The One Where I Drop Out of the Running for Father of the Year

I woke up Saturday morning and the birds were singing, the sun was shining, and the roses were blooming. The children were awake, but still too sleepy to bicker with each other or demand breakfast. In all ways, it was a beautiful day. 

As I looked out the kitchen window I saw several strange men walking up to the front door -- two with video cameras, one with a giant boom mike, another with a trophy and an oversized cardboard check, and someone who looked suspiciously like the late Ed McMahon. A glance back at the driveway told me everything I already knew. Emblazoned across the side of the van were four simple words: Father of the Year.

I should probably make something up about how surprised I was, but that would be a lie.  Afterall, I thought, who else deserves to be Father of the Year more than me?  As I was tossing around ideas for my acceptance speech, a tiny voice in my Father of the Year head told me to check on Alison's frogs.

We keep the frogs (there are two of them now) in a small tank on the kitchen counter, where they're relatively out of the way but still convenient enough to be fed and fawned over.  The first thing I noticed was that the lid of the tank was wide open, and I immediately realized what had happened.  Just before going to bed on Friday night I had gone out to the kitchen to give the frogs a few crickets.  I had opened the lid of the tank, but when I discovered that we were out of crickets, I must've forgotten to close the lid.

This was one of those moments when your life stands still, when everyone around you stops what they're doing and stares directly at you, waiting to see how you'll respond.  I froze in the middle of the kitchen floor, only long enough for this thought to pass from one synapse to the next: "Wouldn't that suck if one of the frogs had gotten out?"

Now keep in mind, even though these are North American bullfrogs, the very frogs which inspired Mark Twain to write The Celebrated Jumping Frog of Calaveras County, we're still talking about two creatures which could each sit on a quarter and give you back about ten cents in change.  Escape would mean a jump of about eight inches straight up, a truly Olympian feat.

But even so, what if they had jumped out?  I quickly saw that the smaller of the two frogs was still there, which was a huge relief.  I didn't see his larger friend right away, but that wasn't unusual.  I peeked in the corners and behind the filter but still didn't see him.  I desperately plunged my hand into the tank, swishing my fingers through the gravel, overturning their sunning rock, lifting out the filter.  He was gone, and it was my fault.  I looked out the window just in time to see the Father of the Year van backing out of the driveway.

My first thought, of course, was for Alison.  I called to her and told her what had happened; the tears were flowing before she got to the kitchen.  We searched the counter tops, pulled dishes from the sink, scoured the floor, and pointed a flashlight deep beneath the stove, dishwasher, and refrigerator.  No luck.

It was difficult for Alison to help me look because she was sobbing almost the entire time.  She had learned enough about frogs to know that he would die if he dried out, but what we didn't know was how long he could last.  Hours?  Days?  My heart ached for Alison and hoped that we would find him soon, but my head knew better.  The house was big, and the frog was small.

What struck me the most was how Alison handled the whole situation.  Her sadness was completely pure and never wavered towards anger.  I had admitted my responsibility, but she never once blamed me and didn't even ask me why I hadn't closed the tank.  She wasn't looking for justice, she was just looking for her frog.  At one point during the search, she stopped and looked up at me, her eyes overflowing with tears, and asked, "Daddy, if you were a froggy, where would you go?"  I think that was the moment when my heart broke.

She remained positive throughout Saturday and into Sunday as we continued to search the house, but I realized that each passing hour made a positive outcome less likely.  We kept looking in the same places and getting the same results until we returned to the family room couch for a more thorough search.  We had looked beneath the couch on Saturday morning as soon as we spread our focus from the kitchen, but on Sunday night I suggested that we take everything out from underneath it, just to be sure he wasn't there.  

I pulled out a few boxes and bags of things stored beneath the couch, all the while crossing my fingers that the frog would come hopping out from behind the next item I picked up.  I found him soon enough, but it wasn't the happy ending I had been hoping for.  I slid out a rolled up yoga mat and suddenly there he was, completely dried out and almost flat.

I looked at Alison on the opposite side of the couch and chose my words carefully, so as not to instill false hope, even for a second.

"Alison, I have bad news."

The tears came instantly as she ran around to where I sat on the floor.  She took one look at her frog before collapsing into my arms, her body shaking with sobs.  I won't soon forget how small and powerless I felt, slowly rocking her back and forth and feeling her tears against my skin.

Why hadn't I just closed the tank on Friday night?  What if I had searched beneath the couch on Saturday morning instead of Sunday evening?  There were no answers to these questions, and as Alison continued to cry, going from my arms to Leslie's and back again, there was nothing I wouldn't have done for her.  A puppy?  No problem.  A pony?  Let me build a pasture in the backyard.

But to Alison's credit, she asked for nothing.  When Leslie offered to buy some more tadpoles, she refused, probably not ready yet to think about replacing her missing frog.  Instead, she found a small cardboard jewelry box in her room, gently placed her frog atop the bed of cotton inside, and set him in a place of honor.

I took her to bed and she pulled out one of her library books, All About Frogs.  As we laid side by side reading about frog croaks and metamorphosis, the tears finally stopped.  She even laughed a little when we learned that frogs can pull their eyeballs into their heads to help push food down their throats.  As it turned out, I hadn't scarred my daughter for life.  She was still sad, but she was getting better, and I was relieved beyond belief.

We finished the book, I tucked her in with a kiss on the forehead, and I turned out the lights.  Through her bedroom window I saw another van pulling up into the driveway.  This one, though, said "Daughter of the Year" on the side.

Comments

[Scott (simplefather)]

Oh to be young and pure again. Not blaming others.

On another note, there's something I have to get off my chest. I once left my daughters goldfish without food for a week, hoping the little bugger would die... but it didn't. Maybe I shouldn't do that again.

[JoAnn]

I am so afraid that is going to happen with Drew's frog (my husband, not my son) that when I saw the lid was a bit off the top last week after the girl who cleans my house left, I surrounded the whole thing with painter's tape....just in case.

[Julie Sundstrom]

Please send Alison our condolences on the loss of her dear frog. And don't beat yourself up - it happens. Though I know all too well that feeling of "would have, could have, should have" is hard to shake. Thank goodness for the resilience of childhood that reminds us not to dwell on such things.