The moment following the birth of one’s child, when you are handed a sleepy, wrinkly, pink little thing that clearly has no protection from the nasty, cold world other than a warm, striped, swaddling towel and the hands holding him or her, is a seminal event in the life of anyone having experienced it. Looking down at that slumbering newborn, you swear to yourself, your offspring, and whatever higher being that will listen that you’ll do anything, anything! to keep the child healthy and happy, come what may. There’s no mountain you wouldn’t climb, no river you wouldn’t ford, no forest you wouldn’t fell; no matter the task, you will find a way in the name of that newborn, so help you God!

You then spend the rest of life trying to figure a way out of that foolhardy oath.

There’s glory in climbing mountains, maybe some honor in a river crossing. But the things you actually end up doing in the name of providing for your family? Yeah, good luck finding glory there, chief. No one’s producing a Movie of the Week to highlight your glorious victory at the Battle of Clogged Commode, or the Miracle of the Bow Daddy Had to Tie on Barbie When Mommy Was At The Store.

I find myself doing many a strange thing these days, things I do NOT enjoy but which cause only slight irritation, which is the lesser discomfort compared to witnessing true, innocent sadness in one’s child. For example, I give you The Puffle Predicament. The Puddinpop occasionally spends some time playing on Club Penguin, where he has decorated an igloo with all the chicest elements and adopted a puffle for every color of the rainbow. One night over Winter Break, though, catastrophe struck: Max, his original puffle, the first in the puffle managerie, returned to the wild!

Max was kind enough to send a postcard.

Apparently, each puffle has statistics of some variety, and if any of those stats dip below a pre-determined level, the ungrateful fuzzball will opt to take its chances in the wilderness. Good luck finding dinner out there in the electronic ether, Max, I hope you choke on it!

Anyway, the Puddinpop took the news stoically, at first. “He’ll be happier with his friends,” he said, trying to convince himself. “He’ll be fine in the wild.” After bedtime, though, I witnessed a heart-wrenching scene when I went in to check on him. He was sobbing quietly into his pillow, eyes full of wet, shiny tears over a fuzzy online pet gone missing.

Nearly heartbroken, I lied, as parents do, and suggested that perhaps Max might return of his own accord, knowing full well that a puffle, once at large, will not return. The Puddinpop seemed to take comfort in the lie and eventually drifted off to sleep, no doubt dreaming of all the fun his online penguin would have with that little blue puffle.

Swallowing the bitter taste in my throat, I then did what had to be done. I poured myself a large glass of courage and logged into Club Penguin, intending to adopt for him a new “Max”. Blue puffles all look alike; no one would ever be the wiser. Unfortunately, though, they cost 800 coins to adopt and at the time, his penguin was only in possession of 816. Sure, I could use the majority of his hard earned coins to adopt another puff of blue, name him Max, and call it night, but my eldest son is nothing if not shrewd in the ways of online commerce; he would know someone had pilfered his account, and that just would not do.

Seeing no recourse, I took a long steadying pull from my beverage, did some online research into which Club Penguin games generate the most coins quickly, and then spent the subsequent 45 minutes playing a mind-numbing game where a waddling penguin avatar unloads coffee beans, of all things, from delivery trucks while flower pots, anvils, and dead fish rain down upon him. The more stacks of coffee you make, the more coins you earn. The ground beneath my (son’s) penguin’s feet were aflame as I shuttled animated bags of coffee beans between the truck and loading dock, dancing wildly as pots of petunias smashed into the earth and rotten fish fell in the space where I stood a nanosecond earlier. By the time I had enough coins amassed to adopt a blue puffle without arousing suspicion, I was the King of the Coffee Truck Penguins! Epic tales of my coffee bean exploits are still whispered among the flock to this day.

So yes, it was not my preferred way to spend a Saturday night. But, more importantly, the Puddinpop’s excitement the following morning, when he found “Max” once again among his flock, was worth every single foolish second.

If parents realized that when swearing their personal oaths to do anything, anything! for a newborn child, they are actually pleading guilty to a crime carrying a maximum sentence of 18 years worth of Chuck E. Cheese birthdays, I think you might see a lot more people making promises specifically referencing a mountain, river, or trip to the moon.

Truth be told, though, pinky swear or not, I’d still do whatever was necessary to re-adopt that damned puffle.

pud’n