Fullness Two
The sequel
About a year ago, when this blog was young, I wrote a piece called Fullness. There was a writing conference called Less Online coming up, and I wouldn’t be making it. If you want to know the specific reasons, you can read that post, but the gestalt was a feeling of saturation, that I simply had too much else going on.
The post concluded like so:
And then there’s the biggest fact, the thing more exciting and terrifying than any conference. The thing that will make this post an Ozymandias statue, poking its head out of the sand. If all goes well (please let all go well) I’ll be a parent soon.
I wonder how full my life now will look to me, sleepless and besieged by diapers, then?
Well. Here I am. What’s the verdict?
The Hours
My life was fuller in a calendar sense a year ago; we travelled a lot for various reasons (work trips for either me or my wife, trips to see family), whereas now that we have the baby, people mostly come to us. Just before my wife got pregnant, she had a work trip in Duck, NC, and I tagged along just for fun. These days, that wouldn’t be possible!
On an hour to hour level, though, the conventional wisdom is true. There is much less free time, once you have a baby. For one, there are more chores; bottles need to be cleaned, the baby has her own laundry, etc. But also it’s just really nice and important to hang out with the baby, and somebody needs to be doing that more or less whenever she’s awake.
There’s also psychic overhead. For example, I am writing this post just before 11pm on Sunday night, to maintain my streak of writing one blog post per week. Normally, I look after the baby from 8pm-1am or so every night, but right now my wife’s out of town and her parents are here helping, so I look after the baby from 10pm-4am.1 Except today was really busy, and my mother in law offered to look after baby for one more hour so I could get the last of my chores done. So as I write, I’m glancing at the clock every few seconds, to make sure it’s not 11 yet. I’m aware this is a weird and boring example, but I think actually that illustrates the flavor of overhead really well; you’re constantly in a mode of inside baseball related to your specific baby care situation, and it takes cognitive effort to think about anything else.
Do I have no time for leisure? Well, hanging out with friends has to be scheduled. Hanging out with my wife, too, is often at the mercy of various parents-in-law or when one or both of us is off work for some reason. But really, it’s more that my leisure time has shifted. Baby sleeps most of the time when I have her during late nights, so I play a lot of video games in that window. On the other hand, outside of that window, I play video games less than I ever have, at least since I was… well, not too much older than her, I suppose.
It’s not challenging all the time, but it’s easy for the challenge level to spike. New demands can be really overwhelming. But the days bleeding together can have a pleasant quality, too. When my wife isn’t out of town, the fullness is often comfortable. There’s the old human desire to break free of too much routine, but for me, that desire is weaker than my appreciation for structure (today was my 77th day in a row taking a walk, thank you very much).
Anyway
If you’re wondering what your brain would be like on baby care sleep deprivation, read the original Fullness, then read this. But don’t feel bad for me! Baby can stand on her own as of recently, and as of today she can even clap while standing. I’m not sure anyone else has ever pulled that off before.
Also, the fullness admits carefully planned exceptions. I am making to Less Online this year, for example. I am going to talk to other bloggers, and stay in a tiny AirBnb with no kitchen, and boy, let me tell you:
I am going to sleep.
In theory. Sometimes I take her as early as 8 or 9, but also most of the nights my mother in law has bailed me out at, like, 2 or 3. I am very grateful.