I don't think I could have asked for better weather for today's trip to Jazz Fest. Sunny, dry, just the right temp.... We all had a great time, including MrMan, though I think he felt a bit tortured that he couldn't eat the food. He sat in his stroller, just watching all that was going on, even when he was tired. (His first tears came seven hours after we left home, a few blocks before we pulled into our driveway.) We also spent some time sitting in the shade in the Kids' area. And, when he wasn't diving down to get some grass into his hands and mouth, MrMan sat along with us. It was like he's become some master sitter overnight.
MrMan, as anticipated, loves him some food. Okay, he's tried only two things (three, if you count my milk), but, so far, he's loving it all. We did rice cereal for a few days and he grunted for more after each spoonful. Then, last night, we spontaneously started him on asparagus. He kept straining to reach with his mouth the asparagus my mom was putting in her mouth. So, we let him gum it, and it was a hit. He kept gobbling the asparagus juice/stalk innards down. He really is my son. Except that I have yet to notice that, shall we say, special asparagus fragrance that follows.
Dear God,
Thank you for making MrMan a non-colicky baby. You never give us more than we can handle, so this probably means that I'm too weak to handle the incessant crying and sleeplessness. I'm okay with that.
Love,
shokufeh
Things that are heart-wrenching:
Things that are heart-warming:
Dear MrMan,
Today you turned five months old. Five months old! Your transformations continue, at breakneck speed. In the past week alone, you have started speaking (after a period of more silence than chatter) with a new precision – you have greater intonation and a wider range of sounds, seemingly more control of what comes out. I still can’t understand you, but you are saying a lot. Also in the past week, you’ve started giving kisses. Just thinking about how you put your mouth to our cheeks brings a tear to my eye. Yours, too, apparently, as just as I was writing that sentence, your cries summoned me to our room. You have become more clingy (and sleep averse), especially at night. I’m flattered that no one else will do, but hope that this aspect of your personality continues to evolve.
Your bed time routine includes “Good Night Moon.” I would say this is your favorite book – it makes you smile and, amazingly, you’re more interested in looking at it than eating it. You try to eat pretty much everything these days. If it’s within reach, it’s in your mouth. When I give you a bath, you inevitably end up, at some point, with your mouth gumming the side of your tub. This results in my singing “The Lady with the Alligator Purse.” Your favorite song is Miss Mary Mack – you hold out your hands, and sometimes your feet, for us to clap. Your enjoying this song ties in with your increased attraction to clapping in general.
This month, you’ve started touching people’s faces more – always exploring them with your hands, sometimes with your mouth. You have a lot more hand control now: a couple of weeks ago, it hit me that the scratches on your face (due to flailing hands) have virtually ceased to appear. It came up the night that you got to meet another little boy, two months younger than you. It was a meeting of the minds, with the two of you gazing at one another. If you’d had your way, I think you would have liked to gum him.
You like the TV remote control. And the computer keyboard. When you’re sitting in front of the latter, you like to bang away at it with your hands. You’re also inclined to shove the keyboard tray in with your feet. Your legs continue to be the strongest part of your body. But today you seemed to actually enjoy time on your tummy. A new development? A fluke? It remains to be seen. I can’t really tell what your favorite toy is of late. Most of them hold your interest for a while and then eventually become a source of frustration somehow. But you do spend more time playing with them – batting them, gnawing them, gripping them – on your own.
You also spend alone time staring at and talking to the posters on the wall. You’re particularly taken with one of Walt Disney’s face, surrounded by several of his characters. You’re not opposed to the poster next to it either – crowded with multitudes of his characters. It’s so interesting to me how much you like those, as you have no cultural context for them. Our room is layered with the past of Mommy, Amu, and Dayi*, as it belonged to each of us at some point.
You’ve now been teething for about two months. The drool, oh, the drool. Sometimes it’s a trickle, sometimes a spurt, but if you’re awake, it’s there. The process seems to cause you some discomfort, but it doesn’t seem out of control – I’m hoping it doesn’t get too bad as we get closer to Tooth 1. Still no concrete sign of it. But that’s not stopping you from wanting to eat. You try, and sometimes succeed at, grabbing my food. A few weeks ago, we got you a highchair, so you could feel a part of mealtimes. That seemed to cause you more torture. But in the past week or so, it seems to have gotten better, maybe because I started attaching your tray. You spend meals gumming a plastic bowl and spoon, and your “veggie burger,” as I like to call your green teething ring. And tonight, the night you’ve been waiting for: you ate something other than my milk. Yes, you had a bit of rice cereal. And asked for more. But you’ll have to wait until tomorrow.
MrMan, to borrow a phrase from a character you are not yet familiar with, as he appeared after the poster on the wall, I love you to infinity and beyond.
Love,
Mommy
*In Persian, Amu is your paternal uncle, Dayi is your maternal one. Growing up, we had Amus, but no Dayis – at least in name: my father is Persian so we used Persian names for his brothers, and my mother is Black American so we called her brothers Uncles. For MrMan, we decided that my immediate family will have Persian titles. However, Naysan didn’t want to be a Dayi, he wanted to be an Amu, because that’s what he’s familiar with. Anis didn’t care so much, so is a Dayi. Just to add to my child’s confusion, Meisa, who’s my cousin, decided she will be his Ameh (the title for paternal aunt). It’ll work.
I like to say to MrMan things like, "Let's go change you up, boy," and "I'm going to feed you up."
I picture a day in the future when, having some command of the english language but not quite enough experience with it, MrMan will finish a meal and say, "I'm fed up."
Maybe I'lll just start saying that now, for the heck of it.
Yesterday morning, my mom led us a few blocks away to view something a neighbor had told her about - a pothole, transformed into the Broadmoor Green Space Migratory Bird Refuge and Wetlands Reclamation Project #60399-7.
A while before I left Honolulu, I got into eating Smart Start Healthy Heart cereal. Yesterday, at the store, lured by the blueberries on the box, I decided to try the Antioxidant version. My cells might thank me anyway, but I was disappointed to discover that there were no blueberries in the cereal. And to find that, apparently, antioxidants are quite sweet.
Yesterday, my dad tumbled off his bike and hurt his wrist in the process of trying to catch himself. Today, I took him to Lord & Taylor.
The connection? New Orleans has a dearth of medical care, especially urgent care. So at some point, maybe a few months ago, medical tents were set up at the Convention Center, for the purpose of providing urgent care in a city lacking emergency rooms. A few weeks ago, that "medical facility" was closed, and one was opened at what used to be Lord & Taylor at New Orleans Centre. Strange to speak of seeking care at a department store. There were large cubicles set up, housing triage, the lab, a couple of other departments. Registration and Medicaid were in smaller multiple booths. X-Ray and Social Work were in former store rooms and dressing rooms. The former men's department was the main emergency department - occupied by a large mobile hospital tent, containing thirteen beds. Large potted plants, likely from the still-closed mall, were scattered throughout. I was able to entertain MrMan by standing in front of the mirrored columns, the same ones I use to stand in front of to see how clothes looked against me.
(Free) Parking was in the Superdome parking lot. Driving in was the second time I've gotten the heebie jeebies since being in New Orleans. The first time was in the parking lot of Memorial Medical Center, when I was taking MrMan to the pediatrician. Besides being parking lots, both places have in common that they were associated with highly publicized human suffering during the storm and have not been transformed into sparkly shiny newness.
...
This evening, we drove through some of the harder hit areas of town. I saw a two foot high wall of silt in someone's yard, close to a levee breach. Among the various devestated houses we passed, one of the images that sticks with me is that of a house that appeared not to have been visited since the storm and had all of its contents in a jumble, visible through the open door and windows.