Saturday, June 24, 2006

"Hello" To The Magical Land of Sleep-Dep

When you're getting by on scattered sleep, your level of consciousness becomes largely a matter of negotiation.

So it's taken me this long to sort out what I dreamt from what I remembered about yesterday morning. Early yesterday morning.

JOOB woke me about 3:45 for a feed, which, as near as I could figure out in a half-sleep, meant I could catch the end of the Croatia match, so I put the TV on (with the sound off) and saw, to my horror, that at the 75 minute mark, Australia was down 1-0. I turned the TV off, finished feeding JOOB, and went back to bed, hoping we'd come back in the last few mintes and equalise. Instead, I woke up next morning to the news that Croatia had beaten us 2-0. Nuts.

Then I was awakened again by the muffled cheering which indicated that somewhere out there in the night, people who'd watch the game in its entirety were celebrating. Bloody Croatians, I muttered to myself and went back to sleep.

When JOOB refused to settle after his next feed, I decided to stay out in the lounge with him. After an hour attempting to persuade him to go to sleep, I was desperately tired and unhappy. Between our World Cup loss and JOOB's ever-changing feeding demands, it'd been a hell of a lousy night.

And then JOOB gazed up at me with his big bright eyes and said, very clearly, "Hello".

Well, that woke me up. Of course, JOOB didn't say an intelligle word after, but it didn't matter. Australia may have lost, but my 11-week-old son spoke to me.

Needless to say, when Skribe woke me later to say we'd drawn with Croatia and were through to the second round, I was more than a little confused.

It would seem being in a permanent fog of sleep-deprivation leads me to interpret what I see and hear "differently", or else the events of early yesterday morning took place in an alternate reality - one where Australia lost but JOOB spoke.

Never mind. I may have remembered it "wrong", but it's still a sweet memory to have - JOOB's first word - "Hello".

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

i am with you on the speaking. with parents like you two, the little thing is bound to be highly advanced. giver a high five from me kay?

ToxicPurity said...

Done.

Okay, it was more like a game of bumper-fists but Joob gets the idea.

High-five! Good boy, right in Mr Rabbit's face. HIgh-five! Yes, now let go of Mummy's hair. High-five again! That's Daddy's nose, sweetie...