My baby was born grappling with the heavy questions that most of us don’t start to ponder until puberty, midlife, or old age. But because she can’t dye her hair black, buy a sports car, or yell at the self-checkout register in the grocery store, her burdensome thoughts are expressed in decidedly babyish ways.
My motherly intuition senses that my baby is an old soul, recalling many past lives and really feeling them. According to her doctor, she’s teething and has gas. This may be true on a basic level, but I am certain that she’s also a highly advanced nascent human with acute existential angst. I’ve lived long enough to know flatulence from the unbearable dread of existence.
Here is evidence of her Weltschmerz:
The baby screams and farts at the same time, over and over; is not soothed by cuddles, her pacifier, or her security blanket; and only calms down when I turn on the Smiths.
The baby lies face down on the floor for five minutes, arms splayed, and screams when I try to move her.
While reclined in her stroller, which is being pushed uphill by me, the baby slowly removes her pacifier, holds her arm out nonchalantly, and drops said pacifier onto the sidewalk, all while staring into my soul, or at my sweaty forehead, disapprovingly. She immediately bemoans her loss.
The baby keeps putting her full hand in her mouth, turning red, choking, and then laughing gleefully at my panic.
Upon meeting my friend’s well-behaved baby, Ernest, my baby throws a tantrum that includes a lot of bucking, flailing, and, ultimately, throwing her bottle at poor Ernest’s head. Ernest cries, which overjoys my baby because she now has a partner in angst.
The baby makes a sound that is technically “baa-baa-baa” but could also be “B.A.H.-B.A.H.-B.A.H.,” as in, “Bored as Hell, Bored as Hell, Bored as Hell.”
Surrounded by a blue teddy bear, a strange-looking knitted lamb, and the melted, purple-plastic blob she found at her cousin’s house and adopted, the baby suddenly begins to yell at her beloved toys with the passion of Greta Thunberg scolding the U.N. Then she falls backward and stares at the ceiling for ten minutes.
I pretend to be struck by an arrow and play dead, and this delights my baby so much that she starts clapping.
The baby takes one look at a smiling stranger who resembles Steve Buscemi and sobs inconsolably for an hour.
The baby grimaces while rejecting mashed-up avocado, so I put it on toast and eat it. She stares at me, frowns, and lets out a velociraptor-esque noise that seems to say, “It takes eighty-six gallons of water to produce a single avocado, many of which are grown in third-world countries by diverting water from rivers to irrigate crops, with devastating effects on local ecosystems and villages. Spread that on your toast, mother, you small-minded millennial.”
The baby never rolls, except when I place her on the bed. Then she barrels toward the edge like a nihilistic gymnast.
While resting peacefully in my lap, the baby suddenly throws her arms up and arches her back, diving head first toward the floor. She wails when I catch her.
While I rock the baby to sleep, she reaches a chubby finger through the darkness and pokes at my neck flab, reminding me that time is cruel and that I should invest in turtlenecks. Then she laughs, turns away, and farts forcefully as she stares into the inky abyss of night.
