Wednesday, December 16, 2009

See Also: Shape of the Universe

I called my mother's breasts Weeble Wobbles, I don't know why. Except that maybe when she bent down to get a shirt out of the bottom drawer they looked like something both weighted and empty all at the very same time. Now when I bend down I see those same breasts, breasts that have fallen despite the jingle daring differently.

There will be no image to go along with that paragraph.

I have a birth mark on my right thigh like a thumbprint. Over the years it has become dotted with freckles, a smattering is what I guess one is supposed to call something like that. Instead I call it my freckle farm, and each spring when I once again warm my legs in the sun I find that I have missed it, my birth mark.

I used to have beautiful feet.

But this is not about my body, believe it or not. My freckles or face or the faint scar on my stomach shaped like the continent of Africa. No, this is about me in mourning for Zoey's tummy. Her pot belly. Because suddenly it's gone, the round curve of her stomach now flat with time. She has grown, stretched out, and last night as Bryan and I watched her sleep we both whispered it: she's not a toddler anymore. Who knows the exact parameters of what happens when; more important are the long legs thrown from the covers like that, the vector of her tummy a different degree while the curvature of a straight line remains zero. Three and a half.

She is three and a half, three years and eight months if we are to get truly mathematical, equal to the inverse and extrinsic. She has one dark freckle on her back and no scars, eyelashes I imagine on a deer; one of her front teeth is very slightly crooked from when she was learning to walk and did not. The oldest she has ever been and the youngest that she'll ever be and yet I cannot help but try and flatten time. When next I see her tummy curve like that she will be a woman and pregnant maybe, her own baby inside, my grandbaby, the points sharply bent into a circle the only constant.
Neither here nor there, but this: for Christmas I asked my dad for this yellow Measure Me stick so we can keep track of Zoey's growth no matter where we live. I am pretty sure he got it for me seeing as how just the other week he mentioned something about a very large package being delivered to his house...

20 comments:

MFAMB said...

so bitter and sweet. enitrely relateable.

Kwana said...

Aww, it's so sad how the stretch on out. The losing of the baby belly and growing up.

AppleTree Staging said...

My daughter is 3 years and 9 months and yesterday she told me, "mom you are not the boss of my whole life!"

Touche, Anna, Touche.

Anonymous said...

Love this post. Thank you.

mosey (kim) said...

I mourned a little when the rubberband wrists on my daughter seemingly overnight faded away....
sigh.

Gini said...

Beautiful. I am longing for the day when I will have these feelings. Womb, cooperate!!

Sarah Ring said...

This is so sweet. I cannot imagine watching a little one grow up so fast.

Jules said...

Yeah, been there. Sigh.

Lovely post, Susannah.

Jen said...

Leah still has her toddler pot-belly, and it gets even bigger when she has to go #2. Is that weird?

Anonymous said...

Ahh. I know what you mean.
My 9 year old is just beginning to develop small breasts -- just a little swelling that is so very sweet and scary at the same time. I want to freeze frame her where she is, on the cusp, and keep her there, my budding little girl...

Zakary said...

Stab, stab, stab my heart.

And I want that Measure Stick. (But not for $120.) Tell your dad I need one too. :)

Richie Designs said...

so sweet.

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Adriene said...

Between 3 and 4 the toddler disappears...It is killing me too. My youngest will be 4 the day after Christmas...atleast she still has dimpled hands, (tear drops, oh lawd! it is good I am spayed.)

Simply Mel {Reverie} said...

Before my eyes, the crumb is becoming fastly independent. This week, she decided to stop breastfeeding. Just. like. that. Done. over. I always hoped she would do it on her own, and when she did, my heart broke. Almost 23months of not-like-any-other bond, and in the blink of an eye, finished. Now, I'm just left with Weeble Wobbles.

krista said...

i had the very same thought about the curve of finn's belly the other night in the tub. weird.
and i COVET THAT MEASURING STICK THING. OHMYGOODNESS.

Judy said...

Do you have ANY idea of how long I have waited for this.....this public admission of Kharma in Action? "Weebles Wobble...but they Don't Fall Down!" Oh, YES, the human ones most certainly DO fall down. They swell, they stretch, they deflate like old empty, used balloons. They more than sag, they just lay on your chest like fleshy pancakes criss-crossed with faint silver stretch marks. And even when you hoist those Girls up and try to whip them into shape, they just look like suet stuffed in a net bag waiting for the birds to feed. A push-up bra? PLEASE...looks like you're trying to serve up underbaked custards on a cafeteria food tray-where's the sneeze guard...please put those things away if you care about us at all!

How sharper than a serpent's tooth was my Precious all those years ago...sing-songing the Weebles Jingle as I lovingly bent over to kiss her and tuck her in for the night....she gazing down the front of my gown then (and I do NOT believe that you have forgotten this nightly-for-a while ritual. Ms. Sus) taking those sweet little hands and cupping my breasts, gently and with great fascination, bouncing them up and down while doing the Weebles song. Oh, yes, my Sweet, they DO fall down and, you know what...they may try with all their might after the first pregnancy to get back up to semi-perk position but, after the second one....oh, they just lie down and die. I told you all this way back then. I even told you that I was going to wait for the day when your Weebles Wobbled....and NOW they have! GOTCHA! But I wouldn't trade one second of you and Andy Boy for the perkiests boobs in the galaxy. BTW, when might the second pregnancy and final downfall of your mammaries happen? Soon? Please!
Your Most Loving,
Mom

Anonymous said...

i want a measure me stick for rio- where do i get one?

Anonymous said...

I see where you got your writing genes..from the Mama....
You think it's bad now? Ha!At 61, I look in the mirror..not for long, as I can only stand so much..and wonder, "who is that old woman?"...
My son is 42, and it all happened in the blink of an eye..savor every moment..even the bad ones..it is fleeting, this life, those children..

Maggie May said...

hey! i left a comment here and it is poof! my comment was about how perfect your description of those breasts is, the weighted yet empty...