My son is almost two now, and I find that as he’s getting older, its becoming tougher to regularly blog *and* be a Dad who is “present” at home. I’m finding something that most new parents already know: as babies turn into toddlers, and as toddlers turn into children, they actually demand more and more out of you. That’s presuming that you want to be a good parent, of course.
I guess it speaks to your own blogging habits as well. I used to be able to blog when I got back from work and maybe after dinner. I used to pride myself on how fast I could blog, but even so, it takes about 20 minutes of uninterrupted time to put something even remotely intelligible.
Why has blogging changed for me? Well, I just don’t have 20 minutes of uninterrupted time any more, until the Boy goes to sleep. And quite frankly, I’m not even doing most of the heavy lifting (points to wife).
And after that, there are other household obligations that need to be taken care of. Perhaps I’m getting older, but I find that I just don’t have the stamina to stay up an extra 30 - 60 minutes to do extra stuff, when I have to be up the next day for work.
I can’t even imagine what it would be like to try all this with two children (or twins), nevermind one.
Bottom line — blogging has been taking a bit of a back seat to parenting these days, and has made me appreciate all of those “mommy bloggers” out there for two reasons: *being* a mom, and being a mom AND a blogger ;)
August 30th, 2008 at 12:25 pm | Permalink
I’ve accepted the fact that I’m probably doomed.
But it will be a spectacular, public, failure. :-)
August 30th, 2008 at 12:41 pm | Permalink
Tony, an awesome heartfelt post that I totally identify with, given that I have a 6 year old, a 2 year old, a working wife, a startup co-founder job (UpTake), and a blog about China (CNReviews). Sometimes I can go 24 hrs and start blogging after kids go to sleep and everyone is up and awake in China. But sometimes I just need to shut it down and be “present” to wife and kids. Thanks for the post.
August 30th, 2008 at 12:46 pm | Permalink
tony tony tony - good to hear from you my man - i miss you on the circuit!
August 30th, 2008 at 4:54 pm | Permalink
You are not alone. I am a blogging father of five.
August 30th, 2008 at 11:38 pm | Permalink
@Brian — good grief, that’s almost a contradiction. Unless they’ve all grown and have left the house. ;)
August 30th, 2008 at 11:57 pm | Permalink
@Allen — I miss being around :P
August 31st, 2008 at 12:03 am | Permalink
@Elliot — you’re welcome. My wife used to get on me, but she doesn’t have to any more. Its not a chore, and quite frankly, I do get a sense that if I’m not present and around, things will change so fast that I won’t be “around” for it when things do. Didn’t realize how important it was to me, but I guess it is. And that’s not a bad thing, I think. ;)
August 31st, 2008 at 12:05 am | Permalink
@Louis — I doubt it, but as long as you’re blogging through that “failure”, it’ll be just fine. ;)
September 3rd, 2008 at 10:35 am | Permalink
I sympathize, though I only started blogging when the munchkin was 2.5 years old. It is difficult to find spare time, between work, kid, etc. Also it takes me far, far longer than 20 minutes to write a post.