Me

boys, and they would tremble as they cried. Even though I was so excited that I felt I might explode, I didn’t cry. Not even a little bit. I was so elated that I wanted to scream, “Give them to me!” I wanted to say to the nurse the minute she came into the room, “I want to hold them right now!”
    The next few weeks were almost a blur. Like almost all new parents, I was totally obsessed with my children. I didn’t want to miss a moment of their existence. They were the most beautiful babies I have ever seen, and I stared at them constantly. I almost never put them down when they were awake. And I didn’t sleep. In your more “typical” newborn household, there are usually two parents and one baby; shared responsibility; and a little time to rest. In my case, it was two babies and one parent, and rest wasn’t an option. But I didn’t care. Don’t get me wrong. I was never alone during those days; I was always surrounded by the people I love most, and everyone was more than willing to help. But there are certain things I wanted to do on my own. (You know, little things like feeding, bathing, diapering, and putting the babies to sleep.) And because I do everything to the extreme, I wanted to do it for both of them at exactly the same time.
    I have a close friend who is a doctor, and she reminded me that I had to keep them on a schedule or it would simply be impossible for everyone. But the one thing I forgot to do was to keep myself on the same schedule! As any new parent knows, there’s a basic rule: When the baby sleeps, you sleep. Period. Whether it’s for ten minutes or an hour, it may be the only sleep you get that day. But I refused; I was so enamored of them that when they slept, the only thing I wanted to do was just watch them sleep! It got to a point where my mother (who was with me from the day they were born) said to me, “Son, you are a zombie. You are talking to me and falling asleep in the middle of what you are saying. Please, please put your head on the pillow and get some rest. You are an incredible father, but please, let us help you.” I listened to her and was asleep within seconds. But that’s literally what it took for me to close my eyes and get some rest. I just didn’t want to miss a single moment of my sons’ lives. I still don’t. But I learned an important lesson in those first few weeks: that I need to take care of myself so that I am able to take care of them.
    I will never forget the moment that each of them looked into my eyes for the very first time. Those were the most precious moments in my entire life. The moments I hadn’t even realized I had been waiting for. They were OUR moments.
    It wasn’t until a few weeks later that the tears finally came. I had sat down to watch some television while the boys were asleep, and a show came on that mentioned the birth of my sons—by then the news had leaked out to the press. The anchorwoman suddenly looked at the camera and said, “We are very happy for you, Ricky. You deserve all the best. Congratulations!” Then everything hit me at once. I think it finally clicked right then that these two little ones who were sleeping in their cribs were actually my sons! And I was their father ! It was a beautiful thing. But a very intense feeling coursed through my entire being, a joy so profound I couldn’t stop crying. My father came over and hugged me for a long time—it was incredibly overwhelming.

ALL KINDS OF FAMILIES
    THERE ARE PEOPLE who say that this isn’t fair, that in order to have balance, children need a mother and a father. And I say they are mistaken. How many millions of children grow up without a mother? Or moreover, how many of them grow up with a mother who does not love them? How many millions of kids grow up without a father? Or worse, knowing that their father exists, but doesn’t get involved with their lives because he doesn’t love them. According to the census bureau of the United States, the number of single parents who live with their children increased by 25 percent during the 1990s. When my sons ask me, I am going to say: “I wanted to have you so very badly that, with God’s help, everything lined up so that you would come into my life.”
    I am also here to say that there are also many successful people who were raised without a mother or father. For example, the vice president of the United States, Joe Biden, was a single father who raised his sons after his wife and daughter were both