I have waited the 25 years of my adult life to discuss the structural integrity of block towers with you. I found your blocks before you were born, storing away the website I could buy them from, so they'd be ready for the day we could build together. You can sit up now and you sit with your hands resting on my thighs for support as I show you each block piece, describing its attributes.
The kingfisher-blue oblong block is my favourite, a real workhorse in the block collection, the unsung hero quietly lending itself to both flat planes for balancing other blocks on, and height, where it can elevate the tower quickly, reaching lofty levels above your head while your forehead creases in the beginning of a frown. The plain wooden square block is our next best friend, creating a solid base instantly, though you barely notice it. You clutch the more complicated orange cylinder, a showstopper, flashy and bright but limited to standing on either end, though the temptation to lay it on its side will prove hard to resist, the tower dashing to the ground, sending the pieces under the couch while you squeal in surprise.
You've learned what falling means, and you've learned cause and effect, your tiny anemone fingers reaching to tear down what I build up. This game is every bit as good as I had imagined. It is better because you are my child, and I can feel you learning in my arms. Your body vibrates with new knowledge, your huffy breath falling from you in excitement as the blocks fall away from us. You lean in, your eager torso straining at its edges, your curiosity testing the seams of your frame.
I've never seen anyone eat watermelon the way you do. You don't eat it so much as destroy it, bending your almost-8kg frame in half to lean on my hands as I hold the bursting red pieces for you. The slurp and liquid crunch, the sucking and snorting, the inevitable spitting out of the pieces that are still too big for you to swallow, then the beaming grin as the juice runs down your chin and down my hands and elbows. Those sounds of complete, abandoned enjoyment repattern the beat of my heart to something more jaunty, more robust. At the end of your lunch we are both covered in food, and I feel the euphoria of having filled you up properly. I never knew being a mother would provide me with this kind of satisfaction. It is the particular gratification of your round little belly swelling above your nappy when I change you, the smears of sweetcorn puree near your ears, mashed kūmara blocking your nostrils.
You were very nearly not mine. We waded through needles and drugs and fear to bring you through. I have never wanted anything more than I wanted you. It caused me pain every single day that we tried. Each time the test was negative I broke apart and it took days to come back together. I kept my positive pregnancy test in the bottom drawer of my bedside table and checked it almost every day that you were growing, afraid I had imagined the wonderful dual lines of your existence. You made it. You arrived with little fanfare, slipping into the world with the help of our obstetrician and her scissors, yelling at us all in the quick, pointed way that has become the signature of your displeasure. When you yell now it is only ever brief; you make your complaint, you move on. You would rather wrestle on the bed or ride the airplane of my shins than be cross.
