February 28 2010 is the date I first rolled into Santa Rosa. Newly purchased Saab 900 packed to its two-door-gills, new job to commence in three days, Lauren almost half way through her final semester of grad school at BSU, and yours truly couch surfing and investigating rooms to rent in the Bay Area. I have a hard time accepting that nearly two years have passed since then... as cleverly stated in a song by The Shins: the years have been short but the days are long.
The situation is more or less the same as it was two years ago. I am working full time, Lauren is parenting full time, and Emma is being a baby full time and a half. We are settling into a routine, as a family. Routines may or may not lead to general contentment and satisfaction (I'll keep you posted on that one). The day, today, has been very satisfying and I am content. Despite the fact the mom and dad didn't go to sleep until about 11 last night, Emma chose to wake us up around 6:45 a.m. (we get no respect, I tell ya). Although equipped with several dozen speak-able words and several hundred words she understands (if not thousands of words), her chosen method of communication, especially at such early hours, is a mix between squawking and barking. Lauren and I both hit full-stride of sleep quality around 5a.m.-8a.m... Emma's waking hour can be a bit taxing on us.
Here is where it gets wacky. You are sound, SOUND asleep. The house is that perfect ambient temperature for hibernation, you're buried under your favorite pile of textiles, you're full-stride into pleasant sorts of dreams (having survived the hallucinogenic anxiety-ridden dreams of fleeing boogeymen while running through what feels like molasses at midnight types of dreams)... BAM. You're awake. You're not happy about it. You step out of bed with an extra-audible thud on the floor, not wanting yet sort of wanting to let that little critter know that she's roused the beast from its slumber and let her fear what just what is going to fling the door open, back-lit in blinding hallway energy-efficient light and casting a malevolent penumbra over her entire body.... but instead you tread normally, maybe lightly down the hall. Between your cocoon of unequivocal comfort and her bedroom door the irritation has waned if not morphed into this overwhelming excitement and desire to see her.
You are no longer in control. You are incapable of any sort of ire-fueled door-flinging. You instead crack the door a few inches. Light is bent and funneled down from the hallway and through the door's slight opening into a rectangular block of brilliance that cuts across the pitch-black room and reveals whichever of the critter's features happen to land in the caliper of radiance. What ends up illuminated is what melts your heart: usually a bright-blue eye, a few curls of yellow-golden blonde hair, a partial pattern repeated on fleece pajamas (monkeys, flowers), and two or three baby teeth displayed by a mouth spreading impossibly wide into a smile. That's it, you are toast.
That is how it works, every morning. Then the day begins. We get up and stumble around the kitchen. I usually hold her in my arms while I make coffee, she pointing me to the next step in the process and insisting on smelling the steam as the coffee filters down through its cone. At some point she expresses the desire to get down from my arms and walks over to the door separating the kitchen from our bedroom; she will either open the door or, if it's shut, begin banging on the glass and yelling "Mama!". The timing here is interesting. She is either bored of me already, has finally figured out mom is missing, or notes that the coffee is made and prepped and ready for mom to consume. Coffee gives way to the news on TV, which Emma usually enjoys. News gives way to breakfast, to reading and playing... eventually we are all out of our pajamas and ready for departure.
I mentioned routines. Saturday's routine may as well be cast in tungsten, so seldom do we deviate. Which is a wonderful thing. We load into the car and head to the Santa Rosa farmer's market near the Fairgrounds. Rain or shine we hit the market, sometimes coming home with bags and bags of fruits and veggies, sometimes only a muffin or two. Lauren is on this huge Kale kick right now, which between the kale and cumin and even olives reinforces my theory that pregnancy somehow scrambled her brain and made her start tolerating even enjoying things she never would have touched previously. We do a big loop through the market, starting with our favorite farm-stand, heading over to the $1 bran muffins, allowing Emma to sniff the bouquets of flowers in the adjacent stand, waddling past the morning string band (and donating a buck or two depending on how much Emma decides to dance). The fish stand is located at the apex of the loop - Lauren hates it but I love it when Emma (per my goading and also holding her up to better reach) prods at the eyeballs and innumerable teeth of freshly-caught salmon, flounder, and trout. I usually grab a lower jaw and start puppeteer-ing in time with a little ditty so the fish sings to Emma. She squeals. I melt.
Eventually we make it back to the car. This morning, after the market, we jetted out to our favorite bakery in the area, Freestone's Wild Flour Bakery (http://www.wildflourbread.com/), where true to routine we each bought a large coffee and a loaf of their Superseed bread, then went outdoors to let Emma explore the garden. Thanks to the 2.75" of rainfall yesterday the garden was a sloppy mess, which in baby vocabulary sloppy mess means totally awesome. Equipped with hand-me-down yellow rubber rain boots and infinite energy she successfully stomped the water out of every puddle in Freestone. She hit all her typical must-sees at the garden: the wind chimes, the strawberry patch, the sawdust paths, the creepy Mayan-esque stone sculpture that she feeds rotten tomatoes and raspberries.
We took a few back roads on the way home, opting to drive North through Occidental and winding along Graton Road and Occidental Road heading East towards Santa Rosa. The sun was shining full-bore, punching up the contrast between crisp winter blue skies and partial cumulus cloud cover. Apple orchards, vineyards, emerald-green undergrowth... definition of bucolic beauty. We stopped to see some horses near Occidental; Emma cried when we finally had to drive away in interest of time. We are back at home now. The critter is down for a nap (and logging some good z's, thank goodness) and Lauren left to run some errands. Great chance for me to type up some thoughts and let you all know that life, for me, is effing wonderful overall and despite the trials and tribulations we're all going to be just fine.
