Yucky Kiss

2 Chronicles

“Joash was seven years old when he became king, and he reigned in Jerusalem forty years. His mother's name was Zibiah; she was from Beersheba. Joash did what was right in the eyes of the Lord all the years of Jehoiada the priest.” -2 Chronicles 24:1-2

“Amaziah was twenty-five years old when he became king, and he reigned in Jerusalem twenty-nine years. His mother's name was Jehoaddin; she was from Jerusalem. He did what was right in the eyes of the Lord, but not wholeheartedly.” -2 Chronicles 25:1-2

“Uzziah was sixteen years old when he became king, and he reigned in Jerusalem fifty-two years. His mother's name was Jecoliah; she was from Jerusalem. He did what was right in the eyes of the Lord.” -2 Chronicles 26: 3-4

Quite often, being a mother feels mind-numbingly boring. It sounds awful to say, but there really are only so many times you can read the same book or push the same button on a toy before feeling your brain turn to mush. Sometimes I look at the clock and think, how am I going to make it through the next three hours until her nap? Usually this is worst at six A.M., which unfortunately is when her mood is the best but mine is the worst. Frequently I lie on the floor like a zombie making half-hearted attempts to hand her toys while she squeals and rolls around next to me.

I’m the only resident in my program who is the primary caregiver for a child. Sometimes I look at the people around me at work and think, they don’t really understand. They don’t understand how making it to lecture is not just a matter of pushing the snooze button, but of getting up hours earlier to nurse or having to pump an extra time and pack an extra bottle for daycare. How staying at home on a snow day off is just as exhausting as a regular day of work. How going to mandatory evening sessions is not possible because it coincides with her bedtime. How leaving on time is not just nice, but imperative, when D is on-call and no one else can pick her up from daycare.

And for the most part, I have nothing to show for all this, other than being able to accessorize at social events with a cute baby. I don’t have research posters, or deep rapport with my colleagues, or the ability to ever sleep in.

In my tracing of the word mother throughout the Bible, I paused at 2 Chronicles. In a book where genealogies generally only list fathers, it’s striking that the author is basically like: there’s this king who reigned this long. This was his mother, and where his mother was from. This is how the king was in the eyes of God.

These men were the legacies their mothers left on the earth. They did big things, good and bad things, and it was clear to God where their heart was. It was clear to God who their mothers were. Their mothers changed the world.

Every night, after she falls asleep nursing, I hold her a few moments before putting her in the crib and pray over her. May she be someone who loves you, God. May she do something really awesome for your kingdom. May she sleep peacefully. Amen.

It’s good to know all that matters. All of it, the prayers and the poops. To a God who cares more about my heart than my CV, who sees every small thing I do, it matters. And that is good to know.

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This post is part of an ongoing series I am writing along with the author of Souljourn Cafe

Journal Excerpt

For a while now she has been emitting keening high-pitched sounds, much like a whale in distress. She goes around keening much more than she tries to talk in syllables. I’ve been wondering where she picked that up from, as I don’t think I’ve ever made such a sound in my life. Her buddy in daycare maybe? (the closest baby in age to her is a light-haired smiley boy, who I think has a secret crush on her. He likes to gurgle at her while she looks back suspiciously. I caught them holding hands once lying next to each other on the playmat.)

Then I clued in. She always makes this sound when she sees one of the cats. Today when Chloe meowed, she keened, then Chloe meowed back, then she keened back. Great. She’s talking with the cats, and I guess she thinks I might speak it as well. When someone asks me what her first language is, that’s what I’ll say. Cat.

She is alarmingly flexible. She has discovered her toes and with them she scratches her forehead. She sucks on her toes and pulls off her socks. Sometimes I carry her against me folded in half, legs up to her face, which she apparently finds a perfectly natural position. I suppose she has spent more time folded in half than lying straight, considering she is still less than nine months old.

When she tries to sit up, she topples forward and folds in half again. I remember the stretches I had to do in gym class, painfully measuring how many inches past my feet I could reach, and I tell her, you’d cream that test easy. Not so sure about the pull-ups, but no problem with the stretches. Maybe you’ll be a dancer one day. Or an escape artist, or spelunker, or gymnast. The possibilities are endless.

Journal Excerpt

Her hair is growing longer in its soft, insinuous way, like ivy along a brick wall or lichen on a log. It’s starting to curl now on her neck. She looks like she’s growing a little mullet. I am looking forward to one day styling her hair. That was one of the reasons I wanted a girl.

Thank goodness she is anything but a picky eater. She rapidly swallows whatever we decide to shovel in her waiting open mouth. This is the time to feed her lots of nastily nutritious stuff, I’m thinking. Pureed broccoli, coming right up.

She still cracks me up when she poops. She gets quite intense and grunts while turning five shades of red. She poops about five times a day and all her poops smell like what she last ate. I don’t think I’ll be able to look at papayas quite the same way again.

The I's Have It