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Pops

A cliche about parenthood: It teaches you to surrender the plan.

My rigidity is above-average. It borders on OCD. Eight quarters for a coffee, every morning. Have the train ticket clutched in one fist at least six minutes before the conductor passes by. Read at least twenty pages before your on-train nap. Buzz in to work at 7:47, and not sooner, because that minute that extends from 7:46 to 47 is your time.

My baby sometimes has Linda-Blair-in-Exorcist moments without warning. The river of spit-up will just emerge from the calm, quiet infant. Multiple orifices--nostrils, mouth. Then, he who was Buddha-esque becomes hysterical. Shrieking sobs, red face.

Or I'll find myself gently folding back rolls of baby fat to insert healing ointment in a neck-crevice; the milk dribbled from the lips has gathered in the crevice and caused a red streak. Just not an activity I ever imagined for a Monday afternoon.

Walking Salvy was--for a while--a big affair, with a stroller and a supplemental podcast (entertainment!) and appropriate footwear. Now, in the dead of winter, I throw flip flops over socks, grab the baby like a football, and head out, dog-leash in the right hand. When a poop occurs, there's a strange balancing-act, with Josh tucked in one sling-like arm and Salvy staring up in disbelief.

The Amazon poop bags are ridiculous; you have to gather the plastic into a kind of pouch and then--oh so delicately--peel back the rim as your various little ones grow agitated.

I believe all of this is good for me. Rigidity can be limiting.

I hope Josh is not seeing the frustration, and is instead (at least occasionally) seeing some cheerfulness and inventiveness, and a willingness to adapt.
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