8:42 AM
i don't know whether to put this here, or over in sophie's world. maybe both, eventually.
i read a number of journals written by people with babies: rob [because he is about a month ahead of me so i can see what is coming 'round the corner], tess [because it prepares me for the toddler version] diane [because she has a sophia also], heather [because i am still overwhelmingly grateful/slightly disappointed i didn't have twins]. when i just need more babies, i surf the journal babies webring. and when i want to remember being pregnant, though i have no need to remember the 9 months of morning sickness, i read karen.
as a whole, this is a group of pretty damn attractive babies.
i, myself, never expected to have an attractive child. when i would imagine future children, they were always cute, in the generic cute baby way, and clever, but not outstandingly beautiful. i also imagined they would be dark, have dark eyes and dark hair. i especially thought that once jim and i got together, as he is even darker than i. so what did we create? a poster child for gerber, a strawberry blonde, denim blue-eyed cherub.
this is not a my-baby-is-cuter-than-your-baby moment, though i have plenty of those. every parent does, and every parent is right. but trying to look at it from outside, trying to set aside my parental prejudices, i still have to say sophie is a beautiful child. she literally stops pedestrian traffic. we have never gone grocery shopping, or to the park, or library or a restaurant without at least one person stopping not just to smile, but to talk and coo and tickle and tell us over and over what an adorable child we have. people will come back for just-one-more-quick-smile. they offer to take her off our hands. friends of mine who are notoriously anti-child love her, when they have disliked other friends' children. people who dislike me overcome that to hold sophia.
it freaks me out. i don't know how to teach her to deal with that sort of attention should she stay this beautiful her whole life; it is completely alien to me. i don't know how to deal with the attention she garners. my first instinct is to nod nicely, then grab the boo and run for the hills. my second, to lock her up, safe from the world and all those who would have a part of her.
