Catching Up Post II

Looking over my old notes, it’s a shame I let this blog lay dormant for so long. I’ve come to realize that this is how I’m going to remember many of the details I don’t want to forget, so I can’t just skip all that time. But it seems strange and nonsensical to write present tense essays about things Jane did a year or more ago, when she was a very different little girl than she is today. And there’s no catching up, condensing each month into a week so that a couple months from now we’re in real time again, with her childhood development strangely telescoped.

I hope to go back to work soon, my 18 months of stay-at-home dadhood drawing to a close. A wonderful opportunity to be intimately involved in my daughter’s life is nearly over. It’s a shame, but the reality is that with so much going on, I’ve been too stressed, strained, depressed and pressed on all sides to sit down, contemplate, and write. My hope is that employment will bring back the preciousness of the moments I do get and I start writing about them again.

So for now, I’ll just continue with the listing.

1/21/10 Jane, on a play date at age 18 months held up a stuffed animal to another parent and said “pink puppy.” It was, indeed, a pink puppy. I think this was her first two-word phrase that wasn’t an obscenity (we’ve since begun monitoring our language more carefully for fear of being shunned by the other horrified parents in playgroup), she knows her colors, but what pleased me most is that she knows there is more than one way to refer to something—it’s pink and it’s a puppy.

I’d always worried that the animals in her stories that have names with pother meanings (a bunny named “carrots” for instance) might be confusing to her, but this showed that she has some understanding of descriptors. One word can refer to multiple things, multiple words can refer to one thing.

1/21/10 In her nap and bedtime tantrums, she throws everything she can out of her crib except bunny. So she has some self-control there. She knows once it’s gone she can’t get it back, her anger is not general or absolute (usually—sometimes bunny goes too).