Many conspiracy theorists still contend that Neil Armstrong was not the first man on the moon. All a bunch of smoke and mirrors, they say. What is incontestable, however, is that Adam was the first man on the earth (haha! But, a good story, nevertheless). There was no smoke and mirrors hoax about that for the very simple reason that there were no smoke and mirrors at the time. Not even CNN was around back then. Soon after Adam, along came Eve.

For as long as I can remember, some people have maintained that having children is a really bad idea. “We live in a wicked and over populated world. Why would anybody want to subject their offspring to such a dismal fate? It’s blatantly cruel and unfair to the children.” And so on and so forth.

Well, Adam and Eve lived in the Garden of Eden for christsake! By all accounts, it was the most pristine and naturally luscious environ known to Man…aside from the possible exception of the Augusta National Golf Course where the Masters Championship is held. I should think that even the most ardent critic of child bearing would find no fault in bringing children into a joint like that. Unfortunately, following a bite from an apple, Adam and Eve were cast out of Eden and forced to contend with a much more rigorous environment. Nevertheless, once they figured out the procedural mechanics, progeny began to appear. First came two boys…Cain and Abel. Then came murder, leaving only Cain. Obviously, more offspring ensued or I wouldn’t be sitting here writing this damn piece. My primary concern with this scenario is that if we are all descendants of Adam and Eve then why don’t we all have cleft palates, facial asymmetry, stunted growth rates and various other physical, mental and emotional maladies associated with inbreeding?

The Stone Age was the earliest classification of Mankind’s tenure on Earth. It covered 99% of Mankind’s pre-technological history and consisted of approximately 6 million primitives living in caves, hunting with clubs, fending off wild animals and raping one another. So OK, maybe not a great time to bring a child onto the scene. Various periods of pestilence, natural disasters and warfare followed. Humans were fed to lions for entertainment during the Roman Empire, Arab Bedouins first set about violent conquest and then concocted Islam to justify it (not the other way around) and much of Western civilization went into decline during the Dark Ages. Then came the Renaissance if you were lucky enough to live in or near Italy, the Enlightenment (not so bad), the Industrial Age and great advances in scientific and medical pursuits. With its typical aversion to prosperity, humanity proceeded to involve itself with World War One, the Great Depression and World War Two. Then, the Cold War with its overriding threat of nuclear disaster. All such circumstances further fueled the arguments against having children. Despite all the naysayers, my wife and I had a baby girl on April Fools’ Day 2015. Why? Because we just had a hunch that the world was about to become a better place. And, sure enough, it did. The very next year the Chicago Cubs won the World Series for the first time in so long that nobody could remember. All I know is that their previous such victory occurred when the iceberg that sunk the Titanic would not have been big enough to make a decent scotch on the rocks. I spoke to my wife about having another child and asked her if it was guaranteed to be a boy would she be interested. I mean, what the hell, wouldn’t it be nice to have a girl and a boy? She said, “Why? I already have a girl child that looks like you and I already have a boy child that looks like you because it is you. So, get off my back!”

The world portrayed in the media is an awfully disheartening place. Perhaps that's the way the media prefers it to seem. I don’t know and I don’t care. What I do know and care about is that the little world I live in with my wife and daughter is a wonderfully joyous one. If there were others around like those two maybe more people would be encouraged to have children of their own.