This weekend I had the opportunity to watch a friend's three year
old daughter, who was adopted from China in 2000.
1. While it is appropriate and generally acceptable to place
smiley
face stickers on coloring books upside down, one should never, under any circumstances do the same with teddy bear stickers.
2. I cannot fit under my bed without a great deal of effort and noise.
My cats have come to accept this. Three-year-old girls can fit under
beds with a minimum of effort and the stealth of a stalking leopard.
This both confuses and startles cats, but is kind of fun to watch.
3. Although I hadn't expected it, or perhaps even thought there
was such a thing, polite and well-spoken three year olds exist in our
world.
4. Older brothers have bunk beds. That is as immutable a law as
gravity. If someone asks you if your older brothers do in fact have
bunk beds, that is tantamount to someone asking you if the sky is up,or water is wet.
5. Water is indeed wet, even if it's left the cup and taken up
residence in the carpet.
6. For the first time in my adult life, I went to McDonalds and
ordered a milk. This can be an unsettling event if you are not
mentally prepared for it.
7. If you're three years old, you don't care who hears you
when you sing out loud.
8. According to literature that is popular among three year olds,
owls can talk, dogs are blue and can also talk, and pandas can talk,
but only to each other. In fact, most animals can and do talk, as do
a large variety of inanimate objects. This may take some world-view
adjusting on the part of the adult, but to a three year old this is
perfectly acceptable behavior for say, a dust pan or an amour.
9. One should never stuff more than your age in french fries into your mouth.
10. Magic is still real, and often supersedes any pesky laws of nature
that get in the way. I'm not sure, but after this weekend, the
world might be a better place if this were true.
~~
What to do while waiting
1. Freak out the neighbors. This can be done by wearing any sort of baby carrying device, filling it with sacks of sugar, flour or a protesting cat, and then wandering around the neighborhood for hours on end muttering "testing this damned..." and "never stand up straight again...". Cats are particularly effective if you wish to test your first aid skills as well.
2. Get a raise. This can be done by spending countless hours at work reading adoption stories. Plan this so that your boss strolls into your office just as you are sobbing like a baby after reading your fifteenth 'gotcha day' story in a row.
3. Practice your acronyms. This can be done by speaking only the following for a 24 hour period. "DTC, I600A, BCIS, DW, DOR, CCAA, CCIA, I-171H, DH, CAWLI, FCC, DD, DS, DOT." Oh, and "CLTC, CSA, CFP". You may not need to do this if you work for the government.
4. Now that your paperchase is done, you may feel a certain. . . something lacking from your life. Volunteer to do the neighbors taxes. Fill out forms for random background checks on local officials and document everything in your daily life, such as the decision making process that goes into buying either coffee ice cream, or vanilla ice cream. Have friends write you recommendation letters to bring to your auto mechanic before you have your oil changed.
5. Practice your socialization skills. Find total strangers who are obviously new parents and ask them about the method of birth, how much the hospital stay ran them, and why they chose to have a child in such a manner. This is best done while wearing good running shoes and with a lawyer on retainer, or physically present.
6. Attend first time parenting classes. You will be one of, if not the only, couples or singles there who are not actually pregnant. If you are a woman, stuff a pillow up your shirt to fit in better. If the class gets boring, pull the pillow out and take a nap. If you are a man, you should also stuff a pillow up your shirt. This won't accomplish anything, but I find the concept of a man with a pillow up his shirt at a first time parenting meeting amusing.
7. Become extremely sarcastic.
8. Organize a shower with your friends. It's a great way to save water, and let's face it, it's a long wait and you will smell horridly if you don't do it once and a while.
9. Go away for a while. If you're planning on a ten-month wait until you receive your referral, I recommend leaving now and returning sometime around May. Trust me, you'll thank me for this later.
~~
Fishing
I went deep-sea fishing with my father a few days ago, to celebrate my impending birth date. I have not been fishing on the ocean for a number of years, and never at depths of 200-250 feet, so I was excited about the prospect.
We arrived less than auspiciously at the dock around 4:30 in the morning with a flat tire, a stomach full of coffee and granola bars and the expectation of catching several thousand pounds of fish. Despite our flat and our misconceptions about how cooperative fish would be in getting into our boat, we had a great time. I also came to a number of realizations which I've summed up for easy reading and/or publishing in a book of helpful life quotes.
1. It's dark at 3:30 am. I mean really, really dark. I didn't even know this hour existed before my fishing trip, as my days generally skip from around midnight till about 6:30ish in the morning. Even then, I'm never fully awake until noon or my 10th cup of coffee.
2. Captains of seagoing vessels are now younger than I am. Getting into a boat with a captain who's still figuring out what to do about college was a little like getting onto an airplane with a captain who repeatedly says "what's this button do?" I guess as time goes on, I'll have to get used to that.
3. It's *still* really, really dark at 4:30 in the morning. I don't know who designed this system, but I'd like to have word with them. When I'm heading out to sea in a vessel the size of my bathtub, surrounded by ocean going creatures who would probably have a good laugh at capsizing it with a captain who wasn't born when I was watching Gilligan reruns, I'd at least like the decency to be able to see the land that I'm too out of shape to swim too.
4. 250 feet is a long way to pull a fish. Especially if you're pulling a fish 250 feet by making rapid spinning motions with your right hand, while thirty pounds of fish is trying to pull itself back to the bottom of the ocean. I discovered several new muscled by the end of my trip that I never would have guessed I had.
5. Whoever said `as easy as stealing candy from a baby' has never tried to steal candy from a baby. This has nothing to do with fishing, but I find that saying amusing.
6. Fish stories are true. Or at least, what they say about fish stories are true. My fish have been growing while the boat keeps shrinking.
7. If you think the fish in the supermarket stink, you should smell them right after they come out of the ocean. I Don't those things ever shower down there? I mean sheesh! I think there's a serious untapped market in fish deodorizers.
8. The ocean is really, really wet. Don't get me wrong, I've stood on the beach and gazed out at the sea and realized that it's wet in an abstract sort of way. However, you never realize just how wet the ocean is until it's all over you.
9. The best part about the trip wasn't the fish I landed, or the time spent on the ocean, or the tales I have to tell. It was spending 12 uninterrupted hours with my Dad. I hope someday I'll have plenty of chances to do that with my daughter, once she comes home.
~~
The Baby Registry
This weekend my wife and I decided that it was time to register for our child. We got ourselves off to the store, completely forgetting our Baby Bargains book and dove in with all the grace of a duck with a cinderblock tied to it’s midriff. Here’s what I learned from my experiences.
1. Given the choice between being confronted by 10 be-leathered Harley guys just finding out their favorite bar has closed down, or 10 soon-to-be mothers who have just found out their baby monitors are going out of stock, I’ll take the bikers every time. I’m not really into motorcycles, but at least with the bikers I could say something like “Gee, how many CC’s ya got there?” or regurgitate a line from Monster Garage. I got the distinct feeling that after registering for 4+ hours, none of the women I encountered would be willing to talk breast pumpology with me.
2. There is one section of the store where men may say “nipples” as many times as they want without drawing strange looks. However, it is not appropriate to giggle each time.
3. Budget at least two hours to register. Than take that figure, convert it to minutes and run it through the following equation: R=(T*t+L+p) – 32.4 Where T=your budgeted time, t=traffic, L=the lady that helps you register and explains the 27 page instruction set, p=the minutes of pain you cause yourself or significant other with bad jokes and 32.4 is just a random number because nothing about this trip is going to be certain. If you come up with anything less than 180 minutes, please check your figures again.
4. If you are there with a man, be he 8, 38 or 80, let him hold the scanner gun thingy. I don’t know why this makes us feel better, perhaps it is a mental link or some Jungian archetype pointing to our past, but it just does. But beware of star wars figures or GI Joes appearing on your registry. Women, be especially vigilant if they have that light-saber that makes noises when you swing it around.
5. Never attempt to test out a car seat on yourself. This could lead to an embarrassing moment or to being escorted out of the store.
6. If this is your first child, the 17-year-old male clerk will know a heck of a lot more about baby slings and binkies than you might. Up until this weekend I thought a binkie was a type of goat found in the Himalayas.
7. The crib you fall in love with will be the one that doesn’t come in the color that matches your nursery plans. Conversely any crib that matches your nursery scheme will have the lowest rating possible in Baby Bargains and/or cost more than your car.
8. Prepare yourself to see more bottles, of different types, than are available at your local liquor store.
9. The last piece of advice I can give you all is simple. Never register when the store you are registering with is hosting its 10th anniversary celebration and has more people in it than the population of New York City. A 6-foot Clifford the Big Red Dog can be intimidating.
10. Finally, one parting thought from my wife: If you have the Baby Bargains book, make sure it is with you when you venture out. You don’t realize how vital it is until you are standing in front of 30 versions of car seats. We were fortunate enough to run into a friend of ours who had just completed her registry and she generously loaned us hers. Thank-you Nina!
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