It's My Party

When my birthday rolls around every October, I have no qualms about letting people know. “It’s my birthday present,” I say to the boutique owner, and point to the ankle boots I’m about to buy, like guilty pretext for the purchase. “Today’s my birthday,” I blurt out randomly to the woman at the movie theater ticket counter. “It’s my birthday today,” I announce to the waiter at the fancy restaurant on top of the RenCen, one part hoping for special treatment, the other part just wanting to hear myself say it one last time. You see, I absolutely love my birthday. Perhaps it’s because I hail from a family of five children, so it was the one day of the year when the attention was mine alone. Or, perhaps I simply love indulgence—and my birthday is the ultimate excuse for abandon excess.

Last year, pregnant for my 30^th birthday, I felt cheated by the wildly extravagant and narcissistic 30^th birthday party I never got to throw. This year, I was determined to make up for it. What I didn’t expect was exactly how that might manifest itself, now that I have a 6-month-old. There was no party. No guest list. No 2am last call. Instead, Ryan ducked out of work for the afternoon, and we took Cass for a long walk, leaves crunching under our feet, the crisp fall air making me feel like a student on my way to class. We had lined up someone to watch Cass, so we could carry on with birthday activities, planned to make me feel: a) special and b) as social and interesting as I was pre-pregnancy. These activities ranged from a movie at an actual movie theater to attending the opening night of the Museum of Contemporary Art Detroit. About 35 minutes into the latter—a thumping, fantastically-hyped, packed-house event bringing out the city’s young and interesting in droves—I was ready to go home. I had been looking forward to this affair for weeks, building it up to be a post-pregnancy coming-out/birthday party of sorts. But once I was there—casually mingling and staring at obtuse shock art—my head went completely vacant. I was pining for home. I wanted to be planted on the couch, curled up next to my husband, discussing the minutia of our delicious dinner, Cass’ current sleeping patterns and the Tigers’ unpredictable pitching program, while watching the last few innings of the 4th game of the World Series.

So we left and did just that. And I can’t remember a better birthday. Ever. That's saying a lot, considering I still can't have cake (darn dairy allergy).

That doesn’t mean, however, that my birthday was without overindulgence. Early that morning, Cass and I sprawled out on the bed, staring at each other. I was trying to convey a sense of significance, but he was riveted by a toy giraffe. His chest was bare, and I wanted to capture that tiny, perfect body that seems to be growing so fast. I grabbed my camera, thinking about how my Dad and brother are constantly ridiculing my photographic excesses. At least once a week, Colin will ask how many pictures I have taken of Cass so far on that particular day. I usually lie, and say five or so. But today I tell the truth: I took 33 photos of Cass within a half hour.

Glorious excess indeed. But, hey, it was my 31^st birthday—and I refuse to erase a single one. [If you click through them really fast, it’s kinda like a video]

It's My Party Slideshow

Sweet Potato Crack

Cass is crazy for sweet potatoes. Seriously crazy. Like perhaps "organic" is some sort of code word for baby crack.

This week we started solids--for real, this time. After previous (failed) attempts involving rice cereal and lots of refusing, grimacing and screaming, we were thoroughly under-prepared for the savagery of his appetite.

Sweet Potato Crack Slideshow

A Five-Month Retrospective

I kid you not, a couple months ago someone had the audacity to ask an exhausted new mom this profoundly insulting question: So what do you do all day anyway? The exhausted new mom was me, and I was far too flustered, too timorous, too bone-tired to respond.

But, now--five months a mother--I'm catching my breath, building my confidence, and I'm finally ready to bring it. Here's a little Harper's-style Index to keep the clueless more informed (no hard feelings; I was clueless once, too). And to serve as a reminder, long after I forget what it feels like to sleep in broken increments of two hours, why I couldn't put together a respectable sentence about what it was that I did all day.

On any given day of any anonymous week :
Number of diapers changed: 10
Number of diapers that exploded, soiling an entire outfit, the changing table pad, and the front of my shirt, requiring two outfit changes and two loads of laundry: 2
Estimated hours spent breastfeeding: 6
Phone calls made to Ryan, asking him to please come home from work: 3
Number of showers I took: Zero
Hours crying: 3 (Cass); 1.5 (Me)
Ounces of breast milk he drank from a bottle: Zero
Ounces of breast milk poured down sink, after he refused to drink from bottle: 6
Number of times I sang You Are My Sunshine: 17
Average number of times I saved draft of the same email until I could finish and send: 4
Number of times I washed my hands: 14
Days I let The New York Times sit on kitchen table until I put it in recycling bag: 3
Number of photos I took: 5
Likelihood I carried Cass home from a walk in the stroller: 1:3
Meals eaten in less than ten minutes: 3
Meals eaten standing up, with one hand: 2
Afternoon naps I took with Cass to fuel up for the evening: 1
Naps interrupted by Fed-Ex delivery man: 1
Possible life-threatening infant diseases/ailments looked up online: 2
Infant massages administered: 1
Hours rocking, pacing, dancing, bouncing, swinging, carrying, swaying, cradling: 4
Hours Ryan let me sleep in the morning, while he got up with Cass: 2
Hours Cass was an angel in the morning: 2
Phone calls I was forced to let go to voicemail: 8
Phone calls I returned: 1
Thank you cards I wrote: 4
Items from Target I needed: 12
Items from Target that landed in the cart before Cass started crying: 3
Mean looks received in checkout line: 2
Number of times I read Good Night Moon: 3
Odds Cass spit-up after eating: 1:4
Number of projectile vomits: 1
Panic attacks: 3
Number of times I thought I was making a mistake: 73
Number of times I touched his skin against my face: 74
Number of times I held him up to the mirror, looking for signs of myself in his eyes: 2
Hours I felt overwhelmingly responsible for his every breath: 24
Number of times he said thank you: Zero

Cass is five months now, and it's all so different. He still can't say thank you, but he knows his mom and dad. His face lights up with recognition when he sees us--and that's the only thanks I need. We laugh and play, communicating in giggles, hugs and our own special language of raspberry blowing. Being a mom is still hard work, but the pendulum swings in both directions: I could never have known just how much I would love this job of mine. I guess you could say I was clueless.