Our second child should make her debut in less than two months. She kicks more than Luca ever did so I can’t help but wonder if she wants to show her face sooner than planned. A doctor’s appointment this Thursday will help answer some of my questions, even though it’s clear that nature has the final say in the end. To some extent, that is, since I’m scheduled to have a C-section, as I did for my son. It feels strange to “schedule” a birth after the spontaneity of a conception.
I continue to be extremely excited but equally as terrified at the looming tsunami about to flood our household with the arrival of La Bambina. Perhaps this is accentuated by the fact that Luca seems more of a boy than a baby these days, and to slip a new creature into his life and his lifestyle ain’t gonna be easy.
Over the past few months, Luca has turned into a little person. He talks constantly in English and in Italian, most of it decipherable but some not, and his imagination blooms as he invents scenarios about his fleet of cars or his way station of trains. He tells us stories about his day. He laughs at the sound of new words (lately the word “Labroador” makes him giggle wildly). He has the eyes of a hawk and will notice things that I often overlook. Last night, we assembled a puzzle of the United States together and I was amazed to see he knew exactly where Montana and Maine fit. He recognizes and identifies every type of car imaginable, and protests if I accidentally mistake a Fiat for a Peugot.
His grandfather, whom we have nicknamed Mr. Tidy for his clean-up skills, has clearly passed on a gene to his grandson. An over-turned carpet corner or an out-of-place napkin on a table setting will promptly be put in its place by Tiny Tidy.
At two and a half, he looks so big already. He has become a little boy, and it has taken me a while to realize he is no longer a baby. As he races around the house releasing energy, jumping off our couch or spinning around on his tricycle, he seems completely in control of himself. He tests out his lungs like a budding soprano, using words whose meaning he doesn’t necessarily understand but, nonetheless, likes their sound. His occasional dictatorial behavior leads me to call him my little Mussolini.
But, yet, when I peak in on him sound asleep with his hands resting placidly above his head, he looks so small. Like a baby again. Last night, excited by the return of his father who had spent the weekend in Rome, Luca had a hard time falling asleep. Normally, he loves going to bed, and rarely protests. Yet last night, he kept calling for us, and did all he could to draw our attention. After an hour into this game, I found him walking down the stairs towards our room, with his worn bag of toy cars in hand, wailing, “Where are you, Mamma?”
I took him back to his room, tucked him into bed, and wiped away his floodgate of tears. Following his orders, I lay down in the single bed next to his. He leaped out of his bed and crawled into mine, cuddling up to me like a baby kitten looking for warmth. Eventually, he purred as I sang to him. His teary heaving stopped as I kept repeating to him, over and over: “I’m right here.”
Lately, when he plays with his cars, he will show me that a certain car is crying. When I ask him why, he replies, “Because he misses his Mamma.” When I ask him how he’ll solve the problem, he shows me how a Mamma car returns and smothers the crying car with kisses.
“Where are you, Mamma?” rings through my head daily as the countdown begins to the arrival of Baby Number Two. The answer? I’m here, trying my best to continue with the my daily routines - taking Luca to day care three times a week, going to the supermarket, making dinner, paying bills, keeping up correspondence with friends, going down my To-Do list. But, I know I’m also elsewhere, wondering how the birth of my daughter will be, if I can handle having two children, if I will be able to maintain a smile for my husband, if I’ll still be a good friend to good friends, if I’ll keep up my writing.
Our nanny, whom we have appropriately nicknamed “Amazing Grace,” has enabled me to rest in my pregnancy, especially on days when I have been overwhelmed by fatigue and future worries. Without her, Luca would not be as stable and happy as he is.
But sometimes I wonder if I’m not doing enough, if my nanny has become too much of a crutch, if I’m not putting in as many hours as I can as a mom. I’m not working so I have no excuses. Yet I don’t always have the energy to play with my toddler full-time, all day long. Is he watching too much television? Yes. He is getting outside enough? No. He is socializing enough? Never enough. Do I lose my temper with him too frequently? Absolutely.
Growing up, my nanny, Helen, became our surrogate grandmother as we weren’t especially close to our own blood grandmothers. Helen was there every day for us after school with a secret grab bag of candies into which we thrust our dirty fists while she drove us home. She was everything to us yet she was never Mummy. Either we knew how to distinguish who she was or she was very good at explaining the difference between babysitter and mother.
I just hope that Luca knows that his Mamma will always be here. I tell him constantly but it remains a mystery as to how much a two-year-old retains.
As excited as I am for the arrival of our little girl, I’m also sad at the thought that Luca will no longer be the only child. I’m nostalgic for him more than for us. I know it will only help him in the end to have a sibling, someone to confide in as we travel the world, change cultures, and he starts to ask questions about his upbringing, his parents, his two cultures, the worlds he slips in and out of.
But I love - and will miss — our nightly snuggle sessions with him where his father pretends there are “pesci cattivi” swimming around our bed, and Luca laughs and laughs and laughs with his mouth wide open and all his little white teeth and pink gums on display, because there’s nothing better than having the sole attention of your parents, whenever you want, all the time.
