When Tim was born, I began to write a journal of his life.  As life continued, the written word was exchanged for photographs.  I recently was able to pull it off a damaged disk.  Tim, this is the beginning of your life.  I love you.

 

7/26/95

Timothy, your journal begins now. I just want you to know your life from the beginning. You were born today, July 26, 1995 at 8:01 PM, weighing 7 pounds 13 ounces, and twenty-one inches long. It's the middle of a heat wave, temperatures reaching 100+ F. You were delivered Cesarean section, because you were too big for a natural birth. Mommy had to be put under because she fought the local anesthesia and other pain medications.

I love the two of you. I cried like you, so beautiful you were-- so full of life, so explosive with energy. Your mother gave me a son. I only wish Mommy was awake to see her boy. But she did great! Well, the doctors did show you to her, but she was too groggy to remember.

I was escorted to the nursery, while the nurse carried you. I was seated and you were handed to me. Some people, I guess aren't used to seeing men cry for the joy of their child being born. I just held you and talked to you; I made promises that I may break, but will work at trying not to. Mommy had to stay in the hospital for three days, for recovery. I would get there late, because I had to clean the house for you to be brought home. The dog tore apart the downstairs one night, and the upstairs the next. You have my face and hair, and even some of my personality, which you also get from your grandmother. Everyone in my family should know that you are the important one; the one to carry on the name. Bringing you home was a day filled with much joy. Mommy's aunt helped out, because Mommy's parents were in Florida with her sister. This really irritated me. An important time for Mommy and they were on vacation. But what's done is done, but I won't forget. I'll try not letting it interfere with your future. Things can be forgiven.

 

8/26/95

You are now a month old. I look at you and I wish for you to grow into an honorable and trustworthy man. You are my son and I want you to have the world. Last Sunday, my father took the three of us to see my grandfather. My grandfather is nearly ninety years old, and I'm afraid he won't be around much longer, but I wanted him to see your great-grandson. Your great-grandfather handed mommy a card for you, and told her just to put it in her purse. Later we found out that it contained fifty dollars. We made plans to matte the money, the card, and a picture of you and my grandfather in a frame. I was upset later that night because I knew it may be the only tangible gift from the man for you. I was more upset that my grandfather won't be around, to do the things with you that he had done with me. I just wish that my grandmother was around, but again, she is in many ways. Timmy, you will have good people in body and soul to watch over you.

 

9/5/95

We are getting ready to move down to Ventnor. I want you to have the same opportunities that I had; but since I had already passed up some that would have helped me; I'll know which you should take advantage. Mommy and I hope to own a house in a few years, a nice place - one of those picket fence types. I love you both. You are now six weeks old. I think you'll have your mother's eyes, blue-gray in color, like the clam center of a hurricane. I'm packing our belongings and making plans. I don't think I'll be at Life Support come next summer; I plan to be working in a casino. I just don't want to make any mistakes that will hurt you later in life. I want to see you grow up.

 

9/10/95

We moved to the shore yesterday. We worked our butts off getting things put away and organized. Sleep didn't come all that easy for me. You were constipated and didn't BM until today after Mommy gave you a bottle with Karo syrup. But misfortune and sadness found me again ... my grandfather suffered an aneurysm yesterday and died today and 12:20 P.M. My father said he sat up in bed and called out for my grandmother who passed on six years ago.

You won't know him person to person, but he lives on in me, grand pop, and you. You'll find the picture of him holding you.

9/13/95

Well, we got kicked out of my mother's. You will know that you have a grandmother down the shore, but at this point you may never know her. I don't hate her, but at this point I will never forgive her. Timmy you will know that I will have my reasons later in life. There's a difference between never forgiving and never forgetting may one day forgive, because Val taught me never say never. You may never know you have family in Ventnor ... But I will never choose you or a sibling over one another.

Timmy I'm sorry...

 

9/14/95

Mommy took you to see her sister in Ocean City. She says she's not mad at me, but I know she cries herself to sleep. She knows I tried. I don't hurt anyone but I will not be the victim any longer. Last night, there was a MVA in Absecon, I came upon. The woman driving a minivan was hit in the rear and the vehicle was turned on its side. The guy I was partnered with (funny as it may seem) is named Tim. He and I asked to assist until the local squad came on scene. I looked at the woman trapped inside the minivan. She had a compound fracture of her left humorous, and was losing a good amount of blood. Timmy, should you decide to become an EMT, or want ever you want, always remember don't enter if the scene is unsafe. There's no sense in getting hurt, because you rushed in without looking all around. It took six men to keep the vehicle stable. A bystander was there holding a small boy. The man said the boy was the woman's son, and was walking around after the accident. I thought, Oh my God, he was ejected. A squad member, Tim, and I collared and boarded the boy. His name was Josh. As I talked to him I thought of you. He was afraid we would crash, as we drove you to the hospital in Atlantic City.

I asked you to count to ten, sing "Twinkle Little Star", and the theme song from Barney. My heart was in my throat. Because of luck and good methods, as well as his mom's care to seat-belt you, he was all right. His mom should be recovering just fine at this time. We should be moving out on October 1, your mom and I haven't agreed where or with whom we will live, until we get our own place. I'll try not to argue with her. She's very special to me, Timmy, and I love her more than most in the world, except you. I just want to do something to make you feel proud of me. I just hope I do, because I know how it is to be let down. You don't deserve to inherit my mistakes.

 

10/29/95

We moved on the first of the month. Just getting settled was a chore, because we had not set anything up at my father's house, like we had at my mother's. We rented a U-Haul truck and gather up the troops to move us. Gary, Ann, Jon, and your uncle Jack pretty much just threw everything into the back of the truck. MeMom came and got you and your mother. Grand pop had the house ready, in as much as he could do. I'm not mad at Mom-mom, I just still feel hurt.

 

11/14/95

Well we've been here over a month. Grand pop may be getting a promotion at work, which will mean he would have to move. He'll leave us the house, but I am afraid of not being able to keep up with the bills. You're learning to crawl and sit up now. You love to laugh and giggle; maybe bounce when your mother or I hold you up. Your favorite toy seems to be Gerry the Giraffe (remember giraffes can talk if you use your imagination). He had all kinds of pastel colors on his mane, until mommy washed him because grand pop spilled coffee on him. I have to go to work now... so I'll see you when I get home.

 

11/19/95

Your mother began to give you baby food a few days ago. I've been sick for a few days now. I thought it was an ear infection, but turned out to be a sinus problem. Christmas is practically around the corner. Soon Santa will come, leaving presents for good little boys and girls. I was never one to enjoy the holiday as I started to get older. But I want you to enjoy it! And remember, your mother is very big on the holiday season - however, she's worried about money for gifts, and she just wants everyone to be happy. Timmy, you are the reason I will enjoy this season. Grand pop is spoiling you awful! You may find that as you get older, you and I may not see eye to eye. I may get you mad when I stick my nose in your business, but remember you’re my son and I love you.

 

12/3/95

It's a few weeks from Christmas, and it's your first. We didn't get you much because we couldn't afford all the things on the wish list. We'll make due. Timmy I just want you to know that Christmas is a time of giving - not receiving. Santa is a nice concept to appreciate for a child, but you may be reading this one day as a man. The year is almost over. American troops are being shipped to Bosnia to help keep the peace. I worry one day you may have to go off to war, and I pray you don't. Here are some headlines for 1995.

A massive earthquake rocked Japan. January, 1995

Paramount Studios launch new television network, UPN (United Paramount Network).

January, 1995. A religious doomsday cult in Japan set off toxic nerve gas, Saran, in the subways of Tokyo.

March 1995 US Federal building in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma bombed by right wing militia-terrorists.

April 20, 1995 Russian cosmonauts and American astronauts link orbiters together for the first time since Apollo-Soyuz in July, 1975.

July, 1995. O.J. Simpson found not guilty of the charges for murders of Ron Goldman and Nichole Brown-Simpson.

October, 1995 A Jupiter size planet discovered orbiting star Peg 51 in Pegasus constellation. October, 1995. The birth of a new star and possibly a solar system, 7000 light years away, is seen with the aid of the Hubble telescope.

October, 1995. Israeli Prime Minister Iszak Rabin was assassinated.

November 4, 1995. Disney's Toy Story is the first totally computer generated animation motion picture.

November 22, 1995 Ed Rendell voted to second term as mayor of Philadelphia, defeating Joe Rocks. 

The Galileo probe set to enter Jupiter's atmosphere on December 7, 1995.

The fifteenth anniversary of John Lennon's murder. December 8, 1995

 

TV Shows Name of Show Network

X-Files Fox

Star Trek: Deep Space Nine UPN

Star Trek: Voyager UPN (new)

Sea Quest: 2032 NBC (new format) (Canceled)

Space: Above and Beyond Fox (new) (Canceled)

E.R. NBC

Friends NBC

Caroline in the City NBC (new) Of course you can't discount your mother's soap opera - General Hospital (ABC).

 

You are just beginning to watch Sesame Street, The Puzzle Place, and Thomas the Tank Engine on PBS. Sometimes I think you understand it better than you let on ... only four months old and already showing signs of genius! But as you can see CBS didn't fair too well with us.

 

12/24/95

Well this is your first Christmas. Grand-pop is on furlough, because both parties in Congress can not agree on a budget. Just so you know in your later years this is a very frustrating time. Sometimes you won't have enough money to get you all the gifts you would like to give; sometimes you won't find the gift you're looking for that special someone. There may even be times when you will feel alone. But, all in all, it's a time to reflect on what you have all ready and the family that loves you. Your mother and you are sick with a cold, which the two of you got from grand pop - who likes to share such things. I'm worried that I got something your mother will like, and that I'll have enough money to last until payday!

 

The Galileo probe lasted 75 minutes in Jupiter's atmosphere. It will take some months to correlate the data and interpret. US troops are in Bosnia. Sometimes it may seem that the world is going to Hell in a hand basket, but remember things always seem to get worse before they get better.

This is a time to have joy and hope. A time to set aside differences and look to the good that people are capable of. During World War I, in a battlefield, on Christmas Day 1916, German and Allied forces stopped fighting for 24 hours. They exchanged cigarettes, candy, photographs of children and loved ones; they even set up a Christmas tree! For 24 hours there was peace!

Christmas isn't about gifts or Santa Claus. It's about man's relationship between himself and God. It may be Jesus' birthday, and how God sent Him to us, but it's more. I think people forget that as time goes on. So many years from now if you are reading this, ask me why I think that.

 

Merry Christmas! Christmas 1995

12/25/95

We just got home from Aunt Hanna's house in Ocean City. You got the mother lode of gifts from your mother and me. Your great-aunt Ann Marie got you and your cousins (the boys born this year) fluffy toy animals; you got a purple baby elephant wearing a diaper, so we'll have to think of a name for him! Your two grandfathers tried to find the on/off switch on a scarf, because one of your aunts wrapped it in a Christmas light box. You're sick right now with a cold - maybe the flu. I don't know. I'm mostly afraid of you having the croup. Timmy, it may seem that I'm complaining or whining, but you are the most important person to me, aside from your mother. I'm new at this daddy business and I don't have all the know how or experience. There isn't a manual written to provide the answers. 

I love you.

 

1/6/96

Well, it's a new year. I signed up to take the city police test; it will be the sixth time taking the exam. Maybe this time it will be the lucky time! You just got over the croup. Yep, your old man was right. Timmy, you are my boy. We are expecting a blizzard, a foot or two of snow is to fall. Daddy standing in 30 inches of snow.

 

1/7/96

The snow has come and is expected to last well into tomorrow morning. A foot or so has fallen already. You are a little cranky today - you're teething and the cold weather is no help. I've been up with you since 8 a.m. and you were miserable most of the morning. Mommy asked me to take you downstairs so she could get some sleep. A daddy's job is never done. You're not that bad, but mommy doesn't like to see you crying - and you rarely do! I shoveled the front of the house, and by now you couldn't even tell that it was done. Now I got the cold that you and mommy had over Christmas. I just wish to thank the two of you. I do love you, don't forget.

 

1/8/96

The sun is shining down outside this afternoon. We got about 31 inches; so bad it was, the governor shut down the roads to everyone except emergency personnel. The buses and trains weren't running so I couldn't get to work. Your grandfather, mother, and I spent taking turns shoveling the outside with a snow blower. So not much is going on. Grand pop was to go back to work after the federal government was shut down after 3 weeks, due to budget talks in congress. We managed to get through this and then the snow came. You're too young to take out in this weather, but when you’re older; you and I will go sledding or maybe build a snow-fort.

 

1/12/96

Well I got some good news. I just got promoted to the Dispatch department at LSA. The pay increase is nominal, but it's better than nothing. The only thing I'm not too crazy about is that it's midnight to eight. But that shouldn't last too long. We were expecting another 6 inches on top of what we already got. But it turned to rain. In a way that is good, but in another that could be a problem. (Snow + rain) lowered temperatures = ice.

You're starting to talk now. Well, you could mimic "I love you" since you were a month old. Now you're saying dada dada. To stay on even ground you're saying to everything not just your ever loving dada.

 

1/14/96

I just wanted you to know that I'm writing this journal, so that you can understand some of the things that I may do as you grow up. I'll try not to be an overbearing father (but I may) and I may be strict with some things that you'll do, say, or act out. Just know that I love you. You and I may spend hours at a toy store or a book store. You may not even like to read as much as I do, but ... When my parents divorced, and my mother remarried, I thought I lost some of who I was. My books and comic books were taken from me and thrown out with the trash.

It was rumored I read too much. Well, guess what? Wrong! The comics that were thrown out could have paid for some of my college and possibly all of yours. Your mom sometimes takes books out of my hands, claiming I need to spend more time paying attention to her. I'm not saying she's wrong, but I get angry with her for doing it. Your mom is one of those people that need to be told and shown how much she is loved and cherished.

 

1/15/96

I think you about everyday you when I have to work. I want you to know a few things about me. I was born here, in Philadelphia, on October 23, 1964. I never really had a charmed life ... more like a time of looking for what I would grow up to be. I wanted to be an astronaut or a pilot; sometimes even a detective. I have a conservative love of science fiction, meaning if it is practical and possible then I enjoy it. I don't have a broad mind for the ridiculous. My parents divorced in 1975. My mother had a fifth child, Jennifer, by her new husband that November. I have an interest in technology and the sciences. It may even be a love. Like the use of the computer to write this journal. Timmy, please, if anything, study hard and learn. Things, like math and science may come easy for you because you already show the potential for being gifted. You're learning at six months what some babies don't learn for a few more months. I'm not saying you'll be an Einstein or Hawkings, but you may be able to understand where they come from.

 

1/21/96

Next Sunday it will be 10 years since the space shuttle Challenger blew up. It was 11:39:13 a.m., Tuesday, Jan. 28, 1986. In the blink of an eye - less than seven-tenths of a second after the shuttle Challenger took off on its 10th and final voyage - a deadly jet of hot gas managed to burn its way through a flawed O-ring booster joint. Seventy three seconds later, at an altitude of 46,000 feet and a velocity of Mach 1.92, Challenger disintegrated in an orange-white cloud of flaming debris, an image burned into the national psyche by unending videotape replays on the news. The Space Shuttle I was just coming from one of my computer classes when I looked at the televisions that were mounted in the hallways at my junior college. The thought was this was a joke. No American spacecraft could ever have a flaw. Tim, I didn't know what to believe. The Shuttle Challenger exploding Tuesday, January 28, 1986.

 

1/28/96

Today is the 10th anniversary of the Challenger explosion. Super Bowl XXX is on TV; the Cowboys versus the Steelers (again). It would have been the Eagles but they lost to the Cowboys two weeks ago. Millionaire John DuPont surrendered to police after a three day standoff, after he allegedly shot a man, David Schultz, at his front door. I have been working Midnight to 8 for a couple of weeks now. I'm still not used to working all night and sleeping during the day. Ten years ago I may have, but I had to get used to going to bed early and getting up early. We got a walker-chair for you from Uncle Jack and Aunt Kelly, since little John is walking. Next Saturday is his first birthday, and we still don't know what to get him. Everyone that has met you says that there is no way I can deny you. I can't. I call you my "little twin", because you look exactly like me. Just like a little twin.

Recently a couple of weeks ago, astronomers believe that they had found two new planets. One is in the Big Dipper constellation, at star 47 Urase Majoris, the other in Virgo, star 70 Virginis. Both may be gas giants like Jupiter, but bigger, possibly 3 and 8 times larger. The question if either has life we may never know in this life time, but these two could harbor complex organic molecules. The four other planets that were discovered are believed not to habitable. Three of them are orbiting a neutron star. The fourth is orbiting too close to its sun to possibly evolve life, because of extreme temperatures. But who knows for sure. Some things may not be known for a long time. We can only speculate using Earth as a model, and modern scientific process.

 

1/29/96

You just came home from the doctor's office with your mother. You had an ear infection which cleared up, but now you have to have a chest x-ray and a barium swallow done. You spit up sometimes like I do and you have a cough. The doctor wants to rule out reflux. It's when your stomach muscles are a little weak and forces your food to go back up to your throat. I may seem like a worrier but I am your dad, and that is my right.

 

2/3/96

Its one day after Groundhog's Day and Puxtsotoni Pete says six more weeks of winter. We just got another snowstorm, it drop about five to six inches this time. It rained a couple of weeks ago, so the snow from the blizzard pretty much washed away. The houses and business down on Main Street, near the river flooded. Today we're going to your cousin's John's first birthday; well we may not, if we can't get a ride. You see I still don't have a car of my own. I ride in the public limousine, which I share with 40 other people. It doesn't matter what possessions you have, it's who you are. 2/4/96 The Anglican church, a few weeks ago, had argued that Hell may not exist as a place of punishment, fire, and brimstone. The argument is that Hell may just be a state of nothingness; a total separation from God and Heaven. Also some scholars argue that Hell may be a concept taken from Greek and Persian Christians in the early church; a possible attempt to make the church truly catholic.

Remember catholic means universal, not just adhering to the canon or laws of the papacy governing your religion. The Greeks may have influenced the apostles as they made their way north spreading the Gospel. The Greeks mythology had a general theme of a punishment and a place of punishment for those that did wrong. I would be able to tell you more, but your mother threw out the paper.

 

2/11/96

The other day you had the test done. Yes, you had a bit of reflux. No it's not serious. But I'll tell you one thing, your mother never saw white poop before.

 

2/23/96

I'm to take the police exam tomorrow, but I haven't studied at all. I'll pass somehow, but not by cheating. I hope to maybe get on the department. I've been working midnights for almost 2 months now and I hope soon to get on a normal shift. Your first tooth is starting to come in and you're sitting up by yourself. Not perfect, but I'm proud of you. You've been a little cranky since but you'll calm down.

 

3/10/96

Your second tooth is starting to come in, and you're trying to stand on your own. I took the police exam, and I know I passed. I hope I make it this time. You're a funny little monkey. But I still love you. I haven't been feeling good for awhile. I think it may just be my body getting tired of this midnight shift.