First Cold

 Oh, my poor baby, what a snot-filled and disappointing Thanksgiving we just endured. All of us wretched, with noses running hither and yon, and canceling your Godlessparents for Thanksgiving and it just being the three of us and Milo, and you were so out of sorts you didn't even want any cranberries or stuffing. For several days you pretty much only nursed, and even that was hard with your stuffed nose. We took as many as four showers a day just for the steam. Today we are still a bit stuffy, but you went back to school, and sobbed when I dropped you off, which you haven't done in weeks. You have been away from school for an entire week, and even though you smiled when you awoke from a car nap to see where you were, I gather it was all too much. You are tired. I am tired. We are tired together. 

In theory your grandparents are coming for Christmas - half of them, anyway. Though if I am honest though I know they miss you and us very much, I am dreading their coming in the midst of a worsening pandemic in which there will literally be nothing whatsoever for us to do except follow the usual routines of the day with you, much of which - bathtime, diapers, snuggling in bed - they can't really be privy to. At some point today I will push through my fatigue and put candles in the windows and a wreath on the door. I will also recriminate myself for not doing more writing even though I am missing you.

These are hard days, Succotash. I've taken to fantasizing about a future normal. I've been looking up pressure walls to make your room in New York. I've been imagining how you will make the transition to your new school. Wondering about when you will start to talk. 

Loving you, and loving you, and loving you.

Falling Leaves

It seems impossible, given the relentlessness with which I document your comings and goings, that I left my phone in the car as we walked up the path to Montessori the day before yesterday on a warm and glistening sunny autumn day. The giant tree in the front lawn was aflame with orange, and when the wind kicked up the leaves drifted down slowly like snow, painting an orange carpet over the grass. You stopped, transfixed, staring at the leaves. You grinned and me and pointed back at the tree. You let go my hand and waded into some leaves, staring with an open-mouthed smile as they drifted down, slowly. 

Instead of watching video of you in this moment I must settle for remembering it, and seeing the expression of pleasure and wonder and excitement on your face as you felt the breeze take you up and take up the leaves and swirl them around and flutter them down to the earth.

When we went back to school today, after yesterday's holiday, the tree was denuded, all the leaves in a thick carpet on the grass, heralding the coming of winter. 

These are transitory pleasures, that we are living. But we are here. And we remember. 

Election Day

 You have jet lag. It was fall back the day after Halloween, and also I'm pretty sure you are teething, and so we've had a couple of bumpy nights. Last night you conked out by 6:30 and this morning you were up and bushy-tailed at 5. You were even done with your first nap in time for us to get to Montessori at 8:45, so you are having a full day at school today. Your first. I hope you are having fun.

It's a brisk and windy day today, as everyone goes to the polls and with any luck American democracy survives. I have moments of excitement but most of today has been a wash. I went to the weird 1920s office space that I share with your godlessparents and I've been reading for work. Brian and Ginger stopped by and Brian opened a bottle of rum at 11:30. If I didn't have to pick you up in the car soon I would have been tempted. There's cannabis chocolate in the fridge too. Nursing, though. I do actually try to be a responsible parent for you. Believe it or not. 

You have gotten in to the Manhattan Montessori that I have been angling to get you into since before you were born, so success on that front. I have already gotten sort of misty in anticipation of how you will feel leaving your current Montessori for life in the city. But that's a year away. No point worrying about it now. For now, let's assume New York City won't be in flames tonight and tomorrow. How about that?

I am glad you are unaware of all these frightening things. You don't seem scared of people in masks, though you usually try to pull mine off. You don't know that we have a frightening and divisive leader. You don't know about racial strife, or economic collapse, or disease. You are a baby, and you are smiley and merry, and experience the world as full of friendly people who love you and want to pick you up. I am grateful for this. I live in fear of your ever discovering it is anything but the truth.

So, today, you are playing now with your friends at Montessori in Massachusetts, and I am trying to work and not doom-scroll, and tonight you and I will go to bed early again, and we will hold each other, and I will marvel that you exist, and you will snuffle and complain until you find my boob in your sleep. I have gotten very involved lately looking at footage of the new giant panda cub at the National Zoo. He's a miracle too. They have a panda cam in the den, and as I watch this giant panda mother and her little round panda cub snuggle and put paws in each others' faces and sit up to nurse and then roll over again I feel like it is a livestream of you and me when we hide together in bed at night, willing the world to be as safe and warm and loving as our secret family den can be.