April 17, 2007 | about me, parenthood
What a day.
So I need to get my car serviced and because of the warranty I need to get it serviced at the place I bought it from. On the phone they assure me they can get it done in one hour while I wait. I insist that this is important because I’ll have a four-month old infant with me, and I’ll have to keep him entertained and fed and clean while I wait. They say, “No problem.”
I get to the dealership (it’s about a 25-minute drive from my house). “It’ll be two hours,” they say. I try to argue that they promised, but it’s out of their hands apparently as the mechanic doesn’t work in-house.
This is my fault. I should have known never to believe a used car dealer.
So I pack up Fecklet and walk into Wokingham, which is 15 minutes’ stroll away. It’s a fine, sunny, breezy day and on the way Fecklet discovers how to pull off his sun hat and stuff it into his mouth. Everything is good.
I decide to go for lunch, find a likely-looking cafe, and go in and select a salad and a smoothie. I ask if it’s all dairy-free (Fecklet is looking like he has allergies so I’m experimenting with avoiding dairy), it is, so I sit down and tuck in.
Two bites in I see a black thing in my salad. It looks like a beetle. It is a beetle. A dead one, attached to the leaf with a bit of dairy-free dressing. At this point I’m wishing for a cheese and butter sandwich dipped in whipped cream.
I ask for another salad and while I wait, Fecklet starts to wail. Now, the only available seat in the cafe was the one beside the plate-glass window, with other people sitting outside directly opposite, and another restaurant with outdoor seating across the pathway. Not exactly a private spot for breastfeeding.
At this point in my life I’ve shown my breasts to just about everyone in the known universe (including many, many motorists the length of the M6 on my trip to Cumbria, and the entire B&Q car park on my birthday). Nevertheless I try to breastfeed discreetly, draping a muslin over the top of my tit and using the Fecklet to cover the rest of it. This works very well, except for when he squirms off (which he does often), showing my nipple to all and sundry.
I deliberately do not look around to see who is watching. At one point I hear someone behind me commenting, “He likes it squidgy and warm”, but after listening further I ascertain that she’s talking about her own son’s cheese panini and not observing my son’s appetite.
My bug-free salad arrives and I try to eat it with one hand, spilling tuna and capers on my jeans, though this doesn’t bother me. Tuna and capers are by far the least disgusting stains on my clothes lately. Only this morning I have looked down at my t-shirt and detected poop, drool, spit-up and milk…and those were just the secretions I could see. (I changed after this. Needn’t have bothered.)
Fecklet squirms and I let him sit up to burp, still eating tuna salad with my other hand. And then it happens.
You see, I’ve been so foolish as to leave the house when Fecklet has not yet pooped. Usually he does his business at least twice in the morning…and it’s 1.30 and he’s been, thus far, poopless.
You can guess what happens next.
But not what happens after that. Not the van. Nobody could guess the van.
To be continued…
Rebecca James says:
he he he.
think of all the good writing material you are getting out of this; all these new emotions you have never (been so unfortunate) to have felt before!
Julie says:
Hmm. While I can probably make displaying breasts romantic, I’m not so sure about the bug in salad or poop explosion incidents.
Biddy says:
Although I thought about Nate today, I don’t think I thought about him at 1.30pm… therefore I am not to blame for this incident!!
mary beth says:
oh no!!!!!
Hugs.
I’m only laughing a little.
Rebecca James says:
no – homicidal feelings are probably hard to make look romantic.
Anna Louise Lucia says:
No!!! You can’t leave us there…. gggggg
Jessica Raymond says:
Oh, poor Julie… Though I am, of course, hooked into finding out what happened next with the van.
Jess x
Julie Day says:
Ugh. What a horrible thing to have in your food. Hope you got the new salad free after the insect incident.
Oh the joys of motherhood, you are saying. That is the time that infants tend to play up – when you’re in a public place. But you love him, nevertheless.
Look forward to hearing about the van…..
Michelle Styles says:
Well at least you made it back safe and sound and I atoo am looking forward to hearing about the van.
And there is no set pattern to baby’s poops. I trust in your ability to cope. And there are time when you wonder why anyone consider a baby wipe adequate for the job intended, or even an entire packet of such things.
Motherhood is a messy grubby job. You really do end up in the poop.
Lynne says:
Oh no! That sounds like a delayed Friday the 13th! I look forward to hearing about the van!
Lynne x
Sadhbh says:
Julie – finding a beetle in your salad is no problem, finding HALF a beetle in a salad you’ve already started might be a problem
Baring your breasts to all and sundry is normal for breast-feeding mothers, I still remember clearly Brendan refusing to feed with a particular nipple protector when we were out shopping over half an hour’s drive from home and yet still screaming to be fed LOL
What about the van? They didn’t want to give it back at all, even when the two hours were up and you and Fecklet were stranded? Or is there an even worse scenario I don’t even want to envisage?
Hugs
Sadhbh
Melissa says:
The joys (yeah right) of motherhood could fill up volumes if women ever decided to get together and write about it. The one thing I never understood is how poop can crawl up a baby’s back and ruin the cute outfit you just shelled out money for. It’s like they wait for the exact moment you put it on them.
Being a mother is a thankless job but I can’t think of something else more fulfilling.
Lynette Rees says:
Can’t wait to read the next installment, Julie. Although, I guess it wasn’t such a great time for you.
I can really empathise about the breast feeding in public thing. When my daughter was a baby, my mother came to stay and ended up dislocating her shoulder by tripping over the dog.
I ended up with a starving baby in the middle of an overflowing casualty unit, having no choice but to feed her in front of all and sundry whilst I waited for my poor mother to go through a reduction and manipulation of her shoulder joint.
The years fly by so fast. My baby is now twenty!
Julie says:
I think one of the things that makes such mishaps easier (besides the fact that of course the baby is the most lovable thing in the entire universe) is that all parents have experienced them at some point or another.
Maybe not the van, though.
Julie, I didn’t get the salad free! I should have asked! Agh!!
Baby poop truly has supernatural powers, Melissa and Michelle.
Lynette, sounds like twenty years have not been sufficient to take away the horror of exposing your breasts to casualty. No doubt it will be the same for you, Sadhbh.
going to Wokingham says:
[...] scene of my infamous day out with the baby Fecklet two years ago (which you can read, or reread, here and here), so I will no doubt be doing some happy reminiscing about bugs, boobs, poop and [...]