Baby Clothes Or Waterboarding?

You would think that I am torturing Evvy when putting these baby clothes on her. Who is making these onesies? An evil? Getting her arms in is like, well, pushing a baby out of a vagina...it's meant to be but with strings attached: pain, crying, stitches. If it were up to me, Evvy would be in a pamper. Just a pamper.

And at night, Meesh just loves putting Evvy in these beautiful organic pajamas that have 6 thousand buttons. So when I get up to do the 5:30 breast milk bottle feeding (by the way, ever seen a woman pump in a hands free boob shirt? UTTERly hysterical...Meesh walks around while the bottles fill up, takes phone calls, writes thank you notes, why just yesterday I saw her doing her nails whilst a machine sucked milk from her bosom) I have to go through a screaming mine field. I've tried doing the pull-off-every-button-in-one-fell-swoop but Evvy was all "Dad, are you fucking kidding?" So instead, with flailing arms and kicking legs (p.s. this lady is mad strong) I attempt to un-button...and any given button could take more than a proper minute as I try to re-direct her limbs. Who invented this shit? "I have an idea, lets make the clothes super impossible to get off quickly so when the baby has a dump in their pants and a suckling mouth the Dad can get really stressed out and start sweating before sunrise."

Shmoolie Strikes Again

*If you have not read my post "The Things Wigged Women Say" please read that first and then come back to this.

It is Friday night.  Good Friday for those hunting for eggs.  Passover for those substituting bread for brick, err, matzoh (I must admit us Jews have really stepped up our game, any average grocery store now sells Matzoh in a variety of flavors...I've become friends with the flax seed whole wheat matz...didn't know you could hit the toilet during this holiday?  me neither.  but now, you might want to eat whilst in the lieu...this matzoh beats the elestra infused WOW! chips of five years ago by an un-scrolled Torah mile) and who knocks on our door but 7 year old Shmoolie and one of his many siblings (remember, they multiply Gremlin style).

I was changing Evvy in her room but I could hear the voices.  You never mistake a young Jewish voice.  You can hear the afikomen hiding in the throat.  Meesh answered the door and Shmoolie and his accomplice said "Where is Moishe (yep, they call me by my Hebrew name.)  We need him for a minyan...now!  right now!" (a minyan, for those of you not of our persuasion, is a grouping of 10 or more men who need to gather for certain Jewish prayers) I was the needed 10th.  Meesh said "Oh...um...well, we have had a long day with the baby.  And I need Matt tonight."  Shmoolie, as per Shmoosual, said "We don't care...we need him!"  Meesh got mad "Well, Shmoolie, I need my husband to help take care of our baby.  And he is changing a diaper right now."

Shmoolie, defeated yet still delusional, said "we are disappointed, but tell him to come as soon as he can."  Meesh has been sticking her nipples in a mouth for three weeks...they are sore...she is sore, tired and over it and she said "Ain't gonna happen, Shmool!  Baruch Atah!"  (yep, Meesh said Baruch Atah and she does not even know what it means however she did not want to say FUCK OFF so instead, she settled for anything Hebrew her brain could call up.)

If you are in a situation where you need to tell someone to FUCK OFF, just say BARUCH ATAH!

It's Like Sex...I've Tried Every Position

It is saturday and I just made my first I'm-going-to-lose-my-shit call to Meesh.  I have been up since, well, last night.  I couldn't sleep.  I heard noises outside.  The same noises I had heard before Evvy entered the world but now my hearing is supersonic (are you singing the JJ Fad song?  I am).  I'm like a fucking x-man:  I can hear conversations miles away and lift trucks and aircraft.  Having a baby has really given me some odd spider bite if you know what I mean.

So, the noises pulled me out of bed every half hour.  I would put my pants on, my sneakers, grab a phone for 911 purposes, run to the door and peak outside to see...nothing.  Point is, I am exhausted.  And today was Meesh's big morning outing:  TARGET.  She got dressed up for it, too.  Showered.  Blew her hair out.  Perfume.  Lipstick.  Very, as my mom would say, Uffcapatch (not nearly the right spelling but it is a Yiddish word I think and it means something like "look at me everyone, I'm all did up and shit.")

So Meesh is off on her big morning and Evvy decides to play games with me.  She would close her eyes for a moment after I rocked her in my makeshift swing (my arms...watch out The Rock) and I would put her in her bassinet.  I'd walk away and she would squeal.  Sounds fun, right?  Cute game.  Not as good as Monopoly and Scattergories, but wicked fun nonetheless.  Then I would do every technique from "Happiest Baby On The Block" (have you seen that DVD?  Working for you?) and failed brilliantly.  I swaddled.  And re-swaddled.  Binky.  No Binky.  Lay down.  Stand up.  Bounce around.  Sit still.  I almost tried to fake her out and pretend my nipple was the right nipple.  Didn't work.  It's official, I'm just like all of the dads who have come before me...I'm an amusement park.  

I called Meesh and said "Bring your tits home now!"

 

The Things Wigged Women Say

We live on a street filled with wigged, skirted women and peyas having men (the Jewish locks of hair that bookend a pre and post Bar Mitzvahed face.)

One family, in particular, has really managed to bring out the ghetto in me (and I'm not talking about a communal, walled dwelling.)

First off, their house is like a clown car.  At least 40 Jews live in it at any given time.  And apparently they prefer parking their broke-ass vans on the lawn instead of the driveway.  And for some reason there are always chicken bones on their property (throwing up yet?...wait) and when I walk the dogs I have, on ocassion, had to rip bones out of their mouths (puking?)

Yesterday, the Jewish Octumom (I don't how many kids they have but I swear it is like Gremlins up in that bitch...everyday a new one) stopped me on the sidewalk to say "So your wife...she ehhh...gave birth?"  I nod YES.  She goes on to say "So when is your dog giving birth?"

She points down to Thursday (an 11 pound chihuahua/jack russell rescue.)  I say "She's not pregnant."  The Hebrew Octumom giggles...a devlish giggle.  "But she look pregnant...she's fat."  I say "She's actually in great shape."  I start to walk away and she calls out "I get one of her puppies for my kids?"  In my mind I turned around and said "Listen bitch, she ain't pregnant and I hope one of your vans rolls off your LAWN and flattens you!"  But instead I turned around and said "Sorry, did you not understand me, sweety?  She IS NOT PREGNANT.  MEANING, SHE IS THE OPPOSITE OF PREGNANT."  I continue walking and I hear her maniacle laugh.

Later that day, one of her kids (a 7 year old boy named Shmoolie...I kid you not) saw me walking Thursday and as per usual he ran across the street to play with her.  I said "You shouldn't run across streets and you can't play with my dog."  He said "Why?"  I respond "Because of your mother."  I walk away.  Shmoolie says "I get one of your puppies?"  In my head I turned back and beat Shmoolie up but then I remembered I can't because he's 7 and I am a Dad.  

Meesh And The Baby

I thought the dogs, August and Thursday, were protective of the belly, well, you best mind your reach when going in for Evvy (I know those two Vs sandwiched between the E and the Y look like a W but to answer your question "person who shall remain nameless" NO, we did not name our daughter Ewy...it is E V V Y -  by the way, my mom suggested I now spell her name out with spaces E V V Y so as not to cause confusion...I, on the other baby daddy hand, think I needn't space my daughter's name out for the sake of people who could think I would name my kid EWY)

Meesh was laboring at home until midnight.  She had been laboring since the midnight before.  In between contractions (which apparently feel like a cross between a broken washing machine inside of your stomach and a little people wrestling match) Meesh would gaze into my eyes lovingly and soft as a baby's butt say "you okay, Matty.  How you doin?  How's it goin?"  As I was about to answer the little people would start to wrestle and Meesh would grab a table, a couch, a dog, my head and yelp "Where the fuck is the hospital, Matt.  What the fuck?  I mean, seriously, THE FUCK!"  So it is my friends, the contraction cliches are cliches because they are, well, totally cliche.

Our doula (oblongata) told us to get in the shower around 10 p.m. (two hours before the clock struck midnight, before princesses turn into pumpkins and queens into witches) and on that Meesh started bawling..."Why the fuck does she want me to get in the shower.  She should get in the shower.  A shower??  The hell is this game she's playing?"  I turned on the shower, came back to Meesh who was squatting between a nook and a cranny and I said "I'm just going to leave the shower running and if you want to get in, it might feel warm and good and..."  She said "Ohhh, you're on her side?"  I didn't know who's side I was on at this point to be quite honest.  My pained, warrior wife or the doula Meesh loved (until this point) who wanted only to help Meesh have the birth she dreamed of...all the while I am thinking about the water I am wasting,  Earth Guilt as if being Jewish wasn't enough.

We got in the shower.  The tears stopped.  Meesh rested her body against mine.  She was at peace.  Got out of the shower.  Got dressed.  Then those rascally little people were like, fuck it, we want to have Wrestlemania in her belllllyyyy.  Clock struck midnight.  Princess Meesh was pumpkin-izing.  We got in the car.  That drive to the hospital is as it is in the films...surreal and slow.  We get up to the room.  Set up shop.  Clary Sage and Peppermint oils in hand.  Ipod playing Joni Mitchell (oddly, theatrical Meesh and Ghetto Meesh did not want to give birth hence no Beyonce or Babs...baby E    V    V    Y (there mom)  wanted to be birthed like a proper, poetic girl.  

2 a.m. rolled around and Meesh was simply plum tuckered.  Very hard to watch your wife in that much pain...heartbreaking...also hard to not laugh (that uncomfortable "i want to cry but instead I'm laughing" laugh).  Needless to say, I had to bury my head a few times.  And after nearly 24 hours of labor, Meesh essentially looked at the doula and looked at me and said "fuck you both...give me the epidural."  

The epidural doctor arrived quickly.  If you ever have to witness this act, just kill yourself.  The doctor opens a suitcase that rivals a 007 assassin kit, throws a wall of sticky plastic on Meesh's back and starts building a house on it...pipes and hoses and needles, oh my!  That was my first black out.

The epidural knocked us both out.  We slept until 6 a.m.  They took her off the epideral.  And shortly thereafter she was 100 percent dilated.  Ready to push.  And then the door opened.  Finally, our doctor had arrived.  Oops, scratch that...our doctor is a young black woman.  This doctor was a not that young white woman.  I pull her aside before Meesh can freak out "where is our Doctor."  And very matter-of-factly she says "she got suspended this morning for brawling over a C-section."  Oh no she di'int.  But, in fact, yes she did.  So it was, the doctor we had spent nine months with was in hospital jail but this doctor loved my Ipod mix so I liked her.

She sat on the bed with Meesh and the pushing began.  25 minutes later a head was crowning (black out number 2).  And then within moments, a face and a chest, arms, legs and the announcement "it's a girl!"  B L A C K O U T #3.  A girl?  My brother has three sons.  A girl?  Everyone thought Meesh was carrying the way one does when they carry a BOY.  A girl?  And then some weird, you-have-a-baby-girl chemical kicks in and you start crying and your heart opens so wide and all you can hear in your head is your own voice saying "I have a daughter" and then you hear your voice but now British saying "Not Without My Daughter" and you think of Sally Field and then you remember the joke you had with someone about being parched and saying "Not Without My Water."  And then...you are asked to cut the umbilical chord.  You do, and then you properly black out.

An Open Letter To My Baby

Today reminds me of all the stories we hear from our parents about those hours before heading to the hospital. When I was in my Mom's belly it was snowing in Connecticut. The house was warm. My older brother, David, was preparing to ninja me whenever I was brought home. My parents were so excited (not about David slicing me with throwing stars but that I was coming into the world.) Just like me and Meesh today. Los Angeles and it is hot outside. We are listening to Leona Naess on Itunes. The dogs, Thursday and August, are flanking your Mom while she breathes through contractions. All the while she is as beautiful as ever. She writes down the time between the contractions and the length of each one. This reminds me of counting thunder claps and lightning cracks. Nature. So incredibly beautiful. What do you look like? Your eyes? Lips? Hands? You are on your way. On your way into our arms. You've been in our hearts already. But soon, you will sleep, your heart pressed to your Mom's, to mine. Chest to chest. Skin to skin. How are we feeling right now? Well, it is indescribable. The way you do when first you see oceans, Yosemite, a constellation. Awed! And you're only just making your way. I have a feeling your arrival will multiply all of the above by millions. Until soon my child...I love you.