Thursday, March 23, 2017

Magical, indeed

Hello, there.

Yes, it is I. No, I did not drop into a black-hole, travel across time and help launch human-kind into an alternative, more sustainable world.

I did, however, do something even more impressive — I launched a baby out of my hoo-haa, even though he refused to come out for two frigging days after the signal turned green. More impressive than that – he's still functioning, after almost an year and a half now. We haven't broken him or had him replaced during the warranty period or anything. Parenting FTW!

Motherhood has certainly managed to evoke a lot of emotions that seem to have been lost under the layers of flab all these years. Some of these emotions, I do not even have words to express.

Take today morning, for instance. All was peaceful in the household. I was getting ready for an appointment, the H was taking a shower, and little !xobele was eating his breakfast while monkeying around – an integral part of his daily routine. Now, our little light-of-life is quite the clean freak. He might splash around on his own pee, he might try to catch cockroaches on the road. By God! He might even try to stick his face into the toilet to see what alternate universe it leads to; but what he cannot stand is a dirty hand. And it was because of this wonderful little quirk that I did not find it weird when he suddenly walked up to me in the other room and stuck out his hand, nor did I think twice when I wiped the brown gunk off his hand with my fingers.

Only to be followed by a moment of dawning realization and utter panic. You see, he was eating peanut butter with his breakfast; which is why the brown gunk made sense. But also a fact that needed to be considered in the situation — he was not wearing a diaper. Suddenly, it did not seem quite so obvious as to what the source of the gunk was.

The whirlwind of emotions I felt at that moment, I do not think I can ever put into words. That divine feeling as I realized that sniffing my fingers was really the only way I could decipher the brand of the brown gunk — priceless. I do not kid when I say that seconds seemed like hours. I caught hold of little !xobele's hand and held him in place lest he decided to run off to stomp on the more questionable possible source. My mind raced to think of a solution that did not involve my nose-buds, but panic conquered all.
I did, however, in that frozen frame of time, realize that this was something... special. Something I would never have been blessed enough to experience if not for parenthood.

The story does have a happy ending; it was peanut butter, after all. As excruciating as it was to lift up my hand to my nose, I got through it. Hey, what doesn't kill you only makes you stronger, right?

Don't such stories warm your heart and make you realize how intense and beautiful the Journey of Motherhood is?

No?
Ok. Suit yourself.

I shall be off, now. I need to hide the toilet brushes before little !xobele comes back. I caught him staring at them today morning and I am pretty sure he thinks they are giant, funny toothbrushes.

Magical, I tell you.