Our son, Owen was born on July 17^th, 2020, at 9:47PM. Like many new fathers, I didn’t really know how to process the moment, but I knew as soon as I first held his tiny little naked body against my bare chest that everything was going to be different. Life was no longer about Patrick Meeker. As the thoughts came rushing in, the song “Once in a Lifetime” by The Talking Heads was playing in the back of my head; the lyrics in particular, “Well… How did I get here?”

My wife Angela and I had been together since 2012. We got married on July 21^st, 2018, so there was certain sigh of relief that we wouldn’t be celebrating Owen’s birthday the same day as our Anniversary. All the sudden, however, what was an otherwise quiet month in our lives had become a very busy one.

We had recently moved into a home in the East Oakland hills from our apartment near downtown Oakland. I had moved across the bridge from San Francisco in 2015, which being a San Francisco native felt like a big deal to me! Anyway, we were barely settled in; boxes were still piled up in the garage, my wife and I were sharing office space off our kitchen, and we were just getting to know our neighborhood.

We had talked about starting a family but like many oblivious husbands, I wasn’t sure when I wanted to do that or if I would ever be ready for it. We thought we could start trying before the holidays when one sunny mid-October day, Angela came up to me when I was in the kitchen and gave me a small box. I wasn’t really sure what she was doing; was this a late birthday gift? Something I had forgot to get at the store? When I opened the box and saw the little thermometer shaped device with the Positive pregnancy symbol on it, my mind went blank. I couldn’t believe it had happened so quickly after we started having this conversation! Once I had returned to earth at that moment, the excitement began to percolate, and I knew this moment would never be forgotten.

Thinking of myself as a parent, sure; I could bring up the many many sleepless nights, or the bouts of wailing and not knowing what to do. Instead, I’d rather think of the role as something as watching a metamorphosis. In a short year, the baby, who initially looks like a misshapen alien, begins to take shape into a little human being. The personality begins to come out and the little movements begin to evolve to all the sudden, I’m chasing him across the room on foot. It’s truly an amazing process…

I hope to continue to see this amazing little person change in front my eyes and I now see the Patrick Meeker story become “Our Story”