TMI: My Vanilla Sky Post

Chris from Stay At Home Dad in Lansing has just written a post about this blog. Go read it here.

In his review of People in the Sun, Chris fearlessly digs into the archives to find a man who's just started blogging after losing his job. That man becomes more politically aware, he starts a new job, he remembers events from his past, and he tries to make sense of the world. Mostly in a harmless way. Nothing in that man's writings could suggest that a few years later, that man would find himself thinking, "This is too good to be true," while staring at poop.

I've called this my Vanilla Sky week.

See, I was killing myself here. Although I said I would never again chase those damn milestones, and although I knew my mother-in-law was right when she said she didn't know anyone who walked down the aisle and wasn't potty-trained, I let it get to me.

We would spend hours in the bathroom every day. I was telling him stories, and blowing bubbles, and explaining the way the body digested food, and nothing... So I put the diapers back on, and a minute later I'd have to change them.

"No no... I'm not angry... I just don't understand why you can't... Never mind..."

And with those awful new Pampers diapers, and with the added cost of buying infant diapers, and with the intuitive feeling that he WAS ready, I pushed it.

And the more I pushed it, the more frustrated I'd become.

"Again, I'm not angry. It's not about me being angry or not angry. It's about you not saying 'No' when I ask you to sit there for a minute to see if you can do it! Why are you saying 'No' all the time?"

I knew I was doing it wrong. I knew I was getting angry with him for no reason. I knew I was pushing it. Pushing the un-pushable. But I couldn't stop myself.

Then last week, when I was at my lowest, it happened. He just went upstairs, and a minute later I heard him say, "Look! Look! Look!" And it's been like that for a week now.

And I know it's too good to be true. I know the evil scientists are playing with my brain. I know that in real life I'm lying in a gutter somewhere, mumbling, "What's so hard about sitting down and letting your body to its thing?" And I'm probably pooping my pants just to prove a point.

But I'll take the Vanilla Sky reality. I'm going to play along and pretend it's real. I'm going to pretend that my boy takes his underwear off by himself, goes to the bathroom, and then when he's all done, throws some toilet paper in the bowl. I've got nothing to lose.