Burnpoetry: A Writer's Attempt to Write

(*Author’s note: this is not an advice column.  If one more person offers me unsolicited parenting advice that is not directly related to me, I’m probably going to kiss my son on the head, apologize to my wife, and commit some kind of felonious crime in a misguided act of retaliation.  I don’t know what I’m doing any better than anyone else does.  However, the “you” I’m talking to here, is anyone that is a parent, has a strange sense of humor, and can identify with any of the skewed views that I have.  I last checked in with readers in this post at the 9 month mark.)

-  That tired thing?  It’ll keep happening.  Even when he “sleeps in” until 6.  Even when your wife lets you sleep in until 9 on the weekends.  Sometimes you’ll sleep so hard that your dreams have dreams of dreaming.  You’ll crash land into bed, with landing gear not fully extended, and end up in a pile of human rubble.  Limbs, arms, sheets, all tangled up together like some mutant boa constrictor.  It will feel immensely gratifying to finally be laying down with the one that you love for a few minutes of complete, languid, relaxation.

You’ll turn on the second half of the West Coast NBA Playoffs game, vowing that this time you’ll make it all the way to the end.  Then from within the tiny speakers of the baby monitor you’ll hear the chilling noise of stirring; a soft whimpering that reminds you, maybe you better get the hell to sleep while you still can, Daddy.  After saying a quick apology to Steph Curry and the Golden State Warriors, you close your eyes and are asleep before the 3^rd Buick ad featuring Shaq.  (*Author’s note: they average about one Shaq-Buick commercial per 30 seconds, as a reference point.)

-  I’ve learned to be careful around my baby’s teeth.  My son has two adorable mini-teeth that have come up on the bottom.  Poking out like two tiny white monuments to his growing-up, they sprouted fully a month or two ago from his bottom gum.  Since my son joyfully puts everything he can grasp into his mouth, he used to happily toss Daddy’s fingers into the mix.  Being the fool that I am I assumed that those mini-teeth were probably just for show and had not real functionality.  Why not, I thought, let the little guy have his fun.  He latched onto my finger like a reverse Dracula, digging his bottom teeth into my finger and latching on like a grinning, cute, viper.  Baby teeth aren’t just for show, apparently.  (*Author’s note: I can’t believe it took me 10 months to learn that, either.)

-  I’ve learned that few things can prepare you for how excited you get watching your child learn how to walk.  Watching his tiny legs instinctually drive him forward while you guide him by his tight-gripping hands, laughing hysterically as he figures out how far to stride and how high to lift his little knees.  It will remind you a good deal of “The Ministry of Silly Walks” skit from Monty Python.

-  I’ve learned that few things can be as terrifying as watching your child learn to walk.  Suddenly here they are, this once safely immobile/slow-moving bundle of happiness, recklessly hauling their miniature frames around the house, heedless of edges and corners and bad footing.  Wildly happy to be breaking free from their hands and knees and carpet-scenery they fearlessly launch into gigantic strides and too-fast pacing.

-  I’ve learned that your child’s impeding mobility will have a profound effect on your feelings of safety.  Suddenly the safety precautions of your home don’t seem like enough.  We’ve purchased two baby gates.  I feel like we need roughly 47 more.  I want baby gates inside of baby gates inside of padding inside of bubble wrap.  And that’s just for the kitchen.

My Ideal kitchen set up. . .

-  I’ve learned that my child needs a bath after nearly every meal.  Eschewing the spoon-fed days of his youth, my independent-minded child wants it to be known that he is calling the plastic –dinner-table shots.  Two-fisting peas, inhaling bananas, attempting to lay claim to the world-speed-eating record for peaches (*Author’s note: in the under 10-month-old division, of course) it sometimes seems as though he has 3 hands and they’re all improbably full of food.  So is his mouth.  So is his chair.  So is his hair.  Twisting joyfully, babbling a tune that only he knows, he smashes beans across his face and gleefully squishes the juice from a pear chunk; painting a masterpiece with hot dogs, spilled juice, and little hands.

-  I’ve learned that expanding your bath-night repertoire to include some other B’s besides just the Beastie Boys is a good thing.  Say hello to Bob Marley, the Bee Gees and “Big Willy Style”, my son.

-  I’ve learned that teaching my son to play a scaled back version of catch is my new favorite thing.  Each time I bounce him the ball and he dives onto it, gripping it between his tiny hands and pulling it up to proudly display for me to see, I can’t help but feel a flood of fierce fatherly pride and a spinning dizziness at how far we’ve come in 10 months.

-  I’ve learned that going a month between doctor’s appointments after a winter of spending far too much time in waiting rooms and under white examination lights is worthy of a nearly-arm-shattering fist pump.

-  I’ve learned that if there is anything on the carpet my son will find it.  He will put it in his mouth.  And he will chew on it.

-  I’ve learned that, when pushed to it, I have the reflexes of a mongoose; leaping from my couch-bound lethargy with puma-like speed and laying out into a Sportscenter Top 10 dive onto the carpet. . .and I still don’t move fast enough to keep all the crud that he finds so appealing out of his mouth.

I’ll risk another bite-wound, probing his mouth in the hopes of pulling out whatever snack he’s decided to latch onto.  Sometimes I find it.  Sometimes he keeps chewing.

-  I’ve learned that watching our child bring happiness to those around him is indescribably joyful.  Redundant?  Perhaps, but I simply have no other words for it.  There is a kind of glow that a 10-month-old baby projects, a light.  It comes from their smile, from their uncontrollable belly laughs that shake their whole tiny frame.  It comes from their little limbs and little hearts and turns into something that’s really quite large.  It mirrors the joys of the world that you love so much and it encapsulates the love that created such a wonderful being.  That light isn’t just yours for the basking, either.  It touches anyone around them, be it Grandparents or cousins or aunts or neighbors or a cashier checking your groceries who just wants to see a shy little smile from within the folds of a car-seated blanket.

-  I’ve learned that watching your child interact with relatives can bring about a feeling of fullness.  Contentedness.  It can bring warmth to a place that certainly wasn’t cold to begin with but that, suddenly, is packed to the brim.  Seeing him laugh and play, kiss and hug, brings on an unheeded upswell in euphoria that now makes you realize just what, for all those years, your parents were talking about.

-  I’ve learned that 10 months comes and goes.  Carried away in the ticking of the clock and the swinging of the pendulum.  But I’ve learned that nothing is more important than the here and now.  A moment with your child is truly the moment.  That each new step, literal and figurative, opens another part of your heart that you didn’t even know was there.  That each day of each month adds up, brick by glorious brick, mortared together with tickled bellies and snatch-kissing toes, and games of family peek-a-boo that stretch dusk into evening and evening into starry spring nights.

-  I’ve learned so much in 10 months.  And I’ve learned so much in 10 months and two days.  And so my education will continue.  An unwritten sonnet or adventurer’s tale.

-  I’ve learned to be thankful for the beauty of a frozen moment, oh yes.  But I’ve also learned to be excited about those blank pages of the future that stare back at my family and I, practically begging for some ink. . .

FIN