They eat well, they sleep deeply, they shit and piss publicly and with goodwill, they make merry all day long. A baby is a rabelaisian figure. A tiny Falstaff.
You know, Atenea would never let me get away with it, but I still feel remiss that I didn’t name the kid Godzilla. Impressive! Vaguely religious! Strong! Gender Neutral!
Spent a good half hour impersonating 70s sports broadcaster Howard Cosell interviewing my three day old child about their meteoric rise in Mexican football. Sometimes I threw an impression of Mohammed Ali into the mix, have him and Cosell make fun of each other back and forth. Good times.
We live on the first floor so the garbage truck outside is really loud. To stop it bothering the baby, we’ve taken to cranking the white noise machine. On ocean setting, you can pretend the back up beeping is seagulls!
The love I have for my child is vertiginous and wild. It is the eeriest and strangest sensation I have felt in a life of loving. I am undone. My wife told me last night that she loved our child more than me, and with great relief and joy, I told her the same. We’re going to be okay if we remember that shared value and let it guide us.
@MordecaiMartin My husband told me it was strange and wonderful watching how I love our child, the joy and gentleness of that love, and I've similarly discovered new aspects of my husband watching him interact with so much patience and humor. Being parents together is a different dimension to the relationship yet again from being married, and got us to know each other all over again in our depths and limitations as we grow as parents alongside our child.
This cat is being so good about the baby. He’s being SO GOOD! Always maintaining a respectful and curious distance, just asking for attention when he needs it, generally not causing trouble. We’re so proud of what a good big brother he’s being
Waiting around for my child to wake up as one waits for a king. I know this total awe of them as a being beyond me, a being of the future, can only last so long. But I intend to cherish it
@MordecaiMartin You may house their bodies but not their souls, For their souls dwell in the house of tomorrow, which you cannot visit, not even in your dreams. - Khalil Gibran's The Prophet, On Children
My child was born with a cleft lip and is so gorgeous and adorable that it's good we're getting them the operation to close it, or else their famously beautiful face will start a weird cleft lip trend.
@MordecaiMartin that's very nice to know! That gives everyone time to figure out a surgery schedule that works for the wee one without undue rush :blobcat_hearthug:
I’m gonna shoot straight with you all: I had an extra large 3 pm Dunkin’ Donuts iced coffee with a ton of cream and like, 6 Equals, and then I danced with my infant child until the oxytocin started flowing, so I am feeling large, in charge and exactly no pain.
Pediatrician visit went well, but apparently the kids these days are into fussing and pretending to be constipated all night. Can’t say I approve of this trend. I blame Tik Tok
Yesterday was one of this wonderful days when you see your family and loved ones for what they really are, the snug holding shape of them that lets you rest and be yourself among them. So grateful to have this child with these people.
I’m in a MFA in creative writing. We have two tracks, poetry and prose. I’ve been in prose this whole time. When my child was born, I joked, “I’m switching to poetry, it’s the only reasonable response to this feeling.” And that was funny . . . But now I’m doing it
@MordecaiMartin there are these little hand-socks to wrap newborn hands with, the stated reason being to prevent them from injuring themselves with their nails but maybe the real reason is that hands are too. scary 🤔
@ljwrites we got a box of newborn toys that are all high contrast black and white, so that their eye sight can make them out. There’s a pair of mittens so that when they wave their hands in front of their face it “stimulates” them
The cutest of my parenting responsibilities involves stopping my son’s startle reflex from waking him up. If he’s sleeping on my chest, as he is now, I do it by kissing his hands as they fly up to his face. It’s a very sweet game of whackamole
@MordecaiMartin It's a really really tough time, especially for first-time parents! 😭 Remember to take care of yourselves as well as the little one, and remember, as long as everyone has basic needs met and no one is in active pain/danger nothing else matters nearly as much. Catch naps with earplugs in if that's what you have to do. Rooting so hard for all of you :blobcat_hearthug:
@MordecaiMartin Nothing better than a cuddle with Big Safe Person! :blobcat_melt: Just be sure the little one has plenty of hydration, as their little body heats up faster than yours.
I don’t know if this was the first day of horrific gun violence since I became a parent, or if it’s just the first one I’ve noticed since the birth. I am thinking about how I want out, for me and my child. I want to go to another place, a place where this won’t happen.
No place is perfect. Mexico, where my wife’s family live and where I’m taking my child, has its own problems, some of them just as foolishly, ruthlessly violent (although much of that violence is also due to the intervention of the USA.)
But I’m sick of this place, the stochastic terrorism of it. I want out!
Ridiculous a calculation as it is, between losing my life to the sort of dangers that plague the lives of Mexicans and catching a bullet from some white supremacist gunman who the news will pretend is acting alone, I’d rather risk Mexico.
We decided to just use the pronouns that “go” with my kid’s genitals for a couple of reasons, but we’re trying to remember and continue advocating, to others but much more importantly, to them, that they can be anything they want, including trans if that is what they want and who they are. Even so, I find myself using gendered language in an overly familiar way that bugs me when I look at it through the lens of queerness and all I’ve learned from trans friends and family. Stuff like “thattaboy” and thinking fondly of them as “my son”, one in a long line of men unbroken back through my father’s father etc. Sentimental, and might even be harmless, but insidious. I’m trying to remember, this kid has the whole world in front of them, genders included. My job is to keep that world wide and beautiful and interesting and safe and fun and true for as long as possible, and let them make the choices, just as long as they don’t become a cop or a soldier. So I’m trying to shift my language. Instead of “my beautiful son” “my beautiful child” No “what a sweet boy” but “what a sweet baby.”
This is me trying to give my kid the whole world. Why should femininity or trans ness or non binary life be off the table, just cuz I’m using he/him?
You know, as I sit here, reeking of my child’s goat milk scented vomit from a formula I pay 40 bucks per can for, I can only confirm my pre pregnancy suspicion: this kid really cramped my style and ruined the vibe
@MordecaiMartin Lol it ain't easy! There's a few more years left of messy stuff, but the first three months are the hardest. Did you hear of the "fourth trimester" hypothesis of pregnancy? I've found the thought both weird and heartwarming, like what better indication of a social animal than the household and community sharing in "pregnancy," growing the fetus together for the final stretch in the extended womb of the home?
My infant child really looked me in the eyes and said, “Sleep? Me?! Calumny! Slander! In short, falsehood. The truth is I have not slept and never shall sleep, for I am a man of principle and ambition, and detest sloth in all its ugly forms”