A Sure Thing

It seems impossible that 4 months have elapsed since I got the warrant to evict the Prawn from her uterine squat.

I expected to want to record every second of her babyhood but I've found it doesn't necessarily make great reading. Days are fairly routine; eating, sleeping, smiling, laughing, puking. I often come to Blogger with a nonsense post and give up in favor of reading "Brown Bear, Brown Bear, What Do You See?" or "Aliens Love Underpants" to her.

Since I spend most of my afternoons with the Prawn just surfing around the internet, I usually try to have something vaguely intelligent on television to keep me company. (The Prawn doesn't watch, but she listens, so I have to make sure that what she's listening to doesn't suck.) The last few weeks, I've been going back though the third and fourth seasons of The West Wing, one of my favorite shows of all time. (And I'd just assume that if the Prawn has to listen to something, it's a script written by Aaron Sorkin.) At the end of the Fourth Season, Toby Zigler, the rather prickly White House Communications Director, and his ex wife have twins, conceived through IVF, on the same night that the President's daughter is taken hostage by Muslim extremists. In a rare moment of downtime, Toby gets to discuss the birth with Chief of Staff, Leo McGarry.

TOBY: I think I was nervous I wasn’t gonna love my kids… the way other fathers love theirs.

LEO: Why?

TOBY: I don’t know. If, for nine months, you’re hearing how this is gonna change your life, and: “You’ve never loved anything like this,” and, “My God, the love” and, “Nothing’s gonna be important anymore.” It just never really felt to me like I was someone who had the capacity for those feelings. Plus, you know, I… I like what’s important to me. I want it to stay important. I, uh…I wanna be able to do it well.

LEO: What do you mean, you don’t have the capacity?

TOBY: (pauses) Anyway, I was just curious.

LEO:Of course you’re gonna be a great father. Of course you’re gonna love your kids the way you’re supposed to, the way other fathers…

TOBY: My God, Leo, we look around, we see that’s not true. It’s not automatic.

LEO: I’m not talking about everybody. I’m talking about you and I’m telling ya, it’s a mortal lock. It’s guaranteed.

I'd been looking for just that sentiment before the Prawn was born. I was terrified that I wasn't going to get that "mommy" thing. That, even after all the heartbreak, I'd look at this pink blob and just go, "Okay."

The Prawn is looking at me right now, moving her mouth up and down and making noises that could best be described as a turtle chewing bubble gum.

It's a mortal lock.

Bookworm

This should make her grandparents, the public school teachers, very happy indeed.

OT: In Need of a Purge

I try not to write stuff on my blogs that I wouldn't actually say to someone's face. The internet, while ginormous, has a tendancy of becoming very small indeed very quickly with a targeted keyword search, as so many people have found out to their peril. I don't like to go spewing vitriol anyhow- I'm not a believer in karma, but it's always seemed to me that when I radiate bad energy, it tends to either eat me or come back on me later in ways I can't imagine. Today, it's eating me and I feel like I've got to give it a voice before it bursts, Alien style, though my stomach.

I find it ironic that Pru also chose today to tackle the subject of the difficulties of making friends. Both being ex-pats, we've faced having to start over again in a new country post-education, making it hard to meet new people. While Mr. DD and I actually DO have some functional friends, the majority of them are wildly dysfuctional and I probably spend more time than I should worrying about what they get up to.

I wrote a post last year that I deleted when I believed that some of the people mentioned might have gained access to my main blog, which, at a pinch, MIGHT be able to lead to this one. I was wrong, but I was glad I deleted the post nonetheless. Unsurprisingly, some of those very same people are STILL turning me inside out with frustration.

Our god daughter's parents have just split up. This is not a particular surprise to anyone. She was an "oops" baby and we've known for ages that her parents don't particularly care for eachother. My issue at present is her mother.

"***** is getting it in the neck for finishing with her boyfriend." her rather flip Facebook status read the other night.

In an MSN conversation with Mr. DD this morning (which was obviously less friendly from his end than she was expecting) she was also remarkably casual about the prospect of our goddaughter never getting to see her half-brother again. (Her father has a son from his previous marriage.)

Mr. DD: will *** still get to see his sister?

Her: i guess, again depends on when (her boyfriend) has them

Mr. DD: :(

Her: again its probley not a great loss to *** as (his mother) will probley twist his head

Mr. DD: when he's older he'll want to know though

Mr DD: as will she

Her: i doubt he'll be that intrested as i said before, *** really happy we split up so she'll make him forget or not be bothered

Um....make him forget that he's got a little sister who he REALLY loves? Make him not interested that this person who's been with his Dad for almost two years now is suddenly not there anymore?

The fact that she's broken up with her partner neither surprises nor upsets me. What gets me is her STAGGERING flippancy about the whole thing as well as her daughter's relationship with her older brother. It's not like she's just tumbled some guy she met out at the pub. She's just broken up with the father of her daughter.

Our goddaughter was conceived at a time when I felt like my world was crumbling around my ears after my second miscarriage. This little girl managed to rescue something good out of a really messy situation for her parents and, in a way, for me too. To see her mother being so casual about ripping her world apart makes me want to throttle her until her eyes pop out.*

And writing all of this down makes me realize that I'd have no trouble saying any of that directly to her face.


*Can I also just mention a few other facts that make me want to commit homicide? She sits the baby down in front of the worst British soaps imaginable; Eastenders, Emmerdale, Corrination Street. In front of shows like Big Brother. Shows where people spent the majority of time screaming at one another. Also? She lives in a house crammed full of toys...with no books. This is a woman who told me I was having a laugh when I told her that we had an International Space Station. I have no hope for my goddaughter.

Goofball

The inevitable result of handing something to someone who doesn't know what hands are for.

Gums of Glory

Despite the serene photo, I should warn you; there's a whole lot of screaming going on at Chez Prawn.

The dreaded teeth are on their way. We hoped we'd have a few more months of lovely shiny gums before evil incisiors started trying to cut their way through our lovely little girl's flesh, but being as how she seems to be doing just about everything else early, it's all about shouting these days.

Being that she is her parent's child and by nature, perverse, while she SHOULD be getting her front teeth first, nature has decreed that her first tooth is going to be one of her BACK teeth, which usually don't come in til toddler years, so we're kind of puzzled about this turn of dental events. We thought it couldn't POSSIBLY be one of her back teeth, but the little white point is clearly visible in the back of her mouth whenever she opens it to emit an ear piercing screech.

To our joy, we've discovered that teething can cause all kinds of other problems including lack of appetite, causing every mealtime to become Wrestlemania. I even got slightly crazy the other day and gave her her first taste of baby rice after being completely exhausted by my efforts to keep her bottle in her gob. It didn't go quite as badly as I expected, although I think probably more of it ended up ON her than IN her. Ah well. Early days.

The cherry on the cake is the vaccination she's scheduled for tomorrow, which is bound to improve her mood. Her first round was administered by a needle that looked as if it was meant for horses, so we're battening down the proverbial hatches for a tidal surge of cranky.