In my possession is a little, purple, faux leather bound book that I bought in 2008 when I was pregnant with a little bean who would become my Lucy. I bought it to record my thoughts when I was going through this strange, new experience, and also to write down a little bit of history for this little addition to my wonderful family. I wrote down a few thoughts on my pregnancy, but they weren't gushing through my head like I thought they would. The real mind work and soul-searching, I'd find out, would come later. I never really got the history part worked out either, but of course, that is still there and progressing. In fact the book has become more about the history of Lucy, the Lucy Chronicles, if you will.
There are, in this book, a lot of dates. The approximate date she was conceived: early July 2008. The date of our first ultrasound: August 8, 2008 (6 weeks). The date I rubbed baby bellies with Erykah Badu at the Austin City Limits Music Festival: September 27, 2008. "And on and on" through last month, when Lucy began walking in shoes. There are even a few pages of her eat-sleep-poop logs from my shaky, sleep-addled, first few weeks as a parent. I've logged the milestones of hers, my first pregnancy, and all kinds of "firsts" she might be curious about later, and I'll keep logging them until she's old enough to remember them for herself.
There are also pearls of advice from me, her mother, that she may or may not find valuable later. There are lessons I want her to learn, things I want her to know, information I want her to have. When she becomes a woman I will pass this little book on to her and hope she can learn from it all the things she is teaching me without even knowing it. And I guess I'll just keep adding to this book whatever I feel it needs for the next seventeen years or so, which suddenly doesn't sound like enough time. It's funny how eighteen years sounds like so much time to a new parent or a prospective parent. Seventeen years doesn't sound like much time at all. I was in junior high seventeen years ago, and that feels like last week sometimes.
So that's all the time I have left to turn this child into a woman. I know it will fly by faster than I can imagine even now. I think all I can do is to keep turning to this little, purple book, and to remember what I wrote one week before I finally met the little creature it's all about: You've already made me happier than ever before just by giving me the experience of bringing you from the universe. It still applies. She makes me a little bit happier every day, just because of who she is, the best gift my husband could ever have given me.
Wednesday, June 2, 2010
Wednesday, May 5, 2010
Green (Emerald)
On May 5, 2005, my drunken overseas love came back from Britain and back into my arms, and I promptly put a boyfriend sticker on him and claimed him for myself. We celebrated with Chicago stuffed pizza from Mangia, which I believe was a first for me.
On May 5, 2006, we got engaged, and then we got pizza.
May 5, 2007 - Pizza for anniversary dinner
On Sunday, May 4, 2008, in a ceremony of blue, white, and green, my husband became officially my husband, and at midnight our honeymoon began. Mangia catered our wedding, and we left the reception with a bottle of champagne and a pizza box.
On May 5, 2009, we ate Mangia in with our four-week-old daughter by our side.
And today, once again I'm full of joy, pepperoni, and sausage.
Happy anniversary, baby.
On May 5, 2006, we got engaged, and then we got pizza.
May 5, 2007 - Pizza for anniversary dinner
On Sunday, May 4, 2008, in a ceremony of blue, white, and green, my husband became officially my husband, and at midnight our honeymoon began. Mangia catered our wedding, and we left the reception with a bottle of champagne and a pizza box.
On May 5, 2009, we ate Mangia in with our four-week-old daughter by our side.
And today, once again I'm full of joy, pepperoni, and sausage.
Happy anniversary, baby.
Sunday, May 2, 2010
White (Diamond)
Five years ago today, there was a great culmination in the works.
I had been faithfully dating my future husband for several weeks. I'd been completely into him for about a month, after we clicked so definitely on our fourth date by Bouldin Creek in early April. A week after Bouldin Creek we had another wonderful date. We got dressed up (I even surprised him with contact lenses and a new hairstyle), we ate Greek food downtown, and we walked to the Capitol for an after-dark tour. I'd never even been inside, but my husband practically had the official tour memorized from so many childhood trips. He held my hand and showed me around, sneaking in kisses here and there, and then I drove him to his house and sneaked in a few more. We had a marvelous time, and we were fabulously into one another. But this is not the culmination I'm talking about.
A couple weeks after our date to the Capitol my future husband got on a plane bound for London, for a pleasure trip he'd spent months planning. I was in for about ten days of the old fondness-growing-through-absence treatment. Just when things were getting really good, he left the country. For the next week and a half or so, I heard from him through the occasional phone call. I heard about the museums he was visiting, the restaurants he was trying, the pictures he was taking, and the famous landmark he defaced with my name + his. He carried a picture of me in his pocket the whole time, so there are even a few pictures of "me" visiting famous London sights. But the best night was when he called me after a long evening of pub-crawling and drunkenly professed his love for me. It wasn't his intention to tell me he loved me for the first time over a trans-Atlantic phone call, but there it was. All I could do was return the favor, hope he remembered it the next morning, and wait patiently for his return, still a few days away . . .
I had been faithfully dating my future husband for several weeks. I'd been completely into him for about a month, after we clicked so definitely on our fourth date by Bouldin Creek in early April. A week after Bouldin Creek we had another wonderful date. We got dressed up (I even surprised him with contact lenses and a new hairstyle), we ate Greek food downtown, and we walked to the Capitol for an after-dark tour. I'd never even been inside, but my husband practically had the official tour memorized from so many childhood trips. He held my hand and showed me around, sneaking in kisses here and there, and then I drove him to his house and sneaked in a few more. We had a marvelous time, and we were fabulously into one another. But this is not the culmination I'm talking about.
A couple weeks after our date to the Capitol my future husband got on a plane bound for London, for a pleasure trip he'd spent months planning. I was in for about ten days of the old fondness-growing-through-absence treatment. Just when things were getting really good, he left the country. For the next week and a half or so, I heard from him through the occasional phone call. I heard about the museums he was visiting, the restaurants he was trying, the pictures he was taking, and the famous landmark he defaced with my name + his. He carried a picture of me in his pocket the whole time, so there are even a few pictures of "me" visiting famous London sights. But the best night was when he called me after a long evening of pub-crawling and drunkenly professed his love for me. It wasn't his intention to tell me he loved me for the first time over a trans-Atlantic phone call, but there it was. All I could do was return the favor, hope he remembered it the next morning, and wait patiently for his return, still a few days away . . .
Saturday, March 13, 2010
Blue (Aquamarine)
I met my husband on March 12, 2005. I know this because I kept a written record. I kept a record for two reasons. One: Dating in the traditional sense was something I had never tried, and I wanted to take notes. I had always considered my relationships to be more like fluid, more organic, just happening, and ending disastrously. I wanted to try this one with terms of my own making, and one of those terms involved how many dates I would go on before I called this man mine. I had to take notes to remember them. Two: Despite my rationale, I knew this man would be my husband as soon as I saw him. I didn't believe it at first, but I knew it. Why wouldn't I keep a record?
So the record shows today, March 13, 2010, to be the fifth anniversary of my first date with my husband. On this night five years ago (I believe it was a Sunday) I went to meet this big, strong, bold man who'd asked me out for coffee, even though he didn't drink it. We actually ended up having tea at the Little City coffee bar on Congress Avenue downtown. We talked for maybe two hours. He found out that I was a college student. I found out that he was a self-proclaimed uber-geek. We learned that we shared a love of Led Zeppelin. I thought he was sweet and respectful. He thought I was sweet and cute. He walked me to my car and didn't even try to kiss me. We parted with a hug, and I went home thinking nothing would become of it, probably because he didn't even try to kiss me. But he had my number, and I had his, and when he called to ask me on a second date, I happily accepted.
Sugar's Note: Two weeks later, on date number three, he finally kissed me.
So the record shows today, March 13, 2010, to be the fifth anniversary of my first date with my husband. On this night five years ago (I believe it was a Sunday) I went to meet this big, strong, bold man who'd asked me out for coffee, even though he didn't drink it. We actually ended up having tea at the Little City coffee bar on Congress Avenue downtown. We talked for maybe two hours. He found out that I was a college student. I found out that he was a self-proclaimed uber-geek. We learned that we shared a love of Led Zeppelin. I thought he was sweet and respectful. He thought I was sweet and cute. He walked me to my car and didn't even try to kiss me. We parted with a hug, and I went home thinking nothing would become of it, probably because he didn't even try to kiss me. But he had my number, and I had his, and when he called to ask me on a second date, I happily accepted.
Sugar's Note: Two weeks later, on date number three, he finally kissed me.
Friday, February 12, 2010
Cliff Jumper
Today was a stressful day.
Not that things went particularly badly. Things are actually going pretty well these days. We managed last month to scrape up enough monetary loot to secure an apartment. We are now the proud renters of a two-bedroom, one-bathroom flat on the south side of town, barely two blocks from the two-bedroom, two-bathroom apartment we moved out of just thirteen months ago. I look at it more as a new beginning than a step back, considering what we learned over the course of the last year and what we now know about rent houses. And it comes in a nick of time too. The four of us adults in the house were trying very hard not to drive each other crazy, after a couple failed attempts between me and my sister. To ice the cake, we also received our W-2s and filed our tax return quickly enough to have the refund in the bank on moving day, with the unprecedented benefits of joint filing and earned income credit. The move went smoothly, thanks in part to the aforementioned refund, and the new place is coming together nicely, despite the boxes we haven't yet gotten around to unpacking. We are quite comfortable for the time being, and worlds more comfortable than we were a month ago. My sister complimented me the other night on how cute the new place was looking. I agreed and told her we owed ourselves a cute place. And it is cute and cozy and very us.
But of course, we still have issues with which to contend, some old, some new, some welcome, some pains in the ass albeit expected ones. My husband is as of yet unemployed. I am still barely self-employed. He still wants more help with the finances. I still want more help with the house and childcare. On a week-long getaway to my parents' house over the holidays we actually managed to establish that we do want the same things in life, for the most part. Our problems remain in the strategic department; my husband does not concern himself much with how to go about getting them. This is a constant source of frustration for me, because I feel like we'd be unstoppable if he did. I have big dreams and lack the will to achieve them. My husband has a will of steel and no dreams.
Today my husband executed his plans of ridding our storage unit of some more of our stuff. He was gone for hours, running these and other errands. I had plans of my own for today, but of course I spent the day taking care of Lucy and getting little else done. This has been the routine for the last week or so. Now that we are in our new home with most if not all of the things we need to live, now that running back and forth between old house and new house and storage unit is not so much a priority, finishing the move has been a question of whoever can get out of the house while the other keeps a watchful eye on our budding toddler. And whoever gets to leave usually gets more of their own stuff brought into the house and more of their own projects accomplished. Although I did not choose to turn today into one, there have been conflicts over who gets to leave. My husband's argument is that we're both working toward the same goal, so what does it matter when and how things get done? I should do my thing, and he should do his, and together we'll get the work finished. What he forgets is that while he does his thing day after day after day, I have my hands too full to do mine.
I try, but constant interruptions get in my way. As I follow a crawling Lucy from room to room, I try to do whatever needs doing where I am, but the work stops as soon as she embarks on her next adventure. If she's awake it's just as impossible to get anything done as it was when she was two months old and eating every two hours around the clock. If she's asleep I crave rest, and sometimes I can't bring myself to try to power-clean or power-write or power-job-hunt for the whole hour or half-hour or two hours she may or may not sleep. And if she falls and bumps her head, or if I upset her by whisking her away from the electrical cord she wants to play with, or if she makes a beeline for the litter box, all bets are off. Whatever I'm doing must be dropped without a thought. For a person like me who always worries about doing better, seeing things left undone can be quite discouraging, but today I tried to shake it off. If I could just get one thing done, the day wouldn't be a total loss of productivity.
I started decorating one wall of my daughter's new bedroom. No, it did not get done. I started the job while keeping one eye on Lucy. Interruptions. Then my husband came home, decided I had everything under control, and went to his computer. More interruptions. Finally I got him to take over Lucy. Then I couldn't get the stepladder to work and got frustrated enough to quit it. Then I messed up with the automatic screwdriver and lost one of the screws I needed, only to find our screws apparently haven't made it out of their box yet, wherever that is. By this time I just wanted a cup of tea and maybe ten minutes alone in front of the TV or something before I had to start cooking dinner. I didn't exactly get that either. So my plans were thwarted for another day.
While I was stressing out over folding up the stupid stepladder a vision of my life flashed through my head. I saw myself standing at the edge of a cliff, with my dreams sitting on another cliff across a great canyon. Since I'm not very good at building bridges or flying (whether it's because I'm not confident enough to try it or because I'm really not very good at it), I often try to get across the hard way or the most obvious way, or maybe both. Sometimes I climb to the bottom and try to cross the canyon and climb up the other side. Sometimes I take a leap of faith and just hope to hit the other side, crazy as the journey may be. However I do it, I usually end up on the bottom of the canyon, and sometimes when I'm down there, I lose sight of where I was trying to get in the first place. My college education, for example, was a climb from the bottom. Having my daughter and leaving my day job was a leap of faith.
And marrying my husband? Sometimes I feel he'd rather just stand on the cliff and enjoy the view than climb or jump with me. But I guess I'll always have him up there to give me perspective and direction when I'm down at the bottom, and maybe throw me a rope, and if I'm lucky, he'll pull me up. At least I hope so.
Not that things went particularly badly. Things are actually going pretty well these days. We managed last month to scrape up enough monetary loot to secure an apartment. We are now the proud renters of a two-bedroom, one-bathroom flat on the south side of town, barely two blocks from the two-bedroom, two-bathroom apartment we moved out of just thirteen months ago. I look at it more as a new beginning than a step back, considering what we learned over the course of the last year and what we now know about rent houses. And it comes in a nick of time too. The four of us adults in the house were trying very hard not to drive each other crazy, after a couple failed attempts between me and my sister. To ice the cake, we also received our W-2s and filed our tax return quickly enough to have the refund in the bank on moving day, with the unprecedented benefits of joint filing and earned income credit. The move went smoothly, thanks in part to the aforementioned refund, and the new place is coming together nicely, despite the boxes we haven't yet gotten around to unpacking. We are quite comfortable for the time being, and worlds more comfortable than we were a month ago. My sister complimented me the other night on how cute the new place was looking. I agreed and told her we owed ourselves a cute place. And it is cute and cozy and very us.
But of course, we still have issues with which to contend, some old, some new, some welcome, some pains in the ass albeit expected ones. My husband is as of yet unemployed. I am still barely self-employed. He still wants more help with the finances. I still want more help with the house and childcare. On a week-long getaway to my parents' house over the holidays we actually managed to establish that we do want the same things in life, for the most part. Our problems remain in the strategic department; my husband does not concern himself much with how to go about getting them. This is a constant source of frustration for me, because I feel like we'd be unstoppable if he did. I have big dreams and lack the will to achieve them. My husband has a will of steel and no dreams.
Today my husband executed his plans of ridding our storage unit of some more of our stuff. He was gone for hours, running these and other errands. I had plans of my own for today, but of course I spent the day taking care of Lucy and getting little else done. This has been the routine for the last week or so. Now that we are in our new home with most if not all of the things we need to live, now that running back and forth between old house and new house and storage unit is not so much a priority, finishing the move has been a question of whoever can get out of the house while the other keeps a watchful eye on our budding toddler. And whoever gets to leave usually gets more of their own stuff brought into the house and more of their own projects accomplished. Although I did not choose to turn today into one, there have been conflicts over who gets to leave. My husband's argument is that we're both working toward the same goal, so what does it matter when and how things get done? I should do my thing, and he should do his, and together we'll get the work finished. What he forgets is that while he does his thing day after day after day, I have my hands too full to do mine.
I try, but constant interruptions get in my way. As I follow a crawling Lucy from room to room, I try to do whatever needs doing where I am, but the work stops as soon as she embarks on her next adventure. If she's awake it's just as impossible to get anything done as it was when she was two months old and eating every two hours around the clock. If she's asleep I crave rest, and sometimes I can't bring myself to try to power-clean or power-write or power-job-hunt for the whole hour or half-hour or two hours she may or may not sleep. And if she falls and bumps her head, or if I upset her by whisking her away from the electrical cord she wants to play with, or if she makes a beeline for the litter box, all bets are off. Whatever I'm doing must be dropped without a thought. For a person like me who always worries about doing better, seeing things left undone can be quite discouraging, but today I tried to shake it off. If I could just get one thing done, the day wouldn't be a total loss of productivity.
I started decorating one wall of my daughter's new bedroom. No, it did not get done. I started the job while keeping one eye on Lucy. Interruptions. Then my husband came home, decided I had everything under control, and went to his computer. More interruptions. Finally I got him to take over Lucy. Then I couldn't get the stepladder to work and got frustrated enough to quit it. Then I messed up with the automatic screwdriver and lost one of the screws I needed, only to find our screws apparently haven't made it out of their box yet, wherever that is. By this time I just wanted a cup of tea and maybe ten minutes alone in front of the TV or something before I had to start cooking dinner. I didn't exactly get that either. So my plans were thwarted for another day.
While I was stressing out over folding up the stupid stepladder a vision of my life flashed through my head. I saw myself standing at the edge of a cliff, with my dreams sitting on another cliff across a great canyon. Since I'm not very good at building bridges or flying (whether it's because I'm not confident enough to try it or because I'm really not very good at it), I often try to get across the hard way or the most obvious way, or maybe both. Sometimes I climb to the bottom and try to cross the canyon and climb up the other side. Sometimes I take a leap of faith and just hope to hit the other side, crazy as the journey may be. However I do it, I usually end up on the bottom of the canyon, and sometimes when I'm down there, I lose sight of where I was trying to get in the first place. My college education, for example, was a climb from the bottom. Having my daughter and leaving my day job was a leap of faith.
And marrying my husband? Sometimes I feel he'd rather just stand on the cliff and enjoy the view than climb or jump with me. But I guess I'll always have him up there to give me perspective and direction when I'm down at the bottom, and maybe throw me a rope, and if I'm lucky, he'll pull me up. At least I hope so.
Saturday, January 9, 2010
6 Things I Have to Take Back Now That I Have a Baby
Since I had my daughter nine months ago I've been haunted by ghosts from the past. These are the spirits of previous Sugars who thought they knew everything. And I guess these Sugars knew all they needed to know at the tender ages of sixteen, eighteen, twenty-two, twenty-five . . . but Sugar at thirty must put their spirits to rest. So I'm taking this opportunity to take back a few things I might have said or ideas I might have harbored when I was younger and less, um, matronly.
1. "Why can't stay-at-home moms take showers? Can't you just take one when your husband gets home? For real."
This was my first big post-delivery revelation. My first "Ohhhhhhh." Do you want to know why stay-at-home moms don't always get to shower, especially new ones? First of all, to understate, babies keep you busy. And I don't mean they make you busy, I mean they keep you busy. Everyone is told this before they have babies, and some people listen, but nobody really knows how true it is until they have one. They start you out with a fairly simple routine of eat-sleep-poop-eat-sleep-poop, and from there it evolves into more interesting cycles of repetition, constantly changing and rewarding all of your parenting accomplishments with new challenges. But for newborns most pediatricians will tell you they basically do five things: eat, sleep, pee, poop, and cry. If they stop doing one of those things, they need to see a doctor. That's sound advice and very reassuring, because they're always doing at least one of those five things. While they're doing those four things other than sleeping, you're taking care of them in a very hands-on fashion. When they finally do go to sleep, you're either trying to get some sleep yourself, eating just enough to stay alive, or trying to clean up things around the house that are on the verge of becoming dire emergencies, like dish avalanches waiting to happen. Why are these emergencies everywhere you look? Because you've been too busy! And even if you're doing stuff around the house while the baby sleeps, you'll quickly realize you should've slept, when the baby wakes up. And repeat! The cycle takes two to four hours and repeats around the clock. It's easy to forget to eat, much less shower. So what do you do when hubby comes home? You let him take care of the baby while you do all those things you never got a moment to do while he was gone. And showering only makes the top of that list every two days if you're lucky. Usually it's beat out by sleeping, eating, or washing the dishes so you have something to eat off of. This is why the luckiest new moms are the ones with vast support networks of friends and family members who will come over and clean house just to get a look at the new baby. I myself had my mom at my side for two weeks after Lucy was born. But she eventually had to go home. And when she did, I cried a little, and then I started to smell. Note: If your child was delivered by C-section, lucky you. You must shower daily until that incision is initially healed. After that, good luck.
2. "You don't have to have a child to understand what it's like to be a parent."
PAHAHAHAHA! (I might not have actually uttered these words, but I know I thought it a few times.) Yes, you do. If you've never had one, you don't understand. Period. It's not a character flaw; it's just a fact. You're not childless; you're child-free. Enjoy it. Because, well, see the next two points.
3. "Your life doesn't end when you have a baby."
Yes, it does. It's not entirely a bad thing. I think Wanda Sykes said it best when she pointed out that children ruin your life, but they give you a new one. And it's arguably a better one. It's like when your house burns down and you take the insurance money and build an even better house. Yes, that fire is shocking and traumatic and leaves you with an empty feeling of irreversible loss. And it's true you'll lose some valuable possessions and never get them back. It's painfully and undeniably hard. But then you look at that insurance check and imagine the possibilities. And then you get to work on making those possibilities reality, and you realize that fire actually lifted some weight off your shoulders. And then that initial shock wears off and you have a new house. And it will surely have its problems just like your old house did, but it's worth the effort of keeping it up. That's what kids do. They burn down your sense of personal freedom, but with it goes your arrogance. They burn down your solitude, but with it goes your loneliness. They take away so many things about you that you've worked so hard to make from yourself, and in return they give you a love like you've never known before. And one day very soon you won't be able to imagine what your life would have been like without that house you're living in now.
4. My adolescence. And everything that followed until I became a parent. Which I can't exactly "take back". But I sure wish I could, for my parents. I now know how and why people "turn into" their parents. It's not that you turn into your parents specifically. It's just that by having a child you have joined a very large club, and left another one behind for the most part. Parents see the world as basically made up of two kinds of people, parents and children. Parents have parents of their own, so they understand what it's like to be someone's child, as well as what it's like to be responsible for one. Children are people who do not have children of their own, so they do not understand what it's like to be someone's parent. This is why children do not understand their parents, or anyone else's parents for that matter. That's not to say that people without children are emotionally immature or somehow incapable in life. And it's certainly not to say that parents are the wisest and most enlightened beings on the earth. There's just a perspective children don't have and will never have until they take responsibility for a child themselves. It's not something to be taken lightly, so no one should be blamed or ridiculed for not being a parent. But once that perspective is gained, years and years of answers about one's parents are gained with it. Other questions are sure to spring up, but understanding is there. I tremble to think about the day, some thirteen odd years from now, when my daughter starts to question my love for her, but I find warmth in the hope that one day she'll have a child of her own.
5. "People who can't have children should just learn to be happy without them."
Okay, I never said it just like that. But when I was still unmarried at the ripe old age of twenty-five I began to examine the idea of never becoming a wife or a mother. What if it didn't happen for me, I was thinking. Did I want to spend my life pining for a husband and children that would never come? Or did I want to be happy with my life as it turned out? What if I fell in love with a woman and experienced the obvious reproductive conundrum? What if I never met the right partner at all and was condemned to a life of limitless personal freedom? I decided I'd look for happiness in any possibility and not build a house around an empty picture frame on a squeaky clean table, to use the example of Jenna Currier Nadeau, who wrote of her experiences with infertility. I still think that was a healthy decision for me. But what of the others around me, especially the ones building those houses? My idea was based on the most widely accepted one that children should be with both their parents, and those who couldn't should be adopted. I couldn't understand why so many infertile couples would put themselves through the rigors of fertility drugs and in vitro fertilizations when there were already children living who needed parents. I couldn't understand why gay couples would go outside their unions to get somebody pregnant so they could have a baby the "natural" way, although this was easier for me to understand given that discrimination against homosexuals is still pretty much perfectly legal in this country, which gets in the way of adoptions on that front. Actually there are a lot of things about these issues I still don't understand. I still think we as a society should turn our attention to the children who are already here, not worry ourselves sick over children who haven't been born or even conceived yet. But to anyone who really and truly wants to have a child, I have to say: do it any way you can. It is worth it. On that note . . .
6. My sanity. Children do bring with them an incredible amount of pressure, and it's easy to get lost along the way. I'm writing this so I can stop yelling at my husband in those hot-headed moments when I temporarily forget it's wrong to do so, even when he does screw up. I'm lucky to have him, and he does try, and things really are hard on him too, even if I sometimes feel I have them just a little bit harder. After a long, long week and a short, short night of interrupted sleep, I stayed in the shower this morning until the water started to go cold, and only then did I surrender and climb out, thinking I'd already experienced the high point of my day--that two or three minutes after I finished bathing and before the water lost its warmth. The bathroom has become my only refuge, and a purely theoretical one at that. To keep out my husband, my child, any house guests, and my nosy cat, a barricade is required. Sure enough as soon as I toweled off my husband burst in on me, and indeed he heard my wrath. But he was coming to tell me he was leaving with the baby for a while. Before my shower I would've seen this as an opportunity to go back to bed. Now it's an opportunity to write. So I guess that moment of silence in waning hot water wasn't the high point of my day after all. And when I see my husband's and my daughter's faces coming through the door, I'll experience another high yet.
There. I feel the spirits resting already. If I think of anything else I need to take back, I'll let you know.
1. "Why can't stay-at-home moms take showers? Can't you just take one when your husband gets home? For real."
This was my first big post-delivery revelation. My first "Ohhhhhhh." Do you want to know why stay-at-home moms don't always get to shower, especially new ones? First of all, to understate, babies keep you busy. And I don't mean they make you busy, I mean they keep you busy. Everyone is told this before they have babies, and some people listen, but nobody really knows how true it is until they have one. They start you out with a fairly simple routine of eat-sleep-poop-eat-sleep-poop, and from there it evolves into more interesting cycles of repetition, constantly changing and rewarding all of your parenting accomplishments with new challenges. But for newborns most pediatricians will tell you they basically do five things: eat, sleep, pee, poop, and cry. If they stop doing one of those things, they need to see a doctor. That's sound advice and very reassuring, because they're always doing at least one of those five things. While they're doing those four things other than sleeping, you're taking care of them in a very hands-on fashion. When they finally do go to sleep, you're either trying to get some sleep yourself, eating just enough to stay alive, or trying to clean up things around the house that are on the verge of becoming dire emergencies, like dish avalanches waiting to happen. Why are these emergencies everywhere you look? Because you've been too busy! And even if you're doing stuff around the house while the baby sleeps, you'll quickly realize you should've slept, when the baby wakes up. And repeat! The cycle takes two to four hours and repeats around the clock. It's easy to forget to eat, much less shower. So what do you do when hubby comes home? You let him take care of the baby while you do all those things you never got a moment to do while he was gone. And showering only makes the top of that list every two days if you're lucky. Usually it's beat out by sleeping, eating, or washing the dishes so you have something to eat off of. This is why the luckiest new moms are the ones with vast support networks of friends and family members who will come over and clean house just to get a look at the new baby. I myself had my mom at my side for two weeks after Lucy was born. But she eventually had to go home. And when she did, I cried a little, and then I started to smell. Note: If your child was delivered by C-section, lucky you. You must shower daily until that incision is initially healed. After that, good luck.
2. "You don't have to have a child to understand what it's like to be a parent."
PAHAHAHAHA! (I might not have actually uttered these words, but I know I thought it a few times.) Yes, you do. If you've never had one, you don't understand. Period. It's not a character flaw; it's just a fact. You're not childless; you're child-free. Enjoy it. Because, well, see the next two points.
3. "Your life doesn't end when you have a baby."
Yes, it does. It's not entirely a bad thing. I think Wanda Sykes said it best when she pointed out that children ruin your life, but they give you a new one. And it's arguably a better one. It's like when your house burns down and you take the insurance money and build an even better house. Yes, that fire is shocking and traumatic and leaves you with an empty feeling of irreversible loss. And it's true you'll lose some valuable possessions and never get them back. It's painfully and undeniably hard. But then you look at that insurance check and imagine the possibilities. And then you get to work on making those possibilities reality, and you realize that fire actually lifted some weight off your shoulders. And then that initial shock wears off and you have a new house. And it will surely have its problems just like your old house did, but it's worth the effort of keeping it up. That's what kids do. They burn down your sense of personal freedom, but with it goes your arrogance. They burn down your solitude, but with it goes your loneliness. They take away so many things about you that you've worked so hard to make from yourself, and in return they give you a love like you've never known before. And one day very soon you won't be able to imagine what your life would have been like without that house you're living in now.
4. My adolescence. And everything that followed until I became a parent. Which I can't exactly "take back". But I sure wish I could, for my parents. I now know how and why people "turn into" their parents. It's not that you turn into your parents specifically. It's just that by having a child you have joined a very large club, and left another one behind for the most part. Parents see the world as basically made up of two kinds of people, parents and children. Parents have parents of their own, so they understand what it's like to be someone's child, as well as what it's like to be responsible for one. Children are people who do not have children of their own, so they do not understand what it's like to be someone's parent. This is why children do not understand their parents, or anyone else's parents for that matter. That's not to say that people without children are emotionally immature or somehow incapable in life. And it's certainly not to say that parents are the wisest and most enlightened beings on the earth. There's just a perspective children don't have and will never have until they take responsibility for a child themselves. It's not something to be taken lightly, so no one should be blamed or ridiculed for not being a parent. But once that perspective is gained, years and years of answers about one's parents are gained with it. Other questions are sure to spring up, but understanding is there. I tremble to think about the day, some thirteen odd years from now, when my daughter starts to question my love for her, but I find warmth in the hope that one day she'll have a child of her own.
5. "People who can't have children should just learn to be happy without them."
Okay, I never said it just like that. But when I was still unmarried at the ripe old age of twenty-five I began to examine the idea of never becoming a wife or a mother. What if it didn't happen for me, I was thinking. Did I want to spend my life pining for a husband and children that would never come? Or did I want to be happy with my life as it turned out? What if I fell in love with a woman and experienced the obvious reproductive conundrum? What if I never met the right partner at all and was condemned to a life of limitless personal freedom? I decided I'd look for happiness in any possibility and not build a house around an empty picture frame on a squeaky clean table, to use the example of Jenna Currier Nadeau, who wrote of her experiences with infertility. I still think that was a healthy decision for me. But what of the others around me, especially the ones building those houses? My idea was based on the most widely accepted one that children should be with both their parents, and those who couldn't should be adopted. I couldn't understand why so many infertile couples would put themselves through the rigors of fertility drugs and in vitro fertilizations when there were already children living who needed parents. I couldn't understand why gay couples would go outside their unions to get somebody pregnant so they could have a baby the "natural" way, although this was easier for me to understand given that discrimination against homosexuals is still pretty much perfectly legal in this country, which gets in the way of adoptions on that front. Actually there are a lot of things about these issues I still don't understand. I still think we as a society should turn our attention to the children who are already here, not worry ourselves sick over children who haven't been born or even conceived yet. But to anyone who really and truly wants to have a child, I have to say: do it any way you can. It is worth it. On that note . . .
6. My sanity. Children do bring with them an incredible amount of pressure, and it's easy to get lost along the way. I'm writing this so I can stop yelling at my husband in those hot-headed moments when I temporarily forget it's wrong to do so, even when he does screw up. I'm lucky to have him, and he does try, and things really are hard on him too, even if I sometimes feel I have them just a little bit harder. After a long, long week and a short, short night of interrupted sleep, I stayed in the shower this morning until the water started to go cold, and only then did I surrender and climb out, thinking I'd already experienced the high point of my day--that two or three minutes after I finished bathing and before the water lost its warmth. The bathroom has become my only refuge, and a purely theoretical one at that. To keep out my husband, my child, any house guests, and my nosy cat, a barricade is required. Sure enough as soon as I toweled off my husband burst in on me, and indeed he heard my wrath. But he was coming to tell me he was leaving with the baby for a while. Before my shower I would've seen this as an opportunity to go back to bed. Now it's an opportunity to write. So I guess that moment of silence in waning hot water wasn't the high point of my day after all. And when I see my husband's and my daughter's faces coming through the door, I'll experience another high yet.
There. I feel the spirits resting already. If I think of anything else I need to take back, I'll let you know.
Sunday, January 3, 2010
The Cat Came Back
January 3, 2009, was a Saturday. Not three weeks earlier my husband and I had ended a glorious year of marriage and pregnancy by moving into our first house as husband and wife. With just three months to go until B-Day we were just getting settled into our new neighborhood when we lost a member of our little family.
Muriel was my cat. I'd known her about three times as long as I'd known my husband, having adopted her when I was nineteen and new to the world outside my parents' house. Ironically I'd adopted her from a friend and new neighbor who couldn't keep her any longer because she (my friend) was pregnant. Actually I adopted one of Muriel's own kittens and meant to find a new home for Muriel so she wouldn't have to go to the pound. But I never really looked for one, and soon Muriel had thwarted my plans by getting pregnant again. After Muriel had her second litter and the older kitten kept hunting and attacking the babies, I ended up getting rid of the would-be big sister. And when the babies got old enough I adopted them out, took Muriel to the spay clinic, and brought her home to stay.
After that she pretty much gave up on adventure and became a porch cat at best. As I spent the next ten years hopping from apartment to apartment, Muriel usually contented herself by taking the sunlight on various balconies and windowsills. One afternoon when I was twenty-one or so, I let her out for a minute without watching her as closely as I usually did and she ran off into the woods. When it came time for me to leave for work she was still gone, so I had to leave her outside. When I came home after dark I went to the edge of the woods and worriedly called her name. I heard crying in the distance, then leaves crunching, then Muriel tearing out of the woods toward my voice as if to say, "Oh my God, I've been worried sick!" After that, she never went further than my balcony without my close supervision, but I indulged her with little walks as frequently as I could.
Until January 3, 2009, when somehow inexplicably, she escaped. My husband and I fought that night. Then Muriel fought with my younger tom, Percy. My guess is she just got tired of all the fighting and longed to check out the new neighborhood. We're still not sure, but I think she must have slipped out the door unnoticed when my husband left the house to clear his head. I was hiding in the bedroom with a book, and when I came out to freshen the water bowls I realized we were one cat short. I must have searched the house top to bottom twenty times before I was forced to admit Muriel was gone. I headed outside with the flashlight and started searching the property. We had a wooden deck in front, but I couldn't see her underneath it. She didn't show up in the hedges. She wasn't under the car. I went up the street one way, calling her name, and then I went the other way. I went halfway around the block and back. Nothing. Finally I put my anger aside and called my husband distraught. When I had to say the words "I can't find Muriel", I broke into shoulder-rattling sobs.
And so began a seven-week ordeal no one in her third trimester should ever have to endure. My husband came home immediately and helped me search the block with no luck. We stayed up most of the night, watching from the living room window in case she should show up. She didn't. As soon as we got up that Sunday morning we went out to try our luck in the daylight. My husband spotted a cat he thought was Muriel, but she ran from him and lost him by jumping through a fence. We went to the house where he'd last seen her, and they let us search their backyard. But there was no Muriel to be found. That night was cold and rainy, and Monday morning Muriel was still gone and I was a wreck. I called in sick and spent my day posting Craigslist ads, filing reports with animal shelters, and walking the block over and over, six months pregnant and shaking a bag of Whisker Lick'n's in my hand. My husband brought home fliers, and with some help from friends we posted them all over the neighborhood and canvassed too.
A few reports came and went. People spotted cats in their yards that might have been Muriel, but by the time we got there the cats were gone or they were just the wrong cats. People pointed out other resources I might try. I visited the city animal shelter every other day after work and constantly kept track of their online mug book. But a week passed by and no Muriel. One week turned into two, two turned into three, and then we'd been without Muriel for a whole month. Gradually I stopped going to the animal shelter as much, stopped crying as much, tried not to imagine what my poor cat was going through, and finally stopped block-walking when it just got too cold.
Seven weeks after Muriel disappeared, I was cleaning up for an Oscar party when I came upon some old fliers, and I made the decision to throw them away. Not one hour later my husband pulled me out of the shower. A neighbor had come to the door with pictures on his cell phone of a cat he'd found starving in a storage closet off his garage. Just as we had no idea how Muriel had gotten out, he had no idea how this cat had gotten in. But he'd taken the cat to an emergency vet, paid the bill, and come home to ask around and maybe find the owner. Another neighbor had pointed him our way. Judging from the photos my husband was pretty sure it was Muriel. I couldn't believe it, but I quickly dressed and we got in the car and headed for the vet's office. I was sick with nerves. I almost didn't want it to be Muriel, because from what we'd heard the cat couldn't be in good shape.
When we got there we had to wait briefly. Then we were led through a room full of cages and vet techs to a pen where a tiny cat was hooked up to an IV. Her bony back was on me and I couldn't see her face, but she looked too small, and her coat actually looked shinier than my cat's. But I muttered, "Muriel?" When my cat turned around, saw my face, and cried that same cry of recognition I'd heard in the woods, I lost it like any pregnant woman missing her ten-year-old cat for seven weeks would. I cried from the gut, so hard I couldn't talk. My husband talked to the vets as I whimpered and stroked my cat's ears; Muriel most certainly wasn't out of the woods and had to stay overnight. She was starving and dehydrated, emaciated, with possible kidney failure. Every measurable fluid level in her body was off. If she made it through the night, we could pick her up in the morning and take her to her regular vet, where she'd probably need to stay for days.
We went home and called off the Oscar party, although a few cat-loving friends came by anyway to offer condolences. Our heroic neighbor came by to check on everything and even told us not to worry about paying him back, to worry about our baby and pay him back whenever we could. The next morning we'd heard no news from the vet (which was good news, as they said), and when we picked up Muriel at sunrise she'd made great progress. We took her to her vet's office, and there she stayed for a few more days before we brought her home with a weak, shaky walk, a bottle of antibiotics, and special food for her kidneys and weight gain. The cat insurance policy I'd taken out when Muriel turned ten paid off in a big way, as we were reimbursed for all the expenses after our deductible and were able to pay back our neighbor. As for Muriel, we celebrated her eleventh birthday just days after her return. It took a few months for her bald patches to fill in, for the meat to come back to her bones, and for her walk to steady itself out, but Muriel looks pretty much the same today as she did on January 3, 2009. Now she's almost twelve, and I don't anticipate any more adventures for her. I think she expended eight of those rumored nine lives.
As for my husband and me--well, it's a new year. Our rough times continued long after Muriel came home, as evidenced here in these very pages. But just as my cat was out there roaming the neighborhood and surviving the whole seven weeks I worried myself sick about her, love and commitment have been with us all along. Old fights and old problems have been put away, and now our marriage is left for new adventures.
Muriel was my cat. I'd known her about three times as long as I'd known my husband, having adopted her when I was nineteen and new to the world outside my parents' house. Ironically I'd adopted her from a friend and new neighbor who couldn't keep her any longer because she (my friend) was pregnant. Actually I adopted one of Muriel's own kittens and meant to find a new home for Muriel so she wouldn't have to go to the pound. But I never really looked for one, and soon Muriel had thwarted my plans by getting pregnant again. After Muriel had her second litter and the older kitten kept hunting and attacking the babies, I ended up getting rid of the would-be big sister. And when the babies got old enough I adopted them out, took Muriel to the spay clinic, and brought her home to stay.
After that she pretty much gave up on adventure and became a porch cat at best. As I spent the next ten years hopping from apartment to apartment, Muriel usually contented herself by taking the sunlight on various balconies and windowsills. One afternoon when I was twenty-one or so, I let her out for a minute without watching her as closely as I usually did and she ran off into the woods. When it came time for me to leave for work she was still gone, so I had to leave her outside. When I came home after dark I went to the edge of the woods and worriedly called her name. I heard crying in the distance, then leaves crunching, then Muriel tearing out of the woods toward my voice as if to say, "Oh my God, I've been worried sick!" After that, she never went further than my balcony without my close supervision, but I indulged her with little walks as frequently as I could.
Until January 3, 2009, when somehow inexplicably, she escaped. My husband and I fought that night. Then Muriel fought with my younger tom, Percy. My guess is she just got tired of all the fighting and longed to check out the new neighborhood. We're still not sure, but I think she must have slipped out the door unnoticed when my husband left the house to clear his head. I was hiding in the bedroom with a book, and when I came out to freshen the water bowls I realized we were one cat short. I must have searched the house top to bottom twenty times before I was forced to admit Muriel was gone. I headed outside with the flashlight and started searching the property. We had a wooden deck in front, but I couldn't see her underneath it. She didn't show up in the hedges. She wasn't under the car. I went up the street one way, calling her name, and then I went the other way. I went halfway around the block and back. Nothing. Finally I put my anger aside and called my husband distraught. When I had to say the words "I can't find Muriel", I broke into shoulder-rattling sobs.
And so began a seven-week ordeal no one in her third trimester should ever have to endure. My husband came home immediately and helped me search the block with no luck. We stayed up most of the night, watching from the living room window in case she should show up. She didn't. As soon as we got up that Sunday morning we went out to try our luck in the daylight. My husband spotted a cat he thought was Muriel, but she ran from him and lost him by jumping through a fence. We went to the house where he'd last seen her, and they let us search their backyard. But there was no Muriel to be found. That night was cold and rainy, and Monday morning Muriel was still gone and I was a wreck. I called in sick and spent my day posting Craigslist ads, filing reports with animal shelters, and walking the block over and over, six months pregnant and shaking a bag of Whisker Lick'n's in my hand. My husband brought home fliers, and with some help from friends we posted them all over the neighborhood and canvassed too.
A few reports came and went. People spotted cats in their yards that might have been Muriel, but by the time we got there the cats were gone or they were just the wrong cats. People pointed out other resources I might try. I visited the city animal shelter every other day after work and constantly kept track of their online mug book. But a week passed by and no Muriel. One week turned into two, two turned into three, and then we'd been without Muriel for a whole month. Gradually I stopped going to the animal shelter as much, stopped crying as much, tried not to imagine what my poor cat was going through, and finally stopped block-walking when it just got too cold.
Seven weeks after Muriel disappeared, I was cleaning up for an Oscar party when I came upon some old fliers, and I made the decision to throw them away. Not one hour later my husband pulled me out of the shower. A neighbor had come to the door with pictures on his cell phone of a cat he'd found starving in a storage closet off his garage. Just as we had no idea how Muriel had gotten out, he had no idea how this cat had gotten in. But he'd taken the cat to an emergency vet, paid the bill, and come home to ask around and maybe find the owner. Another neighbor had pointed him our way. Judging from the photos my husband was pretty sure it was Muriel. I couldn't believe it, but I quickly dressed and we got in the car and headed for the vet's office. I was sick with nerves. I almost didn't want it to be Muriel, because from what we'd heard the cat couldn't be in good shape.
When we got there we had to wait briefly. Then we were led through a room full of cages and vet techs to a pen where a tiny cat was hooked up to an IV. Her bony back was on me and I couldn't see her face, but she looked too small, and her coat actually looked shinier than my cat's. But I muttered, "Muriel?" When my cat turned around, saw my face, and cried that same cry of recognition I'd heard in the woods, I lost it like any pregnant woman missing her ten-year-old cat for seven weeks would. I cried from the gut, so hard I couldn't talk. My husband talked to the vets as I whimpered and stroked my cat's ears; Muriel most certainly wasn't out of the woods and had to stay overnight. She was starving and dehydrated, emaciated, with possible kidney failure. Every measurable fluid level in her body was off. If she made it through the night, we could pick her up in the morning and take her to her regular vet, where she'd probably need to stay for days.
We went home and called off the Oscar party, although a few cat-loving friends came by anyway to offer condolences. Our heroic neighbor came by to check on everything and even told us not to worry about paying him back, to worry about our baby and pay him back whenever we could. The next morning we'd heard no news from the vet (which was good news, as they said), and when we picked up Muriel at sunrise she'd made great progress. We took her to her vet's office, and there she stayed for a few more days before we brought her home with a weak, shaky walk, a bottle of antibiotics, and special food for her kidneys and weight gain. The cat insurance policy I'd taken out when Muriel turned ten paid off in a big way, as we were reimbursed for all the expenses after our deductible and were able to pay back our neighbor. As for Muriel, we celebrated her eleventh birthday just days after her return. It took a few months for her bald patches to fill in, for the meat to come back to her bones, and for her walk to steady itself out, but Muriel looks pretty much the same today as she did on January 3, 2009. Now she's almost twelve, and I don't anticipate any more adventures for her. I think she expended eight of those rumored nine lives.
As for my husband and me--well, it's a new year. Our rough times continued long after Muriel came home, as evidenced here in these very pages. But just as my cat was out there roaming the neighborhood and surviving the whole seven weeks I worried myself sick about her, love and commitment have been with us all along. Old fights and old problems have been put away, and now our marriage is left for new adventures.
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