I don't know where time goes. Our days are not particularly exciting, I don't suppose. They slide in and out, naps and diaper changes and breakfasts and lunches and suppers all just drift by, and one day isn't usually that different from another. You, however, are a weensy bit different each day - napping less or more, trying a new food, dabbling with a new word, preferring a different book, shifting toward something else ever so slightly but ever so steadily.
Some recent highlights:
You're standing! A few weeks ago, I went to get you after your nap, and there you were, standing up and grinning from ear to ear! This morning, your pacifier is laying on the windowsill, so at some point in the night, you've apparently been looking out and left it there.
You now know where your nose, ears, and eyes are. You also know where mine are, which means I now often have a small finger pressing on my nose the entire time you're nursing.
You can tell whether or not a book is right side up and will flip it around the right way to thumb through it.
Your favorite thing ever is pulling all the books off the bottom shelves, making a big pile around you, and looking through them.
You also love baths and in the middle of a bath suddenly lean forward and dunk your face in the water.
You have impressive little fits of temper where you kick both legs in a little jackhammer motion that's actually pretty fun. And today when I told you no about something, your face fell and your shoulders slumped in such a funny, pathetic way that I had to hide my smile.
You pay great attention to crumbs and very carefully hand them all back to me or put them on the next spoon passing through. If I try to give you something you've already rejected, you'll often take it back and then very slowly and deliberately put it in my palm, close my hand around it and shake your head gravely.
You will sit still through at least a dozen books, pointing out all the cats and ducks as we read, leaning back and lounging in comfort.
You are such a sweet, happy, contented little person and we just love living with you. Your daddy and I stand outside your window in the hallway at night and just look and look and look at you. I don't think a night has passed in the last fifteen months where one of us hasn't said to the other, "Isn't she just beautiful? Isn't she just the best thing ever?" So, you see, I've not written much lately, but it's just because we've been awfully busy loving you....
Wednesday, November 30, 2011
Friday, September 2, 2011
Happy Birthday, Baby
I can't believe you've been here one whole year already. (Well, almost - today is your due date actually and I spent what seemed like a year waiting another four days for you to make your appearance.) Sometimes, it seems as though the year has flown by and like you only just got here, but sometimes it seems as though you've been here forever, because I can only get the vaguest sense of memories of life before you.
I'm a little sad. I love you so much, so much more than I could possibly say, and over the last few weeks, you've started taking steps toward becoming a real person, your own person. You're no longer content to be just where you've been put, to play with what you've been handed, to eat what's been given to you. You're moving around like mad - you can roll and wriggle and flail your way just about anywhere now, you're feeding yourself more and more without my help, you're starting to develop opinions (that you share, sometimes loudly) about what you want to do and where you want to be.
People think that the journey begins when a baby arrives, and it does, in some ways. The adventure certainly begins, but I've come to realize that we've been sort of drifting this past year, you and I, in a sheltered, peaceful harbor. Most of the time, it's just been the two of us, preparing the ship for a voyage. We've been learning the ropes, figuring out how things work, how to steer, how to weather storms, doing little practice drills for the bigger things that lie ahead. Will I meet opposition with anger, frustration, patience, wisdom, a combination? Can I take control of my mood or yours and shift from one to another?
We've just been tacking back and forth, lazily seeing the sights and getting the hang of working together as a crew, but before long, we'll actually set out on voyages, do more than sail up to the edge of the harbor and peep out. We'll make longer and longer trips, but I know that this is the first step toward the day when you'll leave the harbor on your own, when you'll be able to set off on your own voyage, and while I'm so excited to see where you go, it makes me cry a little to think about leaving this little world we have together. Bon voyage, sweet baby....
I'm a little sad. I love you so much, so much more than I could possibly say, and over the last few weeks, you've started taking steps toward becoming a real person, your own person. You're no longer content to be just where you've been put, to play with what you've been handed, to eat what's been given to you. You're moving around like mad - you can roll and wriggle and flail your way just about anywhere now, you're feeding yourself more and more without my help, you're starting to develop opinions (that you share, sometimes loudly) about what you want to do and where you want to be.
People think that the journey begins when a baby arrives, and it does, in some ways. The adventure certainly begins, but I've come to realize that we've been sort of drifting this past year, you and I, in a sheltered, peaceful harbor. Most of the time, it's just been the two of us, preparing the ship for a voyage. We've been learning the ropes, figuring out how things work, how to steer, how to weather storms, doing little practice drills for the bigger things that lie ahead. Will I meet opposition with anger, frustration, patience, wisdom, a combination? Can I take control of my mood or yours and shift from one to another?
We've just been tacking back and forth, lazily seeing the sights and getting the hang of working together as a crew, but before long, we'll actually set out on voyages, do more than sail up to the edge of the harbor and peep out. We'll make longer and longer trips, but I know that this is the first step toward the day when you'll leave the harbor on your own, when you'll be able to set off on your own voyage, and while I'm so excited to see where you go, it makes me cry a little to think about leaving this little world we have together. Bon voyage, sweet baby....
Tuesday, August 9, 2011
Right This Minute
I don't know how it's been so long since I've written, but that seems to happen lots - I make a plan to do something and then lie down in bed at night only to realize it never got done. I do this several days, apparently several weeks in a row. Time does, in fact, get away from me. So, instead of tomorrow or yesterday, I'm thinking of right this minute.
You are making the most of all your time. Right now, you are sitting up in your playpen taking note of what happens when you bang various things with your pacifier. You just capsized. Capsizing is probably inaccurate, as it implies a gradual act, while you went over all at once. More "falling off a log" than "capsizing," I think. Now you're attempting to roll over but you keep getting distracted by what you can pick up with your toes and by the tag on the underside of the changing station. Perhaps it is best to express your frustrations to your scarf and wave your left foot emphatically in the air. Or grab Puff Dogg's tail and wave him triumphantly over your head. Or root around like you're sleepy, which you probably are. Or somehow in the last three seconds have managed to rotate yourself 90 degrees. Time to pick up another object and hold it up between your feet for further examination. And now it's time to get you up and let you nurse and put you down for your nap - whenever you start drawing your scarf over your face in shades of, "I want to be alone," it's time for bed. But wait, now it's time to body-slam Winnie-the-Pooh. Grab him by the ears and smash his fat face! And then laugh. You are a strange and funny little person....
You are making the most of all your time. Right now, you are sitting up in your playpen taking note of what happens when you bang various things with your pacifier. You just capsized. Capsizing is probably inaccurate, as it implies a gradual act, while you went over all at once. More "falling off a log" than "capsizing," I think. Now you're attempting to roll over but you keep getting distracted by what you can pick up with your toes and by the tag on the underside of the changing station. Perhaps it is best to express your frustrations to your scarf and wave your left foot emphatically in the air. Or grab Puff Dogg's tail and wave him triumphantly over your head. Or root around like you're sleepy, which you probably are. Or somehow in the last three seconds have managed to rotate yourself 90 degrees. Time to pick up another object and hold it up between your feet for further examination. And now it's time to get you up and let you nurse and put you down for your nap - whenever you start drawing your scarf over your face in shades of, "I want to be alone," it's time for bed. But wait, now it's time to body-slam Winnie-the-Pooh. Grab him by the ears and smash his fat face! And then laugh. You are a strange and funny little person....
Sunday, July 10, 2011
Conveyor Belt
So this morning I cried over diaper covers. Seriously, I did. We're canceling the diaper service (going to do the laundry ourselves and just save a few bucks) and today I had to get everything ready for the last pickup. We gathered stacks of clean diapers from all over the house and piled up the four diaper covers we've rented from the service - melon pink, candy pink, pale green (celery), and pale yellow (butter). And when your father stuffed them into a garbage bag with the extra clean diapers, all I could think about was how small they were and how I'd put them on you hundreds of times and how I'd patted your little pink/green/yellow bottom a million times. I cried and cried, even after you went upstairs to take your nap and he left for work. When they came to pick them up, I even had a fleeting urge to run outside, snatch one back and tell them to bill me for it.
I don't know why. You're getting bigger. That's what people, what living things, do - progress and grow and develop. And I'm excited about that, about all the yous that stretch out into the future: the chubby-cheeked little monkey that climbs into our bed in the mornings, the little girl with pigtails who asks questions every thirty seconds, the awkward middle-schooler taking the first steps toward becoming her own person, the teenager who charms and sulks and surprises, the young woman taking what we've taught her and what she's discovered to create someone new.
But with each step toward those people, we leave other versions of you behind forever and I'm sad to see them go. I love the you that you are now so very much that it's hard not to be sad to see that you slipping into the rear-view mirror. Sometimes I wish I could keep you small forever, sometimes I wish I could keep 60 different versions of you (but I suppose your room would get crowded!), and sometimes I get a little bit impatient for another version to arrive. (Not usually because I'm tired of dealing with whatever the current stage entails, but more because I'm excited for what the next stage brings....)
It's like standing in some sort of cosmic bucket brigade with random objects being handed to you on the right and you have to keep passing objects to the left and letting go. Sometimes what you're looking at is something you're not particularly crazy about or something painful to hold, like a rock or a plastic bottle cap or a thistle, and passing it on is easy, or it just goes by without much notice. But so often, it's something beautiful or sweet or precious, like a flower or a childhood memory or a photograph of someone you love so much. And you want to hold it just a minute longer, just stare at it a second more and memorize every detail, or slip it in your pocket, just because you can't bear to pass it on, to know you'll never see it again, or just because what you have is so wonderful, so tangible, that you find it hard to give it up in anticipation of what might be next. Who wants to trade an orchid for a hairpin? But, of course, you only have the hairpin for a minute too, and then it's a beautiful journal, a polished glass bead, an empty cigarette box, or a light bulb. All of those things have a purpose, a moment, and maybe that's what makes a moment special, when what the cosmos hands you is just what you need at that very moment. Some people seem to spend their lives out of sync, always wishing that what they had would have arrived five minutes earlier or five minutes later.... The trick is, as they say, wanting what you have, especially when what you have keeps changing.
Some day, when you're bigger, I'll teach you to hunt for shark teeth. I can wander a beach for hours, entering into a Zen-like trance when all that matters is what is right at my feet, what's right in front of me. And I'm always surprised when I finally look up to realize that I'm miles from where I started, because to me, when I'm hunting, I'm always looking for the next big one, thinking whenever I consider turning back, "But what if there's a Megalodon carcharodon tooth just ahead, just one shell pile further? What if the Big One is just ahead?" Maybe there are two kinds of people in life - those who say, "Let's call it a day" and head for home and those who keep wandering, looking up every so often to be amazed at how far they've come.
I don't know why. You're getting bigger. That's what people, what living things, do - progress and grow and develop. And I'm excited about that, about all the yous that stretch out into the future: the chubby-cheeked little monkey that climbs into our bed in the mornings, the little girl with pigtails who asks questions every thirty seconds, the awkward middle-schooler taking the first steps toward becoming her own person, the teenager who charms and sulks and surprises, the young woman taking what we've taught her and what she's discovered to create someone new.
But with each step toward those people, we leave other versions of you behind forever and I'm sad to see them go. I love the you that you are now so very much that it's hard not to be sad to see that you slipping into the rear-view mirror. Sometimes I wish I could keep you small forever, sometimes I wish I could keep 60 different versions of you (but I suppose your room would get crowded!), and sometimes I get a little bit impatient for another version to arrive. (Not usually because I'm tired of dealing with whatever the current stage entails, but more because I'm excited for what the next stage brings....)
It's like standing in some sort of cosmic bucket brigade with random objects being handed to you on the right and you have to keep passing objects to the left and letting go. Sometimes what you're looking at is something you're not particularly crazy about or something painful to hold, like a rock or a plastic bottle cap or a thistle, and passing it on is easy, or it just goes by without much notice. But so often, it's something beautiful or sweet or precious, like a flower or a childhood memory or a photograph of someone you love so much. And you want to hold it just a minute longer, just stare at it a second more and memorize every detail, or slip it in your pocket, just because you can't bear to pass it on, to know you'll never see it again, or just because what you have is so wonderful, so tangible, that you find it hard to give it up in anticipation of what might be next. Who wants to trade an orchid for a hairpin? But, of course, you only have the hairpin for a minute too, and then it's a beautiful journal, a polished glass bead, an empty cigarette box, or a light bulb. All of those things have a purpose, a moment, and maybe that's what makes a moment special, when what the cosmos hands you is just what you need at that very moment. Some people seem to spend their lives out of sync, always wishing that what they had would have arrived five minutes earlier or five minutes later.... The trick is, as they say, wanting what you have, especially when what you have keeps changing.
Some day, when you're bigger, I'll teach you to hunt for shark teeth. I can wander a beach for hours, entering into a Zen-like trance when all that matters is what is right at my feet, what's right in front of me. And I'm always surprised when I finally look up to realize that I'm miles from where I started, because to me, when I'm hunting, I'm always looking for the next big one, thinking whenever I consider turning back, "But what if there's a Megalodon carcharodon tooth just ahead, just one shell pile further? What if the Big One is just ahead?" Maybe there are two kinds of people in life - those who say, "Let's call it a day" and head for home and those who keep wandering, looking up every so often to be amazed at how far they've come.
Wednesday, July 6, 2011
The Rest
I do think about things besides you. That's probably a surprise to you (and anyone else who might be reading this), but it's true. It's impossible to focus so relentlessly on just one thing, and I do have other thoughts that shift in and out of my mind. The problem is that, to me, everything other than you is hopelessly banal for the most part, and to other people, everything you is hopelessly banal for the most part. Therein, as Dharma says, squats the toad. So I spend a lot of time keeping my own counsel.
And reading. I thumb my nose at everyone who told me that I wouldn't read again after you were born. I read less, certainly, mostly just because I'm bone-tired when I hit bed at night and can barely keep my eyes open. (And because indulging in bouts of insomnia that allow me to read until 4 a.m. are dangerous.) I've read 20+ books since you were born, and I'm not quite back to my average of 4-5 books a month, but I'm getting there. Since September, I've read, among other things:
Packing for Mars
The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Nighttime
Silent on the Moor
At Home: A Short History of Private Life
The Lace Reader
Motherless Mothers
Room
Freckles and The Girl of the Limberlost (favorites of your grandma's)
Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society
The Sex Lives of Cannibals: Adrift in the Equatorial Pacific
Thinking in Pictures: My Life with Autism
The Secret Life of Marilyn Monroe
Matterhorn
Fingersmith
And, of course, I work. In the months since you've arrived, your father (and I) curated an exhibition at the Decorative Arts Center of Ohio and wrote an exhibition catalogue on Ohio decorative arts. And organized a Midwestern decorative arts conference. And lectured several places, including the Hudson, Ohio public library and the Oglebay Antiques Show. I've written newsletter articles about everything from Waterford crystal to William Henry Harrison, Christmas ornaments to the Chinese Cultural Revolution.
I've taken care of Elvis, our very sick cat; lost 40 pounds; started making homemade vegetable stock; planted nine tomato plants, three peonies, and some rhubarb; knitted socks and dishcloths; shopped for Christmas and birthdays; signed us up for a CSA membership and discovered the joys of garlic scapes; and helped your father assemble an Oldenburg wardrobe. This is how you're going to be a year old soon and I find myself wondering where the time went....
And reading. I thumb my nose at everyone who told me that I wouldn't read again after you were born. I read less, certainly, mostly just because I'm bone-tired when I hit bed at night and can barely keep my eyes open. (And because indulging in bouts of insomnia that allow me to read until 4 a.m. are dangerous.) I've read 20+ books since you were born, and I'm not quite back to my average of 4-5 books a month, but I'm getting there. Since September, I've read, among other things:
Packing for Mars
The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Nighttime
Silent on the Moor
At Home: A Short History of Private Life
The Lace Reader
Motherless Mothers
Room
Freckles and The Girl of the Limberlost (favorites of your grandma's)
Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society
The Sex Lives of Cannibals: Adrift in the Equatorial Pacific
Thinking in Pictures: My Life with Autism
The Secret Life of Marilyn Monroe
Matterhorn
Fingersmith
And, of course, I work. In the months since you've arrived, your father (and I) curated an exhibition at the Decorative Arts Center of Ohio and wrote an exhibition catalogue on Ohio decorative arts. And organized a Midwestern decorative arts conference. And lectured several places, including the Hudson, Ohio public library and the Oglebay Antiques Show. I've written newsletter articles about everything from Waterford crystal to William Henry Harrison, Christmas ornaments to the Chinese Cultural Revolution.
I've taken care of Elvis, our very sick cat; lost 40 pounds; started making homemade vegetable stock; planted nine tomato plants, three peonies, and some rhubarb; knitted socks and dishcloths; shopped for Christmas and birthdays; signed us up for a CSA membership and discovered the joys of garlic scapes; and helped your father assemble an Oldenburg wardrobe. This is how you're going to be a year old soon and I find myself wondering where the time went....
Tuesday, June 21, 2011
Christmas
Having babies is difficult and women seem so often to feel bad about just how it turned out. They did or did not want an epidural, they planned or did not plan on a c-section, they were or were not going to breastfeed. Maybe they get to make the decision, maybe it gets made for them, but after living with it for awhile, they find themselves wishing something different.
Maybe it's a little like Christmas, you know? Where you think *this* year you'll have the perfect one, and you'll get the right tree and get it up weeks in advance and actually get your holiday cards out on time and you'll bake four different kinds of cookies and make time to watch all your favorite specials and you'll have your shopping done two weeks ahead of time and everything wrapped, and no matter how you plan, you end up on Christmas Eve standing in the line at the store, or trying to fit in three holiday movies before bed, or just wrapping presents at midnight on Christmas Eve and wondering exactly where you went wrong and vowing that you'll do it different next time. And you will. But you still won't get it all done just the way you'd envisioned.
At the same time, I've realized lately that this is part of the poignancy of babies, part of what makes all mothers nostalgic and tender in the presence of someone else's new baby - you can't really go back. That's a hard truth to grasp in life, especially in the world we live in. You didn't have the wedding you wanted? Spend a mint and renew your vows! You were distracted during a concert? Buy another ticket and go again! You hated being on the road over the holidays? Next year, stay home and do it up however you like! But children are different. They're like the proverbial river - you never interact with the same child twice and there's something sad and lost about that. I can never have you at three months or six months or nine months again. Those yous are gone and there are days that I break down and cry because I feel like I missed them, like I should have been watching constantly, like I was cheated out of so much by postpartum psychosis.
I have to tell you - I would put my life on a loop if I could. I would do everything over again, even the terrible parts because they lead me to you, if I could, just to keep being your mother for as long as I possibly could. And while I can't go back, I try to concentrate on looking forward - there are so many yous for me to know yet and I'm excited for all of them, even the ones that won't be my favorites. There's the you with your first skinned knee and the you with your first report card and the you with your first sleepover and the you turning one and two and three and four.... When I was pregnant, I couldn't wait to meet you, to know who you are, to see what you'd look like, but I've since realized that I will never be done knowing who you are, never done knowing what you look like, and that's an amazing thing. You're Christmas every day, with a whole new tree and a whole new set of gifts and a whole new set of joys.
I read somewhere once that there is nothing so precious and amazing and awe-inspiring as something on the verge of becoming - becoming something else, something bigger, something more - and that, my little person, is you: constantly on the verge, constantly surprising me, constantly emerging, constantly in metamorphosis from two cells to the person you'll be at the end of your life. It's all I can do not to stare in wonder at you every moment.
Maybe it's a little like Christmas, you know? Where you think *this* year you'll have the perfect one, and you'll get the right tree and get it up weeks in advance and actually get your holiday cards out on time and you'll bake four different kinds of cookies and make time to watch all your favorite specials and you'll have your shopping done two weeks ahead of time and everything wrapped, and no matter how you plan, you end up on Christmas Eve standing in the line at the store, or trying to fit in three holiday movies before bed, or just wrapping presents at midnight on Christmas Eve and wondering exactly where you went wrong and vowing that you'll do it different next time. And you will. But you still won't get it all done just the way you'd envisioned.
At the same time, I've realized lately that this is part of the poignancy of babies, part of what makes all mothers nostalgic and tender in the presence of someone else's new baby - you can't really go back. That's a hard truth to grasp in life, especially in the world we live in. You didn't have the wedding you wanted? Spend a mint and renew your vows! You were distracted during a concert? Buy another ticket and go again! You hated being on the road over the holidays? Next year, stay home and do it up however you like! But children are different. They're like the proverbial river - you never interact with the same child twice and there's something sad and lost about that. I can never have you at three months or six months or nine months again. Those yous are gone and there are days that I break down and cry because I feel like I missed them, like I should have been watching constantly, like I was cheated out of so much by postpartum psychosis.
I have to tell you - I would put my life on a loop if I could. I would do everything over again, even the terrible parts because they lead me to you, if I could, just to keep being your mother for as long as I possibly could. And while I can't go back, I try to concentrate on looking forward - there are so many yous for me to know yet and I'm excited for all of them, even the ones that won't be my favorites. There's the you with your first skinned knee and the you with your first report card and the you with your first sleepover and the you turning one and two and three and four.... When I was pregnant, I couldn't wait to meet you, to know who you are, to see what you'd look like, but I've since realized that I will never be done knowing who you are, never done knowing what you look like, and that's an amazing thing. You're Christmas every day, with a whole new tree and a whole new set of gifts and a whole new set of joys.
I read somewhere once that there is nothing so precious and amazing and awe-inspiring as something on the verge of becoming - becoming something else, something bigger, something more - and that, my little person, is you: constantly on the verge, constantly surprising me, constantly emerging, constantly in metamorphosis from two cells to the person you'll be at the end of your life. It's all I can do not to stare in wonder at you every moment.
Wednesday, June 15, 2011
Broken
A friend told me recently that you broke me, but in the best way possible. Which you did. After years of stasis, I now find myself in a near-constant state of evolving and adapting. Things that would have made me tense or made me break down in tears at other times in my life now make me smile or just sit down and laugh. You spill Cheerios, wriggle around in poo, or whack me in the face with a toy, and often, my only response is amusement. It warms my heart to see how gleefully you go through life, unaware of the need to show caution or restraint or moderation. I used to know how to do that too, I realize, and somewhere along the way, I forgot a little bit more than I intended.
In breaking me, you also broke so much of what restrained me - so many fears and anxieties that simply don't fit with who you are and what you need from me. You broke my heart too, and you break it every day, when you wail with abandon, when your face crumbles like an empty paper bag, when you clutch your scarf with anticipation of being picked up, when you concentrate so hard on picking up something small. I see you wanting and know that you have a lifetime of wanting ahead, a lifetime of things I can't possibly and shouldn't even consider doing for you. It seems to do me good somehow, though. Perhaps I'm learning that hearts break and get put back together all the time, that this morning's tragedy is quickly forgotten, that a good nap can erase a bad night, that a smile covers up so many frustrations. Being broken is freeing - you can put yourself back together however you like.
In breaking me, you also broke so much of what restrained me - so many fears and anxieties that simply don't fit with who you are and what you need from me. You broke my heart too, and you break it every day, when you wail with abandon, when your face crumbles like an empty paper bag, when you clutch your scarf with anticipation of being picked up, when you concentrate so hard on picking up something small. I see you wanting and know that you have a lifetime of wanting ahead, a lifetime of things I can't possibly and shouldn't even consider doing for you. It seems to do me good somehow, though. Perhaps I'm learning that hearts break and get put back together all the time, that this morning's tragedy is quickly forgotten, that a good nap can erase a bad night, that a smile covers up so many frustrations. Being broken is freeing - you can put yourself back together however you like.
Tuesday, May 17, 2011
You Will...
One day, you'll ask me something, and I'll have to tell you that you don't understand yet, but that eventually you will. You understand all sorts of things for the first time when you have a baby. Thanks to you, I understand new things regularly, so I'll come back to update this from time to time.....
You will, without thinking, lick your thumb and scrub someone's cheek.
You will peel an apple slice for your baby and eat the peel yourself. You will also crunch on the apple slice a few times to "get it started."
You will taste breast milk and marvel that someone can enjoy something that tastes so soapy.
You will bite off bits of a snack to make them a safe size.
You will, when left without a baby wipe, use your fingers to mop away baby spit and sticky liquid infant Tylenol and then lick them clean. You will contemplate the fact that it would just be easier to lick the baby's face....
You will wake up when a leaf lands in the gutter.
You will figure out how to prop a breast pump so you can type, dangle a toy, and eat breakfast all at the same time.
You will use your pinkie as a pacifier and will learn to sleep with it in someone's mouth.
You will at some point be so in awe of a dirty diaper that you'll be sure to point it out to your partner later.
You will develop new fleeting but alarming fears, like a roof leak over your baby's bed that will lead to drowning.
You will pick someone's nose.
You will allow everything in your life to be lukewarm - meals, baths, iced tea.
You will cry at 2 a.m. when a diaper change, nursing, and pacing the hall haven't stopped the crying, not because you're tired or in pain, but because you're sure that your baby is.
You will be tired enough that you will knowingly put on jeans with boogers, spit up, and/or breast milk on them and still smile.
You will leave home with a change of clothes, 700 diapers, a backup pacifier, blankets, gas drops, a spare bottle, a nursing pillow, baby Tylenol, two snack options, a plastic bag for dirty diapers, and with your shirt unbuttoned.
You will say things like, "Do not spit avocado on the cat!" without a hint of irony.
You will marvel at how someone immobile manages to get Cheerios everywhere. There is, at this moment, a Cheerio on top of the recycling bins on the back deck.
You will, without thinking, lick your thumb and scrub someone's cheek.
You will peel an apple slice for your baby and eat the peel yourself. You will also crunch on the apple slice a few times to "get it started."
You will taste breast milk and marvel that someone can enjoy something that tastes so soapy.
You will bite off bits of a snack to make them a safe size.
You will, when left without a baby wipe, use your fingers to mop away baby spit and sticky liquid infant Tylenol and then lick them clean. You will contemplate the fact that it would just be easier to lick the baby's face....
You will wake up when a leaf lands in the gutter.
You will figure out how to prop a breast pump so you can type, dangle a toy, and eat breakfast all at the same time.
You will use your pinkie as a pacifier and will learn to sleep with it in someone's mouth.
You will at some point be so in awe of a dirty diaper that you'll be sure to point it out to your partner later.
You will develop new fleeting but alarming fears, like a roof leak over your baby's bed that will lead to drowning.
You will pick someone's nose.
You will allow everything in your life to be lukewarm - meals, baths, iced tea.
You will cry at 2 a.m. when a diaper change, nursing, and pacing the hall haven't stopped the crying, not because you're tired or in pain, but because you're sure that your baby is.
You will be tired enough that you will knowingly put on jeans with boogers, spit up, and/or breast milk on them and still smile.
You will leave home with a change of clothes, 700 diapers, a backup pacifier, blankets, gas drops, a spare bottle, a nursing pillow, baby Tylenol, two snack options, a plastic bag for dirty diapers, and with your shirt unbuttoned.
You will say things like, "Do not spit avocado on the cat!" without a hint of irony.
You will marvel at how someone immobile manages to get Cheerios everywhere. There is, at this moment, a Cheerio on top of the recycling bins on the back deck.
Wednesday, May 11, 2011
Neon Number
So, yesterday, May 10, 2011, was a big day. I was officially older than my mother was when she died. May 9 was not a good day. I kept feeling, not like I should be dying, really, but did catch myself thinking, "Mom only had about two more hours...." And I was short-tempered, but I think that's because part of me is a little jealous of you. You have me, a mother, who loves you and dotes on you, who is able to stay home with you and capture all your little smiles and charms. You have what I have wished for most of my life, and I'm sure there will be days that you'll be angry at me and I'll struggle to understand how you can possibly feel that way when you have me, when I'm still here.
But that was Monday and I was determined to mark Tuesday in some special way if I could. I thought a lot about what would be meaningful - driving off to spend the day in WV, tramping around in the woods, getting a tattoo, being with family - but what I kept thinking was a muddle of what I'd do with my mom if she were still here, what I think she'd have wanted to do if she had one more day, what I'd want to do if I only had one day left, and that all distilled down to spending the day with you and with myself. Not a cliched last day, with a trip to the top of the Eiffel Tower or blowing all the money in the bank account, but a last day of all the joyful small things in life, a good last day if you didn't know what was coming.
So, if your grandma was here and she came for a visit, we'd go out for breakfast, so first thing in the morning, we headed to our favorite bakery for a cinnamon roll. On the way, we saw a pair of great blue herons in flight. And then, of course, she'd want to shop for books and she'd be blown away by Half Price Books. She would, of course, buy me whatever I wanted and buy books for you too, so that's just what I did. I got you special editions of Charlotte's Web and Little House in the Big Woods, and I found myself looking for something meaningful or at least a favorite of your grandma's. But no Daphne du Maurier, no new Stephen King, no Taylor Caldwell. And then, just as I was turning around, I saw on the shelf the book I was reading when I suddenly, desperately knew that I wanted you - The Beach Street Knitting Society and Yarn Club (a terrible Americanized title for Divas Don't Knit - if it tells you anything there's not even a yarn club!). It's a light British novel about a woman taking control of her life and she has two little boys who are so imperfectly charming that they spoke to something inside me that wanted children. And the sequel, Needles and Pearls! I also bought myself three newer books - Sarah's Key, The Night Watch, and A Discovery of Witches - along with some pretty note cards, because, I reasoned, your grandma would have bought them for me.
And of course, she'd want to shop for you! So we went to Once Upon a Child and got you two cute dresses, four onesies, and two swimsuits.
Your grandma loved Chinese food, possible just because in West Virginia in the 1970s and 1980s, it was terribly cosmopolitan and hard to come by. So, we got Chinese takeout at Lucky House for lunch - some soup and lo mein - and headed home.
On our way, we stopped off to buy red flowers at Sambuca's. Red was your grandma's favorite color and when she died, there weren't any red flowers left at the three florists in town and there were hardly any left in neighboring counties, I imagine. I bought two big pots of geraniums for the front porch.
And for our last stop, we went to Linda's 3 in town and spent an exorbitant amount of money to have a photo of your grandma and me beautifully framed with Linda's impeccably tasteful assistance. And I picked up a little miniature monkey for your collection of small things and a little heart-shaped stoneware dish with glass in the glaze, because your grandma loved and collected hearts. When Linda started to pack it up in a recycled gift bag, she found a note that said, "You are a strong, faithful and sensitive person." It felt like a message, so I kept it.
We came home, you nursed and I ate my takeout, and then I did what I'd do if I only had one day left - laid down with you, read you stories, cuddled with you and napped with you for three hours. I tried to stare at you as hard as I would if I knew I were never going to see you again, but it either made me cry or I lost focus. I don't think we're meant to be able to really allow ourselves to think of life that way or else we'd be too terrified to really live it. I settled for just listening to you breathe and being grateful....
We got up, rushed off to pick up Daddy and stopped to get ice cream on the way home - if it was the last day, that would be a good thing. We had a lovely evening at home, just fixed a nice dinner together, gave you a bath, tucked you in and hung out on the couch. It was an awesome, perfect "last day" and I'm so glad you were in it. Being your mother is such a joy and a privilege and I hope I get to keep the job a long, long time. "But if I don't," my mind is whispering, but I've made it this far, so I'm not going to think about that. I'm going to think about having one more last day, and another one, and another one, and another one....
But that was Monday and I was determined to mark Tuesday in some special way if I could. I thought a lot about what would be meaningful - driving off to spend the day in WV, tramping around in the woods, getting a tattoo, being with family - but what I kept thinking was a muddle of what I'd do with my mom if she were still here, what I think she'd have wanted to do if she had one more day, what I'd want to do if I only had one day left, and that all distilled down to spending the day with you and with myself. Not a cliched last day, with a trip to the top of the Eiffel Tower or blowing all the money in the bank account, but a last day of all the joyful small things in life, a good last day if you didn't know what was coming.
So, if your grandma was here and she came for a visit, we'd go out for breakfast, so first thing in the morning, we headed to our favorite bakery for a cinnamon roll. On the way, we saw a pair of great blue herons in flight. And then, of course, she'd want to shop for books and she'd be blown away by Half Price Books. She would, of course, buy me whatever I wanted and buy books for you too, so that's just what I did. I got you special editions of Charlotte's Web and Little House in the Big Woods, and I found myself looking for something meaningful or at least a favorite of your grandma's. But no Daphne du Maurier, no new Stephen King, no Taylor Caldwell. And then, just as I was turning around, I saw on the shelf the book I was reading when I suddenly, desperately knew that I wanted you - The Beach Street Knitting Society and Yarn Club (a terrible Americanized title for Divas Don't Knit - if it tells you anything there's not even a yarn club!). It's a light British novel about a woman taking control of her life and she has two little boys who are so imperfectly charming that they spoke to something inside me that wanted children. And the sequel, Needles and Pearls! I also bought myself three newer books - Sarah's Key, The Night Watch, and A Discovery of Witches - along with some pretty note cards, because, I reasoned, your grandma would have bought them for me.
And of course, she'd want to shop for you! So we went to Once Upon a Child and got you two cute dresses, four onesies, and two swimsuits.
Your grandma loved Chinese food, possible just because in West Virginia in the 1970s and 1980s, it was terribly cosmopolitan and hard to come by. So, we got Chinese takeout at Lucky House for lunch - some soup and lo mein - and headed home.
On our way, we stopped off to buy red flowers at Sambuca's. Red was your grandma's favorite color and when she died, there weren't any red flowers left at the three florists in town and there were hardly any left in neighboring counties, I imagine. I bought two big pots of geraniums for the front porch.
And for our last stop, we went to Linda's 3 in town and spent an exorbitant amount of money to have a photo of your grandma and me beautifully framed with Linda's impeccably tasteful assistance. And I picked up a little miniature monkey for your collection of small things and a little heart-shaped stoneware dish with glass in the glaze, because your grandma loved and collected hearts. When Linda started to pack it up in a recycled gift bag, she found a note that said, "You are a strong, faithful and sensitive person." It felt like a message, so I kept it.
We came home, you nursed and I ate my takeout, and then I did what I'd do if I only had one day left - laid down with you, read you stories, cuddled with you and napped with you for three hours. I tried to stare at you as hard as I would if I knew I were never going to see you again, but it either made me cry or I lost focus. I don't think we're meant to be able to really allow ourselves to think of life that way or else we'd be too terrified to really live it. I settled for just listening to you breathe and being grateful....
We got up, rushed off to pick up Daddy and stopped to get ice cream on the way home - if it was the last day, that would be a good thing. We had a lovely evening at home, just fixed a nice dinner together, gave you a bath, tucked you in and hung out on the couch. It was an awesome, perfect "last day" and I'm so glad you were in it. Being your mother is such a joy and a privilege and I hope I get to keep the job a long, long time. "But if I don't," my mind is whispering, but I've made it this far, so I'm not going to think about that. I'm going to think about having one more last day, and another one, and another one, and another one....
Sunday, May 8, 2011
Tina Fey
I found this by Tina Fey and wanted to keep it here for you to read someday. The "all-at-once exhausted, bored, and in love" is so very, very true - the most accurate description. And so is the poop everywhere. One of the things that breaks my heart is that if something were to happen to me now, you might never understand how much I loved you, how much I cared for you, how much I gave to you when I was so beyond having anything to give. I want you to know that someone loved you like that, because now that I've done it, I can safely say, no one, ever in your whole in entire life, will love you as much I as do. And no one will love me as much as my mother. Knowing that is the gift you gave me....
A mother's prayer:
First, Lord: No tattoos. May neither Chinese symbol for truth nor Winnie-the-Pooh holding the FSU logo stain her tender haunches.
May she be Beautiful but not Damaged, for it’s the Damage that draws the creepy soccer coach’s eye, not the Beauty.
When the Crystal Meth is offered, may she remember the parents who cut her grapes in half And stick with Beer.
Guide her, protect her when crossing the street, stepping onto boats, swimming in the ocean, swimming in pools, walking near pools, standing on the subway platform, crossing 86th Street, stepping off of boats, using mall restrooms, getting on and off escalators, driving on country roads while arguing, leaning on large windows, walking in parking lots, riding Ferris wheels, roller-coasters, log flumes, or anything called “Hell Drop,” “Tower of Torture,” or “The Death Spiral Rock ‘N Zero G Roll featuring Aerosmith,” and standing on any kind of balcony ever, anywhere, at any age.
Lead her away from Acting but not all the way to Finance.Something where she can make her own hours but still feel intellectually fulfilled and get outside sometimes And not have to wear high heels. What would that be, Lord? Architecture? Midwifery? Golf course design? I’m asking You, because if I knew, I’d be doing it, Youdammit.
May she play the Drums to the fiery rhythm of her Own Heart with the sinewy strength of her Own Arms, so she need Not Lie With Drummers.
Grant her a Rough Patch from twelve to seventeen.Let her draw horses and be interested in Barbies for much too long, For childhood is short – a Tiger Flower blooming Magenta for one day – And adulthood is long and dry-humping in cars will wait.
O Lord, break the Internet forever, that she may be spared the misspelled invective of her peers And the online marketing campaign for Rape Hostel V: Girls Just Wanna Get Stabbed.
And when she one day turns on me and calls me a bitch in front of Hollister, Give me the strength, Lord, to yank her directly into a cab in front of her friends, For I will not have that shit. I will not have it.
And should she choose to be a Mother one day, be my eyes, Lord, that I may see her, lying on a blanket on the floor at 4:50 A.M., all-at-once exhausted, bored, and in love with the little creature whose poop is leaking up its back. “My mother did this for me once,”she will realize as she cleans feces off her baby’s neck. “My mother did this for me.” And the delayed gratitude will wash over her as it does each generation and she will make a Mental Note to call me. And she will forget. But I’ll know, because I peeped it with Your God eyes.
Amen.
A mother's prayer:
First, Lord: No tattoos. May neither Chinese symbol for truth nor Winnie-the-Pooh holding the FSU logo stain her tender haunches.
May she be Beautiful but not Damaged, for it’s the Damage that draws the creepy soccer coach’s eye, not the Beauty.
When the Crystal Meth is offered, may she remember the parents who cut her grapes in half And stick with Beer.
Guide her, protect her when crossing the street, stepping onto boats, swimming in the ocean, swimming in pools, walking near pools, standing on the subway platform, crossing 86th Street, stepping off of boats, using mall restrooms, getting on and off escalators, driving on country roads while arguing, leaning on large windows, walking in parking lots, riding Ferris wheels, roller-coasters, log flumes, or anything called “Hell Drop,” “Tower of Torture,” or “The Death Spiral Rock ‘N Zero G Roll featuring Aerosmith,” and standing on any kind of balcony ever, anywhere, at any age.
Lead her away from Acting but not all the way to Finance.Something where she can make her own hours but still feel intellectually fulfilled and get outside sometimes And not have to wear high heels. What would that be, Lord? Architecture? Midwifery? Golf course design? I’m asking You, because if I knew, I’d be doing it, Youdammit.
May she play the Drums to the fiery rhythm of her Own Heart with the sinewy strength of her Own Arms, so she need Not Lie With Drummers.
Grant her a Rough Patch from twelve to seventeen.Let her draw horses and be interested in Barbies for much too long, For childhood is short – a Tiger Flower blooming Magenta for one day – And adulthood is long and dry-humping in cars will wait.
O Lord, break the Internet forever, that she may be spared the misspelled invective of her peers And the online marketing campaign for Rape Hostel V: Girls Just Wanna Get Stabbed.
And when she one day turns on me and calls me a bitch in front of Hollister, Give me the strength, Lord, to yank her directly into a cab in front of her friends, For I will not have that shit. I will not have it.
And should she choose to be a Mother one day, be my eyes, Lord, that I may see her, lying on a blanket on the floor at 4:50 A.M., all-at-once exhausted, bored, and in love with the little creature whose poop is leaking up its back. “My mother did this for me once,”she will realize as she cleans feces off her baby’s neck. “My mother did this for me.” And the delayed gratitude will wash over her as it does each generation and she will make a Mental Note to call me. And she will forget. But I’ll know, because I peeped it with Your God eyes.
Amen.
Wednesday, April 20, 2011
In the Teeth of the Marketing Machine
Recently, we had to run into the hideously named "BuyBuyBaby" (honestly, not even a thinly veiled blatant commercialism?) to purchase a thing or two for you. We were making a lap through the store, which sort of reminded me of that Bugs Bunny cartoon where Yosemite Sam is tiptoeing through the lion den as a Roman gladiator, trying not to make eye contact, but just get through intact. And we made it about as far as the cribs in the back when I started to tear up.
Rationally, this makes no sense. I know this. I know you have no need for any of these things. I know you can't possibly have a desire for them. I know that most of them are cheap imported junk made from molded plastic and stapled laminated wood and fabrics awash with flame retardants. And yet I found myself feeling awful that you didn't have the "perfect" room with a set of matching furniture (furniture your father summarily dismissed as "garbage") with matching ribbon-embroidered rosettes and your name on every available flat surface.
Your father gently reminded me that my ability or my willingness to purchase things for you did not define my parenting abilities or the quality of your childhood and then he said, "You know, you shouldn't feel guilty. What you should feel is mad. You should be angry that corporate executives are all too happy to mine a mother's desire to do the best for her child in order to create this kind of guilt just to make a buck." And the more I thought about it, the more I realized he was right. I should feel angry about that, that someone has figured out how to manipulate my best biological instincts, to subvert my intentions and my hopes, just to make money, that I should feel hurt or "bad" or upset that despite being home with you and nursing you and turning my body over for the repeated pummeling that is pregnancy and childbirth and breastfeeding, I'm still made to feel as if I've not done enough for you because you don't have a rug emblazoned with your initials or large "N" bookends shellacked with white enamel paint. Selling emotionally raw people that kind of idea is a lousy thing to do.
And, while we're on the subject, I'm also annoyed that society tends to make mothers feel like their instincts aren't good enough. If you're doing this someday without me and I can't tell you anything else, I'll tell you this: trust your instincts. I hope you'll mother in a different world, but the one we're in currently makes a lot of money off of telling mothers all sorts of things that just muddy the waters. Child health and safety have improved dramatically, but women have been raising children literally since the dawn of man. Literally. Think about that for a moment. And there were no baby safe feeders or baby monitors with lcd displays or talking heads spouting off endless nonsense about what sort of emotional problems sleeping issues will cause. It has to be an instinctual process and it is, if you can just get everything else out of the way and not doubt what your gut tells you to do. We have somehow decided to let people tell us how to do something that we've known how to do for centuries.
I'm off to assuage my guilt by reading to you lots and lots and lots. I will read Brown Bear, Brown Bear, What Do You See? until I'm hoarse, but I'll probably still be thinking of those $&*# embroidered crib blankets....
Rationally, this makes no sense. I know this. I know you have no need for any of these things. I know you can't possibly have a desire for them. I know that most of them are cheap imported junk made from molded plastic and stapled laminated wood and fabrics awash with flame retardants. And yet I found myself feeling awful that you didn't have the "perfect" room with a set of matching furniture (furniture your father summarily dismissed as "garbage") with matching ribbon-embroidered rosettes and your name on every available flat surface.
Your father gently reminded me that my ability or my willingness to purchase things for you did not define my parenting abilities or the quality of your childhood and then he said, "You know, you shouldn't feel guilty. What you should feel is mad. You should be angry that corporate executives are all too happy to mine a mother's desire to do the best for her child in order to create this kind of guilt just to make a buck." And the more I thought about it, the more I realized he was right. I should feel angry about that, that someone has figured out how to manipulate my best biological instincts, to subvert my intentions and my hopes, just to make money, that I should feel hurt or "bad" or upset that despite being home with you and nursing you and turning my body over for the repeated pummeling that is pregnancy and childbirth and breastfeeding, I'm still made to feel as if I've not done enough for you because you don't have a rug emblazoned with your initials or large "N" bookends shellacked with white enamel paint. Selling emotionally raw people that kind of idea is a lousy thing to do.
And, while we're on the subject, I'm also annoyed that society tends to make mothers feel like their instincts aren't good enough. If you're doing this someday without me and I can't tell you anything else, I'll tell you this: trust your instincts. I hope you'll mother in a different world, but the one we're in currently makes a lot of money off of telling mothers all sorts of things that just muddy the waters. Child health and safety have improved dramatically, but women have been raising children literally since the dawn of man. Literally. Think about that for a moment. And there were no baby safe feeders or baby monitors with lcd displays or talking heads spouting off endless nonsense about what sort of emotional problems sleeping issues will cause. It has to be an instinctual process and it is, if you can just get everything else out of the way and not doubt what your gut tells you to do. We have somehow decided to let people tell us how to do something that we've known how to do for centuries.
I'm off to assuage my guilt by reading to you lots and lots and lots. I will read Brown Bear, Brown Bear, What Do You See? until I'm hoarse, but I'll probably still be thinking of those $&*# embroidered crib blankets....
Friday, April 15, 2011
Orbit
In the beginning, we were a very different kind of us. Not a you-and-me, give-and-take, back-and-forth us, but an us that neither one of us will really ever be with anyone else. An US us, welded together.
And then we took our first step apart and became just an us like every other pair with your birth. We formed a close, tight orbit, a dizzying and suffocating spin around and around each other. Initially, it seemed as though you were the center, but I'm come to realize it may be me. For months, I thought I shifted around you, that you were the only fixed point in the world and I was bound by you, unable to wander far from the course you permitted. But now, I think it may be different, that it's my job to sit, steadily anchoring the center of your universe.
Strangely, I'm a little flummoxed by this, not sure whether it is better or preferable or enviable to be the orbiter or the orbitee, but in the end, what I think about it doesn't matter. Maybe your rotations seem to be on a daily basis now, still snugged up close to me, but as time goes on, you'll become your own increasingly independent little universe, only coming close periodically. Perhaps there'll even come a day when you're very distant, stretching the bounds of my ability to hold you in balance, far enough from me that you're barely able to see the light of my love, let alone feel its warmth. But it will not be your job to be fixed and I will never set my compass by you as you will by me.
I'm a bit frightened by the idea of being a center for anyone and sometimes it seems so cosmically sad, the idea of being a sun, but perhaps it is a metaphor for motherhood. You burn with a fierce light, your nurturing makes life on the "planet" of your child possible, and too tight an orbit burns them up, while charting too wide a track freezes them out. And then you glow and glow with a self-immolating intensity....
And then we took our first step apart and became just an us like every other pair with your birth. We formed a close, tight orbit, a dizzying and suffocating spin around and around each other. Initially, it seemed as though you were the center, but I'm come to realize it may be me. For months, I thought I shifted around you, that you were the only fixed point in the world and I was bound by you, unable to wander far from the course you permitted. But now, I think it may be different, that it's my job to sit, steadily anchoring the center of your universe.
Strangely, I'm a little flummoxed by this, not sure whether it is better or preferable or enviable to be the orbiter or the orbitee, but in the end, what I think about it doesn't matter. Maybe your rotations seem to be on a daily basis now, still snugged up close to me, but as time goes on, you'll become your own increasingly independent little universe, only coming close periodically. Perhaps there'll even come a day when you're very distant, stretching the bounds of my ability to hold you in balance, far enough from me that you're barely able to see the light of my love, let alone feel its warmth. But it will not be your job to be fixed and I will never set my compass by you as you will by me.
I'm a bit frightened by the idea of being a center for anyone and sometimes it seems so cosmically sad, the idea of being a sun, but perhaps it is a metaphor for motherhood. You burn with a fierce light, your nurturing makes life on the "planet" of your child possible, and too tight an orbit burns them up, while charting too wide a track freezes them out. And then you glow and glow with a self-immolating intensity....
Monday, April 11, 2011
Never Go Anywhere Empty-Handed
We're past that initial exhilaration and desperation, and somehow, those first months are already fading in my memory. When I think back, I can only seem to muster a handful of extremes. Short on sleep, pain of nursing, drowning in adoration, all spent in either whole days on the couch or what seem like whole years on the road, nursing and changing you in rest area parking lots, behind gas stations, corners of park-and-ride lots, staring at the front of outlet malls. You're sleeping on your own, soundly, only nursing about four times a day, and seeming more and more contented to drift a little further away.
So it seems like a good time to begin offering little bits of advice and life philosophies and all those things that you'll be hearing from me constantly and not really be interested in until I'm dead and you find yourself saying them to your own children. And there's no better place to start than your namesake's favorite - "Never go anywhere empty-handed."
Your great-grandmother said this all the time. This could be because when I knew her, she lived in a beautiful split-level house that was positively state of the art when your grandfather built it in the late 1950s or early 1960s. (I know it was state of the art because there's a newspaper article somewhere of your grandfather standing with his cows in the field that refers to the house and it's "state of the art" or "latest style" or "up to the minute" or something else equally valued in the 1950s....) Anyway, this meant that you walked in to a wide tiled entryway (which was always the coolest place in my world in the summer - they had central air and we never did) with a "rec room" off to the left ("rec rooms" being a must in 1950s homes). Straight ahead, and this seemed completely normally then, but completely strange now, was a half bathroom where your grandfather could scrub up before really coming into the house. The strange part is that there was also a file cabinet in there with a roll-top desk where all the household accounts and documents from his businesses were stored. Anyway, from there, you could go down seven steps to the basement (which always smelled so good because your great-grandmother used gallons of fabric softener - your grandmother never did - and she line-dried all the sheets) or, from the hallway, go up seven steps to the living room, dining room and kitchen. The three bedrooms and only full bath were up another flight of seven stairs.
Anyway, living in a house where you had to go up seven steps to go to the bathroom or down fourteen steps to do laundry probably made her very efficient. As a result, if she had to up to use the bathroom, she'd take the shampoo she bought at the store. When she came down, she'd bring the dirty laundry. If she had to go the basement with the dirty laundry, she'd come back up with the cans of tomatoes she'd need for dinner. Once we got big enough to do her bidding, she'd send us to the basement for potatoes or frozen vegetables from the chest freezer, but before we could dart off, she'd press something into our hands with instructions on what to do with it on the way.
Like most good instructions, it seems simple on the surface of things, but only deepens with examination. To never go anywhere empty-handed requires forethought, planning, awareness, and remembering. It fostered in my small self a sense of intention and later, it served well as social advice too, reminding me to always bring a hostess gift, a willingness to help. "Life's complicated," it says, "so think about what you're going to do, make a plan, and go out into the world prepared." The world is full of people who show up, metaphysically and literally, with their hands empty, and I don't want you to be like that. Show up with something to offer, show up with your hands full.
So it seems like a good time to begin offering little bits of advice and life philosophies and all those things that you'll be hearing from me constantly and not really be interested in until I'm dead and you find yourself saying them to your own children. And there's no better place to start than your namesake's favorite - "Never go anywhere empty-handed."
Your great-grandmother said this all the time. This could be because when I knew her, she lived in a beautiful split-level house that was positively state of the art when your grandfather built it in the late 1950s or early 1960s. (I know it was state of the art because there's a newspaper article somewhere of your grandfather standing with his cows in the field that refers to the house and it's "state of the art" or "latest style" or "up to the minute" or something else equally valued in the 1950s....) Anyway, this meant that you walked in to a wide tiled entryway (which was always the coolest place in my world in the summer - they had central air and we never did) with a "rec room" off to the left ("rec rooms" being a must in 1950s homes). Straight ahead, and this seemed completely normally then, but completely strange now, was a half bathroom where your grandfather could scrub up before really coming into the house. The strange part is that there was also a file cabinet in there with a roll-top desk where all the household accounts and documents from his businesses were stored. Anyway, from there, you could go down seven steps to the basement (which always smelled so good because your great-grandmother used gallons of fabric softener - your grandmother never did - and she line-dried all the sheets) or, from the hallway, go up seven steps to the living room, dining room and kitchen. The three bedrooms and only full bath were up another flight of seven stairs.
Anyway, living in a house where you had to go up seven steps to go to the bathroom or down fourteen steps to do laundry probably made her very efficient. As a result, if she had to up to use the bathroom, she'd take the shampoo she bought at the store. When she came down, she'd bring the dirty laundry. If she had to go the basement with the dirty laundry, she'd come back up with the cans of tomatoes she'd need for dinner. Once we got big enough to do her bidding, she'd send us to the basement for potatoes or frozen vegetables from the chest freezer, but before we could dart off, she'd press something into our hands with instructions on what to do with it on the way.
Like most good instructions, it seems simple on the surface of things, but only deepens with examination. To never go anywhere empty-handed requires forethought, planning, awareness, and remembering. It fostered in my small self a sense of intention and later, it served well as social advice too, reminding me to always bring a hostess gift, a willingness to help. "Life's complicated," it says, "so think about what you're going to do, make a plan, and go out into the world prepared." The world is full of people who show up, metaphysically and literally, with their hands empty, and I don't want you to be like that. Show up with something to offer, show up with your hands full.
Tuesday, March 22, 2011
Skinless
Two weeks ago, when you hit the six-month mark, I wished you a happy birthday on Facebook. I thought about celebrating with a post about the mammoth accomplishment that has been nursing you. Over the couple of years I've been on Facebook, I've seen posts about all sorts of celebratory things: weight loss, wedding anniversaries, ultrasounds, healthy babies. Every single one of those things is bound to be a struggle for someone reading them - someone's got a friend who is 50 pounds overweight, someone who has recently been divorced, someone who can't carry a baby to term or has a child with health problems. I wouldn't be angry or feel judged by someone who lost weight, but being a mother's not like that.
Being a mother, at least being a new mother (I can only hope this fades somewhat), is like having no skin. Skin is an intermediary for nerves, a big down comforter that strips the experiences of the world down to a manageable level. Skin softens the sensory overload of the world to a tolerable point. But now I find myself walking around with no skin, and even the gentlest, most well-intentioned "touches" from contact with other people burn like fire. Even the most commonplace interactions can suddenly leave me feeling flayed open, internally wide-eyed at the rapid delivery of distress and panic and inadequacy, like having a house dropped on me out of a clear blue conversational sky.
Speaking to me now, at least in an ideal way, would probably be akin to speaking to a wild animal or a mental patient. It's best to make no sudden movements, to speak softly and slowly and roll the weight of every word around before dispensing it. Sometimes, all of a sudden, language seems awash with vast gulfs of meaning, and instead of standing on a secure shoreline with gentle waves, I find myself miles from anything solid, casting about, sucked into the trough between "Is she..." and "Isn't she...." "Is she..." implies hope and future and growth and potential, while "Isn't she..." seems filled with recrimination and criticism and uncertainty. "Is she..." means she will, but "Isn't she..." means she should be by now.
Initially, I was sure this was the fault of other people (and I still make regular vows to myself about the kinds of things I'll say to new mothers), but I think some people are just more firmly anchored, so moored to their secure sense of being right and doing right that there aren't places between the words for them to fall. I realize now it's a testament to my carefully constructed facade, to my years of studying how best to approximate normal, that someone can look at me and see a confident sailor, at the helm of a steady little craft skimming across smooth water instead of a small vessel floundering in dark, rough seas, struggling to find keel, to keep from taking on water.
At one time, I would have been sure this was my curse, comfortable with the sharp irony that my talent was my undoing, but now, I just wonder if maybe, just maybe, they might be right and I might be wrong. Could my understanding of myself possibly be so skewed? There's irony in that as well, I suppose. Perhaps, like the Velveteen Rabbit, after years of being pretend, I've finally been made Real, and somehow I'm the only one who doesn't know it yet.
Being a mother, at least being a new mother (I can only hope this fades somewhat), is like having no skin. Skin is an intermediary for nerves, a big down comforter that strips the experiences of the world down to a manageable level. Skin softens the sensory overload of the world to a tolerable point. But now I find myself walking around with no skin, and even the gentlest, most well-intentioned "touches" from contact with other people burn like fire. Even the most commonplace interactions can suddenly leave me feeling flayed open, internally wide-eyed at the rapid delivery of distress and panic and inadequacy, like having a house dropped on me out of a clear blue conversational sky.
Speaking to me now, at least in an ideal way, would probably be akin to speaking to a wild animal or a mental patient. It's best to make no sudden movements, to speak softly and slowly and roll the weight of every word around before dispensing it. Sometimes, all of a sudden, language seems awash with vast gulfs of meaning, and instead of standing on a secure shoreline with gentle waves, I find myself miles from anything solid, casting about, sucked into the trough between "Is she..." and "Isn't she...." "Is she..." implies hope and future and growth and potential, while "Isn't she..." seems filled with recrimination and criticism and uncertainty. "Is she..." means she will, but "Isn't she..." means she should be by now.
Initially, I was sure this was the fault of other people (and I still make regular vows to myself about the kinds of things I'll say to new mothers), but I think some people are just more firmly anchored, so moored to their secure sense of being right and doing right that there aren't places between the words for them to fall. I realize now it's a testament to my carefully constructed facade, to my years of studying how best to approximate normal, that someone can look at me and see a confident sailor, at the helm of a steady little craft skimming across smooth water instead of a small vessel floundering in dark, rough seas, struggling to find keel, to keep from taking on water.
At one time, I would have been sure this was my curse, comfortable with the sharp irony that my talent was my undoing, but now, I just wonder if maybe, just maybe, they might be right and I might be wrong. Could my understanding of myself possibly be so skewed? There's irony in that as well, I suppose. Perhaps, like the Velveteen Rabbit, after years of being pretend, I've finally been made Real, and somehow I'm the only one who doesn't know it yet.
Sunday, March 6, 2011
Six Months!
Woohoo! You've been here six months! Six whole months and it seems like years and years, but in a good way. I look at all we've learned over the past six months, and I don't know who to be more impressed with. Okay, I'm more impressed with you, but only because you didn't have access to the internet. :)
I've learned so much about you. I've been reading Bill Bryson's memoir, The Life and Times of the Thunderbolt Kid, and he talks about how intimately you know the world as a child, and it struck a chord with me, because I remember knowing my childhood world that way. I knew how many stairs there were down to the basement, what the gas furnace sounded like when it clicked on, how many times Mom would answer the phone on Saturday morning before getting out of bed, the number of tiles on my bedroom ceiling and where the brown water stains were, how long I could run the garden hose before getting caught, where the warped spots were on the ping-pong table in my grandparents' basement, what name to call your uncle to start a fight. I knew the smells of everything: my grandpa's workshirts, the cabinet under the sink, the loft in the garage, my grandmother's lotion, my mother's perfume, the hot plastic smell of our Buick in summer, the burners on the gas stove. (This, by the way, is why you'll someday be annoyed with the "I don't remembers" you get from all adults in your life; you'll not be able to fathom how such a fundamental understanding of our world slipped away from us. I can't either.)
But now, suddenly, I know something so microscopically again: you.
I've learned so much about you. I've been reading Bill Bryson's memoir, The Life and Times of the Thunderbolt Kid, and he talks about how intimately you know the world as a child, and it struck a chord with me, because I remember knowing my childhood world that way. I knew how many stairs there were down to the basement, what the gas furnace sounded like when it clicked on, how many times Mom would answer the phone on Saturday morning before getting out of bed, the number of tiles on my bedroom ceiling and where the brown water stains were, how long I could run the garden hose before getting caught, where the warped spots were on the ping-pong table in my grandparents' basement, what name to call your uncle to start a fight. I knew the smells of everything: my grandpa's workshirts, the cabinet under the sink, the loft in the garage, my grandmother's lotion, my mother's perfume, the hot plastic smell of our Buick in summer, the burners on the gas stove. (This, by the way, is why you'll someday be annoyed with the "I don't remembers" you get from all adults in your life; you'll not be able to fathom how such a fundamental understanding of our world slipped away from us. I can't either.)
But now, suddenly, I know something so microscopically again: you.
Tuesday, March 1, 2011
Paper Moon
Parenting is a controlled illusion and an illusion of control. We struggle so much with teenagers because we feel as though we're losing control, but in reality, I realize already, we've never had control. Never, not for one moment of a child's existence. We snap inwardly at parents with unruly children, muttering, "Control your child!" or "He's completely out of control!" Yet actual control is not what we ended up wresting for, but rather a sort of cotton candy control, all puffed and spun and empty.
I'm not sure why we're so surprised, so baffled and wounded, when our elaborately constructed, self-proclaimed authority comes crashing down around our ears. Perhaps it's because we have spent years and years carrying this sense of control around like a talisman against all the uncertainty of the world, comforted by the steady weight of it, only to discover when called upon to use it that it's merely like Dumbo's magic feather. We mistake control for influence because influence is not enough. In reality, I've never had control of you, even when you were in the womb. You've been thwarting my meager attempts at authority, the authority of my body and my mind, since you were two tiny cells. I couldn't dictate when you wriggled, when you pressed outward against my ribs as though you were attempting to blow out a wall and enlarge your inadequate accommodations, when you hiccuped.
Although pregnancy is the large black underscore for loss of control, it's really when the illusion takes root. All things become about shaping the production process, selling the idea of indirect control by molding fixations on the raw materials delivered. Lunch meats with nitrates should be avoided, eat lots of fish to assist with brain development but only certain types and not too often lest the excessive levels of mercury you're bound to ingest lodge in a developing brain, avoid varnishes and stains and aerosols...the lists and concerns go on and on and on. The physical weight of your body was nothing compared to the weighty sense of responsibility I felt at every moment, with every decision. We sell ourselves on the idea of our control over you so that we can then sell you on it as well. Converts, it is well known, make the best evangelists....
I'm not sure why we're so surprised, so baffled and wounded, when our elaborately constructed, self-proclaimed authority comes crashing down around our ears. Perhaps it's because we have spent years and years carrying this sense of control around like a talisman against all the uncertainty of the world, comforted by the steady weight of it, only to discover when called upon to use it that it's merely like Dumbo's magic feather. We mistake control for influence because influence is not enough. In reality, I've never had control of you, even when you were in the womb. You've been thwarting my meager attempts at authority, the authority of my body and my mind, since you were two tiny cells. I couldn't dictate when you wriggled, when you pressed outward against my ribs as though you were attempting to blow out a wall and enlarge your inadequate accommodations, when you hiccuped.
Although pregnancy is the large black underscore for loss of control, it's really when the illusion takes root. All things become about shaping the production process, selling the idea of indirect control by molding fixations on the raw materials delivered. Lunch meats with nitrates should be avoided, eat lots of fish to assist with brain development but only certain types and not too often lest the excessive levels of mercury you're bound to ingest lodge in a developing brain, avoid varnishes and stains and aerosols...the lists and concerns go on and on and on. The physical weight of your body was nothing compared to the weighty sense of responsibility I felt at every moment, with every decision. We sell ourselves on the idea of our control over you so that we can then sell you on it as well. Converts, it is well known, make the best evangelists....
Wednesday, February 23, 2011
Mother of the Year
Well, I imagine my nomination got retracted yesterday. What a day! I should preface all this by saying that what you're about to read does not reflect the standards of the house you grew up in. That's probably why I was especially horrified. We have a very sick cat at the moment, one who probably shouldn't have been allowed to get this sick, and so we suddenly have a whole lot of new challenges that I really don't need at the moment! And something horrendous has happened to my stomach in the last six weeks or so, guaranteeing that at least four days a week, I have horrible stomach pain and an urgent need for a bathroom at least four times a day. Yet another challenge that I don't need at the moment....
Anyway, we started home from a long weekend in WV, with bad weather looming, and most of the trip went smoothly. I think you were fed up from a disrupted schedule so you didn't nurse much, and I was clearly fed up from a disrupted schedule because my stomach was killing me. I had to stop about an hour and a half from home to be sick, and you were happy to sit in your car seat and smile cheerfully and encouragingly at me, which helped. Then about 50 miles from home, you were just so hungry you couldn't stand it any more, so I made it to our exit and stopped to nurse.
Fed you in the corner of a truckstop parking lot while my stomach started raging again and the snow was coming down. I didn't think I was going to make it to the bathroom, so I drove across the parking lot with you in my lap, grabbed you and the diaper bag and rushed into the bathroom. In the plus column, it was a single contained bathroom, but in the minus, there was no changing table. None. But I was too sick to wait, so I had no choice but to put your blanket down on the floor and lay you down. On a truckstop bathroom floor. I know, I know.... Take heart - at least when you have children, I'll not be harping about "putting my grandchildren in that filthy blah, blah, blah," but telling you, "Oh, don't worry about that pacifier - I changed you once on the floor of a truckstop bathroom and you didn't get typhoid!" Got you changed, crouched down and at arm's length because my boots were wet and I was shedding clumps of snow all over the tile floor around you, got back in the car and made it the last few miles home, but in retrospect, it might have been a more peaceful evening if we'd just slept in the parking lot for the night and then kept driving west.
Anyway, we started home from a long weekend in WV, with bad weather looming, and most of the trip went smoothly. I think you were fed up from a disrupted schedule so you didn't nurse much, and I was clearly fed up from a disrupted schedule because my stomach was killing me. I had to stop about an hour and a half from home to be sick, and you were happy to sit in your car seat and smile cheerfully and encouragingly at me, which helped. Then about 50 miles from home, you were just so hungry you couldn't stand it any more, so I made it to our exit and stopped to nurse.
Fed you in the corner of a truckstop parking lot while my stomach started raging again and the snow was coming down. I didn't think I was going to make it to the bathroom, so I drove across the parking lot with you in my lap, grabbed you and the diaper bag and rushed into the bathroom. In the plus column, it was a single contained bathroom, but in the minus, there was no changing table. None. But I was too sick to wait, so I had no choice but to put your blanket down on the floor and lay you down. On a truckstop bathroom floor. I know, I know.... Take heart - at least when you have children, I'll not be harping about "putting my grandchildren in that filthy blah, blah, blah," but telling you, "Oh, don't worry about that pacifier - I changed you once on the floor of a truckstop bathroom and you didn't get typhoid!" Got you changed, crouched down and at arm's length because my boots were wet and I was shedding clumps of snow all over the tile floor around you, got back in the car and made it the last few miles home, but in retrospect, it might have been a more peaceful evening if we'd just slept in the parking lot for the night and then kept driving west.
Monday, February 14, 2011
My New Mother, Google
I have no idea how I could have been a mother without being a librarian. We'd still be trying to get you out of the car seat! There was just so much I didn't know and no one I felt comfortable asking. Besides, I have, and I hope you've not inherited it, a deep-seated dislike to being told what to do. I don't like to let anyone tell me what to do. If I'm making a new soup, I'll find three different recipes and combine them. If I've got something to make, I'll shop around for different ideas and come up with my own take. When I was in college, I didn't research and form a viewpoint on a topic. I formed a viewpoint and then found quotes that agreed with me. Terrible, I know, but it's how I do things. And so, I'm most comfortable with tracking down a whole bunch of viewpoints, sifting through them for bits of common sense, threads of common philosophy, and snippets of research, to come up with an approach.
I really should have kept track of my Google history, because my searches over the last five months - actually over the last seventeen months - detail virtually ever question, dilemma, or irrational fear I've had. We could start in the summer of 2009 with searches about planning for pregnancy, appropriate vitamin supplements and folic acid levels. Then we move into basal body temperature tracking, luteal phase information, and sample charts. (This phase was repeated over and over. No matter how confident I was in my math, the months of September, October, November, and December found me lying in bed late at night constantly counting and subtracting days in my head before getting up to double-check the number of days in the various phases of menstruation with a Google search. I had a calendar and a thermometer within arm's reach for weeks!) Then came days of searching for how early pregnancy can be detected, what first trimester symptoms there might be, and how I might recognize them.
Of course, after I confirmed I was pregnant, I searched for cute ways to tell your grandparents, what to expect at neonatal appointments, and a practice with midwives and a history of noninterference. For most of pregnancy, my searches fall into two categories - planning and panicking. I planned and planned. I searched for lists of questions to ask potential midwives, I researched birth costs and induction rates, I read up on the recommended supplements. And then, mostly late at night, I panicked. Sometimes it was because I had symptoms of something, but sometimes it was because of the near lack of symptoms. What are late-term miscarriage rates? Is my baby moving enough? Can my baby be moving too much? Am I gaining enough weight? What can I do if I'm gaining too much? Hours and hours of searching, reading accounts of strange concerns and even stranger side effects.
And then my due date came....
I really should have kept track of my Google history, because my searches over the last five months - actually over the last seventeen months - detail virtually ever question, dilemma, or irrational fear I've had. We could start in the summer of 2009 with searches about planning for pregnancy, appropriate vitamin supplements and folic acid levels. Then we move into basal body temperature tracking, luteal phase information, and sample charts. (This phase was repeated over and over. No matter how confident I was in my math, the months of September, October, November, and December found me lying in bed late at night constantly counting and subtracting days in my head before getting up to double-check the number of days in the various phases of menstruation with a Google search. I had a calendar and a thermometer within arm's reach for weeks!) Then came days of searching for how early pregnancy can be detected, what first trimester symptoms there might be, and how I might recognize them.
Of course, after I confirmed I was pregnant, I searched for cute ways to tell your grandparents, what to expect at neonatal appointments, and a practice with midwives and a history of noninterference. For most of pregnancy, my searches fall into two categories - planning and panicking. I planned and planned. I searched for lists of questions to ask potential midwives, I researched birth costs and induction rates, I read up on the recommended supplements. And then, mostly late at night, I panicked. Sometimes it was because I had symptoms of something, but sometimes it was because of the near lack of symptoms. What are late-term miscarriage rates? Is my baby moving enough? Can my baby be moving too much? Am I gaining enough weight? What can I do if I'm gaining too much? Hours and hours of searching, reading accounts of strange concerns and even stranger side effects.
And then my due date came....
Tuesday, February 1, 2011
Flotation Device
You are my sunshine. I never knew how true those words were, just thought of "Sunshine" as another nickname or endearment like Peanut or Baby Girl, but I mean that in the purest, truest sense. You are the light in my days. Your little face in the morning, smiling next to mine as you wake up, sopping wet and starving hungry, but smiling anyway, is like the sun peeping over the trees. When I'm paused in my work, looking around as I think something over, your small self, pink-nested next to me, is like the burst of bright light when the clouds shift away. And when you cuddle up next to me at night, take a few pulls on your pacifier and sniff a small, contented sigh, it's the same peaceful closing of the day that sunset offers. I track your presence as devotedly as any sunflower ever tracked the progress of the sun across the sky.
It feels a bit backwards, to be so dependent on you. I like for you to be happy, of course, but even when you're not, your presence offers a purpose, an anchor, that keeps me from drifting off course during my day. Even when you're red-faced and in full voice, most of the time I'm thinking, "Oh, she's experimenting with the new vocal ranges she's discovered!" I'm a bit frightened about how I'll manage this when the day comes that my decisions will make you displeased, but I think that's how it goes with mothering - I'll know the necessity of that decision in the bigger picture while you'll only sense the frustration of it in the moment. Right now, we bob through our days, treading water together, doing our best to keep our heads above water, and I'm never certain who depends most on whom, but I cling tightly to you and somehow, we manage to stay afloat.
Our society seems, at the moment, to value pushing babies away from us at lightning speed. You're born and we commence immediately to push you toward adulthood - we want you to sleep alone, to sit up, to walk, to feed yourself. Maybe this is because I came to all this later, but I'm contented to savor it. I'm pretty sure you'll be feeding yourself before you start kindergarten. No doubt, you'll be sleeping through the night in your own bed before you start high school. You came into the world with a little map all your own, and I don't think we're at the point where I need to be yanking it from your hands, shouting directions and pushing you to get wherever it is you're going faster. The sun finds its way across the sky, and I'm certain that with less guidance from me than I'd like to believe, you will too.
It feels a bit backwards, to be so dependent on you. I like for you to be happy, of course, but even when you're not, your presence offers a purpose, an anchor, that keeps me from drifting off course during my day. Even when you're red-faced and in full voice, most of the time I'm thinking, "Oh, she's experimenting with the new vocal ranges she's discovered!" I'm a bit frightened about how I'll manage this when the day comes that my decisions will make you displeased, but I think that's how it goes with mothering - I'll know the necessity of that decision in the bigger picture while you'll only sense the frustration of it in the moment. Right now, we bob through our days, treading water together, doing our best to keep our heads above water, and I'm never certain who depends most on whom, but I cling tightly to you and somehow, we manage to stay afloat.
Our society seems, at the moment, to value pushing babies away from us at lightning speed. You're born and we commence immediately to push you toward adulthood - we want you to sleep alone, to sit up, to walk, to feed yourself. Maybe this is because I came to all this later, but I'm contented to savor it. I'm pretty sure you'll be feeding yourself before you start kindergarten. No doubt, you'll be sleeping through the night in your own bed before you start high school. You came into the world with a little map all your own, and I don't think we're at the point where I need to be yanking it from your hands, shouting directions and pushing you to get wherever it is you're going faster. The sun finds its way across the sky, and I'm certain that with less guidance from me than I'd like to believe, you will too.
Monday, January 24, 2011
Pink and Sparkly
The last post about the balancing act that is marriage post-baby makes me feel a little bad. I don't want you to have the wrong idea, but in leaving you this record of your early years, I don't want to give you the impression that motherhood is all smiles. While I worry that you might someday read this and feel as if I didn't love you or think I was terrible, I'd rather that than have you find yourself alone someday reading a glossy, smiling account of everything and thinking, "What's wrong with me?! Why can't I manage this? Mom never had these problems." Um, yes she did, and then some.
Now in case you're reading this before you're really able to understand, I want to explain something. You'll probably know by now how it goes with some things in life. A great number of life experiences have fabulous outcomes after lots and lots of work. When you're young, sometimes it can be hard to separate the two - to understand that the work and the outcome depend on each other, but are sort of separate experiences. Like when you have to clean your room or study for a test or save your allowance for weeks to buy a new toy - the cleaning, studying and saving aren't the fun parts (although if you can learn to make them at least moderately enjoyable, things go more easily), but the neat room, the good grade or the new toy are terrific. You are the end result, not the process, and I can be frustrated, taxed and tried by the process but still madly in love with you. Two completely, totally, entirely different things!
As I've mentioned, physically pregnancy wasn't rough, but emotionally, I had more than a few rocky spots. But we got you here, and, when I have good days, I can recognize that I walk a little taller inside knowing that I was able to get you here under my own willpower, without having to have the extra assistance of medication or surgery. And I can also recognize that I've pushed through the difficulty of nursing to an almost inhuman degree.
Nursing might be where things first began to slip a bit.
Now in case you're reading this before you're really able to understand, I want to explain something. You'll probably know by now how it goes with some things in life. A great number of life experiences have fabulous outcomes after lots and lots of work. When you're young, sometimes it can be hard to separate the two - to understand that the work and the outcome depend on each other, but are sort of separate experiences. Like when you have to clean your room or study for a test or save your allowance for weeks to buy a new toy - the cleaning, studying and saving aren't the fun parts (although if you can learn to make them at least moderately enjoyable, things go more easily), but the neat room, the good grade or the new toy are terrific. You are the end result, not the process, and I can be frustrated, taxed and tried by the process but still madly in love with you. Two completely, totally, entirely different things!
As I've mentioned, physically pregnancy wasn't rough, but emotionally, I had more than a few rocky spots. But we got you here, and, when I have good days, I can recognize that I walk a little taller inside knowing that I was able to get you here under my own willpower, without having to have the extra assistance of medication or surgery. And I can also recognize that I've pushed through the difficulty of nursing to an almost inhuman degree.
Nursing might be where things first began to slip a bit.
Friday, January 7, 2011
Seesaw
You hear a great deal about how children change marriages. This, I believe, is inaccurate. Children do not change marriages, but rather bring a new level of awareness. They change your awareness of your marriage or your role in it.
Your dad and I have a pretty stable relationship. If you think of relationships as a seesaw, some people are at opposite ends, as far as they can get from each other. These work, of course, but because if their distance from the fulcrum, it can take a little more work to keep things balanced. Your dad and I are both pretty near the center, so historically, it's taken a lot for us to get unbalanced. We're so close to each other in terms of work, interests, outlook, etc., that we're like two people scooted right up to the center of the seesaw. If you ever try this, you'll see just how hard it is to shake things up!
And that was always important to me. I grew up in a culture that really values men and male contributions. I would like to think that you're reading this some distant day in the future and thinking, "Huh? What was that like?" but I'm not that optimistic.... It's getting better - when your grandma had me, she was told by her employer, "I don't hire pregnant women. If I can give your job away while you're on maternity leave, I will." So she only took eleven days off. That sort of thing would be a lawsuit today, but even so, when I was growing up, there was a real imbalance. The men in our family made the big decisions, even about things they didn't necessarily know as much about as the women. They sat down at the dinner table and waited to be served. When dinner was over, they went to the living room to lie down and talk while the women cleaned up. Women could be talking and one of the men would decide they had something to say, interrupt and just change the direction of the conversation. Your grandma and great-grandma took us shopping, weeded out our clothes, picked up birthday gifts for our friends, and just generally made our lives run smoothly.
Still, early on, I realized that there was an equation and that I was on the wrong side of it.
Your dad and I have a pretty stable relationship. If you think of relationships as a seesaw, some people are at opposite ends, as far as they can get from each other. These work, of course, but because if their distance from the fulcrum, it can take a little more work to keep things balanced. Your dad and I are both pretty near the center, so historically, it's taken a lot for us to get unbalanced. We're so close to each other in terms of work, interests, outlook, etc., that we're like two people scooted right up to the center of the seesaw. If you ever try this, you'll see just how hard it is to shake things up!
And that was always important to me. I grew up in a culture that really values men and male contributions. I would like to think that you're reading this some distant day in the future and thinking, "Huh? What was that like?" but I'm not that optimistic.... It's getting better - when your grandma had me, she was told by her employer, "I don't hire pregnant women. If I can give your job away while you're on maternity leave, I will." So she only took eleven days off. That sort of thing would be a lawsuit today, but even so, when I was growing up, there was a real imbalance. The men in our family made the big decisions, even about things they didn't necessarily know as much about as the women. They sat down at the dinner table and waited to be served. When dinner was over, they went to the living room to lie down and talk while the women cleaned up. Women could be talking and one of the men would decide they had something to say, interrupt and just change the direction of the conversation. Your grandma and great-grandma took us shopping, weeded out our clothes, picked up birthday gifts for our friends, and just generally made our lives run smoothly.
Still, early on, I realized that there was an equation and that I was on the wrong side of it.
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