The below picture, is one of my all time favorites!
Reason 1: My eyes are not even open. I am too tired to bother.
Reason 2: My face is dementedly serene.
Reason 3: The Munch’s expression… It has this “I am going to get you” quality. Not “I’m gonna get you” in a fun, flirty way. More like “No, I am seriously going to get you. And when I do you will be sorry.”
Reason 4: The way the picture says “Hey, it is just me and my baby in a cemetery. So?”
What do you think is better… wanting something of having something? Is it better to want that person, that piece of chocolate cake, that Ipad, or actually possess it? Isn’t there something exhilarating about the desire? The limitless potential of what life would be like if you had it. In a way, the fantasy can be so much more fulfilling that the reality, because that feeling of anticipation is so much more exciting.
I see this every day with The Munch. I will dangle something in front of her face; it could be anything really… a toy, a diaper, doesn’t matter. I will hold it just beyond her reach, and she will go ballistic with enthusiasm. Her little body almost shaking under the weight of her eagerness. “Oh boy! I can’t wait to hold that toothbrush!”
And then I give it to her. She examines the bristles, puts the plastic end in her mouth, holds it in front of her face, but something is missing. The joy. The emotionality. It is like she is saying to herself “Huh. This isn’t as great as I thought it was going to be.” But if I were to take it away… she tenses up, pumps her fists like she is in Jersey, and the fervor starts all over again.
Maybe that is because our imaginations are more infinite than the binding of reality. That what we dream will always be more satisfying because there is nothing but our minds to taint the desire. Maybe there will always be something slightly disappointing in knowing what something is like rather than yearning for it.
“Oh boy is that a wallet?! I want that wallet so bad I can taste it!”
“Oh… right… it is just a wallet.”
Do you remember watching the “Price is Right,” and how in the beginning of the show the contestants would bid on something for a chance to compete for the big prize? The winner was whoever guessed closest to the actual price without going over. Sometimes someone would say “$600,” and you could see the pride on their face until the next person said “$601.” Yeah, maybe that “$601” person would win, but didn’t you want to punch them in the face for being such a one-upper?
Something about being a parent brings up the one-upmanship in even the most refined of people. And it is not just about how great their baby is, but also how much more difficult their experience of parenting is. If things are good for you, its better for them, or if you are having a tumultuous time, their torment is exponentially greater.
Sometimes I find myself in conversations that go a little like this….
Me: “Man, I am so tired today… the Munch was up a bunch last night because she had gas.”
Other Parent: “Yeah… my eyes are bleeding because I haven’t slept for 7 weeks. My baby had so many farts in his large intestines that he transformed into a Japanese Blowfish, and has been piercing my flesh with his quills causing massive internal damage from the poison.”
Or
Me: “The Munch started clapping her hands to the music the other day! It was so adorable…”
Other Parent: “Yeah, my daughter was doing that in utero. Now she is playing now she is playing Hadyn’s concerto in C major for the cello. I think when she starts standing on her own I will introduce her to the violin as well… you know, so her brain doesn’t go idle.”
Munch: “Wait a minute… how does this thing work? Something is not right.”
Munch: “Riiiiight. Now I get it!”
Me to Other Parent: “Do you see how advanced The Munch is?”
How much of our every day lives do we take for granted? Do you ever stop to feel the texture of your keyboard when you type? Or find yourself putting your mouth on the grocery store cart handle to get a sense of what that might be like? When was the last time you picked something up, turned it over, banged on the bottom of it, turned it back over again, dropped it, picked it up, banged on it and screamed? Probably not recently enough.
Watching The Munch is like watching someone on acid. Whoops… What I meant to say was, observing The Munch discover the world is a chance for me to stop and see just how magical this place called planet earth is.
Granted, if I thought a place mat was as fascinating as The Munch, I would never get anything done, but I do think there is something to be said about seeing the world through the eyes of a baby. I find that most of the time, I am so lost in my own head, I don’t really notice the world around me. Or, I am so used to world the way it is, I don’t take the time to remember how complex everything really is. When you think about it, how amazing is a spoon!? What a crazy invention that shovels food into your mouth, sparkles when clean, and you can see your reflection in it.
Just look around your room and imagining seeing everything for the first time, not particularity concerned with function, but more the form. A computer with all its lights and buttons, the smooth tactile nature of a table, the fabric of a throw pillow… and those are just man made. Imagine the intricacy of nature and going outside! No wonder The Munch tried to eat a dead ladybug. If I didn’t know better it would have looked both crispy and delicious!
I am not saying that we can expect ourselves to have the endless fascination of a being who literally is experiencing the world for the first time, but I do think that there are moments where it is meaningful to connect to the wonder of it all. Sober moments mind you… sober moments.
(Yes Munch… the Ipad is amazing!)
If you are an adult with no teeth it is quite creepy, but it is a good look for a baby. Come to think of it, having no teeth is just one of the countless things babies can get away while still looking cute, and grown-ups can’t. Like open-mouth sleeping…
Fine, maybe there is a selfish part of me that feared The Munch growing teeth. One being my terror that breastfeeding would be like feeding a piranha, and my total dread that the teething process would transform her into a demon. Of course I did not want her to feel the pain of a tooth shooting out of her gums, but I didn’t want to feel the pain of her misery. I had heard horror stories from other friends of just how dramatic the teething process could be.
“Oh yeah… my son had explosive diarrhea when he started teething.”
Or
“My baby girl cried every hour she was awake and nothing would console her.”
I was half expecting someone to tell me their child shot laser beams out of their eyes and turned into a dragon as I pushed on her gums in an effort to deter any fiendish tooth from emerging. I couldn’t understand why nature would be so cruel to new parents. Haven’t we gone through enough? It is not like I was going to be giving her Saber Tooth Tiger-meat to gnaw on anytime soon. We could stick to smooshed veggies and breastmilk, at least until she was old enough to lock her self in her room and suffer alone while listening to The Cure.
I lived life in a state of perpetual panic waiting for this dismal moment to occur. Every bad mood I would say “Oh… this is it… she must be teething. It is happening!!” Then she would fart, let out a sigh, and feel better. I must have been anticipating this moment for months when one day my mom was playing with The Munch (who had been in an amazing mood all week) and said rather nonchalantly…
“She’s got a tooth.”
“What!?” I stuck my finger in her mouth and she enough there was a little jagged baby tooth nestled in her bottom gums, mocking me.
Do you ever wander about the evolution of humans? Are we still evolving? And what does that mean? Will there be physical changes, like growing an extra set of thumbs for power texting? Or mental advancements like being able to read minds, or communicate with computers through our cerebral cortex? Will the evolution be instantaneous, like whoops… one day all babies will be born with a blue tooth implant?
Well, according the thinkers like Doreen Virtue (and with a name like that, how can we doubt her) the Crystal Children are the new generation of evolved human beings. Crystal Children supposedly have a universal consciousness rather than an individual sense of self. They have a crystal-colored aura, a theoretical field of radiation around the body and are the physical manifestation of pure love. They are next level humans that are born from the Indigo Children, who are a little less evolved then the crystals, and have an Indigo colored aura.
Now, I don’t know about you, but I am definitely an Indigo Child. I look great in blue. And that Munch has got to be a Crystal Child, because when I was preggers I said to my belly “you better be a Crystal Child or I am sending you back to the baby factory.”
Before having a baby, I would often feel an intense despair about the helplessness I felt about the state of the planet. I would spend hours watching documentaries that convinced me that the world was coming to an end either from an asteroid, food contamination on a massive scale, or the New World Order’s evil plot. But then I heard of these magical Crystal Children and decided to believe in them. Much like unicorns, or the tooth fairy, I just felt a great comfort trusting they were out there.
If you take a moment to really consider it, maybe this isn’t so crazy after all. Lets take for instance the oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico. Can man ever undue the damage? Even though we don’t hear about, the Juan Valdez spill, it is still destroying the environment. Is it seriously possible that we humans can clean up the mess that we have made? But maybe these Crystal Children with their magical ways will be able to meditate healing energy into the planet, purifying all the damage? Maybe they will come together with their advanced state of conscionsness and envision the world back into a state of health? Or, maybe The Munch will resent the hell out of me when I try and get her to practice her Crystal Child meditation skills on cleaning up the kitchen for me?
Toni Nagy is a writer that writes real good and comedian that talks funny. She also is a filmmaker that films stuff.
© 2022 Toni Bologna | I’m close-minded about people that aren’t open-minded.
