SPLIT LIPSVILLE

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A co-worker of mine has a brand, spanking new baby, and he mentioned to me that he was dreading his child's next doctor's appointment, as it would be her first shots.

I recalled my daughter's first shots, when she wailed and sobbed and looked at me with pitiful little eyes, and how I felt absolutely awful for inflicting the pain on her.

But then I recalled my son's first shots. For some reason, the parental terror was not there. The agonizing, gut-wrenching feeling of wounding my child was not there. Granted, that was partly because, when he received his shot, he did not cry, but rather turned a steely gaze to the nurse, as if to say, "I'll remember that."

But anywho, it goes without saying that, with your second child, you are not nearly as emotionally fragile as with the first.

It's certainly not that you have less love for your second child. It's just that you realize that this is a tough, cold world, and nobody will look out for you but yourself, and crying is for the weak...

Oh, wait, sorry. What I meant to say is that you learn to read the cries of your children and tell the difference between "I'm not hurt but could use a little TLC" and "I am pretty sure my arm will need reattaching."

You also learn that, quite frankly, kids are tough as nails. Take, for example, the other day, when I gave Parker a big, fat bloody lip. Now, settle down. It was an accident. Parker is learning to walk, and he somewhat resembles Nick Nolte taking a field sobriety test. He will take a wobbly few steps, giggle, step some more, and then reach for his hip flask.

So we were walking the other morning, having a big ol' time. His sister was helping by swooping in to "help" him walk, as if dragging him to the couch will somehow benefit him. So in between sisterly take-downs, Parker was walking quite well.

On one of the tries, he was staggering towards me, giggling all the way, when he suddenly lurched forward. I leaned to catch him. Ideally, the best part of a human body to use to catch a falling child is the hands. Unfortunately, he found my knee first. He went to his bottom and sat there for a second, staring at me. Then came the tears. And then came the blood.

I immediately picked him up to comfort him. He had a little nick on his lip, but it was churning out copious amounts of blood. He stopped crying after only a couple of seconds, probably because, despite the pain, he felt comfort when he saw Allie sprinting down the hall screaming, "MOMMY! PARKER'S BLEEDING!" I think an easy way for the U.S. to bring home every Olympic track medal is to line all of the starting blocks with mothers and, rather than fire off a starter's pistol, have someone scream, "YOUR BABY'S BLEEDING!"

Fortunately, I managed to make it to the room before my wife had track-shoed up, and told her that Parker was fine. We then had the following conversation:

MY WIFE: What happened?

ME: I kneed him in the face.

MY WIFE: Why?

ME: He was trying to walk.

MY WIFE: So you kneed him in the face?

Eventually, I explained to her that it was accidental, and she soothed Parker. Everybody was fine.

But I am convinced that, had the same thing happened when Allie was a baby, we would have carried the guilt with us for weeks on end. It would have been an emotional sucker punch.

But with the second child, you realize that accidents happen, and the best thing you can do is to tend to your children and let them know that it will be OK. They know that you didn't intentionally knee them in the face. All they want is a hug and some tenderness. And perhaps not to be kneed in the face again.