Your first head explosion

Today I woke up, took a shower, shaved and got ready like so many other times in my life. Its been years since I’ve had to do that, and so I don’t… normally. But I had to get off my arse and find a good preschool sooner or later for Calliope. Today was our parent tour of our one finalist in the list of preschools I’ve been researching. They have a spot open mid year which is lucky. They aren’t cheap. Neither are nannies. We really want her to be hanging out with other kids on a more regular basis. And not just one or two. Group dynamics are hard. I still haven’t conquered them and I’m pretty close to 40! Plus one of the neighbors’ little girl goes to this same school. We actually saw her there today which was kind of nice. Calliope would not be in her class as she is a little bit older, but they will see each other in the outdoor play area during the day. And its possible that we could work with the neighbors to organize group drop offs and pick ups! I love carpooling. It’s my version of saving the world. The school is great. The most amazing thing was the ratio of male to female staff/teachers. Its almost 50/50 which is extremely unusual. Being a gay man, I love it. It feels awesome. Don’t read more into that than need be. The other arresting moment I had was when I realized that I had been in a room of about fifteen two year olds for at least ten minutes discussing politics and what have you with the school administrator without being interrupted by craziness. It was calm. Fifteen kids, two year olds! It was incredible and that was when I was sure it would be a fine place for Calliope to spend some time. I think Michael was very happy with the visit as well. The paperwork might take a while with all the permission slips and doctors’ approvals, but I’m sure we’ll manage. I just don’t think she’ll be going there next week.
Afterwards, I dropped Michael off at the house and took Calliope with me to order a light fixture for a client. Well, that didn’t last long because she decided to throw a huge fit and we had to leave right in the middle of the transaction. That was fun. However, after a very stern conversation in the car with Calliope about her transgressions, I decided to try REI for some snow boots. We were successful and several people commented on how cute, nice or pretty my daughter was. One lady in line was so impressed I thought she was going to give me an award or something. Two and a half? Really! She is so tall and well behaved and well spoken. Its just unbelievable. Of course, I’m thinking to myself that only if she had seen Calliope a mere thirty minutes earlier, she would understand 🙂
We went home after that where I made lunch for everyone and Calliope went down for a slightly late nap. I typed some emails to clients, even made a couple of phone calls. Had decided to go down to the lighting store during naptime and finish my transaction from earlier, though I loathed the thought of the looks on their faces upon my return. Michael is on the phone. I believe he is talking to my sister’s partner, but when he comes towards me and puts the phone on speaker as he sets it upon the table, I know it isn’t her. Michael knows how much speaker phone is not an option for me. It feels so cold. There’s always a pause where there shouldn’t be in conversations caused by this form of speaking on the phone. I can’t hear it that well, and I’m never sure if they can hear me. Its just awkward and I hate it. Anyway, its our Adoption coordinator. There is very little information. New Orleans, no drugs or alcohol, picked us specifically, black baby due on Tuesday of next week. Are we in? Yes, we are in. Please get the ball rolling to get more information as soon as possible. This means finding an agency in LA that will work with our agency here to administer all the paperwork, legal and otherwise. They will also coodinate an assessment of the young lady to ascertain the truthfulness of everything reported. We only have a week, not even. Get over there and do it already. They will, but its already the end of the day there and so we won’t hear anything again until tomorrow. But we can’t exactly wait to start thinking about the possibilities, the ramifications, the torture a five day pregnancy would cause to our lives!!!! So I leave and go to the lighting store. Somehow facing them in light of new circumstances is trivial. And I do and I handle it. They are fine, cordial even. Then I run home, take some more work notes and scream out loud with anxiety every time my mind has a moment and stop about the possibilities. Should we take Calliope with us, or leave us here? Wait. One couple we know were out of town for a month for an out of state adoption. We can’t leave her that long. No, she definitely has to come with us. Do we have enough starwood points to cover a suite in New Orleans for at least a couple of weeks? Ha. Thats funny. Because we totally do!
Oh wait, we have to wake up Calliope because we have an interview with a potential babysitter in about fifteen minutes. Great. Do we have a list of everything we want to talk about? Have we even thought about it? Can we possibly do this given the phone call that we just got? I’m losing my mind here. But we do go through with the meeting. The lady is nice. A little older than I expected, but completely comfortable with Calliope and us. We will definitely use her, I’m sorry, IF we don’t have a newborn baby in five days. We will not be going on any “date nights” which was the whole purpose of a babysitter. This is ludicrous. What about that client that I just landed that has exactly two pieces of furniture in his whole house? Superfluous I know, but my head is spinning and … well… lets just order pizza and watch a bad movie. Michael is totally game. Man I love him.