or maybe this:

haha. This you???? http://foo.ws/KD7P

Whatever you do, DON’T CLICK ON THE LINK IN THE MESSAGES. These are examples of a rapidly-spreading Twitter hijacking “worm”.  I haven’t seen a good explanation of the how or why this is so prevalent, but when I see some even my most web-saavy friends (you know who you are), and even the Internet legend Cory Doctorow being duped, I figure it’s high time to make a post.

WHAT TO DO ABOUT IT

While I don’t have any hard-and-fast info on how or why this is spreading, there are two easy things you can do:

1. Typical phishing-prevention steps: review all links before you click on them.  Does the URL say TWITTER.COM or does it say TWITTAR.BIZ? Yeah. I realize this might not be possible on a mobile device, so exercise caution.

2. Update your password to something complex. A little uppercase, a little lowercase, a number. e.g. FooB4r! (and no, that isn’t my password)

3. Check your “Connections” on Twitter. Review them all and remove any that look suspicious.

When this exploit gets loaded and sees GoogleBot, it spits out its content – which is normally a big wad of pharmaceutical SPAM, like Cialis, Viagra, etc. Google picks it up in it’s search results and the content the SPAM links to gets a bump in Google’s search ranking.

For example, when I view CXMagazine.com normally I see this:

But when the search engine crawler views it (or when you view the page using Firebug+FirePHP):

And eventually the search engine entry for that site looks like this:

Oops!

PS you can use the Google Mobile Viewer to view a site as Google might…

Some searching in the Wordpress Support Forum led me to this post: Site Hacked – 301 Redirects, with some suggestions on fixes. None of my sites have been exploited, so I’m not sure what it will take to fix, but I would assume that as long as your database hasn’t been affected simply updating to the newest version should be sufficient.

I don’t know if this is a recent “development”, but this exploit is likely the result of folks not updating their Wordpress installations after the major security update Wordpress released back in the Fall of 2009. If you aren’t running the most recent version (2.9.1 as of this writing), you need to be. Check this: Old Wordpress Versions Under Attack.

Kelly, Amelia and Ben Wilson

…and…

Amelia as Giraffe on Halloween

that

Amelia eats peas!

was

Amelia lookin' FIERCE

that!

Amelia's First New Years

I can’t remember a year when I’ve had more fun…and more challenges.

Click here to view the embedded video.

Cobbled together from sketchy footage and so-so photos from both days at the 2009 USGP here in Louisville. Enjoy.

Featured are a number of Rogues, some of which who Love the Pain, IronMan Michael, ‘Zanne, her crippled hubby, Molnar (whos baby girl gave me a dollar), those awesome little scamps from Red Zone cycling, and of course Jimmy the self-proclaimed “one-eyed drunken cyclops” from F*ckgas.org. Where’s all the TwinSpires.com guys?  Well… my one and only teammate DNF’d in the mudpit at the end of the video on the first lap. Chapeau!

The kids in the yellow t-shirts are from Lionhearts Junior Racing – which I can’t find a website for, but I am totally a fan of them now. Root beer hand-ups for all!

Music:
Old Crow Medicine Show – Trouble that I’m In
Blizten Trapper – Gold for Bread
Old Crow Medicine Show – Tear it Down

Why is this man so happy?

The USGP is a well-organized, well-sponsored event. The USGP is a circus, and when the circus lands in your back yard, you show up and you have fun. Beer is a common currency, costumes are encouraged, muddy, pain-wracked smiles are the norm. This isn’t road racing, for sure.

I raced in the Category 4 (the lowest level) race at 8:30 AM on Saturday and spectated on Sunday. I shot a lot of photos (and some video) of the non-PRO races, and I’ve been attempting to find the one photo that tells the story, like this one:

But I think the story is best told in a string of photos. I took a bunch (Day One, Day Two), and after the jump you can enjoy a little tale…

The USGP of Cyclocross Comes to Town

by Ben Wilson

Kids

Ladies

and full-growed men…

…paid good, hard-earned money to ride their bikes…

…out in the cold on a wet, muddy, ex-golf-course…

(replete with sand traps)

Not only that, but somebody put hurdles in the middle of the course…

and there was this big “Green Monster” thing someone thought was a good idea…

…it had stairs on one side, mocking you with beer ads…

…and a big BMX-style slide on the other…

They all suffered…

…even the children.

And yet some still smiled…

…some danced like no-one was looking (note the tongue)…

…and some even dressed up like they enjoyed it!

Because at the end of the day, it’s all about the glory of suffering…

…and, of course, the beer:

~ fin! ~

A huge thanks to all the people in town who made this thing possible. All the organizers, volunteers, racers and fans who came out. It’s great that my hometown can put great events like this. It was a riot!

PS – Much love to all the fine Rogue Racing Project folks. That’s a good group of people, and I support good groups of people. (Especially those with a keg of BBC Belgian-style steps from the course)

More photos here:

USGP of Cyclocross Louisville Derby City Cup, Day One

USGP of Cyclocross Louisville Derby City Cup, Day Two

All photos copyleft by me, except for the first photo of me shot by Marcia Seiler.

Amelia sternly criticizes my performance at the 2009 Tour de Louisville cyclocross race. One of my favorite photos of her.

Some blogs do everything “right”, meaning they’ve optimized their site and content for a wide range of viewers – friends or strangers, people new to the site, old hands, people new to the subject they are writing on and people well-acquainted, and people reading it via their primary domain or via the rising trend of RSS readers.

But MOST blogs could use some sort of tweaking to keep their readership, whomever they are, engaged and growing. And that’s where I’ll come in, with this very article you are reading.

After the jump:

• Say Hello and Show Your Face
• Don’t Assume I Know What You Are Talking About
• Google Reader, RSS and publishing your FULL entries
• Don’t Get Crazy with your Blog Template

Say Hello and Show Your Face

If you are running a blog that is super-secret and filled with scandalous juicy tidbits, or divulging intimately personal information on the Internet (don’t do that), then DON’T take the following advice: Put a photo of yourself or your co-bloggers and brief capsule of who you are and why you are writing this blog on your blog.  Secondly, use your real name – even if it’s just your first name. You don’t have to give away the store, just give some details that will connect your readers to YOU, which is why they are reading your stupid blog in the first place.

These things are especially crucial if you are writing a locally-focused blog and chances are you will run into one of your devoted readers on the street, in the park or at the grocery. Otherwise, you’ll be ships passing in the night. Ships that are constantly scanning the crowd wondering Is that the girl that writes that blog I love? Man, I’m just not sure. Oh well, I guess I’ll go home and play Bejeweled. While the Internet is a lovely place to be alone, the world itself is not.

Don’t Assume I Know What You Are Talking About

New visitors to your site don’t know a hoot about you, and they don’t know about your past, in-jokes, lingo, friends or possibly even the subject matter of which you speak. This, however, isn’t a problem thanks to the much ballyhooed “hyperlink“. The hyperlink states “there is more information about the word or words I contain, if you just click on me”. This provides a couple of advantages:

• You don’t have to explain the topic right there in the article, leading to brevity and focus
• You can educate your reader (if they want)
• If the user is interested, they don’t have to Google whatever the heck you are talking about.

For example: “Man, I totally had a bitchin’ time flying handlaunched gliders with my friend Chris Lee that time I went to the 2008 MVSA Gateway Open”

You might not know what a handlaunched glider is, who Chris Lee is or what the MVSA Gateway Open was, but you could know just by clicking. It’s a good idea any time you mention an event, organization, person or possibly-confusing topic to link to it. You only have to do it once, whenever it’s mentioned the first time, just like footnoting. I am also a big fan of linking people deeper into the archives of your own blog – another great way to introduce yourself, and it helps with the ol’ search engine rankings somewhat.

PRO tip: “You can find out more information at so-and-so’s website.” Do you see what’s wrong there? It’s not the sentence, it’s the fact that “so-and-so’s website” isn’t linked. If you mention a website, by god link to the damned thing.

Google Reader, RSS feeds and publishing your FULL entries.

RSS means “Real Simple Syndication”. It’s a one of those “standard” things on the Internet, and every single blog application (Wordpress, Blogspot, TypePad, etc) has it built-in and turned on by default nowadays. It allows your users to pop your blog URL into a newsfeed reader (like Google Reader) and be updated when you update your blog. Except, of course, that they don’t have to actually visit your blog.

“Buh! b-b-b-but I want people to visit my blog, right?”  Well, sure, but that goal actually becomes secondary the moment they hit your blog for the first time. Then, after that, you want them to read your blog and then you want them to keep reading your blog. Forcing someone to A) remember to check and B) type in “thebestestfoodblogthereeverwas.blogsploot.com” every time they want to read your blog is “sub-optimal” as my ex-colleague Andrew might say.

Google Reader is the gold standard of web-based news readers. I use it daily and it has revolutionized the way I get my news on the Internet. Subscribing to a news feed is wicked simple, as is organizing my subscriptions, navigating and reading new stories that automatically appear. No more remembering to check someone’s blog or remembering pesky URLs. It’s all right there, everything I want to know about cooking, fantasy baseball, cyclocross, model airplanes, astronomy, whatever. Also, it’s available on your mobile device: m.google.com/reader. You can also do some real handy things, like “starring” favorite articles, or sharing articles with your Google buddies.

PRO tip: you can search past stories you’ve read. If I want to know what Beyond the Box Score said about Angels pitcher Scott Kazmir back in June, I can do it by typing “Kazmir” into the search engine. BAM.

Publish the whole story to your news feed, please. One of my biggest pet-peeves are sites that don’t publish the whole story in their news feed. Most of these are commercial sites, and working in advertising, I get it – they want me to drive traffic to their site to view their pretty, shiny ads. However, that rarely works: if I’m on my mobile device, I will rarely if ever suffer through their terrible, non-mobile version of their site to view the full article. If I’m using Google Reader on the web, I will sometimes open the full article if the (usually poor) lead-in catches my eye. It’s just like reading a real newspaper. People skim articles until something catches their eye, and then they read the whole thing.

PRO tip #1: In Wordpress, you can adjust this setting under Settings > Reading > For each article in a feed, show Full Article.

PRO tip: You can publish ads at the bottom of your articles in your newsfeed, or better yet, just make contextual links in your article to other links on your website. The hook is set because I’m reading your article, all you need to do is reel me in.

Don’t Get Crazy With Your Blog Template

I know it’s fun to add all sorts of jangly shit, widgets or giant image banners to your site, but keep in mind that’s not why people visit your blog. (Unless it’s the jangly shit blog or a MySpace page.) Here’s a couple of web-design standards we try and follow in “the industry”:

1. Design to assume most people are viewing your site on a 1024×768 monitor (I have numbers to back this up)
2. Keeping in mind #1, try and keep your header (where am i?), your personal info (who is this?) and at least the headline of the content “above the fold” (the bottom of the browser window). People don’t mind scrolling down, but don’t enjoy it, and they certainly don’t like scrolling left-to-right just to read your run-on sentence.
3. Font size at 12px or above, and no red-on-black or blue-on-black. High contrast=easy reading.
4. Your content is king, so don’t pack a bunch of other shit around it. Space is good.
5. Sidebar content is great, but keep it to a minimum and organize it accordingly.

Ben Wilson doesn’t classify himself  as an expert in too many things, but having been working in the industry for a decade, and blogging for just as long, he’s going to go out on a limb and consider himself an “expert” on building stuff on the Internet and reading blogs. But as with all Internet “experts”, he’s probably got another thing coming.

Look upon my works, ye mighty, and chuckle heartily.

What you see before you is my spring/summer waiting-on-the-baby project, a cyclocross bike. It’s a jumble of parts acquired from my basement, local sources, Craiglist and eBay. It is also my first from-the-group-up bike build. Finished in August, I spun it out the River Road Country Club cyclocross (CX for short) course to make sure it wouldn’t fall apart, and then… I raced it at the Tour de Louisville cyclocross race October 4th. The race and the bike were awesome. I even got a little bloody…

I’ll be racing this Saturday AM at 8:30AM in the Category 4 Open Men’s race. It’s gonna be NUTS.

More details on the bike after the jump…

Anyone who has experienced my own odd sense of fascination understands that I understand you need to get your hands dirty to truly know a thing. When confronted with the choice of purchasing or building, most people would probably side with the former. Let’s face it, it’s easier – whether it’s a computer, a model plane or even a loaf of bread. However, I am not that person. I am that person that bike shop owners and mechanics yearning to serve, wish would just give up and leave it to the pros.

So it was when I decided I wanted to try cyclocross. I read everything I could get my hands on and cashed in some relationship capital with Kelly to let me start sourcing parts over the summer so I could build it for the fall ‘cross season.

While I know the value of “doing something right the first time” I am also of the school of well-earned knocks. I could spend a ton of money and build myself an expensive, poorly built bike. It would be an expensive lesson – especially considering how really fair-to-middling I am as a rider. Instead, I relished the thought of finding that intersection of cost, reliability and performance and dove into researching. My Google-fu is strong and anyone who tells you otherwise is a fool! All told, I spent less than what I would have paid for the bike new and also gained a ton of knowledge in the process. (See the parts list at the bottom of this entry) But onto the gory details…

The Frame

I found a Scattante XRL Cross frame on Craigslist for $175 (a steal!) and worked up from there. For the money it’s a nice, lightweight frame with good welds and a nice integrated headset. Some folks complain about the ovalized tubing on the top tube where your shoulder would go when you carry it in cyclocross, but to be honest my shoulder is the least of my worries when I’m suffering like I suffer during a bike race. I also kinda like the color… or at least it’s unique.

The Wheels & Tires

Uh, well… it’s a pair of Ritchey clincher road wheels I had in the basement from a previous singlespeed project. I gather most dudes run lighter, tubular tires with more spokes, but again, my game ain’t at the level where that’s going to make a difference. I have found these wheels to remain true over my training and racing on them, but I’d really like to build some wheels this winter, so until then…

The tires are Kenda Kommando clincher tires I bought from Aaron at The Mountain Bike Depot. When I went in there and asked his opinion, he laid it out straight – “for you, I’d suggest these. Later, you can move up to these Grifo $80 tires”. He didn’t try to oversell me. He knew what kind of rider I was based on my insistent if underwhelming racing at their Shorttrack Mountain Bike Series. Much respect. I love those guys and their wonderful support of cycling in our town.

Drive Train

I did a one-by-nine setup (1 chainring in the front, a 9-speed cassette in the rear). Part of this is a practical solution – you don’t need the gearing you do on a road bike in CX, it’s lighter and there is less to be clogged with mud. But, in reality – the shifter bits (brake/shifter combo levers) are dang expensive! I figured I could get by with just one for now. I wanted to get a Shimano setup but found that 9-speed Shimano shifters of decent quality are expensive, even used… but Campagnolo ones aren’t. Odd! But you can’t run a Campagnolo shifter with a Shimano rear derailleur, right? Wrong! Enter the world of the Campy/Shimano… Shimergo setup!

Specifically, I found a Shimano Deore XT derailleur and a Campagnolo 10 speed Centaur brifter. Following the handy charts on the link above, I found that you can mate a Shimano rear derailleur with a Campagnolo 10 shifter with the “Hubbub” modification, which is simply a re-routed shifter cable.

Since this isn’t an EXACT match, getting it dialed it took a little longer that normal, but not too long. The XT derailleur also doesn’t come with a cable barrel adjuster (WTF?) so I had to use a Jagwire “Mickey” adjuster mounted on the seatstay cable boss. Just a little twist here and there keeps everything in line. I’ve practiced on this setup and I’ve raced on this setup, and I’ve had zero issues. CX racing is a little more rambunctious than road riding, so every once in a while I get a unintended gear change, but it’s rare.

The cranks are some older Shimano Ultegras with a 42 tooth chainring and a Spot brand bashguard. I picked em’ up on eBay for cheap.

The Other Stuff

I just recently put on the Crank Brother Candy SL pedals – and I am loving them! I previously had a set of the Crank Brother’s “eggbeater” pedals without the platform, and they were good, but in ‘cross you need to be able to “find” the pedal easily – and the platform surrounding the “eggbeater” pedal is great for doing so. They also feel a little tighter than the “eggbeater”, but are just as easy to get out of when you dismount the bike.

Noodle Bars! I love these Nitto “Noodle” handlebars. They’ve got just a little bend in the top (I find myself riding with my hands on the top of the bars) and just a slight flair on the drops. And they look classy, all nice and round.

On the top of the Nitto Bars are my Cane Creek in-line brake levers – and I’m loving those for their extra stopping power, especially on courses like the Fisherman’s Park course with crazy, steep, off-camber nonsense.

In the end…

I definitely spent less on the bike than I would have had I plucked something similar off the shelf… and I know this bike, and I am responsible for it working. It feels all the better when I cross that finish line, totally blown.

Parts Listing

Scattante XRL Cross Frame and Fork
FSA Integrated Headset
Nitto Noodle Bars
Shimano 600 Crankset
Shimano Bottom Bracket
Crank Brother Candy SL pedals
Salsa 40 tooth chainring
Spot Bashguard
Shimano Deore XT rear derailleur
Campy Centaur 10 Speed Shifter
Cane Creek Brake lever
Jagwire Basics cables and such
Dimension Seatpost
Bontrager Seat
Ritchey Wheelset
Kenda Kommando Tires

That’s 14 different manufacturers. It’s a beast for sure.

The weather was so-so with rain often, but enough sunlight and wonderfully cool temperatures to make it all very spring-y. We didn’t have any serious plans early on, save for relaxing and making pancakes and looking for bears. Soon after I made the reservation, Doug suggested that I try riding from the entrance to the Great Smoky Mountain Nat’l Park to the tip-top of Clingman’s Dome – some 5,000 feet of climbing in a single 20-mile bike ride. This was initially met coolly by Kelly, but after a few heart-to-heart discussions, she agreed to let it go off.

Upon arriving on Friday, we decided to reconnoiter the ride. We started from the Sugarlands Visitors center, just a few miles from downtown Gatlinburg, but feeling already deep into the woods. Immediately the road starts up at a grade that would not be unusual in some hillier sections of Kentucky… over short distances… and with a nice descent on the other side. It felt steep in the car. And then it got worse. And then I started to laugh uncomfortably. By the time we reached mile 13 and the lookout and Newfound Gap, I was either loopy from altitude (just shy of a mile high) or I was seriously freaking out and reconsidering the whole endeavor.

And whereas we had originally discussed Kelly having a “spa day” while I attempted the 2+ hour ride, Kelly decided that after seeing the first 13 miles of my ride that she’d really feel better driving the team car. And I gotta tell ya I felt better knowing she’d be there too.

That night I was served up the largest single plate of pasta I’ve ever seen at the Brick Oven Pizza & Pasta in Gatlinburg. I ate what I could and took the other 3/4 of the plate back to the cabin.

The morning of the ride (Saturday), and it’s 60 degrees outside and spitting rain. I am dressed in my standard TwinSpires cycling team uniform. I strap on my red, reflective ankle RoadID, and my PlanetBike SuperFlash taillight for safety. It gets foggy up yonder and there are a couple of hairy tunnels on curves – the more visibility the better. Knowing it might rain, I also slather some Winston’s Knickers embrocation on the legs. What’s embrocation? you ask. Imagine… waterproof IcyHot for the legs that smells like mint. It has a bit of an ardent following among some in the cycling world. I figured this would be a good test of Winston and his liquid Knickers. By the way, Winston’s Knickers is a local Louisville concoction, and you can pick it up at the Mountain Bike Depot.

I’m riding my main “road” ride – a 2007? LeMond Reno with a triple chainring in the front. I do most of my “serious” riding and racing on this bike – and you don’t see a whole lot of triples in the races I do. I had flirted with the notion of changing over to a double. I am glad on this day that I did not do that. More on that later.

Starting out of Sugarlands is a relatively flat area, and wanting to warm up a bit I’m already in my 2nd (middle) chainring. I’m topping out at 13 or 14 mph, wanting to get nice and warm for the really steep areas and also not wanting to ruin mine and Kelly’s vacation by hobbling myself for the following 2 days.

That shallow area lasted approximately 1/2 a mile.

Clingman's Dome Elevation Profile - the red means steep.

See that bit between miles 2 and 4? That says “Welcome to the Mountains, Flatlander” without words.

It was a struggle, and one I kept intentionally slow, to savor perhaps. I thought a lot about all of those classic cycling moments – Lance Armstrong “dancing immodestly” on his pedals crushing the field on a mountainside in France, and thought about what a fantastic thing the human body is.

But at some point it became a psychological tussle. Not a fight or a battle, but just a tussle. A quick back and forth. My legs begin to ache and I look down to see that I am in my lowest, smallest gear in the front.  A little further back down the road sits my rear wheel, and the chain is resting on the biggest gear back there. “I better keep going as I don’t have any gears left” is my thought, and I do.

Rounding one of the many corners at the bottom, the valley opens wide and I look skyward into the fog and see my quarry. It looms. But that looming is majestic and beautiful and distracts me with a calm that is beyond calm. I do not notice the rain that is falling off and on.

Kelly stops for me every few miles. Most miles I crawl past her. It is a relief to know that I am going onward and up.

It is about halfway up that I recognize that it is beginning to rain very heavily at times. I don’t really notice all that much – it’s in the low 60s and I’m (very) warmed up. I pause for a moment with Kelly near a stunning overlook and drink some fluids and eat a half of a PowerBar. My muscles begin to tell me to get going. It is steep here and getting back moving on the bike is tougher than normal.

Rounding one of the last corners before Newfound Gap (an overlook with a parking lot), I have the opportunity to see from whence I came. It is far away now and the cars are quite tiny. I look up to see one of the steepest grades of the journey shrouded in mist. There stands Newfound Gap.

Rolling into Newfound Gap, I am 13 miles away from and some 3,500 feet above my starting point. I have seen one cyclist so far, and he was on his way down on a mountain bike. I gather he is just descending that day.

A man approaches me while at Newfound Gap and we make smalltalk about cycling. It’s clear he’s been away from the sport for a while, and it’s clear he misses it. He talks about meeting the great Greg LeMond and Phil Liggett, the “voice” of the Tour de France to many. Meanwhile, my hamstrings being making smalltalk as well. In the foggy, dense chill at Newfound Gap, my hamstrings have begun to cramp and there is a feeling like pulling a single string out of band of elastic. I bid this man, Russ, adieu and continue on up, hamstrings already paining from a continued and out-of-character climb.

There are two roads from Newfound Gap, one leading south into North Carolina and one leading up to Clingman’s Dome. I take the latter. There are only 7 miles left in my journey, but this leg seems much more solitary. Fewer cars make the march to Clingmans, especially on this increasingly foggy and wet day. There are fewer pull-overs and hence, fewer places for Kelly to sit and “sag wagon” for me.

Extended stretches of time pass where the only sound is the rain. My breath. My wheels. It is lonely, but I crave that solitude some times.

My bliss is momentarily broken as I realize that I am here alone, tired and turning the pedals slowly, and I am in bear country. The exclamation flashes across my mind, all one word: “ohshitbears”.

I could not, I rationed, outsprint a bear up this hill. I could not, I rationed, retreat from this endeavor. It would be I and bear, mano y claw. There would be no venue for failure.

Eventually that moment passes, and for a short stint, so does the incline. All of the sudden I am hurtling at 30 MPH along a wet and rainy stretch, around tight rock-bared corners. I am cold. My hands chilled on the brakes – I want to get my glasses out of my pocket, but at what risk?! Tears stream from my face as I think of the old timers stuffing newspapers under their jerseys after having mounted similar peaks as this one. It is good company.

This fast stretch raises my average speed to 9 miles per hour. Nine.

The road once again rises to meet me and I am climbing again. I have not seen this part of the course and I never know what is around the next corner. Should I push harder? I know I’m almost there. Perhaps my computer lies and I am farther out. I am also hungry again.

But up above I see a horizon through the trees. I am near the top. One final push. The horizon opens and… it is surrounded by fog. It is raining heavily. There are no crowds. There are no banners. I see Kelly’s car and she is smartly inside, with heat.

I laugh, uncontrollably. This is it. I take a lap through the lot, but I am very cold. Kelly snaps a photo of me through the window of the car.

I did it.

It was stunning and awe-inspiring and I loved that mountain for what it put in front of me.

On the ride up I thought a lot about what Kelly went through with the Ironman, what she was going through with pregnancy and how our lives had changed and would change after we became three. This was not some grand good-bye or some swan song, but a fitting cap to a year of both of our lives in which we saw and made some great things happen. I explained this to the mountain and the mountain listened. In short, I worked some shit out.

A few months later, Kelly and I would have our first child.

Shortly after, Kelly would say she was glad that I got a chance to do this – and I am glad that I married and had our baby girl with a woman who understands my silly needs. It’s pretty awesome.

Kelly, Amelia and Ben Wilson

It’s one of those days you can read about and plan for, and you never know just what is going to happen. In one moment yesterday, I went from waiting to being told my wife and my baby girl’s life would teeter on the balance. But you’ve got to stay strong, ’cause really that’s all a guy can do.  A smile, a hold of hands, a brush of the hair. There are no words, only small actions.

From doctors all the way down to the nurses aides and even the rooms at Baptist Hospital East were absolutely amazing, consummate professionals. Very PRO. From the moment we entered labor and delivery, the nurses were funny, engaging and knowledgeable. “Amazing Nurse Connie” made fast friends, like she knew us an age already. I miss each of them already, and it’s only been a day. There are no words to say how much that helps.

When she was awake, I was by Kelly’s side. My heart rose and fell watching those meters rise and fall. We exchanged knowing smiles, better than words. The decision to go into surgery was a quick one. “Are you OK with this?” I asked. No words, just a smile and a nod.

We parted for the first time, Kelly stronger than I at that moment. I sat alone in my own, private waiting room. My fear subsides slowly as I take it moment by moment. I am led by a nurse into the operating room, I saw Kelly. I saw inside Kelly. That was all I needed to see of that! Around the backside of the shield, I saw Kelly’s face and I saw her fear. Numb from the chest down, hard to breathe. A few words of encouragement. Small gestures. “Can you see anything?” “I can see what I want to see”

A peek. The head! Oh my god this is real.

A cry begets crying.

Around the side of the shield our doctor comes, our baby a grisly sight. The doctors work quickly to get the baby cleaned up, and soon I am looking over my beautiful baby girl, in what amounts to a fry warmer.

“Can I touch her?” It sounds naive now, but at the time – what was protocol? I’m new at this. One of the doctors asks “Did he just ask if he could touch her?” A small giggle, and a response: “Yep, you sure can! She’s all yours now…”

Amelia, mere moments after birth...

They swaddle the baby and hand her to me, and suddenly I realize that Kelly is still just across the room, frightened, alone. The floor is a maze of tubes, stands, chairs, feet. My god what if I drop her! I cross that abyss, successfully. No words, just a rock of the baby in my arms and a rake of my hand through Kelly’s hair.

And Kelly sees her baby up close for the first time. No words, just tears that stream back from the corners of her eyes to her temples, the world turned on it’s side in reality and in metaphor.

We meet the family later, and all five grandmothers are elated. All two grandfathers are proud, stoic. Uncles, aunts, beaming.

My father extends his hand to me, a handshake, no words. All is understood.