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.