Seventeen Months

Today you turn 17 months old. Will I still be doing this when you are 205 months old and writing about I called you up at college and you have changed your major yet again and that I think you were out partying? And praying that you will just hurry up and graduate, with ANY major, so that your father and I can stop with the never ending college tuition.



As I type this you are clutching two little matchbox cars to your chest with one hand and trying to scale the back of my chair by hanging from my hair with your right hand. It is a miracle that I am not bald yet. I know what will happen next, you will climb up to sit on top of my head and fling your little cars at my computer screen. You hate my computer. You don't understand what I could find so interesting about it when I could have YOU in face, YOU jumping up and down on my lap, YOU pulling on my hair and screaming at me.

I wish I could invent a device that would give you an electrical shock every time I am typing on my computer and you try to climb on me. Just a little shock that would render you unconscious for a few days moments. Also I wish such a device would be socially acceptable. Do I have to say I am kidding? Probably, the internet takes itself so seriously.

The big thing that has happened this past month is that you have stopped nursing. I know I said I was going to nurse you until you went to college, but I reconsidered.

Since you have stopped nursing you have been sleeping through the night. It is strange how quickly it happened and even more strange how used to it I have become already. The transition has been harder on me than it was for you... as these things usually are.

You have to have Funky Monkey in bed with you. I am thinking of buying a second one should something unfortunate happen to the original. Like it self destructs so that it doesn't have to listen to me sing my personal rendition of the Beastie Boys "Brass Monkey, that Funky Monkey..." Of course I keep saying I'll buy a second one, but much like backing up my pictures on my computer, I never seem to get around to it.

Then one day it will be too late and Funky Monkey will be gone forever and you will be traumatized and spend years in therapy discussing it.



This marks the end for me. The end of nursing. The end of nourishing another human being with my body. It is like the final cut in the umbilical cord. And while I look forward to wearing clothes that don't provide easy access to my boobs and bras that don't have flaps that open and close, I can't help but feel a tiny twinge of sadness. Both for the end of an era in my life and my now poor sad non existent breasts.

Ah big boobs, I hardly knew ya.

Yesterday I was getting dressed and you were playing in my room with me. Suddenly you stopped and stared at my naked chest. I wondered if you were going to ask for your beloved nursies. And I felt a bit sad for you. But instead, you started laughing. A little too much if you ask me. And you walked away muttering to yourself.

It was much the same way as when I went back to my highschool reunion and saw that boy that I had pined for all those years ago. And there he was now fat, bald, and a much bigger know-it-all than I could have thought possible. I shook my head wondering what it was that I ever saw in him. Well, that was the way you looked at me, like you were thinking, "Wow, I remember those being much better. I can't believe how much I used to love them all those three weeks ago."



You still don't say Mama...though I know you can. I ask you to say it and you giggle, shake your head, and say uh-uh. It's something of a game now that we play. I tell you to say Mama and you say no. Then I go through every other word that you say... teeth, daddy, bye-bye, nite-nite, ball, baba, tv, and you repeat them back to me. Then I say Mama and you laugh and scream Uh-uh.

You don't have an extensive vocabulary. I like to say that you are a quiet baby of few words, which we can all agree is a euphemism for I think my baby might be... what is the p.c. word now... verbally challenged.

You have discovered blowing your own spit bubbles, and you say ma-ma-ma while you do it. So I pretend you are saying mama. Yes, I lie to myself. It's quite pathetic isn't it?

We have an unbreakable mirror that you love to play with. I'll ask you, "Where's the baby?" And you will run over and look at yourself. You will sometimes put your face right up against the mirror and look at your reflection up close mesmerized by your own cuteness. More often you will head butt the baby. It must be a sign of affection because after a long break with no head butting you have suddenly begun doing it in earnest again.



You love riding on your little girly car. But you only know how to power yourself in reverse, which is the source of many tears and much screaming on your part. You will get frustrated with your inability to drive forward, get off of your little car, and try to push it over while you scream what I imagine are baby obscenities. I know that I shouldn't laugh, but I can't help it. Your fury is so intense for someone who stands only 2 ft tall.



You love to bang and hammer things. You still love anything with wheels. You can stack several blocks to build a tower, but you seem to enjoy throwing the blocks at unsuspecting siblings more.



You love digging in the garden and tearing out my freshly planted flowers. You love throwing your food off the kitchen table.



You are passionate about emptying the tupperware drawer several times a day. That last one drives your father crazy, with a capital C.



You are a happy little pita pocket, and I love you.



Now, about saying mama...