Baby Memoirs – What About Me?

I may be a bit biased on the matter, but I think I have the best wife in the world.   Among the many (and there are many) reasons I believe this, perhaps the most amazing is how well she understands me.  She knows full well my various eccentricities and handles them all with grace and a certain “monk like” level of patience.  My pet name for her is actually “my sweet, sweet baby” and it couldn’t be more true.  Her pet name for me is that I am her “very complicated creature”.  I’m still wrapping my head around that one, but that’s not the point here.  The point is there is no mistaking she is a natural born caretaker, which of course is significant and great, as we have a baby on the way and it’s been rumored that I am somewhat obstinate and difficult to live with as well.  I am not sure I totally agree with that, but left to my own devices, it has been alleged that my bad habits do indeed run amuck.

It has been said I stay up all night working and/or reading and then am exhausted and grumpy the next day.  I guess that I forget to eat all the time, usually when when I am engrossed in some sort of project, and then all of a sudden get sick and nearly pass out.  I do not take my vitamins when I’m supposed to and purportedly I go weeks without taking out my contact lenses.  Then there are my ever changing moods, which I see no real point to elaborate on.    

I choose to think it is a simple matter of priorities.  I get more work done at night when all is quiet.  Forgetting to eat is not a big deal if the project is important and I have not passed out yet.  A few missed vitamins will not kill me and so long as I can still view the computer screen and see those around me, then taking a “timeout” to clean my contact lenses seems pointless.  The list goes on of course, but I think the point has been made well enough that some of my habits are not perfect, which again, I see no real reason to elaborate on.  After all, this is more about my wife Aubrye and her being pregnant than it is me.   

Among her many wonderful (but also annoying!) traits, Aubrye combats my brigade of so called bad habits with military like precision.   She has made it in all out war to limit aspects of my absurdity and to keep me healthy and happy at all costs.  It’s like a never ending game of Chess between us, and admittedly, she has incurred serious damage on a few of my more errant behaviors and has also kept at bay a few of my others. 

This is not to say I do not win a few of the battles as well.  I have all sorts of carefully planned counter schemes and tactics to defend this absurdity, but by far the biggest hole in her entire strategy is that she goes out of town for business quite frequently and also flies all over the country for her many social retreats.  This leaves me at home and alone for extended periods of time without any sort of authority figure, and I can pretty much undo in 48 hours most of the progress she’s made with me.  She is actually in New York on business right now and for protection purposes, I’m not going to say what time it is that I am writing this.  But again, this is not about me, so let’s go ahead and move on to the rest of the narrative.      

To keep me from passing out, she not only demands that I eat on a schedule, but she also prepares what I eat.  She harasses me about not sleeping and reminds me endlessly to come to bed at a reasonable hour.  She divides up and then leaves out on my bedside the precise amount of vitamins I am supposed to take each day.  She more or less makes me take my contacts out to rest my eyes and then will often clean them for me.  This is all in spite of my protests, which normally are “Not to worry honey; I am good, things are fine as is.  I’m a bit busy with work right now and I’ll make sure and handle tomorrow”.  Of course, she has figured out pretty quickly that this line of “handle tomorrow” means I am buying time to get her off my back until the subject comes up again.     

What is most irritating about all this is that she is fairly crafty in her approach and does not at all come off as the usual nagging wife.  If she did, I could easily get away with more, as I would simply start an argument to get things off topic and go my merry way without her even realizing it.  But I tell you, she is the proverbial Gandhi of wifehood with her passive resistance and endless persistence.  This makes me crazy, as you can’t argue with someone that won’t argue back, and this is especially true when you know that person is right.  Truthfully, I have no clue what I would do without her. 

In addition to her keeping me mostly in line, I absolutely cherish our various daily rituals.  Drinking coffee in bed and making wise cracks about the idiots on the morning news, watching our nightly crime dramas and kibitzing about who killed who and how the murderer could have covered his tracks better (until she falls asleep and I am able to sneak out to work on the computer again).  I also absolutely treasure our mini date nights.  It is the simple things like going to get frozen yogurt with loads of toppings and then spending ten minutes debating which yogurt concoction has the best flavor profile.  Mine are always better by the way.  There is perhaps not anything I enjoy more than going to the mall with her, as we both share a penchant for clothes and can pretty much always con ourselves into buying just one last outfit.  We’ll justify by saying things like “we won’t go out to dinner for the rest of the month” so as to combat the budget deficit incurred by our recent splurges at the mall.  There is an endless list of simple and ever so joyful routines with my wife that I have grown to love.         

In the big picture, it makes my heart sing that a woman this fantastic will be the mother of my future child.  I’ve heard that newborns require a lot of patience and responsibility.  Many of my close friends have recently become fathers.  Each and every one I speak with can attest to the amount of exertion involved with caring for a late stage pregnant wife and then a newborn, and all have this look of “god please help me” on their faces. 

Does that make me nervous?  Yes, a bit.  But I feel comforted knowing Aubrye’s patience, responsibility and caretaking traits are as fail-safe as they come.  After all, I’ve experienced firsthand the level of patience and amount of responsibility that having me as her husband must require.  

It was then that something really weird happened.  Like a voltage bolt in the nuts from a Tazor gun, it was this very realization that sent my head swirling and put me into full panic mode.  That is, how is she going to be able to handle our newborn and still  have time left over for me?   I mean, I am now at the risk of being second fiddle and not only that, but all of our wonderful daily little rituals will be compromised as well.   Despite my feeling blessed beyond comprehension that we have a child on the way, I kept having these despicable and shameful thoughts zooming around in my brain like runaway rail cars.   I kept thinking, what about me? 

I have to ask myself at this point, what sort of horrible and self involved person would actually be thinking thoughts of this nature with a beautiful gift of a baby on the way?  It is simply wrong.  It is not only wrong, but rather really wrong.  I couldn’t be this horrible of a person, could I? 

I mean, even before I came about this recent and very startling second fiddle realization, I had in earnest been trying to step up my game over the past two months.  Aubrye even said so.  I know full well that more and more is going to fall on me as the pregnancy progresses and I am really OK with that.  Never mind  the fact I have no clue how to run the dishwasher and wouldn’t know a clothes iron if it bit me in me in the ass.  In fact, just a few nights ago I actually needed her assistance to find the Pop Tarts in the pantry.  I tend to be a quick learner though, so hopefully locating the Pop Tarts will only be a temporary problem.     

The more I think about it, the more I realize it is not being second fiddle that worries me.  It’s really not that at all; and unfortunately I know it.  Way down deep, beyond my XY chromosome fueled excuses, what really worries me is that I will not be able to take care of my “sweet, sweet, baby” of a wife when she most needs it in the same remarkable and graceful way she has always taken care of me when I’ve most needed it.                       

Comments

["Grandma" (to be)]

I have to say Bill that reading this I laughed alot and then I cried alittle. Your words about Aubrye show how very much you love her and I know how very much she loves you. Trust me when I say that you will be able to take care of her as you always have. That's what love is all about.