I.& I: ON BEING A FIRST-TIME GRAN – a journal, a memoir, and assorted rants
This week, for the first time, Esther included shoes in I.’s bag of necessaries – not little slipovers, but proper shoes with rubber soles and velcro fastenings. Now he’s discovered movement he’s on his feet at every opportunity, pulling himself up on any available item of the right height – knees, chairs, the washing-machine door. So, shoes. They look minute to me, but Esther assures me they’re huge, size 4, which is apparently unbelievably enormous for a person only eleven months old. I. is forecast to end up extremely tall – when he was born they predicted somewhere between 6’6” and 6’8”, now thankfully revised down to a mere 6’3” – and as with puppies, this is evidently reflected in his shoe size. He has great big hands, too, compared to other babies’ dainty little paws. Perhaps he’ll be a concert pianist, specialising in Rachmaninov.
Predictably, now that he can move his first instinct is to investigate what’s most unsuitable – for instance making a beeline for the toilet after I changed his nappy, and trying to pull himself up on that. You can see it’s interesting, the way it swallows stuff with all that gurgling water. I put the lid down firmly and coaxed him out of the bathroom, at which he made straight for the nearest bookshelf and tried to taste some expensive art books …
After lunch, we went to explore the local playground. It was full of terminally bored mothers standing around and making lacklustre conversation while their tots climbed or slid or swung (there was also one father, who spent the entire time on the phone). I knew how they felt. I used to dread the playground when Esther was small, and would make long detours to avoid the mere sight of a swing. Once a week, however, even the playground is bearable. I. swung for ten minutes or so, and then we moved off to a comfortable log on which I sat while he pottered around on the grass tasting dead leaves and sticks. He’s only recently discovered grass, and isn’t at all keen on it. Though a hearty eater, he won’t touch green vegetables unless they’re heavily disguised (as in sauce for pasta), and Esther thinks he thinks grass is a vegetable, which I suppose it is, and therefore, when first faced with it, wanted nothing to do with it. But now that he realises eating it is purely optional he’s becoming reconciled, which is fortunate, grass being pretty much unavoidable once you leave the house. Leaves and sticks, being brown, obviously don’t count. Soon, snails. ‘I really like snails, just not the yucky part,’ as small Esther once said.
Esther got back early from work, and we chatted for an hour, so that I didn’t arrive home until seven. And this time I wasn’t really tired at all. Or rather, I was tired, but normally tired, as after a hard day’s work, rather than exhausted to the point of being literally unable to move. Either I’m getting into the rhythm of it, or I.’s getting easier; or perhaps, more likely, we’re simply getting to know each other better. And as everyone knows, it’s easier to relax with friends.
Originally written Monday, 14 October 2013