Today was our first full day on Ko Samui and aside from a walk up the beach to see our friend Gina who is fasting at Spa Samui, S has mostly slept and ate while I’ve battled with sorting out an internet connection — seems I got the short straw.
Now that work is out of the way, S has two distinct modes — eat and sleep. While I’d seen hints of this modular behaviour before, its only now with the distraction and background noise of work out of the way, that I can see with absolute clarity her phases.
You see, all this time we thought the baby was constructing a jungle gym inside S, when in fact she was building a control centre. This control centre has two levers and I like to imagine her sitting between them on a nice little recliner chair afloat in a sea on embryonic fluid — in fact if we both were involved in organised crime I’d further imagine that she was a he (crime bosses never have girls) and the baby would be smoking a cigar, balancing some bourbon and swinging those levers to the background of an insane cackle of laughter…But as we’re not crime bosses and the baby is a she not a he, I prefer the image of her reclining on one of those little strappy lazy chairs with a copy of Hello!, perhaps a banana daiquiri on the side and the faint hum of Cafe Del Mar in the background…
So anyway, back to those levers.
The one of the left is marked “Sleep” and the one on the right is “Eat“. All she need do is lever one or the other and S has no choice but to obey — immediately.
Today was a prime example. S had been asleep for a good hour of so in the early afternoon, dead to the world. Then she leapt out of bed so suddenly it startled me and half dressed made for the door. Baby had the right lever pressed right to the floor.
“Where you going?” I asked.
“I want to eat, you can come down if it suits”
What a tempting invitation — note the use of the word want — S actually thinks she is in control of her actions…
So we get down to the restuarnt and order, S has a delicious fruit salad and I’m chatting away about something. Mid conversation, S’s eye’s glaze over and she looks away, obviously not even following what I’m saying.
“I’m going to bed. See you back at the room.”
And so it’s right lever back, left lever full forward.
I’ve done some research and have found this baby control centre is a common feature. I’m dreading the enhancement that should come in the next week or so — the mood button.
Fittingly, it is big and red.