Last weekend we took Ezra on her first boat ride around Lady Bird Lake in Austin. It was a perfect day to be out...warm sun and a cool breeze. The babe was perfectly content during the hour long drive and and the five minute walk down to the boat, but as soon as we boarded and pulled up a chair next to the grandparents, she started belting out the screams. She usually only cries if she needs something...a bottle, a burp, a nap. Seriously, she's mostly a very happy baby. But that afternoon she was completely inconsolable. The list of possible irritants ran through my mind over and over again, it couldn't have been the movement or the breeze. Like most babies she likes a gentle rocking and she's already spent more time outdoors than most of her school age cousins, so I knew it wasn't the breeze.
After much rocking and pacing back and forth, fretting that my screaming baby was disrupting the party, my mother-in-law's sister-in-law, (really I don't know how else to explain it), walked up to me and very sweetly insisted that I hand over the baby to her, saying that she remembers what it's like to be a new mom with an upset baby, and that I return to my table and finish eating my lunch. Before I knew it she and a couple of other ladies were passing Ezra around, rocking and playing with her, and she and I were both as happy as clams.
It's true, what they say, that once you're a mom it's like all of a sudden you're part of some secret club. And it is great. Ours is an ancient, world-wide club of strong, compassionate, and understanding women that I am so proud to be a part of. And I can't wait to help out the next mom.
