Mother Nature

Today, I found a piece of cereal in my slipper. I haven’t quite mastered the art of eating breakfast while standing, especially when there is a sling attached to me. Later, as I was undoing the sling, I found even more crumbs and gently brushed them off my unfazed baby.

To say this has been nothing but wine and roses would be more obscene than the noises my son makes when he dirties his diaper after diaper. The simplest of tasks – things like putting baby pictures in an album or updating this blog or finishing up on thank you notes – seem light years away. I suddenly look back on my life and remember a simpler time when I could literally do whatever I wanted to do. And to think I ever thought that was stressful?

Easy it is not. Demanding and taxing and tolling it most certainly is. But natural . . . Natural is the best way I can describe it. There is just something so instinctual about this. Primal, too. I am that mare who lets her wobbly foal nudge and head-bump her into feeding after feeding. I am that cat who wants to clean and preen her kitten. I am that dog who is constantly sniffing him, making sure all is well. I am that wild sal who looks like a mean, hot mess but is tender and soft when it comes to her young. I am that mama bear stressing, nuzzling and teaching my demanding, precious cub . . . and who would fight to her death to protect him.

Walden is now a month old. He changes every day. Two pounds heavier, and I already get the sinking feeling he is growing up too fast. He remains a good baby. There is always an answer to his whimpers and cries. It just comes down to if mommy and daddy are good enough to figure it out.

Figuring it out we try. Through the bleary nights and fussy moments, daddy and I give it all we’ve got. We grow from who we were as a couple. We embrace who we are as a new family. We beam at the twinkles of new life and new love. And as we settle into our nest, we fan our feathers around our little hatchling, bringing us all comfort and uncontrollable joy.