There are so many unexpected surprises of parenthood. One aspect that I never truly understood until the RRBB came, well, out of me, was how much he feels a part of me. I know there’s a very real line that separates him from me–and entire person, in fact, his entire person, but sometimes I can’t really see where I stop and he begins. There was a funny line in a Laura Lippman novel I recently read about a single mum worrying about scarring her child for life by him accidentally and then sometimes on purpose seeing her in the bathroom. Goodness, I thought when I read that, RRBB’s probably already mortified because he’s in the bathroom with us all the time. When at home and he’s awake, I never eat a meal without a baby on my lap. He’s starting holding our finger with his tiny hand as we walk around as a habit. And as much as he likes to assert his independence, it usually ends up with a crash, a bash and a fall, and he’s in my arms again.
This weekend at the death-trap otherwise known as the cottage, the RRBB fell off of a deck onto a lower deck. It was the most scared I have ever been in my life. I was a step away. Just far enough that I wasn’t there in time to catch him, and just close enough that I was horrified to watch it happen. It wasn’t the first accident he’s had–like I keep saying, he’s an intrepid little fellow–and I’m sure it won’t be the last. But to see your child topple off something at least twice his height, well, the response is immediate, aching, and utterly emotional. There’s no thought. You scream. You run. You pick him up. You access whether or not he’s injured (he was fine; amazingly). And then you realize how much instinct is involved in everyday life. And then, the guilt descends, almost immediately. I’ve been replaying the fall in my end on a ceaseless loop for the last few days. The RRBB is his usual go-go-go self, he seems no worse for wear, and was actually scaling a playground two days after the fall like it was no biggie, with me, panting along behind him in fear of him tumbling again.
Therein lies the difference between parent and child. Okay, the many differences–he feels safe and secure, all the time and is utterly shocked when something happens when he’s not. I am constantly terrified for his safety and even when you are vigilant, which we are, accidents still occur. But that deep, deep feeling of “OMG OMG OMG!” when he fell was beyond emotions for me. I was all reaction, no thought, there was not a calm bone in my body. I know it’s not an easy age, for him either, he wants to go, to move, to jump, and just assumes the world, and his parents, will be there to catch him. I suppose, in a terrifically metaphorical way, his fall is simply preparing both of us for what’s to come–that I won’t always be there for him, that he’s an utterly separate person from me, as hard as that is for me to admit, and that he’ll soon be big enough to toddle through the world without my hands in his. I just wish all of the growing didn’t have to be so very painful.