Friday, November 11, 2005

Let Down....


I'm well, thanks to all of you who've noted my absence here and elsewhere.... certainly busier after the first couple or three weeks when kind folks brought by some dinners and came by to help.

Back on my own and My Beloved Mister gone seven days a week working, the babe (and the dog) claim my heart, my hands, and pretty much all my time. And patience. Bert the dog is genuinely trying my patience, the lion's share of which is all funneled in a different direction-- guess which? And I'm afraid to share that with the Mister as he says things like, "Dog for sale?" And I get a huge lump in my throat.


I actually did have lunch w/ a friend the other day. Out. Only the second time since giving birth I've done that. Said friend is childless and couple decades older. A lovely and dear woman, she's been true blue; I bored and horrified her, I think, because she asked, "What are you doing besides the baby?" and I said, "Not much."

He's only six weeks old, I wanted to say. And only small so short a time..... But I didn't because she'd moved on to commenting on another mama chum who breastfeeds on demand, doesn't make the baby adhere to a schedule, and won't let her child "cry it out." And all I could say was, "Me, too. My heart tells me.... and Studies show....."


I know now what an anomaly I've been all these many years when I was childless and most of my girlfriends, and ALL the closest ones including my sister had babies and I hung with them not occasionally but regularly, and in fact, helped them raise their children with whatever time and skills I possessed when needed. I welcomed being part of the Village. The Hands On Village, that is. I see now that the speed of my life with my more recent pals who have not children is odd. Er, I mean to say, we all must recalibrate. Sort of like when I quit drinking all those years ago and most everybody else stuck with it.

And so it goes.


Our Ziggy is gorgeous and thriving and I think both his father and I are stunned by the purity and ferocity with which we love him, and how endlessly fascinating we find him. It's every bit worth the sleep deprivation and the craziness and the fibromyalgia flare up due to such a radical loss of rest. Ziggy smiles and the world is new all over again. Such an act of faith to bring a child into this world....

He'll be seven weeks old Sunday and at last check, was up to 13 1/2 pounds, 24 inches long.


Since Ziggy's birth, his Daddy turned 42, we celebrated our three year anniversary of marriage and our four year anniversary as a couple, Maggie the mini van has been worked on as has Ziggy's great grandfather's Lumina sedan (now being driven by My Beloved Mister). We've had long helpful visits from Diggy (my mother) three times. My brother and wife were in from Boston, then My Mister's folks came down for a spate of days.

The leaves turned all gold and crimson and the weather stayed mostly warm.


We're off to Michigan for a few days over Thanksgiving with the Mister's clan (including Aunt Ingrid and her man, in from London!), and I've already done a couple trips across the plateau to East Tennessee to see family, the first one coming within a day of being proclaimed well enough to drive (two weeks ago, I think). I'm healing somewhat slowly, but am mostly happy, and a little bit cagey, surfing the learning curve, learning how to be ever more present for someone else.

Some moments I want to cry with both open hearted wonder and this hard mean little anger that catches me wildly off guard.

Of course, that could have something to do with being way more into the Halloween candy than anyone in their right mind ought. Especially me.


The babe is now sleeping in the Baby Bjorn after one of our twilit walks with Bert. We await the Mister's homecoming.

This may well be the most I've written in weeks..... and now my milk's letting down, so off go I.

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