Nov
6
It sounds horrible to admit now, but when I was pregnant with Dylan one of the many emotions swirling around in my head at that 20-week ultrasound was disappointment that we were having another boy. Part of it was that just like when I was pregnant with Riley, we’d come up with names and vague half-formed imagined babyhoods for both sexes, and putting one entire (non-existant, but still) persona to rest was oddly difficult — a wistful strange feeling of saying goodbye to someone who was never there in the first place. With my first pregnancy, her name was Madeline; with my second, it was Audrey.
I’ve never longed for a daughter, and in fact there are many aspects to raising girls that terrify the living shit out of me, but I think this last time around I was feeling let down because I thought having another boy would be like giving birth to Riley all over again. I had this misguided idea that everything would be exactly the same, which isn’t to say I didn’t want another Riley, but I — oh, it’s hard to explain. Like if you had some wonderful rich meal from this exotic, exciting menu, and it was delicious and filling and fantastic, and you went back to the same restaurant the next day and, you know, wouldn’t you want to try something different this time to more fully round out your gustatory experience?
Hmm. Note to self: work on metaphors.
Anyway, obviously that was totally naive. Right from the getgo it’s been obvious that Dylan is no Riley clone, he’s absolutely his own personality, as complex and delicious as something from the flipside of that bad-metaphor-menu. We would have loved a girl just as much, but it’s impossible to comprehend, now — the notion that Dylan might not have been Dylan. I’m not religious and not normally much of a woo-woo believer in fate or destiny but man, it’s hard for me to think that our kids are the product of this capricious life path, one that could have so easily veered in any other direction. Even a single confused sperm (“Um, has anyone seen the corona radiata? My GPS is all fucked up, here”) and the picture could be completely different, I suppose, but my brain cannot wrap itself around that concept. It’s like trying to think of infinity. Or Helena Bonham Carter’s fashion choices.
All that said — my glorious status as mother of two boys acknowledged with gratitude and love — I can’t help sometimes thinking that I sure do have to deal with a lot of penis these days. Remember Mr. Brown in Reservoir Dogs? “I’m talking morning, day, night, afternoon, dick, dick, dick, dick, dick, dick, dick, dick, dick.” Diaper changes, baths, getting dressed: it’s a veritable Vienna sausage party around here. SO MUCH TINY PENIS, ALL THE TIME WITH THE PENIS.
And men, I’m sorry, but I don’t know how you take that thing seriously.
Nov
5
Sometimes when I’m making Riley do something he doesn’t want to do, he starts wailing for JB. “Daaaaaaaaaddyyyyyyyy,” he snivels in his best skull-rupturing whine as I force him to endure some mighty injustice, such as having his butt wiped. YOUR DADDY CAN’T SAVE YOU NOW, I think evilly, but I just count to ten and remind Riley that Daddy’s at work, where presumably he is not being required to remove poop from anyone’s rectum, the lucky bastard.
He does the same thing to JB. “MOMMMMMMY,” he’ll howl from his bedroom, where he’s being marched at gunpoint into his pajamas. If I’m within eyesight, he’ll reach his arms out to me beseechingly, his great liquid brown eyes Bambi-like in their sorrow. It’s sort of annoying/funny how he seems to think the parent who isn’t in the midst of the unrewarding activity might just swoop in and put an end to it — he has yet to learn that JB and I are mostly a unified, heartless team when it comes to discipline, and neither of us can be swayed by piteous moans, calls for help, or haddock-like thrashing.
The playing field is fairly even these days, when it comes to Riley’s affections. Sometimes he wants his dad, sometimes he wants his mom; most of the time he’s happiest when we’re both around. He likes to test our individual boundaries (ie, when JB tells Riley no, he’ll turn to me and tattle: “Mommy, Daddy said I can’t haaaave that,” clearly hoping I’ll overrule the decision), but overall he doesn’t seem to prefer one parent’s company over the other’s.
It is nothing like it used to be, and that situation improved so gradually I only recently realized how different things really are. I can’t tell you how awful some of those moments were, and for everyone who gently reminded me that it was a stage, thank you. You were right. It may be uneven again in the future, or maybe we’ll go through a rejection/preference period with Dylan, but I’ll try and remember that nothing is permanent. Everything is always, always changing.
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