a big sister

When  I walked into the living room this morning, Rudy was wailing on the couch, and Marley was beside her, plugging her ears with her fingers.  I noticed Bean's sly smile: apparently, when you're three, you really can make bad things go away by blocking your ears.  (Those who know me know that I try to avoid conflict and once literally pretended to be asleep - while a full-on, raging argument went on around me - to do so.)  I grabbed that little Rudy Toot and brought her into the kitchen.  Poor Bean: sometimes being a big sister is fun and rewarding, and sometimes it's loud and annoying.

Marley was the first visitor I had in the hospital after Rudy was born.  Rudy Joy was breech, wedged upside down with no chance of any last-minute gymnastics, and so after a c-section, I got to enjoy a five-day stay in the hospital.  And I really do mean "enjoy."  Nurses gave Rudy one bottle each night while I got extra sleep.  Sleep!  Late mornings, I wheeled Rudy back to the nursery, took slow, stiff showers, and changed into freshly laundered johnnies.  Laundry I didn't do!  I ate breakfast in bed, lunch and dinner in bed, and one night, a nurse brought cookies.  Cookies!  Todd came every day and most nights, and he brought Marley with him, and then he brought her home.  I read books (plural!), I watched Barack Obama give his first press conferences on CNN, I adjusted my hospital bed to its most comfortable positions, and I held, swaddled, fed, and loved little Rudy all by herself.

We told Marley that she was going to be a big sister when I was about four months pregnant, and then she waited a long time for it to actually happen.  The last few weeks were especially hard: Marley's number of tantrums far, far exceeded her quota, I waddled up and down the sidelines during the field hockey games I was coaching in increasingly chilly and wet weather, and the impending lack of sleep  was worrisome.  But when Todd wheeled Rudy, just hours old, into my room where Bean and I waited, Marley actually lit up.

 

For the first few days, Marley raced for diapers and wipes.  She wanted to help me hold each bottle.  (For the first few days, Marley also refused to call Rudy by her name.  Instead: Cinderella.  Of course.  I would say, "Isn't Rudy so cute?" and Marley would echo, "Isn't Cinderella so cute?")  When we brought Rudy home, Marley gave her a tour of the house, sorted her diapers into piles organized by Sesame Street character, and dragged her stepstool to Rudy's swing to activate the twisting and chirping bird, butterfly, and bee.  Now, though, when I ask Marley for a diaper or a tissue or a bottle, she's usually too busy.   Busy working on a puzzle or stirring a handful of rocks and several multicolored superballs into a tiny pot of stew.

When I gave Rudy her first sponge bath, Marley helped me to gather the towels, the soap, the cotton balls, the wipes, and the diapers.  Her first look at a poopy diaper may have been the beginning of the end of that sort of assistance.

But it's not really Marley's job to take care of Rudy.  It's Marley's job to be a crazy three-year-old: crawling on the floor gobbling, because she likes to pretend that she's a turkey; flapping her arms while she stomps up the stairs with crooked fairy wings on her back and a wand in her hand; and scattering puzzle pieces all over the living room, kitchen, and playroom floors.  Not to mention: whining for me to carry her things downstairs exactly the way she wants; refusing to say "please" so stubbornly that the most she'll concede is "pleh"; and of course, picking her nose no matter how many times I tell her to stop.  Once, Will tried to help me out.  "That's gross," he told Marley, older and wiser at four.  (His mom Liz smirked: "You should know, Will.") Anyhow, I imagine Marley will be telling Rudy the same thing in just another year or so.  That's a big sister's job.