Thomas the Tank Engine is wrapped in clingfilm, has been since yesterday. Buzz Lightyear is also wrapped in clingfilm, but that's just a copycat gesture. My eldest gets more eccentric by the day. He's only 4 but I am sure that by the time he reaches puberty he'll either be genius level at whatever subject draws his massive intellect or sat in a dark room reciting only prime numbers and pulling his hair out one by one.
Having children was not on my list of things to do, climb to Machu Picchu, yes (done); see Carnivale in Rio, yes (done); marry an insanely wealthy ex-model with an IQ of 170, yes (still looking). Having children, no. Mum had already been warned not to expect any more grandchildren from her barren eldest child. It was Enrico who convinced me that it would be a good idea and frankly, I was getting towards a certain age and looking forward, the future looked just a bit too much, 'same-old same-old' tending worryingly towards the 'oldest swinger in town'. Not ever for one second expecting it to really happen, we started trying and within one month - Giorgio! Ha! Dig that one out of the back of the net, Trevor!
We were really really not prepared and when he arrived a month early, this strange, baby-spider-monkey-like little beast, we were just utterly unprepared. Enrico manifested this by carrying on going out every weekend and I manifested this by - well, I don't know really. It is just such a crazy thing, having a baby. All of a sudden whole worlds open up you never knew existed while many previous worlds are closed and gone forever - not a bad thing in many cases.
A whole new world of GUILT opened, for example, and is pretty much a constant companion these days, now more familiar and therefore easier to cope with but I remember calling my brother and telling him how guilty I felt for everything, from having a drink of wine to leaving the TV on standby (yikes, all those precious resources wasted). His reply has stayed with me since: 'Welcome to being a parent'. Apparently, it's normal to feel guilty all the time. I sit here - even though it's a Saturday and E's sat next to me watching the news and the boys are playing quite happily in their room - and feel guilty I'm not whipping up an exciting activity to stretch their little minds. Or that I haven't yet started a programme to get Giorgio reading properly. Or that I don't give Edoardo enough time to help him colour inside the lines better. Or that this week I gave them pretzels and Cheesy Wotsits for dinner because I was just sooo tired. I don't like sending them to nursery every day, even though I have a fairly convincing argument why it is a good idea (I would kill the pair of them if I had to be with them all day every day) and hate leaving them there sat on their little tiny-person chairs, dear GOD it feels terrible, and yet it is no doubt better for them in the long run... Logic seldom enters into discussions where parent-guilt is involved...
The older they get, the more fun they are though, and the more they express themselves, the more you realise that you're not doing too badly. Really. All things considered. I am sure there's a good reason for Thomas being wrapped in clingfilm, and the fact that the number 1 has such significance. And that everything has to be blue. All perfectly normal. Nothing to worry about here. Probably. Who am I kidding. Whatever it is, it's all my fault!!!!
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