Walking Flower

It seems that Lily is grown up at only nine and a half months. She is weaning herself, she is walking, she dislikes having her face washed and she has little time for stillness. This morning I awoke to her happy chatter, the past few weeks sponsored predominantly by the letter D and once she's up she's ready to go. I, on the other hand, woke up feeling lousy - tired and nauseous and our quiet in bed nursing snuggle gave way to, what she considers, playful bites and frustration that I'm not more pliable. And that is how our conversation goes. "No biting Lily, that hurts Mama", "Ouch Lily! No. No biting." And then we get a bottle. And later, "Where's Mama?! Here's Mama", "See Mama wash wash wash?" "Brush brush brush?" "See Mama's here! See Mama in the shower?" "Mama's putting socks on" "Socks go on feet" "Give to Mama, Lily" and on and on. Mama talk. Lots of it.

And now, Lily is walking. Quite early I might add. I am proud of her development but we/I could have waited.. a bit. She still prefers crawling but she moves with lightening speed and yesterday morning I went into the kitchen and after two minutes noticed "the quiet". I ran in to check on her and my nomadic roamer had pushed open what I thought was a closed bedroom door and was sitting in the bathroom hanging out with a sock. Thank god the cleaning products were recently relocated. Do racing hearts burn calories? Might be an advantage of sorts... But in the past month Lily went from crawling to walking with only a few breaths in between. Her steps are staccato, Frankenstein steps - a bit stiff and they come in clusters of three or four (or more whenever I am not present to witness) and she is quite pleased with herself. She is easily amused and often merely a good dose of standing will do - rocking forward and back on her toes a few times provides plenty of entertainment. When she crawls she enjoys taking a break to clap and look behind to contemplate the distance she's covered,and this morning I had to hide her alligator walker as it was just too early to rouse the neighbors with it's thunderous clap, caused by jaws that open and close to the rhythm of Lily's quickstep. My headache didn't need it either. Feeling sick on top of all of this is a test. Thankfully I had my mother-in-law for the early shift so I chose lying in bed over a shower and headed for work wearily, closing the door on a screaming, tired-sweet-baby-face and wondering if my strength would ever return. Gradually it does, mere thoughts of Lily help to curb the way I feel and if I can ever catch up on some sleep perhaps I'll nip this bug before it fully blooms. But when I feel like this my mind spins, how will I take care of her?, what if she catches it - we don't even have separate bedrooms and share very close quarters and I'm not ready to part from her for even a night other than sleeping on the couch in the other room. It's a desperate feeling because someone more important needs to be taken care of. I can and will do it, but emotionally and physically it can take it's toll. But Lily is resilient, I can even go so far as to say that she's tough. She has her delicate, sweet, soft moments but she is a girl on the go - all smiles, new teeth poking through, drool floodgates open as she glides across the floors and climbs among the furniture. Wipe outs are fairly frequent but she remains relatively unscathed.

Alan loved what I thought to be one of my sadder childhood memories - the day we made Native American drums in pre-k and all of the girls had already appropriated the "feminine" Indian names on the walls for their decor before I had gotten to pick one out for myself. They got the good ones: "Little Fawn", "White Deer" "Soft Cloud" - I don't know what - but I ended up with "Red Feather". My mom loved it, Alan did too - but I was disappointed. Still played my drum but never forgot the prettier names I could have had. Luckily, or unluckily, more serious issues dominate my trying moments. And I had a laugh yesterday as Lily stepped forward into my arms - her own drum name came to mind. "Walking Flower". I think Lily (and her dad) would be just fine with that, assertive yet delicate, just as she is.