I don’t like to eat it, but I’ve always been fascinated a little by jello molds with fruit (even vegetables!?) suspended in them. It always looks like the fruit was caught right in the middle of something and stuck there in time, except for the little wiggling it gets to do. Like Hiro from the TV show, Heros was around and he stopped time.
That’s why I feel like a banana in a jello mold. Being home with a baby means always being held mid-flight. You can’t expect yourself to finish or even start anything. If anything, those bananas must be zen. How can they be anything but in the present moment? I’m not saying this stuckness is a bad or good thing. It is just a state I’m in. So when I start to feel like it is a bad thing, I remind myself that I don’t have to be anywhere and I’m not working. I make myself look at the baby. Smile at him. Get him to laugh. Enjoy his fleeting babyness. He’s my sweet and sticky reason for being right now. I won’t ever get this much time with him again. (Unless we decide to hike the Appalaichain Trail together or something like that some day.)
Stillness can be hard for a person like me. I need to feel like each day has some kind of value. So if I didn’t get to work on my book, or finish the laundry I started, or organize something, I feel antsy. I really need to deeply understand the value that is holding my baby all day if he doesn’t want to be put down, or cuddling with him on a blanket on the floor. I need to embrace my inner banana and enjoy the view from the jello mold.
9 Comments
October 28, 2008 at October 28, 2008
I totally get the need to have a goal. Each day I would come up with one thing I’d hope to get done. Not because I HAD to, but because I needed to feel some sense of purpose/accomplishment. I’ll probably miss that when I go back to school next week and have too much to accomplish.
October 28, 2008 at October 28, 2008
I think the only fruit you’re not supposed to put into jello is canned pineapple. Correct? I think it makes it too liquidy or something.
Glad you are enjoying your time at home. I think it has taken me a good 5 years to get to that point. You have a much better learning curve.
October 28, 2008 at October 28, 2008
Definitely embrace your inner banana and baby’s fleeting babyness. (nice phrase) And remember bananas really are so good for you too zen-courting-mommie!
October 28, 2008 at October 28, 2008
I hear you on the substantive points and I empathize, but that is one weird analogy.
October 28, 2008 at October 28, 2008
I love how your photo is the most ambitious, intricate banana mold ever made. It totally helps me understand how tough this time is for you. My clever, ambitious friend . . . Feel free to keep pushing me on my pet project if it helps!
October 29, 2008 at October 29, 2008
well, alli
it is me we’re talking about. i could have said i felt like an actor who had been paused on the dvr, but that is not really me is it? i’m a little bananas… ouch.
October 29, 2008 at October 29, 2008
You don’t like jello?!!
October 29, 2008 at October 29, 2008
Not the kind with anything floating in it!!! I’ll eat empty jello. Now that sounds like a good name for a band.
October 30, 2008 at October 30, 2008
I have to say that is my biggest worry about being a stay at home care taker. I hear the view from the jello mold is pretty good – I like you just am afraid that I would not be able to find the window. p.s. I really like your new header.