What I Want For My Daughter
There are two moments that bring tears to my eyes without fail: tucking my daughter into bed and watching her wake up, seeing me or her mother for the first time. My daughter Harper already possesses everything I could ever want for her. The list isn’t long, but these two qualities will help her move mountains.
What are they?
Curiosity & Kindness.
The rest will take care of itself. I take great joy in watching her share, in witnessing her help others, and in seeing the pure elation she shares with her “friends” as they explore the art of building sandcastles. I cherish the moments when she sits with me, asking to watch the SpaceX Dragon launch again. “The astronauts go high, high, high, Daddy.”
When she asks for my hand, for a cuddle, or to ride on my shoulders, I feel honored to bear the title of “Daddy.” There’s a bittersweet joy in how quickly she has progressed—from lying down, barely engaging with her dangling mobile, to becoming a resilient little explorer, unsatisfied with simple responses.
I look forward to the day when she grows tired of my stories and begins to tell me her own—her experiences, her dreams. I can only hope that what I have to share about my own life will hold value for her.
Before becoming a father, I didn’t truly understand what it meant to love someone. I know now. I want to be there to help her through the mistakes I made and to admire her character when she avoids them. I will never tire of her endless curiosity, her constant “why?”
Beyond the curiosity and kindness she embodies, I want her to see life as I see it: a wondrous burst of sensory experience, a daring adventure, or as Helen Keller said, “nothing at all.” I want her to know that she is loved not only by her parents but by the very universe itself. And when she can’t trust in the universe, I need her to know that my support is unwavering.
It’s important to me that I share with her my array of esoteric and varied knowledge—not just facts and axioms, but mental models and ways of thinking. I want her to see that mathematics isn’t just a school subject, but a tool of economic trade on the practical one extreme and a complex model of infinites among infinites on the other end in the realm of pure mathematics and logic. I want her to tell me that she doesn’t like Mathematics because she knows I don’t care. I want only for her contentedness in her life.
I want her to call on me when she’s in trouble because she trusts me through the years, even when she’s afraid, lost, and feels alone. To know that I am always with her. I aspire to be a model of the human I hope she’ll become because it’s the only way for her to become it. I want her to accept and love herself for who she is from the very start. And when she falters, I want us to be there to remind her until she remembers.
I hope she avoids the pitfalls of false idols like money, status, and other things of no intrinsic value. I want her to understand that when you live with virtue to the best of your ability, the rules placed upon you are optional and created by someone with an agenda—you ignore then not with a free lunch but to either your peril or benefit. I want her to be aware of what is human-made and what is an indefatigable force of nature. When to fall in line and when to break your own trail.
I want her to know that the Joneses don’t have it all and that everything she seeks is within her. I want her to become a trusted source of curated and well-thought-out information and to develop her own model of reality, the universe, and existence.
I want her to witness more sunsets than broken hearts. I want her to be surrounded by love without bounds. I dread the day I have to teach her that not everyone is her friend, but I know it’s inevitable.
My intention is for her to know all of this, and to understand that her dad is just another monkey who would do anything for her. I want her to know that she showed me what love truly is, that she revealed to me my inner child. Her childlike wonder reflects my own, even 34 years down the road. I want her to keep that wonder. I don’t want the world to wear her down as it has me. The look in the eye of a toddler is the same as a 90 year old recounting their fondest memories. The same as the soon to pass who have accepted the inevitable.
I want my daughter to be infinite.
— Snyata
Aylex Riom 