i blame facebook

for our recent quiet. i joined it because a local social group was using it for invitations, and suddenly it’s this puzzling and slightly frightening and potentially entirely engrossing new electronic toy.

[are you done laughing at me yet? no? okay.]

[how 'bout now? alright then.]

okay, not quite “new,” but to me it is. yes, i know i’m one of the last people in the world to join facebook, or at least it feels that way — hell, even my dad’s on facebook, although i think he’s a bit of a deer in the headlights.

anyway, that’s my explanation for why the blog has fallen silent with a crashing thud.

but the fact is, i like writing a bit more than facebook encourages, and i have a feeling that as soon as the novelty wears off and we figure out where facebook fits in our e-lives, i’ll be back.

meantime, tiny eamon ain’t so tiny no more: his six-month checkup was glowing, he’s sitting up (well, mostly — he still pitches forward alarmingly sometimes), and his sister can’t stop hugging and kissing him. neither can carole and i, for that matter.

now if he’d only sleep through the night, or even half of it…

she slays me …

… she really does.

yesterday evening the kids and i bundled into the car to go pick up c from work. mairin, who had a good nap, kept a monologue going for the whole drive, occasionally asking me if we were going to pick up mommy at work. we get to the parking lot, and she starts peering up and trying to see over the back of her seat, saying “we picking mommy up from work?” again and again. when carole came out, and got into the car, mairin could no longer contain herself and blurted: “hi mommy! i so happy to see you!”

i’m perfectly willing to believe (in fact, i know) that you had to be there, but for some reason this gobsmacked both of us: it made us giggle for the incongruity of such a grownup phrase in such a toddler’s voice (and enunciation), but it also was one of a number of moments recently that highlight how quickly she’s developing language — in fact, it’s so fast that i think we’re missing a fair chunk of it.

and with a four-month-old who looks more and more like a little kid and less and less like an infant every hour (rice cereal?!?! already?!?!?!), all this crazy high-speed development is a little dizzying, and makes me want to s-l-o-w down just a little.

not much chance of that. and when push comes to shove, i wouldn’t have it any other way.

daddy’s boy

when mairin was little, i simply got used to the fact that if she was in the same room as me and carole, i might as well be invisible. she would dance and cry and smile and stare holes in her mother, but if i made attempts to catch her eye, suddenly there would be something very interesting on the wall, or ceiling, or out the window. but certainly not me.

so i got used to it, told myself it wasn’t personal, that all babies are fixed on their mothers and for good reason, especially if the mother doubles as the cupboard. i read the paper, organized the bookshelves, did the dishes, and, yes, took pleasure in watching the two of them cement the bond that currently manifests in almost-parodic repetitions of “i want my mommy. i want my mommy. i want my mommy.” (oh, who’m i kidding? — they’re more parodic than any parody — high-pitched, pouty, dramatic). just last week, mairin was whining from her crib for her mommy one morning, and i walked in. she, standing at the rail of her crib, melted down onto her mattress and wailed “NO! No, Da-ee! I WANT MOMMEEEEE!!” charming.

but my boy — well, he’s my boy. i mean, sure he wants his mom, especially when he’s hungry or tired, or can’t tell whether he’s hungry or tired. but put the boy in his bouncy-seat with a full belly and lines of sight on both his mother and father, and he’ll fix on me and laugh and coo and squint playfully and throw his arms and legs around (okay, he doesn’t have any control on that last one yet, but it does serve to emphasize his excitement) and generally do the ol’ soft-shoe to get his dad’s attention.

at first, carole would have to point this out to me: “um, shannon, someone wants your attention.” and i’d say sure he does, and put the paper down but not too far, since of course he’ll be turning back to his mother soon. and then he wouldn’t. and i love it.

i think we’ll have to cancel our newspaper subscription, though — it’s just not getting read these days.

yeah, i’m here, too.

so i just scrolled through a bunch of posts on this blog to figure out the last time yours truly authored a post, and was appalled to discover that it’s been one and a half months – 3/4 of tiny eamon’s life.

sigh.

the truth is, though, i don’t feel like i have a lot to add. at least, not that’s funny, or whimsical, or just plain lighthearted like a parent should be after welcoming a healthhy, grinning newborn. actually, if i’m honest, i feel pretty overwhelmed by the whole thing, and writing about it (i fear) will just sound like i’m complaining, or inadequate, or not taking the right pleasure in the Things That Count. heck, i don’t even know what “the whole thing” that i’m overwhelmed by is. sometimes i figure it’s just the growing pains of having two kids — what i’ve heard described as having to switch from zone defense (2 parents, one kid) to man-to-man. it makes a difference for your relationship, for geting daily stuff done, for simple conversation. then, other times, i think “the whole thing” is the long odyssey of bringing these two little children into the world, and their two sisters whom they (and we) will never meet much less play with, and the fact of this odyssey ending and being happy about that but also feeling this sense of vertigo that the one thing that’s been driving my life for 5 years has suddenly changed and now you have to — what? move on? redefine? be happy? and then i think “the whole thing” is making me feel just little too uncertain, and damnit i don’t have time to feel uncertain i’ve got two kids and the economy’s in the tank and and and …

you see? not pretty. so i’ve just been leaving the blogging in funnier, more capable hands.

do they make that in emperor-sized?

over the past two weeks, as eamon has slept for entire football games and gone twenty-four hour stretches without making more than a creaky squawk, and mairin has kissed her brother with real affection and, when out of his presence, repeated over and over (and over and over) “i see mommy i see baby” — carole and i have remarked repeatedly how smoothly this transition from a family of three to a family of four has been going. heck, even the dogs took perfunctory sniffs of the little man’s head, wagged their tails, and curled back up on their blankets, as if to say, “yup. been there.” (me: “yes, but don’t you know that’s new baby smell, the BEST SMELL IN THE WORLD, you curs?” dogs: “heh. you’re kidding, right?” abby: “hey rufe, remember when the squirrel got run over, and then the popeye’s chicken wrapper got stuck on its body, and then the temperature went up up up, and i rolled in it? remember that? now that was the best smell in the world.” rufus: “oh yeah yeah yeah yeah. let’s go do it again. yeah.”)

but during all of this blissfully smooth inital domestic adjustment, a little voice in the back of my head has been whispering (think dennis hopper in apocalypse now): “yeah, but things change, man. they change quick, man, when you got two little ones. fast and quick, man.”

and poof. things’ve changed. mairin doesn’t like to sleep any more. and eamon doesn’t like it as much either, unless he’s attached to his mom. and apparently that toddler bed we got mairin and that cradle we have for eamon were simply frivolously hopeful expenditures, since these nights we’re all lined up across the king-sized bed: carole, usually with eamon on her; mairin, not infrequently sideways, with her head on mama’s arm or belly and her feet (stinky by the way, ever since she quit wearing socks with her mary janes) in dad’s face; and finally dad, who is contemplating investing in one of those mountaineer’s tents that you can spike to the side of the mountain, since he sleeps with most of his body hanging over the edge anyway (you can tell i’m tired because i’m speaking of myself in the third person). “sleep” being a relative term, both because of the discomfort of the position and because of mairin’s wakefulness: she came in around 3am the other night, crawled into bed, and proceeded to lie on her back, fiddling with her belly button and whispering “zoom zoom” over and over (and over) for about two more hours, before we all fell asleep in the predawn and were subsequently late for work (okay, the last was just me).

on the other hand, she’s got the first seven letters of the alphabet song down, to go with the last four (sounds like “bub-ba-ets-why-iy-cee”), she still loves her little brother, and she still has a (largely) delightful disposition. and her brother is coming along nicely, having just had a glowing report at his two-week checkup.

who needs sleep?

no labor …

… no news, except that we’re getting up before the crack of dawn tomorrow and trundling off to the hospital to meet gus.

nervous? check.

excited? gettin’ there.

i’ll do my best to keep our readership posted in a timely manner.

as with mairin, carole and i have made our predictions of gus’s weight and length:

carole: 8lbs 11oz, 21″

shannon: 8lbs 4oz, 20.5″

me, i think 8-11 sounds HUGE, especially for a 39-weeker, but carole says his movements and weight are so much greater than mairin’s that she’s basically just reached her number by taking mairin’s weight and length and adding a pound and half-an-inch. then saying to herself, wait, that’s too easy, i’ll subtract one ounce so it’s not exactly a pound more. real scientific.

in my embrace of the scientific method, i arrived at my numbers through rigorous and secret observation, experimentation, and hypothesis. while carole was asleep (no mean feat), i deftly applied measuring tape and calipers to her belly in a secret pattern guaranteed to provide accurate measurement of his head-to-toe length. then i took a tape player with a tape of whale sounds, placed it on one side of her belly and turned it on while placing my ear firmly against the other side of her belly. a careful logarithmic evaluation of the volume and distortion of the whale calls when they reached my ears gave me a firm grasp of the little guy’s density. from there, using a slide rule i was able to extrapolate his weight to within a quarter-ounce.

any of you duffers want to take a guess in the comments section, feel free.  but be forwewarned: we’ve got experiential knowledge and scientific conclusions covered — you’ll be relying on gut instinct.

love note

misery, thy name is carole.

you can’t sleep … can’t breathe … can’t walk … can’t pick up your ever-needier daughter … can’t smile … can’t sit … can’t stand to be touched, or kissed, or even asked about the status of the source of your misery, one not-so-tiny gus.

i’d feel for you, really i would. but i’m too far along in my own anticipatory anxiety-ridden countdown to be anything but prickly myself.

sorry.

but not quite sorry enough, and i know that.

still, you find the energy, the empathy, to pat me reassuringly, to hold my hand until it’s too hot for one of us, to let me help you a little even if you don’t quite need it just then, or ask you that question one more time (‘how’s he doing?’). you, for whom any touch must by now feel like barbed wire, place my hand on your belly, punctured with a thousand needles, so i can feel my son’s protruding elbow, his knee, his butt: his big, healthy movements.

thanks.

<5d.

we can do that, right?

right?

homestretch?

last night carole began complaining of back pain, and then wrinkling her brow quizzically as she checked all over her belly.

“what’s up?” i asked, trying not to screech with anxiety at her expression.

“dunno,” she said. she’s real communicative these days.

a bit later she stood up next to me, and said, “feel my belly.” i did. i don’t disobey these days.

it was taut all over, like a round trampoline, or like an overinflated ball, except that there were little movements (like tiny sharks just beneath the surface) at the same time.

“i can’t tell if he’s just pushing really hard all over, or if that’s a contraction,” she said.

“i don’t really think he’s quite capable of such uniform pressure all over your belly,” i said. well, i wasn’t that articulate, but i’m writing this, so that’s my story and i’m sticking with it. “i think that’s a contraction.”

“me too,” she said. and smiled.

and they continued through the evening, irregular, not painful (although her back is a different story).

we both know that this situation could continue as is for the remainder of the time until the scheduled c-section. in fact, the contractions seem to have diminished this morning, even as gus keeps on rollin’ around. what we aren’t sure of is how the doctor will respond to this: we know he’s super-risk-averse in our case. will this 1)  be enough for him to pack us off to the hospital and scrub in? will he 2) want daily check-ins from here on? or 3) will he tell us, “great! braxton-hicks. call me when it hurts”? we just don’t know. fortunately, we don’t have long to wait, since carole has a regularly scheduled appointment in a few hours.

just to be safe, we’re taking the hospital bag (with her new pyjamas) with us.

**updated** saw the doc, and he went for option #3. carole feels miserable, and he says that’s just about right. we’re hunkering down in the a/c for a long hot labor day weekend.

if i’m really honest with myself …

… i’m not sure i believed six months ago, or maybe even as recently as four, that this day would come. no, he’s not here yet (and that’s a whole other category of suspended not-quite-belief), but he’s basted in his mama for thirty-seven weeks as of today, officially entering him into the camp of “term pregnancy.” the likelihood of any need for the nicu just went down, the possibility of underedeveloped lungs just went down, and the possibility of a lot more things going right just went up up up.

oddly, my response to this is muted. there’s too much to do to spend a whole lot of time musing on milestones anymore. more accurately, maybe the BIG MILESTONE is close enough (and boy is it close) that any others seem barely worth noting as they pass by in a blur of preparatory bustle.

in honor of this particular milestone, though, let’s shift perspective a little. he’s 37 weeks today, but more importantly:

< 14 days before we welcome gus.

little man…

… is actually pretty big, if you take any stock in those “damn machines” (as carole’s OB would say). his head: big, as in >98th percentile; everything else, big, as in just right. carole says: big head, long torso, short legs — just like his daddy. his daddy says, harumph: it sucks to be reduced so … reductively.

his estimated weight, plus or minus 511 grams (i kid you not, that’s what the printout says: 511 grams is the margin for error): 7lbs, 11oz. how’s that for mixed metaphor? near as i can tell, that means he weighs between 6lbs, 9oz and 8lbs, 13oz, which is right in the range of normal baby weights. (but i’m counting on geohde to set me right if my gs to ozs is off.)

if you ask his mama (which i daren’t do), she’d say “of course this baby is big — he’s huge, and he’s f*&king hurting me with his g#$@amn motherf^%#ing elbows and knees! why are you telling me what is so f*&king obvious, you a$$h*le?!?!?”

damn machines.

36w4d.