Fat Wash

It’s important to teach a baby language skills. And they say, I don’t know specifically who “they” is here but give me the benefit of the doubt, that singing is an excellent linguistic delivery system. 

So, one day, I was trying to nap. With the baby. No, not co-sleeping, she decided right around the time she weaned herself—6 months, just like her older sister—that mama was lame when it came to a) producing enough breast milk, and b) co-sleeping. I don’t know. I’m somehow not cuddly enough? I try. Perhaps I’m too cuddly, spontaneously squeezing her fat in the middle of the night when she  accidentally sticks her fat-loaf--what? Not my fault if it looks like a loaf of
fat bread--foot in my mouth. Okay so maybe that was the problem. Whatever, man. 

At any rate, her crib is in our room so we can keep her quiet and not bother her sister. Also, so we can be sure that we never, ever use our room now since it is now hers. 

But this afternoon, I was bone-tired. Determined to sleep in my own bed, not the sofa downstairs or in my daughter’s bed. I do that enough at night when she insists I sleep with her. 

Uh, no. After a half an hour of her babbling and cooing, I decided once again that the only way to get her to nap was to make her cry. Which I did, by leaving the room. Ten long minutes later of listening to her cry while ensconced in my daughter’s bed and finally. It ended.

“Ahh,” I said to myself, “the silence of the Fat.”

I was so pleased with myself that I texted a friend about it. A friend who, by the way, has two of her own.

Her response? “Oh my god! I’m obsessed! Fatballs! Blazing Fat! I think that’s my favorite!”

Throughout the day, we texted each other different movie titles with the word “Fat.”

Now, my husband is very funny. He has a very dry sense of humor which is one of the things I love about him. The ability to put me into paroxysms of laughter is, I think, key to all of my relationships. It’s like a litmus test. True to his dry sense of humor, he just casually said, “Fat by Fatwest. Fat Wash.”

That did it. Fat Wash. 

Of course, it’s easy because it comes with a song.

I confessed to my friend that I couldn’t stop singing it, to which she responded, in text, “Working at the Fat Wash, yeah!”

You know where this is going: “Wo, wo, wo, wo, Fat Wash.” The Fat One smiles sooo big whenever we sing it and of course, we’re not one of those parents who bathe our children every day (uh, not good for their skin, people) but every few days, after crawling all over the backyard and mixing all kinds of rich, composted soil with the strawberries she’s been eating—or mushing—even we concede she needs a bath.

So we bust out the song. “Fat wash. Working at the Fat Wash, yeah! Wo, wo, wo, wo, Fat Wash. Working at the Fat Wash, yeah!”

The other day, you guessed it. She got it. I cued her. I bounced her up and down and sang, “Fat Wash!”

And she replied, “Wo, wo, wo, wo.”

Irritatingly, she refuses to do this when I’m actually filming. Honestly. So difficult.