The Number One Topic of Conversation is Number Two

Todd here again. In this installment, I offer my keen insight, sharply honed wit, and effusive, evocative, and inimitable style on the topic of doo-doo.

Remember, I am a professional writer. I get paid to put words to the unspeakable. Don't try this at home, kids.

We are now fourteen days into Naomi's life and I have become that most dreaded of beings: the cliche. I am overanxious about my child's health. I wake up in the middle of the night to make sure she's breathing. I stay up at night wondering how I'm going to pay for her to go to college -- a decision that is more than seventeen years away.

But the thing that has made me the greatest cliche of all is the fact that I love to talk about my baby's shit. There is no part of her crap that I don't like to discuss: shape, size, volume, frequency, consistency, and color -- it's all fair game.

On the one hand, there's a fairly simple explanation. When a baby is breastfeeding, there's really no way to tell how much she's getting, so you pay attention to the diapers. More than X wet diapers and more than Y dirty diapers and your baby is likely doing fine. (You also look for weight gain, but that's not as much fun to talk about.) For the overanxious parent (like me), the dirty diaper is a little gift, a reminder that she's a healthy baby girl. Every time she poops, she poops pennies from heaven.

But that's kind of a simple explanation. There's another level to it, too, which is that I think my daughter is funny, witty, and charming, and is best -- nay, only -- able to express herself through bowel movements.

Take, for example, her latest opus. (Please!) One of her favorite things to do is to dirty a diaper moments after it has been changed. Funny stuff! Well, this is one of those times. So Daddy -- that's me -- pulls off the now-soiled wrapper and begins cleaning. That's when Naomi pees. Haw haw! Funny gal. So Daddy rolls the baby over to begin cleaning her back -- the place where all liquid rolls -- when Daddy hears a loud, eerie, and demonstrative sound come from his daughter's bottom. It is the sound of a thousand deaths. It is being; it is nothingness; it is wet and mustardy and it is moving very quickly through the air.

If projection counted, this one would have scored major points. Unfortunately, it does not count, except in Daddy's heart.

I'm glad you're healthy, sweetness. Keep up the good work.