Instead of taking up some issue or theme, today I'm going to sit back, relax, and chronicle the aimless pleasures of a still-new dad hanging with his two-year-old girl on the first warm day of spring.

It begins with one of those funny nonsense conversations one has so often with a toddler. Larkin and I are at the kitchen window, and she's standing on the sill, watching the morning sun navigate trees and rooftops. I stand behind, lightly bracing her. "Dada," she says, "get away from my window!"

"Your window?" I say. "Actually, it's my window."

"No actually it's mine."

"Actually, it's mine."

"No actually, it's mine." This will go on and on, Monty-Python style, till one of us finally caves in. Today it's Larkin. "Dada and Larkin both have windows," she says, calling a truce.

With that settled, at 9 a.m. we walk over to a neighborhood salon called Fashion Flair. Larkin is way overdue for a trim; her hair hangs in her eyes,… Read More

First, thanks to those who posted after my blog on failure. It's nice to know that so many other parents of toddlers live half-buried amid mountains of stuff they're forever shoveling into the "guest" room. And laughing ruefully at the occasional reminder of life without little kids. Last week I saw a lifestyle article in the New York Times, titled "A Weekend Affair With Plants." The writer discussed how " the challenges of nurturing flower beds and vegetable… Read More

Yesterday I went to a real estate closing. For months we've been trying to sell my mother's house, the one she was living in when she died of lung cancer a year and a half ago. For a while it looked like one of my sisters might move in, but finally that didn't work out, so we put the house on the market. It lingered and lingered, and eventually sold for 20 percent less than our mother had paid for… Read More

This is going to be a less polished column than usual, really more of a primal scream. Here it is, in plain English: I feel like a failure. Not with Larkin, not in my role as her dad. Just everywhere else in my life.

Aaaarrrrggghh!

The problem is time, time, time — the lack of it. Molly and I both work a lot, and we were already too busy before Larkin. Now, with her as our number one priority, we can't keep… Read More

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For the past few months Larkin has been helping me make coffee in the morning. This began as a way to pry her free from the books she makes us read as soon as we take her out of her crib. "Want to go downstairs and have breakfast?" we ask, after the third book. "Want to help Dada make coffee?"

"Yeah!" she says.

So I take my little barista downstairs and into the pantry. She stands on the countertop, and… Read More