The little wrinkles in Franny’s 9-month-old thighs have gone from three to two as she gets more and more mobile.

Wednesday, September 13, 2000

The little wrinkles in Franny’s 9-month-old thighs have gone from three to two as she gets more and more mobile.

Now she crawls, wriggling her little butt as she moves across the living-room floor to capture whatever it is that caught her attention. If there’s any kind of paper on the floor, you can bet that will be her first priority. Bills from the insurance company, copies of the Austin Daily Herald – she is indiscriminate in her eating. It must be some biological need for more roughage.

She also is throwing out random words here and there – beyond mama and dada and baba – not to be heard again. Both Mary Alice (her baby sitter) and I heard her say "gra-pa" (grandpa) the other day, then she clearly said "bear" when I handed her one of her little books about some bears that go to school. Mary Alice thought she said "book" on Monday, but would she repeat it when I got there? Never.

And, while I came to terms with my bodily functions when I trekked in Nepal, where the toilets are of the squatting variety outside of the bigger cities and you (should) use the water scoop provided and your hand to clean yourself rather than littering the landscape with toilet paper, I never knew I’d get so comfortable with someone else’s. We stopped to change her on the back of the car once: I already had poop on my arm, then she peed on me when I (unwisely) chose to pick her up and let her dry out for a while. Was I grossed out? Not at all. Although I used a couple Wet Ones to wash off my arm, I stayed in the same clothes until we got home and went to bed.

The joys of being a mother are many – and the effects are very different from what I’d expected.

Before Frances was born last November, I pictured the three of us – her in a metal-framed backpack – going to exotic places like India or the Dominican Republic. Now I’m not so sure I’d want to put her at that kind of health risk.

Granted, since the flood, our house is little India. We’ve shocked the well twice already and we still can’t drink the water. I hear from the county environmental health department that it’s nothing unusual: some people have shocked their wells four and five times and are still not getting a clean bill of health from the county.

As for parties, I – who used to be the queen of backyard bonfires (over which we roast hot dogs and marshmallows for the information of the Austin Fire Department) that would go on late into the night – can’t manage to stay awake past midnight anymore.

Did I once have a busy social life in Austin or was that just a dream? Will all the downtown bars be flattened before I enjoy an evening of live music again? Will I ever be able to wear the tres cool clothes I brought with me from London when I moved to Austin?

Those things don’t really matter as much as they once did, because I’m way too busy enjoying almost every moment, every smile, every pout and every belly-laugh as Brady pretends to sneak up loudly behind her. I don’t miss the social life (much), nor do I miss reading books with more than 30 different words in them (at the moment).

Those things will come all too soon.