January 28, 2000
When I come home from work Abby runs in the opposite direction, crying, avoiding me like the plague. This is a new thing, and I try not to take it personally, since it only takes a few moments before she's crawling on my lap and telling me all about her day. Still, Amy and I are both stumped. Amy says she talks about me during the day-asks where I am, asks Mommy if she can talk to me on the phone-and she loves playing with me in the evenings. But for those first few moments after I walk through the door, she's upset and angry.
On our way into the doctor's office, Abby marvels at the water fountain. There are large boulders in it, horizontal lime-stains on each one showing where the waterline usually is, except now they've taken the water out, of course, for the winter. We step into the building, and at our invitation Abby runs to the elevator and presses the Up button. We all step in and, on our way up, we sing the Richard Scarry song about elevators. ("Oh, the elevator is a machine…")
The nurse puts the blood pressure cuff around Amy's arm, and Abby points and asks, like she always does, "What that lady doing?" Everyone, including the "lady," explains. When the doctor comes in and listens to the baby's heartbeat, Abby points at Amy's belly and asks, "That baby?" We all nod our heads.
Afterwards, we come back down the elevator, step outside past the fountain, and trudge across the street back to our car. Abby says, over and over-and will keep saying nostalgically all day, according to Amy-"That was bun. Go bye-bye, see doctor, that was bun!"
When we get back to the apartment I kiss her goodbye and she doesn't seem confused. "I've gotta go to work," I say. "Okay!" she says, and kisses me back.
I'm on the phone with Mom-she's wishing me a happy birthday, telling me about her cruise-and Abby is whining because Amy won't let her have more cake. "Abby," I say sternly, putting a hand over the mouthpiece, "let's stop it with the whining, okay?"
She squinches up her face, shouts, "Nooooo!"
"Do you want time-out?" I say.
She says, real sweetly, "Okay." She starts walking toward the stairs. "I need go time-out."
"Is there trouble over there?" Mom asks on the phone, amused.
"Sweetie," I say, "you don't have to go to time-out."
"I need go time-out."
"But you stopped whining. It's okay. You're a good girl."
"Can I talk to her?" Mom asks. "I need to talk to my girl."
"Do you wanna talk to Nana?" I ask Abby.
She nods her head, run over, takes the phone, puts it up to her ear. "Hi," she says, her voice now subdued, tender. "Uh-huh," she says, nodding her head. "I want more cake…. Uh-huh. I need go time-out…. Bye… I lub you, too." Then she hands the phone back to me.
"Are you there?" I ask Mom.
At first I think she doesn't hear me, because she doesn't answer right away. Eventually, though, she manages to say, "That just melts my heart."
Our TV's tint controls are suddenly out of whack. Blue is green, purple is blue, red is purple. The only way to adjust the colors on our TV is by using the remote control that came with it; problem is that that remote control no longer works, even with fresh batteries. (It's a nine-year old TV.) We're not sure what to do. For now, when we watch the TV we have to make the appropriate mental adjustments just to keep from freaking out: the sky isn't really an emerald green, President Clinton really isn't freezing to death, despite his purple lips. On "Teletubbies," Abby points out with a laugh that there are now two La-Las, since yellow stays more or less yellow, and orange is kind of yellow now too. Elmo looks like Barney's long-lost cousin. Confusion abounds.
Abby says, "I wrap you a present." She takes her Big Red Barn book off the coffee-table, goes into the kitchen, grabs a clean dish-towel from the stack of dish-towels under the sink, carefully covers the book with the towel, then comes back into the living room and hands it to me.
She holds her hands clasped in front of her, her eyes wild with anticipation as I slowly, slowly remove the towel from the book. "Oh, my gosh, the Big Red Barn! I love this book! Thanks, Abby!" She steps forward and receives a hug from me. Then she grabs the book from my hands, wraps the towel around it again, and gives it to Amy.
Abby plays quietly by herself while Amy and I eavesdrop on her from the couch. She's got several of the Little People on a dining room chair, and she's making up conversations for them. "Let go to a movie!" she has one of them say. "Okay, honey," another one says. "Oh, alright, honey!" still another one says. "I love going movie!" "Me, too, honey."
She makes sure Amy is included in our conversations. They spend all day together, and just because I'm home now doesn't mean she's going to forget about her mommy, who, at thirty-four weeks, is plumb out of gas by the end of the day.
"I love salad!" I'll declare. (Ah, to have a child, to be given the freedom again to shout out such inane but nevertheless satisfying declarations as these!)
"Me, too!" Abby will say. (It seems I have taught her this ungrammatical construction, and I'd correct her if it weren't so damn cute.) "You too, Mommy?"
"Yes, salad's great," Amy will say.
"Let go to the park!" Abby will say. (In Abby's world, every pleasant social exchange ends with an invitation to go to the park.)
"Okay, but we have to wait until spring, when it gets warm."
"Oh! Okay! Mommy come, too? You come too, Mommy?"
"I'll be there," Amy will say.
At dinner Amy says that she accidentally knocked Abby down earlier. "You ever do that?" she asks. "Just kind of turn around to move somewhere else and there she is under your feet, and you just kind of mow her down?"
"Sometimes. She moves unpredictably."
"Well, I knocked her down today and she wanted me to call you to tell you all about it. 'Tell Daddy on bone?' she said, pointing to the telephone."
But just as often she doesn't like Amy to tell me about their days together. Amy is in the middle of an endearing monologue about Abby helping her make a birthday cake for me when Abby points sternly at Amy and says, "No! Don't tell Daddy! Don't tell Daddy, Mommy!"
I wonder if she thinks that, merely because Amy is reporting it, it means she's in trouble. More likely, though, I believe it's related to Abby's budding self-consciousness, her growing realization that words are never quite accurate enough, her dawning fear that somewhere in all these details we are laughing at her, making her look foolish or childish.
Also, maybe she's jealous of the time she spends alone with her mommy.
She's playing with her Little People again. Like mobsters or Washington Post reporters, they have all gathered in a parking garage (in this case the garage is made out of yellow plastic and is two feet high) for their little confab. They are chattering away, nudged around by Abby's careful fingers.
Finally one of them decides to leave. "I have to go to work, bye-bye!" this one says. The others say bye-bye to him cheerfully. "I go to work, now, bye-bye!"
I put the key in the lock and turn it. I push on the door and come in. Abby runs into the kitchen, crying. I've got my coat on, my shoes have snow and slush all over them, my leather bag is slung over my shoulders, I'm carrying the day's mail in one hand, my empty coffee thermos in the other. I kick off my shoes, put down the bag, and yell out my greetings. Amy and I kiss and hug. Abby watches apprehensively from the kitchen. Whenever I look over at her she starts whining again, and runs away. One wonderful part of her day is about to begin, but first another wonderful part has to end.
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