“You’ll understand once you have a kid,” Mr. Burrito Bowl to everyone who doesn’t have a kid, in about a week.

Well, it’s somehow mid-December.  That means Baby Burrito Bowl is most likely within a few days of her long-awaited arrival.  Pregnancy’s weird, man.  She’s just hanging out like RIGHT THERE in Mrs. Burrito Bowl’s belly.  It’s the craziest thing.  She’s a full on human baby just kicking it, literally, for the next several days. 

For those of you who don’t know, Baby Burrito Bowl will be our first kid.  Mrs. Burrito Bowl is busy knitting all sorts of baby related clothing articles and I’m typing things into Youtube like: “What do you do with a baby that’s a girl?  A human baby girl.”

Mrs. Burrito Bowl is the trooper of all troopers.  She finished up her last day of work on Friday and only ran our van into one concrete barrier her entire pregnancy.  We still go to the gym several times per week despite the actual human hanging off of Mrs. Burrito Bowl’s front side.  I guess I should say ‘She still goes to the gym,’ not ‘We still go to the gym.’  I mean, I also go to the gym, but after watching Mrs. Burrito Bowl waddle around with a human inside her, it suddenly makes the fact that I showed up to the gym, even though I ate too much, seem less impressive.

We know it’s not going to be all cuddles and hilarious yawns.  There’s going to be a lot of poop and interrupted sleep.  Probably at the same time.  Hopefully only by the baby.  I think we’re holding out hope our baby will have better manners than to wake us up several times per night but kids these days don’t show respect.  We’ve been doing our best to prepare by waking each other up every half hour during the night.  

We Own Baby Things At Least

A bunch of our friends have given us various baby themed contraptions for either sleeping or wearing.  We are incredibly grateful to all the people who have given us their adorable hand-me-down and new outfits.  

Above all we’re just really excited.  We’re grateful that Mrs. Burrito Bowl can take 4 months off and we don’t have to worry about how to pay the bills or how we’ll get by.  Living below our means and saving the rest has given us a cushion so we can relax and enjoy this time.  Yup, other than spending every minute anxiously rocking back and forth hoping we don’t ruin her, it will be nonstop relaxation.  

Reproducing is just weird.  It’s like, “Hey everyone this is the most important, craziest thing that’s ever happened to us!  We just made a NEW human.  She didn’t exist, I winked at Mrs. Burrito Bowl, nine months later here we are.” But at the same time, it happens every day. To everyone else, it’s not super important that we somehow made a miniature combination of the two of us.

Objectively, I know she will look like every other combination of two people for the first several months.  Eventually she’ll start to look like us, but at first she’ll just look like a baby.  All babies look the same.  I’m not about to change my opinion about that just because now one baby on the planet belongs to me.  

Weird, Man. Just Weird.  

The other weird thing about it is the mystery of it all.  Who is Baby Burrito Bowl?  What’s her name?  We can call her whatever we want and that’s just the way things are.  Some name will pop into our heads and we’ll agree that, “Yup.  That’s her name.  From here on out she’ll be known as…”  Weird.  

Speaking of mystery, she’s a full human baby now.  She has a nose and eyes and facial features.  They’re already there.  We, her dang parents, have no idea what she looks like.  We wouldn’t be able to pick her out of a line-up of babies to save her life.  BUT, in a few days we’ll have her face memorized.  Crazy.  Sure, this paragraph completely contradicts the paragraph two spots up about how all babies look the same, but life is full of contradictions.  

She has no opinion one way or the other regarding broccoli.  She has no opinions on anything other than she doesn’t like to be cramped up in a belly.  Soon she’ll be full of opinions and thoughts of her own.   

Also, December 19th.  That’s the due date.  For the last 9 months we’ve been counting down the clock to December 19th.  But she might not be born on that date.  Once she’s actually born, December 19th goes right out the window.  For now though, it feels like an important date.  

A Pool Analogy

The whole thing is surreal.  Pretend we’re all at this big humanity wide pool party.  If you’re a parent, you’re in the pool.  If you’re not a parent, you’re outside of the pool doing fun things like suntanning and hanging out at the cabana.  Those who are about to be parents on the diving board getting ready to jump into the pool.  I haven’t really thought this analogy through all the way but I’m going to just power right through it.  

We’re about to jump off the diving board.   We see a bunch of weary-eyed parents in the pool talking about how rewarding/exhausting the whole thing is.  This is terrifying because I enjoy feeling rested.  I really love the idea that when I go to sleep for the night I just get to stay there, asleep. 

We see a bunch of our non-parent friends who are walking around the pool.  Some of them hope to one day be on the diving board too, and some of them think we’re nuts for even approaching the water.   The pool isn’t for everyone. 

We’re bouncing on the diving board as we speak getting the momentum for the big jump.  Weird.  

***UPDATE***

I’ll probably mention Baby Burrito Bowl a few more times over the next several years.  Thanks for reading this very important post despite it not having any applicable takeaways.