My Lady of the Lantern

Figlia spoke her first phrase couple of days back. It was two words short of a full sentence. Everyone (my parents are visiting us) was astounded. She has not really repeated the whole thing again, but she is crazy with her vocab now. She has stopped resisting her sandals. She has understood that sandals = going out. And well nowadays, our index finger permanently points outward. She still fiddles with the sandal straps, but she no longer pulls them in round one.  We are still not convinced about brushin' the teeth though.  Her eating is better, her mood is not. She is very irritable lately. Anything and everything sets her off. Teething is definitely one of the culprits, plus she had another round of immunization on last Saturday.   Figlia climbs stairs like a champion, but she is not good at getting down the stairs. Specifically, she mimics the  posture and stance of an adult. You know, just me on my two feet, no holding the railing, just one foot af...

I finally put up a picture of Figlia in the house. (yes, there wasn't any of hers till now, even though I have more than a thousand of her). I realized Figlia calls other girls something equivalent to older sister . I showed her the pic, and that is what she called the human in the pic.  "No, it's you. >>insert real name<<" Figlia muttered - >>real name<< Oh ma precious! So, it's all fun and games, and that is one activity we do every day, sometimes multiple times in a day. Point to the pic and ask who the human is. Till it struck me to take her to her sister's pic. I know that Figlia tends to point girls as older sister . She was truly facing her older sister. Nopes, not a thing came from her mouth. She wasn't quite interested by the pic either too.  (We like things we can hold and twist and turn in our hands, lick them or possibly throw them on the floor. If none of that happens, we do not lik...

Every day, it becomes clearer as to what a wise decision it was to not pursue baby making. While we were on the same page for long,  post-Figlia we seem to have evolved in the hierarchy of needs.  - - -  I sorted through few cartons to prepare a lot to send to an expectant mother yesterday. Till Thursday, I had planned to make two lots.  That changed when one of the receivers lost her baby at 6 months gestation. I am still not aware of the details. Now one lot sits ready for transit.  I do not deal well with death, especially when children are involved.  - - -  I could not believe the size of the clothes that Figlia was in, in her first year. There is this romper that was in 0-3 mos size, and I remember dear daughter being too thin in it, and she gradually fitted only at 4 months. Such a long journey, and it is just a year ago.  The other top that I am not giving away is the one in which Figlia came from the NICU t...

So, if I haven't ever mentioned this before, Figlia is quite the handful. We are fidgety to the core. What occupies us, does so for a matter of few seconds only. Buttons are pushed, things are switched on and off, and the refrigerator is growing protective armour in defence.  She wants to be held but not for long, she won't let undressing be easy on her mother's poor bones, and dressing is quite the chase too. She enjoys dressing only if I am waving my head and letting my short hair fly left to right (you are imagining this one right) and back. I would have thought that so funny, but it's me we are talking about. After being sapped to the core by the joy of working in the modern workplace, I go back home with a kid who has no idea of what boss means, what deadlines are and well why mummy has anything else in her life at all. She has to be kept busy. Figlia does not watch TV. But she loves to fly the buttons on the remote.  Figlia does not do books either. S...

Kiddo turned 15 months old yesterday. She celebrated that by bringing her sandals to me, and whining till I understood she wanted me to make her wear them. They came out soon after they were fixed, but it was the first time she has wanted to wear them without coercion. My easy-on-feeding girl has gone cranky on it. She is no longer interested in the food she originally had minus a cry. Consequently, she does not have much of anything, and so I have to try lot more variety which she nibbles in bits, and then says no to.  I told my Mum on Wednesday that Figlia was down to just one bottle during the night. I should have held my tongue longer, because for the last two nights we are back to two bottles.  She is doing well in the speaking bit. She copies words and speaks them, even if she may not repeat them, and she may not understand some of them.  She is fascinated by a backhoe that is currently employed at a construction site right in front of our building....

Torture. Ah Facebook - that intense medium that lets you 'visit' people you won't actually visit in the next two decades. I hopped on to a profile from the friend list of a girl I know from childhood. She is supposed to be a long distance relative, and while growing up we were in the same city, so we met on occasion.  She has two children. She looks great. Her kids look grown up. And her daughter has the same name as CBub. The name bit I had discovered a year back or so, I just hopped on to see if there were any new bits,. She is not on my friend list, but her pics are open to public.  Beautiful children. Two beautiful children. The kind of children whose arrival was perfectly planned and perfectly delivered. And two too.   I should not go to those profiles. I do. And self-inflict a lot of uncomfortable thought cycle. - - - A girl in the neighbourhood, not yet an adolescent has the same name as CBub. (I can promise that CBub's name is not that c...

It really began in my mind, with my October-November 2008 IVF/ICSI cycle.  All I had to show for that cycle was a lonely ultrasound pic of three embryos trouped into my uterus, hoping that they would root in the lining.  All I had was that one pic which hung around in my purse for a long while. Till it faded, and died. That image of the pipette shaped uterus with three light blobs is fresh in my mind, and in no want of a physical reference.  I brought three crows to mark them embryos.  I was overly confident that my IVF would work. It did not.  I spiralled into depression. But I had to be the skeleton that hangs to the pothole's lid.  I came out.  When I became pregnant with Lol.a, and on my own for that matter, I was overly confident that this would work, and I will have a baby of my own. She died.  Oh, there was all hell around it.  I went back to the chalk-board for I had no more to do but to do...

Figlia is spirited and naughty and stubborn. And fully mobile. Mummy goes away to another room only because she is playing hide and seek, and she wants to be found. Mummy pulls her hair at every opportunity of dressing and undressing the kid, because salons are expensive. Mummy wakes up and stays awake in wee hours because mummy does not want to lose the practice of preceding year. - - -  I saw a pizza delivery boy resting against a tree, his two-wheeler parked away from the edge of the road. You know the guy who gets flak for being late everywhere?  Yesterday, I went to pick up a package at a courier office. And detoured to a local eatery. The darkest chocolate pastry please. And then a cupcake. Yes, please.  I wanted a chocolate fix. I wanted a time away from thinking of things to do at home, the next morning, the office. I was the pizza guy yesterday. - - - I really do not belong to a family of crazy people. But I have been really t...

We wrapped up a trip out of town this Saturday.  Figlia survived it in mixed-bag way, and my fate is tied to hers. Our train trip to the destination was fun for the first 20 minutes. After that, my daughter wanted to chart the whole vehicle, say hello to strangers, and take the long-distance call of nature. My companions had to be told to please help with the diaper change, because well, I am not as capable as I look.  Her sleeping was off normal, and my daughter slept through half the birthday party, and cake-cutting. However, the night sleeping was fantastic. She slept 11 pm - 7 am straight. She was so excited that you  couldn't drag her to the bed and keep her there. On the last night, my daughter put her cheek on the resting birthday girl's cheek, and kissed her nose. So beautiful.  The train trip back was dreadful.  - - - M K Gandhi said that an eye for an eye makes the whole world blind. I used to take that sentence literally, and ...