goodbye, dear pram

I've been doing a big house-reshuffle, converting my office into a small gym for Steve, moving the kids into different rooms, clearing out the shed.  The only bit that hasn't changed is the kitchen (where I'm writing this now). 

I decided it's time to let go of the old pram (pushchair, technically).  I'm not one to hold on to things. But folding up The Pram for the last time and putting it in the car to go to the tip I felt close to tears.

My mother bought us this most excellent all-terrain pram soon after Tyrone was born.  We were beside ourselves.  Tyrone was  not what you could call a sleeper.  He was into nursing (so much so that he looked like a little sumo wrestler) and crying at every imaginable stimulus, and month after month when midwives would ask if he was 'settling' I'd give them my Mad-Eye Moody look and force back a hysterical laugh.

Every day, in the quest for peace, I took him out in the pram for a long walk in the morning and another in the afternoon.  He slept.  That first winter we had him we were living in a rural house rented for us by Erika and Richard.  The place was way out of our price range (which was why it got so hairy when they reneged on the rent, but that's another story) and we didn't have enough money for utilities so we kept most of the place closed off and only heated a couple of rooms.  I had no UK driving license, Steve was recovering from surgery on a broken leg and couldn't teach.  We were effectively cut off all winter. 

This was around the time I was finishing Maul.  Steve could cope with the baby for about an hour a day, so I'd walk him in the pram, breastfeed him, and then hand him over and race up to the computer to work before he broke down screaming.  Other than that if I wanted to work I'd get up in the middle of the night, sneak out of bed and write until Ty discovered I wasn't there and started crying. 

This was a kid who regularly cried so hard he vomited.  Like that.

Every day I walked a quiet road near the house.  There was a steepish hill and I'd go up and down it, again and again and again, in all weathers thanks to a rain shield and parasol, every day.  I developed muscly forearms from pushing.  Over that winter I thought only in terms of one hour at a time--one day at a time was too much.

The pram came to NJ when we had to move in with my folks for a couple of months.  Steve and I took turns walking Tyrone up and down my parents' hilly neighbourhood and again, I'd run inside to write while the toddler Tyrone was in good spirits (Double Vision, by then). Eventually Rhiannon came along and had her time in the pram, too.  Even Sean had his share.  By then the tires had been repaired countless times and the thing had a battle-scarred look about it.  But I loved that pram.

Yesterday I told the kids they could have one last ride before saying goodbye.  They thought it was hilarious.  Tyrone, who is no longer podgy but tall with enormous hands and feet, tried to squeeze in and nearly broke it. 

I'm not usually so sentimental, but goodbye, dear Pram.  You saved us!

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