Internet Grapes

don't think twice

In my mind, our series of difficult events stretches back four years or so to include our failed attempts to conceive, my sister in law Stephanie's attempted suicide, my miscarriage, Stephanie's later death, my job conditions worsening, my salary being cut, my job being cut, my lack of success at finding new employment, Geoff's church and his own personal piano being destroyed by arson.  There were other, smaller difficulties, many of them tied up in these larger events, and many of which can't be explained well in a few words (although I guess maybe in a way they can: potty training a kid who was almost five, having a newborn who didn't sleep well for quite awhile, general depression and irritability, lack of hope about the future, an extremely bad financial situation caused in large part by keeping up with payments on a home that we never really loved, in a location we grew to really dislike), but really, when I look back on a certain period of time starting around 2006 or 2007 and stretching through mid-2010, I feel like it was A Very Hard Time. 

And I don't know if it has worked this way for you, if you have gone through your own Very Hard Time (as I'm sure many of you have), but when you are in the midst of that Very Hard Time, every small setback or mistake or disappointment can feel like a part of the larger era of the Very Hard Time.  Every small difficulty serves to bring back all of the negative emotions that you've had about every other larger difficulty.  In other words, when you spill the milk all over the kitchen floor shortly after having mopped that floor, it just goes to show that your life sucks.  When the dog steals the whole loaf of bread off of the kitchen counter and eats the whole thing, it means that you have been a fool for thinking that things will ever be any easier or better. When your GPS suddenly freezes up in the middle of your trip, refusing to start up again no matter what you try, it means that you were wrong to think that you could ever make a living doing something other than a lawyer, that you have wasted your life, that you are stupid and a failure at life, and that nobody who knows the real you actually loves you. 

Ahem.  Or something like that. 

But the point I really want to make is that we are now in a new era, one that is not marked by difficulties and sadness, but - so far - mostly by the idea that we are in a New Beginning, facing countless possibilities. The new era didn't wait until we moved to Fort Wayne to start - there were signs of it once in awhile when I was taking pictures that I loved of people who might love them, too, and it really threatened to take hold when Geoff got a job offer for a full-time job which appeared to be a job he'd really love, working for and with people who would really appreciate and welcome him (it gained some more strength when the pastor of the church sent Geoff home from his interview with gifts for me and the girls, too, especially since my gift was the gift of delicious chocolates).  But of course a move comes with its own difficulties and frustrations, and so even though the good days started to outweigh the bad ones, the tiny bad things still carried so much weight that it was hard to tell what was going on.  The rest of the family, I think, handled it better than I did, but speaking for me - I had a tough transition. 

I sat down to write this, though, because our condo in Chicago was supposed to close yesterday, and it did not.  In fact, it appears that the would-be buyers will not be able to buy the condo at all, and as far as that goes, we might be back to square one.  I sat down to write this because this development did not fell me.  I did not rail against my lot in life.  I did not berate myself for the mistakes inherent in every financial decision I've ever made in my life.  I did not cry. 

I was disappointed.  I'm sorry that our neighbors (the would-be buyers, who we really like) won't get to own the entire two-condo building, and won't get to turn it back into a single family home.  I am annoyed that our attorney hasn't gotten back to us about the lack of a closing at all, and I am not sure exactly what will happen next as far as our ownership of the condo. 

But - and I think this might be the best way to put this - the disappointment didn't touch me.  I am fine.  I am ok.  My life is full of goodness - people I love who love me, and so many creature comforts of home.  It's almost Christmas, and the cats haven't destroyed our tree yet.  I still have bad days, of course, when I cry over spilled milk, but I no longer feel like every spill signifies disaster and failure. 

The girls are taking a bath together upstairs.  I hear them splashing and talking and singing Jingle Bells, and every laugh of Katie's is followed by long seconds of Annabel's giggling.  We have food in the house (including Christmas cookies and chocolate dipped candied orange peels).  The lights in the den are twinkling away merrily.  Last night Geoff and I went to a performance of The Nutcracker, courtesy of a very kind woman at the church who offered to buy us tickets, while the girls stayed home with Stephen, a favorite babysitter.  Today the girls and I will make some more cookies, and Geoff and I will make lists of who and what we still need to shop for. 

Who cares about that stupid condo, anyway?

peace and the unknown

I have spent a lot of time in the past year telling myself that I would feel better if my future life were more certain.  If I knew where we'd be in a year or two.  If I knew what city we'd be in, what house we'd live in, what jobs we'd have, what school Katie would attend.  If I knew that we were going to emerge on the other side of this un-insured time healthy (and not bankrupted by some emergency or illness that had taken place in the meantime).  If there wasn't so much that was unknown.  If there wasn't so much that was up in the air.  That was what was bothering me, I told myself (and Geoff) - that I didn't have any real idea what our lives would be like in the future. 

My photography business could succeed, but will that happen before my unemployment benefits run out?  Will I have to take a part-time job working retail?  Will I end up accepting a temp job, legal or non-legal?  Will I end up back in an office, working as a lawyer?  If I do, will I have time for photography work?  I've applied for some jobs out of the area - if I get one of those, will we leave Chicago?  And for where?  Somewhere closer to my family?  Somewhere else that's not close to anyone we know, but that's exciting to us for other reasons?  Should we try to stay in this condo until we can make some money from selling it, or should we just cut our losses and try to get out now?  Should we stay in it as long as we're going to be in Chicago anyway?  Or should we sell it either way?  What's going to happen to us when my unemployment benefits run out later on this year? 

I'm sure that this kind of uncertainty is hard for most people.  I know that it's been hard for me.  I have thought often about what I read in Stumbling on Happiness a few years ago, that possibly the biggest single factor in determining a person's level of happiness or contentment is the amount of control that she (or he) feels she has over her life (ironically, the author points out that depressed people are likely to have a more accurate view of the amount of control they are truly able to exercise over their lives).  In so many ways, for several years now, I have struggled to feel in control of my life. I have been waiting to get back to a place where I can look forward to next year, or even next month, and know what will be happening in my life.

Last Saturday night, a friend of ours from church treated us to a concert downtown performed by the St. Olaf choir.  It was a wonderful performance full of beautiful, moving music.  (Go see them if you get a chance.)  There was one piece, though, that stood out for me not because of the performance, or even because of the music itself, but because of the lyrics of the composition.  The piece - "This House of Peace," by Ralph M. Johnson - had been commissioned for the opening of a medical center in Oregon, and the lyrics included both a Gaelic blessing (as the chorus) and real words taken from letters written by loved ones of people who had been treated at the healing center (as the verses).  The last verse includes: "We live moment to moment now,/ not knowing what next will be./And in this unknown, I live in peace./She is sleeping well."  

At the very end of the piece, the lyrics repeat: "And in this unknown, I live in peace."

And in that moment, as the soloist's voice rang out through the sanctuary, I had my own epiphany.  I realized, suddenly, that the future is always unknown.  Here I have been thinking that once I had a job, or once we had a home we never planned to leave, or once we had financial security, or once we had health insurance, that I would know what my future held, and that the future would no longer be a vast unknown.  But in that moment, in a flash of intuition, I realized although we may sometimes have the illusion of knowledge and stability, that in a very real way, we never actually know. 

I never knew that I would be involved in a car accident in the summer of 2006 that would total our car and leave the other driver dead.  Katie and I could have easily been killed, too.  I didn't know, when we bought our condo, that it was not the sound financial investment that we thought it was; we were sure at the time that we would not live here for more than a year or two.  I never knew that out of all of our family members who attended mine and Geoff's wedding, including grandfathers in their 80's (and one of mine who is now 90), that the only person who would not live long enough to see our fifth wedding anniversary would be Geoff's sister Stephanie.  I never, ever even thought that the way I would leave my former place of employment (where a claims department had been in operation for at least forty years) would be because my employer would shut down the entire department and lay all of us off at once.  

There are good unknowns, too: I never knew I would marry my best friend after meeting him on the internet, or what amazing personalities my children would have (and when I would have them), or the fact that losing my job would turn me into an aspiring professional photographer within the year.  

I have been waiting, you see, for the knowing.  I have been waiting for more certainty in my life, assuming that once I had that, I could be less anxious, less fearful.  I have been waiting for stability to bring me peace.  And while it is true that my life has certainly had more dramatic upheaval and change in the past few years than most people's probably have (and certainly more than my life had in the few years before that), there will always be changes that can not be anticipated.  There will always be frightening unexpected occurrences that pop out of nowhere, and stressful events that I don't handle the way I thought that I would, and (thankfully) wonderful surprises that spring out of the mist to greet me.  And if I wait until my life is constant and stable before I allow myself to feel at peace, then I may never feel at peace. 

I want to feel some peace. 

At dinner after the concert, I told Geoff and the two women that we'd gone with (both of whom are friends of ours from the church) about the epiphany I'd had during the concert, about how we are always living in the unknown, and about how I wanted to find peace, regardless.  At home that night, half joking, I told Geoff that I wanted to give up when it came to trying to figure out what to do with my life (with our lives), and that maybe it was time to do what the church's interim pastor had suggested in a sermon awhile back - that when we no longer knew what to do, we should "give it to God," admit that we were not in control, and ask for help.  "I am ready to give up," I told Geoff.  "I do not know what are the best choices for us to make right now.  I want help."  I decided that maybe I needed to believe the idea we had explored in my Mondo Beyondo course - that "something greater is holding me," and that the universe has a way of working things out.  Just the idea that this was a possibility - that I could stop worrying about it - that God or the universe would deal with all of the agonizing implications arising from every tiny decision - made me feel a little bit better.  I don't know if it's true, but I don't need to.  Just the idea that it might be - that it's ok for me to stop trying to line up and piece together the 582 different future scenarios my life could include - gives me some peace. (And there is that other truth I've realized over the past few years: no matter how much I expect and prepare for the worst, it does not seem to make the worst any less painful, when and if it does happen - all it does do is make the previous days more painful.)

Anything can happen at any time, I told myself.  But for now, we are all right.  We are healthy, and we have clothes and a home.  We have friends, and family, and computers, and televisions, and cell phones.  We will strive for peace in the now, without knowing what will happen tomorrow. 

The very next night, our church - where Geoff has been the director of music, and which we as a family have attended and participated in for the last five years - was set on fire by a member of the congregation. The sanctuary and offices are mostly destroyed.  The outer walls are mostly intact.  Geoff's piano is ruined, and his personal music collection (thousands of dollars worth of music collected over decades) is largely destroyed.  

You may expect some pithy ending to all of this.  I don't have one.  Except that Geoff could have been at the church that night, working on some things, and he wasn't.  The fire could have been set on Thursday night, when Geoff was at the church, working on some things, and it wasn't.  Someone, including the man who set the fire, could have been killed, but no one was.  Geoff could have lost his job, but he hasn't.  Insurance will cover not only rebuilding the church (although it's possible that the total rebuild could cost more than the insurance policy limit, it will at least cover the vast majority), but also Geoff's piano and most (if not all) of his music. 

Already there is something amazing happening at the church, too, which is that the community is coming together in ways that I haven't seen while we've been there.  The huge loss of the church building that so many of its members have cared so much about for so many years has caused grief that we are all sharing, together.  It is a reminder, as so many sudden losses are, of what matters most.  And just as I will never be grateful to my former employer for leaving me without a job (especially in a time when finding a new job has been, and continues to be, so difficult), I do not give thanks to the arsonist for starting this devastating fire that destroyed so much of what was once (and what will surely be again) a beautiful building beloved by so many.  And yet it would also be wrong to fail to notice the good that so often does arise out of loss, or to fail to realize that sometimes the events that endanger our previous stability the most are the same events that create new possibility.  They may even show us where our real strengths lie. 

Or at least this is what I am telling myself, even in the midst of my own grief and confusion.  And even in the midst of this grief, knowing even less about tomorrow than I did a few months ago, I am amazed to find that I do have some measure of peace. I try to hold it close to my heart, for as long as it will stay.

prayers, answered and un

One day, several months ago, as we sat in church listening to the sermon, I found myself looking out at some people in the congregation - a father with his son and daughter.  The father was wearing glasses, and the son was wearing his glasses (although I've also seen him without them), and the daughter didn't have glasses on. I tried to think whether I'd ever seen her in glasses or heard her mention contacts.  The mother of the two kids was not sitting with them - she was sitting with us in the choir - and I know she wears contacts.  We occasionally see her in glasses.  I only thought about this for a second (not nearly as long as it has taken me to type this). 

These thoughts led me to start thinking about genetics, and about how things like poor eyesight make their way from one generation to the next, and I wondered about the baby growing inside me, and whether she would need glasses.  Geoff wears glasses.  I have had glasses during two different periods of my life, but for eyestrain, not for vision.  I guess it remains to be seen whether Katie will need glasses. 

And then I started thinking about other members of mine and Geoff's families, and which of them have glasses, when suddenly, as clear as a photograph held right in front of me - no, as clear as a person sitting right in front of me - I had a vision of Stephanie, wearing her glasses, leaning toward me, beaming at me happily and maybe a little conspiratorially, the way she did so many times.  And as I saw her, I felt an urgent PLEASE rise up inside me, a plea for Stephanie to be alive, for her death to have been a dream (a nightmare), and for me to have a chance to see her smile at me like that again.  And even though I knew, of course, that my plea would not be answered, there was a part of me that kept hoping that somehow I had misunderstood, that even though all these months had passed, that she was really ok, and that her death had never happened.

On a different day, around the end of April, in the last month or so before Annabel was born, I was driving home from work on Lake Shore Drive when I realized that I couldn't remember feeling any major movements from the baby that day.  Usually there was a flurry of activity at some point every morning, and again every afternoon, that was so forceful that I couldn't help but stop whatever I was doing to focus completely on the baby in there, to wonder what she was doing, and to be grateful for her existence (but often also to wish that she wouldn't push quite so hard).  I couldn't remember any such flurry from that day.  There was no such movement right then, either.

I reached down to my belly to feel for her hard shape under my skin.  Just there, to the right of my belly button, I felt an expanse of babyness - maybe a back, or a butt, or a head.  I pushed on it gently.  It didn't push back. 

This was normal.  She slept, often, so the fact that she wasn't pushing back at me didn't mean anything was wrong.  I knew that she was probably just fine.  But still.  I had a nagging sense that maybe, just maybe, something was wrong. 

I pushed again.  Nothing.  "No."  I said.  I was alone in the car.  I said it out loud anyway.  "No.  No, no, no, no, no."  After a few minutes, I started to cry.  "No."

I kept driving, and I kept waiting for movement, and every so often I would push on my belly, and there would be no response (even though each time I could feel some part of her little body in there, under my skin).  Even though there was no real reason for it, I felt panic rising inside me.  I thought of the day, almost a year before, when we'd gone to the doctor and discovered that I was having a miscarriage; I thought of how the day had been sunny and clear and warm.  I thought of how up until that afternoon, there had been nothing to distinguish that day from any other day, no way to know about the grief that I was going to experience before the end of the day.  Nothing to warn me that I was going to spend the afternoon sobbing and the next few days despairing.  No clues. 

"Please," I said.  "Please," again, out loud.  "Please.  Please.  Please."   

I thought how easily this day could be another day like that day last May, how suddenly, with no warning, this day could turn from ordinary to unforgettable. I thought about how bad things so often do happen that way, coming out of nowhere, slamming you to the ground and knocking the wind out of you. I thought about how so many bad things happen not because we deserve them, but in spite of the fact that probably nobody deserves them.  I imagined getting home, telling Geoff, driving to the hospital, discovering that the baby had died, deciding where to go from there (I was eight months pregnant; there would have to be labor and delivery; there would be no miscarriage in the privacy of my own bathtub), and wondering whether I would ever find the strength to try again. 

And then, as I drove along, crying and praying and pleading, as I was preparing myself for disaster and despair (it couldn't really have been very long - maybe it was fifteen minutes, or maybe it was only five), she moved, gently, inside me.  And then she moved again.  And then again, more deliberately, and stronger. 

I gasped a huge sigh of relief.  "Oh, thank you," I said, still crying (maybe crying harder).  "Thank you.  Thank you, thank you, thank you." 

A little over a week ago, at the end of July, we were in Halifax, Nova Scotia, visiting Geoff's family while I was on maternity leave.  While we were there, we all drove out to Lawrencetown Beach, to scatter Stephanie's ashes in the ocean, from a beach she loved to visit.  There was fog everywhere, and the air was much colder than I'd realized it would be, so before we could walk over to the water, we had to spend a few minutes dressing Annabel more warmly, and putting a jacket on Katie.  Geoff strapped on the Baby Bjorn, and we put Annabel into it, and we all walked over to the rocky beach together.  As we stood there in the fog and wind, watching what was left of Stephanie's body fall into the water and blow through the air, I did not say "please."  I tried, really hard, to think about how glad I was to have known her, to be grateful to have had her as my sister in law and friend, and to feel lucky to have known her.  I tried, really hard, to pray "thank you," even though there will always be a part of me, I think, that can't help but say "no." 

In the car, driving back into Halifax after we left the beach, Katie (who had sobbed nearly hysterically at the beach) kept asking us to tell her about Stephanie and about how she had died.  We did the best we could to explain, again, what had happened, and why, and made sure to let her know that we didn't completely understand it ourselves.  Katie started to cry again.  "I don't remember her," she said, and cried as if she understood just how much of a loss that was. 

Annabel is two months old now, and except for a mild rash on her cheeks, she is completely healthy.  For the most part, she is a happy, alert, easily soothed baby, who makes me smile every day.  There is a woman at the church who wants to hold Annabel every time we see her. "A healthy baby," she says, "is like winning the lottery."  She smiles at us, and tells us how lucky we are.  We smile back, and nod, and say that she's right.

10 weekends until my due date. And counting.

To sum up the past almost three months: this pregnancy is kicking my ass. 

It's not that anything unusual or incredibly difficult is going on physically.  In fact, the past month or so has been really great in that respect; I'm no longer having daily headaches, feeling continous nausea, or suffering from extreme fatigue no matter how much sleep I get, and I'm not (quite) yet big enough that I have to have a debate with myself about whether or not it's worth it to try to pick something off the floor.  The cold and cough that lasted for over a month have been gone for at least a month by now.  And the baby in there kicks and punches and twists and turns many, many times each day, so often that even my newly cynical mind doesn't consider, morbidly, on a daily basis, whether or not she's possibly died in there.  (I was thinking that routinely for awhile, not because I expected it, but just because my frame of mind was very much along the lines of "anything bad can happen.) 

But I've been an emotional basketcase.  I think I've been better during the last week (although I probably shouldn't say that for fear of jinxing myself), but before that, wow.  Look out.  I don't have any way to test whether or not I'm more emotional and sensitive than I was when I was pregnant with Katie, but I know that I've been crying more often, feeling hopeless more often, wanting to throw things against the wall more often.  I blame, in large part, the awesome child I live with, who is just doing her part toward growing up - she's testing her boundaries.  Constantly.  I remember being weepy and sensitive when I was pregnant with Katie, but I don't remember feeling, over and over, like I was on the verge of a tantrum.  It's probably not a coincidence that when I was pregnant with her, nobody ever woke me up in the middle of the night.  There was nobody to stop me from going to bed as early as I wanted, or from falling asleep on the couch before dinner.  I didn't have to put anybody else to bed (negotiating with me every freaking step of the way) when all I wanted to do was to collapse in a chair in front of the tv.   

The two major issues we've been facing with Katie have been sleeping through the night - and going to bed on time - and pooping in the toilet.  The way things have shaken out, these end up in direct conflict with each other, because most days she will hold her poop all day, until after bedtime, and then she'll poop in her overnight diaper.  Sometimes it takes her 45 minutes or an hour to do that, and by then it's almost my bedtime. 

Work has also been incredibly frustrating lately.  I won't write much about that here, but I will say that the job itself, even on the best days, is full of possibilities for getting frustrated, since no one ever submits a claim unless and until something has gone wrong.  So by the time I talk to someone, they're usually already angry, and I am often the first person they can take it out on.  When you also take into account the suckage of the real estate industry these days, it means I'm doing spending more time doing more work which is more difficult for people who appreciate it less.  Despite that, we aren't getting any raises this year, and the corporate office adds new requirements on a near-weekly basis.  And this winter has been full of snow and ice and snow and ice and gray, dreary days with no sunshine.  Today it has already snowed at least 6 inches.

And on top of all of the other hard stuff, I find myself thinking often, lately, about my sister in law Stephanie, who in August 2002, three months before Geoff and I got married, asked me when we were going to make her an aunt.  Who came to visit more than once while I was pregnant with Katie, and who took me out to get manicures and pedicures about two months before my due date.  Who apparently bragged about Katie to everyone she knew, and who knew how much we wanted another baby.  Who told me often about how much she looked forward to having her own children.  I know she would have been excited for us, with this new baby on the way.  If she were alive, I bet she would be visiting sometime soon, to take me for a pedicure, to stock our freezer full of ice cream, and to offer to babysit for Katie while Geoff and I went out to a movie or dinner.  There aren't that many people who put their hands against my stomach and felt Katie kicking from the other side, over four years ago, but Stephanie was one of them, and facing the birth of this new daughter makes me think about her.  I miss her. 

And although I don't really grieve my miscarriage in an emotional way anymore, it has been on my mind lately, too.  It hasn't been quite a full year since I found out I was pregnant, but it seems like it, since I had my first positive pregnancy test that time on Good Friday 2007.  I found out that the fetus had died on May 31, 2007; this baby is due to be born on May 29, 2008, almost exactly a year later.  I certainly don't feel like the baby is cursed because of this; in fact, lately, when I think about it, it comforts me for some reason, as if this is all part of an intricate cylical plan. 

This is not how I planned this post to go.  This is where my head has been, a lot of the time, over the past few months.  But there have been plenty of good things, too.

We had a second trimester ultrasound, where we were told that the doctor was "98% sure" that we're having a girl. 

Katie started drawing pictures of our family holding hands.

And writing her own name.  (She can write all the letters of the alphabet now, nearly perfectly.)

My niece turned one.

Katie started participating in a new "liturgical dance troupe" at the church.  She's in a group with 2 or 3 other 4 year olds and one 5 year old.  She loves it.

As for that "other four year olds" part?  Katie turned four at the beginning of this month.  She is everything I was hoping I'd get when I wanted a child, and when I found out I was having a daughter - and lots more bonus things besides, and I told her so. 

Oh, and I've gotten a bunch of cute maternity clothes online from Target. 

At the beginning of the year, I decided to try to post one picture per day on Flickr.  I'm not exactly meeting my goal - I think I've missed 7 days already.  But it's still been satisfying - a tangible record of the past few months that pleases me to look back at, and reminds me in a very literal way that this year has not all been difficult and crazy-making.  Some of it has been downright wonderful. 

(Click on that photo to read the story behind it, because it's pretty awesome.)

It's just a little over two months before my due date, and we don't have a place for the baby to sleep.  (The old crib is broken and has pretty much had it.)  In order to create a place for the baby's bed to go in our room, we need to move the Ikea wardrobe in our bedroom out to the back porch.  But in order to move it to the back porch, we need to move lots of stuff back there down to the basement.  And it's possible that things in the basement will have to be moved around to find a place for what's coming down from the back porch.  Counting this weekend, we have 10 weekends until my due date, and I think we need to make them count.  Geoff also needs to complete his doctoral requirements no later than June (according to the school), and no later than we have a NEWBORN IN THE HOUSE (according to me).  I think it will be a busy spring.

But I also think it will be a good spring, and an even better summer.  The cynicism that's been surrounding me for the last four or five months seems to be lifting, and I feel like I am going back to my old self, able to see and appreciate my blessings even on bad days. 

I just wanted to let you know.

For now

From December 22, 2007

Karen's funeral started about 20 minutes ago.  I have been thinking about her family, her friends - some of them our mutual friends - and wondering how they are doing.  I know they can't possibly be doing very well. 

Karen and I were never incredibly close, but we've been friendly or friends since my freshman year in college in 1988.  Karen's college roommate and high school friend Tracy became (and remains) one of my best friends, and my college roommate Laurie and continued friend became (and remained) one of Karen's best friends.  For the five years I lived in Lexington, Kentucky, I saw Karen regularly.  We went to parties together, ate meals together.  I remember sledding together with a group of friends.  I was not in Karen's wedding, but both Tracy & Laurie were bridesmaids, and I still remember it pretty well; how happy Karen & Kyle both were, how happy I was for them, how much fun I had at their wedding reception.  I made and decorated the cake for Karen's bridal shower.  In the year after I graduated from college, Tracy and Laurie and I shared an apartment in the same complex where Karen and Kyle lived, right across the way.  My dad still remembers Karen from Laurie's wedding that year, how she danced and hummed to the music.

In the years since then, Karen and I haven't remained in close touch, but we've always been fond of each other and happy to see each other.  That fall, Karen and Tracy and Laurie and her husband all flew up to Chicago for a visit.  I remember us ducking our heads against the wind from the lake as we hurried to museums downtown.  I remember that Karen's ride on the plane to Chicago from Louisville was her first time on a plane.  Later Karen and I were both bridesmaids in Tracy and Tim's wedding.  I remember getting drunk on amaretto at Tracy's bachelorette party and feeling sorry for myself, having recently broken up with my long-term boyfriend Allen.  I remember Tracy and Karen comforting me. 

Karen had three children: a girl, Kellie, who is now 11; a boy, Kevin, who is now 9, and another boy, Kasey, who is almost 4 (only a couple of months younger than Katie).  I happened to be visiting Laurie when Kevin was born, so we visited Karen in the hospital and saw the brand new baby and the shy older girl, Kellie.  When Laurie was pregnant with her son Jack, Karen and I were both at Laurie's baby shower.  And in more recent years, when I've visited Laurie, several times we've planned a visit with Karen and her kids (her husband, Kyle, was often at work).  Last summer Karen & Kyle and all three kids came up to Chicago for a vacation, and Geoff and Katie and I had dinner with them.  It was really nice to see them, and Katie and their kids had a good time together.

Then last week, barely a week before Christmas, Karen got a horrible headache, and a few days later, she died from a brain aneurism.  Her 9 year old son called 911 for her.  Her husband was in Japan for work, and came home right away - they kept Karen on life support until he could get there. 

And other than the ones above, I don't really have words to talk about Karen and her death, how frightening and sad and awful and nonsensical it all seems.  How I have been grieving the fact that she is not going to get to be here while her children grow up, how they won't get to have her in their day to day lives, and how her husband is going to have to manage a whole new way of life without her.  And I keep wondering how or whether they will manage to find any joy in their Christmas.  I have been praying for their whole family, and for my friends who were also her friends.  I wish any of this made sense.

From January 3, 2008

The postscript to this is that on Christmas Eve, I went to work in the morning.  Geoff and Katie were home together, and I expected to leave work early.  Shortly after I got to work, Geoff and I were instant messaging each other.  He told me about his horrible headache.  We talked a little more, and then later, I sent him a message and he didn't respond, so I called him on the phone.  There was no answer.  I thought maybe they had gone out to run an errand, so I called him on his cell phone.  Still no answer.  A little later, I called home again and left a message.  Soon after that, I called the cell again.  It had been about a half an hour since I first tried to tell him something, and suddenly I remembered his horrible headache, and started to panic.  I thought about how Katie didn't know how to answer the phone if we weren't there to tell her to push the "talk" button, and wondered what she would do if Geoff had fallen unconscious.  I wondered if she would be ok in the time it would take for me to get there.  I wondered how I would make it, what I would do, if I didn't have Geoff in my life, and I thought about how much I loved him, and how very much I would miss him.  When he finally answered the phone with a jaunty hello, I was starting to cry. 

He was all right (of course he was).  We are all right.  It was been a hard year, with my miscarriage and Stephanie's death, but here we are, and I am still pregnant, and we are all still healthy, and we had a very nice Christmas.  I am hopeful that 2008 will be a better year. 

And yet I keep thinking about the bad things that might happen, that could happen, with no warning.  For no reason.  At any time.  I think how we are all right, for now.  And I wish that "for now" felt like enough, and that it didn't have to be.

miracles and mistakes

My belly is growing, again, enough that today I thought about taking a picture and posting it on Flickr.  And then, no.  Just, no.  I remember my happy picture, posted at almost exactly the same point in the pregnancy where I am today, and I remember that despite how happy I looked (how happy I was), that eventually I learned that the truth was that on that very day, there was no longer anything living in my uterus.  I also note, in retrospect, what I didn't think much of at the time, that by that time I wasn't having much, if any, nausea any more.  No more furious acne on my face.  Not nearly as tired as I'd been, but having a lot of headaches.  I thought it was all caused by the end of the first trimester, and that I was just going to have an easier time of it than when I was pregnant with Katie.

Today, this week, I comfort myself with what would otherwise not be comforting things - I retched several times this morning.  My face and neck are breaking out painfully and horribly.  I am exhausted.  (Still, any day I have a headache I wonder if it's a sign of the end, of the days and days of headaches that I had at the end of and after the last pregnancy.) 

Still, I'm not ready to take or post the picture.  Maybe in another week and a day, after our ultrasound.  Maybe then.

I have reminded myself, repeatedly, that some of the feelings I have are ridiculous, but still, sometimes, I have them anyway.  When I found out I was pregnant again, I was hesitant to tell anybody, not because I didn't want them to know, but because I didn't want to get their hopes up "for nothing," again, like last time.  As if I were somehow to blame for what happened.  As if my own grief from the miscarriage paled in light of the way I had dashed other people's hopes.  As if I didn't deserve to tell anybody about it unless I could guarantee that this time, there would actually be a baby at the end of the road, instead of just a lot of blood and sadness.

So I haven't taken the picture, but I will admit that I am pleased to see the growing belly.  I am working from home today, and I have stood, more than once, sideways in front of the mirror in the dining room so that I can admire my profile.  Definite pregnant belly.  I even tried to suck it in, and I couldn't (a clear difference between the pregnant belly and the flabby belly of the past few years).  There it stayed, gently rounded, almost as far out as my breasts, daring me to look at it and think anything but good thoughts about the little creature that's housed inside (which recently, so I'm told, made the transition from embryo to fetus). 

My friend romanlily posted a photo on Flickr with a quote from Einstein that I've been thinking about a lot the past few days.  "There are only two ways to live your life.  One is as though nothing is a miracle.  The other is as though everything is a miracle."  I know which of those ways I'd like to live my life.  And it's true, isn't it, that this whole crazy thing, this making of a human being from scratch - from two tiny cells - really is a miracle?  Although my miscarriage was a personal tragedy to me, well - perhaps the real miracle is that as many babies are made and born in as perfect condition as they are.  All the fingers and toes.  Beating heats and eyelashes.  Skin that feels, eyes that open and see, vocal cords that make noise, mouths that suck and throats that drink.  Brains that work.

There is no guarantee, of course, that I can give you, or give myself, that this pregnancy will result in a real live baby with all working parts.  But I'm going to believe in that miracle, as much as I can. 

Hope

I don't know where to start.  I didn't mean for so much time to pass before I posted again, but from the last time I posted until just recently, it has been a whirlwind of busyness, celebration, grief, recovery, exhaustion. 

On September 18th, the same day as my last post, I took a home pregnancy test that had a second line so faint I thought I might be imagining it.  On September 19th, I got a darker line.  A couple of days later, one that was even darker.  Since then, I've had bloodwork and an ultrasound and exam at the doctor's office.  I'm pregnant again.  About 10.5 weeks right now, with an estimated due date of May 29, 2008. 

On September 26th, we celebrated Geoff's 31st birthday.  The weekend before his birthday Katie and I visited my Mom.  The weekend after his birthday, Katie and I visited my dad & stepmom, and also my brother and his girlfriend and my niece. 

On October 4th, Geoff's parents arrived to visit, and to be here for his doctoral recital on the 7th.  His sister Kimberley arrived on the 5th.  My dad & stepmom and Josh & Frankie arrived on the 6th.  The recital was a big success, with lots of our friends attending, and with everyone impressed by and/or proud of Geoff and his talent and skill.  On October 9th, his father and girlfriend and Kimberley went home.  On October 10th, his mom went home. 

On October 10th, Geoff's brother Matthew, who was worried about his sister Stephanie, went to her condo and found her.  Stephanie had died that day of an accidental overdose (I hope it is not a violation of her family's trust to say that; I know much of her story is not mine to tell, and I won't try).  She was 28 years old.  It makes me cry to sit here and type that.

I went to work on the 11th and prepared to be gone the next week.  On Friday the 12th we spent most of the day downtown at the passport agency, getting Katie an emergency passport so that we could fly up to Halifax the next day.  After waiting in many lines, we got the passport.  On the 13th, we flew to Halifax, to be with the family, to grieve, to attend the visitation and the service.  The outpouring of love for Stephanie was overwhelming and wonderful and heartbreaking.

On the 18th, we flew back home very early in the morning and visited my obstetrician in the afternoon.  Everything looked good, she said.  There was a heartbeat, just like last time.  So far, so good.

On the 19th, Katie and I flew to Boston for a trip we'd had planned for months, to visit with a huge group of women and their families; we have been an amazing support group for each other since I joined the PSV online forum in January (and many of them have been an amazing support group for each other for years now).  We had a wonderful time.  On the 22nd, we flew home.

On the 23rd, I went back to work.  The rest of the week, I tried to catch up. 

Geoff found and bought Katie a Snow White costume at the church rummage sale for $2.  On Halloween, we went trick or treating. 

And now it's November.  Saturday was my mom's birthday, and she came up to visit.  We had a good visit with her.

I will write more about the most important events here, but right now this is what I can manage. 

I miss Stephanie.  Already.  She was not just my sister-in-law, she was also my friend, and I thought we'd have until we were old women to get closer to each other, to be part of each other's lives, to watch our children (when she had them) grow up.  She was going to be Katie's special aunt, she said, the one who took her travelling and took her out for a drink when she turned 21 (or maybe even before).  When she saw me or talked to me, she would shout out, "Sister!" as if that was the best thing in the world to be.  I am mad at her for letting this happen, for leaving us.  But most importantly, I loved her.  I love her still.

I have not really allowed myself to be thrilled about being pregnant.  I am happy.  I am cautiously optimistic.  There is no real reason to think that things won't be ok, except that sometimes, things aren't ok.  I am nauseous a lot, eating pretty healthily, sleeping a lot.  I have had at least three separate nightmares of having a miscarriage with this pregnancy.  I am scheduled to have an ultrasound on 11/15, at 12 weeks, and in my mind that is a benchmark, a time past which I can relax and not worry quite so much. 

I am sorry that I never got to tell Stephanie that I was pregnant.  And I am sorry that Katie will not have any real, solid memories of her Aunt Stephanie.

We are ok.  Or we will be.  It's been a pretty hard year, in a lot of ways, but I am hoping that the near future holds some wonderful things, and that we are able to let go of some parts of the past.  I hope that wherever Stephanie is, that she is at peace.  I don't know what else I can hope.

all those things I've always been

What I am realizing lately, more than anything, is that if I take it day by day, and let go of past misery and loss, then each day carries itself - and me - forward.  Each day is pretty good.  Days like today: I made pancakes, played with Katie, drank coffee Geoff made me, put Katie's hair in pigtails (on request) and took a few pictures (including the one below - it's hard to be sad when you're living with THAT), took Katie to daycare (and got lots of hugs and kisses - I hardly ever drop her off), worked from home all day, listened to music, washed some dirty windows and mirrors, worked out to a The Firm DVD in my living room, took a shower, ate a salad for lunch in the backyard (with Geoff, in the sunshine), played with the dogs (ours and the neighbors').  This is a good day, not even over yet.  Day by day, things are pretty good.

I wrote this in mid-August:

I am still angry about the miscarriage.  I'm angry about the fact that it is now 20 months since we started trying to get pregnant (and I'd been wanting to try for a second child for around 6 months before that, but we waited for the start of the year so that new insurance would kick in), and I have nothing to show for it except a lot of grief and disappointment, not to mention physical discomfort.  I am angry that I have put too much stock into the idea that I could get pregnant at any time, so I have foregone making plans for too many other things. 

I'm not just angry, though; I'm also sad.  And tired - Katie has not been sleeping well lately, sometimes waking me up as often as four times a night, and almost always at least once.

I have been hard on myself for a lot of things, including feeling bad. Yesterday Eliza and I talked, and she suggested that when we went home that night we should make it a goal to do something nice for ourselves, to be kind to the ones we love, and to spend that time with open hearts.  And you know what?  It made a difference.  I came home, and Katie and I made chocolate chip cookie dough, then ate dinner, then she took her bath.  After she'd been in the bath about five minutes, she called out, "Mommy, aren't you going to take a bath with me?"  I was tired, and a little headachy, and my first instinct was to say "no, not tonight," but I stopped myself, and thought about opening my heart, and I said yes.  Baths with Katie involve a lot of splashing and tickling and laughing. It was a good way to spend 30 minutes or so.  And then we got out, and it started to rain, so she ran out onto the front porch, naked, to feel the cold rain on her little body.  After a little while, I put her in her nightgown, and put her to bed.  After she was in bed, I looked at the pictures I'd taken during the day, and I uploaded some to Flickr.  And after that, I drank some green tea and did some yoga for beginners with a DVD I have. 

Things are very much the same now, but better (and with more sleep).  It is still painful, to work with a woman who was due 6 weeks before me, as she approaches her due date in October.  It still makes me rage, occasionally, against the universe and everything, about the unfairness of it all, although one ironic thing about the miscarriage is that my grief from it, as great and intense as it was, was (and is) less than the grief and depression that arose (and arises) from trying and failing to conceive, for month after month after barren month.  I have decided that the major reason for this is that the miscarriage was a large event that called for grieving, not just by me, but by almost everyone who knew me, whereas the seemingly endless months of infertility do not fit in with anything that I know how to grieve appropriately, and they do not lend themselves easily or comfortably to public support.  Each month of failing to get pregnant is certainly not worthy of the grief that the miscarriage caused me, but all of the months put together have affected me much more than the miscarriage.  Now that we are back in the months of trying to conceive, I find myself trying to hold onto a mentality that does not involve tallying up each month as another personal failure. 

When people wonder how I am, I am torn between explaining that I am still in mourning (not only for the miscarriage, but for the failure, so far, to have another child, and the knowledge that I may never have another child) and between explaining that I am good.  I am fine.  I am loving and loved, busy and happy, blessed and lucky.  All those things I've always been.

The Epiphany

On July 3rd they closed our office early.  I had driven, so I got home in record time, and then Geoff and I went to the grocery store together.  Afterward, we went home and watched one episode from Season 2 of Lost, because we can't get enough of that show.  Then we got the bikes and bike trailer out of the basement, and rode over to Katie's daycare to pick her up from school.  Geoff went in to get her, and when they came out and she saw that I was there with the "BIKES?!"  she was very excited (actual mouth agape and everything).  We fastened her into the trailer and rode home. 

After we got home, we rested a little bit (it was hot out), then Geoff fired up the grill and I made chocolate chip cookie dough.  Katie cracked the eggs - she cracks them, then I open them up.  Geoff set the table in the back yard for dinner.  I called my brother Josh to wish him a happy birthday, and Katie and I sang into the phone.  Around 7 or so, our friends Heather & Arek and their dog Phoebe (our neighbors during the time I was pregnant and for the first year plus after Katie was born) arrived, came upstairs, and started making mojitos from scratch.  We haven't seen them in too long, and as we talked to them, I kept thinking how good it was to see them.  They are smart and funny and quirky and kind, and we miss them. 

The grilled salmon was ready to eat at about the same time that the mojitos were ready.  Katie went down the back stairs all by herself, into the back yard.  Heather & Arek & I went downstairs to meet Geoff and Katie, and then we all poured water, distributed silverware, and mojitos, and salmon and corn on the cob.  Heather raised a toast to summer.  Katie had to be reverse-psychologized into eating her meal ("I hope nobody eats this piece of salmon!"), but she did eat almost all of it, the salmon and corn both.  For awhile, she lay on a sleeping bag in the middle of the yard, the dogs arranged around her.  We talked and laughed and ate, and before we went in, the fireflies came out.  Katie pointed them out to us, over and over.  "Do you see that one?!"  Just after dinner, Josh called back, and we chatted for a little while.  We're planning to meet him and his family at the Indiana Dunes in a few weeks; I said I'd bring a cake to celebrate his July birthday and my August one. 

We went in and got Katie ready for bed.  She wanted to sit on Heather's lap and have Heather read her stories from her "Frog & Toad" book, so that's the way it happened.  In the middle of Heather reading, Katie interrupted her to say, "I like your shoes."  After the stories, and tooth brushing, we turned out the light and put her to bed.  Heather and Arek stayed an hour or two longer, while we ate ice cream and chocolate chip cookies and drank wine or more mojitos or water. 

The next day, Katie woke up early, came out of her room, and came down the hall to our room, where she asked me to pick her up and put her in our bed.  She snuggled down between me and Geoff and went back to sleep.  After an hour or two, she and I started waking up.  "You are my best girl in the whole world and I love you," she said, as she has been saying a lot lately.  Then she talked and talked about whatever came into her head.  I heard Geoff laughing quietly on the other side of her.

When we got up, Katie and I made pancakes.  Geoff got up and made us bacon, and we all ate together and hung around the house, relaxing, taking our time showering and getting dresssed.  A couple of times Katie yelled out, "I have to PEE!" and I would say, "Ok, let's go!" and the two of us would race to the bathroom.  She told me to sit down on the side of the tub.  "Watch," she said, and then changed her mind.  "I mean, listen!"  And when she peed, we both got huge smiles on our faces.  Then she picked out her sticker for the sticker chart. 

Suddenly it was time to leave if we wanted to get to the movies in time to see Ratatouille.  Geoff bought us tickets online, and we drove up there ("this is a long way," Katie said, about the 10 minute drive to Evanston), parked, and walked together to the elevator.  When we got there, Katie and I went to find seats while Geoff went to buy snacks: popcorn and a drink for me and him to share, and a kid's thing (drink, popcorn, treat) for her.  She sat between us during the movie, and she was pretty wriggly (head in my lap, feet in Geoff's, then standing on the floor, leaning against me, then in my lap, then back to her seat), but we all stayed in the theatre the whole time, and she was basically well behaved.  Not only that, but all three of us were actually able to enjoy the same movie! 

When it was over, we headed out to find a place to have lunch.  We stopped at an Asian place where Geoff said he'd eaten once before.  The menus were huge in selection and physical size, with pages full of color pictures of fruity drinks and yummy looking appetizers and entrees full of vegetables and noodles.  Katie kept pointing to the page with the fruity drinks and asking, "Which one do you like, Mommy?  Which one do you like, Daddy?  This one?  Do you like this one?"  And when we answered, "Good job.  Now which one do you like?  This one?" 

Katie was a little antsy, having been in the theatre for a couple of hours, and a little loud, and I said to Geoff what a good place it was for us - loud enough to drown out Katie's particular brand of noise, so we didn't have to worry that she was bothering anybody else - but not too loud to keep us from hearing each other.  We got toys out of the diaper bag for Katie to play with; we heard her talking on behalf of her toys while she moved them around on the table or on her chair.   

It was noisy and bright in the restaurant, and it was the middle of a lazy holiday day with my little family of three.  The people all around us were all different ages and races and types of groups.  The food, when it started arriving, was delicious, and we all shared each other's.  Geoff and I kept laughing about Katie, who took turns talking to us and talking to her "kids" (her imaginary friends, who are all children from her daycare). 

Then suddenly I had one of those moments when I felt like I was in a movie.  You know the kind of scene: where the real life sounds of dishes clinking and people talking disappears underneath the music soundtrack, while the camera pans over all of our happy faces, smiling and eating and talking and laughing.  And I thought, This is my little family.  And if this is the biggest my family gets - if Katie is the only child Geoff and I have, it will not be settling.  It will be good.  It will be wonderful.

I think they call this kind of moment an epiphany. 

Later I was sad again, and a little worried, and a little sorry for myself.  But ever since then, I have my epiphany to hold onto.  Even when I'm sad, I know that this is my truth.  I close my eyes and I see the sunlight filtering through the wall of windows in Joy Yee's Noodles, and I hear the noisy conversation of all the people around me, and I see the way Geoff and Katie and I look at each other, and I feel it all over again. 

self portrait as self-assessment tool

another self portrait
Originally uploaded by jessamynn.

I'm not really sure why I keep taking so many self-portraits lately. I keep wanting to take them, thinking that if I do it enough, I'll be keeping track of my progress, or taking my mental temperature, or something. "How am I doing?" I ask myself. And then I take another self portrait.

I'm doing ok. I've got this cool new skirt that is reversible, which means that even though I wore it to work last week, I can wear it again today, and to my co-workers it's a WHOLE NEW SKIRT. This makes me happy.

I got a haircut last Thursday, and got as close to a lecture as my hair stylist gives about my lack of consistency when it comes to coloring my hair. "You need to pick a color and stick with it," she told me. "Otherwise you end up with these rings and rainbows and whatever else you have going on!" So last night I colored my hair (4 weeks after the last time, the white roots were already showing clearly). It's pretty close to my natural (original) color right now, I think.

This morning I drove to work. Traffic was light, I think because of the holiday on Wednesday. The sun shone bright. The radio played songs I'd never heard that made me bounce in my seat a little bit. I was wearing my new skirt. And I realized that I was unequivocally happy. Not just ok or content, but happy.

A few hours later, sitting at my desk, thinking about things, wondering about the future, I felt another wave of sadness wash over me. It is possible that I think too much.

Geoff and I are planning a trip to New York City at the end of the month - our first trip-not-to-visit-family together since our honeymoon in November 2002. It's about time, I think.