Sky Bluesky: The Baby

Confidence - L'il Walking Oliver

Fri, 14 Jul 2006 04:03:11 GMT

Many things happened while we were in Boston. There was the whole reason we were there, R's sister's wedding. It was beautiful, and small, and heartfelt. Both her sister (who we'll call Pickle, for reasons known only to me) and her hubby are in their 30's, and didn't want something that was too big or too traditional. So they wrote their own vows, planned everything from the pre-wedding champagne toast to the reception. And it was great. It actually made me think about what me and R had missed by eloping - the chance for families to come together, a real public celebration, the cake and the dancing and all that.

But the big news - possibly bigger than the wedding - was this.

Oliver took his first steps.

Yeah, yeah. I know. I waited for two freaking weeks to tell you. But I've been busy! (See previous post.)

I was away at the bachelor party for the future Mr. Pickle, and Pickle and R were at home with little Oliver. At some point, R was walking him across the hardwood floors, hand in tiny hand, and suddenly he let go, and he took two little tiny steps just like that. Bang. There it was.

(R didn't remember to tell me until sometime the next morning. I almost spit out my coffee.)

He did it again two or three times while we were out there. Once, the future Mr. Pickle stood a few steps from him and dangled my watch (a favorite toy of Oliver's) in front of him. "See this? You've got to come here to get it!" And he did - six steps, right to Mr. Pickle and the watch, while we watched with our jaws on the floor.

And that was fun. And we were all excited, because suddenly we had a genuine! walking! baby! But then we came home, and suddenly he showed no interest in walking. We'd try to get him to do it, taking him on little strolls, then releasing his hands and whispering "Come on, Oliver. You can do it. We know you can do it," while the other person teased him with a book or a toy. And he'd plop right down on his bum and crawl over to the other person. He took the very occasional step or two, but nothing to get excited about.

And then, a few nights ago, he remembered. Nothing seemed to change, there was no great bolt of lightning or shower of fireworks going off, but when R would let go of his hands, he stood for a minute, giggle maniacally, and then step... step ... step. And he did it again, and again, and again. Once, he went for a good twelve paces before he let gravity take hold again. And every time, the wild giggle, like he couldn't believe he was doing it either.

Like silly people, we applaud every time he takes steps on his own. And we try not to groan too loudly when we stand him up, and instead of walking, he drops down on all fours and crawls instead.

Tonight was the absolute best, because after taking a few hitchy baby steps, he started clapping himself. It seems only fair. He's the one who's doing all the work. It's only fair that he should get to applaud himself.

P.S. At the same time, he's suddenly learned how to turn his wagon around by himself. (I complained - gently - a few posts ago, because he was using the wagon like a maniac, but daddy or mommy had to turn it around every time he hit a wall or a corner.) All of a sudden, we saw him doing exactly what daddy did - tilting the handle back, pivoting the wagon until it was in the right direction - and then tearing off again. Once he got the mechanics, he was very nearly unstoppable. (Well, if it weren't for the toys that kept logjamming under his wheels.)

And once he could control the wagon, I realized that I had made a horrible miscalculation. During the early days, when I was trying to coax him into using the wagon at all, I would encourage him to use me as a target. "Come on. Come get daddy." And then, when he was a few steps away, I would leap away with a little scream. Well, now he's decided that the game is Hit Daddy with the Wagon. And I'm jumping out of the way more and more now, and no, it's not fun anymore. He's still laughing, though, every time he gets me lined up in his sights.

Back to Regular Dad

Sat, 01 Jul 2006 02:49:08 GMT

I know that ticklish spot, right under Oliver's chin, and I know that when I hit it with my bare toe just right, he goes spasmy with giggles.

I know that sometimes, his favorite thing is rolling across the floor like a log going down a hill. And that, if I gently nudge him with my foot, he'll roll and roll until he hits the window, softly giggling the whole time.

I know that he takes his naps almost like clockwork at 9 am and at 3 pm.

I know that he loves aquariums. And peekaboo. And watching birds. And watching the construction trucks that stream by our apartment. And anyone walking by our window.

I know that he smiles and occasionally waves at strangers. And he flirts with every woman who works at the grocery store, and they all flirt right back.

I know that when I eat snacks, I'd better put down a handful of Cheddar Bunnies or Veggie Booty for him, or else he'll get resentful.

I know that my little boy loves me. I know this. I know if I lay on the floor, sometimes he crawls right up to me and puts his little head against my chest for a few moments. If I'm really lucky, he'll crawl up to my face and give me a wet, sloppy, open-mouthed gooey kiss right on the lips. And that's the best thing ever.

Today is the last day I get to be a stay-at-home dad.

Mrs. B came home tonight and began her summer vacation, which is (unfairly) only six weeks. She gets a month and a half to be the primary caregiver for Oliver, while I try to find myself some gainful employment. And then, when the fall comes, both she and I will go to work, and Oliver will go to the day care seven blocks from our house.

I think back to those early days, when I worried if I was ever going to get the hang of taking care of him all day. (Actually, that first day, I was really worried if he was ever going to take a bottle from me.) Naps worried me. Feedings frightened me. I was constantly worried that I would poke him in the eye, or drop him, or something similarly awful.

And here we are, ten months later. Naps don't scare me any more. The bottles aren't even an issue anymore. We do two meals a day, two naps, hours of playing, and sometimes I'm exhausted and nap while he does and sometimes I don't even bother. I can keep up with him. He doesn't scare me anymore.

It's been nearly a year that I've been taking care of him, and we've grown so much together. I feel privileged to have had this much time with him, that we've been able to afford (barely) to do this. I have a bond with our little boy that not enough fathers get. My own father never had the connection with us from the early days that I get to have with Oliver.

Now I have to readjust to being just a regular working dad, one that drops his kid off at daycare in the morning and sees him at night for dinner and sleep. (Actually, the daycare won't start until late August, but stick with me, folks, I'm on a roll.) I won't get to see him play during the day, giddily tearing through his books or tossing around his blocks, one by one, with a squeal of glee every time one flies into the air. Those moments will just be on the weekends.

I'll miss all the intensive time with him. Hours of playing on the floor, hundreds of books read, balls tossed, blocks stacked and tumbled, messes made and cleaned and made again. I won't miss the problems: the difficult naps, the teething miseries, the days of complete distraction where he couldn't do anything for five minutes without screaming in frustration.

Well - I say I won't miss that. But I will. Because when things went wrong, I was the only one he had during the day to make things better, and almost always, I figured out how to make it better. I got him to sleep. I provided teethers and (before he had actual teeth) my fingers to soothe his aching gums. I found ways to keep him entertained. I figured out how to be his parent, the caretaker, the one he relied on. I learned how to take care of him, and he learned to trust me.

I don't ever want him to forget how much that time meant to me. I know I will never forget it.

Sleater-Kinney - the End of the Road

Fri, 30 Jun 2006 16:54:20 GMT

Sleater-Kinney is breaking up. The website says it's an "indefinite hiatus," but I know a euphemism when I read it. They're done. Corin Tucker will move to widely acclaimed and occasionally misunderstood solo albums. Carrie will throw down as a guest artist on albums by Pearl Jam, the Gossip, and the Queens of the Stone Age. Janet Weiss will still play with Quasi, and some other group will have the good sense to sweep her up. She may be the only drummer strong enough to replace Matt Cameron, should he ever leave Pearl Jam.

Sleater-Kinney is breaking up. They released the most unexpected and devastating record of their career, the one that makes everything else look like an elementary school project. Then they folded up the tent. I'm left with a new sense of sadness every time I hear the blowtorch opening of "The Fox" or the vicious interplay of "Entertain." This was the last album by this band. This was the one that killed them.

I've been comforting myself with overload. I've been watching clips of them on the Henry Rollins show and live segments off the website. I'm listening to two live concerts from 2005 posted here (and my sincere gratitude goes out to the host. The cover of "Fortunate Son" is a gem, and the retooled versions of old songs are remarkable.) I've been reading their biography off the website, the birth I missed, even though I'm out in the land of evergreens and coffee. I didn't pick up on S-K until "The Hot Rock," and I didn't really hear them until "All Hands on the Bad One." And then I was hooked. I explored their catalog backwards, only recently hearing their remarkable debut album. I've only seen them once, during the AHOABO tour, playing a 1/3-full Key Arena and blowing the lid off it.

It's a week of transition here at Casa Bluesky, and it only hit me yesterday. This is the last week I'll be home with Oliver full time. Next week, Mrs. B comes home, and hopefully, I'll be working somewhere, either temping it or suddenly seizing a full-time gig. We have today and tomorrow, and then it's over. I'll talk more about this in a later posting. (I'm not ready yet.)

So what I'm doing today is project all of my emotions of loss and sadness about ending my stay-at-home tenure into my sadness about losing Sleater-Kinney. That's the only explanation for why I started getting weepy halfway through the (weird, foresty, blurry) video for "Entertain." That's gotta be it.

I saw something online that suggested that Le Tigre might be breaking up, too. If that's true, I'm just gonna fall apart.

Off to Boston

Wed, 21 Jun 2006 04:55:01 GMT

Hey, faithful reader(s),

Me and Mrs. B are flying to Boston tomorrow morning for the wedding of Mrs. B's sister. We'll be gone until next Tuesday, so the blog may be quieter than usual. Slightly.

It'll be the first plane trip of Oliver's young life. We've got layovers coming and going - one short flight and one looooooooooooooong one. If all works well, little O will sleep and eat snacks and play peek-a-boo with the people sitting across from us, and he'll be adorable.

If not ...

Well, wish us luck.

Bouncy Bouncy Bouncy

Wed, 21 Jun 2006 04:54:05 GMT

We have been bouncing Oliver to sleep for nearly a year now, using a giant red balance ball, as sold in inumerable sporting goods stores. I have lost an inch off my waist. My arms are more toned now than at any time since high school, and my shoulders are broader. I think this should be an official exercise regimen:

The Baby Exercise Routine

1) Get a long pillowcase. Buy twenty five pounds of stuffing - buckwheat, couscous, flour, it doesn't matter what as long as it's the right weight.

2) Fill the pillowcase with your stuffing. Sew it shut, making sure that the stuffing is equally distributed, more or less. If one end is heavier than the other, label it "head." Label the other side "feet."

3) Write down the following numbers:

5
5
10
10
15
25
30
30
30
45
60

Write down each of these numbers on a piece of paper. Every time you exercise, draw one of these numbers out of a hat. This will be the amount of time you exercise.

4) Get a balance ball. Place it in your bedroom, at the foot of the bed.

5) Every four hours, get your pillowcase (just for kicks, call it "the baby") and sit on the balance ball, balancing "the baby" across your outstretched arms. "The baby" should be resting on the insides of your elbows, with the weight mostly on your forearms and biceps.

6) Bounce with "the baby," keeping the "head" and "feet" level. If you really want a challenge, sew a bubble level into the center of your pillowcase and watch the bubble. If it moves out of the center lines, stop and start again.

7) After you've bounced for the proper amount of time, stand up with your "baby," continuing to keep the "head" and "feet" level. Place your "baby" gingerly on your bed. If at any point, the "head" and "feet" are not level, get back on the ball and bounce again.

8) For a change of pace, try this additional step. Once a week (on random days), draw two numbers out of the hat. Use the first number and bounce for this amount of time. Put down your "baby," and leave the room for five minutes. Go back, pick up your "baby," and bounce again for the amount of time on the second piece of paper.

Walking for the First Time

Thu, 15 Jun 2006 23:50:30 GMT

As one of his birthday presents, Oliver got a little wagon (officially, it's called a Toddler Wobbler, which seems prescient) that could be used as a walker. The wheels have adjustable brakes so it doesn't go flying out from under him, and it's just the perfect height for him.

Oliver had it for a week or so and didn't seem to know what to do with it. He put toys into it and pull them out, and sometimes he would push it across the floor with his hand.

Then, suddenly, one night he climbed up, grabbed the back of the wagon...

and he was off, wobbling his way across the living room. We were stunned at how quickly he went, and how eager he was to walk once he figured out how to do it.

He made probably a dozen laps, back and forth, across the living room, stopping only when he hit a wall or another obstruction.

Then his legs started getting wobbly. He still didn't stop. Didn't stop, even when he could no longer stand up and he was pushing the wagon on his knees. Didn't actually stop until we took him away from the wagon, and he fought us even then.

So now we've got an official toddler. He's compelled to walk now, the same way he was when he first learned to crawl. The urge is so powerful that we have to hide his wagon so he won't just walk back and forth all day. Then he'll just take the laundry basket, or the Incrediblock seem above, and use them as quasi-walkers. To hilarious effect.

Bonus! If you go here, you'll be able to see a very grainy and in-your-face video of the boy walking on his chubby little legs. Enjoy.

Everything

Thu, 01 Jun 2006 00:03:40 GMT

Everything changed.

People use this phrase all the time. Everything changed on September 11th. Everything changes once you're old enough to drink. Everything changes once you drive a Hemi. Everything changes once you listen to the Doors.

On May 31, 2005, everything changed for us.

I remember so much of that day, and the days leading up to it. I remember exactly where I sat and where R lay when she had the misoprostol treatments. I remember the restaurant on Capitol Hill where we ate our last formal meal pre-baby. The antiseptic smells of scrubs and clean towels. The bathtub where she tried using hot water to stem the pain of her contractions, to postpone the epidural just that much longer. The salmon from the cafe, the location of everything in the room - the tv, the bassinet, the sink, the bare padded area where I slept while my wife worked to bring our baby out of her body and into the world.

I remember seeing the crown of his head emerge, as magical as anything I have ever seen. I realized then the weight of creating another human being. We weren't just creating ultrasound pictures or something to put in the crib. We created a person, and here was his head, and here were his shoulders, and the umbilical cord caressed his throat gently, like the last kiss of a lover, and then the doctor's scissors snipped it away and he sprang out into the cold light of day. It was 5:32 am. It was a Tuesday. Today is Wednesday. We have gone fifty two weeks and one day since that magical moment, and today is the anniversary of his birth. It's his birthday.

I want to say that we were playing his lullaby CD, the one that's playing now as he slumbers in the next room. I could be wrong. We could have been playing James Taylor or Cat Stevens or Enya. But my heart wants it to have been that lullaby CD that welcomed him into the world.

I remember so many trivial and hugely significant moments that splash against each other in my mind like ripples in a turbulent sea. I remember his tragically feline cries from those early early days, and I remember how much he slept as his body struggled to draw as much nourishment as he could. The desperation of those early days, until the lactation consultant came and taught R about latches and the satisfying clunk! of his swallows, and he began to feed in earnest. Then it all comes in cascading waves. Meconium diapers. Blankets. His play gym, and the way he would lay on his back and bat a fist at his little hanging frog.

The frightening first day I spent alone with him.

Baths. Strolls in the Bjorn and in the various strollers. I remember the first time we went to the store in the Bjorn - he spit up on the padding and I didn't even notice until we entered the store and I saw the white patches against blue fabric. (I had nothing to clean him up with. I had to learn.) The first time I went to parenting class, feeling awkward and slightly desperate and wildly emotional in a room full of mothers who were equally emotional if not more.

More memories. Solid food. Smiles. Laughter. Tears and crying jags that evolved from catlike cries into real babylike sounds. (No less tragic.) Naps that were blissfully still and long, and naps that descended into chaos and tears on both sides. All of it.

I remember it all, and the things I don't remember sneak up on me unexpectedly. I remembered suddenly this morning how tiny his first diapers were, and how small his body was, like a doll.

I used to be so tired that I would fall asleep on the couch carrying him, and we would sleep together, sprawled together in a pile of fatigue. I fell asleep holding him that first day, sitting upright, and I startled myself awake with nightmare visions of how I could have dropped him, how I could have somehow slipped and had him tumble out of my hands. I don't believe that now. Even that first day, I was his father, and there was no force, not even my own exhaustion, that would have caused him to slip from my grasp.

Our boy is now a year old. 365 days ago, everything changed for us. My career changed. The way I looked at everything - television, food, baseball, alcohol, plastic, honey, electric fans, newspapers, everything - changed. My new world is exactly one year old, and I'm only starting to get used to it. He is the joy of my life, and the greatest thing I have ever been associated with.

Happy birthday, Oliver.

The First Time

Tue, 16 May 2006 23:48:45 GMT

The interview last Friday went well. Good rapport, good answers, blah blah blah. I'm waiting to hear from them.

What really mattered to me is that Oliver was a gem in his first daycare session. He was charming, he was playful, he only had one serious crying jag. He also was nearly asleep on his feet when I came to pick him up - the interview went longer than I expected.

I've been at home with little O for nine months now, and last Friday was tough for me. It was like the beginning of the end. If I don't get this job, I'll get another one, and we'll be putting him in someone else's hands for eight or nine hours a day. I don't worry about the daycare provider - she's great and kind and loves Oliver. It's just ... well, it's not us. It's not me.

When I came to pick him up, I was disappointed that the main daycare provider wasn't there (she had to pick her own kids from school.) The other person there wasn't able to give me a full rundown of how the day went, only the short time she had spent with him. Before Oliver saw me, I peeked in the door and saw him playing contentedly with the daycare worker. I called his name a few times (it felt like several hundred) before he looked my way. And then he let me pick him up. And then burst into tears.

And yes, I felt nine shades of awful. A little girl looked up cautiously and asked, "All right?" He was all right. Tired. Maybe hungry. Maybe a little spooked at having suddenly been dropped into the hands of strangers, with a gaggle of other kids he'd never seen before. But of course he was all right.

I took him home and he almost fell asleep on the eight-block drive home. He was down for a nap in minutes, and only then did I allow myself a few tears at the new bridge we had crossed.

Interview

Tue, 16 May 2006 23:47:07 GMT

Note: originally posted 5/11/06 to the other blog. Sorry, Salon readers.

Hokey smokes. I sent out a resume last night, and twelve hours later, the organization called me back to set up an interview.

I can't tell you the organization, obviously, but it's a fundraising job and it's a much larger organization that I first realized. My interview's at 1:30 tomorrow (Friday.)

My contract work with my previous employer dried up at the end of April. I finished everything I could do, and though it was tempting to invent some previously undiscovered work so I could bill them for more hours, I dutifully reported that my desk was clean. (One of these days, they'll realize that I still have office keys.)

As much as I want to continue being a stay-at-home dad, things are tough on one income. I could hit some temp agencies, but they're all M-F businesses, and my M-F daytime hours are busy. (I can't imagine sitting Oliver in the waiting room of a temp agency while I do typing and grammar tests for hours.)

So after sending out two dozen resumes, I got a lightning-fast bite. The job description is comprehensive, the voice over the phone was friendly, and these folks really look like they've got their act together. I could really enjoy being just another employee in a well-oiled machine of a development department. Cross your fingers for me.

Oh, and we're also going to try daycare for the first time tomorrow. While I'm interviewing, little O is going to be hanging out at an at-home daycare for an hour or two. It's the first time he's been away from both of us since he was three months old. So cross your fingers and toes. Between the new experience of daycare and the job interview, I am in an emotional state commonly referred to as "freaking out."

The New Rules of Driving

Wed, 26 Apr 2006 17:34:31 GMT

I'm sorry if you're following me. But I'm in the slow lane. I'm not going to speed up, so you might as well pass me.

I'm not going to speed up, unless it looks like I might miss the next traffic light. Then I'm going to floor it - but gingerly, gradually, because I don't want to wake my passenger.

That's the thing. Oliver's in the back seat. Asleep. His head is slumped down, his chin in his chest, his lower lip moving softly with every breath. And so I'm going to do everything I can to keep him asleep. That means I'm not going to stop this car for the next hour. At all. So you probably better just go around me, because this won't be much fun for you otherwise.

Why is he asleep? Sometimes he just conks out on the way back from a distant location. Sometimes, I'll admit, I know he's been awake for three hours and he'll fall asleep on the way home, and I take him out anyway because I want him to sleep in the car. Naps get tiring for me, and sometimes I'll admit I need a break. I want him to sleep without me having to bounce him for fifteen minutes, without the sudden wakeups after thirty minutes. So we drive around town.

If you're behind me, you should be warned that I'm going to coast through stop signs. Oh, sure, it'll look like I stopped, but if you study it closely - if you videotape the intersection and then play it back in slo-mo - you'd realize that I merely downshifted to first gear, and slowed down to a near-stop. I paused, just long enough for the momentum of the car to shift slightly, almost imperceptibly, and then we're off again. The car never stopped. The baby's still asleep.

Stop lights are, of course, a particular hazard, but I've figured out the secret. I watch the walk signals. If I see the walking man, then we're in the clear - I can proceed at a normal rate of speed. Unless we're too far away. Then, I'm going to lean on the gas, just a bit. And possibly switch lanes, if I need it. I will not miss that light.

And if I see red on the crosswalk sign, watch out. I'm going to gun it. Not shift gears. I'll just gently rev it up until we're going fast enough to make the light. If it's yellow, I'm not going to stop. And if it turns red just when I'm going under ... well, I'm just going to have to explain it to the cop while my kid screams in the back seat.

If, god forbid. we actually hit a red light, I'm not going to stop. I'm not going to go through it, mind you - that would be dangerous. But I'm going to do everything in my power to keep the car from actually coming to a complete stop. So I'll downshift gently, one gear at a time, slowing down very gradually - the trick here is change speed so slowly as to make the word "gradually" seem like reckless abandon. A bit more. Just a bit more. Now we're in first gear, and I'm coming up on the car ahead of me. So now I'm going to take the car out of gear, and coast in neutral at microspeed. We're still moving, but at a snail's pace. Rolling. We're drifting toward the other car now, breathtakingly slow, but we're still moving. A second more - only a few feet more before the car ahead of me forces me to hit the brakes. Come on. Just a second more.

And ... the light turns green.

As the car ahead of me accelerates, I slip the car back into first gear and tap the gas. And we're moving again. Never stopped. See how nicely that worked?

So if you're behind me, I'm going to look like a driver grappling with indecision. Speed up. Slow down. Switch lanes, then switch back. Creepy-crawl up behind other cars at intersections. I'm constantly watching fifteen blocks ahead of me, and my eyes are also constantly scanning my rearview mirror, in which I can see his rearview mirror, the one that faces him in the backseat. I watch his face for any sign of motion, the slightest blink of an eye, the slightest grimace. I'm constantly looking backwards and forwards while driving. It's tricky, but I've gotten used to it.

You really should just get around me. I'm just driving around and around in a giant circle, up and around Alki Point, down 35th, down around the ferry dock. I'm not actually going anywhere, unlike you. So you'll probably get impatient, and maybe you'll want to lean on your horn a little. (Please don't.) Just go around. Because I'm going to be driving like this for as long as I have to, as long as that little boy's asleep.

Making My Move

Thu, 06 Apr 2006 23:23:51 GMT

Hi! How've you been?

It's kinda lonely here out in Salon Blogland. Ever since Salon announced they were closing off the Salon blogs to new subscribers, I and a number of other bloggers have made plans for the end of this little neighborhood.

The Salon blogs have been a tremendous experience for me. I've enjoyed the instant audience that comes with a connection to a large (and intelligent) web magazine like Salon.com. I've been maintaining this blog for nearly two years, and I've enjoyed sharing my life, my left-leaning and often smartass views, and most recently, the arrival of my son. And don't worry, chiquitos, I'm not done yet. The new TMBS is now located at blogger.com. (Change your bookmarks, s'il vous plait.)

And what's going to happen to this blog? Here's what I wrote when I created the new blog:

...what's going to happen is that my former blog is going to essentially waste away. Once the license fee comes due, I won't renew it because it doesn't make sense. Once the blogs were no longer actively promoted by Salon, most of the appeal wore off. Sure, we were still technically part of Salon, but the page views we were once virtually guaranteed were gone. So, like Billy Joel said, I'm moving on. Or moving out. Er ... moving.

The reason I haven't posted here for a while is, well, kinda complicated. Not long after I created the new blog, my computer died. Straight up went and died. You can read all about it here. (P.S. Another shoutout to my brother for being such an unexpected savior.)

I'm not running on an amazingly sleek 1.5 GHz Intel Core Mac Mini. As R says, it's about the size of a hardcover book. An amazing machine. I'll tell you about it someday.

I haven't tried to start up Radio since then, for fear that it wouldn't recognize the new computer and it would freak out, or delete my blog, or call me filthy names in Mandarin. To my great amusement, none of that happened. I still have my entire hard drive saved on an external drive. So I just mounted my old hard drive on the new computer, and opened Radio. Apparently, it assumed I was on the same computer and ran just like normal. Score one for complicated and expensive workarounds.

Anyway, I'll do my best to cross-post on this blog and on the new one until my yearly subscription runs out. If you want to leave comments on any future post, please do it on the new blog and not this one. I'm lonely over there, y'all!

But of course, if you've been waiting here to hear from me, holla at me in the comments.

Switching Career Paths

Sat, 18 Feb 2006 03:42:33 GMT

So, seven years ago, almost to the day, I got fired from a thankless, pointless job at a machine shop. I won't say it was futureless, but I didn't want a future as a machinist. I'd seen the guys whose careers were as machinists. Their fingers were short and stubby, as if they'd sanded off parts of them.

In other states, it would have been an illegal firing. They made up complaints about the quality of work I was doing. I consulted lawyers who explained to me that Washington was an at-will state - as long as you're not being fired for legal discrimination, they don't need a good reason. I had no hope of a lawsuit.

So I ranted and sulked and filed for unemployment, which was hysterically fast (the counterbalance to Washington's lax labor laws.) And I looked for a job. I scanned the back of Seattle's sketchy indie paper, the Stranger, and found an ad that promised something silly - saving the world while getting paid. I bit.

Since then, I have worked in non-profits. I have been building a non-profit resume, and considered myself on a career ladder. The pay isn't great, but I was satisifed knowing that I was moving in a direction with my career. And I'll admit that I take some solace in working for the greater good. I'm not making tons of money, but I'm part of "the movement." Helping to save the world.

Even while I'm raising Oliver as a stay-at-home dad, I'm still working for a non-profit. I'm working around 12 hours a week as an independent contractor, helping with the website and newsletter for the organization I left in August. But that work's running out, and I have to look for something else.

I spent a couple of weeks sifting through the job listings at idealist.org and the non-profit wing of craigslist, and I saw a few things. The pay was always fair-to-middling, but the jobs sounded interesting.

I told R about my work so far, and she said something that surprised me. "Maybe you should look outside non-profits."

I was a little shocked, and I suppose I didn't take it well. For me, nonprofits had been my lifeline, and I was afraid to let it go. Even at this point, I'm afraid that I can't get a straight job. Maybe I can only survive in the slightly askew world of "the movement," where someone with little experience and a sketchy resume and an odd toolbox of skills can find a good gig.

But she's right. She's right on both counts. Right that I deserve better pay than the paltry wages offered by non-profits. And she's also right that I can get one of these jobs. I look at the qualifications for administrative jobs and managerial jobs, and I'm practically overqualified. I have a solid resume. I'm ready.

So I've started to branch out. I'm still looking at non-profit jobs, but only the ones that pay more than $35,000 a year. I'm also looking at legal firms, at corporations, at straight jobs. I do have some standards, however. I'm using Lloyd Dobler's words as my credo:

I don't want to sell anything, buy anything, or process anything as a career. I don't want to sell anything bought or processed, or buy anything sold or processed, or process anything sold, bought, or processed, or repair anything sold, bought, or processed. You know, as a career, I don't want to do that.

I'm not really troubled by the idea of turning my back on nonprofit work. I'm not giving up on my progressive save-the-world ideals, after all. If I'm making decent wages, I can actually afford to be a more conscientious consumer, buy local goods and organic produce, and that helps to make the world a better place. Plus I will finally be able to afford to join the ACLU, Amnesty International, and all of those other organizations I can't afford to join right now.

Fair Warning

Sat, 18 Feb 2006 02:51:23 GMT

I try to be respectful of my son's delicate eardrums. I use the fader on our car stereo to play the music through the front speakers, and I usually keep it pretty low. After all, he's just a baby.

However, there's always a risk that I'll be playing the radio, and a song will come on the radio that throws my restraint out the window. One of those loud songs, the ones that make you sing at the top of your lungs, break out your best driving dance moves (all head, wrists, and shoulders), and turn up the volume before you realize you've done it. If one of those songs comes on the radio, I cannot take responsibilty for my actions. Oliver's just going to pull his little fuzzy hat over his ears until it's over.

This is the list, so far. Others may be added later, depending on the quality of Seattle radio.

Sly and the Family Stone - "Dance to the Music," "Stand!" "Thank You," "I Want to Take You Higher" (not including any version with will.i.am on it)
T. Rex - "20th Century Boy." "Bang a Gong (Get It On)"
Led Zeppelin - "Kashmir, " "Babe I'm Gonna Leave You," "Communication Breakdown," "Whole Lotta Love"
Edited to add: "Misty Mountain Hop." Because, oh my God. That song just kills.
My Morning Jacket - "What a Wonderful Man." "Gideon"
Pearl Jam - "Do the Evolution," "Glorified G," "W.M.A.,""Not for You," "Given to Fly," "Go"
(Note: I live in Seattle, so hearing PJ on the radio is a real risk.)
Neil Young - "Like a Hurricane," "Rockin' in the Free World" (electric)
Derek and the Dominos - "Bell Bottom Blues," "Why Does Love Got to Be So Sad?" "Layla" (not Eric Clapton's wet teabag acoustic version)
Santana - "Soul Sacrifice," "No One to Depend On"
Cream - "Crossroads," "I Feel Free"
Beatles - Everything, but especially "Paperback Writer," Revolution," "She Said She Said," "Helter Skelter," "Rain," and if they ever played it, "It's All Too Much"
U2 - Everything, but especially "Vertigo," "Bullet the Blue Sky," "Elevation," "Love and Peace or Else," and, if they ever played it, "Gloria"
Run-DMC - "It's Tricky" or anything else from "Raising Hell"
Chaka Khan - "I Feel 4 U," "Ain't Nobody"
Prince - "Let's Go Crazy," "When Doves Cry," "Alphabet St.," and if anyone ever played it, "It's Gonna Be a Beautiful Night"

Nightmare

Tue, 14 Feb 2006 03:58:35 GMT

I'm not writing this down willingly. I need to purge it from my memory.

Last night I had the nightmare that makes all others look small and petty. I woke up shivering and nauseous. I couldn't go back to sleep, afraid that I would slip into that same dark world in my mind, the same shop, the same frighteningly empty hallway that I've already memorized.

Last night, in my dreams, Oliver vanished.

I was in a store with him, in his stroller. It might have been a clothing store. Maybe kid's toys. But the walls were stained wood, and there were rustic windows. Everything looked new-old, in the way that the shopping areas of tourist towns look.

I went away from Oliver for a minute. I was looking in my bag for toys for him, and I took my eyes off him. I pulled out something long and furry, and then I pulled out his Piglet rattle, which is a soft plush sort of rattle. The worst part is that this Piglet rattle exists not only in the dream world, but in real life. So I can't completely disconnect this dream from reality. I have a hard time looking at his Piglet rattle now, in daylight, without it all coming back.

So I rummaged and rummaged for toys, and then I looked over at him. And he was gone. There was no in-between state. I saw no dark gloved hands taking him away, no squeaking wheels, no mysterious laughter. There was no warning at all - he was there and then, he was just gone.

I looked frantically for him in the store. Maybe I had left him behind a rack of clothes, up against a wall. He wasn't anywhere.

I rushed into the hallway, my dream eyes wild with fear. I looked up one way, ran a few steps, looked the other, knowing it was futile. I did the worst thing a parent can do, and it had happened. I had lost our baby.

I rushed back into the store, hoping against hope that I had missed him. And he was there - not in the stroller that belonged to him, but someone else's stroller. But I was crazy with relief, and pressed his little body up against me and sobbed grateful tears that he was safe after all, and told him how frightened I had been.

And the boy then looked up at me, with his tawny skin and his short hair and his dark brown eyes, and we both knew then that I had the wrong boy.

I ran around the hallway more, unsure which way to go, and then the worst part of the dream occurred. I started to see the future, the new, severed future, unfold. I saw that Oliver would be forever frozen for us in his incomplete infancy. We would not see him stand, or walk, or talk, or go to school. Someone else would see him grow up. We had lost him.

And we would be forever looking for him, the rest of our lives. We would look at the faces of children going to pre-school, kids in the supermarket and the department stores. And then at the faces of kindergarteners. And then 1st graders. And then 2nd graders. And on. And on. Staring at playgrounds, at zoos, at school buses, at faces of children who were not ours. Forever looking for the boy we had lost.

And then I woke up.

R was asleep, with Oliver breastfeeding next to her. I peeked over her side to ensure that he was there, that it wasn't an illusion. He was there. His little lungs breathed in and out in languid slow motion. He was there.

I told R. I knew immediately that it was a mistake, but I had to let it out. Even saying it out loud brought a quiver to her lips, but I had to get it out of my head. We talked about it a minute, talked about stroller motion sensors and baby leashes. We let it go then. We had to, for the sakes of our frayed new-parent nerves.

And now I'm sharing this with you.

I mean no harm, readers. I wish this on no one. This terror, the heartbreaking loss I felt in my dormant state for just those few minutes. Maybe by writing this down, I can help crystallize the dark fears in the back of your own heads. And maybe by bringing the monsters into the sunlight, we can make them go away for just a little while.

Raiding the Library

Sun, 12 Feb 2006 16:06:40 GMT

All of Oliver's board books sit on the floor, in two plastic bins. He crawls toward them with a mischievious half-smirk on his face, making little giddy noises. He reaches a hand into the bin, grasps "Barnyard Dance," and pulls it out with one great tug upward. He reaches in again, pulls out two books at once with one hand. And then another. And another.

He starts leafing through the pages of "Barnyard Dance," trying to turn the pages by himself, putting his hand through the cardboard insert on the front cover. He turns the pages of board books now while we read him bedtime stories, and it's the coolest trick in the entire world. Everyone talks about crawling and talking and eating solid foods, but you really see that your baby's growing older when he can turn the pages of his own book.

He's now sitting in a sea of board books. He anxiously turns around in the pile, leafing through one, then another, looking at the pictures, acting for all the world as if he's following the stories. He opens the Dr. Suess book with the odd inserts, pulls at the enormous blond hair, the blue feathers, the rings on the Gack.

Oliver does not want for toys. He has a quilt covered with dozens of toys, balls, blocks, teethers, noisemakers, whoozits and whoozingers. But he loves playing with his books. They are his favorite toys. In fact, R has discovered that when Oliver's crawling toward something he shouldn't be exploring (say, power cords or stacks of firewood), she can get his attention by sitting on the floor and reading one of his books. He crawls over to be a part of the action, as though it's unseemly to have a book read without his direct involvement.

We were cautiously silent on our hopes for Oliver before he was born. Neither of us openly wished for a boy who could throw a perfect curveball, or who would compose symphonies, or would become an astronaut or an actor or a President or a point guard. Both both of us wanted to have a reader. It seemed only right that in a house of voracious readers, with families of voracious readers, that our baby would inherit a love of books. But you never know. But he sits on the floor and plays with his books as if they are old friends he has come to visit. It's a good sign.

Windstorm Apocalypse 2006

Sun, 05 Feb 2006 16:41:34 GMT

(Note: this entry is a live digest of events from yesterday, Saturday, February 4th, when the power went out for over 100,000 homes in the Seattle/Puget Sound region, including Casa Bluesky.)

7:00 am The power's out, but the coffee pot is still on. That doesn't seem right.

We lost power this morning, while Oliver was in the middle of a fine oatmeal-and-banana breakfast. There was an insane windstorm that's still whipping around outside our windows. R was smart and noted the lights flickering earlier, and got out the candles and the single flashlight we own. Oliver finishes his breakfast by candlelight, which seems to complement the vase of white tulips on the table. He can't get his eyes off the one candle whose flame is standing up like an extended finger, far too high for my liking. I keep worrying it will set one of the tulips alight.

Then I notice that our coffee pot is still on. I decide not to worry about it - maybe it was some sort of emergency setting hitherto unknown to us, to ensure that fresh coffee would be available even in an emergency. (Why this type of setting wasn't available for our tv, our radio, or our computer didn't enter into my mind at the time.)

7:30 am Like a good little doobee, I call Seattle City Light to report the outage. I first have to listen to the recordings (made by employees, not by goofballs like me) of other outages in the area. There are lots of neighborhoods out in North Seattle, but we weren't on the list. Then it asks for my phone number to verify my address. I dutifully dial it in, but because it's a cell phone, it doesn't work. So I'm told that I'm going to be connected to an operator.

"We are experiencing a high volume of calls, so your wait time may be longer than usual." Okay, saw that one coming. "Your wait time will be longer than ... fifteen minutes." Urrgh! But I hang on and hang on, through staticky announcements and bad Muzak renditions of "Somewhere Out There," which I'm horrified to recognize by the cheeseball bridge. Finally I get a live person.

"It says that power has been restored there. What was your apartment number again?"

I assure her that power had not been restored where I was sitting. Oliver is playing with his blocks by candlelight and the first hints of daylight. She makes me check my circuit breakers, which does absolutely nothing except irritate me.

The apartment is starting to get colder. Naturally, all of our heat is electric, except for the decorative fireplace. If this keeps up all day, we'll need to get a hotel room for the night.

"Okay, we'll have someone check that out. We anticipated this outage today, so we're staffed up to handle it." Great. If they saw it coming, why am I sitting in the dark?

"Do you have any idea how long we'll be down? We've got an eight-month-old baby."

"I really can't say. But if you have no heat, you'll need to bundle your baby up."

Through clenched teeth, I reply, "I'm aware of that, ma'am." What I don't say is - because I'm his father, and I have a little bit of understanding of how to care for him.

"And if it goes on for too long, you may need to make alternate plans."

Impressively, I get off the phone with Mrs. City Light without using a single obscenity. But I didn't think it was very reassuring to have the power company telling me about making alternate plans. Weren't they supposed to be more optimistic than me about their own ability to get our lights back on?

There are 15,000 customers without power, according to Mrs. City Light.

7:30 am I walk down the stairs. The emergency lights are on in the fourth floor stairwell, but when I get to the third floor, the regular hallway lights are still on. What the hell's going on here?

At the second floor, I run into the old Scottish woman who lives on our floor. "I just went doon to the garage, and there's no power at all." A second floor resident peeks through the door, and reports that everything's off except her refrigerator. Hmm. Maybe I'd better recheck that coffeepot.

I walk to the manager's office to find the emergency numbers, and call all of them. One is just a pager. One is a real estate office, which gives me the "if you are calling between the hours of eight and five..." business. I don't bother leaving a message. I want live people.

My wish is granted with the next call. A drowsy voice answers, "Hullo?" I explain the situation, and he promises to look into it. I feel a little remorse about waking up, but not much. Serves him right for listing his home number as an emergency contact.

8:00 am Oliver's down for his first nap in near-complete silence. His humidifier isn't working, and neither is the CD player to play his sleep CD. He goes down remarkably well.

The refrigerator is still running. Both of the outlets near the refrigerator are still working. This is odd.

8:45 am I just got a call back from the property manager. Apparently, the apartment next door lost power for about six hours last night. I explain the whole mystery of the coffeepot and the refrigerator, and she asked me if I had tried my circuit breakers. I go through the whole routine over again.

"Okay, we'll look into it and I'll let you know."

She informs me that the building next to us (part of the same apartment complex) was out of power for six hours this morning. Now they've got power. Apparently.

9:30 am To get out of the apartment, R and Oliver go shopping. I stay at home, and decide to start a fire. Partly, it's for warmth. I'm also using the fireplace as a makeshift document destroyer. R has developed a habit of not shredding all of the confidential documents she works with, and instead brings them home in her trunk over the summer. (In her defense, she barely has the time to do her job, much less shred reams of paperwork.) Last year, it was fairly easy to shred them while watching tv, but this year that proves to be impossible. So, I'm burning them. The warmth and smoky fragrance make me happy.

10:00 am I go downstairs to investigate, and take out some garbage. I run into a maintenance worker, who says that there are no breakers downstairs, so he can't figure out why the power's on in spots in the building. He then helpfully adds, "I'm no electrician, though." However, a genuine electrician's on the way.

I run into someone who's moving onto the third floor today. I feel rivers of pity for them.

10:15 am Power's on! Hooray! But I'm going to wait for a few minutes before I call R to tell her the good news.

10:18 am Ker-BOOM! Power's out again! I hear explosions from across the street. Chloe jumps and runs out of the room. Across the street, a tree branch is slumped over a power line and smoldering. A couple of neighbors come out to stare up at the smoking branch - I stay home, since standing under a smoking tree branch crossing a power line strikes me as not smart.

11:15 am I finally think to call Seattle City Light back to let them know that our power's out again. We're back on their radar. No word, again, on when power's coming back on.

There are over 40,000 people without power. Most of the trouble seems to be up north by the King/Snohomish county line, but other outages are reported in Fremont and along the 520 floating bridge.

11:30 am R calls to check in. Oliver's fallen asleep in the back seat. She's driving around until he wakes up.

1:00 pm Still burning, still dreaming. My fire's starting to turn to embers. Oliver's still asleep. R gives up, and pulls the car up in front of the building because she's tired of driving around Alki and West Seattle. Naturally, once the car stops moving, he wakes up immediately. I go downstairs to help cart the boy up four flights of stairs.

3:00 pm KUOW reports that over 100,000 people have had their power knocked out. The 520 bridge has been closed because of high winds, for the first time in over seven years.

R and I start discussing the possibility of getting a hotel room for the night. We can't sleep here with no heat. It's bad for us, but it could be really bad for the baby.

4:00 pm Cashiers at the local grocery store tell me that the store lost power at the same time we did this morning. Apparently, Target still has no power, leaving customers to shop in the dark. I feel no small amount of schaudenfraude at hearing this. The barista tells me that her power's still out in her house. She saw power lines sparking and buzzing when she drove in for her shift. Her theory is that everyone three blocks out from the store has no power.

As I'm buying firewood, R calls to tell me that heat is seeping out from our vents. I still buy the firewood. I come home to discover that indeed, we have a small amount of heat coming out, and the baseboards appear to be giving off some heat as well. My frozen toes rejoice. It's just a trickle of heat, but it helps.

We now have our bedroom clock radio, R's cell phone charger, the laptop, and my iPod charger plugged into the outlets by the fridge. This is the weirdest power outage I've ever experienced.

4:25 pm An orange Seattle City Light truck pulls up on the street adjoining our apartment. I try not to feel too encouraged, but my heart is beating up in my throat. I cannot believe how empty the house feels without internet access, or television, or even the CD player. Or proper heat.

He takes a chainsaw to the branch that seemingly blew out our power this morning, and then they pull up to the nearest utility pole. Enormous branches fall to the sidewalk below. R and I are gawking out the window at him. It's probably the first time he's had an audience for his job. I'm resisting the urge to applaud from the balcony.

5:10 pm The lights go on - across the street. Apparently the line that was repaired wasn't ours. R wants to strangle somebody. The neighbors downstairs are vacuuming. Vacuuming! We hate everyone with lights.

Over 160,000 customers are without power. On the radio, people are being warned to plan for a multi-day outage, and to figure out other methods to watch the Super Bowl. Did I mention Seattle's in the Super Bowl tomorrow? They're lucky to be in Detroit, a modern city with working heat and electricity.

5:20 pm R's violent tendencies are put in check by the miraculous return of our power. Oliver wakes up a few minutes later. I go in to bounce him back to sleep, and triumphantly turn on his humidifier. The steady hum soothes him back to sleep with minimal fuss.

6:00 pm Takeout dinner from the teriyaki place up the street. The cashier says they had no idea about any power outage. They've had power all day. I tell her she missed all the excitement. She shrugs. "We don't care." I trust that she means "we don't care" in the sense of "we just do our jobs, whatever's happening in the outside world," as opposed to "we are mavens of teriyaki, and your puny lives mean nothing to us."

7:30 pm Cable comes back on, which gives us both internet access and television. The official news reports are 135,000 homes still without power across four counties. We had no juice for over ten hours, but I feel grateful to be going to bed in a heated apartment, with the Innocence Mission whispering us to sleep.

Malfunkshun: Baby's First Cold

Wed, 25 Jan 2006 02:45:23 GMT

The darling boy was sick for a week. His first cold, and it was possibly more traumatic for mom and dad than it was for him. I mean, how could you not feel miserable for him? Let's reflect for a minute on how much it sucks to be a sick baby:

You can't blow your nose. Babies can't use tissues or handkerchiefs or nothin' to blow their noses. They just let the snot dribble down their sad faces, welling up in green puddles below their nose until it becomes annoying enough to whine about. And then, he would let loose with some of the saddest, most defenseless crying you've ever heard.

At night, the snot would collect in his nasal cavities, so he would snort and snorfle in the night. Sleep was not fun for a week.

You can't eat. Babies eat by clamping their mouths on a breast or a bottle's nipple and sucking. When you can't breathe out of your nose, you can't really eat. So Oliver would try to suck, gasping the whole time, stop, catch his breath, groan a little,and then try all over again. Sometimes, as a bonus, you would literally see the discharge dribbling out his nose while he was trying all of this. Fun.

The pain. Lord God, the pain! Colds cause muscle aches, as every human reading this must know. But for a baby, muscle aches are new stuff. After all, he's just getting used to how his body works. He's just figuring out how to use his knees and shoulders to crawl, and how to perform the trick of balance known as sitting up. All of a sudden, it all hurts like the dickens, and he doesn't know why. So he would roam around on his quilt for a few minutes, and suddenly something would happen - he would bump his head infinitesimally, he would drop his toy, the air would crystallize - and he'd start pouting. Not crying. Pouting. Sad, groany, "woe is me" pouting. This went on for days.

Temperature checks. Look, he's a baby. Sticking the thermometer under his tongue doesn't work. There's only one sure way to get a baby's temperature, and it involves removing his diaper.

I checked his temperature rectally three times in twenty-four hours. I have become an expert in something I never wanted to be an expert in. He didn't seem to mind it very much, but it sure didn't make me happy.

As far as his actual temperature, it spiked at just over 101ª. Once it hits 102ª, you're supposed to call the doc. We dosed him with ibuprofen and it worked wonders on both the pain/discomfort and his temperature.

So, anyway, he's better. He gets a little drippy at the nose occasionally, but things are much better. And now that he's healthy, he's decided to learn everything all at once. This week he has started sitting up completely by himself, crawling, and he's on the verge of pulling himself up to a standing position. Plus he's started saying consonants. So apparently while he was sick, he was plotting the overthrow of the house. More later.

Me and the Cement Mixer

Thu, 12 Jan 2006 03:55:10 GMT

It's hard enough getting Oliver to sleep on a good day. Unfortunately, our bedroom window faces out onto a street, and we hear passing cars, talking children, the occasional barking dog, and other odd street noise. Yesterday, I had him all asleep and ready to put down on the bed when a car sans muffler zoomed by. He woke up instantly.

There's also a new (and apparently enormous) house being built on that street. So we hear everything from nail guns to table saws to hammers. Often, the noises seem to crank up in intensity right when I'm trying to put Oliver to sleep. There's nothing more infuriating than winding down the boy until he's dead asleep, only to hear a table saw start buzzing away.

There are trucks. Lots of trucks. Trucks that roar, and grind their gears, and make me want to shout out the window until I realize it's the middle of the day, and they have every right to be driving around on public streets.

Monday was the worst. I tried to put the kid down in the morning around 8, and things were going well. Suddenly, I heard a tremendous roaring sound. There was a truck coming up the road.

Then the noise stopped, and incredibly, started again. In reverse! There was a giant cement truck going up to the construction site and it couldn't go straight in, so it had to drive down the street and back in. So I had the double thrill of roaring truck engine plus the backup warning signal - beep beep beep. I could have killed somebody.

We have a CD player and a white noise generator playing in the bedroom, but there's no amount of white noise that can drown out this crap.

And just for kicks, the apartment directly below us is being renovated for a new tenant. We've had to deal with all kinds of banging and crashing and pounding from down below, not to mention a horrifying chemical stench that apparently came from an epoxy used to install kitchen cabinets. I'm feeling like we're under attack. It amazes me that he can sleep through any of it. I suppose I should feel grateful that he sleeps as hard as he does, so that the ruckus almost never arouses him.

Peas and Panic

Sun, 08 Jan 2006 05:09:54 GMT

There's not a space in Oliver's baby book for the first time he threw up, but if there was a space, we'd fill in yesterday as the date. And it was a doozy.

Oliver ate peas last night (he's been on solids for three or four weeks now). He had been eating squash, but we ran out, so we went back to mashed green peas, our all-purpose backup food. (We had several days' worth of peas frozen in ice cube trays, so we could prepare them on short notice. Did I mention we're making all of our own baby food? More on that later...)

Mrs. B and I went to bed around 9. Mrs. B had been complaining of feeling sick, and she was asleep as soon as she hit the pillow. I was restless, and I couldn't quite get comfortable. I felt too warm. I read for a bit, and then tried to go to sleep.

Around 10:00, Mrs. B leaned over to check on the boy and found several dark thick puddles in his co-sleeper. (I think she screamed.) Oliver had barfed up all of his peas all over his co-sleeper and himself. She picked up him and said, "Oh God, Oliver!" The back of his neck was covered in sweat, and his hair was matted and damp. His eyes looked glassy. I don't think we've ever seen him sweat before, and we both went into full bore panic mode. R kept talking to Oliver to get a reaction out of him. I ran to call the doctor on call at our local hospital.

It took us a couple of looks to discern that the piles of vomit were just peas, and not bile or some other horror. But we called the doctor anyway, and she advised us (it's amazing the things that new parents have to be told!) that babies throw up all the time.

But what about the sweating? I asked.

He's just thrown up, the doctor said calmly. Think about a time when you got sick. Did you feel a little warm? (Um, yeah. And my eyes probably looked a little glassy, too.)

(It's worth noting here that as soon as we got out of bed, we both noted how hot it was in the room. R's temperature was just off enough so she cranked up the heat a little higher than usual, and it was also unseasonably warm. The result was that the room was overheated, which probably explains the sweat on our poor little boy.)

So we were reassured that we didn't have to rush him to the emergency room. Pretty quickly, Oliver started to look like his usual self, smiling and looking around, a little bewildered at being up so late. I picked him up for a hug, and I guess I might have squeezed a little harder than usual, because he proceeded to barf up the remaining contents of his tummy all over my shoulder and lap.

It's a constant surprise to me how comfortable I've become with Oliver's bodily fluids. So much so that with Oliver's liquidy green puke all over me, I just held onto him and held his head gently over the burp cloth. "There you go, little boy. Get it all out. That's a good boy." We'll doubtless repeat this moment in his teenage years.

The rest of the night was stunningly uneventful. R fed him and then let him fall asleep on the bed next to her. (Our usual routine is to swaddle him up and put him in the co-sleeper at night, but she wanted him close. Plus, he'd conveniently puked all over his swaddling blankets.) He was a bit restless, but no more barfing, no more cold sweats. Today he's been grand, his usual bouncy animated self. No ill effects. All is well.

R told me today that when she first pulled him out of the co-sleeper, she was thinking the worst possible thoughts. Like, what if he passes out? What if he stops breathing? As I was calling the doctor, I started trying to remember the infant CPR lessons I had taken and realized I couldn't remember the sequence at all. It's hard to convey, after a day's reflection, the sheer panic that went through both of us seeing our little boy surrounded by puddles of his own vomit. It was a nightmare moment that neither of us is likely to forget. Ever.

I think it's gonna be alright. Yeah, the worst is over now. The mornin' sun is shining like a ...

Wed, 04 Jan 2006 04:07:26 GMT

I've said it before and I'll say it again: there's only so much you can do while you're bouncing on a giant red rubber ball.

We started using the ball when Oliver was around 4 months old. His sleep had gotten harder, as sleep does for babies around that age. They can see for longer distances, and suddenly the whole world is one big set of distractions. (Nursing also becomes more difficult at this point. One pediatrician of note calls this time the "nursing in the closet" period.)

I had seen mothers bouncing their babies on the big balance balls in our parenting class, but I never really thought about it for Oliver. Or rather, I never saw myself I would be bouncing up and down on a ball with Oliver. Frankly, it looked silly.

Until I tried it. He was crying miserably one day in class, and rocking him in my arms wasn't working. Someone innocuously said, "Do you want to try the ball?" I tried. My face probably turned red as I tried to balance myself, because suddenly I was the center of attention and not really sure what I was doing. (Some behaviors from high school never go away.) But I started to bounce with him flailing in my arms, and suddenly, within minutes, he was out cold.

I tried it in later classes, and each time it worked like a charm. So we bought our own big red ball from the local sporting goods store. It worked for Oliver like nothing (walking, rocking, singing) did anymore. We'd bounce for ten or fifteen minutes, and he'd cry for a little bit and then, as he settled, you'd hear his breaths timed rhythmically with the bouncing. Bounce, bounce, "hahh," bounce, bounce, "hahh." And then he was asleep, and you could sit in the rocking chair or on the couch with him and watch tv while he slumbered.

And it worked magically, for a while. And then it started getting harder. We'd have to go back to the ball again and again during the naps. After a while, I started putting the remote controls on the coffee table next to the bouncy ball (which sat in the middle of our living room like bizarre futuristic furniture) because I knew I wouldn't move from the spot for a half-hour. Even if I was just sitting on the ball, rocking gently forward and back, I couldn't leave the ball until he was absolutely sound asleep.

At its worst, Oliver would wake up while I was sitting with him, and the only way to keep him asleep was to get back on the ball and bounce. And bounce. And bounce some more. This went on for forty-five agonizing minutes sometimes. My knees started to ache. R's back was starting to scream in pain.

But nothing else worked. So, bouncy bouncy bouncy.

There were times I could imagine myself falling asleep on the ball, my legs mechanically repeating the motion over and over again. I started closing my eyes while bouncing, for just a few seconds at a time, taking little microbreaks. Once I nearly rolled off the back.

By the way, at no point during his naps could we put him down anywhere. Every so often I tried putting him in the co-sleeper (in the bedroom, a good fifty feet away) only to watch him wake up five minutes later. So, three or four times a day, R or I would have to bounce the kid to sleep and hold him for an hour to 90 minutes. So our shoulders were starting to ache as well just from supporting the weight of our rapidly growing boy in our arms.

Finally, I decided it was time to look for other options. We knew we weren't ready to get rid of the ball, but we had to be able to rest our arms and back while he was sleeping.

We picked up Elizabeth Pantley's book "The No-Cry Sleep Solution" and I turned to the section on getting a baby to sleep longer on his own. This was essentially the heart of our problem. Babies sleep in 30 minute sleep cycles, and unless they can get themselves back to sleep after the end of one sleep cycle, you're going to be rocking them or bouncing them or shushing them every half-hour.

So we made a decision to try it. The dreaded ball moved to our bedroom, so I could move Oliver easily into the co-sleeper. I tried it for Thursday and Friday of the first week. The first time I joyously emailed R. "He's been asleep on his own for ten minutes!" As soon as I sent the email, he was awake.

On Saturday, R had a revelation. Rather then moving him into the co-sleeper (which, because it has high barrier walls, requires lifting him up and then down onto the mattress), she just put him onto the bed when he was asleep. She got him down onto the bed for fifty minutes, and the masses (read: us) rejoiced. We danced. Birds sang. Trumpets played. (The trumpets and birds, of course, woke him up.)

So it's been a few weeks now, and he's doing alright. He's able to sleep by himself for long periods. We're still bouncing him to sleep on the dreaded red ball, but it's only for a few minutes at a time now. My knees and shoulders and R's back are starting to recover. He seems to have cut down to three naps a day, and that also helps.

My mind still drifts a little when we're bouncing, and the lights are off, and his sleep CD is playing, and the white noise machine is running. Everything designed to help him sleep makes me woozy. I start examining the contents of our closets to keep myself occupied. I think about lyrics to songs. Often, I think of punch lines to jokes, silly things in sitcoms, things that I know will make me laugh. I think of them - against my will - precisely because I'm trying so hard not to laugh while he's trying to fall asleep. And sometimes, often, I just get sleepy and yawn every five minutes, which interrupts him while he's trying to get to sleep.

Our next hurdle is getting him to sleep through that first sleep cycle and thus take an entire hour nap without needing our help. But one step at a time. We're making progress.

Sleep in Heavenly Peace. Please?

Fri, 30 Dec 2005 04:50:23 GMT

Let me talk about sleep for a minute, and then we'll talk about Oliver's Christmas. I promise, we'll get to the good stuff soon. But first, let me explain why sleep and Christmas were so interlocked this year. (Here's a cute picture to hold you over.)

Yes, yes, Christmas. The lights, the festivities, the nog. Tidings of comfort and joy. Except we were terrified.

See, we had started sleep-training Oliver just a couple of weeks ago. We got tired of holding him for thirty, or sixty, or ninety minutes at a time during his naps, and wanted to move him toward sleeping by himself. "Where" didn't matter - he could sleep in the crib, in his co-sleeper, on the bed, under the Christmas tree. I didn't really care, as long as he was sleeping on his own.

So we started working on him, and started seeing progress. (For those of you taking notes at home, we're using Elizabeth Pantley's book, The No-Cry Sleep Solution.)

We could get him to sleep successfully for twenty or thirty minutes by himself on the bed, and on rare occasions, as long as forty or fifty minutes. Not fabulous - we were still bouncing him around on our red rubber ball when he wasn't on the bed, but it was progress.

So Christmas was coming. and it meant two days of driving - one day down to Oregon and one day back - and three at Uncle B and Aunt N's house, including several hours spent at someone else's house for Christmas dinner itself. The car rides, we decided, would be somewhere between pleasantly surprising (he might sleep for a good long while) and horrific (screaming, screaming, screaming.) We were convinced his naps would be whacked out, because he would be in a strange environment. We brought all of the things that he needed for sleep - his white noise machine, his lullaby CD (which plays at the same time as the white noise machine, for reasons that only make sense in my own brain), his two swaddle blankets that we use to double-swaddle him. We borrowed a balance ball from our hosts - too small, but at least it was a ball. We thought we were in for a miserable four days.

The ride down was no picnic, but it wasn't bad. We drove a rented car, which was big and luxurious and smooooove. Oliver slept for a while, woke up and played, and then screamed and went to sleep. R fed him on the road in the parking lot of an Arby's. Like I said, not bad.

He slept like ... well, like a baby ... on that first night. He woke up often, and because we were in a full-size bed, he slept between me and R, so both of us were kept awake. But it wasn't awful.

Naps, amazingly enough, were hardly an issue during the entire ordeal. When it was time for him to sleep, he went down with a minimum of fuss and slept quite well. One of us or the other sat outside his door (terrified that he'd roll off the bed). But surprise, surprise, he was great. Even on Christmas day, when he was bombarded by sensory overload, he slept surprisingly well.

We must have looked pretty funny every time he went down for his naps. Whoever had sleep duty would come up and say the same thing. "He went down really well, he slept forever by himself. I couldn't believe it." Yet, each time it was true. Each time, we couldn't believe it was working.

I even had a couple of episodes where I put him on the bed before he was completely asleep (deep breathing, no body motion at all.) After a little tossing and turning, he would settle right down and conk out by himself. This may not sound like much, ye non-childbearing people, but it was a big big deal for me and R.

And Christmas itself? Yes, it was fabulous. There were clothes, and toys, and clothes, and toys, and more toys. My grandmother knitted him two sets of mittens and stocking caps. (I love my grandma.) And another relative, sort of a grandmother-in-law, went to the trouble of making him an enormous quilt of his own, with dozens of tiny patches of things like Bugs Bunny, kittens, trucks, Tiggers, and other kid stuff. It's an amazing piece of work, and R and I both got a little teary when we saw it.

We have a dozen new ornaments that we can tell him came from his very first Christmas, including one adorable piece with a photo of him in his little red union suit, looking for all the world like Santa's littlest helper.

The best present of all, though, was experiencing all of the sights and memories of his first Christmas. I loved helping him "unwrap" each of his presents. I would find a loose corner of wrapping, let him grasp onto it, and pull the present in the other direction, so the wrap would come off in his hand. He got to meet his cousin Cutie-Pie for the very first time. She's a ripe old 2 1/2 now, and talks and walks and uses sippy cups by herself. (He suddenly has taken an interest in using his own sippy cup, and I think it has something to do with cousin envy.) His grandmother on R's side was there, and everybody just took so much joy in seeing him and playing with him. We have fifty squijillion pictures of him. R actually made several photo books for our faraway relatives with pictures of his first six months, and every one who received one was awestruck and touched. (Yes, he's that cute.)

I'm already excited (and a little exhausted) in anticipation of next year's Christmas. And his first birthday. And his first real Halloween. And his first real Independence Day. And the first summer where he can run around barefoot. Holy cow, he's got a big year coming up.

Give Peas a Chance

Thu, 15 Dec 2005 02:28:44 GMT

I forgot to mention that Oliver's been eating solid foods since last Sunday. He had sweet potato for his first food, and he quite enjoyed it. (Most experts these days are saying that the first food doesn't have to be rice cereal, and some are even going farther with their food recommendations.)

Tonight he had peas, which, for those of you who may not be aware, are green.

He was wearing a white sleeper when he ate peas for the first time.

Are you seeing where I'm headed with this? Peas everywhere. In his hair. On his eyebrows. Under his chin. On his cheeks. Behind his ears. All over his chair, and his outfit, and his tray, and his sippy cup. Hooboy, was it a mess. I had to fish the pea chunks out of his seat belt buckle with a q-tip. He needed an outfit change after the excursion.

The good news is that he's not one of those kids who rejects food (yet.) He quite happily shoves the spoon into his mouth - and usually, leaves it there for a minute or two. Sometimes he moves it around, and even shoves it back to test the ol' gag reflex. And once, he tried to stick it in his eye. Luckily, his aim isn't all that good.

So now that it's working, we're going to start experimenting with more new foods once a week. Apparently, it's even okay to introduce things like chicken or turkey now.

The one unexpected problem we've run into is actually preparing his food. Neither of us thought much about this, but you've got to do something to mash the stuff into a palatable form. My food processor has proved useless for mashing quantities like three tablespoons at a time - it just splatters food all over the sides of the bowl. We've resorted to mashing his food through a strainer to get it to the right pureed consistency. There are apparently food mills available for this sort of thing. I pooh-poohed the idea originally, but I think we're going to have to break down and buy one of the wretched things.

Sitting Pretty

Thu, 01 Dec 2005 14:07:37 GMT

It's amazing to think back on the early days, when Oliver was just a blob in a blanket. He was always held, he barely moved, his head flopped back and forth like the clown in a jack-in-the-box. His face was all wrinkles, because he hadn't grown into his own skin yet.

His cries were like a small animal, a bird, perhaps, or a stray cat. He cried so much in those early, early days, before breastfeeding became an easy habit. And we cried so much, too - out of fear, out of mad hormone-driven love, out of sleep deprivation.

And of course, he was pooping out that nasty black tar meconium stuff. (Viewer warning: that link brings you to a page that includes a full-color picture of baby poop. Approach with extreme caution and on an empty stomach.) Ah, good times.

And now, look at him. He's turning into a real little boy. He's even got his own seat at the table (we bought his high chair over the weekend.)

Now, when we laugh at him, he smiles and sometimes even laughs back. He has wild giggle fits, where just saying the same word over and over again can send him into spasms of joy ("Hey, baby! Hey, baby! Hey, baby!" "Hee hee hee hee hee hee ha ha ha!") He rolls over onto his stomach effortlessly and sometimes rolls himself back. He can sit up, mostly, by himself (with a few strategically placed pillows). When he's playing, he rotates himself around to get to all of his toys, spinning on the axis of his belly button.

And he's on the verge of crawling. He gets up on his hands and knees now and bucks back and forth, like he's warming up his little engine, getting it all ready. Once I saw him climb onto hands and knees and after a few revs, he flung himself forward. About a half-inch and onto his chest. Probably not the best way to move yourself around.

He's officially six months old now. He's passed through so many of those milestone moments, and he's on the verge of a pretty huge milestone - his first solid foods. I'm going to the store today for a cart cover, so we can sit him in shopping carts. Sometimes, when I'm sitting on the rocking chair with him, and he's been sleeping for an hour, and my arm is falling asleep, it helps me to remember just how far he's really come.

Fact Check

Wed, 30 Nov 2005 03:38:06 GMT

I was cooking in the kitchen when R called over to me.

"What did Bunny Foo Foo do?"

"He hopped around the forest," I replied. "Scooping up the field mice, and bopping them on their heads."

"Okay, thanks." She went back to playing with Oliver, and I returned to cooking.

I remember when we used to talk about politics.

Thanks Giving

Thu, 24 Nov 2005 03:55:09 GMT

Oliver and I have this dance we do in the morning. R wakes up at 5:30 am (yikes!) for work, and goes to take a shower while O and I stay in bed. He's almost always asleep, and almost always trying to turn over onto his stomach in his sleep. If he's successful, he wakes up, and the day begins. So my job is to keep him asleep. (My greedy personal stake, of course, is staying in bed and keeping my eyes closed for just a few more minutes.)

So I scootch over, right up next to Oliver's little body. His head is just below my chin: his feet are down just below my waist. (I hope every day for him not to kick his legs suddenly.) He lays on his side, facing me.

R gets the privilege of sleeping next to Oliver for half of the night. It's a mixed blessing: she also has to wake up when he does, sometimes once every two hours, to feed him. But she has this time with him, and she has moments in the dead of night that I will never ever have. I can't feed him in the middle of the night realistically - with Mom, he eats and goe back to sleep relatively painlessly. If I tried to feed him, even to allow R to sleep more, I'd have to pick up Oliver, bring him to the kitchen, pull a bottle out of the fridge, warm it up under the hot water tap, pour it into a bottle, feed him, and by then he'll be fully awake. then I'd have to spend somewhere between ten and thirty minutes on the dreaded bouncy ball (more on this later), bouncing him back to sleep. Then I have to try to ease him into the cosleeper without waking up, which only works sometimes. So R feeds him at night. That's how it is.

But back to the morning. Sometimes I'm a very very lucky man, and Oliver just sleeps. We doze, chest to chest, and sometimes his hand will be pressed up against my chest as we sleep. These are the days that I slip easily back to sleep, and R surprises me when she comes back into the bedroom, towel wrapped around her hair.

Sometimes it doesn't go quite so well, and he struggles to stay asleep. He fights to complete his roll onto his tummy, and I have to press my chest flush against him, bracing him on his side. His fingers scrabble for a handhold against my bare chest, tickling me, once startling me by grabbing my nipple. He rocks back and forth, back and forth, trying to rotate just a little farther every time, and sometimes during this effort he dozes off between efforts. I sit and stare at his beautiful eyelids, at the tiny quiver of his lips and the almost invisible movement of his lips as breaths slip out and in. And he wakes again, tries one more time to topple himself over, tries and fails as Daddy silently body-checks him.

These are my favorite moments of the day. He's barely awake at these times, and I can just soak him in without worrying about such distractions as feeding or playing. I love feeling his chubby thighs press against my stomach as he sleeps. I sneak kisses while he sleeps, and smell his forehead and feel the wispy downy-soft hairs on his head. He is in his purest, most elemental state.

Eventually, inevitably, he wakes up. He opens his eyes, trying to see where he is and who he's laying against. His eyes meet mine. I look into the eyes of my son, and he stare at each other, belly to belly, chest to chest. Sometimes he reaches a hand out and finds one of my (comparatively) giant-size fingers, squeezes it. And we begin the dance of the day. We spend many hours together, playing, laughing, feeding, but I feel like I never have clearer communication than when we're laying next to each other in bed, eyes locked, each of us searching to find out what the other is thinking.

A happy Thanksgiving to you and yours. Be grateful for what you have. The Universe is not always kind, but sometimes, if we are lucky, if Fate smiles on us, we get exactly the thing we desire most.