I’ll have to thank Bo and Riley (and any other kids of ours) someday for making me try so hard, but making me want to try even harder. Not in an abnormal way, they’re just being themselves. And they need us to love them and make sacrifices for them...especially now.

Sleeplessness, teething, digestive issues, tantrums, barking, eating, escaping the fence. Something or another is always happening, and sometimes many at once. And, I’m no pro, but experienced enough to know it will get much harder. 

These hard days are equally if not more joyful. The struggle is worthwhile. I’m thankful for that.

But I’m also thankful, at least in retrospect, for the struggle. The struggle and the sacrifice it requires helps me understand my truest self (and fall even more in love with my wife). It helps me get closer to what Hindus call the Atman, or soul, as it’s known in the West. The struggle and sacrifice can be an act of purification, assuming I surrender to it.

For so many reasons, I love our boys.