That moment when I first held my daughter is still indelibly etched in my mind. I had spent the last several hours sitting next to my wife, letting her crush the life out of my fingers with each contraction and reminding her to breathe. I was tired, my body was sore from leaning over the arm of the uncomfortable hospital chair for the past three hours while we waited for the doctor to arrive so he could catch the baby....

But when I held her... it was in one moment the most amazing and wonderful feeling. This was my little girl. She was the most beautiful thing in the world. And, with her skin all flushed dark from birthing, her long spindly arms and legs folded up against her long, skinny body (13 inches long and only 5 and a half pounds), her head all flattened and curved back by the delivery, I looked down at her and thought, 'It's an alien from the movie "Alien."'

Even though she's nearly 21 years old and away at college studying psychology, she and I still laugh about that sometimes and we talk every weekend as daddy and daughter.

Charles