Three days into this parental-leave business and still not quite *with it*, as my grandpa used to say. It's a big change, from rushing off to work in the morning to waiting around for someone to poop (actually, there are some similarities there). At the office I'd just blaze through my morning, knowing full well how wool-headed I was in the afternoon; now we don't even get out of the house until three or so (which has, this week at least, been the time for the sun to finally come out). I understand the rhythms of the day well enough -- it's basically just play, eat, play, eat, poop, nap, repeat ... again, not entirely different from the office -- but I'm still not making enough hay with my quiet time. But then the last few months have been a real drag, and I'm tired ... Chicken Licken is asleep right now and I'm tempted to put my head down, too. And the second I drift off is when, of course, she'll wake right up.
People are always telling me that my work is too dark. So I've put up this sunnier story, but even it has a shadow, as its original publisher – a fine Atlantic Canadian literary magazine called the Gaspereau Review – is no longer in business. ---------------- It was a simple enough thing and that thing was simply this: Edmund Kelley was a gentleman. Of course his mom called him her 'little gentleman', as in 'Oh Edmund, you are my perfect little gentleman,' which did seem to hold to a certain logic that these type of things often follow, considering her affection for him and the fact that he was, after all, only ten years old. Still, Edmund himself was not particularly fond of the diminutive aspect of that title. Gentleman was enough; gentleman summed up the whole thing rather nicely, thank you. He was definitely a more refined version of your average child. He lived in a state of perpetual Sunday m
when needed:
ReplyDeletealways nap when baby naps.
common sense.
love the work/baby day analogies.
god, it's so flippin true.
only with the baby, it's meaningful.
have fun. i so envy you!
Susans advice was just what I was going to say..I learned early to sleep when the babies slept..housework is not important
ReplyDeleteBabies do have a habit of waking up at inopportune times don't they?
ReplyDeletewhy the need to make hay?
ReplyDeleteNap! Enjoy! You have lots of time to make hay or grind flour or whatever....
ReplyDelete*ahem* And I quote: "I don't understand why you don't just nap all the time. If I were you, I'd be napping all the time."
ReplyDelete