This will be a weird post for me because, well, it just has to be. I’M weird right now. There’s a mess of emotions circling each other in my gut and I’m not really sure what my head thinks of any of them.
It’s the Bean, my little Bean, my precious, special, beautiful Bean that’s got me all tied up in knots.
Every thing that kid does makes me smile, even when he’s being a little shit (which luckily, isn’t very often), and even when I’M being a little shit (which happens much more frequently). It’s such a joy to watch him on his path and to be a part of it all. He’s got Personality Plus, my kid, and it’s a wonderful thing to watch.
He’s recently become even more generous with his hugs and kisses, and I can’t put into words the feeling I get when this perfect little man walks right to me, arms outstretched, or grabs me by the ears and pulls my face to his wide open mouth to plant a slobbery smack on me.
Maybe a better writer could explain it, maybe there ARE actually words for it somewhere, but if there are they elude me completely.
Last night he was just out of his bath, running around the house naked, playing with his dinosaur toys and grocery cart – and as he hobbled down the hallway it suddenly hit me that he no longer has the body of a baby. His torso is long, his face has thinned out a little, his hands and feet have lost some of their chubbiness and look more and more like his dad’s. The child we once lovingly called “Patches” now has a full head of long, thick curls.
His mind works less like that of a baby, too. His play is more deliberate. He’s more reflective. He even gave me his first complete sentence a couple of weeks ago – on the playground, just freed from his stroller shackles, “I don’t know” was his answer when I asked him just where he thought he was going.
My heart stopped then, as it’s stopped a thousand times over the past 20 months.
Of course there are still elements of baby — diapers, babble, chewed crayons – but they’re fewer and farther between now, and every day he seems to shed another layer.
My head is spinning.
I don’t come around to change easily. It takes me a LONG time to settle into a routine and even longer to truly embrace something new. Always has. Sometimes my reluctance works to my advantage (see: Marriage). Often it holds me back. Either way, my fear of change has never, well… changed.
But parenthood doesn’t give you TIME to come around to something new. You’re thrown in to deeper, darker, more scary waters every day, without warning, without any time to prepare yourself for the stronger current or the dangers that might be lurking beneath.
The first few weeks after the Bean was born were AWFUL for me. I was completely overwhelmed by this monumental change to my life, the Bean was just this unknown, needy blob that I was suddenly a slave to, I was whacked out with hormones and lack of sleep and even a touch of post-partum. Then the colic. Oh, the colic. For about a week, I wanted my old life back more than I’ve ever wanted anything before.
But around six weeks, everything changed. Suddenly we had smiles, we had laughs, we had a HAPPY BABY. He loved people, he loved LIFE, and you could tell. And we were in love with him.
It’s just gotten better and better since that day.
Still, I have these moments. Moments like the one I’m in now, where I see it all slipping away. It’s so fleeting, all of it, and I just want time to stop and LET ME CATCH UP, DAMMIT.
He was born and in the blink of an eye he had his first tooth.