The Beginning of the End

Yesterday I sold a rather large baby item; the infant papasan seat that Momo got for us, when I discovered that I would need another place to set Big T, when he was a tiny, squishy, soft infant and I was nervous about what should be done with him when we weren't holding him.

He had sat in the infant seat, and listened to the music while it vibrated his teeny little body. Then, when he was too big for it, which came very quickly, I dutifully cleaned it (okay, I didn't really clean it), but I did dutifully and carefully pack it away, knowing that very soon we would have someone else using it. Someone else of ours would be listening to the music, staring up at the little round mirror, while the seat vibrated beneath them.

I did this with all of T's items, large and small, as he stopped needing them. He did eventually stop needing all of them, even the beautiful swing that was a gift from one of F's students. The swing was an integral part of our lives for his first year, and one day I had to wrest the swing away from F as he tried to put T's too big body in the little supportive and soothing cocoon. It was time to let it go. T was too big.

I packed up T's blue and white striped jammies with the hideous bunnies on them, the onesies that Grampa got him, all of the clothes and baby goodies that Grandma brought for us from Minnesota, the bottles, the pump, the other vibrating seat, the mobiles. This packing and storing was not a problem for me. I love to save things.

I have my Mom's woodland corelle. I have all of the letters my sister ever wrote to me. I have every single email my Dad sent to us from law school. I've saved all of my first communion cards, my speech critiques from high school, the "good luck" package that John Davis made for us when we went to state (minus the kool-aid drinks, of course). I have a guest book from the funeral of a man I never met who is my father-in-law. I save everything I can.

Now Big M is growing out of the things she uses. The swing, an integral part of her life too, I gave away to a family at our daycare. I felt good about this. I heard the woman mention how her "dream swing" would be the baby papasan swing, but that she hadn't gotten it as a shower gift. That was the swing we had! It was like it was "meant" to go on to the next person. I gave this to her with an open heart.

Big M is growing out of many things now. I looked over in our den and saw her infant papasan seat, and her other bouncy seat, and realized that she hadn't really used them in weeks. Well, once a baby stops using an item like that, it's not like they are going to return to it later when they aren't tired of it anymore. She wasn't tired of them, she'd outgrown them. Slowly but surely now, I have to go around the house, and decide what will happen to these outgrown objects. I can't help but want to save them all. The "save for posterity" pile is so much larger though, than the, "okay to get rid of" pile. I have to let some go. It's time.

The infant seat papasan seat, I suspected, would sell quickly. I was right. Not a day after I had put it up for sale, I had a buyer. I hated her at first. I hated having to respond to her email and say that, yes, I would meet her in a parking lot and exchange one of our baby things for her money. But I can't keep everything, even though I'd like to, so I met her.

She was adorable cute, and puffily pregnant. Even as I was bittersweetly sad to be handing over our seat, because we won't need it anymore, I was also thrilled and gladdened to see her smile and to hear her say, "Oh, it's so very sweet!" I shook my head to agree with her, it is indeed, so very sweet.