He Jes Keep Rolling along

A song (with great apologies to Jerome Kern and Oscar Hammerstein sung to the tune of their "Ol' Man River") to honor the news that Ramajit Raghav, a Kharkhoda (India) farm laborer who at 94 is now living on a pension and has a new son, "god's gift" Karamjit, thanks to the help of his 50 year old wife:

Dere's an ol' river called de Ganges
Dat's de ol' river dat Raghav see!
What does he care if de world's got troubles?
What does he care if no land has he?

Ol' man Raghav,
Dat ol' man Raghav
He mus'know sumpin'
But don't say nuthin',
At 94 he's rollin''
He keeps on rollin' along.

He don' plant taters,
He don't plant cotton,
An' dem dat plants'em
is soon forgotten,
But ol'man Raghav,
He jes keeps rollin'along.

You an'me, we sweat an' strain,
Body all achin' an' racket wid pain,
Tote dat barge!
Lif' dat bale!
Git a little drunk
An' you land in jail.

Ah gits weary
An' sick of tryin'
Ah'm tired of livin'
An' skeered of dyin',
But new father Raghav,
He jes' keeps rolling' along.

He's 94, wife's 50-sometin,
Baby Karamjit a little dumplin',
He ain't got money from de dawn to sunset,
Gittin' no rest till de judgement day.

Don't look up
An' don't look down,
Kharkhoda farmer
Grab de oldest father crown.
Bend your knees
An'bow your head,
An' pull date rope
Until you' dead.
 
Ol' man Raghav,
Dat ol' man Raghav
He mus'know sumpin'
But don't say nuthin',
At 94 he's rollin''
He keeps on rollin' along.

Ah, gits weary
An' sick of tryin'
Ah'm tired of livin'
An' skeered of dyin',
But ol' man Raghav,
He jes'keeps rollin' along!

Celeb Battles

The celeb "war" between boys and girls has been joined. Ricky Martin has announced that he is looking to do some adopting — clearly putting Angelina Jolie in his sights. Additionally, Elton John, 62, has announced his is a new father — and now we wait to see which famous woman of a certain age is willing to match that!

Baby Medicine

Want a jolt to your health after a couple heart attacks and a stroke? Have a baby: it's what worked for seventy-year-old Aussie Kevin King.

Of course, it might not hurt that his wife is only 31. He met her while going walkabout after being told by his doctor he had but three years left to live — a prognosis since withdrawn. With baby Pierre one-year-old, King spends his days as a stay-at-home-play-at-home-dad while wifey goes off to earn her keep.

Good on ya Kev!

Have A Baby by Ne

In July, rapper Ne-Yo told CNN, "I'm terrified, I'm gonna be all the way honest. I've never seen myself as a father, you know what I mean" Still, babies do arrive and so Shaffer Chimere Smith is claiming Madilyn Grace Smith as his own even as he is not yet claiming her mama as his one true love. Of course, to be fair in 2005 when he claimed the son of his girlfriend as his own it turned out he wasn't actually the father.

In any case, as he sang with 50 Cent, Have A Baby By Me:

Dad Designs

Graphic advice and perspectives for the dad-to-be has just been released  via Ideo's Designs on Birth, from "an international, web-based community for designers and design enthusiasts." One can, of course stick to a traditional source, like Parenting Mag's take on the advice for new pops thing: "...it can be hard to connect with a being you can't see, feel or touch, but you can still do things that matter, from putting money aside for a college education to learning how to change a diaper..."

More amusing, however, is the Ideo-posted, Ikea-like instruction sheet

And for a better sensory experience of what will be coming with the labor, there is also the documentary-like video advisory:


Men in Labour from IDEO on Vimeo.

Sometimes a Cigar Is Just a Smoke

Busted! A proud new pop in Uniontown, Pa., lit up that which was not a celebratory cigar in the designated smoking area. Unfortunately for him, the sweet, distinctive marijuana odor caught the nose of a passing nurse, who mentioned it to the cop on the beat. It is not clear whether the still-anonymous dad is heading for a court date. He did, after all, give a perfectly reasonable explanation to the policeman: "I'm having a baby and wanted to get a buzz," according to the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review report.

If he does face the mellow-crushing threat of slammer time, he could certainly do worse than calling the daddy-daughter firm of Margolin & Margolin. Father Bruce has been battling anti-doobie laws for more than 30 years; daughter Allison — a grad of Columbia University and Harvard Law — now goes by the moniker L.A.'s dopest attorney. After all, a father and child devoted to marijuana reform? Who is going to work harder for a new father just trying to chill?

Fathers Below; Hope Above

Hope and fathers are entwined in below-ground news. From Chile comes the good word that one of the miners buried underground is a new father. Naturally, he named his baby daughter Esperanza (Hope). And notice arrives — that brings a smile to Greek tourism officials — that an elaborate underground tomb more likely contains the remains of Alexander the Great's Pop, the Macedonian military master Phillip II, rather than feeble half-bro Phillip III.

The Anti-Hobson's Choice

Frenchman Gilles Simon was faced with a father's fabulous choice Sunday. He could win — defeating world No. 1 Rafael Nadal in their fourth round match — or he could win — freeing himself to get on a plane to fly home and see newborn son Timothee, who was born as Simon was away at work, playing the U.S. open..

Not surprisingly, Simon won. ... Oh, and Nadal won, too.

Hair, There, Everywhere

It's a shame that daughters can't (or at least definitely, positively, absolutely — and we repeat, absolutely — shouldn't) wear their father's mustache. It is a connection. It is an ode. It just makes one feel good to know about it.

When the late, great Kurt Vonnegut Jr. gave the 2003 Clemens  speech at the Mark Twain House in Hartford, he began:

First things first: I want it clearly understood that this mustache I’m wearing is my father’s mustache. I should have brought his photograph. My big brother Bernie, now dead, a physical chemist who discovered that silver iodide can sometimes make it snow or rain, he wore it, too.

Him. His brother. Their dad. All tied together by a mustache.

It's an idea that actor/musician Jason Schwartzman has also adopted. In announcing that he is expecting his first child, Schwartzman explained whey there was a new bug reposing beneath his breather. In his own baby pictures it was his father's goofy mustache that stood out. He hoped to offer his child the same dubious pleasure: “I decided to grow out this mustache, so when we take photos — my boy or girl, whatever it is — they’ll be embarrassed. ...I am now thinking of ways to embarrass my unborn child.” Like Vonnegut he will be tied to his child and will also be hoping his daughter (should he have one) won't be using the idea like a family heirloom.

Did We Mention Your Pre-Deceasers?

Tall, dark, handsome and being set up with multiple females sounds like a pretty good life. But did we mention that there is a baby on the way in two months for the soon-to-be surrogate pop? It may also have slipped our mind that the actual impregnator died of some sort of "spontaneous" diabetes, which followed the rise and fall of his predecessor who seemed to be in good health until he passed with a "sudden" heart attack.

And so the saga of Kesho begins. The 11-year-old "black back" gorilla is being moved from the Dublin to the London Zoo before the new baby is born so that one of his first acts as a new father is not killing his child. The explanation for his presence being necessary within the menage is that without him the ladies (ages 11, 17 and 35) will become unsettled. Instead, given the fates of his predecessors, we're betting Kesho is one unsettled father in the very near future.

The Successful Soundtrack

“It’s great,” Kansas City Royal outfield David DeJesus told the Kansas City Star about fatherhood . “I can’t wish for anything better.” His son, DD Jr., was born about two weeks ago and father is still sleeping seven hours a night and his focus at the plate has raised his average over .300.

The story is a great and hopeful one, with only one dark cloud. The reporter heard him repeating the first line from the anarcho-rock band Everclear's song "Father of Mine." While that first line, part of a stick-in-your-head hook, sounds optimistic, the song actually tells the story of a son who's pops walked.

All hopes, prayers and wishes are going out to DeJesus and DD Jr. that all the great things continue. However, it couldn't hurt to choose a different soundtrack.

Oh Just Keep an Eye on the Baby, Won't You?

Is being a new father tough? Try raising a child as a blind man.

Ryan Knighton, who is creating quite the genre for life through the eyes of a blind man — in print, blog and Twitter form — offers C'mon Papa, just in time for that gift-giving gala, Mother's Father's Day. Perhaps the most magical of all the literary tricks he pulls is the one that relocates the reader from the mental space where one wonders how a blind man types, to the space where s/he is overwhelmed by how he tells his story so well, a sorta second memoir, after Cockeyed.



And now we wait to see where the third volume of the memoir takes us.

In (e)volved

Acts around the world are taking place to get dads involved with their kids. It may not be much for wealthy men in the Philippines to start up a "Father's Action Network/Dad's for Life" program or for new fathers to get little cards from the British National Health Service telling them what to do so as to do better by their kids.

Still, it is something and even the tiniest jots of info about holding, burping, swaddling and diapering can't hurt ... and might even include moments of fun.

Twin Musings

Are twins really twice as much joy, two times the trouble? You could ask the father, but how would he know ... it's not as if he has conducted a scientific experiment to compare his feelings with test and control subjects.

Still, for interesting opinions on new twins, you could probably do worse than to ask Nguyen Duc (a Siamese twin separated from his brother who has just given birth to fraternal twins) or Richard Roden, 71, who impregnated his 25-year-old wife with what have turned out to be twins to the oldest Brit pop of twins and previous father of a mere 10.

So far, though, Roden is offering much more than cliches:

Being a dad at 71 is definitely more tiring than in my 20s, but they give me such a lot of pleasure; and, I wouldn’t swap them for anything – not even winning the lottery. They have made my life complete.

Listen Up

Advice for new fathers come in all forms. There are the columns of collected wisdom such as the easy column for new dad journalists to phone in. And then there are the men who want to talk of themselves as they talk of their kids. Presumably with tongue stuck somewhere in his cheek is unacceptableface, offering "My thoughts on this momentous occasion. Probably one of the most important, inspiring videos on youtube." Including such revelations as:

• Mother and baby both very good. I mean, if I'm forced to choose, I'd probably prefer the baby.
• It was only when I looked at little face that I realized ... quite ... how incredible I am.I created life.
• I'm not saying I'm better than someone who hasn't gotten a child; I obviously am.

Almost reluctantly, he reveals the important stats. Eight pounds (and 40 pence) to pay for parking.

Baby Daddy, Baby

We're a bit late to the party on talking up this idea that seeing "baby daddy" in the headline can only mean scandal. It's particularly enticing for short articles referring to Hollywood hunks. This is not to suggest that there can't be scandal when a headline includes the more traditional "baby's daddy," as in "I'm That Baby's Daddy: Priest" (all about the looming custody battle between Catholic priest David Dueppen and his stripper baby mama). It's just that there's much more ring to saying BD, for example, than for the equal in meaning "baby father."

Adopt Me, If You Can

Much of fatherhood is wending one's way through the gray areas. Among the places with the thickest fog is the island nation of Adoption.

Sometimes it is hard to even get to find the place as was the case of Alabaman Andrew Scott. The 20-year-old may have lost his child because he didn't put his name on a state registry claiming fatherhood within 30 days of the birth to his one-time partner of the baby boy. That he didn't know he was the father until after the deadline has proven — so far according to state courts — no excuse. His son now lives with adoptive parents a couple uncrossable miles away.

While Scott is fighting for his day in court, he might take some inspiration from South Africa's Jose Williams, who fought and won the right to his daughter's custody almost 2 years after his ex-partner offered her for adoption — approximately two months prior to going into labor.

He might also be happy to hear that an Irish court overturned the adoption of a man's 8-year-old by his ex-partner's new husband, when he had never been informed that it was even in the works. (Of course, one man's happiness can be another father's regret ... what's a not-even-step-dad to want and do?)

To the dads above who might miss out on their kids by not being married, it woudl seem that the "piece of paper" would be the key to being named father. In truth, even that is no guarantee. For example, two New York dads are currently fighting in a U.S. Appeals court against the state of Louisiana because, although married to each other, only one of them can be officially listed as the father of the child they are adopting out of the Bayou.

Admittedly, the best interests of the child should be premiere over those of the adult, but at least from the cursory review above, it does not seem to always be the GPS a father can use getting to and finding his way around the land of Adoption.

Not What You'd Think

More material for the "don't jump to conclusion's file": From the culture of gay can come surprising fertility.

In nature, evidence comes from the partnership of two Griffon vultures. Dashik and Yehud, both male, were an item before a zookeeper thought about making them foster parents, which they did successfully before splitting up. However, post split up, the gay dads biologically fathered with new, female partners, having baby GVs on the same day and with the exact same weight.

In politics, we have the case of San Francisco (the Gay Sodom, according to some who believe the San Francisco treat should be nothing more licentious than rice). Mayor and gubernatorial candidate Gavin Newsom has been busy off the campaign trail twittering the birth of his new baby girl, Montana. Newsom follows in the stroller path of former mayor Willie Brown, who also fathered while in office and joins an apparent heterosexual fertility culture by the bay in City Hall as supervisors and others have also become new pops.

And the lesson is ...?

Working on a Holiday

Some jobs are better than others when you have to work on Fathers' Day. Playing tennis would seem to be one of them. A shout out then — on FD, as celebrated on September's first Sunday in Australia, New Zealand, Fiji and Papua New Guinea — to Aussie Lleyton Hewitt, father of Mia Rebecca and Cruz Lleyton, as he takes on new father of twins, Swiss Roger Federer [Earlier: Ace] today in the US Open Round of 16.

Ace

"You change, all of a sudden," Federer said [to the AP about being father of twin girls], snapping his fingers, "from needing nine hours of sleep, to saying, 'five is plenty."'

"Federer," of course, is the current (and perhaps all-time) No. 1 tennis player — appearing left on this week's objet d'eBay, a pillowcase. He begins his defense of the U.S. Open men's single title with his less than two-month old twin daughters, Charlene Riva and Myla Rose, in attendance (actually, probably in the hotel room). It's been a very good year since his last win and the betting is that he will cap it off with another title in Flushing Meadows, Queens. He (and you) will surely need a good night's sleep after that.