Human Peculiarities

Dear Mama,

Humans are so peculiar sometimes! Or maybe it’s just my human. One day she’s trusting me to take care of both of her children, one of whom is almost as big as I am, for the whole day, and the next day she doesn’t trust me to clean up after she breaks something! What? I just don’t get it!

Okay, let me back up and start from the beginning. So I think I mentioned last time I wrote that Brad and Nicole were going to Chicago for their wedding anniversary to see an art museum, and I would be staying at home to take care of the babies. That happened yesterday, and it mostly went really well. Oh, there were a few incidents. Caleb was pretty emotional all day because he was missing his mama, and he was difficult to settle for naps and stuff. Charis was pretty good except around her mealtimes, and she did have one diaper explosion, which absolutely ruined the adorable outfit Nicole had dressed her in and meant I had to give her a bath. Other than that, it was a really nice day. I just wished I could have taken them outside because it was so beautiful out there. But that would have been very, very dangerous without Nicole or Brad, because to humans who aren’t in the know, I would just look like a small toddler. I think Caleb would have felt better if we could have done it, though. He loves to be outside. Sometimes Nicole takes him and Charis out to sit or lie on a blanket in the grass and play. I’ve been able to watch through the window, but couldn’t go out myself.

Something happened later in the day that changed that, though. I had finally, finally gotten Caleb off to sleep late in the afternoon, when I heard a soft thud against the front door. I thought about what to do for a minute, then hovered up to the peephole and just took a peek outside to see if someone was there. I saw the back of a man walking away, so I waited until he was gone, then opened the door and looked out to see what was there. It was a very small, light package. I brought it in and put it on the table to give to Nicole when she and Brad came home, and didn’t give it any more thought that day because I was busy with things for the babies.

Around seven o’clock, Caleb got especially upset, screaming and flailing and refusing to be comforted. By then Charis was really unhappy too, and nothing helped her except to hold her. I was just getting overwhelmed when Brad and Nicole came back, tired but happy, and took over. By then I was absolutely exhausted! I’ve invented a sort of semi-hover for when I absolutely have to move Caleb around. He can scoot, but just because he can doesn’t mean he always will, so if I really have to move him, I get him in an upright position with one hand behind his neck and one under his bottom, then use the Helping Hand to hover him while I support him like that. It works really well, and he likes it, but it is really, really tiring, plus I had been doing little light effects and stuff for him a lot during the day to try to keep him entertained. His favorites are overlapping, different colored geometric shapes that move and change to form bigger shapes, and change colors and spin around and stuff. He just loves those and will watch them for a long time. Charis seems to prefer faces.

Anyway, I was tired out, and Nicole said she would take the babies in with her, and I could go to bed and sleep as long as I felt like. It took her some time to get them settled, and I was just relaxing and unwinding, but after a while, she knocked on the nursery door and brought in the little package I’d brought in earlier. “This is yours, Elli,” she said, sitting down on the edge of my bed. “Do you want to open it now or wait until tomorrow morning?”

Well, that woke me up a little bit. She opened the thick envelope so I wouldn’t have to, then handed me a pretty little tissue-wrapped package. I didn’t want to tear that lovely, delicate paper, but she laughed and said not to worry about it. It’s so easy to forget how… well, careless humans are about things like that, because they don’t have to reuse everything as long as they can like we do. Inside the package was a long, creamy golden piece of fabric, cut and sewn into a point at each end. I didn’t know what it was, but there was a little instruction card with it that showed how to use it. It’s called a head wrap,” Nicole told me, “ and it can be wrapped and tied in lots of ways for lots of different looks. “Lulu and I thought it would be good for you when we go places, to cover up the tops of your ears without making you feel too hot in summer. I thought of it, but Lulu found this one and bought it for you.”

I was so, so tired, but I had to try it on right then. It took some time, and I needed some help, to get it wrapped, tucked, and tied just right, but it covered my ears nicely without making them feel all muffled.

“There, what do you think?” Nicole asked, tucking in an end and then letting go.

I reached up to touch it. “Wow!” I said. “Do I really get to go places with you now, like Bert does with L?”

Nicole laughed. “Well, you knew you would. I’m not going to keep you cooped up here forever. We just needed to find you the right thing, because I don’t want you to have to be a doll all the time, you know.”

I don’t know if they were teaching that when you were at Shya-Roven, Mama, but I was taught how to be a doll if I have to, if Nicole and Brad have people come over who don’t know about me and who might see me, or if my ears have to show in public for some reason. It’s sort of like putting a freezing spell on yourself, but not dangerous. I can still feel, hear, see, and smell things, but I don’t have to move at all. I don’t like it much because it makes me feel really vulnerable. Anything could happen to me when I’m being a doll, and I would have to just stay still and silent and let it happen. That scares me, especially now that I’m beginning to see and realize what a truly big world it is, and because all but the very youngest humans are bigger than I am. But if my ears are covered up and I’m a good enough actress, I can pretend to be a toddler, just another one of the kids, and still move around and even talk a very little, if I’m really, really careful what I say so I don’t give myself away by talking like a grown-up when I only look about two. So this head wrap made me really happy. I was a little nervous about how it would look on me, but thought I could wait until morning to find out because I just couldn’t face the thought of hovering up to the mirror above the bathroom sink to see myself. When I told Nicole I was too tired to hover, though, and said I would wait, she gave me a big hug, thanked me for taking such good care of the babies all day, and then gently carried me to the bathroom so I could see my reflection. I was afraid the wrap would look frumpy, like those scarves some old fems wear around their heads, but it doesn’t. It looks really cute! I went to bed very, very happy. Thank you, L!

I must have been more tired than even I thought, because the first sound I heard today was of something shattering, followed by Nicole’s loud cry of dismay from the kitchen. It was eleven o’clock by then. I came running as fast as I could, and oh, stars on the water, what a mess! It looked like a dish had just exploded all over the kitchen. Nicole had accidentally dropped a bowl, which she said was supposed to be one of those shatterproof ones, by the way, and it had landed hard on the tile and smashed into zillions of tiny shards. Caleb was crying because he was strapped in the bouncy seat and he couldn’t see Nicole around the corner. Fortunately Charis slept through all the racket.

Well, I hurried to help, and do you know what Nicole said? She said, “Oh, Elli, don’t come in here, sweetie. There are little splinters all over the floor and I don’t want you to get cut.” Just as if I really was the toddler I look like and couldn’t clean it up about a thousand times faster than she was doing with that horrible clumsy sweeper thing she has with the little brushes and wheels on the bottom and everything.

“Oh, Nicole, let me clean it up,” I said. “It’ll be so much faster, and anyway I have shoes on.”

“No, no,” she said very decisively. “You didn’t make this mess; I did. It wouldn’t be fair for you to have to clean it up. If you would, just see if you can distract Caleb for me. I’ll have it all done in a few minutes.”

It didn’t take her a few minutes. It took her almost two and a half hours, and she never, never would let me help! We’ve still been finding little bits all over the kitchen for the rest of the day. And then, after she was all done, she went over to the stove, and I saw she’d left three eggs just sitting in the pot she’d boiled them in and not even taken them out to cool in ice water, and she’d had coffee sitting in the pot for stars know how long, and even though it was past lunchtime, she just took the eggs out, peeled them, salted and peppered them, and had them with her coffee and some toast. Can you believe that? I mean, after they hammer it into us so hard at Shya-Roven that humans eat such different foods for different meals and we should always remember that and make appropriate meals according to the time of day, she just sits down and has breakfast at one thirty in the afternoon! I say it again, humans can be very, very peculiar.

Well, the babies are in bed, and the house is pretty quiet except for Brad practicing on his guitar. He plays that, and Nicole plays the piano. I love to hear them. Tomorrow Nicole and Brad go to church. I can’t go because people might ask too many questions if I always wear a head wrap and never get any bigger. Nicole says they care about the kids so much there, it wouldn’t be safe for me. So I stay here and take care of the babies so Nicole doesn’t have to leave them in the nursery, which she says is very chaotic because there are a lot of other babies there. I’d like to go because I’d like to hear people reading from the Bible. I like all the names and stories and stuff. But I love my babies and don’t want them to be somewhere that’s chaotic, and I don’t want to be in danger, so I won’t grump. More soon.

Love,

Elli