Burping the Baby on a Non-Skid Sock (And Praise God for Mickey Mouse!)

Author's note:  Skip the initial paragraph if you're the sort of person who is offended by the mere mention of human bodily functions.  Come to think of it, I'm not sure you should be reading my blog at all if you're that sensitive!

"Oh Dear Lord, help me!!"  That was the first thought that crossed my waking mind this morning, as I sprung from bed and made a headlong rush for the downhill ski run that passes for stairs in our small house.  I rounded the corner into the living room almost without touching the floor and dove into our tiny, cramped bathroom.  Yeah, it was one of those mornings, when the cumulative effect of too much unfamiliar food over the past two weeks had finally exacted its toll on my intestinal fortitude, sending me on a frenzied race for the loo.

The balance of the morning brought more of the same.  While Kristi wrestled a three year-old and a newborn simultaneously, I lay under a heap of blankets on the sofa, trying to recall any way in which I might have offended someone in a position to make a voodoo doll of my digestive tract.  Finally by mid-day, Montezuma's revenge took its leave of me and I began to hobble weakly about the house, making my best efforts to help dress myself and my aforementioned progeny for what lay ahead.

First, we walked across the street to my home church, to say goodbye to a dear sweet Christian lady who has blessed our lives for years now.  It was emotional for many reasons:  our grief at losing such a dear friend; our heartfelt sympathy for her family; and the fact that it was our first real public outing with our new baby.  Some of the people we met clearly knew that Cooper had Down Syndrome, probably by way of friends and neighbors and Facebook; others did not, and explanations had to be made about our extended hospital stay following his birth two weeks ago.  While meeting all these people, Kristi was carrying Baby Cooper while I escorted my beloved little buddy Sawyer.  I love the boy dearly--I really do, but if you have never had the pleasure of leading a three year-old through an event like a funeral visitation line, let me draw a comparison for you:  Imagine, if you will, that you are on a deep sea fishing excursion and have just hooked a very large and active marlin on a lightweight rod.  Now, imagine that said fish is slightly jealous of his new baby brother and expresses this emotion via a series of ear-splitting shrieks uttered at random intervals and in response to stimuli not immediately obvious to you.  Now, imagine that many people want to shake hands with your marlin while you're attempting to land it.  This is a fair comparison to today's experience at the funeral.

Now, I don't know about you, but when I'm stressed, I sweat!  Add to that the fact that the temperature had climbed to around eighty degrees outdoors and all the entrances to the church were flung wide open.  I was a perspiring, stressed-out wreck of a father, wrangling a child who saw every pew as an opportunity for climbing.  Repeatedly, other people spoke gentle and consoling words over me as I removed my glasses to wipe my eyes.  What they took for tears of grief or the emotion of retelling the story of our son's challenges, however, was actually the blinding sting of sweat pouring into my eyes.

At last, we had seen our friend's family, made the rounds of everyone in the community who wanted to see Cooper and hear our story firsthand and were ready to move on to the next event.  Back across the street at our house, I helped Kristi load the kids into the van, then dashed inside to divest myself of my black suit jacket, pants and dress shoes in favor of cooler and more casual dress appropriate for the baby shower we were about to attend for two of our dear friends in another town.

As we rode to our second stop, about an hour away, Kristi sat in the back of the van in order to keep an eye on both Sawyer and Cooper.  A short distance from home, Cooper awoke in need of feeding.  Ever prepared, my dear wife whipped out a bottle and began to feed him in his carseat.  This went well until he began to leak a bit, as newborns sometimes do.  Over the din of "Mickey Mouse Clubhouse" playing on the DVD for Sawyer, I heard her ask me if I happened to have a burp cloth at hand.  "No," I replied, "I don't see one."  "Well, check the console in the middle" she said.  Groping my way across the cluttered console of our van while trying to focus on the road, my hand brushed something that felt textile-ish.  "Found one!"  I said.  The object my right hand brought into view proved not to be a burp cloth, but a gray, rubber-soled nonskid sock my mother-in-law had brought home from her recent hospitalization for some tests.  "Oops, wait! False alarm!  It's just a sock your mom brought home from the hospital!"
"Well, pass it back here!"  "Are you kidding??  It's an old sock!!"  "It's all we have!"

Our second stop was the wedding shower, a time of celebrating with a couple who are among our dearest friends.  Having been cooped up in the van for a good while now, I took pity on our older son, against Kristi's sound advice.  Sawyer hit the church fellowship hall like a rabid weasel, careening from one person to another, greeting everyone and finding one thing after another on which to utilize his climbing skills.  Soon, I was darting through clusters of people conversing and excusing myself over my shoulder while diving after him.  Soon it was time to eat, a good excuse to return him to his stroller and offer him some dinner.  After eating and watching our friends open their gifts, we reloaded the van for the trip home.  Sawyer was tired and quickly joined his brother in dozing off, which gave me a opportunity to turn off the DVD player and have a rare conversation with my wife as we drove home...or so we thought.  We were talking about all the events of recent weeks, about our hopes and dreams and fears for Cooper's future with Down syndrome, how tired we both were and what was on the calendar for the coming week.

Suddenly, Sawyer twitched and opened his eyes--eagle eyes that instantly latched onto the DVD player and quickly realized Mickey Mouse was no longer singing that infernal "Hot Dog Song."  I was driving, so my only view was a quick glance in the rearview mirror, but judging by the sounds coming from the back seat, I can only surmise that by this point, my son's head had begun to spin around and flames may well have been coming from his nostrils.  "MICKEY MOUSE!!! MICKEY MOUSE!!! MICKEY MOUSE!!!!!!!" was the cry from the right middle seat, half frantic and half enraged:  "MICKEY MOUUUUUSE!!!!!!!!"  As I scrambled to operate the DVD player while simultaneously keeping our vehicle upright, the cacophony behind me seemed to swell even louder, as if he had backup screamers.  Kristi coached me from the back seat:  "Press the 'mode' button....now 'DVD'....now hit number two, twice!"

Finally, the machine whirred and clicked and Mickey rejoined us, still in the middle of that blasted song.  I have a love / hate relationship with the "Hot Dog Song" really--if I've heard it once, I've heard it at least a hundred thousand times; yet I catch myself humming it in the grocery store, even when I'm alone.  At my desk, I often snap to from a brief daydream, only to realize that the soundtrack I'm hearing is audible to everyone else, too, and it's THAT SONG....but praise God for Mickey Mouse!
If it were not for the calming effect of watching a familiar video, we might have long since followed through on every parent's threat to sell our child to a passing band of gypsies--if such a thing ever traveled through rural North Carolina, that is.

Would we like to be the family who always have a supply of freshly-pressed, lavender-scented towels at hand for our baby's convenience?  Sure we would!  And would we prefer that our child calmed himself by meditating on the rush of the wind and the sight of budding trees and frolicking birds in the roadside forest?  Naturally that would be great--heck, maybe we could get him hooked on memorizing poetry while we ride, The Rime of the Ancient Mariner, say, or maybe Evangeline?

The point is, life is what it is, and many days that's not what you'd envisioned.  Like every pair of new parents, before Sawyer's birth we envisioned having children who never fussed or pouted; never cried for ice cream or junk foods we don't normally let them have; and certainly they would wait quietly and patiently while we finished our adult conversations before politely raising their hands to interject something....but that isn't what we have.  Strangely, it doesn't seem to be what anyone else has, either!
And so, we accept that some days our children will be well-mannered and some days they'll fuss.  Sometimes there will be a pristine linen cloth, and some days you'll have to burp your newborn on a hospital sock...it's real life, so it happens.  Too often, we're guilty of living in constant pursuit of some fantasy of life, some imagination of what things could be or "should" be, and in doing so, we can easily miss just how good things are.  

Lord, teach us to number our days, that we would gain a heart of wisdom.  Help us to rejoice in the here and the now and the real and the authentic, not fritter our time away chasing a pot of perfectionistic gold beyond an unending rainbow.  We think it will be better, but often it won't.  We think it should be more, but often that isn't your plan.  Help us to celebrate Your gifts, Mighty God, and teach us thanksgiving so that every frenzied day of parenthood would become a precious memory.
Thank You, God, for our children...and Praise God for Mickey Mouse!