The Diaper: A Mother’s Companion: Part One

It’s 9:17 p.m.

I am parked in a car on the main street of Smalltown outside a bar where I once fell in
love with a guy who asked me to meet him in New York for Christmas. He said he’d fly
me there and I was young. Regrettably, the timing was wrong.

I contemplate going in.

Several things have happened. Sir Dick, the Guppins and I have moved from Big City
to this Very Large Village. Although I still have my apartment in Toronto (subletting
for three months) THANK GOD. It has been a complicated journey. There has been
the packing: his house, my house (not really), the Guppins sleeping at his place, then
at my place, camping in the new small-town house, the move itself, the episode of
Hoarders Sir Dick could have shot while I packed and rid his house entirely of debris
(yes, “debris,” as stipulated in the buyer’s contract). There has been stomach flu, the rat
who scurried — nay, boldly strode — around the living room while I packed.

When the movers picked up a couch, it darted into the kitchen.

(A squeal from within)

“The baby’s in the kitchen! The baby’s in the kitchen!” (me, running, anguished)

Mover guy: “Don’t worry, if it bit her she’d be making a heck of a lot more noise than
that.”

There has been the intense, almost indescribable mental anguish of Sir Dick at having
to burn away his old life for one anew at age 68. And, of course, the disintegration of our
relationship, which is a shambles, a reeking ruin of despair. But let’s keep this related to
babies.

I have discovered, through this journey, several new uses for the disposable baby
diaper:

A. To vomit into while driving.

B. To relieve myself into in the parking lot of the Mennonite thrift store.

C. To use as an overnight maxi pad when in desperate need.

Please please don’t tell my daughter.

I go into the bar.

-Drama Mama