Cold Spaghetti

Will golfing, playing in the park, eating, and more…

Granna & PapPap’s Weekend with Will (Feb 18-20)

http://www.ofoto.com/I.jsp?c=8wsl6ap.1rcr2d3p&x=1&y=-sq9vor

– Sunday night, after we (Granna, PapPap, Paul and I) got back from the park. Will ran right to his high-chair, scaled the front (no small task), climbed inside, and sat down. (As we usually wrestle him in, this was a bit of a surprise. We were all stunned.) The message: he was READY for dinner.

– Blowing on his food before eating it… in other words, doing exactly what we were doing with our hot food before eating it.

– BIG HUGS. He’ll run at full speed, throw his arms around you, put his head on your shoulder, and pat his little hands on your back. *melt!*

– BEDTIME. Between 7-8pm. We’ve finally got a routine and schedule — and BOY DO WE LOVE IT!

Trying to sing, “La, la, la-la, La, la, la-la, Will-iam’s song!” Dinner Monday night (Feb 21)

On the swings with PapPap!

On the swings with Mom!

Climbing the equipment at the playground. Taking Will to the park is not for the light-hearted. This child has *energy*, *willpower*, and *strength*. That is enough to make anyone tired, but he also is completely FEARLESS! Watch out, world!!!

Saturday, February 19th. PapPap gives Will his first golf lesson. Will watched and concentrated VERY hard… he spent the next hour chasing after the golf ball with the putter. He was good at hitting the ball, but needs work on the “two hands on the club” part.

Paul took Will out for a haircut today. Will’s new ‘do is ADORABLE. But he looks so much like a little boy that it hit me: my baby is a toddler! For the first time, I felt the unbelievably fast passage of time. Where did my baby go? It makes me want to take more movies and pictures… whatever I can do to capture every bit of wonder and discovery. How is it that my little baby is suddenly a walking, talking (well, almost), little boy??!!

Will enjoying dinner!

I knew it would come, everyone says it does. I am missing my baby. It is incredibly difficult to work on a PhD while being a parent of a young child. I tend to shrug off when people comment on how impressive it is that I am managing both… I attribute it to a strong, supportive spouse and a great kid and leave it at that. But really, it is so much more.

I am a jealous that Paul gets every afternoon with Will — they play in the park, go for walks, and run errands. It becomes time for me to work or have class, so it is in theory a gift of time for me. I am so lucky that Paul is able to be with him, as opposed to a sitter that we don’t have the budget for. But it makes me keenly aware of what I am missing.

I do not want to stop what I am doing, but I do wish I could slow it down. As with any profession, the academy does not take consideration of children. If anything, it forces parents (particularly women) to work even harder to prove that they can do it. I am not saying Tulane necessarily applies this pressure, but the overall feel of any academic environment certainly has these overtones. One of my professors told me today that she actually finished her disseration before her cohort — by more than a year — and she attributed this to her having to be so scheduled because of being a parent and needing to juggle both. She felt that my efforts were much in the same light. Of course, I want to finish slower, not faster — and have more time to be both a Mom and a doctoral student at the same time — so I’m not sure how what I want to do fits in with what is expected of me to do.

The bottom line is: I absolutely understand why parents (ie: Mothers) “chose” to stay home. THERE IS NO CHOICE. The mechanisms to allow us to have both really aren’t there.