This is where Mulan spends most of her day, nestled in a soft bed made of a cigar box, cotton material and an upside-down strawberry crate. Henry got into the car yesterday in a grumpy mood, tired and unwilling to share what had happened that day. Henry is almost
never in a bad mood, so when I gently probed, I learned that not only was he tired of dealing with his egg, but the whole project was getting
boring and
hard.
Tell me about it, I said, trying not to sound smug. Henry slumped further down in his seat, clutching Mulan's box.
The money thing is just hard, he said,
I'm tired of it. I just raised my eyebrows and murmured
The other night, at the school's fundraiser, I had commiserated with Henry's in-laws about the project. The father thought it was
too negative as did a haughty French woman I'd met earlier in the day who I rather ineffectively argued with about being a thirteen year old parent. She was impossibly French, inferring confidently in the usual never-disappearing-French-accent-despite-years-and-years-of-living-in-the-United-States that with the proper
amour, a baby can be a beautiful thing. She disapproved of making the whole baby thing so negative. When I pointed out that I was the loving mother of three and the only mother in the room, actually, and that I would
of course, support, a baby if Henry were to have one, but that it would be an unequivocal disaster, as far as I'm concerned. Frankly, I wanted to say that if Henry were to have a baby, I would be hard put to not say
Your life is fucked.
Oh la la.
So, the ride home in the car was pretty silent. Moods were grumpy enough that Oliver's pleas to play music from the station that rotates about six songs were ignored, and when we pulled up to Noah's house to drop him off, I cheerfully asked whether I could take a photo of Baby Brooklyn. Noah, who is a quiet guy and probably the sweetest kid on the planet, cheerfully uncovered Baby Brooklyn for his first photo:
Noah, I might remind you, is a single parent, and while
I'm a little bit in debt, he told me,
everything is pretty good.
Reader, I'll let you take that where you will.
Mulan, Part One
Mulan, Part Two
