Kanye, Kimye, Maeve, me, and other parents

Last night at 2:00 in the am I was rocking my sick child. She has a terrible cough, mucus from ever orphus, a sore throat, etc. I was tired, but she couldn't sleep when laid down, so here we were. Me and the mrs. were taking turns, and although not ideal, it was ok. She made it to the doctor today. I sort of slept walk dreamily through my teaching, and none of us were worse for the wear. When I came home, I had to give her some tylenol. Our little Maeve hates taking her medicine, and much like llamas, ostriches, and vultures, her body has created a unique, and very effective manner of protection from taking it. She gags and vomits. Today it was after her 4 o'clock milk, so the puke came out in curdled white lumps of dairy goodness. We stripped her down, washed her clothes, our clothes, gave her a bath, and not two hours later her diaper leaked...diarrhea. Her antibiotics causing her loose movement and amidst her playing rings and with her baby dolls, her diarrhea leaked on our carpet, kitchen floor, it was over her hands, her legs, our hands, then over our bathroom mirror, sink etc. Once again, we stripped her, we washed her, us, etc. I got down on my hands and knees and scrubbed and disinfected looking the excrement right in the eye.

Now I mention all of this, not only as a motivator for my kids to be abstinent, but also because for the past 3 days, I have been thinking about little Kimye Kardashian West and what her upbringing is going to resemble. I don't know the Kardashians. I don't watch their show. I don't know Kanye West either. I did watch some of his reality shows on the MTV where he was hiring, firing, yelling, putting young singers through greats amounts of emotional stress, so I can't really say what little Kimye's life will be like. I picture her coming into the world with diamond encrusted cloth diapers, and armada of nannies, wet nurses, doctors, etc. I picture Kanye diligently interviewing thousands of potential nannies and eliminating poor men who can't lactate on demand, or sing every lyric of Rock-a-by-Baby, who forget to pull the tongue of the Baby J's out from behind the pant legs of some skinny jeans.

Who knows, maybe it will be a very average, typical rich kid upbringing. Lord knows they have a large  family that is very involved with each other, and they will have tons of resources and network to help support them, but it is just so hard to picture Kim or Kanye rocking their baby all night, or cleaning up  diarrhea out of their carpet. I see them buying new carpet, or ordering that poor women who holds 5 cell phones and walks 3 steps behind Kanye at all times, to clean the diarrhea.

I can't really say why I have been thinking about this. Maybe because announcing a birth of a celebrity child at 3 am on Twitter reeks of narcism. Maybe because it was late, and I was tired, and what am I to think about sitting in a dark room with no tv, books to read, etc.

What I hope is that little Kimye will feel more than well provided for, will feel more than entitled to good things, that she will feel like more than simply an excuse for an Hermes baby bag and reality tv drama. I hope she feels desperately loved and wanted. I hope Kanye has stories to tell her of colic, of driving her around at night to help her sleep, of being puked on, stories about her first steps, what annoying tv characters she was in love with. I hope Kanye and Kim can tell her these things, and not simply have someone send it to them in a weekly email recap. Because these are the things a child needs to hear, to know that their parents loved them, fought endlessly for them, bent over backwards rearing them. They don't need to hear about their mother's sex tape, and the millions of men and women who have intimate knowledge their mother's hootie-hoo.

So, needless to say it has been a rough 3 days in some ways; bodily fluids, crying, short tempers, exasperated patience, little sleep are all things that are not fun--I can't romanticize it too much. But I have taken heart in knowing that I think I am more capable of love than I used to be, that we will have stories to laugh about with Maeve, to embarrass Maeve when she is older. I hope this is the same for little big bootied Kimye, as I guess I hope it for any kid and for any parent, because that is sort of what it seems to be about--pushing yourself past your limits, all the while increasing your capacity to love, and  I think a little poop scoop is totally worth that.