as filler when I can't think of anything to write about. There's something to look forward to, eh?

Anyway, Happy Birthday, Tanner! Thank you for enriching my life in so many ways. I love you, Dude. Have a great day!