Slightly Askew

Maggie

Tuesday, June 14th, 2011

I’ve just got home after spending a day at the hospital.

The reason being my first child, Maggie Jean Waters, was born at 8.16am this morning.

I feel like I should write something down for the sake of posterity or something. So this will be poorly edited garbled nonsense, but it’ll be honest and true.

Okay. First, it’s fucking incredible. And I know that we’re all supposed to feel that way because of TV and film and suchlike – we feel it’s our duty to shed a life-affirming tear / have an emotional breakdown at the birth of our first child. But when another human that you helped to create falls out of your wife and starts breathing, it’s bloody hard not to dodge that tidal wave of joyous wonder.

Second, I realised that the world needn’t be just one big, horrible popularity contest. Because once you create a family, you really couldn’t give a flying fart what someone else chooses to do with their money / time / emotions / sexual organs. You care instinctively and intensely about your own.

Third, I had a weird sense of wanting to tell everyone and nobody. Part of me wanted to phone the whole of my address book, and upload every last photo on Facebook and Twitter. And the other part wanted nobody to know; I wanted to cocoon myself with my new family for as long as possible.

Fourth, I felt like the best photographer in the world today. Every photo I took of my beautiful baby girl was a belter. If you’re crap at photography like me, capturing the magic is a whole lot easier when there’s tonnes of magic to go around.

Fifth, midwives are incredibly kind, loving and skilled people.

Sixth, there’s nothing quite like the birth of a child, but that doesn’t mean you can’t prepare for it. Caroline and I didn’t go to NCT. We went to one all-day class together that covered only the labour, but in great detail. As a result, I was calm and always felt in control (which if you think about it, is fucking stupid) throughout the birth.

Seventh, read the above paragraph with a pinch of salt because 75% of the things I learned on that day we didn’t actually use.

Eighth, get some sleep when you can.

Goodnight.

You’ve got to say yes

Tuesday, May 3rd, 2011

Opportunities present themselves every day.

It’s easy to say no; to resist change; to play devil’s advocate and ask “but what if it doesn’t work out?”.

Much harder to say yes; to embrace change; to say “this is an incredible opportunity – let’s make it happen”.

You can pretend that you’re being cautious because it’s the sensible thing to do. Sometimes it is – but often it’s just the perfect excuse.

I could have said no. James could have resisted. Adrian could have backed out. Tom could have decided to stay in London. Nina could have decided it was too much of a risk. Anders could have gone to work at a ‘bigger’ company.

But we didn’t. And now we’ve created something called The First Sixty-Five, and it’s going to be one hell of a ride.

You’ve got to say yes.