The Last Great Happiness

I can't believe it has been almost a month since my last post. It has been a fairly sleepless month, but also one that saw Phoebe and I settling in to life at 10 East End. My girl was a great sleeper in Vietnam, so I am hopeful, that her system will eventually shift back into gear. She now sleeps about 5 straight hours from 10pm to maybe 4 or 5am. WIth hour naps on either sides, still getting about 8-9 hours of sleep-- just not all in a row. Sadly, for me, they don't feel cumulative when they are fractured by a crying baby and a late night feeding. But no matter, when that baby wakes up and smiles, all the rest (or lack thereof) fades away.

We live in cynical times. The world is a ridiculous mess, and our leaders are the ones mostly to blame. We are in the midst of the most interesting Presidential Campaign of my lifetime. A Woman, A Black man (well, multiracial), and a decent Republican, real Republicans love to hate. One is 46, one is 73. One was First Lady. One was a POW in Vietnam, the country where I found this amazing child. And so, in this messed up world, the only thing that renews your spirit is the face of a child smiling at you. Babies make people happy. I now see, every day, grown humans reverting to giggles and coos when they meet Phoebe. You can't help but smile when you see her- she is simply edible :)

Over this month, Phoebe has met dozens of people in our world. She met her Godmother Carol (now to be called TiTi) and Carol's parents too. She met Marni and Debbie, the Greenbergs and the Nadels and the volunteers at the Soup kitchen. She met the other Vietmoms who are waiting for their children to come home, and of course Diana and her daughter Liana who came from the same Orphanage in Vin Phuc. We wondered if Phoebe and Liana recognized eachother. She met lots of Yates and Birches. She went up to Vermont with my parents and Jeff and his son where she met Franci and Tom and Rabbi Novak and Yuval, Harvey and Janet, Morty and Anita, Cecile, Joanne, Matthew and so many more. Phoebe absolutely loved it. She gets a kick out of people. I sometimes fear I'm not entertaining enough for her by myself :)

Her Grand parents are clearly ga-ga (I think that's an official term). How nice it is for me and for Phoebe to have them right at the end of the block. Grammy sings to an adoring Phoebe (she particularly likes songs from Singin' in the Rain) and Grampy loves to lift her up to let her feel the air up there :) Some day soon, it will be warm again and we will be strolling on the boardwalk every day. We were out there the other day and I had a moment. I was stilling on a bench overlooking the East River. I could see the bridges and the buildings of Astoria. Phoebe was asleep in her stroller. It was then I realized that I am on the boardwalk as a Mother. I am now officially a baby person. I used to be a dog person, but I graduated. I hope to someday be an old person on this boardwalk, most likely, with a dog...