To be perfectly honest, I've been on the couch since 7:30. I've gotten up to pee once, and I've gotten up to put a DVD in once. I can get away with this because my husband is at work until midnight. On nights when he works, I can do whatever I want. I spent the evening laying on the couch. I ate a dinner that was part mac and cheese, part pasta and tomatoes (there weren't enough of either to make a full meal, so I alternated between the two), with some palate cleansing Thin Mints in between. I watched the movie Wonder Boys since I finished reading the book on Wednesday, in anticipation of Book Club. Then I fucked around on the internet some and halfway watched "Florida's Top 10 Beaches" on the Travel Channel. Now I'm watching Most Haunted on the Travel Channel and wondering why British people are so much better at sounding ominous than Americans. I think both of these shows are idiotic*, but I'm watching them, fucking around on the internet some more, and decidedly not done any of the simple tasks my husband has requested that I do. He's asked me to wash some socks for him and iron a shirt and two ties.
What I've failed to mention so far is that I walked in the door at 12:20 this afternoon and saw my husband sitting on the couch in a t-shirt and boxers staring catatonically at the blank, silent television. Papers were strewn all over the entranceway, and the baby was sitting on the floor, wearing his pajama shirt and mismatched sweatpants, smiling and waving a tampon as though it was the Olympic torch. It had clearly been a rough morning. I thought: When he goes to work, I will clean the house so he has a nice, calm environment to return to. Maybe if it's neat in the house when he comes home, he won't feel stressed about not yet finishing Anna Karenina. There are toys on the floor. There's food on the floor from all of the baby's meals and snacks today, the laundry's not folded, and there are dishes in the sink.
He gets off at midnight. Since it's 11:38, I've got a good fifteen minutes before I actually have to get up and do anything.
UPDATE: He came home fifteen minutes early! Eeek!
*I just switched the channel from Most Haunted to whatever the Food Network is showing. I was starting to get scared.
23 May 2008
09 May 2008
Little Things
You used to laugh when I tried to teach you to spit, I will tell him. I used to lean over the sink and spit. PUH, I'd say, and spit into the sink, and you'd laugh and laugh.
When you were first born you loved lights, I will say. We'd take turns holding holding you in the kitchen so you could gaze at the light above the stove. We'd turn the fan on, too. Sometimes the light and the fan were all that would calm you.
Your dad made up songs for you. You cried when you rode in the car, so he sang to you, I will say. The songs didn't help you much, but they distracted me some. You cried a lot.
I will tell him:
You loved to clap, and you loved when people clapped for you. When you smiled you showed your dimples, dimples you definitely didn't get from me. And when you smiled, I smiled too. I made the signs for 'Mama loves you,' and you clapped. One day you stopped clapping when I made the sign. I kept making it anyway.
When we took walks, we would tip the stroller up-like wheelies-and smile at you. Your teeth showed, and your eyes crinkled, and we knew you were happy.
You loved outside. Sometimes I held you on the porch, just held you, and that was enough. Enough to make you smile.
You talked before you had words. You held conversations with us. "Dougledougle," you'd say. "Duckaday." "Gleeeee!" Your conversations had the intonations and pauses of a real language, one we couldn't ever understand.
When you got angry you picked up toys and threw them on the floor. You reached out for whatever toy I offered to appease you, to calm you. You took it and threw it on the floor or swatted it out of my hand. When you didn't want to eat your food, you threw it on the floor. You picked it up in your little fist, raised your fist, and threw it to the floor with a force surprising for a baby. I watched as time I spent making food, warming it, cutting it into small pieces splattered into disconnected heaps I would have to sweep up. Again.
You gave zerbits and kisses-kiss kiss we called them. You opened your mouth and put it on a belly or an arm or a cheek of whoever you loved at that moment. They were the most slobbery, disgusting kisses, but we were thrilled any time we were on the receiving end.
When you were a few days shy of fourteen months, you learned to stick out your tongue. You imitated anyone who stuck their tongue out at you. When you saw me touch my nose with my tongue, you tried so hard to do the same. We adored each new trick you showed us.
I will tell him these things because he won't remember, and I won't allow myself to forget.
When you were first born you loved lights, I will say. We'd take turns holding holding you in the kitchen so you could gaze at the light above the stove. We'd turn the fan on, too. Sometimes the light and the fan were all that would calm you.
Your dad made up songs for you. You cried when you rode in the car, so he sang to you, I will say. The songs didn't help you much, but they distracted me some. You cried a lot.
I will tell him:
You loved to clap, and you loved when people clapped for you. When you smiled you showed your dimples, dimples you definitely didn't get from me. And when you smiled, I smiled too. I made the signs for 'Mama loves you,' and you clapped. One day you stopped clapping when I made the sign. I kept making it anyway.
When we took walks, we would tip the stroller up-like wheelies-and smile at you. Your teeth showed, and your eyes crinkled, and we knew you were happy.
You loved outside. Sometimes I held you on the porch, just held you, and that was enough. Enough to make you smile.
You talked before you had words. You held conversations with us. "Dougledougle," you'd say. "Duckaday." "Gleeeee!" Your conversations had the intonations and pauses of a real language, one we couldn't ever understand.
When you got angry you picked up toys and threw them on the floor. You reached out for whatever toy I offered to appease you, to calm you. You took it and threw it on the floor or swatted it out of my hand. When you didn't want to eat your food, you threw it on the floor. You picked it up in your little fist, raised your fist, and threw it to the floor with a force surprising for a baby. I watched as time I spent making food, warming it, cutting it into small pieces splattered into disconnected heaps I would have to sweep up. Again.
You gave zerbits and kisses-kiss kiss we called them. You opened your mouth and put it on a belly or an arm or a cheek of whoever you loved at that moment. They were the most slobbery, disgusting kisses, but we were thrilled any time we were on the receiving end.
When you were a few days shy of fourteen months, you learned to stick out your tongue. You imitated anyone who stuck their tongue out at you. When you saw me touch my nose with my tongue, you tried so hard to do the same. We adored each new trick you showed us.
I will tell him these things because he won't remember, and I won't allow myself to forget.
Bad Theology
"Where's Spiky Sam?" I asked Husband. "I want to sing to the baby."
"Oh, he's on the Ark with all the other dinosaurs," he replied, and handed me the baby.
I shook my head. "Oh, Baby, that's just bad theology. Everyone knows the dinosaurs wouldn't fit on the Ark. That's why they went extinct."
"Oh, he's on the Ark with all the other dinosaurs," he replied, and handed me the baby.
I shook my head. "Oh, Baby, that's just bad theology. Everyone knows the dinosaurs wouldn't fit on the Ark. That's why they went extinct."
Pavlov's Baby, or Stupid babies need the most love, Part 4
First, watch the following video.
Between the three of us, Husband, my mother, and I appear to have classically conditioned my kid. I'm not quite sure how it started. I think it was my mother trying to teach him to talk around seven months. Since I talked at nine months, and my first word was light, she's been on top of this kid to say light.
Say light! she'll coo.
Lelelelelele, he replies.
That's right! she says, in perfect motherese. Light!
Eventually this kid started looking up at the light when she asked him to say light. Then we started noticing that he could point. So we began asking him to point to the light. At first he looked at us cluelessly. Then he started looking at the light. One day something connected and his index finger shot out and his arm extended with the enthusiasm of a Nazi, affirming allegiance to the Fuhrer.*
Being semi-doting parents and a very overly-doting grandmother, we made a huge deal over this. We clapped and cheered like idiots. Loudly. Enthusiastically. Repeatedly. My kid got a huge smile on his face, which of course suckered the three of us in. We began asking him to point to the light wherever we were. He did it in the dining room while eating. He did it in the living room, bathroom, and bedrooms. He pointed to lights at grocery stores and restaurants. We clapped, he clapped, and all were happy.
One day he stopped pointing. Out of nowhere. We asked, whined, begged for him to point to the light, and he just wouldn't do it. Initially he just gave us a look that said are you people really so stupid that you don't know where the fucking light is? Then he went straight from the question to the clapping and smiling.
We weren't concerned at first. We just tried reasoning with him.
No, Baby, we explained. If you want clap-clap, you have to point to the light.
We thought maybe he just needed to be redirected and reminded of how this clap-clap thing works. He didn't point.
Baby, we sighed, can you please point to the light? He didn't point.
Then we did that thing that adults do that kids love-once-and then get sick of and think the adult is much stupider than the kids themselves.
Baby, can you help us out, please? Mama and Dad don't know where the light is. Can you point to the light?
He clapped and smiled.
I started to worry. Husband, I whimpered. I think he's regressing.
Why?
Because he can't point to the light anymore. He used to be able to do that, and now he can't. My eyes got teary as I thought of years of IEPs and child-study meetings, if he was even functional enough to go to school.
Sweetie. He sighed and rolled his eyes. Again. He's not getting dumber. He's a baby. Babies do whatever they want.
But I knew the truth. I knew he was getting dumber. I added it to the list of reasons my kid would, in no way, ever have the capability to be a productive member of society:
1. Cries every time he's strapped into carseat, even though carseat reasons have been explained to him multiple times.
2. Dances, even when there is no music on.
3. Couldn't walk or talk at the same age I talked and walked (9 months).
4. Thinks books are to be read upside down.
5. Stands and tries to walk in the bath.
6. Continually picks up the extension cord in the living room.
7. Thinks Behind the TV Stand is an appropriate place for a baby to go.
8. Makes the sign for more when he wants to eat.
9. Makes the sign for milk, even when he is drinking water.
10. Makes the sign for "How the fuck do I know?" when telling us he's finished.
11. Can't point to the light.
But I kept trying. I wasn't going to end up with a kid who can't point to the fucking light. He continued to smile and clap, and I continued to explain that I ain't clap-clapping if he ain't producing. If he managed to get a point, or even a glance in the direction of the light, I clapped as excitedly as I would at a BNL concert.
Then I thought about my psychology class in college, Principles of Learning, and wondered if we'd created the baby equivalent of Pavlov's dogs. What if we had conditioned the baby to clap when asked to point to the light? I tested my theory on a visit to the 8th Circle last week.
Okay, Baby, where's the light?
Clap and smile.
Okay, Baby, where's the...
Clap and smile.
Baby, baby, I didn't even finish my question. Then it hit me, and I ran some more tests.
Where's the tampons?
Clap and smile.
Where's the formula?
Clap and smile.
Where's the fatass?
Clap and smile.
Where's mama?
Clap and smile.
Where's the Trojans**?
Clap and smile.
Where's the redneck?
Clap and smile.
And so on. I amused myself for a good ten minutes, and my kid was happy, as evidenced by all the clapping and smiling.
Finally, Okay, Baby. I paused for dramatic effect. Where?
Clap and smile.
Yep. I have conditioned my child to clap when someone says the word where to him.
It's not like we could have afforded college anyway.
*I can't wait to see what statcounter turns up for this one.
**Or this one.
Between the three of us, Husband, my mother, and I appear to have classically conditioned my kid. I'm not quite sure how it started. I think it was my mother trying to teach him to talk around seven months. Since I talked at nine months, and my first word was light, she's been on top of this kid to say light.
Say light! she'll coo.
Lelelelelele, he replies.
That's right! she says, in perfect motherese. Light!
Eventually this kid started looking up at the light when she asked him to say light. Then we started noticing that he could point. So we began asking him to point to the light. At first he looked at us cluelessly. Then he started looking at the light. One day something connected and his index finger shot out and his arm extended with the enthusiasm of a Nazi, affirming allegiance to the Fuhrer.*
Being semi-doting parents and a very overly-doting grandmother, we made a huge deal over this. We clapped and cheered like idiots. Loudly. Enthusiastically. Repeatedly. My kid got a huge smile on his face, which of course suckered the three of us in. We began asking him to point to the light wherever we were. He did it in the dining room while eating. He did it in the living room, bathroom, and bedrooms. He pointed to lights at grocery stores and restaurants. We clapped, he clapped, and all were happy.
One day he stopped pointing. Out of nowhere. We asked, whined, begged for him to point to the light, and he just wouldn't do it. Initially he just gave us a look that said are you people really so stupid that you don't know where the fucking light is? Then he went straight from the question to the clapping and smiling.
We weren't concerned at first. We just tried reasoning with him.
No, Baby, we explained. If you want clap-clap, you have to point to the light.
We thought maybe he just needed to be redirected and reminded of how this clap-clap thing works. He didn't point.
Baby, we sighed, can you please point to the light? He didn't point.
Then we did that thing that adults do that kids love-once-and then get sick of and think the adult is much stupider than the kids themselves.
Baby, can you help us out, please? Mama and Dad don't know where the light is. Can you point to the light?
He clapped and smiled.
I started to worry. Husband, I whimpered. I think he's regressing.
Why?
Because he can't point to the light anymore. He used to be able to do that, and now he can't. My eyes got teary as I thought of years of IEPs and child-study meetings, if he was even functional enough to go to school.
Sweetie. He sighed and rolled his eyes. Again. He's not getting dumber. He's a baby. Babies do whatever they want.
But I knew the truth. I knew he was getting dumber. I added it to the list of reasons my kid would, in no way, ever have the capability to be a productive member of society:
1. Cries every time he's strapped into carseat, even though carseat reasons have been explained to him multiple times.
2. Dances, even when there is no music on.
3. Couldn't walk or talk at the same age I talked and walked (9 months).
4. Thinks books are to be read upside down.
5. Stands and tries to walk in the bath.
6. Continually picks up the extension cord in the living room.
7. Thinks Behind the TV Stand is an appropriate place for a baby to go.
8. Makes the sign for more when he wants to eat.
9. Makes the sign for milk, even when he is drinking water.
10. Makes the sign for "How the fuck do I know?" when telling us he's finished.
11. Can't point to the light.
But I kept trying. I wasn't going to end up with a kid who can't point to the fucking light. He continued to smile and clap, and I continued to explain that I ain't clap-clapping if he ain't producing. If he managed to get a point, or even a glance in the direction of the light, I clapped as excitedly as I would at a BNL concert.
Then I thought about my psychology class in college, Principles of Learning, and wondered if we'd created the baby equivalent of Pavlov's dogs. What if we had conditioned the baby to clap when asked to point to the light? I tested my theory on a visit to the 8th Circle last week.
Okay, Baby, where's the light?
Clap and smile.
Okay, Baby, where's the...
Clap and smile.
Baby, baby, I didn't even finish my question. Then it hit me, and I ran some more tests.
Where's the tampons?
Clap and smile.
Where's the formula?
Clap and smile.
Where's the fatass?
Clap and smile.
Where's mama?
Clap and smile.
Where's the Trojans**?
Clap and smile.
Where's the redneck?
Clap and smile.
And so on. I amused myself for a good ten minutes, and my kid was happy, as evidenced by all the clapping and smiling.
Finally, Okay, Baby. I paused for dramatic effect. Where?
Clap and smile.
Yep. I have conditioned my child to clap when someone says the word where to him.
It's not like we could have afforded college anyway.
*I can't wait to see what statcounter turns up for this one.
**Or this one.
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