Playing defense

Last night


Scene: Erik and Carolyn have received a lovely bottle of Greek red wine as a gift. Long after Pete goes to bed, and when we think he has finally stopped the questions and demands and dropped off to sleep, we open the bottle and have a little of the wine with cheese and crackers. Then Pete, sounding worried, calls Erik up to his room.

Pete: Papa, I don't want a fire alarm in my room.
Erik: Oh, it's OK, Pete. Those are just there to keep us safe. We have them all over the house. Nowhere I've ever lived has had a fire, and I don't think we'll ever have one, but they help us stay safe, just in case.

In the interest of full disclosure, I suppose I should say that the house next to me burned down in Philly, I had to call 911 when I realized that flames were all I could see from my third-floor window, and the firefighters chopped through my ceiling and windows to put the fire out, and it was all very scary, but that wasn't technically a fire in my domicile. I chose my words carefully.

Pete: Papa, if we had a fire, would you run out of the house and the firefighters would come and help me?

Erik realizes that Pete is genuinely scared and that this is therefore a Big Parental Moment. He lies down next to Pete on the bed.


Erik: Pete, I don't think we'll ever have a fire here. But if we did, the very first thing I would do is come to get you and take you out with me. And that's what mama would do, too, OK?
Pete: OK. But firefighters help kids in fires, too.

Erik and Pete undertake a brief conversation detailing the complementary roles of parents and firefighters in keeping kids safe.

Erik: So all of us would work together to keep you safe, OK?

Erik is, frankly, feeling pretty good about himself.

Pete: Papa, I smell beer. Were you drinking beer?

In retrospect, this is what I would like to have said: "No, that's wine, Pete. Remember Will and Giota? Giota's father makes wonderful wine in Greece, and Mama and I just opened it up to taste it. Isn't that cool?"


What I actually said:

Erik: No!

True! Technically true!

Pete: That's what beer smells like.

In a further gesture of defensiveness, I hereby attest that I drink maybe a beer a week in a fast month. And a glass of wine here and there. Carolyn drinks even less. This is NOT a kid who should have a highly developed sense of alcohol smells.

Anyway, I try the old change of subject.

Erik: I was eating cheese. Do you smell cheese?
Pete: No.


[beat]

Pete: Was it beer cheese?

Sweartogod. WAS IT BEER CHEESE.

Erik: No, just cheese. It's time to settle down again and sleep, OK?
Pete: OK. Papa?
Erik: Yes?
Pete: Would you tell Mama to get me first if there's a fire?
Erik: Absolutely, Pete. Have a good sleep.
Pete: Good night, Papa.

Homecoming

We're home! We came here last evening after dinner. Pete, as expected, screamed up a storm as we took him out to the car for the first time. He tends to cry enthusiastically every time room-temperature air hits his skin (meaning every diaper change, basically), so we knew that would happen when he first met winter. But the movement of the car calmed him down right away, from full-throated protest to mellowness in about ten blocks.

The cats freaked out a little when we came home. Pretty soon, however, Giddy decided that his love of the comforter on the bed trumped his anxiety about the new visitor, and he settled down there while Pete was nursing. Kirby stayed skittish for longer, but he ended up settling nicely, sleeping at the end of the bed with all of us most of the night. We've tried to encourage Kirby to enjoy the fact that he's no longer the smallest member of the family; he outweighs Pete by about four pounds. At one point, we did have all five of us sharing the bed at once.

And Pete has been great. He wanted to be fed a lot during the day and evening yesterday, and the payoff came when he slept really well the first night, including a lovely stretch from four to eight a.m. curled up on my chest. So the transition home is thus far a success, and we now commence the first day home, as well as the first full day without nurses and grandparents to help on demand.

Other baby notes:

* He now goes by Sweet Potato, or occasionally Pete Potato, in addition to Peter, Petey, Petester, Pip, Pipster, Piparoon, etc. We have discovered that baby nicknames multiply rapidly when Pete cries and we are trying to think of things to say to him.

* His yawns and sneezes are especially cute. Sneezing is not a sign of sickness for a newborn, so we can enjoy the funny look of it without worry. He occasionally yawns and sneezes simultaneously. Hottt.

* We had heard from other parents that their bodies somehow adjusted immediately to sensing the position of their baby when sleeping so there was no danger of rolling onto or otherwise harming the baby. This is amazingly true. When Pete was three hours old, watching him from six feet away caused unbearable anxiety--aah! he's moving! what do we do! aah! he's not moving! what do we do!--but putting him on my lap in the stupid hospital daddy recliner felt completely secure.