I just got back from welcoming a new citizen of Earth to the planet.

At eleven o’clock, while Mary Ellen and I were both in bed reading our ways towards drowsiness, the phone rang, and my son Scott told us that our third granddaughter, little Nova Ann, just entered the world at 10:54 p.m., weighing in at seven pounds and nine ounces.

Mary Ellen started to cry.

I just put my book down, took off my glasses, and let a million thoughts rush through my head.

My first thought was that Scott is experiencing something that I never got a chance to experience myself. He was a biological father, and he now knows that his blood and genes will be carried on into the future.

(My children are all adopted, and I love them beyond belief, but I know that my genes stop right here.)

I remembered back to when I first adopted Scott. He was five years old, suffering from ADHD, and he couldn’t put three steps together without falling on his face.

As he grew older, he had trouble in school because of his inability to focus due to his hyperactivity.

When his mother and I divorced, Cruella got custody of both my kids and moved to Burlington,VT. She did a tune on both Scott and his sister, convincing them that I was the Devil Incarnate. Consequently, my relationship with them became strained and uncomfortable for a very, very long time. (During that time, I made a conscious effort never to speak badly about her to either Scott or his sister. Nor did I try to defend myself against her lies by calling her a liar or other appropriate and well-deserved names.)

When he was living with Cruella, Scott dropped out of school and got involved with gangs. When Cruella couldn’t take it any more, she called me and told me that if I didn’t take Scott back, she was going to terminate her parental rights, turn him over to the state and put him in the foster care system.

So, Mary Ellen and I took him in. After two years of insisting that he go to school and follow a set of rules at home, Scott was turning himself around. He was doing well in school, he had a nice girlfriend, and he had gotten himself on the high school soccer team.

Then, Cruella called him one day crying, and she told him how lonely she was and how much she missed him.

So Scott, feeling that he had to save his mother, left us for her. Almost immediately, he dropped out of school again and renewed his involement with gangs.

My relationship with him became strained again. One day, during a phone conversation with him, he got angry, called me a fucking asshole and slammed the phone down.

He didn’t speak to me again for six years.

Then one afternoon, out of the clear blue sky, he knocked on my door with his hat in hand. He said that he wanted to start over again.

And that’s what we did. He got himself an apartment in the area, got himself a good job as carpenter's apprentice, and ended up, with my help, getting his G.E.D.

Now, he and his fiancée live in a farmhouse a half-mile down the road from Mary Ellen and I, and our relationship with him and Sandy is extremely close. (When Scott and I meet, we don’t shake hands; we hug.) Sandy calls Mary Ellen “Ma” and I’m “Pops.” They both stop over at the house about once a week, and Mary and I do the same to them. I’ve been invited to dinner there a number of times, and Scott and Sandy have been to our place for countless dinners. Scott, who is incredibly handy, comes over and fixes things around our house that have left me, quite frankly, completely baffled.

I am amazed at how much he knows, at how good he is with wood and tools, and how much confidence he has in himself when tackling projects like putting in a new bathroom in his house, (electrical, plumbing, new floors, and three new walls) all by himself.

I am also amazed at the depth of his love for Sandy. It is SO GOOD to see that!

Cruella, for the most part, is out of the picture.

And now, little Nova Ann is going to grow up right under my nose! (I’ve already told Scott and Sandy where I’m going to put the playscape on their front lawn.)

When I held Nova today, I was mesmerized. I couldn’t believe that Scott had come full circle, and he was now a responsible, hardworking, loving man with a great sense of humor, a wonderful woman, and a child. There is no longer any residue of the ten-pound chip on his shoulder that he carried for years.

As I entered the hospital room this morning, Scott insisted that I hold the baby. After about fifteen minutes, it was Mary Ellen’s turn. When I relinquished the baby, I kissed her. Then I went over and kissed Sandy, and hugged my son. As I hugged him, Scott whispered in my ear, “You and I, Dad. We’ve made it, haven’t we?”

I whispered back, “Yes.”

Then he squeezed me so hard that I thought he was going to crack my spine.

Much to my amazement, I held it all together all during the visit.

However, as Mary Ellen and I were leaving and walking down the hospital corridor to the exit, she grabbed my hand and said, “How ya doing, Grandpa?”

That’s when I broke down. Mary just smiled and squeezed my hand as I cried like a big baby myself.

I didn’t even try to hide my tears as we entered the hospital lobby.

I didn’t care who saw.

Really.

I am the luckiest man on the planet.