Straight No Chaser

You Do Too Have a Future

i saw lana at the grocery this morning. not the lana, not lamb lana, but our lana, our baby. and i know what aaron means, the cafe au lait thing. it is frustrating to watch somebody else push our baby out the front door, and not be able to stop her.

her hair was oiled and soft and parted into three sections, brushed and twisted and held in place with round plastic beads. yellow, to match her yellow overalls. she was eighteen months at oldest, and precious; a cinnamon clove dipped in honey, dark eyes, endless lashes. bright little studs in her tiny little ears. she liked to clap.

ironically, among the several things i was there to purchase, one was a mother's day card, which i will address to his mother and mail to louisiana sometime tomorrow. he is generally supportive but thinks this is a risky move. "everyone's going to hear about it," he said, referring to the grandmother as well as all the aunts, aunties, cousins and family friends looking to see him married off to a nice girl like me. "they're going to talk talk talk talk. i'm going to have to distribute a newsletter that says we didn't elope."

i said whatever, there are worse people you could have eloped with. and it's a totally generic card, the kind you'd buy for an aunt or a godmother.

anyway, i don't think it makes him uneasy, really, but for now i won't tell him about lana. maybe in june, or sometime when he's in a really good mood and feels like flirting, which generally entails talking about the future. not today, which is fine.

inasmuch as coffee-colored children are some type of commodity, i guess it's interesting to think that i have reasonable access to something somebody else might want. but i get it, it's frustrating. lana (whose real name was jaden or something) wandered away from her mother at one point, while i was choosing the card. toddled right up to me, wrung her hands together and gave this breathy little laugh, then turned and toddled back. her mother didn't look down or say a word about it, didn't seem to notice she'd been gone.

i could have snatched her up and run out the front door with her, easily. yes, there are better ways to obtain adorable babies. but still. if lana's out there, growing up without us, i'd like to know somebody's sort of looking after her.