A Mother's Heart

I don't like this.

There is a new phenomenon of able-bodied blue-collar guys wandering aimlessly the streets of Portland.

One sits in a small car crammed with stuff, with eyes that do not want to be seen. It is not hard to guess what happened to him.

Another, at the bus stop, asks me if I have a quarter. I do actually not have a quarter. What I do have is a cranky child pulling at my chest, and two hands full of stuff. A chill wind is blowing. Rain is coming. I am exhausted.

Experienced panhandlers do not bother women in my predicament. I blow him off. And I feel terrible.

Today I hauled the baby around our neighborhood for a walk in the sunshine. Here, in one of the most desirable areas of one of the most robust housing markets in the country, there were too many For Sale signs.

I came home to find a realtor trying to gain entrance to our building. Our neighbor below us, who we thought had sold her condo, had the sale fall through. The bank foreclosed last night. Washington Mutual. So they are trying to figure out how to list the property, without having the keys, or any sense of what they now own.

I help the realtor, sort of.

I wish I was kinder to those in need. I have seen so many scams, and I didn't have a quarter. But I do have a heart, and I could've done something other than slamming it shut.

The baby opens my heart, and saves me from worrying too much about the economy. He is doing an incredible amount of growing, physically and mentally. The thirst for becoming is so obvious in him. When he was two months old, you could sense the hugeness of his desire to move across the floor. Now, at seven months, he yearns to stand, to climb, to explore. One person's "exploration" is another person's "getting into things." Outside of our names and opinions, the baby does what he does. And the world does what it does. Fortunes rise and fall because we experience them as fortunes.

From the baby's point of view, as long as he has his parents, he's happy. He really doesn't need much. Lately, something called "small-object fascination" ensures he will spend twenty minutes trying to pick up a cereal flake. Pop him in his new Bumbo chair, give him two flakes of cereal, and he's occupied for quite a while.

We will get through this. Humans have survived much worse; right now, in other places, people are meeting far greater difficulties. My wish would be for the open heart of the mother to depersonalize enough to encompass the world.

Even as a mother protects with her life
Her child, her only child,
So with a boundless heart
Should one cherish all living beings;
Radiating kindness over the entire world:
Spreading upwards to the skies,
And downwards to the depths;
Outwards and unbounded,
Freed from hatred and ill-will.....

Cutting Through the "Oh So Zen" Stuff

Seeing your nature is Zen. Unless you see your nature, it's not Zen

--Bodhidharma

I have started up a blog about living simply, and parenting a child with a minimum of Stuff and a maximum of Heart.

It is called Nothing Extra, and I invite you to look around, comment, and generally let me know what you think. Although inspired by Zen (inevitably, since it's written by a practitioner), it's not actually a "Zen" blog. Meaning it does not explicitly address life from the point of view of practice, as "Shugetsu" aims to.

So I was looking around the Internet the other day, searching for blogs about frugality and contemplating overlaps and distinctions between Frugality and Simplicity, when I came across a blog that seemed worthy of further exploration. Lots of information there about living the simple life, and saving money, and taking time to smell the flowers.

But then there was the title of this blog, ZenHabits.

Sigh.

I could spend my days and night whining about "Zen" cereal and "Zen" spa treatments and "Zen" couture and Ananda-Knows-What-Else. In fact there could be a whole blog there for Dharma curmudgeons: we submit truly egregious examples of "Zen" crapola and make fun of them amongst ourselves.

In common parlance, this is called "Discussing the Faults of Others." Something to be avoided. Recognizing this as an ethical matter provides a cue that this is a fraught topic.

What is the appropriate response, here in the crowded cacophony of the internet? Dismay? Or beyond that, recognition that humans have a deep-seated desire for simplicity, for meaning, for sacredness--and that the "Zen" label attempts to market to that impulse.

Desiring simplicity, we are sold more Stuff. How utterly--predictably, endearingly, dangerously--human.

And what is Zen, this thing we are all yearning to have?

I won't claim to know. If you go to the current Wikipedia entry:

Zen emphasizes dharma practice and experiential wisdom—particularly as realized in the form of meditation known as zazen—in the attainment of awakening. As such, it de-emphasizes both theoretical knowledge and the study of religious texts in favor of direct, experiential realization.

I suspect a few of the Zen priests I know would have something to say about this definition. Carpe Lector Wikipediam! You'd never know that Zen existed prior to DT Suzuki's rather iconoclastic take on the topic. Or that it has a rich textual history, within the context of an ancient and formal religious tradition.

The internet in general is full of vague circular discussions along the lines of, "Zen is beyond ideas, therefore how can you presume to discuss it?" This makes me sad. Which is not to say these people are wrong; they just don't know what they're talking about. Their spiritual energy is being directed away from practice and direct experience, and toward debate, or posturing.

But I digress from my original complaint. Assuming for a moment that the Wikipedia entry is an approximate starting point for the definition of Zen, is there anything about it that suggests a connection to the otherwise very nice ZenHabits blog, which is all about simplifying your life, getting organized, getting motivated, being a nice person, staying healthy, and so forth?

No. At least I don't see it. Maybe it's buried in "16 Tips to Triple Your Workout Effectiveness" It's certainly not to be found in the spirituality forum section, where someone asks, "Is anyone on this site into Zen?" To me, this sounds so plaintive; it is the voice of a searcher.

The answers are typically, "Not really. But the popular literature on the topic made Zen sound pretty much in accord with my preexisting beliefs about reality." Except for the few responses which are more along the lines of, "I am so Zen. That which you seek is causing you to seek. Be at peace. And check out my website, which also has a Zen name, and little to do with Zen."

Alas.

Sometimes at the beginning, reading is all we have. If you want to know more about Zen, please eschew vague new-age spiritual mishmash. See the poseurs for what they are. Read instead Joko Beck, Shunryu Suzuki, Taizan Maezumi, or (my secret favorites of late) Kyogen Carlson's lovely "Zen in the American Grain" and Robert Kennedy's "Zen Spirit, Christian Spirit."

And know that one's initial ideas about Zen, or any romanticized spiritual practice, are extremely useful because they provide material for disillusionment.

In order to actually practice , you should find a reputable teacher in an established lineage. This in contrast to self-appointed Zen teachers (the ones without a lineage of teachers going back in time), who are usually individuals who had a blaze of insight one day, realized it sounded like "Zen," and proceeded accordingly. They are not bad per se, but they are potentially very dangerous. Nobody sees their own weaknesses as a spiritual guide, least of all a self-styled spiritual teacher!

You don't want to entrust your deepest self to someone who's self-educated. And that someone includes yourself. Practice on one's own can be dangerous. You don't hear much about this, but I've personally known too many people who "meditated" their way to madness. All of us--certainly all of us drawn to spirituality--have within ourselves an tiny "self-appointed teacher." We tend to think that our profound early insights mean something about our spiritual greatness. And we may be spooked, or fascinated, by the hallucinations and odd physical sensations that are common in beginning meditators.

Look for a teacher who has through the years overcome any tendency to grandiosity, and whose students are people you would wish to be. Coming from a reputable lineage helps assure this; it's like a Good Housekeeping Seal of Approval for the most precious home there is.

But rather than continue to cast aspersions on the widespread co-option of the term "Zen," I will tell a story.

One morning over breakfast at Great Vow Monastery, Chozen Bays Roshi told the story of going to Japan and meeting the abbot of a prominent temple. Faced with this slight Western woman, he posed a question, "What is Zen?"

At that time, the answer that came to her was, "Zen is about having a calm mind and an open heart." You could argue that this is another way of saying "dharma practice and experiential wisdom." And you could argue that what she said at that moment was a minor matter compared to her own evident calm mind, and her own blazing heart.

Having told that story, here is what I know: In the living of our daily life, a clear and uncluttered space reflects and reinforces a calm mind. In the living of our daily life, certain activities deepen the spirit, salve the heart, and promote true peace. I am not above publishing lists of exercise tips; I am not even above reviewing products in Nothing Extra. But I want my heart to be in every post. I want to build a community with others who are making simplicity happen in their inner and outer lives.

Unlike "Shugetsu," Nothing Extra is not a blog about the Dharma in/as Life. The title is intended to be oblique, a signal to those in the know--if you get it, you get it. If you don't get it--well, you're probably also very content being hit over the head with considerably less-Zen blogs (and god-knows-what-else) bearing labels like ZenThis and ZenThat. I guess that's the wonder of the internet. We all find our way to the material that suits us. I don't know if we are challenged, or if our understanding progresses, but we do band together with like minds out there. What we discover together, or deny, or mindlessly reinforce in one another, is up to each of us.

Kalachakra-527x488
Originally uploaded by doctor_ian

☯

Movie Review: Once

I don't often talk about movies in this blog. I don't really pay attention to new releases these days (I have my own six-month-old "new release" to chase around the flat). So Once took me by surprise. I didn't watch the Academy Awards, and it's only now, still reeling from viewing Once on DVD, that I am finding out how much recognition this film actually received.

In case you, like me, have been living under a rock for the past year or so, I'd like to recommend this film, and say that it should have won an Oscar for Best Picture.

Once had little to recommend it as an instant personal hit. It's set in Ireland, true, but not in the romantic past. The characters are clinging to the underbelly of the Celtic Tiger, and their poverty is not of the picturesque shawl-and-donkey-cart variety. They are the people we brush past in the big city as we pretend look elsewhere: an Eastern European girl peddling flowers; and a scruffy street musician with a beat-up guitar. When these characters leave the busy street behind at the end of the day, they go home to spaces that exude authentic poverty: there is the clutter of near-worthless items, the narrow bed, decorations that are faded and cheap.

Beyond anything else, this movie is Real. The film is shot in a grainy, homespun style that deepens the sense that we are eavesdropping on another's life. There are no melodramatic camera tricks; you are simply somehow in the middle of these people's lives, drawn into the action by sheer human kinship. There is no heightened drama for the sake of drama. The most pivotal moments are, if anything, underplayed. They slide by, the way real life slides by. As the two main characters get to know each other, you feel party to their loneliness, their assumptions, their anticipation, to the simple poignancy of lives that are neither glamorous, nor romantic, nor easily-resolved.

And, improbability of improbabilities, this terrific movie is also a musical.

If you watched the Oscars, you know this already: Once won for Best Song. And rightly so. These are two musicians--the guy plays the guitar, and the flower-selling girl is an excellent piano player. With her on keyboards, and her help composing words to some of his tunes, the guy's music blossoms and starts to look like it might go somewhere. The songs are liberally scattered through the film, and--get this--they are never extraneous to the plot! When these people sit down to sing and play together, something happens, so that by the end of the song, things are not as they were before. Life has shifted; we know something new. Lyrics and melodies propel a developing relationship, or they illustrate the depth of an old heartbreak. In this story about musicians, music drives the story.

Today, the next day, I am still haunted. I want to know what became of my friends from the night before. I want to see them again. And I also don't want to. I have that funny aversion that comes when you face someone after too much revelation. I feel the way you feel around someone who has said too much; I feel that awkwardness that descends after an acquaintance confides something too large for a relationship to bear. This impression--that I have witnessed real lives, in all their gawky fragility--tells me that Once is truly a great film.

To Those Who are Gone

Murrays, c. 1931
Originally uploaded by Shugetsu

All these people are gone.

On one day in 1931 or so, they paused after a day of picking apples. Seventy-seven years later, what remains of them is memory, their shadow in the features of their children, and the fuzzy capture of this one moment.

The little girl in front is my Aunt Pat. I adored her when I met her sixty years later. Her children, my cousins, are dear to me. But on that day, she was a toddler with an apple.

In front of her sits my Great Aunt Ann. As an old lady, she answered all the letters I wrote her.

Behind her, Marguerite, of French Canadian stock, married one of her brothers. When I met her at Ann's house, they ribbed one another over their age difference; Marguerite is two years older than Ann, and always will be.

But they are all gone.

We are coming to the season of death, when summer gives way to fall. Everything seems to be spinning down, to some deeper place. Leaves circle to earth, to take up existence as loam. The financial markets are in disarray--where does the money go, when shares in a company lose their value?

On Tuesday, my mother in law was found dead in her house. Her life was too short, marked by hard work and little enjoyment. She had just retired. She was ill, but her death was a surprise.

And so we have been struggling with the big questions. Why do we die? Does life mean anything, beyond what we give it? Why are we here? Is there a reason for any of it?

There is no pat answer to these koans. You find the truth by living it.

What I feel now is a deeper engagement with the Dharma-unfolding-as-life, a kind of surrender, or faith. Faith that things find their own way, regardless of our ideas about them. Faith that this woman's life was what it was, as perfect and complete as a life can be. That we all fall, one day, like leaves to loam. That the days we have are precious; that they contain tiny unfurlings of life and death that mirror the Great Pattern.

And, this is sad. We have been sad. It is time to be sad, to look more closely at the life we are living, and the life we want to live. One day, we too, will be nothing but a photograph, and one day, not even that.

Love, Pain, Politics. The Usual.

Often I have forgotten the nobility of the First Noble Truth. Suffering catalyzes and cauterizes us. It does not always lead to a deepening of experience, but many a better human has looked back in rueful gratitude on her darkest hour. But that is abstraction.

Here is concretion: If there were no frustration or dissatisfaction, the baby would never learn to crawl. Lacking any desire for things to be different, he would not feel a colassal urge to get from one place to the next.

The milestones are piling up fast and furious around our little apartment. Every physical one-- the trunk lifted off the ground; the three-point pushup; all these mini-steps leading to crawling--every milestone is accompanied by great complaining, caterwauling, and carrying on.

It's painful, I am surprised to find. Painful to be with a child learning to crawl.

Painful also to be with a child who has sprouted eight teeth in three months. But now the infant fairies have given us Motrin, which is an anti-inflammatory, which Tylenol was not.

Knowing I could relieve some of the baby's suffering, and judging that I should not do so, because it would involve way-too-much drugs--that hurts most of all. Is my reasoning sound? Am I harming my child? Or is he already, from the moment of his birth, an exceptionally fortunate child?

I don't know. I'm not not accustomed to having someone's life so completely in my hands. One day it will become less complete--he will have more power over himself--and become commonplace.

---

Today we were walking through the chill air, baby riding on my front, and we stopped at an intersection. If not for my defensive pedestrian instincts, we would have been mowed down at the corner by a woman in a car bearing stickers that said, "SARAH/McCAIN" and "IT'S A CHILD NOT A CHOICE."

Not from these parts, obviously.

I don't think I can begin to accurately unfurl my political feelings here. And I don't want to. Suffice to say, I will be relieved when this election is over. I am under the impression that newsworthy events (other than the financial bailout) continue in the rest of the world. Today's Oregonian helpfully told me it would take over 65 years to count every one of the 700 billion dollars in the proposed bailout.

Better start counting, blessing upon blessing: I am alive. Baby is well. Found teething biscuits that delight and distract him. Have funds for food and teething biscuits. Took huge 3.5 hour nap today to compensate for a sleepless night. And so forth. 700 billion is perhaps a drop in the bucket, seen like that.

Belonging

Sometimes, when the baby falls asleep, a great tenderness overwhelms me. It's as if all the day's caterwauling and carrying-on collapses down into one truth: this is my little son, and his precious life is my main responsibility.

The baby feels something for me in return. I don't think you could call it love--it's something more primal. There is an element of need involved: the baby experiences a non-negotiable requirement for maternal attention, maternal sustenance, maternal babywearing. And there is an element of "Belonging."

It took years of practice, and years of falling in love-or-something-like-it for me to finally identify Belonging as a force. Beyond the interpersonal reward of being seen and understood, deeper than the sensory pleasures that accompany affection between humans, is a fundamental desire to Belong.

The strength of the urge to Belong is what keeps us in situations that have long since ceased to be rewarding. It's not an obvious mental construct; it goes beyond saying to yourself, "These are my people. Therefore I will stay here." It is a feeling that you are part of something that also includes other beings.

So beyond any notion of what it means to "be a family," there is the unavoidable fact of our Belonging. The baby does not do tenderness yet, or compassion, or anything generally recognized as "love." But he does Belong, with a passion and a wildness, as if his survival depended on it.

Which I suppose it does.

Wisdom Quote from the Buddha

Poison won't penetrate where there is no wound.

Dressing a New Mother

After nearly five months, my body is approaching its pre-pregnancy dimensions. I have never been able to tell how fat or thin I am. Failure to accurately assess body image is very common. People cannot judge their own overweight-ness, or that of their children--perhaps because children function as surrogate selves to their parents?

Anyway, the body is finding its own shape, and the way I know this is by trying on my old clothes. A month ago I was dismayed to find that none of the old skirts or pants fit, and since I was feeling otherwise fine and healthy, I despaired of ever reclaiming my old wardrobe or my old dimensions.

There are shirts that no longer fit, too. But that's not such a problem. The maternal chest is substantially larger than before, and its duties are not compatible with certain style and fabrics. You want shirts that open in the front, and fabrics that are patterned (the better to conceal leaking milk, spit-up milk, and any other schmutz). Most of sweaters and many of the shirts must go, and that's not painful. I'll miss the cashmere bargains, but my new size is not upsetting. Given my dimensions in the upstairs department, having a fat chest has never been an issue.

I have worried about having a fat butt, though. So squeezing the butt that I have into the pants I once wore brings a certain satisfaction. Looking good, wearing clothes that I know flatter my body, brings a certain thrill, a flavor of something half-remembered.

I say "half-remembered" because there is a disconnect. Trying on these old clothes, I realize how I've changed. The body really isn't the same, and it never will be. The abdominal tone is um, very different! The spread of the hip bones is wider.

The heartmind is different, too. I am someone I was not before. Digging these clothes out of storage and putting them on is like putting on a dream person's clothes. Once, a self who no longer exists wore this slinky red satin sheath, this flouncy little black thing, this sexy retro tunic. Once upon a time, a woman bought clothes she liked without a thought as to whether they were compatible with breastfeeding or baby-wearing. Once upon a time, when I had no idea that I would be a mother, no idea how my heart would be opened and warmed and expanded by the tremendous and very simple birth of this baby, I wore these clothes. I went to parties and visited with friends and took myself to movies and generally did as I pleased.

I no longer do as I please; I no longer need the clothes that suited my old lifestyle. There is no regret in this. I am on assignment in the trenches of motherhood, where functionality trumps style. A cashmere sweater (hand-wash, hang dry) is no longer going to work for me.

Fortunately the neighborhood thrift stores giveth, and the neighborhood thrift stores taketh conveniently away. There's some serious turnover in the offing, both for them and for my closet.

Everything Ends

Today, 8/8/08, it is exactly one year since I began married life. My baby son came into this world exactly 139 days ago.

When we celebrate anniversaries and calculate ages, we count all the hours and minutes since the beginnings of things. We celebrate the passage of time from a beginning point. On some level we know that the conditions to allow marriage, and babies, and our own lives, to come into being were brewing for a long while before their official beginnings, but we have to pin something down, and declare how things endure and unfurl through time.

What we don't know is our reverse age. We don't know many years we have left, how many months remain until the end of a life, how many weeks or days until death (or divorce) do finally part a married couple. Time remaining has been heavy on my heart lately.

A relative has been in and out of the hospital. How much time does she have? We don't know. Perhaps twenty years, perhaps twenty months. I pray they're happy ones. I imagine I will have the honor of outliving her and remembering her one day. But it really is imagined, an assumption. Who's to say she will go before I do?

Last night, the phone rang. I eavesdropped. "Does her husband know?....No, let's leave him alone for now. We can call him in the morning." What could it be? An affair? You don't expect people to die.

But it was a death. A good friend had fallen--too far--while climbing a Cascades peak. Two weeks ago, at dinner with group of friends, B had no idea he would never see her again. It was not a particularly tough climb; she was an extremely experienced climber. Of course we want to know just how it happened; did gear fail? was she overconfident? But it doesn't really matter. Without warning, this person's life ended unexpectedly. Unimaginably. But expectations and imagination count for nothing in the end.

There was nothing to do but get ready for bed, check our sleeping baby very carefully, and hold each other in the darkness.

I know we are still processing this terrible gift of death. We are forced to face the profoundly precious, incredibly mundane matter of our ongoing existence. We go along imagining we possess a certain mastery over things, but really the life we are immersed in is barely understood. Its end is even more completely unknown. Having no other recourse, we pretend trivial things are important to keep ourselves occupied in the interim.

I used to think that all distraction from the Ultimate Matter was evil. But there needs to be joy in life. More than ever, I am looking forward to seeing who the baby is when he wakes up from his nap; to watching the Olympic ceremonies tonight on a borrowed TV; to getting a facial sometime soon. To savoring the mundane mystery while I can.

fan

my internet browser dont work
my baby dont sleep
but the laundry is done
and a fan whirrs this hot day away

i cut the tie today
to work that pays well
for now

the baby yearns to crawl
looks across the room
lunges onto his face
can sit and use two hands to eat a scarf

he said "a-ma"
probably nothing
but my heart flipped

this is what you type with one hand
while an infant with hot skin
holds your other arm in place

Introducing The Parenting Bodhisattvas

There are those who argue we should always keep the Dharma in the forefront of our minds; others proclaim there is no Dharma, and no mind in which to keep it. But, regardless of what is meant by "mind" and "Dharma", there is the mundane experience of remembering and dwelling on the Truth, and of experiencing our life as a manifestation of that Truth.

A person under stress is liable to forget that the life they are living is nothing other than the unfolding Dharma. Fortunately I have a husband who will kindly remind me--at 2:30 a.m. when the baby refuses to sleep--"This is your advanced spiritual practice."

It's easy to say, and a little cheesy to say, but it's also true. This is a spiritual practice, a lesson in applied bodhisattva-hood. You are literally giving your life to another being. Their supper is your body; their pain racks your heart; to relieve their suffering you would do anything; to see them smile and laugh is a prayer fulfilled. As a parent, your heart is torn open, and you wouldn't have it any other way.

You are also aware of not being in control. This has a painful side: your child may scream all night, and you may never know why--but there is also a joyful side: you do what you can, and somehow because of you but more likely in spite of you, a human being self-assembles. An intellect coalesces; a body grows; new preferences and abilities come out of nowhere. A baby does not need to be taught to suck or laugh or hide its head shyly. There is no instruction in chewing on your own toes, falling asleep, or clamoring for solid food. These things happen on their own, when the time is right, regardless of parental effort or opinion.

You could invoke biology to explain the birth and development of babies; you could employ the tools of sociology and psychology to tell you what happens to make some babies grow up into wounded adults, while others endure great pain and are mostly fine. But the experience of being a parent, of witnessing a new human flowering into itself, is something beyond what science is equipped to explain. There is a spiritual element to it--something magical, profound, and deeply right. As a parent, as a human, as a former baby myself, I experience energies that correspond to the archetypes known in Buddhist thought as Bodhisattvas.

Kwan Yin (Jap. Kannon, San. Avalokitesvara)

Kwan Yin is the great parent, the parent you secretly hope to be--and the one you sometimes are, impossibly, with her help. Her kindness and sweetness are boundless. When you feel your heart expanding as if it would burst, she is in you. She embodies the great love that parents and children feel for one another. She brings babies to parents, and parents to babies. She fulfills the unfulfilled; she makes love whole.

To be a baby is to suffer. The screams of the suffering children of the world find a deep hearing with Kwan Yin; she understands and does not avert from their grief. The healing balm she carries soothes the most searing hurt. She is a being composed of pure compassion. When pain overwhelms us, she holds us. When joy overwhelms us, she holds us. Like the extraordinary parent she is, she desires nothing but our safety and happiness, and the fulfillment of our greatest destiny. When we this for our children, and live from that place, we are Kwan Yin.

Jizo (San. Ksitigarbha)

Jizo guides the spirits of new children into this world, and watches over babies who depart from this realm. Nobody really understands where our life comes from, and nobody really understands where we go when we die. In the elation and the tragedy of these transitions, Jizo stands guard with steadfast kindness.

For all the children who enter the world only to find that their parents cannot care for them properly, Jizo is a comforter. For all the babies who cry alone in their crib, Jizo is there. For all the babies who are ignored or mistreated as they earnestly try to accomplish their destiny as little humans, Jizo is there. In the bewilderment and terror of a child in war, of a child abused, of a small life snuffed out or subverted, Jizo offers silent solace. There is no situation so terrible that Jizo's brave heart does not shine.

This Moment of Peace Brought to You by Zantac

For the past two weeks, the baby has not slept well. I can count on one hand the number of times he's gone down for more than 2 hours at a stretch. Or I could try--I might be too fatigued to make it that high.

Trapped gas, burps and farts, seemed to be a major contributor to the wakefulness. I have learned in the past few months that it's nearly impossible to burp a sleeping person or a screaming person. Moments when the baby is awake and not distressed have been few. You can't burp him because he's too busy yelling about the trapped air in his tummy. It's a very unpleasant cycle of suffering.

This morning, whilst searching online for new and better ways to burp my son, I came across a post that equated trapped air, "colic", and reflux.

I thought he was over his reflux. But perhaps this latest round of arching the back, pulling off the nipple, screaming, non-burping, waking up the minute he was laid down, etc....perhaps this was reflux.

There was some unused baby Zantac in the medicine cabinet. I put it to use.

Twenty minutes later I had a sleeping baby, and an hour later I had a relaxed and peaceful baby.

We walked all the way up to the Japanese Garden. I renewed my membership and we went inside. It was members-only hours, and we had the garden and the gardeners all to ourselves.

The baby was transfixed. Everything needed to be looked at very carefully. The light on the water. The way the water runs between the stones The braided straw insets on the sheltered bench that is my favorite seat. He could have stayed there all day.

A very sweet gardener with a gentle German accent saw me with the baby carrier. "Oh, is it hiding?" she asked. The baby peeked at her while we chatted. Her job that morning was watering moss. Doesn't that sound pleasant? Almost as pleasant as sitting with my baby, just looking at a waterfall.



Later in the day, I found myself lying on my back, feeding the baby, and...we started joking around, I swear.

The little guy looked at me with a glint in his eye, made a giant lunge for the boob, and we both started laughing. I wrinkled my nose. We cracked up. He made a funny sound. We lost it again. This went on for a while until he got hungry enough.

It's good to laugh, especially after these past couple weeks. It's good to laugh with the most precious 4-month-old in the world and feel that you are communicating with this little person.

He's in bed for the night now, and I'm praying for some sleep.