Get Out of My Way, I'm Walking Here

Something occurred to me today: Jack and I are the New Yorkers of the family. Jeff and Rose are, well, the not-exactly-New Yorkers of the family.

Sometimes (often) I look at my son and think, WHO are you? HOW are you you? I think of myself, in my most self-deprecating modes, as lazy and low-energy. Meanwhile, he careens through life, his energy can be explosive, his emotions are full-force. And he's been like this since approximately Day 3. A little background, if I may semi-digress. This kid almost did me in in his first 6 months of life. He never slept and he always cried. Cry isn't the accurate word; it's nowhere near adequate to describe the tortured screams that were always either in progress or moments away from starting. Sometimes he could barely be held safely in arms. He arched his back with great strength, almost flipping himself backwards. And he regularly scrabbled at his own head, leaving scratches, in seeming agony. 

In desperation, after exhausting more traditional approaches, we took him to a holistic healer, a local acupuncturist who didn't use needles on babies as young as he, but had some other mystery methods. She smiled at us in sympathy, and took him from us, laying him down on a blanket in front of her. She smiled at us again, a kind, but just slightly patronizing smile, to say, "I've got this." Guess what, she didn't. He started to wail, and her hocus pocus didn't stop him, if anything, it enraged him more. She was taken aback; she seemed shaken. Still, she found something positive to say: "HE HAS A REALLY STRONG LIFE FORCE,"  and we clung to this comment, held on to it like a life preserver. This is all an old war story now, but apparently not irrelevant.

Finally I think Jack and I have a lot more in common than I'm quite willing to acknowledge, since he can aggravate me so intensely. He's not as alien to me as I often feel he is. Jack and I are hard-wired New Yorkers. He and I are perpetually in a rush; we share a sense of urgency; we have to BE somewhere, dammit, and you are slowing us down. That you can be Jeff or Rose. They don't seem to care if they're late, they amble, they take their own sweet time. FUCK, Jeff, let's go! Or the g-rated version, for Rose: ROSIE! pick up the pace! We're late again. I speak to them in italics.

I'm not making a judgment. Or, I am, but I'm not sure what the verdict is. Should Jack and I slow it down a little? Should Jeff and Rose PICK UP THE FUCKING PACE? Or can we accept -- or, sigh, at least tolerate -- our foursome's diversity of speed? The way we New Yorkers, despite our sometimes-angry energy, ultimately tolerate each other, and even tolerate those goddamn rubbernecking ambling tourists on the sidewalk in front of us near Herald Square while we're rushing to work. All along the way, I mutter curses and threats under my breath, but this is where I live. End of story. And Jack and Jeff and Rose are what they are, even when my fists and teeth clench in a barely-reined-in fury. End of story