‘Ms I don’t know’ sits down across the library table from me. For now I’ll call her Ms Mom. Immediately my shackles cackle. A baby in a pink fuzzy outfit is on her mother’s lap. I assume the young woman is the child’s mother but could be an au pere or a nanny and I don’t care. The baby doesn’t walk, talk or read, can’t even sit up straight. She fusses, cries, disturbs my making a decision about which books I should check out.
The mother removes an empty plastic bottle from her knapsack, unscrews the top that already has an uncovered nipple on it. Into the bottle she pours canned water and some yellowish powder, tightens the lid, puts her unwashed hand over the nipple and vigorously shakes the concoction.
My eyebrows furrow. What is that girl/woman doing? Did I sleep through 30 years? Don’t mothers sterilize anything any more? Don’t they have to warm the dextrose/milk in the already sterilized glass bottles, put a sterilized nipple on it and before feeding the baby, shake a few drops of the formula on her wrist to be sure the baby isn’t burned?
I look again at what is going on (or not going on) and the baby gives a loud burp. Before I can pull my books aside, curdled spit up polka dots Wuthering Heights, a book I have read three times and still love. My eyes glower at the mother who makes no move, no apology. The baby then heaves up most of her meal, on to my slax and into my shoe. While I’d like to give ‘Mom’ a good tongue lashing, I pick up the soiled book with a few sheets of wrinkled Kleenex I carry in my purse, wipe off the mess and take the book to a librarian, point out the culprit and head for the ladies’ room to salvage my slax.
Cool down, Fool , I tell myself. Water will make things worse. As I open the door, in walks Mom, dangling the baby by one arm. She looks at me as if she never saw me before and asks me to hold her baby while she uses the toilet. The baby really stinks and so do I. My heart has empathy for the child not for the mother. I turn into a bitch, ignore her and leave her to her own devices.
I go back to the book shelves, find another worn copy of Wuthering Heights and hate myself for days.
About Me
- Zela Bop
- It was Christmas Eve, 1924. A baby girl was almost not born. Her umbilical cord was wrapped tightly around her tiny throat. Somehow with magical fingers, and needed knowledge, the doctor managed to save baby, a holiday gift for the waiting family. As years passed, so many memories remained for Zelda Brotman. Yet at age 50, when her older brother told her he always thought of her as “Zela Bop,” she was puzzled. He said when people would stop to say ‘hello’ to the cute little red headed kid and ask her name, she couldn’t say it right so out spurted “Zela Bop!” And Zela Bop she was, until her tongue untwisted.
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