from the syndicate

Naomi turned seven weeks last week. It’s an understatement to say that time flies with a newborn. Somehow, despite being awake far more than you’re used to, it passes as if it were a dream. I’m still blown away when I hold her and rock her to sleep against me. Ashley and I made something beautiful. The poor girl has both my appetite and bowel movements, and I adore the surprised look she gets when a fart turns into a blowout. She can get mighty hangry, just like her dad, and she squeaks like a baby pterodactyl. It’s obvious she loves her daddy: she’s in a better mood when I’m home, and I have a remarkable ability to get her asleep on my chest. She loves to cuddle up with her binky and wrap my fingers in her hands. I miss her like hell when I’m at work.

Speaking of work, I’ve started (finally!) transitioning between our ‘home care’ to our day program (with steps being taken towards our employment division). It’s been a wild change of hours, but at least now I’m home on the weekends. I haven’t had weekend nights off for close to five years. It’s a great change of pace, and it’s enabled me to spend more time at home. Chloe and I are going to start watching The Walking Dead together; I think she’s finally old enough not to be scared by it. She loves spooky stuff – I always give her grief about the scary teen books she reads, and when something startling happens I make sure to say, ‘Chloe, I know that was scary, but it was just the wind, you don’t need to be scared.’ It pisses her off every time, but there’s always the hint of a smile behind her frustrated annoyance. Because Chloe and I are watching something, Zoey and I have to watch something, and I’m scrabbling my brain trying to find something that would be interesting for both of us. I’m not sure if she’s still into The Clone Wars, but that’s an option. Ash ruled out The X-Files.

Last week I took each of the girls out to breakfast separately before taking them to school. With the chaos of the holidays, my crazy work schedule, and then the constant demands of the newborn, finding time for these ‘father-daughter breakfasts’ has been a nightmare. Thus it was good to finally have time for morning breakfasts. Chloe chose Waffle House; we both got the All Star Special (and we split an order of biscuits-and-gravy). That girl can eat like a champ. Zoey chose McDonald’s; she got a McGriddle and a yogurt and barely touched any of it. She spent most of the time chattering away about God-knows-what and picking at her food. She ate the egg patty and the bacon and left the rest to the birds.

I’m writing this from the Newport Syndicate.

I’m dressed fancy and found a comfortable corner booth.

People are dancing, there’s a buffet, this isn’t half-bad.

I’ll say, though, that I’m not a fan of the noise.

(I think it’s the aspie side of me…)

Of course Ben’s trying to sit with the band members but their table is full. They’re working on hammering out their set and he keeps walking around their table shouting orders like a conductor. He’s introducing himself as Keith Urban’s son – “Bastard son, maybe,” I told Ash – and pretending to be a waiter. He chewed out some guy for getting food out of line when he didn’t in any way, shape, or form get food out of line. I’m sitting at a table with some of Jason’s friends. Maggie is Ryan’s new girlfriend, and Ryan is a part of Jason’s social club. Ryan had an old girlfriend named Meredith. It just wasn’t working out, so then he started dating Maggie and that caused a bit of drama in their friend group. Because Meredith was heartbroken, and she and Maggie had been friends, so it was a pretty rough betrayal. A girl came by the table and asked Ryan if he liked their picture together from the event’s photo booth. Apparently this cat Ryan got his pic taken with another girl, and now Maggie felt betrayed. She says she feels extremely jealous and it hurts even more because she doesn’t know who this other girl is. Ryan’s saying all the right stuff but you can tell he’s pretty done hearing her talk about her feelings.

The Newport Syndicate is a happening place, as you can see.

Postscript: The Morning After

When I woke up at the guys’ house, I heard a commotion out back. I checked it out to find policemen prowling the apartment grounds just behind the house. One of them asked me a litany of questions and told me what happened: early this morning someone stumbled around a naked twenty-something-year-old who was all bloodied up and lying in the snow. The guy’s all right, but he wouldn’t tell the cops anything other than that his name was Liam. An odd start to the morning, for sure.