11.13.2006

My baby ate my homework

Ok, he didn't really. Yet. But as I sat cutting out dozens of little chiclet-sized squares of double-sided mounting tape with which to adhere all the tiny pieces of my first model for class, even I was tempted to sample. Mmm...chewy...

Speedy turns 1 on Friday, and, right on target, he's cruising, babbling, and shoving fistfulls of everything into his mouth (including, sadly, this morning's Cheerios unearthed from somewhere on the diaper table). 1 is this magical age when babies apparently become invincible. Thursday: rear-facing carseat; no cow's milk, honey, citrus, or nuts; no duplo blocks or walk-behind bubble-mower. Friday: front facing, enough caesin to grow a baby cow, and his first lesson on excavation with the Bobcat.

I was reading the 12-15 mos section of Brazelton's Touchstones today, and could kinda identify with his description of the push-pull of toddlerhood. As an adult, I'm still bouncing from wanting to "do it myself" -- forging out to take more classes, biting of bigger designs than I can chew -- to getting scared and frustrated by all of the newness. Luckily, perhaps, I don't have the option to just let someone else take care of it all and remain dependent.

Had a great talk with my visiting mom about this (dynamic of adults wanting to be taken care of) at our final meeting. She was commenting on how even with grown children, it can be a challenge not to "do for" them. Likewise, it's a challenge not to ask someone else to do for us, or to find another way to pretend we're not responsible for our own destinies.

We joke about how much babies at the breast look like drug addicts -- their little eyes rolling back in their heads with pleasure, and then, "Oh, oh, I need another hit!" But one of the saddest moments I've had in the last year was seeing a businessman on his lunchbreak upending a sizable bottle of alcohol into his Dunkin' cup. Speedy was only maybe a month old, and I had the simultaneous thougts: (1) Please don't let my baby grow up to be an addict, and (2) How sad! This man just wants to be nurtured, to feel safe from the chaos of the world, to be accepted, loved, and cared for unconditionally, to slip into that same oblivion that Speedy has when he's nursing. Seems all of life is a series of weanings. Probably not what the Buddha had in mind when describing samsara...

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