Tonight we were sitting on the couch; Saint Aardvark and I eating a delicious dinner of 3Cs (Chili! Cheese! Chips!) and Trombone between us. Trombone was alternating playing with a maraca from Cuba, an old remote control and a duck rattle with teethable wings. Suddenly he leaned to his left, towards me, and began to hoist himself up to standing, using my shoulder and (ow!) rib-flesh as handles.
“Heh heh heh ha!” he chortled, his two bottom teeth gleaming. He did a little dance and plopped back down.
Trombone is not a laugh-y baby. I have met babies who are eternally amused by the world, who laugh if you look at them, poke their tummies, tickle their feet. Trombone – so far – is more like me, in that he stares a lot, smiles a lot and occasionally laughs uncontrollably. In recent weeks he has been more easily amused; if you fly him in the air like a plane, he giggles; if you rub his tummy on your head (watch his hands they’re gonna grab your OW! HAIR!) he giggles; today when I danced around the kitchen with pants on my head, well, he giggled. As would anyone, I like to think. But this evening was the first time he ever laughed at himself, at something he did, with self-awareness and the pride that accompanies it.
And oh, the baby laugh. It’s like being in a room full of helium and cupcakes. It makes my soul ache. And zap
just like that
– all the months of aches and pains
– sweating with 40 extra lbs in the hot hot spring
– labour
– hospital food
– well-meaning public health personnel
– the screaming
– the crying
– the fussing
– the whining
– the despair
– lately, the pinching
– the behavior that makes no sense
all vanishes.
My brain says, “Oh. What a lovely, lovely baby. Look how he sits up and watches you and passes toys from hand to hand and smiles and laughs at his own accomplishments. And so beautiful. Fuzzy soft hair. Round peach cheeks.”
And then my brain says, “HOLD UP. You told me to watch out for this. You said, Hmm, I wonder why so many people have their children 18 months apart? I wonder if it’s because of hormones or lack of birth control or on purpose to space them just so or if something WEIRD happens to people 9 months post partum and they start to think it might be a good idea to do it again. You said, I should watch out for this when I am 9 months post partum. Because I am SURE I will not want to do it again, not so soon. It took me 30 years to convince myself to do it once. 9 months is obviously not long enough to convince myself to do it a second time. So hi. Just letting you know I’m still paying attention over here.”
There are as many reasons to have one’s children 18 months apart as there are beautiful blades of grass in a glistening soccer field. But as a person to whom none of the other reasons apply, I am telling you; the biologically-induced amnesia is a tricky son of a bitch. Even up until 2 weeks ago I could not fathom why anyone would ever have more than one child. I could still smell that hospital meatloaf. I didn’t feel like my head had crested the water long enough to take a meaningful breath of air in, oh, about a year. Every once in a while I would do a quick self-check. Self? I would say, Is this baby miraculous enough to make you forget what a pain in the ass he is yet? And my self would cackle and curl up into the shape of a comma and wait for the next question.
It’s not that Self doesn’t think the baby is awesome. No no no. Self loves the baby. Self even likes the baby a lot of the time. But the scales hadn’t quite balanced. There had not been enough happyfantastic to outweigh the crankycraptastic. Sometime in the past 2 weeks, that changed.
Luckily, I write everything down – especially when I’m sad and / or angry – and have an accurate record of the past 7.5 months to hold up for my brain’s examination. You will not get the best of me, o trickster biology. I am keeping my pants on and remaining vigilent throughout the next several months. And if any of you hears me swooning Oh, I miss my TEENY WITTLE BABYKINS please feel free to belt me soundly about the head.
OK but also? Unstoppably cute:
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