Ladies and Gentleman Big Rich's Small world would like to present our first guest article written by none other then Ed "No Look" Mejia. Enjoy

A Letter to Logan about Parenthood from a guy he barely knows.

Dear new Facebook friend Logan,
There’s a saying in my village about the transition a man goes through when he becomes a father, it says, “you can take a burro to the outhouse but you can’t make mango juice from corn tortillas”…or something like that, it rhymes and is a beautiful sentiment in Spanish, really. You’ll have to trust me on this one, anyway it’s never rang truer for me than it has this January.

You see Loge, (can I call you Loge?) when Big Rich asked me to write a guest article about my first month of Parenthood, I thought to myself, “what in the world can I tell all 4 of his blog readers and Logan that they couldn’t gather themselves by watching a Steve Martin movie by the same name?”

Then I realized maybe there were some insights, some secrets I can let the crew in on. It might seem to you that being a single dude, X-Boxing it up every night and wearing pantless costumes would be the zenith of a man’s existence. But I’m here to tell you, Logan there’s more to life and really, there’s nothing more gangsta than being a dad. Peep this:


1. Carrying a baby around makes you look like Brad Pitt with the abs of The Situation rolled into one sexy Taylor Lautner, but only sexier. - Let’s just address the elephant in the cyber-room here…I’m what they call “not model material” (well not anymore, right Sears?) and I definitely married “up”. However, once I started walking around with my progeny I went from George Lopez’s ugly brother to Benjamin Bratt! If I had known this in college I definitely would’ve bought that kid on the black market of Jakarta. I’m just being real.

2. If you are into soft, pink blankets…Loge you’re about to hit the motherload! (fatherload?) – not much to say here other than you’ll be swimming in pink quilts with teddy bears, and who doesn’t like that?

3. The word “cute”? No longer off limits! - before babies your reserved this word only for such emergencies like, “girl is cute, she kinda thick but she gots a face…she thick though,” but with a baby it’s carte blanche on dropping the “cute” word. “That’s a cute level 4 roll on your 24 sided die, bro!” “This lapdance is cute!” and so on and so forth…you’ll love it Loge.

4. You finally wanna finish Modern Warfare 2? Get a baby! – I’ve never had so much time with my PS3 like I’ve had every night at about 3am, right after second night feeding, but before 6am when baby falls asleep. That’s PS3 time! Babies love explosions it reminds them of uterine gurglings. It’s science, really.

5. Fix that slice! – I had a bit of a problem with my swing off the tee. But ever since I got my baby bjorn and baby, I’ve managed to keep the proper separation between my arms that I need to keep my swing on plane and to hit through the ball like I need too. I just added 30 yards to my drive and the beverage cart girl can’t stop bringing me diet Cokes.

6. You need to take off from your internship early to hit up LIDS at Gateway? - Well my friend, the baby just ran up a temperature! – Free passes all day, every week, no questions asked. Don’t be afraid to make up sicknesses. My baby had cholera last week and daddy was able to get himself an Auntie Anne’s pretzel.

7. You know how many pairs of jacked kicks from Richard Young's closet fit in a baby car seat? – Four, to be exact. Without the boxes of course.

8. Now, when you’re at Dillinger’s and “I love it when you call me Big Poppa” comes on, you can point at your sleeping baby, and everyone knows you’re the real deal.

9. Never miss another Super Bowl party with the Young Adult Sabbath School crew – it’s no toga party at Hugh Heffner’s house but let’s just say this year the JELLO will probably have grapes in it and if left out a tad too long the fruit pectin and the amino acids in the grapes can combine and well, let’s just say you better get a designated driver. PARTAY!

10. Brother, you ain’t never seen this much breast in your life! - Being around hungry babies is like being at an outdoor Hooters-slash-Hanes-Her Way t-shirt party on a rainy day! (but within the context of a happy Adventist marriage.)

And so dear Logan (what’s your last name?), if this humble little list of miracles doesn’t inspire you to pickup your little Bluetooth earthang and start dialing Rees Hall numbers, I’m not sure if anything can. I wish you the best of luck out there at Union College. Now go make a baby! (within the confines of a monogamous marriage of course.)

Your friend,
Ed Mejia – father, level 3 warlock (World of Warcraft), artist, spoken word poet, thespian.