extremes

Life with baby could be called, "life in extreme." Extreme love. Extreme intensity. Extreme need. Extreme beauty. Extreme helplessness. Today I'll go with Extreme Toddler. From the moment she is up in the morning, Eliana is non-stop. She talks and talks, wants to be read to, wants to play, wants up, wants down, wants out, wants in. You get the picture. So we are extreme together.

Then after dropping her off, I race to school where I am Extreme teacher-lady. I always like to add "lady" to my title at work because I feel like such a lady when I'm there, so not the sloppy goofball I am on the weekends. So teacher lady dictates sentences and reads stories and teaches about similes and takes running records and tells people to hush. Then teacher lady races back up the hill to find her Pea.

Upon seeing her mama, happy toddler Pea goes from laughing and smiling to immediately pulling on the collar of my tee shirt and whining. Even the shirts I didn't intend to have look like they're outta "Flashdance" are sporting that look lately. So I nurse Eliana and, of course, try not to feel somehow "bad" about myself because I'm trying to not nurse her during the day so much, though I don't care at all, it's just all the books and people who say it's going to be so much harder to wean the longer I wait, so now at 15 months maybe I'm starting to inch into that "freaky nursing mom" category when mom's nurse their babies way too long. And I'll tell ya. I have seen my fair share of up-close-and-personal mommies nursing their four year olds in between bites of burger. And while now I feel like a bit of a loser for judging any mama's personal breatfeeding choices, you've gotta admit, four is a tad bit mature.

So, I move through and beyond all my weaning anxieties, hang out with my mother-in-law for a bit and hear about her tales of her recent trip to Portland, then tear myself away because I know there's way too much more to do. Head to my least favorite spot, Albie's (aka Albertson's), to pick up birth control pills so Eliana doesn't have a lil buddy just yet. $20.00 worth. I remember when they were $5.00. So I curse our health care system under my breath, wax nostalgic for the good ol' California public school teaching days where I went to the dentist like, every three months, just because it was so very free. Don't ask me when the last time I saw a dentist was. That shit changes when you don't have dental care.

So we needed bread and some other junk, so I raced around the store while Eliana, aka, Shark, chewed on the nasty metal bar on the cart. Yes, I tried and tried to stop her. Yes, she went right back on chewing the minute I looked up. And I can't put her down and let her walk cuz she'll pull stuff off of the shelves and get lost. I didn't have the Ergo. And Albie's doesn't have fancy carts for kids like The Good Food Store. Oh, how I love The Good Food Store. Oh, how I loathe Albie's.

So we came home and mommy tried to make chili with all the damn deer sausage she has left in the freezer. There's only so much one can do with deer breakfast sausage. Believe me. Chili works. So while I'm trying to chop onion and brown meat, Eliana is pulling jams off the shelves, throwing "pasas" around, feeding crackers to Lucy, eating food out of Lucy's bowl, taking dirty clothes out of the laundry basket and distributing them around the house, bringing me books to read to her, and, generally, all over everything.

So I stopped cooking (though I really kept cooking, so I burned the meat), and gave my daughter the undivided attention she so clearly wanted. We read. In fact, I'm pretty sure we read The Very Hungry Caterpillar and Piggies and Goodnight Moon like, eight or nine times each. Said the word "hush" way too many times for a normal person in one day. And every time I would try and run out to pee or stir the now almost totally scorched chili, should would cry out, "mama, no, no, no!" and whine and follow me around.

Finally Jeff came home and advised me to take a walk. Always one to sense when I'm overwhelmed, he sent Lucy and I on our merry way around the park. But it was raining. And my calves feel like they've been beaten with a bat because of the hike I did yesterday. And there were weird, sketchy dog owners with even sketchier dogs who were getting Lucy all riled up. And it was stressful and not really relaxing at all.

I kind of feel like Alexander and His No Good, Very Bad, Day. If you don't know what I'm talking about, come visit my classroom library.

Anyway. The day began to turn. I ate the chili and, celebrated the real reason for chili, grilled cheese sandwiches. I had a tiny, much needed, glass of red wine. I then raced out to the Birth Center to tell my birth story to a room full of pregnant couples, as a favor to my doula who is teaching the class. I so didn't want to go out in the rain and schlep to the other side of town. But soon enough, I was walking back into that sacred space where Eliana entered the world.

I remembered all the funny details of that day. Remembered the heat and the walks around the building and the sound of the jets in the tub. Remembered the song that we played to try and lower my blood pressure, the way Jeff held me on that red bed and tried to get me to mellow out so we didn't have to go to the hospital. Remembered the way Jody, my doula and friend, told jokes in between contractions and tried to keep the scene light, keep it normal. Remembered how big the birthing room seemed, how it was absolutely the only thing in my universe that day. Well, until my little friend arrived.

Didn't want to toot my horn too much, but loved telling the class how Elie shot out like the little fireball she is, how I never had to "pass the shoulders", one of my big, pre-birth anxieties. How my body voluntarily pushed for me, how I never really had to scream the way the ladies do in the movies. Loved remembering that quiet time, late at night, when we were still safe and secure at the Birth Center. Before we were released into the wild, unknowns of the real world.

Walking back out to my car in the rain, I remembered the way we fumbled when we put Elie in her carseat for the first time. How dark it was and how tired we were. The rev of a motorcycle pack racing down Reserve Street. The way Jeff and I exchanged a knowing glanced that affirmed, yes, the world is full of loud, scary, unexpected unknowns. Yes, we are in charge of her forever.