baby's first word

baby's first natto

Well, he is his father's son.

kidfest

Oh, the lure of swag.

What parent wouldn't brave thousands of square feet of fluorescent-lit warehouse crammed full of random vendors & hawkers, inflatable jump rooms, hyper kindergartners, and parents with neck tattoos just to get some free shit?

We watched a juggler in a sparkly vest, we visited an underwhelming baby section that featured a couple of deflated beach balls and some multi-colored cushion mats, we missed the Irish Dancers by mere seconds, and watched a lady in striped pants give a superbly condescending presentation on dog safety while her dog sidekick slept. We marveled at the long line of people waiting to get into the "grocery area" where it looked like they were getting free samples of Froot Loops and string cheese. Hey, times are tough.

Auden had the most fun at a "book nook" booth that had been deserted, running through the green curtains again and again, squealing with pleasure. Oh, and the baby goat was pretty cute, too.

Here's me with the kid:



And here's the kid with a kid:



I'm not sure what we came away with... some coupons and a squishy frisbee, I think. And some cute diaper covers that were cheaper than the Thirsties I was just about to order.

I kept thinking, surely there's something cool -- let's just look over there! no, over there! maybe there? -- until I accepted that it was just a big advertisement and that the wires running to the stages were more appealing to my child than any of the performances.

Okay, here's looking forward to Kidfest 2010!

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bargain

For sale: my soul.

Asking: a decent night's sleep, OBO.

For: the love of all that is good and merciful.

I keep saying that I have Reached My Limit with this fractured, erratic, nightly scream-fest of baby sleep pattern (er, not-sleep, not-pattern?)... but a limit is a choice, and I keep pushing the limit further out because to do otherwise would end in a clinical diagnosis. Of the Crazies.

So! We keep plugging ahead! Marching into a new day with irrepressible hope! He has to sleep someday, right? Right!

Let's hear some of your favorite sleep (or not-sleep) stories.

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spring, cleaning

I know the seasons are changing because the angle of the sun is different and is suddenly illuminating areas of the house that have been all but forgotten during the winter darkness.

Spring cleaning takes hold of me with unpredictable and non-negotiable urgency. There are things that I had until yesterday been perfectly content to look over, like the spackle of unidentifiable liquid on the refrigerator handle and the fine layer of fur on the bathroom floor, but today we have reached critical mass. Auden brought forth a dust bunny from behind the bedroom door that not only had fangs but was also rabid. Note to self: schedule routine tetanus shot.

So this morning I attacked the most offensive areas: I realized that the cabinets in the pantry, whose charming original brass fixtures are relievedly not painted over, are not in fact supposed to be speckled. They are just spectacularly dirty. Ditto the glass in the front door. While I admit the diffuse light that came through the film of grime was sort of romantic, it is decidedly better to be able to see out the window. There are robins and other spring-like things out there.

I also sorted through the detritus atop our dresser. Stuff just accumulates there... spit clothes, books, earrings, toys, shoes, small knives. Incidentally, have you ever found yourself walking around the house with a bulb syringe, a spatula, a book, a dirty diaper, and a pair of sunglasses? You fully intend to put them all in their rightful places, but then something happens and they end up in a different but equally random places? (See also: You Know You're a Parent When You Catch Yourself Picking Crumbs Out of Your Child's Neck and Absentmindedly Eating Them.)

Well. I was properly seized by the tidy bug, and now there is a semblance of order round the house.

Now if only the weather would cooperate.

one year, in pictures

one year, in words

Auden, my darling son.

You are a year old today, a length of time that is as meaningful as it is arbitrary.

We like it when things come full circle; we like to point at a map and say, I was here.

And so I was. We were. A year ago I was entreating you to come out, so exhausted of sleeping on my side, and of heartburn, and of the hugeness of you inside me. I promised you lots of kicking room, I ate spicy food, I cried. And then, when you were ready, you came, and you became our son.

I had a dream a long time ago about you, except in that dream your name was Bella and you were also my lover. The telling seems perverse, but I must have known somehow that my love for you would be that fierce, so intimate and raw and consuming.

We are creatures: in the most primal acts we discover our capacity for the divine. In those early days after you were born, I smelled like blood and you smelled like blood and we were irrevocably linked, my body still your home and your body finding equilibrium among the light and the dry air.

Over these months the seed of you has sprouted -- your personality is unmistakable -- and as much as I try to teach you about words and sleeping and what not to touch, it is you teaching me how to unfold, be patient, stay open to new growth.

Sometimes I worry that I am not enjoying you enough, the way you are at this very moment, because every moment is changing. My heart aches and I can't bear to think of you as a toddler, as a teenager, as a grown man with a baby of your own. I told you all of this when you were seven months old, back when that seemed like eons since those huge bleary incomparable days of your newborn-ness.

And so I want to preserve it all, like every parent does, in words and pictures and force of will, the feeling of you being my son. The things I love:

The very boy-shape of your head, the way you point and ask "ah? ah?" and I know what you mean, the way you are thrilled with yourself for learning to blow your whistle, the way you love books now and wait for the tiger pages so you can growl, the way you are too busy to eat in your chair and so take your food on the run like a pint-sized marathoner, the pursed-lip face of concentration you get when you're screwing the cap on and off, on and off, on and off the water bottle, the way you insist on still biting my chin with affection (even though now you have teeth).

Last week you even slept through the night, three nights in a row, all on your own. I really love that.

In this past year I haven't been able to finish a book, or a painting, or most of my sentences half the time. I have felt panicked, delirious, wise, giddy, angry, and damn strong -- often in the same day. I have felt debilitated by the exhaustion, and the weight of being your non-stop everything. I have felt resentful of the marionette strings of domesticity, I have felt constricted by your nap schedule (or lack thereof), I have felt unfairly wrenched out of my former life as a book-finishing, painting-finishing, out-to-dinner going, lazy-Sunday-morning-breakfast-eating, witty-conversation-having, quiet-observing non-parent.

You changed everything.

I traded all those things for the unalloyed pleasure of silky baby skin, staggering-drunk-zombie baby walk, exquisite staccato baby laugh, the inquisitive impatient wiggling goofy gorgeous go-go-go of YOU.

So I celebrate your first year, and my having survived it. Happy Birthday, sweetness.

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