she's gone to edmonton!

Last night, when I called Dirk to arrange lunch tomorrow, he mentioned something about "a woman in his life." This comment was soon buried under a flood of more important topics (like Human League albums and whether Wednesday had really moved to Hamilton like we'd all thought). Today the phrase took on an ominous quality. What exactly did it mean?

I suppose I don't need to tell anyone that I'm rather possessive of Dirk. Sure, it's hypocritical – 1) I'm married 2) I have a child 3) we never had that kind of relationship anyway. But there it is. I always seize up like mousetrap whenever I get a hint of this kind of thing in the wind. Besides, when did it become the law that you have to be romantically involved with someone to develop unhealthy needs for reassurance?

But Amoret, you say, you seemed to be okay with it when he & Stacy were an item. Were you just lying to us all? Well, no. I think I was okay with it. The problem was that due to my distance from home, the whole episode never really came into focus for me. It was like living in an episodic cartoon with a 30-minute reset rule – their relationship started when I was in Nova Gothic, I barely had enough time to adjust over Christmas, I went back to Nova, and by the time we came back to look for an apartment everything was over. With that kind of timeline, it was easy to convince myself that I'd wandered into an alternate universe for the holidays.

Besides, how could I be jealous of Stacy? She's Stacy. I'm stupid, but I'm not that stupid.

I guess that on some childish, unfulfilled level, I want to preserve every relationship I've ever had in polished amber. Also, I can't quite get over the idea that affection is a zero sum game: there's only a limited quantity to go around. And in the worlds of Sisters of Mercy, I need all the love I can get.

There. That's me being totally self-centred & infantile for the day. We're done.

Postpartum group keeps getting better & better. This week I actually got out of the house without my mom, so I was able to bring up the topic of postpartum depression without worrying that any confessions would be used against me later (as happened at my 4-week visit with Hectate). I bulldozed the topic schedule, blew it clear out of the water – who knows when I'd have another chance? And it worked out really well. Everyone laughed when I said that I'd thought about putting Blake down & driving to Edmonton.

"Why Edmonton?" they wanted to know.

"Because it's really far away," I replied. "And I know a priest there, so I can claim sanctuary."

Later I was in the washroom talking to Stephanie & rinsing out a poopy diaper. Sue looked around. She was holding a semi-conscious Blake & I was nowhere to be found.

"Oh my God!" she apparently declaimed. "Aleta's done it! She's gone to Edmonton!"

Afterward half of us went out for lunch at a local cooking school/diner/laundromat and it was even better. I gabbed my freaking head off, ecstatic to be with other women who were just as conflicted about pacifiers and just as ravenous (I ended up eating 2 entrees because one just didn't do it for me). I really really wish that I could join in with the nascent plans for baby-sitting co-ops and the like. But just getting into the city once a week requires an amazing amount of effort, let alone committing to childcare. Bah. I hate living in the burbs.

I ended up extending my journey with a trip to Secrets From Your Sister for nursing bras, so I was ultimately out of the house with my baby buddy for 7 straight hours. (Yay!!) I'd like to say that Blakers was an angel that whole time, but it'd be more accurate to say that he displayed the full range of his behaviour while we were out. He slept in the car, nursed during the first part of the group and then played on the floor happily for awhile. Then he got fussy & Sue took over when I went to the bathroom (as Robbie was sleeping away in his car seat). She got him to sleep until the group was over (again, yay!). More nursing, then the restaurant, where he spent a happy hour cuddled on my lap and then fell asleep in Stephanie's arms while I slurped down hot lentil soup. By the time we left the restaurant, he was wailing away again. I had to nurse him in the lingerie store, after which the owner took over & rocked him to sleep while I finished trying on nursing bras. He slept all the way home.

Sigh. Sometimes I think that I have the baby who makes other moms feel good about their babies.

"I love his cry – it's like the world's ending." – kate & shelly

Still, I wouldn't trade him for a million monkeys. Everything about him is epic: his sleeping, his conversations, his expressions of wonder, his wails of discontent. Every day he gets a bit stronger and a bit more of his personality emerges. The baby iceberg, that's him. Blake: now being hauled across the ocean to make the desert bloom. Or, you know, not.

I declared today "Enjoy the Baby Day" – and it really was. I started reading Nighttime Parenting tonight (after the declaration), and while I don't completely buy into the attachment parenting model, I was grooving on the idea that co-sleeping puts us in synch with each other on a biological level that helps me deal patiently with crying & fussiness. I don't think I've slept more than 3 hours at a stretch since he's been born (usually 45 minutes is the best I can do), but I'm not as tired as I used to be simply because I've made up my mind to enjoy the baby "as is." That means cuddling him almost all of the time and not getting too attached to any one plan of action. I have found pretty consistently that my frustration is the highest when I try to be "old Amoret" (sleeping by myself, writing on the computer, reading novels for long blocks of time) and he needs me to be "new Amoret" (cuddling him while he sleeps, talking & holding him at most other times).

Today I made a sandwich, and by the time I was ready to eat it, he was ready to "talk" to me about everything. And by the time he was ready to stop, he needed a lot of jiggling to stay quiet while I ate. I'm becoming mistress of the lightning-quick food preparation, because I never know if I'll have to eat something one-handed while I jiggle him on my shoulder (or nurse). But it was fine. Because every day should be Enjoy the Baby Day. It makes things a lot more fun for both of us.

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- Rocketbride's adventure of 2/06/2004 08:53:00 p.m.