Of Halloween and Eating Babies

Happy Halloween! More and more Austrian children and drunken young adults celebrate Halloween each year, but alas our baby is a little too young.  I secretly would like nothing more than to dress her up like she's going to an Anne Geddes photo shoot but sadly I couldn't think of a single justification. 

Babies dressed as food. (Actually I think this is
freaking adorable. Costume here.)

Anyway, because Halloween is supposed to be at least a little scary, I thought this would be a good time to bring up the eating of babies. As in, you know, eating babies. 

This is a terrible thought, right? Occasionally you read a story in the newspaper about people who killed and ate a baby and it is the absolute worst crime that there is, the most heart-wrenching:  the murder and cannibalism of a defenceless little muffin. 

A cutesy poopsie muffin that you just want to EAT. 

You see? What is wrong with us? We compare babies to food all the time - pumpkins, cookies, sugar, honey, sweet peas, nuggets, peanuts.  

We're so sick in the head, half the time it's the first thing we talk about when we meet a new baby. As we pretend to gnaw on one of their tiny feet or slurp on a mini-finger, we'll coo and say one of the following: 

"Ooh, I just want to eat that arm!" 

Also dressed as a vegetable.
Well, technically a fruit. You see what I'm saying.
This costume for sale here.

"I want to nibble on her fat little toes!"

"Look at those squishy little cheeks - yum yum." 

"I am going to eat you right up! Yes I am! Yes I am! Num num num num num." 

Where did this come from? Does every culture do this, or do we just need some kind of collective therapy? 

Anyway, this week it became clear to me how deeply ingrained is this habit of equating cute with delicious as I was talking to our niece, who is our buddy and just the sweetest little eight-year-old in the world. We were sitting with the baby between us, and the niece says to me (in German): 

"Ach, she is just so cute I want to EAT HER. You too?"

"Sometimes," I say. I smile at the baby and pretend to chew on  her foot. "Because you're so sweet and delicious, right? Hum num num." 

Um. So cute, so wrong!

The baby giggles.  

"Hahaha," laughs our niece. Then she says, "We can split her. Fifty fifty. The left half for you, the right half for me."

I look up. 

This peanut costume also kind of looks like 

something else that starts with a p that you 

would not dress your child as. Cute kid though.

The site its from has a bunch of food costumes for 

babies. Yum! 

She goes on, "And we'll have her head for breakfast, the middle for lunch, and the feet for dinner. Right? We should save the feet for last. Because they look the most delicious." 

I am horrified. 

"Dude. What are you talking about?" I say to her. "That's sick." 

The niece looks at the baby. "Oh," she says, leaning her sweet head on a fist. "Yeah, true. That is sick." 

And you know, it kind of is. Happy Halloween! 

P.S./Update: You know who probably really eats babies? Fox News. Please see this article about Halloween. It leads with "Finding a Halloween costume that doesn't terrify politically-correct college busybodies could be a challenge this year..." and goes on to quote campus organizations that raised concerns about blackface or dressing in sombreros or as geishas and so on. I actually agree with Fox that half the fun of Halloween is being a little offensive, which is why next year I think I'm going as Fox News. 

Boob: Once More, With Feeling!

Some time in the last two weeks our sprout hit a major developmental milestone when she parted her precious lips and, instead of crying, said, "Goo?" 

Her first sounds sounded vaguely like "hello" ("egh'looooo"), which was cute, and like "boob", which is even better. When she's upset she'll stick out her tiny little lower lip, say "booboobooboob," and drool. From a evolutionary perspective this adorableness is a pretty effective strategy, I have to say. 

Anyway, now we're trying to teach her that the sound "boob" has an actual meaning. 

"Boob?" I'll ask, encouragingly. "Are you hungry?" 

Alex says, "Is it time for a boob party*? Booooobies?" He points. 

I do a suggestive little shimmy. "Booooobs." 

Nava says "boobooboob." 

The cats pee on the floor. 

On one hand she doesn't really get it (it'll be months before she says a real first word and a few more after that before she really means anything she says). On the other hand, when she is unhappy, boob is always the answer so maybe she'll eventually put it together. 

I tried to film her saying "boob," but obviously as soon as I had my phone out she stopped. So here we have a video of me trying to coax her into saying boob, but with no success. The good news is that she makes other cute noises. 

I've read that kids don't remember anything that happens before they can talk (which will make that a dangerous little milestone). That had better be true, because her father and I are basically twelve-year-olds who are allowed to drive and buy candy whenever we want. Oh, and have children. (I'm beginning to realize why the world is in such a state.) Also, in two years Nava is going to walk up to some lady, point and say "BOOBS" and that will be our just deserts. 

____________

* Around here we refer to breastfeeding as "having a boob party," because infantile. When Nava was just a couple of weeks old we went down to the Lainzer Tiergarten for a walk. If you don't know (and if you don't live in Vienna, why would you), it's an enormous (really enormous) park with miles and miles of trail through woods and across meadows. If you like, as we did, you can pretend to enjoy some memorably bland gray food at the Rohrhaus. (Pro Tip: Bring a sandwich). Anyway, while we were there we spent some time eating ice cream on a scenic meadow that was riddled with a whole biology lesson's worth of animal poops. We sat in the sunshine, and confronted for the first time ever with sunshine, Nava freaked out. She continued to freak out all the back across several kilometres of trail and into the car, where she freaked out all the way home. During this time we pleaded and begged with her to relax because a "boob party" was just around the corner ("Think about it logically," as Alex likes to tell her when she is truly falling apart. "Let's analyze this situation together."). And so now we say "boob party". 

DAAHHHH!

I didn't have any time to blog last week because I was busy. What's that, busy? Me? No. But I am not going to the office and my kid can't even walk yet, can't even talk. What is it that I DO all day? Surely I am not BUSY. 

Reader, perhaps you are clever and can see I'm about to go off on a long and pitilessly boring rant. I'd like to apologize in advance, but only pro forma, because as I shall convincingly argue here, I deserve your sympathy. 

Last night I went to bed planning to blog about some fun things that happened on the weekend. But this morning I awoke to find more cat pee in the hallway and my heart was filled with the blackest rage. A dark cloud descended and I realized (how did I fail to see it before?) that I am the victim of countless horrors. 

There is a sticky spot on the living room floor of indeterminable provenance and when I look upon its tacky face I hate it. I hate it for existing, for catching lint, for making me stoop to clean it up. 

And I hate its family. The other cursed sticky spots - be GONE, you foul flat beasts - and their distant cousins, the dustballs and the dirty dishes. I hate their cnidarian immortality, the way they sprout new limbs, keep walking, always return in defiance of science and morality. 

I am Sisyphus; no, I am Prometheus - and these coffee grounds do mock my pain. 

Some old exhortation about joyful hearts flickers briefly across my mind but I stamp it out like a weak bug. Unsatisfied by my generalized fury, I set upon a hairy sock that is not mine but which belongs to my husband. That cretin. Oh God and these pants of his on the floor, doubtless a provocation. 

Is he trying to say that in addition to everything else I am now solely responsible for the laundering of his clothes, that I have nothing better to do than scrape his rags off the bedroom floor, that my time is less valuable than his time and that since I look after our child I am effectively his cleaning lady? Because I have news for him, that man, this guy, my husband. I will not be taunted into washing your pants AGAIN, sir, no! Not for me, SIR, your pants, again. Actually, I might even wash your pants for you, as a favor, because I am lovely and kind, but I will not have you mindlessly expecting washed pants. I am a feminist, for fuck's sake. 

I suddenly yearn for the kind company, virtual or physical, of those awesome and supportive Sisters, with or without kids, who say nice things and are self-deprecating and hilarious. I want to braid your hair and be like you. Briefly, the ice in my heart melts.

But not for long. As I storm about collecting the raft of waste paper that has accreted on our furniture (receipts, price tags, and magazine inserts entreating me to subscribe at a discount: to you I say DAAHHHH) I catch a glimpse of myself in the mirror and my ire takes another turn. Surely it is someone else's fault that I am still so fat. 

Actually, that's probably just my fault, which is why this is an unpleasant train of thought. But you know who sucks though? Those Other Women. Those judging harridans who are not among the handful of awesome and uplifting Sisters, but instead want you to know that whatever you are going through now, you are wrong and it gets worse. To those women who would like me to feel worse so that they can feel better, and while I'm at it, to those women who would have me believe that pacifiers breed 26-year-old thumbsuckers: F*** you. All of you. You are not helping. 

***
Glad I got that out of my system. And now, you know who's awake? My daughter. Who is also daughter of my gorgeous husband. She has this smile. 

Unfortunately for her, she also has a mother who is blatantly insane. Don't look at me though. That's someone else's fault.