I could also have called this post 'thoughts parents have when talking to their non-parent friends'. And just a heads up: they're the kind of thoughts that may be expressed as delight at the vicarious titillation we get to enjoy through your exploits, yet deep inside they're really a boiling pot of envy. After all, when you're a parent, especially one to a new baby as I am, even a night that involves nothing more addictive than popcorn seems hopelessly glamorous.
This point was driven home to me when I was recently visited by a dear friend from the UK, whom I shall call Helga because it is close to her real name while being unattractive and inelegant. Because she is the exact opposite of these two qualities, it gives me great pleasure to think of her thus.
Now, I am already jealous of Helga because she lives in London and I have a weird thing about the UK. I know it's one of the most advanced societies in the world but I still picture residents in home-cabled cardies serving each other tea biscuits over melamine tables as they did in the war, an image I find quaintly endearing. Also, Helga's career is such that, while I have, in the name of work, been forced to phone gynaecologists and say "Hi there! I am writing an article on whether you should steam your vagina!" (and have to keep a stiff upper lip in the face of the inevitable giggling that ensues), Helga travels the world, interviewing presidents and staying in ice hotels.
My latest bout of jealousy was sparked by the fact that Helga is newly on the single scene and enjoying a good bout of debaucherous fun. I could not help but draw analogies between our lives:
1. Helga spent the night with an Austrian aristocrat, hopping from one techno club to the other, until the sun comes up. Now, I must state unequivocally that I would hate to listen to a minute of techno, let alone a whole night of it. But it's the idea of being awake at 4am for purposes other than breastfeeding that is undeniably alluring. Just think: she was out! Actually out the house! Wearing something that doesn't unzip or unbutton at the top. And if she did have to get her boobs out quickly, it sure as hell wasn't for someone who would later vomit on her.
Now, often people require some sort of stimulant to keep going for a night on the town. Again, I can't really identify. That said, there is a lot of snorting going on in my house - not of cocaine, but of the nose Frida. For those not in the know, the nose Frida is a tube you use to suck out your infant's snot. Yes, I actually said that. It's a hideous notion but since poor old Jessica has a loud honking snore you'd expect more from a hirsute truckdriver than a sweet four-month-old, de-snotting her is a necessary process. It's also (gloves off) one I have come to enjoy in the same shameful way one likes squeezing pimples - a challenge of the grotesque over the functional.
3. Helga smells of perfume. I, on the other hand, smell of spit. That's because Jessie is the moistest baby I know, coating my arms in little gloves of spit when I carry her, as I often do, on her tummy like a leopard. My skin is getting sensitive from her digestive enzymes breaking it down. I used to get furious with the dogs when I saw the little puddles dotting our floors, then I realised it was all due to Drooly Julie, as we call her.
Yup - it's glamour, glamour, glamour all the way in my house.
This point was driven home to me when I was recently visited by a dear friend from the UK, whom I shall call Helga because it is close to her real name while being unattractive and inelegant. Because she is the exact opposite of these two qualities, it gives me great pleasure to think of her thus.
Now, I am already jealous of Helga because she lives in London and I have a weird thing about the UK. I know it's one of the most advanced societies in the world but I still picture residents in home-cabled cardies serving each other tea biscuits over melamine tables as they did in the war, an image I find quaintly endearing. Also, Helga's career is such that, while I have, in the name of work, been forced to phone gynaecologists and say "Hi there! I am writing an article on whether you should steam your vagina!" (and have to keep a stiff upper lip in the face of the inevitable giggling that ensues), Helga travels the world, interviewing presidents and staying in ice hotels.
My latest bout of jealousy was sparked by the fact that Helga is newly on the single scene and enjoying a good bout of debaucherous fun. I could not help but draw analogies between our lives:
1. Helga spent the night with an Austrian aristocrat, hopping from one techno club to the other, until the sun comes up. Now, I must state unequivocally that I would hate to listen to a minute of techno, let alone a whole night of it. But it's the idea of being awake at 4am for purposes other than breastfeeding that is undeniably alluring. Just think: she was out! Actually out the house! Wearing something that doesn't unzip or unbutton at the top. And if she did have to get her boobs out quickly, it sure as hell wasn't for someone who would later vomit on her.
Now, often people require some sort of stimulant to keep going for a night on the town. Again, I can't really identify. That said, there is a lot of snorting going on in my house - not of cocaine, but of the nose Frida. For those not in the know, the nose Frida is a tube you use to suck out your infant's snot. Yes, I actually said that. It's a hideous notion but since poor old Jessica has a loud honking snore you'd expect more from a hirsute truckdriver than a sweet four-month-old, de-snotting her is a necessary process. It's also (gloves off) one I have come to enjoy in the same shameful way one likes squeezing pimples - a challenge of the grotesque over the functional.
3. Helga smells of perfume. I, on the other hand, smell of spit. That's because Jessie is the moistest baby I know, coating my arms in little gloves of spit when I carry her, as I often do, on her tummy like a leopard. My skin is getting sensitive from her digestive enzymes breaking it down. I used to get furious with the dogs when I saw the little puddles dotting our floors, then I realised it was all due to Drooly Julie, as we call her.
Yup - it's glamour, glamour, glamour all the way in my house.
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