One Week Old But Reading At a College Level
Today, my son Jonah is seven days old.
It's a big event for him, obviously. Also, his parents are celebrating being able to keep a tiny human alive for that amount of time so it's a fairly big win for the entire family, especially when you consider his unquenchable affinity for attempted self-suffocation.
He started the festivities off a little early last night around 3:30 in the morning when he embarked on what can only be described as an all-out offensive of bodily fluids.
I awoke to his cries in the wee hours as he fidgeted frustratingly in his bassinet due to the fact that he takes that phrase very literally (you'll have to forgive him, he's kind of an idiot...he is a baby after all). Bree was in the bedroom sleeping.
We've been taking shifts you see--like two drowsy employees passing each other as we clock in and out of an industrial baby factory--punching the paper time cards of perpetual parental responsibility.
Anyway, I was nearing the end of my shift when he decided to embark on the most ambitious release of human fluids since the Birmingham prison riots.
What started as a wet diaper quickly turned into a poopy diaper and then a combination of both of those things as I changed him once, twice, three times a baby.
He hit me from all sides. Waiting until my troops had reformed ranks only to flank me with an unexpected fountain of fresh, milky puke, or sniper-shot of urine to the face.
What transpired over the next thirty minutes I wouldn't wish on my worst enemies. I went through an entire box of wet wipes, four diapers, two spit rags, some paper towels, two onesies, one twosie, and all of the sailor vulgarity that I can get away with while he's still young enough to not recognize the words.
You've heard of Shaken Baby Syndrome. This was Shaken Adult Syndrome...in that...by the time it was all said and done, I was emotionally shook.
When he was finally fully washed, cleaned, rash-creamed, diapered, and swaddled; when the carpet was stain-treated; when the walls were wiped down and the ceiling decontaminated; the morning crew was just coming on to relieve me.
I tried to do the carnage justice in the retelling to my wife, but there's a reason that many veterans never tell their war stories; rather, they smoke pipes in silent corners of bars with others who have been through the same.
After regrouping around midday, we took our tiny fluid generator to the beach and sat on a sunny patio. Bree pumped.
And then we ordered alcohol. The good stuff. The mind-numbing, chest-warming elixir-type stuff.
Then afterwards, he somehow beat me in a game of chess using the Newborn's Gambit, and I have to believe now that the previous night's chaos was just him subtly maneuvering me into some kingly missteps based solely on exhaustion.
Parenthood is messy...
wonderful...
joyous...
but mostly, just messy.
And it's the greatest thing I've ever done.