All in all I would say that Saturday is easily my favorite day of the week. Even though I legitimately enjoy my job, many of us are grasping for the weekend once we get to about lunchtime on Weds. In fact, a former coworker and still good friend and I used to have a bit where we would play the song “Working for the Weekend” to start off the day each day from Weds. through Friday – it only lasted a few weeks and students may have been traumatized. This said, as a teacher, Sunday’s are often ruined by the fact that there is always grading to be done. Remember that gnawing feeling that you had homework to do when you were a kid? Same feeling. Saturdays though, Saturdays are my day. A good Saturday in the spring and summer usually involves playing softball or some outdoor event, and in the fall it’s college football and maybe even a tailgate. Today was a very different Saturday.

My wife left for work on the 7:00 hour, so it was me and Maddie from there on out. Other than a phone call from my dad mid-afternoon, talking to my wife before she left for work this morning was my last actual conversation I had for the remainder of the day (at 4 months, Maddie hasn’t quite mastered the art of conversing yet). Early this afternoon the weather turned, and it became clear that we were not leaving the house today. I spent my entire Saturday in the house with a 4 month old with essentially no outside communication.

Today was a great day.

All day long Maddie was in a great mood, smiling and laughing, and it doesn’t get much better than that. I can’t say I know where the milestone markers are and what babies are supposed to do and when, but what I do know is that Maddie’s interaction is growing by leaps and bounds – her eye contact is much longer and more spontaneous, she’s reaching for things much more, and she seems to want more interaction. Putting all these together is just awesome – holding her and she reaches out, grabs my hand, looks up at me and smiles? Forget it, done for. Additionally, Maddie has been all about rolling from her stomach to her back for weeks, but she’s only rolled from her back to her stomach a few times; she’s made it clear that she can do it when she feels like it, she just hasn’t really felt like it. Well today she was all about it, rolling from her stomach to her back, then back the other way, and back and forth over and over. It was literally impossible for me to watch this and not sit there smiling and laughing with her. When she’s happy it’s just contagious. In fact, the low point of the day was seeing the clock tick closer and closer to her bedtime, not wanting it to be that time yet. As that time ticked on and it got closer and closer to the bedtime process to begin, I put on some music and danced with my daughter for a few songs. This has become, without any doubt in my mind, my absolute favorite thing to do – period. Now, I have never been known to be much for dancing, but this is just a whole different animal. As discussed, Maddie loves music, so she will just be mellow and happy, and she’ll burrow into my shoulder, and it’s just truly the greatest feeling I think I’ve ever known. It’s also something that I know is temporary and fleeting so I’m taking in as much of it as I can, while I can. Along these lines, the reality did hit me fairly hard today in realizing that I essentially have only 2 weeks left on my leave, which makes me distraught. So all the more reason I’m taking in as much as possible while I can.

Maddie went to bed quite easily and it’s 8:30 on Saturday night – I have friends who are probably just now getting ready to head out to start their night. I also have friends who I know were still out from brunch about 9 hours earlier. I made myself some dinner, poured myself a good beer, and put on a movie. I also baked cookies, because if I’m gonna go in on this whole domestic thing, then I may as well go all in. This was a very good Saturday, even if I never left the house.

In two weeks I go back to work. I pray that in doing so I’m still able to enjoy these days at this level, if not even more-so, rather than letting the pressures and issues from the outside world encroach on this time. It’s just going to have to be something I make sure of.

 

*skip to 2:24 for the good part.