For Ben Jackson

Carrying him on my chest in a light green snuggly, his reddish brown hair in my nostrils, his warmth against my chest-breast, and on my back, a tear-drop pack with Pampers, wipes, a bottle of milk and a stale bagel, because he’s teething, we have everything we need.  We can go anywhere, do anything.  We are self-contained, a pair attached, self-sufficient, each a part of the other.

He is my ambassador to the world.  He announces me in the streets and shops of the city, calling out without a word, “Look at us. Here I am and that’s my man, wearing me as his biography to tell the world he has a baby and he knows what he’s doing.”

Some will ask: “Where’s his mother?” and I will reassure them that she will be home later, and they will say: “How nice of you to fill in.” They will not know how big is the space I am filling with my baby on my chest and diaper bag backpack.

But I will know and not tell, because why?  I have what I need next to me strapped safely to my chest.  I know my story, how I came to be here with this baby.  I will tell it if asked—the short version.  The long version goes back into an almost forgotten past, whose starting point I have not yet found, so all I can do now is begin in the middle, where all stories really start, and hope that satisfies their curiosity and lets me get on with my baby business: the two of us on a trail, finding new ways to be, new ways to love, a new kind of family.