Sunday, July 3rd 2005.

Afterbirth (part II)

12:45 a.m.

One of the things about being on your own for a few days is that it's quite easy to sleep in. I managed this once already this week, a hand sleepily reaching out to silence the alarm (I must have done it, even though I can't remember) before lapsing instantly into unconsciousness. After three mornings at work, this is the chance I've actually had to sleep in and not subsequently dash around like a mad thing, and needless to say I looked forward to the prospect of few hours' uninterrupted sleep.

You have probably already guessed from the buildup that it didn't work out this way. My mother's telephone call at half past eight was one thing, but the cat was quite another. To be honest, the cat has been playing up for most of the week: he obviously misses Emily, and knows that something isn't right when I go to bed without her. He paces around the house with intermittent whines, begging for more food and trying (in vain) to exploit my tendency to spoil him. This morning, not content with jumping on the bed at six in the morning to paw my eyelids in the hope of coming across as cute enough to earn an early breakfast, he also chose to interrupt me just after four o'clock (less than two hours after I'd actually gone to bed) with a few miaows, a scuffle in the hall, and an accompanying squeak.

I jumped out of bed and walked over to the front door, where Woody sat looking down at the frog he'd brought in. The amphibian appeared to be unharmed, but was obviously terrified. At this point I have to admit I panicked a little - it's generally Emily who gets rid of the frogs - but soon overcame my nerves and went to fetch the kitchen roll, in which I wrapped the frog before dumping it next to the back garden pond. No sooner had I put it down on the concrete when it instantly jumped into the green-brown water, obviously unharmed. After this I went back to bed, only to wake half an hour later, utterly disorientated under the illusion that I was still dreaming, and in the middle of an alternative reality where it was Joshua who'd brought in the frog. I dashed into the spare bedroom, realising I'd left him unattended and in need of having his nappy changed. Woody glanced up at me, obviously terrified, but I quickly realised my mistake and gradually slipped back to full coherence, before slipping back into bed.

I tried not to be too hard on the cat. He only does it because he loves us.

We have spent an enjoyable day in the hospital: Mr and Mrs Knight, visiting for a couple of days, were left babysitting while Emily and I took a walk up the road to get some fresh air. It was only the second time she's left the building in the space of the last week, and she was anxious to avoid cabin fever. We strolled out of the car park by the tree-lined memorial garden that sits outside the back of the John Radcliffe, as clouds hung low in the sky. She had her hand clasped in mine, and then decided that it would be more fun to stick an arm round my waist instead.

"Do you realise," I said as we walked, "that this is the first time we've spent together alone since the baby was born? Just the two of us."
"It is, isn't it?" she replied. "It's wonderful to be so couply. It reminds me of when I was living in Cambridge and you'd visit."
"Mm-hmm. The irony is that I've never been so proud of you as I have this week, and I haven't had the chance to really express it properly."

The truth is that I miss her heaps, particularly at night, curled up in an oversized bed, but you knew that. "I hope I haven't been pushing you away," she said. It was later in the evening now; she was towelling dry after her bath, during which I'd been reading to her.
"Not at all," I said. "You haven't."
"It's just...I know that I may have stopped us getting too close. It's because it was difficult at night. But I hope you haven't felt I've been cold."
"No, no, no. You mustn't worry about that," I replied. "I didn't think that - and if on some level I did I can completely understand why you might have done it. It's just easier to think about the baby and concentrate on us when we get home."
I looked at her. "You know, you don't look like someone who's just given birth. You look better. Much better."

She said something amusing then, but she'd kill me if I put it in here. Some things are better left unshared.

Doctor Ahmed dropped in this afternoon - one of those well-meant but pointless visits from a man who has no idea who he's really talking to and has just examined her notes for two minutes. He asked her twice if she was experiencing pain when urinating, and then asked if she was tired. She said "Well, I have just had a baby....". He was just doing his job, but it reminded me of the time that my brother, facing a drink driving charge, was interviewed by a desk sergeant who asked him if he was affiliated with any terrorist organisations. (When my brother paused, trying to work out if it was a trick question before answering 'no', the sergeant sighed and said "You know, I don't know why we ask that.I don't know what we'd do if someone said yes.")

Regardless of the slight redundancy of the interview, Doctor Ahmed has given Emily a clean bill of health and she can go home tomorrow - now we just have to hope that Joshua will be OK, which I'm sure will be the case. He has responded well to the antibiotics and has only one more session, tomorrow at four o'clock in the morning. We just have to wait for the paediatrician to make an assessment and that will hopefully be that. I know that this is old fashioned but I can't help thinking that the best cure for any jaundice that's still present is going to be fresh air and sunshine, of which he's thus far been deprived.

Early evening I rang my brother. "I was wondering how much of last night you remembered."
"Ah, yeah. I rang you, didn't I?"
"Yes you did," I said. "You were absolutely out of your tree. You said 'I'm so PROUD of you, man! You've both just done so fucking well, and you're just AMAZING! It's just fantastic; I've been showing your picture of little Joshua to fucking everyone I know, and telling them 'that's my little nephew!'"
"Yeah, I'd been in the pub since six o'clock."
"You went on for about ten minutes."
"Oh, man. Sorry."
"Are you kidding? I laughed my friggin' arse off," I said. "It was just so funny. But I don't know how much of it you can recall and how much is swiss cheese."
"I remember calling you, but that's about it."

We talked of superficialities, and I asked him if he'd heard the new number one yet.
"Hell yeah. Isn't it great?"
"It is, actually," I said, agreeing with him for a change. "I like it a lot. I mean, I have the original Elton John that they took it from, and they've actually chopped and changed it quite a lot to make it work. But I liked it, although it beats me where they keep finding these new Tupac records."
"Apparently he made two unreleased albums before he got shot," Mark replied. "It's pretty ironic; he's making much more now he's dead than he ever did when he was alive."

The situation with the number one - which I finally got round to buying today - does at least explain why Joshua was two weeks late. It has nothing to do with hormone deficiency or Emily's body's reluctance to be in any state other than late pregnancy. It's just that our son didn't want to spend the rest of his life saddled with a birth date that coincides with a chart domination by Crazy Frog. He simply wanted to hang around until it had been shifted from the top spot. I can't say I blame him - in fact, I think it bodes well, and is a sign of his obvious fledgling musical taste, which is perhaps unsurprising considering his parents.

After all this was over, and we'd said our goodbyes, I journeyed home to watch the last couple of hours of Live 8: specifically the old Gods almost dead, as the Waters-led Pink Floyd took to the stage, reunited for what will probably be the last time. It seemed obvious that they weren't particularly enjoying themselves, but there was something seminal about this particular flying pig, which for once wasn't floating over Battersea Power Station. Hell froze, and all the devils were here: inner demons ranted and raged, and the sense of alienation seemed apparent. Money was sloppy, and Waters stood apart from his band mates and rarely sang. There will be no permanency in this reunion, no tour, no comeback album.

Nevertheless, there was in the midst of this one-off something extraordinarily poetic that can't really be framed in the context of an online diary. Regardless of any ill feeling, it was great to see the four of them back onstage again, in whatever state of relations. Certainly the third verse of Wish You Were Here moved me to tears: it's a song about Syd, but when Waters and Gilmour sang about "two lost souls swimming in a fish bowl year after year", it was one of those moments that defined the song, the people singing it, the history of the band, and the whole moment. They took it further with Comfortably Numb, another piece about alienation - a miserable epic that nonetheless seldom fails to uplift me, even when the musicians look as fed up as they did tonight. As Gilmour's solo billowed over Hyde Park, you could truly believe for a moment that in the midst of a superficial and frequently disappointing concert something important had happened - something that defines compromise and redemption in the midst of cynicism and stubbornness. They probably won't play together again, but somehow that didn't matter. This final jam may not have been perfect, but it was enough.