the happiness project

i spend a fair amount of time these days imagining what my son is thinking. I mean, the poor freaking guy, right? Andrew and I got all this preparation on what to expect while I was expecting and how life was about to change and all the ways in which we could swaddle our new baby and change his shitty diapers and try to soothe his cries….but he, HE, got to spend ten months floating blissfully in my belly only to suddenly be ejected into bright lights and a room full of really large humanoid people and a mother who cries periodically because breastfeeding is hard, damnit, it’s so much harder than anyone warned her it would be.

But I digress.

So I really wonder how he sees the world, and the more I think about it, the more I see that he must think our normal is crazy.

Hanging out in the stroller around our yard as his father weeds and plants and maintains the green which grows there. So let me get this straight, two inches is the maximum distance we move at a time? Isn’t this a stroller? Aren’t we supposed to be on a stroll?

The mini-blanket that has a giraffe head on it, which I keep trying to get him to love. I actually enjoy the moments I am alone and this woman is obsessed with having me entertain this damn piece of fabric.

Isabella. Oh, dear God, what does our little man think about Ms. Isabella, I can only imagine. Please tell me someone is going to clean up the armadillo carcass in the road, what will the neighbors think?

It’s made me look at our lives differently, now that I attempt to see it without all the bullshit context we regularly associate with our activities. Don’t worry, I’m not moving into a Bette Midler moment, there will be no Hallmark sentimentality in the foreseeable future of this post. But I am going to point out that whenever I lean in close with my iPhone to take a picture of the baby he flashes me a look like, ‘What is this black rectangle thing you always put in my face. And more importantly, why must it always be with us?’

Tomorrow is my 32^nd birthday. In the past I have always spent my birthdays in rather fabulous & fun places. Vegas. Mexico. New Orleans. And so for the last month Andrew and I have been talking about what to do for the celebration. We started with west Texas  then due to the travel hassle we downgraded to Austin and/or San Antonio for a couple days, and then in the end we decided, hell, we’re happy here, let’s just stay home. Tonight Andrew was like, ‘Are you sure you’re okay that we’re not going for a celebration somewhere?’ And I had to think about it, because it’s always been this thing, this very important thing for me to have a birthday celebration that’s a big damn deal….but I could see it as the baby would see it. All this packing up of stuff and driving and then a big hullabaloo getting settled in a hotel and at some point mom and dad would probably raise their voices at each other because, let’s face it, this is a first-time travel experience with the baby and on a scale of 1 to 10 that’s like an 11 as far as optimal opportunities for frustration. If I traveled, it wouldn’t be because I thought it would be fun in execution, it would just be fun in theory and then probably provide some fun facebook photos that would inform all my ‘friends’ what a great time I had on my birthday. (If only those photos could talk, right? They’d say ‘WHY ARE THESE PEOPLE FORCING A VACATION WHEN THEY HAVE A NEWBORN IN TOW?’)

I assured Andrew that yes, staying home was fine with me. And I know that it’s true, so, am I just getting older and therefore more boring? Or have we lost the battle and our spunk is gone only two months into the parenting adventure. Worst case scenario: we are now the most boring people alive and I’ll soon be spotted wandering through the country wearing mom jeans that have waistlines right beneath my bras and I’ll have to wait until I’m 50 to resume my birthday celebrations. Best case scenario: this is just a little blip of domesticity on the radar and next year we will introduce the baby to the glory of my birthday week celebration. At which point he’ll likely be thinking Did I seriously end up with a mother who lip syncs Bon Jovi, and if so, is there any way to go back and request one who isn’t destined to embarrass me on a regular basis throughout my junior high and high school years?