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Ellis Paul

Feature

Babyville, VA

Babyville, VA

winston churchill

Feb 21, 2007
Crozet, VA

I AM WRITING FAST CAUSE THERE'S A NEWBORN DOWNSTAIRS WHO COULD AWAKEN AT ANY MINUTE AND DEMAND SOMETHING OF ME. A BOTTLE, A CUDDLE, OR THE DREADED DIAPER CHANGE. IT'S NOT THAT I DONT LIKE THE DIAPER CHANGE. TRUST ME, I CAN HANDLE THE MOSAIC MUSH OF COLORS, SMELLS, AND SOUNDS. IT'S JUST WHAT A DIAPER CHANGE DOES TO TIME, AND TO ME AND MY SENSE OF TIME, AND MY SENSE OF SELF IN TIME.

EINSTEIN SAID THAT IF YOU TRAVEL FAST ENOUGH, YOU CAN ACTUALLY BEND TIME MUCH LIKE A TIME MACHINE, AND THIS HAS BEEN PROVEN BY SCIENCE AND AIRPLANES WITH MICROSCOPICALLY TINY SHIFTS IN TIME.

THE PROBLEM WITH DIAPER CHANGES IS ANXIETY. tHE CHANGERS ANXIETY, USUALLY SOFI DOESN'T SUFFER FROM THE SAME PROBLEM BECAUSE THERE'S NO ANTICIPATION OF IT'S ARRIVAL, IT JUST COMES NATURALLY.

THE PROBLEM FOR ME IS THAT OCCASIONALLY SOFI DECIDES TO GO WHILST MID CHANGE. GEYSER LIKE. BOTH NUMBERS, 1 AND 2. THEY HAVE APPEARED BEFORE ME IN THIS MANNER, AND ON ONE OCCASION, I WORE A BROWN/PEASOUP GREEN STAIN ON WHAT WAS ONCE A PERFECTLY CONTENT BLUE COTTON SHIRT.

WHAT THIS CRISIS DOES TO TIME IS AS FOLLOWS--

TICK... TOCK... TICK...TOCK (WAITING HERE, DIAPER CHANGE IS COMING) TICK, TICK, TICK (HERE WE ARE MID-POO, ALL THE SIRENS ARE RINGING)

TICKTICKTICKTICKTICKTICKTICK, (WITH BABY I AM RUNNING TO THE CHANGING TABLE)

TICTICITICITICITICIT ( MOVING NOW AT THE SPEED OF LIGHT, A QUICK WET WIPE SQUEEGY STYLE SWEEPING OF THE PRIVATES, i PULL THE USED UP SOPPY DIAPER FROM HER BUM AND WIP A FRESH ONE MASTERFULLY BENEATH HER BEFORE A TRANSITIONAL EXPLOSION 0F WEE-WEE--POO-POO CAN HAVE ANY PROMISE TO OCCUR)

THEN THE LANDING: A QUICK CLEAN, CLEAN, CLIP, CLIP, SNAP SNAP, AND THE LITTLE TUGBOAT IS READY TO GO!.

i PRIDE MYSELF ON CALMNESS. MY LIFE IS CRAZY. BUT IN THIS ONE MINUTE, I BEND TIME. I ACCOMPLISH MORE IN 60 SECONDS THAN I DO ON WHOLE AFTERNOONS.

SHE IS GURGLING. I MUST GO.

written later--
Then there's this. When I have to walk Sofi Rose about the houseand put her in that comatose deep won't wake up for hours sleep, before laying her in the baby swing or wherever she is going down for the night. It is just slow monotony. And I can't rush this. I cant put her down too soon, or I have to do the loops all over again from the beginning. I learn how not to fight time here. I have nothing I need to do, I have no book, or guitar, or song. I block them out in the shadows and corners, or they affect my patience, and my timing, and my ability in numbing her to sleep.

Sofi is blue eyed and a brunette, and she looks vaguely like Winston Churchill, or WC Fields, Stan Hardy or some other middle-aged, overweight, slightly drunk man. She manges to be beautiful despite this. She is calmer than Ella was, a little buddha-like. Where as Ella seemed shocked to be out of the comfort of the womb, her first three months were like a person getting off a plane thinking it's Hawaii and immediately getting put through some kind of ritual survival challenge in Antartica, it seems like Sofi landed saying "This is exactly how I pictured it, though the people are taller in person"...

I walk around the house in a figure eight, the top loop is around my staircase, it's 35 steps around, step 26 is a squeeky floor board that echoes through the house and flutters her eyes awake every pass. I gently step here. The bottom loop is through the kitchen and pantry and is slightly shorter, 33 steps, with one bright hallway light where she tightly closes her eyes. I cradle her in a blanket in my arms and gently pat her bottom, watching her jowels softly shake with each tap. The adult version of this ia a $.25 cent vibrating bed at some cheap hotel on the Vegas strip. On each pass the seconds stretch, I keep my sanity by counting steps and loops and floor squeeks and singing "You are my sun shine" like some kind of whispered mad house mantra, and then I start thinking about how the song is really a depressing ode to death and loneliness. Itsy btsy spider, maybe. Ahhrg. I hate arachnids.

I need to find the baby whisperer in me.

Come on Sofi... SLEEP! You are getting sleeeeeeepy... sleepy... sleepy.

This can take either five minutes or over an hour.

and then she looks up at me with those damn Ghandi eyes, like "whats with the oppression, Daddy?"

"BE HERE NOW."

I figure it took Winston Churchill three vodka tonics before his eyes went to half mast, and his acerbic wit started wittling the egos in the room, until he owned the place.

Sofi needs 4 ounces of breast milk.

and three burps, over easy.

with love, see y'all in March--
Ellis