Tonight I had to put Noah down in his crib and walk away for about 5 minutes. I stood on the porch and breathed while holding the monitor and listened to him play with his crib toy. Then I heard a thud and a happy squeal from Noah and ran in to find one of the cats jumped in with him! Because I’d forgotten to close to the door!
That is mother guilt. Of course they were fine: Noah was standing (because he can, you know, pull up in the crib) chatting to Keats and Keats was enjoying the soft fleece blanket (which is now in the laundry).
So why I had to walk away: last night we were trying very hard not to turn the air conditioning on yet and to see if we could acclimatize a bit, just using the ceiling fans. At least that was the grand justification: really it’s ’cause neither of us had had time to inspect the a/c or get a check up or whatever we ought to do before turning it on. We’ve never had central a/c before and last year these things were done before we took possession.
But it turns out that in hot weather a baby just wants to nurse. All night long: 6:30-7:45; 10:30-11:30; 12:30-2:45. When Noah woke up again at 4 am, after I’d just barely gotten to sleep (hot baby pressed up against me for over two hours doesn’t make for falling asleep fast either), I woke Carl up, but it was a no-go: Noah wanted the boob. I slammed the door of the nursery behind me at 4:30 am, I admit, (it won’t actually slam, but Carl can tell the difference even if Noah can’t), irrationally since I am an equal partner in the lack of a/c startup planning.
Ten minutes after that the a/c came on, without incident, because Carl apparently still had a brain! And can read wife! and Noah fell asleep at 4:20, me at 4:22, I would guess. Of course Noah was up at 6 with the sun. I slept to 7:30, thanks to Carl again.
All this made for a very long day. Noah was cranky and I was spent. (At least we had a/c. If not I would have moved to the basement. And I don’t know how people who live in highrises without a/c have babies.) But we soldiered on and had our rousing games of peekaboo and play with toes and read books and roll balls and play toy pianos and chase cats and have naps and so on. I did take him to the mall in the afternoon to buy a few summer things for me, but I chickened out. (Are capris ridiculous at the age of 35? And are gauchos really back? And fuck, whose body am I wearing these days?) And then we cuddled on the couch with books and then had a nice dinner.
But then Noah didn’t want to go to bed. About 12 or 13 nights out of 14, he goes down well with his routine. But the 14th night, and sometimes the 13th, he just – doesn’t, and then it’s anyone’s guess. And Carl (poor Carl) was stuck in a meeting at his office (still is as of this writing at 8:30 pm). And I got scared that he wouldn’t go down for hours and hours. And I was just cranky.
And he writhed on the change table, nearly falling off a few times despite mirror, groovy toys, music, dancing, and tickling; he smeared poo all over; he grabbed my glasses WITH HIS POOPY HAND (I was trying to distract him long enough to deal with poo, and leaned too close) and flung them onto the ground and then cried when I had to put him in his playpen to clean that up; he kicked my ribs when we were getting settled into nurse, and then he bit my tit with his three teeth, because number four is coming through (poor kidlet). But all that was okay.
It was that he then nursed, then decided he had to flip over on his tummy in my arms with my tit in his mouth 45 minutes after he’s usually at least mostly asleep. And then screamed in indignation when it didn’t work.
That is when I got up and plopped him in his crib unceremoniously, forgot to close to door, and went to sit on my porch. I am not glad it came down to that. But I am glad to know that when it does, I could set him down and walk away and breathe.
And then, the cat noise.
And then a soupcon of gratitude that he’s ok, that I’m ok, that we can just have a day together.
And then I carried him back to the rocking chair with a lot of praise for being so big as to pull up on the crib and so smart as to not grab the cat (although I’m sure he would have)Â and then he nursed for 5 minutes and fell asleep.
(Nursed on the -other- side that is).
I’m stretched in more ways than one. And now I’m off to bed for some SLEEP!
(this post UIL)
It seems that gauchos are back! Debbie’s nephew had them on Sunday, he called them “long shorts.” His mother, Beth who ius 1 year older than me called them cullottes. I remember them both well. Next we’ll be seeing leg warmers and double belts, yuck!!!