Stepping back out

5 months. 5 months! I couldn't believe it when I logged onto my site a minute ago and realized how long it had been since I've written. I mean, I know I haven't since Parks was born, but 5 months? That's almost 6 months. And 6 months is half of a year. Wow.

My lack of posting is the consequence of several circumstances:

1) Time. For the first two months of his life, Parks didn't nap. At least not in his bed. Kinda hard to type a blog when there's a child in your arms, you know? For the past two months, he's napped, but only for 30 minutes at a time. Those precious 30 minutes (about 4 per day) are devoted to reading (but not responding to) email, eating, showering, sleeping. Usually in that order.

2) Prior to yesterday, I had 40 thank-you notes that were, as yet, unwritten. Any time that was not spent on the aforementioned four activities was spent feeling guilty (but not doing anything) about those 40 unwritten thank-you notes. Written, finally, yesterday. Yes, I'm currently taking a very deep bow.

3) Lastly, and equally important, is the lack of interesting events to write about. I have no problems with blogs written about a people's children. In fact, I read several, and it's a great way to keep up with out-of-town family members' kids, etc. However, when I started this blog four years ago, I did it with the intention of writing about MY life and MY experiences, not those of my kids. In other words, I don't want this to turn into a blog about Parks's first word ("Dumbledore," of course) or sentence ("Fly, you fools!") or steps or girlfriend or whatever, even though I'm sure it'll happen occasionally. While I may write about my take on motherhood, I want to use it to maintain my identity as Miriam, not as Parks's mother. Make sense?

So for my first blog as a mother, I thought I'd take it easy on myself and just make a little list of the ways my life is different now, for better and for worse.

-- I caught myself yesterday holding my bare hand cupped in front of Parks's mouth as he spit up his last feeding. I didn't have a burp cloth handy, and I had just put him in his clean pajamas. I had frightening flashbacks of seeing other mothers in my past use the same gesture to catch the gum that their children had been chewing. Hmmm.

-- Remember the Miriam who loved living by herself? Whose idea of a perfect day was holing up in her house alone to read a good book in her pajamas for hours? Since Parks was born almost four months ago, I have been really and truly alone for a grand total of two times, thanks to Cal's taking the baby on shopping jaunts to the sporting goods stores. Two times! 4 hours, tops. Sure, our parents and a couple of our friends (Elizabeth, namely) have kept Parks while I've run to Walmart or out to eat with Cal. But can a trip to Walmart be counted as alone time? Don't think so.

-- I have not slept a full night in four months.

-- I am on an antidepressant. (Yes, it's true.)

-- I have only seen one movie in the theater in four months. I cried when it was over and I had to go back home. No, the movie wasn't sad ... it was, actually, a comedy. Did I mention the antidepressant?

-- I, a pridefully independent person, have relied more on my mother in the last few months than I have in, perhaps, my entire life. The wealth of knowledge and insight there is amazing. From my sisters, too.

-- I know now just how sweet a sleeping baby can be, especially when he's in my arms.

-- I have not only learned what a breast pump is, exactly, but I've learned how to use it quite proficiently. Consequently, I've learned to hate it quite passionately.

-- I have also learned that I blessedly inherited my mother's gift for fast childbirth (3 hours). I also inherited her difficulty with nursing. See above re:breastpump.

-- I've occasionally found myself in the last few weeks wishing I were going back to school with everyone else in a couple of weeks.

-- I get excited when I suddenly remember another children's song from VBS or elementary school. I've got a repertoire of thousands, I'm sure; I just can't think of what they are.

-- Huge shocker: I actually have started to wonder if I might want to move back to Thomasville one day. Having a baby without family around to help out from time to time is a lot tougher than I thought it'd be.

-- I've discovered the difficulty in letting a child cry himself to sleep. Previously, I always thought moms were silly when they went on and on about how terrible it is. Yesterday, I wanted to take all those thoughts back ... as I was crying, too.

-- I have learned just how patient Cal, a self-described impatient person, can truly be. He's been wonderful.

-- I have also learned just how hard of a sleeper Cal is in the middle of the night. At least, how hard of a sleeper he PRETENDS to be ...

-- In the last month or so, I'm understanding what everyone said (and I never believed) about how you forget how hard it is in the beginning once the babies get a bit older. In spite of how dramatically my life has changed, Parks is stealing my heart more and more every day.