Here’s why: When I picked up my son, Bing, because he was screaming his head off like he was in the final stages of starvation, and told him, “Don’t worry, I’m going to feed you,” and then, to soothe him, held him up in front of me and made the faces and noises he loves, and he THREW UP RIGHT INTO MY OPEN MOUTH, so that I tasted baby bile and regurgitated breast milk and it spilled all down the front of my shirt, I neither reciprocated and vomited into his mouth because the little fucker deserved it, nor did I throw him across the room and shriek in revulsion because I could not “man up” and swallow. No, my first thought was, “Shit, I forgot to burp him.” Then I imagined the scene from his perspective:
Bing’s shitty morning with the dumb giant
Okay, I’m on my back in my happy place and everything is pretty chill because I’m in a fresh diaper and wearing a clean shirt (the one with the boats on it), but something is wrong—you know that feeling? The wrong feeling? Like when someone drops your head the last inch to the mattress or you just know they’re gonna walk out of the room and leave you in the crib without your ugly doll? And then I figure out what’s causing it: the electric sun is not singing. Sing, sun, sing! I command. But there’s no response. I feel empty. I don’t cry often, but man, when the sun doesn’t sing even when you’ve got a clean diaper and a boat shirt on, you’ve run out of options. Time for the waterworks. I cry for a long, long time. Really long. Forever long. Hey, I’m crying over here? What does a guy have to do to get noticed? Service is miserable in this place. I consider crapping my pants, but that’s risky because sometimes it’s not stinky enough to create the kind of urgency I need at this juncture. Finally, my giant shows up with that obsequious smile of his—like I don’t know he was hiding out in the break room arguing politics with some douchebag on the innernuts—and transports me across the room to the comfy spot in the puffy place with the blanket. He puts the artificial boob in my mouth and I drink. Nothing like expressed breast milk to put things in perspective. I decide not to fire him. I really kind of like him. Maybe I’ll start calling him that gibberish “dadadadada” name he keeps blathering at me. Also, I’m not sure how easy giants are to come by. My other, Doot, and I have two of them, a male and a female. I know, it’s extravagant, but hey, we need them. We’ve even discussed trying to get a third. Or moving somewhere with better healthcare. I sent a letter to Nana requesting asylum in her house, but I’m afraid it may have been intercepted by one of the giants. They’re pretty wily for brutes that can’t babble properly.
While I’m in the puffy place on the blanket, I see Doot in one of the giant swings. He spots me and the artificial boob. He is pissed. It’s in the rules that we get as much boobz as we want and, to be honest, I’m worried about his consumption. He gets pretty squirrely when he doesn’t get his drink—sucks his thumb and whines. Frankly, it’s pathetic. Milkaholism affects the whole family. Anyway, Doot is thirsty. I can practically hear his tummy tiger growling. So I knows he’s scared, because the tiger might get big and eat him if he does not get his own fake boob. He screams: “WHAeAyA AgAiAvAeA AmAeA AsAoAmAeA AoAfA AtAhAaAtA AwAhAaAtA AyAoAuA’ArAeA AdArAiAnAkAiAnAgA AIA AnAeAeAdA AiAtA AbAeAfAoArAeA AmAyA AtAuAmAmAyA AdAeAcAiAdAeAsA AtAoA AeAaAtA AmAeA!”
In a blatant display of favoritism, the giant responds to Doot immediately. The artificial boob is yanked from my mouth the instant it is empty (and it was only a half booble) and I am shunted into the other giant swing while Doot is rescued and given his own fake boob. To think I was starting to like that giant. I’ll say “Mother, I love you best,” and present her with a rose and a sonnet before he gets one “dadadadadadadadada” out of me.
Then, sitting in the swing—I do some of my best thinking here—it occurs to me the giant has two hands. In fact, I’m sure I recall him holding boobles for us simultaneously. I could STILL. BE. DRINKING. I start screaming. I call the giant every bad thing I can think of: taco pits, stubble face, no boobs. I scream so loud the boob giant hears and calls up from whereever she is, probably out getting her boobs refilled, to tell the dumb one to feed me. He waits until Doot passes out (pathetic) and then comes to get me. He comes over cooing and making burbling noises, eyes wide with that goofy open mouth smile. He picks me up and it makes me so mad I get ill. So I puke into his mouth and instantly I feel better.
But I’m still considering emigrating to Nana’s.
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Doot, right about here you are wondering why I’m holding a camera, and not a bowl of Sweet Potatoes. Right after this was taken, no doubt a memo of protest was drafted and landed in my inbox, but it’s all fuzzy now because this is my fifth month straight of pulling triple shifts with my colleague in this Doot and Bing Raising enterprise, your father.
