2001-12-20
Last night I had a little revelation: I'm going to be a parent for the rest of my life, so what's my rush? I haven't been a nervous wreck or anything, but I have definitely felt eager for labor to begin. But I realize that, particularly given my relative physical comfort, I ought to try to enjoy these last days of freedom.
So today I went out. I didn't do anything special, just ran a few errands and had lunch at a cafe near our old house. While there, I ran into a guy I know. I actually know his boyfriend better, but I've always liked this guy as well. Their big news, which I'd heard about from mutual friends, is that five months ago they adopted a baby girl. We talked, naturally, about parenthood. He seemed pretty enchanted by it. He said, "I never realized how much time I used to waste watching reruns of Law and Order!"
At the library today I picked up this book of essays on parenthood by Susan Cheever. As a memoirist, she's a little annoying and maybe less than fully trustworthy, but usually pretty interesting. I started reading it earlier. She had her first child at 38 (as I am doing) and didn't really expect to like it all that much right off (a sentiment not entirely foreign to me). But when she saw her daughter she underwent this profound transformation. It's like she became an emotional person, she understood love, she was, basically, over the moon.
It's interesting, this transformative power of the infant. Will I experience anything akin to this? I have a pretty tight lid on my emotions; will it fly off? And if so, will I mind? Will I like it? Will I recognize myself? All these questions of identity arise for me. As I've said before, I don't think there's any way to prepare for this stuff.
I've started thinking about dates. Today is December 20, tomorrow the 21st. That's the shortest day of the year, and would make a good birthday, I suppose. (Of course, any birthday is going to be awfully close to Christmas, which I don't suppose makes very many children happy.) We're also right on the edge of the astrological signs changing; if he's born tomorrow or Satuday he'll be a Sagitarius, any later and Capricorn it will be.
God, this is weird.
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