Five months of sweet Lilit

Today at work, I surfed my own blog while I pumped milk at my desk. I give myself this little break while I pump--time just for my baby, even though I can't be with her.

I revisited Avi at 5 months old and was shocked that he was eating banana and avocado--Lilit barely tried her first spoonfuls of rice cereal last week and it felt big. It also felt mundane; I handed nanny M the box of food one morning and she looked at me with surprise. She wondered if I wanted to feed her first? Is it strange that I didn't mind not being the first one to feed my girl cereal?

Tonight I introduced her to pears while Avi splashed in the tub. Again, I mused about birth order. Lilit's first food experience beyond rice cereal was unceremonious--first in my arms while I helped Avi undress with one hand and he climbed into the tub, then in her bouncy seat while I alternated between soaping the boy and feeding the girl. Today I read about how I painstakingly mixed breast milk with avocado for Avi. Lilit was very cool about her experience with the pears--just as she is about most things.

I love this girl with such fervor. The way she falls asleep with her head turned to one side, her hand stretched up to her face, palm touching her lips and nose like it did in her ultrasound photos.

She had a late third nap today after she fell asleep on the short car ride home from her Bernal Heights pick up. I marveled at her good timing; Avi was having a high-need afternoon and I tiredly attended to his regression, his need for things past.

At the same time, he also loves the present. He talks about his friends, calls me by one of his teacher's names, goes to bed early each night because he is so worn out from his wonderfully stimulating days.

I feel like he does; I long for the past, for the early infancy of my children, for the sleepy, hazy existences of my maternity leaves. Simultaneously, I love my work. It feeds me in an essential way. Soon my good friend and I will begin creating and rehearsing a dance piece, which will profoundly nourish my core.

Leeor also mourns infancy while longing for the future (at 5 am this morning he wondered aloud when we would "get our room back"). Our family is grounded in each moment while occasionally peering nervously toward our future, too tired to make sense of anything. We reminisce about the recent past, which has become sweeter with memory.

The aches and pains of childbirth are more distant. My girl is thriving, and so are we.