Column for the Sun Times Mar. 27

My youngest son Nathan has a Cabbage Patch Kid. He has lots of Star Wars figures and vicious swords as well. But he really loves his baby girl. I had one when I was little, a girl with green eyes and brown hair like me and her name was Sarafina Jane. Nathan has decided that a fake baby girl will have to do since I refuse to have a real one for him.
His ‘daughter’ is named Carly Morgan but he insists on calling her Alyssa. Now, I don’t really like this because it’s breaking the Cabbage Patch Kid rule. How will this baby of his receive her birthday card from the Cabbage Patch Adoption Agency? But he won’t hear anything different, and when I try to change his mind he glowers at me while he changes her poopy diaper for the 5th time. I should maybe be grateful, because his original idea was for me to have a baby girl and officially name her ‘Pretty Lovely McGuire’.
“And we can buy her a white dress and a golden crown and on her birthday we will make everyone call her Princess.” Isn’t it a shame that I didn’t have a girl? It sounds as though she would have been a joy to be around, what with her crown and obnoxious demanding birthdays.
He is taking his child rearing very seriously, though, and his brothers have been just fabulous. Callum, who is 13, babysits for Nathan while he’s using the bathroom and Jack (7), or Uncle Jay, as Alyssa likes to call him, is responsible for nap time. He prepares her travel bed, checks her diaper, and takes off her little tap shoes. Ben likes to feed her her bottle, which is shocking and wonderful for an 11year old boy. Her blond hair is normally in a high ponytail but Nathan likes to pull it out all the time, and just this afternoon we were fighting about whether or not she looks better with her hair up or down. It takes so little for me to be sucked in.
Like yesterday, the 4 boys and I were all huddled in the doll aisle of Wal-Mart - normally a foreign land to this family - looking for baby outfits for Alyssa. We saw a great little Pucci patterned rain coat with an umbrella, a purple dress with matching tights and a holiday dress that I loved but Nathan thought would make her look fat. He’s judging her already.
Here’s where I need some advice. Am I making them weird? Not that I’m terribly concerned with convention, but I feel there may be cause for concern when Nathan comes grumbling down the stairs from his imaginary laundry room and says - “The damn washer is broken again. Now how do I wash her clothes?” Or when he tells me he’s exhausted from all of Alyssa’s rolling around in the night - when are we getting her that crib I promised?
You would think that, with 3 older brothers, he would get teased terribly. No, I must say the older boys are brilliant with him. They let him bring his baby to watch them play hockey at the rink and she takes ‘a turn’ on their video games. The other night Callum had a few buddies over and when they saw the doll - that’s what they dared to call Alyssa - one of them picked her up and pretended to rip off her head . Nathan fell to his knees and let out a wail, covering his face in terror like the perfect Italian Mama. Callum yanked her away, hugging her and giving her a kiss before handing her over to her father. I don’t know if that will earn him any friends, but he certainly earned something else from his brother.
I do feel rotten for Jack sometimes, though. Nathan can be so over-the-top with his antics (like when he asked me for a perm so he could have curly hair like Anakin Skywalker). Maybe Jack feels pushed aside? That must be why he whispered to Nathan - “Your baby isn’t real, you know” and proceeded to bash her head into the wall. Nathan grabbed Alyssa from Jack, checking in vain for a pulse. He checked for sounds of breathing, too. I thought we were going to lose him until Callum explained that babies don’t breathe or have a pulse when they sleep. All was right with the world again. At least our perverse little world, anyways.