Apr
8
Monster babies
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A few years ago when Riley was still a very small baby we visited some friends who had an older child, maybe a year or eighteen months old, and I remember looking at what appeared to be a giant infant hefted in the mother’s arms and thinking, I hope Riley doesn’t look like THAT when he gets bigger. Like some kind of weird MONSTER BABY, all enormous and able to walk but still, like, slobbering and not talking and stuff. UNNATURAL.
Of course that’s exactly what happened to him and I didn’t think he looked weird at all, he was adorable. Aw, who’s a little man? WHO IS? YOU are! Etc.
Now Dylan’s in the Monster Baby stage and I happen to think he’s pretty cute too, but I’m leaning back toward my original stance that this age is completely unnatural. It’s just not right that a child can be so large and mobile but still practically a fetus. In my opinion, children should remain small mostly unmoving blobs until they reach a more stable state of cognitive development, because this business of being able to RUN AROUND with a brain primarily formed of suicidal Silly Putty is ridiculous.
For instance, I cannot keep Dylan from eating random pieces of filth off the floor. No matter how much I vacuum, he toddles around scanning the floor like the Terminator in order to locate the one solitary pine needle I missed and in the time it takes me to lunge at him yelling Nooooooooooooooo he gets it crammed in his mouth and begins the process of choking on it.
“Kaaaaack,” he says, his face awash in total dismay, “Kaaack! Kaaaaaack!” I sweep it off his tongue, we both take a breather, maybe weep a little bit—then he’s off to find . . . ANOTHER FUCKING PINE NEEDLE.
It’s also stupidly frustrating to me that I can’t talk with Dylan. I mean, it’s not like I think he should be capable of carrying out conversations at 14 months old, it’s just that it’s hard for me to switch gears all day long between one child who can explain he’s feeling sad because his blanket is in the laundry and another whose eardrum-shattering screams must be analyzed and a best guess hazarded. It’s not much different from dealing with a baby—”Are you hungry? Tired? Bored? WHAT OMG WHAT IS IT”—but, you know, it IS, if only because a toddler can make so much more noise when they’re pissed off. Plus, they can follow you around the house, howling like tiny wolves.
I feel like this is one of the hardest ages in terms of connecting with my own child. He’s unpredictable; he’s filled with fleeting, terrifying rages; he requires so much intervention it sometimes feels like all I do is make him upset as I pry him away from various unwanted activities. I often feel at a total loss for how to communicate with him, like I’m trying to talk to someone behind a thick wall of glass. Hello, hello? Am I getting through, here? No way to know. I get kisses one minute, wild kicks the next. He loves me, he loves me not.
Still, there is nothing like a young child experiencing everything for the first time. The sweet shock of smelling a richly-scented flower, the startled joy of seeing a bird at the feeder. To be with him right now is to have a chance to see the world through fresh eyes, and even Riley—hurtling through life at breakneck speed—often slows down to join his brother. We all stop for a moment to marvel at a soap bubble, point at a trundling beetle, smile at the descending bounces of a rubber ball on a wooden floor.
(Oh, and don’t forget the PINE NEEDLES. Those things are FASCINATING.)
The Monster Baby stage is difficult for sure, but for all the bad moments, the good ones are like sunshine. I will never stop being amazed at how parenthood swings on and on and on, highs and lows, a new view every day, everything balancing out in ways words can’t even explain.
Apr
6
Parenting poetry: Dylan edition
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For Dylan at 14 months.
Consistently
when prompted
you tilt your little flower face up to offer a kiss
to the stuffed lion puppet.
But you will rarely
kiss me
in the same way.
What
the hell, kid?
The stuffed lion puppet
did not have its abdomen sliced open with a meat cleaver
so that you could make your entrance
into the world.
A little gratitude
please.
:::
You bitched and moaned
so mightily
over the small blue broom
I finally said fuck it
and gave it to you.
Now you push it all over the house
making swirls of dirt and dog hair
stopping only
to point accusingly at the
tall
YELLOW
broom
kept in the utility room for the express purpose of killing spiders
and scream, scream, scream at the unfairness
of it all.
:::
When you first
bapped your little hands together
in the sign for “more”
I thought oh!
He is a prodigy.
But now that I’ve seen how you
so eagerly throw yourself backwards
in order to smash your skull on the
nearest hard surface
I am a little worried
about your future
test scores.
:::
So tell me
if I took this Eggo waffle
and wiped it on the floor
collecting a repulsive mix of
pine needles, filth, and animal hair
would you
eat it
THEN?
:::
They say do unto others
as you would have them
do unto you
and frankly
the notion of
someone squirming their fingers
into my armpits and
wiggling them around
while I shrieked with hysterical
uncontrollable
laughter
sounds really really
unpleasant.
But that doesn’t mean
I am going to stop
doing it
unto
to you.
:::
I love the heft of your warm body
your outflung hands
your curious glances
but seriously, kid.
Could you do me a solid
and hang on when I carry you?
Consider the
koala
or perhaps the
tree frog.
Both fine examples
of the methodology I would prefer
that you employ
instead of this business
that involves my left arm
falling
the
fuck
OFF.
:::
I remember your brother
at eighteen months
how he screamed and pitched tantrums and was
generally
a spot of bother
as they say.
You appear
to have reached this stage
a full four months
early.
Hooray!
Gold star
for YOU.
:::
Here we are
all of us
in the bath together.
I treasure these silly, splashy
moments.
Even if you are curiously grabbing
my nipple
while your father joyously yells
TUNE IN TOKYO! TUNE IN TOKYO!
:::
Oh my god!
Oh my god!
Did you hurt yourself?
What is the matter
is there
blood?
Why
why
why are you shrieking like that?
What—
oh.
Oh, I see.
Your ball has
rolled under the couch.
Sure, I guess I can get that for you.
Just let me
take a minute
to ride out the palpitations
while shooting you the double eagle salute
first.
:::
I don’t know if I’ve ever
seen anything quite so awesome
as you dancing
(spinning in circles)
(doing knee bends)
to Eminem’s “Crack a Bottle”
Uh oh uh oh
bitches hoppin in my Tahoe
:::
You can say
ball
Dada
Mama
dog
kittycat.
You can walk, run, climb
and play peekaboo.
You are growing so fast,
sniglet
but on the issue of
getting yourself trapped between the couch and the side table
and sitting there bonking your head and wailing in frustration
let’s be honest
there hasn’t really been any
improvement
in months.
:::
At bedtime
you used to fit in the
crook of my arm
Now your body sprawls
from my shoulder
to my knees
and soon
we won’t sit
in a rocking chair
any more.
But for now we are here
you and I
in this
chair
in this
moment.
Shhhhhhhh.
The room is dark
the room is quiet
and we are
here.
:::
(Previous Parenting Poetry from the Spleen entries here.)
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