Lost Days

I have literally not left the house for the last two days.  With the exception of my stepping out onto the front porch to check the mail, I have been housebound for 48 hours.  Oy vei.  And I've missed out on some really glorious weather.  As a result, I don't have a heck of a lot to talk about.  So here is a random sampling of my stir craziness:

Just as I did when I started teaching, I am finding myself thinking that there is an end point to my sleeplessness.  (After two weeks of teaching during my first year, I kept thinking that it had been fun and I would miss it when I got back to my real life, which would happen at any time.)  I have caught my thoughts leaping gaily to the idea that maybe tonight I could get a good solid 9 or 10 hours of sleep.  That sound you hear is the shattering of my brains illusions.

LO seems like an old soul in some ways.  I am certain that I am not the first person to think this about her child.  However, I cannot help but notice that LO has some old man expressions.  (And I do not think this simply because his pants come up to his armpits.  Although when he's wearing those pants, I keep expecting him to cry, "Get off my lawn!")  When his eyes screw up just as he's about to wail, I feel that more than hunger is bothering him.  He is expressing some existential angst over the difficulty of finding meaning in a world that is random and far too familiar to one who has seen it all.  Either that, or he has a wet diaper.

Ever since I found out I was pregnant, I have been awed by the fact that every single human being on the planet has been through this experience.  Adoption doesn't get you out of gestation.  In vitro and other technology do not change the basic facts of pregnancy.  It's amazing to me.  Since LO has been here, I've been overwhelmed by the thought that every single human being was at one time a tiny baby.  While pregnancy amazed me in the abstract about every human on earth, witnessing LO's babyhood amazes me in the specific.  My parents were that tiny.   Supermodels were once squalling infants.  The one that's really blowing my mind is this: George Will used to be a baby.  Do you suppose he was born wearing a bow tie?

I am a member of the FlyLady cult of cleanliness.  I have been for years.  (I'm not sure that anyone can tell the difference when walking into my house, but hey, I get daily emails!)  One of the things that FlyLady suggests is doing one load of laundry every day, so that you never have the overwhelming Mount Saint Sudsy to take care of on the weekend.  For years, I have wondered how anyone could possibly generate enough laundry to have an entire load to do per day.  Then, I met LO.  Boy is he leaky.  If his diaper isn't failing, his fuel gauge is proving faulty and causing an overflow.  Because I tend to only have a burp cloth handy when I don't really need it, I'm finding that I am the burp cloth.  Add to that my milk delivery issues, I'm changing my shirt approximately 23 times per day.  One load of laundry a day isn't proving to be enough.

Today, I have my 6 week post partum check up appointment, so I will have to leave the house.  Thank goodness!  I also drank a half cup of coffee, so hopefully the perpetual daily narcolepsy that has plagued me for the last two days (and is the main reason why I have been home-bound) will not be an issue.  Ah, the joys of caffeine.