Brave new world

Now that Bean is walking more steadily, I took him for his first walk around our SF neighborhood, Glen Park. On my own or with him in the stroller, we rush past the world, but holding his hand as he walked, I slowed down to his pace and the world opened up under his curious gaze.

He climbed his first hill – a San Francisco rite of passage. He tapped on store windows and the people inside waved back, smiling. He picked up dirt and leaves and I refrained from cringing at the thought of germs.

He also had his first close encounter with a dog, and seemed astonished at the soft and warm reality that had leaped off the pages of his Brown Bear book and onto the sidewalk to lick him. Watching him touch every pole, sign, and wall on the way, I smiled, thinking how alike dogs and children can be, swallowing the world whole with their tongue, nose, and hands.

I take him to Yerba Buena playground daily, where shallow waterways are meant for little hands and feet to play in next to birds bathing and drinking, and the recycled playground turf is soft under wobbly little legs. The first day we went, he stood staring down at the waterway while I tugged at his hand wanting to take him to the slide.

It struck me that my enthusiasm to share an experience with him was preventing him from having an experience of his own. So I stopped tugging to let him decide what he wanted to do. Bean is a cautious, deliberate baby. He takes his time in reaching milestones, warming up to people, and exploring new terrain. As an introvert myself, I understand him, but in a society that worships extroverts, I sometimes worry.

He was a little afraid of the water, so took his time contemplating the beckoning rivulet before gravely putting one hand in. Within minutes, he was gleefully splashing both hands and wanting to climb in fully clothed. He played for 15 or 20 minutes before toddling off to the sand table, which he approached with the same serious expression as before.

After a couple of minutes observing, he picked up a plastic sieve and began putting a few grains of sand in and watching them fall through. As time slowed down & expanded, details emerged. I could feel the warm sun on my head, the breeze tickling the trees in front of me, and the soft sound of sand clumps falling onto the metal table.

We sat for a long time. The sand table was a zen garden raked by baby hands into zigzags and circles of perfection, demanding that I slow down, be present, and pay attention.

Close enough to touch

My annual treatment was scheduled this morning for just a few short weeks from now. After the birth of my son last year, I no longer feel trepidation before the treatment, only an impatience to be past it and the side effects so I can go back to being his mother.

This time, however, I also feel sorrow because it marks the end of nursing my (almost) 15-month-old.

Nursing has been one of the greatest challenges & pleasures of my life. I started out as one of those starry-eyed pregnant women who plans to have a natural, drug-free birth, nurse till the baby self-weans or turns two (whichever comes first), and provide an organic & healthy environment pre- & post-birth.

The reality? I ended up having a C-section after 89 hours of labor, and initially nursing was a disaster that left me weeping and depressed. We’ve been able to fulfill the third goal about 80% of the time. During the other 20% – travel + relatives – we just do the best we can.

This taught me right away that parenting, like most important relationships, is about the best possible compromise. There’s a complex weighing of every decision: I’m not making enough milk for him, but don’t want to give him a bottle, but he is hungry, and as much as I hate to admit it, I need to rest = Bean nurses for half of his nourishment & receives a bottle the rest of the time. I can look at this as failure, or I can look at it as my being the healthiest mother possible for him.

Just as Bean & I found our nursing rhythm when he was 3 months old, I had my 2010 treatment, after which I pumped & dumped for three months till the meds exited my system and I could nurse again. When he was six months old, I tried to get him to latch, but he’d refuse and cry for the bottle. So I continued pumping milk for him for another six months, though I hated the process.

While we were in Kauai for his first birthday, he suddenly started nursing again, and has been doing so for almost 3 months now. Being able to put away the pump, and to feed and soothe him throughout the day & night, is one of the great joys of my life. I love the way his fat hands hold on, the way his eyes close, and how he murmurs “mmm, mmmm, MMMMM” to himself. I love the intimacy of us being joined together again.

Many of my friends chose not to or could not nurse, or are planning on weaning before the baby turns two. I understand that and believe that each mother must make decisions that are best for her & her family. But I find incredible happiness in nursing this child who once lived inside me, and now carries my heart everywhere his chubby legs can take him.

Nursing transforms my body into a source of nourishment and beauty far beyond fickle fashion. It may protect him (God willing) from the health issues that plague my extended family, and it provides both of us quiet time to physically and emotionally connect during days that are beginning to run into each other in his growing-up-too-quick.

Through having a child, I’ve come to a new understanding of God’s love for me, and my mother’s love for me. Their love has become tangible, corporeal through this boy’s flesh; my love is made tangible for Bean through my milk.

Letting go of nursing feels like the start of a lifetime of letting go as he grows up. I want him to thrive and be independent, and I also feel sadness at this inevitable growing up and away.

Cella is one of the few friends who understands what this means to me, how emotional this bond is. In a recent phone call, she said that when her doctor said she might have to take a 10-day course of antibiotics and stop nursing during that time, she felt a sense of loss and thought of me, of what it meant to give it up for so many months. As I always do when I feel deeply moved, I covered it up by minimizing my experience, instead of owning it, and, by doing so, also did not honor her love and empathy. (Sorry, C – I’m working on that!)

I could pump & dump again for three months, but I just don’t think I have it in me to do it again. Bean is a toddler now and most days I feel like I’m barely keeping up with him before crawling exhausted into bed at 10 pm. Adding something I found stressful and tiring when he was far more stationary doesn’t seem like a good fit for where we’re at right now.

But, I’m not ruling anything out. As I learned after his birth, being a mother means staying wide open to all possibilities. More and more I see that living in hope and reaching high for one’s child is balanced with accepting the (unlooked for, unexpected) gifts you are given instead.

Nursing for the sweet six months I was given has been an incredible gift – one that I will deeply miss.

After the festival

[Cross-posted at Religion Dispatches]

It’s 4:30 am and I can’t sleep. Outside our bedroom window, trucks begin to move in to prepare for the neighborhood festival. I get up and work on the anthology for hours in the rare silence before the baby & Basil awaken.

The festival begins. It’s one of those perfect San Francisco days, warm enough to enjoy the perpetual breeze. The band plays just beyond the walls of our roof deck, and soap bubbles float up close enough to pop from the crowded street below.

All afternoon, friends join us. Music and sunlight stream in to the kitchen through the open glass doors. We eat dark strawberries picked the day before, drink homemade lemonade, and dance on the deck to everything from the Beatles to Hank Williams. Our friends are second-generation American Muslims of South Asian, Arab, and African heritage, white converts, and beautiful toddlers of inter-racial marriages. Watching them interact, I am content, and hopeful for our future here.

After our friends leave, Basil and I push the stroller through the neighborhood. The festival is officially over but children are still dancing on a wooden floor as a crew dismantles the stage behind them, as women clear stalls of crafts and clothes.

Later that night, Basil and I are stunned and relieved at OBL’s death, watching Twitter swell and listening to President Obama’s address on the laptop.

The relief dissipates. I have no desire to set off fireworks, jump into a car and yell out the window while waving fists and flags. If I were in New York City, I would light a candle at the memorial and keep vigil. In San Francisco, I pray in a room lit only by a streetlamp, filled with sadness for those who have died in America, Pakistan, Iraq, Afghanistan, and elsewhere, and apprehension at the terrorism-related deaths to come. Our work as Americans and Muslims is far from done.

The next morning, all I want to do is read articles and listen to NPR, but Bean is grouchy, refusing food and wanting to be held. The more he grabs at my legs, the more irritated I become. Aggrieved, I take him to the other room to play. Within a few minutes, we go from grumpy to giggling. Right now, being aware of the world and its future is meaningful only if I can also be fully engaged with this tiny, wriggling, joyful boy.

There will be many articles searching the details for meaning in the coming days, and after awhile they will all begin to sound the same. What is important is this: He is dead, and in the court of the best of judges. We who live have choices to make.

Perhaps I will remember the neighborhood festival for the news at the end of the day. More likely, I will remember it for the women setting things right after the crowds dispersed, and the children dancing as men worked carefully on.