Why My Wife Thinks I'm an Idiot The Life And Times of a Sportscaster Dad

The First Trimester: Denial I must confess, the very first thought that went through my mind was that Ricky Ricardo was full of shit. And that devastates me, because I love Ricky Ricardo. The man was wearing clothes in the fifties that would still be hip today, and he made smoking look so cool I started doing it. To my mind, he was the coolest character in the history of television. What a shame he was so obviously full of shit. I'll tell you how I know: Remember the episode where Lucy tells Ricky she's pregnant? She does it anonymously, making him figure it out in front of his audience at the Tropicana nightclub. Ricky sings "We're Having a Baby, My Baby and Me," trying to guess which guest is the lucky one. Do you remember how he strolls right past Lucy without the foggiest notion it might be she who is expecting? What are we to make of this? Was it the second Immaculate Conception? Had Ricky never traversed the space between those separated twin beds? Could it really have been that much of a surprise? Now, this was the fifties, so I'm willing to cut them slack on sexual chemistry. I suppose in the time of Joseph McCarthy, network censors might have been squeamish if Lucy had said, "I should go off the Ortho-Cept this week. Last time it took me three months to get my period." But did they really need to insult our intelligence? Now, maybe it was better the way they did it. I certainly didn't need to hear Lucy tell Ricky she was ovulating, or tell Ethel she was three centimeters dilated and twenty percent effaced. I don't regret never seeing Lucille Ball in the stirrups, or bored out of her mind on bed rest because she was carrying too low and they didn't want to use a stitch in her cervix. Perhaps the world was a better place when we were spared all of that on television, but mustn't Ricky have had some inkling that Lucy might be knocked up? The point of all this is that today, my wife told me we are going to have a baby. Unlike Ricky, I was not shocked by the news. Not after we went off the pill three months ago, visited three obstetricians and a pediatrician, pinpointed the optimal instant of ovulation, became unprecedentedly intimate with a thermometer, had sex when I didn't feel like it (a first), and spent hundreds of dollars on bookseverything from prenatal diet tips to the benefits of communication with the fetus. Like everything else in my life, this transaction was carefully budgeted, programmed by a computer, dissected on a spreadsheet, discussed via e-mail, and scheduled in my BlackBerry long before any rabbit died. My wife didn't need to slip me an anonymous note, and there was no point in feigning surprise. This was a day that was only about the facts. We're having a baby. My baby and me. The first thing I have learned is that my role in all of this is negligible. My wife's obstetrician made that abundantly clear when I made the catastrophic mistake of attending an appointment. What I found is that my contribution to anything beyond insemination is purely optional. There was not a single question I asked to which the reply was not: It doesn't matter. Should I exercise more? Should I stop smoking? Should I get more sleep? Is there anything I should do about my diet? It doesn't matter. But the doctor did have a great deal to say to my wife and, frankly, the language she used was absurd. Am I really supposed to know what a uterus is? I mean, does everyone? Apparently my wife thinks they do. "How in the world can you not know what a uterus is?" she asked.Greenberg, Mike is the author of 'Why My Wife Thinks I'm an Idiot The Life And Times of a Sportscaster Dad', published 2006 under ISBN 9781400064380 and ISBN 1400064384.