Dawn of the Dead

Well, I haven't posted for a while, mainly because I've been busy running this bed and breakfast here, or at least it feels that way lately what with multiple visitors and dinner guests. We had weekend guests, my best friend and his new bride, and if they were having any misgivings about having children, I suspect this has been tipped towards the negative over a weekend where Teague arose screaming at 4:30 AM on consecutive mornings, and could not be convinced to return to sleep in order to wait out Aurora's arrival. I mean, what are you supposed to do about this? We've tried putting him to sleep earlier in the evening (which many books suggest) to no avail, and tried later in the evening too, tried to increase nap time, get him to eat more at dinner, or eat less maybe, or decrease nap time.... but no combination or ritual seems to dissuade him from this brutally early wakeup alarum.

And so I stagger along the creaky hallway in the chill of pre-dawn, and open his nursery door to find the toddler Teague standing up in his crib, his mouth a rictus of wailing sorrow, his rage caused by this terrible, nightly abandonment, but then now he's also half-laughing in relief at my appearance, though simultaneously choking and gasping for breath. So, I pick him up, and calm him by singing the alphabet, the letters of which are affixed to his nursery wall, each letter having an accompanying little picture (like "Apple" for A) and so we have to go through a few of those pictures, identifying the Pig, the Monkey, or the Owl, and then we move on down the creaky hallway where Teague likes to point at the various family pictures that line the wall and I inform him of the subject of each picture even though it is almost totally dark: Uncle Jim, Cousin Sarah, Grandma Stone, etc. Then slowly up the stairs (the stair are also creaky, which is part of living in a 100 year old house) to our third floor bedroom where Mira lies waiting groggily, still more asleep than awake, Teague growing ever more excited in anticipation of the exposed breast lying there warmly in the dark, commencing then frantic nursing for as long as Mira will put up with it, which could even be a couple of hours or more which I think is ridiculous, but if not that, then what? Head down to start drinking coffee and playing with the myriad blocks at 4:45 AM?

Well, what are ya' gonna do but love him anyway, right? Despite his appetite for household destruction, food hurling tendencies, and fecal disasters, we love him all the more, for he is all brilliant energy and brutal, unknowing optimism, and every day I am amazed all over again at how he grows, learns, and darts about with miniature energy. It makes me wish I could look at the world as new every day, and to feel as unsullied and pure as I once was before the oceans of poison in this world washed through my body, tarnishing it, staining the mind and body forever, as we are all tainted by bad habits, age and cynicism to some degree. Perhaps like my father I will fall into the role of curmudgeon or aging misanthrope, but if anyone can save me from such a fate, it will be Teague, who I believe is right now throwing bath toys into the toilet, so I must go...