I Cried My Heart Out

Last week - well, actually last week stunk. It was one of those weeks where I kept checking their gums for new teeth because they were SO inexplicably cranky. There was a lot of biting - you know the kind of week I mean. And I was already in a pretty foul mood myself, thanks to girl-hormones. Toxic combination. And I had two days off work scheduled but J needed to do some emergency house repairs so instead of some time for trying to work on my stupid book I had two extra days of very intense mothering instead.

There was a high point, however. Through a complex mix of bribery and determination, I finally convinced Pink to sit still for long enough for me to do her hair in twists. I know that most of you are going to look at this and think "Woah! How am I going to say something tactful about that?" but getting these twists onto her head was a big deal in our house. I'm very proud of them. And nothing that anybody says will make me un-proud. Okay? OKAY? (Sorry. Still working on conquering that foul mood).

Here she is, seeing herself in the mirror for the first time and entranced by her own beauty:
(a note about the video - noo-noo is what she calls herself, I'm not just making up silly names for fun, okay? Although I guess that is a fun name). 


Anyway, it was a big deal and we were happy about it. In fact, I got so fired up and proud of myself that I decided: THIS is the moment. I am finally ready. We are going to cut Blue's hair. Pink, at long last, has hair like a proper little girl; it's time for him to look like a proper little boy. When they are together, I want it to be really obvious why only one of them is wearing a dress.

So we did it. Actually, J did it because for some unfathomable reason he has proper haircutting scissors (!!!!) and wanted to give it a try. So we sat Blue in his highchair and J carefully cut off his curls until he only had about a third of his original length. I was ready for it, I had decided to do it, he needed it done because it will make combing much easier, I knew it was the right thing.  But by the time J had finished, a different child sat in front of me and I found myself crying and crying. With that haircut, my baby is gone.

And it strikes me - I had an imaginary baby for much longer than I had a real baby. While we were waiting, I had this sort of pretend baby who lived in my head and never got older. I didn't ask for him/her (the gender was never clear) to come and stay; he/she took up residence of their own accord, uninvited. This pretend  baby (because clearly, I'm trying not to use the word fantasy) kept me company for years and years and years. I'm sure some of you are a little bit horrified by that, but I'm guessing I'm not the only one this happened to. (Yes, he/she sort of had a name. No, I'm not going to tell you what it was).  He/she never grew up, and they certainly never had a haircut.

But now my real babies are all gone. I mean, okay, they can't actually do anything remotely grown-up like actually talk, or eat with cutlery, or invest in the stock market.  But they are just so clearly little people now. And it happened so painfully quickly. The imaginary baby did not prepare me for that. This has got all kinds of implications - you know, all the usual adoption stuff about how we need to remember that we are parenting future adults not perpetual children.   But that's not really what I'm thinking about right now. I'm just wondering when I'll be able to bear to take out the camera and record his new short haircut. Until it's on film disk, I can sort of kid myself I imagined it. He's no less beautiful, but he's getting so big. And like pretty much every mother who ever lived? I. Am. Not. Ready.

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Mr Linky is now up for the topic of Conspicuous. If you want to take part (please do!) please write something and link up by the 24th of August - next Wednesday.