My apartment is now one of those apartments. The baby apartment. I always swore it wouldn’t happen. But there is crap everywhere: a bassinet and a rocking chair in the living room, a springy jumper thing hanging from the door frame, blankets and puke-crusted washcloths on every surface, and something always underfoot, always a stuffed toy or a tiny knitted hat or a drooled-on plastic thing to trip on, curse about.
This is added to the regular clutter of a bohemian apartment without enough closets and no basement, the usual review-copy books falling from shelves, headphones and hard drives wrapped around chair legs, more obsolete computers on every ledge and table than any African village could use. Step into my place and the word harried will come to your mind.
I don’t actually know if it smells like sour milk, because I have lived with spit-up milk for so many months I couldn’t possibly notice it if it did. I am hoping my friends would tell me.
Went out to a fantastic concert of experimental music last night. Blissfully alone. Cool atmosphere in downtown gallery, cool people dressed head to toe in black, fantastic glowing racks of electronic equipment. I could have stayed drinking beer and chatting till midnight at least; I normally would. But the second it finished, at 11 p.m., I dashed out and raced home, burning with guilt. It felt like a terrible indulgence.
Sure enough, baby was screaming and mom frazzled. She handed him right over. I suppose it makes these brief moments of freedom even more intense.
Cute baby, though.
Image courtesy of Theob on Flickr.
