A Segway

My birth, literally.

My parents said they gave birth to an old man. Not in a weird degenerative sort of way, they just said I was crotchety, short and intense. I guess this makes sense seeing as I was 3 weeks late. I was burnt to shit and practically walking by the time I came out. The first words to ring through the delivery room walls, "What the hell is wrong with his head" My grandpa, the hawk. Like I said, I was late to the party, and the woman juices up inside my mom started boiling and gave my skin a bright purple tone with a heat-blister texture. I was also my mom's first child, and she was a small woman, so without going into too many nauseating details, my head was a little deformed. So here I am, this new born baby-man, burnt, lopsided and ready for a night cap, being plopped down onto a paper sheet to have all sorts of me snipped right off. My freakin' belly button straw was the first to go. That thing was so epic. I didn't even have to chew. Whenever I was hungry I'd just kick and my belly button straw would suck up milk and tacos, and baby-ice and Snickers bars. I miss it dearly. As if that wasn't enough, they brought my Dad over and asked him how much? "How much", I thought. "This isn't a haircut", I cried! I squirmed my little fat legs in circular motions until the hairy-armed doctor had his hairy-armed nurse hold them down while he went to town. Now, I'm sorry to be so frank, but the dude did just cut my dick. I appreciate it now, having a porn penis and all, but back then it was traumatizing. I didn't play with scissors until high school. High school! Do you know how tough it is growing up without arts and crafts? Well I'll tell you. When everyone else is making lanyards and Father's Day gifts and dioramas, I was sitting in the corner holding onto my shit! They'd taken enough; I wasn't going to let them take any more. Don't Give An Inch, is what I would have had tatt'd across my chest if babies were allowed to do that kind of thing.

So I get carried off to the nursery now with little blue plastic bracelets that dig into my ankles and wrists. I'm all worked up and sick of being around so many people and lights. I had hoped to be put in a private room, I thought I had requested it upon arrival, but to my dismay I was placed in the middle row, in the middle of the others, in the middle of baby hell. These other kids, they weren't like me. All soft and pathetic. They radiated "ignoramus" from their beady little eyes. Through my clear plastic holding cell I saw a distorted vision of my father. Other parents were out there too and I'm not sure if these dumb little shit's around me were mad or inept, but they didn't wave back at them. "F that", I said. So I propped myself up with my rolley little elbow and gave my pops a wave and a smile. He was a good guy, I could already tell. He fought for me in the whole penis-gate incident and he also wouldn't let these male nurses with polished cuticles and plucked eyebrows carry me away. My Dad was the man! When I waved everyone got really crept out. I knew I wasn't the prettiest baby, but come on, I'm trying. What more do you want? Some of the onlookers gasped, others made the sick face and one old hag even fainted. My dad though, my dad waved right back. Ha, chumps.

I spent a few hours in the nursery, being fed and washed and manipulated. My pops kept his eyes on me the whole time. I had a weird feeling that these doughy little babies were being given back to the wrong families and I think my dad did too. We stuck it out together like champs. Before they gave me back to my mom, they wrapped me up in this constricting little diaper made of cloth and Velcro. The Velcro wasn't aligned right and irritated the crap out of my baby thigh. It itched like hell. They thought I was peaceful, at one with being a baby, but the truth was that my belly straw was gone, my ween had just been raped by surgical scissors and now this Velcro was digging into my purple heat blisters! It was everything I could do just to stay lucid for the next 24 hours or so. The next day we were allowed to go home, Mom, Dad and me. I had been held and kissed and picked at for long enough, I needed to be alone.

My dad had fixed up one of the rooms really nice. He painted the walls blue, they had an airplane wallpaper border around the top, the crib was a fair size and the natural light was to die for. Around the crib were gifts that my parents had received on my behalf. The best was A.G bear. The second best was the Bob's Big Boy bobble head. Me and Bob were homies. I'd just let him have it, let it all out and Bob was a trooper. He'd just take it and bob his head up and down. The perfect listener, exactly what a grumpy old man such as myself needed to get by, to make it in this candy coated world of manufactured civility and charm.

Speaking of  civility, there was one more thing about my birth that was particularly disturbing to me. I'm not sure if babies at this point in their life, the first few days after escape, are expected to be animalistic, crawl, eat, shit, get pet, but I for one, was not about to compromise my baby integrity to fit the mold. Every time I'd get wrapped up in that poop sack I'd roll my little fat, burnt body up underneath the curtains and rip it off. It was bad enough I had to defecate on myself, but on top of that,  I was expected to be fine with it, like, "Oh hey lets go be cute with acidic shit eating through my little angel cheeks." As a man-baby wise beyond my years, it was inherently obvious that this arrangement just wouldn't do. So like I said, I'd make my escape to the curtain, unlock the chastity belt, and let it flow, all hidden and adult-like.

So that's pretty much the story of my birth. Not much else to it, I could probably generalize it as the story of my life. A crotchety old man caught up in a baby world just trying to get in where I fit in.