My Daughter at 9.5 Months: A Prose Poem

My daughter is shaping up to be a cool little person.  She has a tough edge: bumps her head and keeps on going, bites like a piranha.  And she yells for attention.  Not cries, yells.  She has an angry baby that kicks in when you are not fast enough, not clever enough with the anticipation of needs, or simply, not enough.  In short, there is a lot of the stubborn people she comes from.  A lot of me.

I think she's also  clever.  She's incredibly curious about everything, especially what's dangerous.   She also loves anything with which we regularly engage: remote, phone, computer mouse.  Batterie'd things are probably not good chew toys, nor wires, I'd imagine, but with ninja speed, she finds these before you remember they were there to hide.

I am often tired, but in damn good shape.  I bounce, and bend and twist and climb.  It's pretty freaking fun, and the fact that there's that mutual benfit is pretty awesome.  I'd hardly ever find the energy to get this much exercise on my own.


Sometimes I wish I didn't believe in zero population growth.  I clearly make wonderful humans.  And, if I don't fuck this up, because the force is strong in this one, this could be a soldier on the side of the light.  I should make more and more of those.  It's only right....  if only.

 I make myself laugh sometimes, and I often talk to myself.   I sound like a raving person at times.  I will surely say things I don't mean, particularly when that little piranha in you is anything with a teen in the end, probably even sooner.  I hope you'll be able to deal with this.  In exchange, I offer family meals that sometimes get to be ice cream... or whatever else we have that you decide you want for a meal (one vegetable must also be eaten, and it can be anything: even a crap ton of Halloween candy).  To help you with your homework, and bring you to and attend whatever thing it is you need to do, and to be proud of you when you do well.  You will love to learn-- whatever it is you love to learn-- and will know that your job is to grow. For that, I will ask the right to be disappointed when you do the opposite, and to do what it takes to make you see the difference.  I only get to make so many soldiers.