Sunday

The cool has arrived.  Low slung clouds and sprinkles of rain, thick tights and thicker soled shoes.  At church, the mothers have brought out the boots: brown and black, leather and suede, up to the ankle or calf or knee, buckles and zippers, heels and wedges.  Then leggings and long, soft sweaters or short wool skirts.  Some people mark the arrival of fall by the shift in leaf tint but I mark it by the appearance of the boot.

Sometimes I'm not sure it's worth it to go to church anymore.  Here is the play by play of today's service:

Your sister decided to choose a Busy Bag and sit through the service with us.

For the first ten minutes she kept poking me and pointing to the googly-eyes in the middle of a board book about Sam the Minnow.

Then she drew her purple-tighted knees up to her chin and spread her knees wide and balanced the heart shaped Etch-A-Sketch over her crotch.

Then she decided she wanted to go to the nursery.

I came back, sang half of one hymn, and then you started to fuss.

So I took you to the nursery, fed you, changed you, and made it back in time to hear something about Dorothy Day and something about the accumulation of Christian good deeds.

Then I laid you on my lap and you cooed and smiled and I couldn't pay attention to what was being said or sung because even your eyes get into the joy act, curving up and the corners and yes, I will just say it: SPARKLING.  Your eyes sparkle.

Then Daddy decided to get Thisbe for communion.  Rather early, in my opinion.

She could not keep her paws off of you.  She cradled your head in her hands, she whacked the plateau of your chest, she tried to maneuver your fingers around her wrist, she tried to press her lips over yours, and finally she bent her head over yours so aggressively that I heard the crack of someone's bone or teeth and then a piercing wail.  "NOT OK, THISBE" I whispered in my Darth Vader voice, swooping you up and carrying you out of church to contain the crying.

By the time I returned, you were happy but Thisbe was sitting on your father's lap, mournfully carving her name into the attendance book.  "What do you say?" said Daddy to Thisbe.  "I'm sorry," Thisbe whispered, her small voice breaking and tears filling the gullies of her eyes.

I felt guilty so I gave you to Daddy and sat Thisbe on my lap and we looked at a coloring book called "Heroes of the Bible" that featured pages with beared men interspersed with gummy looking birds and turtles.  The one cartoon woman was naked and her boobs were covered with a rainbow.  "I think that's Eva," said Thisbe.  "I think so," I said.

We made it up to communion (FINALLY) and your sister dutifully held out her hands for the bread and politely whispered "Amen."  When she got to the wheel of miniature wine goblets, however, she ignored the white grape juice in the center cups and took the red wine instead.  The woman holding the tray looked at me with a mildly horrified expression and said, "we'll see how far she gets with THAT." At which point your sister threw back the whole thing in a single gulp and did not make a face or seem to register in ANY WAY that this liquid was not standard fare in our household.  The woman holding the tray looked even more horrified.

We marched back to our row and Thisbe kept marching, declaring she was going back to the nursery without a backward glance.

Then you started to fuss again and by the time I'd gotten you successfully sucking your nuk the service was done.

It took us another ten minutes to process to the car, trailing coffee mugs and receiving blankets and pacifiers and Sunday school worksheets.  By the time I got there, Thisbe was tightrope walking the yellow parking lines.  We made it home without further catastrophe.

Sweet baby boy, I am falling more and more in love with you every day.  You love to sleep shrugged against my chest or your father's chest (or Martha's or Sam's or Ampa's...) and when you are fed and full of good sleep you unleash smiles and coos at any adult willing to peer over your round face and offer you their full attention.

And today's terrible truth is that I'm often not sure I'm cut out to be a very good parent of TWO children.  A few months ago your sister was the center of my world.  Now, I often wish that she could be kept in a large, sound-proof, glass box in our living room where I could casually observe her but she could not touch you and I could not hear her or feel the waves of energy that wash off of her, regular and emphatic as tides.  And of course she senses this and that makes me feel worse.

When Thisbe was born, I felt like I had to turn away from myself, or a version of myself, in order to learn to love her.  With you, I feel like I have to turn away from Thisbe, or my old relationship with Thisbe, in order to learn to love you. 

Which maybe is why Thisbe is doing shots of wine at church.  A moment during which I was secretly kind of proud to claim her as my own.