GK

In case you don’t know, that nice guy smiling in the picture above is my brother Kenny. He’s sitting with his two granddaughters.  Eliza is the spunky brunette with the peanut and Susannah is the natural blonde swigging the Diet Dr. Pepper.  (His third granddaughter, baby Delia- now six months old- was not yet born when this photo was taken.)

They are all at Wrigley Field.  (In case you didn’t know.)

And today’s post is all about GK.

“Grandfather Kenny.”

Even though I am the older sister and had kids first, as yet, I am not a grandmother.

That’s A-ok by me.  I am in no rush- and have told both my married children so.  Babies hold no charms for me.  I find them baffling, boring, unsanitary and terrifying- all at the same time.

I like dogs.

I’ve always felt this way about babies.  Ick. I never babysat- or even touched one- before I had my own.

What To Expect When You’re Expecting:  When I was six months pregnant with Natasha, my sister-in-law, Mary Lu, thought this egregious lack of tot-tending skills should be addressed.  After all, sooner or later, I was going to be sharing my home with one of these sticky little things.

To that end, she called her pal Judy Cooper who already had a baby of her own- Christopher.  (Christopher, btw, was only the beginning of the Cooper Dynasty.  He was followed by Bridget, Alex, Candace and Kendall.)  ML explained that I was in desperate need of some emergency baby-socialization skills and asked if we could come over so I could meet with Christopher.

Judy saw the logic and graciously extended an invitation.  We were escorted into the nursery where Christopher was regally ensconced in his crib.

I know I was supposed to be cooing over the baby, but all my attention was totally diverted by the presence of an adorable black and white lhasa apso** underneath the crib (Oreo, Judy?  Help me out here.)

** AKC Update:  Mary Lu has just jibed my memory. It was a shih tzu.  Mea culpa, Judy!

As I fell to my knees, Mary Lu reminded me that I had not come all the way from Barrington Hills to play with the dog.

Ha!  What did she know about it?

So my record of never having actually touched a baby was still intact when the nurse in the maternity ward handed me my very own infant.

Hmm.  What to do?  I didn’t know exactly.  And I remember thinking “How can I kiss her? She doesn’t have fur.”

But I didn’t want to goof her up from Day One. (There would be plenty of time- and one messy divorce- for that eighteen years later.)

And so I mustered up my courage, found the furriest spot I could locate- the top of her head- and closed my eyes and puckered up.

And I kissed her.

It wasn’t so bad.  As a baby, Natasha was pretty cute- as babies go.  (That is to say she looked like a doll.  Her temperament was that of a mountain lion.)

Kenny was in the exact same boat. He hadn’t had much hands-on experience with babies, either.  And he was strictly a hands-off uncle when Natasha was born.

I remember an incident when I was anchored down with newborn Nicky on my lap and Natasha, nineteen months older, was crawling too near our sunken living room steps. Uncle Kenny was in striking distance, so I called to him to move her away from the precarious precipice.

He did.

With his gym shoe-clad  foot.

But from these less-than-auspicious beginnings, Kenny soon found his way to fatherhood.  With three boys under his belt, he quickly became a pro at the diapering, burping, middle-of the-night feeding and stroller-pushing that infants require.

And when the boys picked up balls, Kenny really kicked into high gear.

He became the soccer coach and Little League coach and finally Pony League Commissioner for many, many, many years.  (These “manys” are no literary device. Long after his kids grew up, Kenny was still running Wilmette Baseball with a fair- but iron- hand.)

He was the perfect dad for three boys. Although I did have one quibble with his disciplinary style.

All my years as a “dog person” came in handy as I “housebroke” each kid.  I firmly believed  that it was my house and the toddlers should learn to respect it.  To that end, Nicky thought that “No, don’t touch that!” was his name for the first two years of his life.

Kenny on the other hand was much more lenient.  His idea of discipline was to coo, “Don’t do that, honey.” Despite this, my nephews Greg, Andrew and Matt all turned out to be great guys.

And it is the oldest- Greg and his wife Ashlee- who have turned Kenny into GK with their contribution of three grandchildren.

All adorable little girls this time.

Although it was quite a curve ball, Kenny wasn’t thrown by this gender change-up. He is the most hands-on grandfather I have ever seen.

From their infancy, he has happily schlepped them around everywhere.

And by himself.

He’s taken them out alone all over the city, and he can tell you first-hand about the perils of “GK, I have to go to the bathroom NOW!” when he’s been at Wrigley Field with them.

He’s also indulgent.  Single-handedly drove them to a “bouncy house” birthday party in a snowstorm this month.  Braved the nasty weather and two and half hours of screaming kids going berserk because he couldn’t bear to disappoint them.

This deserves a medal of valor in my opinion.

He baby sits for them, too.  But one afternoon- now that there’s three of them- he caved and called for back-up.

Me.

Granny Sidebar: Mary Lu was already spoken for that day.  But she was on tap to pick Eliza up at her school.

All Kenny and I had to cover was the three year old and the three month old.  But I was way out of my depth here.

Comfort level for Aunt Ellen- zero dark thirty.

I had no intention of touching little Delia, who, although charming-looking, was still so new that she didn’t have the requisite “starch” in her collar to keep her head on straight.

And all the hoop-la around feeding time gave me the willies, too.  Pre-pumped breast milk?  It may have gotten the seal of approval from La Leche League but I wanted to call Wanzer Dairy.

And let’s not even talk dirty diaper-changing.

Kenny was well aware of my phobias.  But he wanted me around for moral support and to lend an extra (unhelpful) hand.

I was scared. But I needn’t have been.  Suze, the intrepid three year old, had the situation well in her little hand.

We referred every question to her and she always knew the correct answer.

Where was the tv remote?

Where was the pacifier?

Where were the diapers?

Where was the bottle?

She showed us.  (Along with a stern admonition not to make it too hot.)

This brainy kid had the whole thing under control. Thank goodness.

There was one dicey moment when I actually had to hold the baby.

Uh oh.

Of course Delia started to cry and I started to sweat.  But I didn’t drop her and I was pacing up and down like “Uncle Dorothy” in Tootsie when Mary Lu walked in with Eliza.

She stared at me in amazement.  Who could blame her?

But the experience was a good life lesson for me.

After all, both my kids will probably want to have one or two of these critters around their houses one day.

Okay by me.  But kids…

Just remember. If there’s a problem…

Call your cousin Suzie.

Now if your dogs need walking?

See GE.