you say tomato, I say that just looks bad. real bad.

According to the parenting literature, Burton will develop his own ways of doing things with the baby--ways that will be different from mine, but not necessarily wrong for that reason alone. Just different. On the whole, I can buy that. But somehow I can’t bring myself to tell Burton he’s done a good job when he dresses Henry. I just . . . can’t. It is not right.

on open-ended questions

A woman sits on a city bench. “Spare some change?” she says, as passers-by pass by.

A man in a suit zags in her direction, digging into his pockets. “How much do you need?” he asks, rattling around his change.

“ . . . Uh, five dollars?”

from opposite ends of life

Melissa and I are having a bite to eat, the babies asleep in their car seats. At a table near us, two older gentleman have been keeping up a conversation at a good, healthy volume: old friends determined to maintain their gift of gab, despite a loss of hearing. Having finished their meal, they start making their way to the door, the ambulatory one pushing the other’s wheelchair. Their faces brighten as they approach us and our piles of babies.

“Oh!,” says the one on wheels, visibly excited. “There’s TWO of them! Are they twins?”

As I explain that they came from different owners, the twosome peer into Owen’s car seat, both craning to get a good look through their thick glasses.

“What’s the name?” wheelie asks.
“Owen,” Melissa says with a big smile.
Wheelie leans in close. “MAUREEN?” he shouts, to confirm.
“O-WEN,” Melissa says in his ear.
“HELEN!” he says. “A beautiful name! So how old is baby Maureen?”

Melissa does her best to respond with appropriate volume and the necessary hand gestures to illustrate ten weeks. Owen hardly notices, but the two gentlemen coo like a pair of pigeons over his tiny face. Eventually, they pull themselves away and wish us well, wide smiles on their weathered faces.

Henry and baby Maureen

ode to a baby

A bit of talcum
Is always walcum.

--Ogden Nash

fresh eggs

What I remember most vividly about having chickens as a kid are the smells: the dry hay, the poop, the heat of the coop in the California sun, and the sweet, cool dirt scratched up by our four hens. And most delicious: the smell of eggs before they’ve seen the inside of a refrigerator.

Popping my head into the barn of a local farm to snap these photos last weekend, I was slapped by the smell, all old and familiar.

babies babies everywhere

Three babes born to three friends in three weeks. Pictured here is their first meeting. I can’t say for certain, but I suspect they were all drunk.

Kinkos? KinkNO!

When I managed to find a parking spot within car-seat-hauling range of the Harvard Square Kinkos, I thought it was a good omen. But it must have been just a spot of plain-old dumb luck, because it all went to hell from there. Off we go:

I find the only Mac in a sea of PCs, only to discover that it costs 40 cents a minute, whereas PCs are a relative bargain at 25 cents a minute. “Why?” I ask.

“Because this is a design station,” I’m told, as if that clarifies the situation. I look down and notice that the “design station” comes equipped with a keyboard blackened by a thick patina of grime. (If Antiques Roadshow has taught the nation that a natural patina increases the value of a fine piece of furniture, it must be understood that there are exceptions to the rule.) “Let me know when you’re ready to print,” the guy adds.

It’s a simple enough task that I’m there for: Print my document on card stock. But I sit down and immediately start to panic about my per-minute fee. The baby helps things out by fussing. Can’t hardly blame him, though, because he’s still bundled up for the cold, causing him to roast in his own juices like those turkeys cooked in plastic bags (a question for another day).

With the document ready to go, I look for the guy with the power to print. “He’s gone downstairs for a few minutes,” I’m told. “But he’ll be back.” In my mind, I see a giant digital tally of my mounting fees, like the tickers that calculate the national debt. But before too long, he’s back, attempting to connect my “design station” to the “printer.” Without luck. We reboot. Twice. Finally we’re ready to go, but what’s this? Someone else is printing out what can only be a copy of War and Peace, double-spaced in Courier. “I guess we’re gonna have to wait,” I’m told. On my dime (and nickel and quarter)? There goes the kid’s college fund. But, wait! It’s finally our turn. He loads the paper, I hit print. Paper jam. We do it all over again.

“I guess you can’t print on this paper,” he decides, after the page comes out smudged but unprinted.
“Whaa???” I stammer. (Henry backs me up with a “WAAAAH!” of his own.)
“I guess you could buy our card stock downstairs and use that.”
“But I want to use this card stock, the card stock that I’ve already paid for,” I say. (Henry is a beat behind in the conversation: “WAAAH!”)
“Well it doesn’t work in our printer.”
“ ,” I say.
“ ,” he replies. “Or I guess you could try using this other printer,” he finally volunteers.
“There’s another printer?” I say. “Hook me up!”
“It costs twice as much. I guess because it’s a color printer.”
“But I’m printing in black and white.
“Yeah, I know. . . . ”
“But it’s still twice as much? For the same thing?”
“I guess so, yeah.”

In the end, I declined the offer. I didn’t buy their card stock. I didn’t pay extra to print my black and white document on their color printer. And the kind young man generously offered to credit me for the whole 20-minute transaction. So I collected my stuff, including my crying baby, and walked out of there none the richer and none the poorer, either. Except I did score 20 minutes of free “design” time.

The lesson? Next time, hire a professional.

stay-at-home torture

There are few things worse than being pinned to a chair by a nursing infant while the radio, within earshot but out of arm’s reach, broadcasts an NPR fund drive. Make. It. Stop. Please?

he must have been late the day they handed out necks

unnecessarily exclusive coverage

“Only Entertainment Tonight follows Anna Nicole to her final resting place.”

As much as I wish that show would take the big dirt nap, is it really worth the ratings?

there was much rejoicing in the land . . . and then the hospital bill arrived

If Henry were a chicken for sale at the grocery store, his cost per pound at birth would work out to be $2,625.98. Per pound, people. And there were seven and a half of him. Fortunately for us, we send an indecent percentage of our take-home pay over to the folks at the insurance company, who are finally earning their keep.

The damage, incredibly, came to $19,957.42. That figure includes $376 in pharmacy charges, $11,700 for “semi private obstetrics,” and $386 for a labor room that was used only to store our bags while the baby was delivered surgically in the $4,538 operating room (where I received $1,159 worth of anesthesia). Had I known, I would have done a more thorough search for sample-sized shampoos or other value-add souvenirs in the labor room; $386 seems steep for three hours of luggage storage.

from the glad-it-wasn’t-me department

If, on a Saturday morning, after your wife has been awake for several hours feeding and soothing and entertaining the newborn, she taps your arm and asks you in her please-won’t-you-help voice to change the diaper, and you promptly fall fast asleep for another hour and a half, then wake up and ask your wife if she isn’t ready to hand over the baby so you can go ahead and get that diaper changed, but then the baby starts crying on the changing table and you’ve lost your marbles and you put the kid back in his pjs diaper-free, please don’t register shock or awe when the baby pees on your chest.

genetics

Burton’s eyes are Caribbean blue; mine are poop brown. We’ll have to sit tight for a few months before discovering which way Henry’s will go. But one inheritance, at least, is clear: That boy is wearing my furrowed brow.

fool for love

Never have I been so impressed with someone who offers so little. Honestly, if he were to post a personal ad, it might read: “SWM: eats, poops, and pees. Usually enjoys gas, except when it makes me cry.”

And me? Hopelessly fallen.

the footling arrives!

Henry Calder Flint, not willing to wait around, was born on Jan. 30. Seven pounds, nine ounces, and ten delicious toes.

thoughts on a ball and chain

Three sets of flip-flops, shades, and cargo shorts pass me on the sidewalk. "I don't think it's going to be that bad," one of the owners says to buddies 1 and 2, who are visibly concerned. "I mean, a lot of the important stuff has already been put out there--like baseball. She knows I have to watch a lot of baseball."

"Ok," says buddy #2, who is wearing a Captain Underpants t-shirt. "But does she really know what that means? I mean, like, what if she doesn't GET it?" His voice is shrill with tension.

Buddy #3 doesn't say much, yet manages to say it all: "And what about the fantasy league? And pub quiz?"

"I know," says the one considering a trip to the dark side. "But really, I don't think it'll be that bad."

As they pass out of earshot, Captain Underpants moans, "Dude, you have no idea!"

the altogether true story of a wayward afterbirth

* Gentle reader: Do not fear the worst. No one was harmed in the creation of this true story. If your stomach is steely, please read on.

Sunday morning, around 11: Wellesley's campus is crawling with alums wearing feather boas and funny hats, the better to celebrate reunion with. A large herd of students have stuck around after exams to work the weekend, in exchange for a small wad of cash and the chance to rub elbows with gainfully employed people. The staff is also there, of course, exhausted from the weekend itself and the weeks of envelope-stuffing leading up to it.

A couple of townies take a dog for a walk on campus, strolling past one of the ponds. What's that floating at the water's edge? A bird? A plane? In point of fact, it was a placenta.

The police show up with a bulldozer and a police boat, anticipating the worst. The news vans and helicopters follow, like remoras with satellite feeds. The campus is locked down until every dorm room and dumpster can be searched for a sign of a baby or a mother or some explanation for a wayward afterbirth. The pond is emptied, trash is picked through, and the campus canvassed by dogs. Twelve hours later, still no explanation.

Fast forward to lunchtime the next day (raise your hand if you've lost your appetite!): Somehow, it seems, the police learned that the offending tissues belonged to someone who gave birth several months prior (everyone was healthy!) and must have brought her placenta home from the hospital in some sort of David Lynch-style doggy bag, at which point the placenta took up residence in the family freezer. As I'm sure everyone can relate, freezer space is a limited and valuable commodity. And there comes a time in every adult's life when stock must be taken and priorities laid bare. I like to imagine that moment went something like this:

Honey, I need to make room for the 30-pound bag of frozen berries that I brought home from Costco--do we keep the turkey carcass from two Thanksgivings ago that we'd swore we'd make soup with, or is it finally time to toss the placenta?

And then, unimaginably, a young mother or perhaps father decided to set the thing loose, Free Willy-style, into a small pond (a VERY small pond, people) on the campus of a women's college, whereupon the thing thawed and floated to the surface and was recognized by someone and/or their dog.

Don't believe me? Stanger than fiction, people.

a market for every product

The Watertown Mall is no Mecca for quality. Even the Gap there is second rate, selling pants with three legs and socks without openings. But still, I never would have expected this sign, posted by the roadside to lure in bargain shoppers:

Strawberries
All Used
Buy 3 Get 1 Free

lost and found

Susan was trying to pretend she wasn't, but she was shaken. In the Park Street T station a few minutes before, someone had snatched her wallet. She realized what was happening in time and even saw the perp running away. "HE STOLE MY WALLET!" she screamed. "STOP HIM!" Improbably, four strangers did. Three men and a woman grabbed the punk and pinned him to the ground. They retrieved Susan's wallet, then debated what to do with the offender. Turn him in? Let him go? Wait for the police, who may or may never show? Since no one had been hurt, they collectively decided against pressing their luck and let the guy go. Susan, amazed both by her luck and lack thereof, tried to thank the wallet-retrievers. "We have to help each other," one said, walking away.

Too late, Susan wished she had asked the punk if he needed money, then offered up whatever cash she had in her wallet. We do have to help each other, she said.

red line maneuvering

We had all waited the better part of an eternity for a train to show up, so by the time the doors opened, everyone crushed inside. But in a precise and practiced order: As always, the quick-steppers are first. Usually iPod-listening men in their 20s or 30s, they come from somewhere in the back in the pack, far enough away that they get a running start. With speed and a steely determination, they blow right past the ledge-waiters. Often short, older women or anyone who came without reading material, ledge-waiters claim their territory with a wide stance and cold stare. They plant themselves close enough to the edge of the platform that no one dares step in front of them. No one except the quick-steppers, who do so with a screw-you-all purpose. The ledge-waiters, once passed by like a wilted kale garnish on the fried-seafood platter of life, scowl and mutter and try to muscle their way through the doorway, as though terrified that they won't get on. Or just steamed that their first-in-lineness was so blatantly scorned.

And yet, despite the pushing and shoving, everyone fits in. We all do. Almost all of the time, people. Or is that not the point?