Mama’s got a new ride.

I used to be the kind of momma who drove a pickup truck. I'm not sure what that means exactly, but I just know that it felt kind of cool to hoist the baby into the carseat and take off in our powerful truck, maybe with a bed full of cargo in back for some project or trip or something like that. It felt kind of rough and tumble, safe, powerful and kooky at the same time. Not your average baby-mobile.

Last week a mechanic told me not to invest more money into repairing my truck. This news came at a particularly bad time, as I have recently (as you know) re-entered the work force and started commuting to the city with my girlfriend. We share the driving – two weeks on, two weeks off – and we were just coming on my weeks when the truck noises led me to the mechanic's door.

There followed approximately a day and a half of research, comparison shopping, asking around and scoping out every car on the streets. Hubby and I came up with a list of vehicular requirements which included:

• Safety
  


• Cargo space
  


• Freedom from worry (i.e. a new model)
  


• All-wheel or four-wheel drive
  


• Power
  


• Towing capacity (for the fishing boat etc)
  


• 
  
  Fuel efficiency
  
  
  

  
  

And after filtering out all of the too big, too expensive, too weak, too small, and too ugly options, we came up with the idea that we'd go for a Hyundai Tucson.

When we got to the dealership a couple of things happened. Firstly, we looked at the Tucson and realized that the 2012 model is quite a lot like a large Pontiac Vibe, which is what we already drive. The car had been subtly redesigned so that the back end is less boxy, which means the 2012 has a hatchback that is more rounded than straight up-and-down, which means that the upper area of the cargo space is limited. There is no way we'd fit coolers, backpacks, fishing equipment, Nora's porta-crib, bedding and potentially our dog in that back space. If we ever decided to have a second child and the back seat space became occupied, we'd have a pretty hard time fitting our 80-lb Labrador in there let alone all of the necessities for a quick weekend at the cottage.

In the end, we allowed ourselves to be up-sold a bit. Coming in at just a hair over the price of the 2012 AWD Tucson was a 2011 AWD Santa Fe, which had all the cargo space we'd ever need in the interior of a vehicle. They just happened to have one on the lot that they wanted to get rid of (yeah right, I believe nothing) so we were able to negotiate the inclusion of a nifty cargo mat, a gas card, a tow package, four winter tires on rims, and 10 free oil changes.

I picked it up three days ago. It's black. It has bum-warmers in the front seats, and I can control my radio on my steering wheel (which I strangely find much more distracting than doing it the old-fashioned way). If my cellphone has its Bluetooth activated, I will be able to make phone calls simply by speaking loudly into the car. I have a remote lock on my keychain that goes "Woop woop!" so I no longer have to pretend by actually yelling "woop woop!" when I approach my car in parking garages. The seats are comfy and the engine purrs softly. It is AWD and has a v6 engine so it's nice and perky to drive – indeed, this car wants to go fast. Sorry officer! Not my fault. My car wants to go fast.

Now I am a mom with an SUV. I have a ginormous top-of-the-line carseat in the back seat – rear facing, natch – and when I blow-dry my hair and wear my pressed work clothes, and drop my toddler off at daycare with her little lunch baggie of wholesome breakfast food and overpriced bottles, I no longer recognize myself. At some point in the last year I became a full-fledged yuppie without even realizing it, but oh well, I see how it happens. My urge, when choosing a car in which to drive my baby around (and everything else to do with baby, of course), was to get the biggest protective bubble I could possibly find.

Today I wore my black converse sneakers as compensation. I may have to go out and get an edgy haircut and some funky sunglasses to disguise my newfound yuppiedom. I am avoiding Starbucks at all costs.

But I am now a momma with a hot new ride, no doubt about it.

Week Two.

Back at it, week 2.

This morning I dropped a very-unhappy little Nora off at daycare. She was fine as I unstrapped her carseat - she was even ‘whistling’ at the birds she saw on the power lines (going ‘ooo ooo ooo’ with pursed lips it’s the cutest thing) – and even as we entered Sue’s house. She started giving Sue the stink eye a minute later, and when I handed her over I got the baby chimpanzee clutch and the earfull of protest. When I waved bye-bye and left, I closed the door behind me and listened for screaming, and it was all I could do to keep putting one foot in front of the other and keep walking towards the car.

I just called just now (9:39) and apparently after I left, she sat down and barfed up her breakfast yoghurt, and then was fine. Hm. This is the second time Nora’s been to daycare, and the second time she’s barfed on Sue’s rug. Methinks she’s going to get herself a wee reputation. So not only is she no longer in the totally adorable outfit I put her in this morning (brand new t-shirt, new purple stretchy pants), she’s been changed into the emergency outfit I brought along – the shirt that’s covered in tomato stains that I noticed too late and pink pants that don’t totally fit anymore. Then she spilled water on herself in the highchair and Sue mistook it for a leaking diaper, so she changed her pants into daycare-issue hand-me-downs. My little urchin is now playing happily, dressed like shit, and this seems to be all I can focus on.

Let it go momma, let it go. She’s happy and playing with the other kids. So she doesn’t eat so well three mornings out of the week; she’ll make up for it at lunch and again at dinner, and then eat her fill at Oma’s on Mondays and Fridays. I don’t like the barfing but I’m not surprised; neither of her parents can stuff our bellies immediately after waking up, so why should she? I have to figure out this breakfast thing though. It’s not her favorite meal at the best of times, when we leisurely cruise in for breakfast at 9 a.m., so to expect her to wolf it down at 6:45 is asking a bit much.

What I really can’t take about this whole back to work routine is the mistrust. She now looks at me with a look of mistrust that breaks my heart. It’s a look that says “are you staying with me today, or are you leaving again? Where are you leaving me today?” and I can’t dwell on it as much as I do because it renders me non-functional.

Last week during my many moments of desperation I did all of the circular thinking around this change; I calculated how much it costs me annually to go to work ($12,000, including food, gas, parking, and a wee clothing allowance to be realistic) and figured out that it’s not financially worth quitting. I read a very interesting article about how Dutch women are doing exactly what they want to do, which usually includes working part time and spending the rest of their time being with their families or friends, and the ridiculous feminist hand-wrenching around the issue. I thought about our expenses and our revenues, and whether or not we could make it work on one salary and delay our dream of building a cottage until a time when Nora goes to school and I can re-enter work life with a more clear conscience, but that’s not quite do-able or right either. I considered whether or not my own job could be done from home or part-time (obviously it could, here I am writing this blog entry) but it would never fly with my boss or HR department. While my workplace is friendly, they are remarkably inflexible when it comes to arrangements like that. I thought about having a second child, so I can take another year off and spend it with Nora (and whassisname too, obviously). What my thinking exercise came up with is this: I am going to grow out my hair, so that I can just clip it up every day, and spend my blow-drying time in bed with Nora. There it is: I gained an extra 5 minutes a day and will look 8% crappier. And! I will save money on haircuts.

Which doesn’t solve my main problems, which are thus:

1. I miss Nora. I miss her so powerful much that it’s almost a physical response, like my guts are missing or something really dramatic like that.

2. It feels wrong to drop a one-year-old baby off at someone’s house for the day, as though all three of us are off to our respective locations every day. Like it’s her baby job. I drag her out of bed before she’s really ready and she’s all like “what the hell man?”

3. I have a hard time with the idea that for three days a week, Nora is on someone else’s routine, and ours is out the window. I have worked so hard to set a routine that works, and now it feels all loosey goosey and wrong. I worry about her food intake and her nap timing, and I worry about these things all day long. I try to impress upon Sue the importance of my routine and of jamming food into Nora, but all this barfing is leaving her unconvinced I’m sure.

4. Regarding said routine, I have a really hard time figuring out what to do about breakfast.

What I have to remember is what the Doctor tells me: she’s no longer a tiny baby. I no longer have to count millilitres of formula and tablespoons of food, I have to let her regulate what she wants and trust that she will get enough. I have to let go and realize that she’s big enough to make her own way in the universe a little bit, to hang out with other kids and develop socially in a way that she just doesn’t get by hanging out with me and the dog all day. I don’t want her barking before she can talk, after all. On Thursday she spent the day at daycare with 5 other little ones and on Friday, at Oma’s, she decided to try to walk all day. I also have to think that we avoid a lot of anguish when it comes time to start school, as she’ll already be used to a morning get-up-and-go-somewhere-else routine.

Deep breaths, deep breaths. When I had the baby, it was the most difficult thing I’d ever done in my life. As it turns out, leaving her is a hundred times harder.