Safe and Sound

I have come to a basic conclusion about parenting and the differences between moms and dads. Moms and dads are, you know, very different, and you'll figure out exactly how, I'm sure, so that when you're eight, you'll be very adept at gauging your chances with each of us before deciding who to ask permission. Part of that probably is some deep hardwired connection in the brain, some basic chemical differences, but I think the biggest difference has to do with how you get here.

Your dad will never have the sense of complete safety and complete responsibility that I have for you now. (That's not to say that he won't love you as much. Of course he will, and it will be in a completely different way - that's why you get both of us, so we can take turns being the voice of reason!) You're inside ME. If something happens to you, it's my responsibility, and I have, in theory, the ability to keep you as safe as I possibly can. I realize there are external things that I can't know about or prevent, but still, for the most part, it's like you're tucked away in a box that I get to carry around with me all the time. As long as I feed you good things and stay out of harm's way, we're good, or at least so I can tell myself.

For the rest of your life, I'll make you nuts. That's because for the rest of my life, I'll remember my ability to keep you safe just by keeping myself safe, equating your safety with my personal responsibility, while he'll always view you as an external responsibility. Remember this and don't hold it against me when your dad will be more likely to let you do something crazy involving pulleys, an umbrella and water wings, while I'll be struggling to let you go get the mail without a bicycle helmet.

Happy Bump Day!

Actually, it's a Monday, but this morning we got our last look at you until you arrive. (We hope - no offense, but having another look probably means they're worried about you, so I can wait a few months to see you again.) Everything was fine. You're in the 88th percentile in terms of size. According to them, of course, because if you ask us, you're in a class by yourself. And all arms and legs, which must come from my side of the family, and a "Harvard-sized head" according to your doctor, which honestly you could have gotten anywhere in this family.... You were waving and wiggling, but you've been considerate enough to position my placenta between you and my stomach wall, so while I occasionally feel little twitches from you, there's not been much flailing and kicking felt yet. And you were very modest, making it difficult for the doctor to guess, but we had her make a note and seal it up in an envelope for us, just in case we change our minds or in case it comes to pass that anyone needs to know before you get here.

Mostly, I've been quiet for a few reasons - first, you've been quiet. Not much moving, not much making me sick. (Aside from that one bout of chest pain brought on by a cramped-up stomach - no worries about me confusing indigestion with a heart attack now, thank you very much, although I was thinking we were headed for the E.R. for a bit!) I can't say that I've ever felt calmer or more peaceful, and other than periodic frantic spells of whether or not you'll like me, whether or not you're okay in there, whether or not I'll be able to keep you safe, and all the other crazy things I worry about these days, we've been getting along swimmingly.

And we've been on the road quite a bit lately! Today's April 19th, and in the last 25 days or so, you've been to Delaware with me and your dad for a furniture conference at Winterthur, to Texas for a week where you got some of the first spring breezes and some needed sunshine, and to Oglebay Park in Wheeling where we went to an antique show and gave a few talks.

(And then your mother cried from Wheeling to Cambridge out of sheer homesickness. I hope you'll have a sense of place growing up, although it's one of the most inexplicable things in my life. "Home" for me is two places, sadly - West Virginia and where your dad is, and it's probably the greatest heartache in my life that those two places aren't the same place very often. Can't explain it, because it doesn't even have to do with people or specific houses, but a geographic location is home and always has been. Part of me desperately wants you to have it, and part of me, knowing the ache it causes, wants you to be free to go wherever you like.)

And finally, I've not had much to say because we've been working on getting the house ready for you and that's taken a great deal of free time. We're pulling up all the old, icky carpet, and we've painted the floors, walls, trim and doors in your room. We're rebuilding the bed in there too, although you'll be too little to sleep in it for quite some time. The guest room, which will eventually be yours, is almost done - should be reloaded this evening, and then we'll start on our room, where you'll be hanging out for awhile. After that, we're hoping your grandpa is going to come up and help Dad put in new countertops and a new sink, and finally, hopefully, before you arrive, there'll be a nice new bathtub with new paint and tile and trim so you have a clean space to splash around without flooding the foundation. Your dad wants tile around the tub, but your grandpa can probably tell him all about what my bathtimes did to his tile over the years! And then there's the garden - not doing too much there this year, but some tomatoes, cucumbers, beets, onions, rhubarb, lettuce, and who knows what else we'll come home with, will mean good eats for both of us while you're growing.

So, keep doing what you're doing in there while we keep getting ready for you out here!

Equatorial Calms

"Equatorial calms" sounds nicer than "doldrums." It's not a bad thing, but we've entered the quiet period of pregnancy. Nausea and fatigue are abating, jeans still fit, and sometimes I catch myself thinking, "Am I *really* pregnant?" Then I think, "You've seen two ultrasounds. You're pregnant." Pregnancy does weird things to your mind - don't make fun of your mother!

A couple of weeks ago (February 22, I think it was), we got to see you again, but you were very shy about showing us your face. Got a good look at your backside, though, and your ridiculously small feet. They are ridiculously tiny, which will probably have to console you later in life when you either have my long, skinny feet or your father's "Hobbit" feet. The nurse wanted to check your heart rate with the Doppler, but you were too squirmy for her to get a good read on you, so they decided to do a quick ultrasound just to make sure that you were fine and being productive. It just took a second for you to come into focus, and then all of a sudden, you flinched and wriggled and my breath just stopped. Yours didn't though - you were trucking right along, and your dad was the first one to spot the little tiny flicker that is your heart. So, we've confirmed you have toes (I didn't get the chance to count them, but I think you're good), and you have fingerprints and are now able to squint. Keep up the good work!

Your dad had a birthday this past weekend, one of the many things that makes me think, "This time next year, we'll be doing this with our baby," and we went out for birthday breakfast. Sitting there waiting for a table, I suddenly looked around this crowded Sunday-morning restaurant at all the older women, the young men in baggy pants, the new moms with babies, and realized that everyone, every single person on the planet, was once where and what you are now. Epiphanettes, we call those around here; the things you know, but suddenly see in a way that allows you to *know*. Was an amazing thought to realize that at some point, everyone I could see had once been so small, so formed yet unformed, so busy with the very basics of life, that they too had once not even been in existence. It's a powerful thing to realize life exists in a place where there once was nothing, and the knowledge that all of the things you are and will be and can be is already in there is beyond amazing. There's a lot waiting for you to discover out here....

Blue and Green

So we went to see Avatar yesterday. In 3-D. The day after morning sickness started. There are people out there who never know how grateful they should be for things they don't know almost happened. A number of people in the Worthington area, for example, should be very grateful they were not thrown up on during the noon showing of Avatar. I have no morning sickness in the morning - afternoon and evening are worse, which we found out when I decided to get sick in the middle of dinner Saturday night. Not to worry, though, because your dad is the best at dealing with sick people. Me, I'd shut the bathroom door and try to get as far away from the person making that noise as possible, especially if I'd been right in the middle of eating my own dinner, but he's right there, rubbing and patting, producing ponytail holders and cold washcloths and ice water. You're going to want to keep him around....

Nostril Day

Yesterday was Nostril Day. Just in case you were wondering. Your father has been very interested in reading up on your development, thinking about what you might be doing in there while we can't see you, and this week, apparently, you'll get nostrils. For some reason, he had a feeling that that might be yesterday. He also waves at you, but I've explained you'll not be waving back until at least next week, when you get hands. He'll just have to wait.

Waiting is what this process is all about, it seems. This must be the start of parenting, subverting your will to someone else's. I want to know what you're doing, what you're thinking, what you're up to in there, but I won't, and in reality, even once you're out here, I'll probably spend a lot of time wondering about those same things. I'm learning patience already, or trying to.

So far, you've been a very good baby. No morning sickness, despite some vague feelings of nausea at random things. (Your father had to go trim his cuticles somewhere else this past weekend. I don't know.) Going to the bathroom all the time, but that's in part because I'm doing my best to keep us both hydrated. Apologies if you're awash in there already. And a few times a day, I suddenly become so incredibly tired that I just have to lie down for a few minutes. But then I only manage to rest for 20 minutes before I have to pee or some small noise wakes me up and I start thinking about all the things you'll need, and all the questions I have for the doctor, and all the outlets you might stick your finger in. (When you get fingers.) And then I'm wide awake again. I imagine that's also something I should start getting used to.

So much to show you when you get here! There's snow to learn about, of course - I used to collect snow in jelly jars, bring it in and watch it melt, and we'll have to have the whole discussion about liquids, gases and solids and how interesting water is that way. And the birdfeeders are crowded because it's been 25 or below for days, so there are all the birds to learn about. Have to dig around and find the bird book I had when I was small so I can read it to you when you get here. So many things to do before you arrive, so stay warm and toasty in there while we're getting things ready for you!

Land Sighting

So last night went better. I managed to confine my panicking to the half hour before sleep, which I'm sure Andrew appreciated. Woke up early this morning, half hour before the alarm, which I hate, so rather than try to eke out a few more minutes of unsatisfactory sleep, I figured I'd get up and be productive. Kitchen's clean, litter scooped, and a load of laundry started. And yesterday, I made my first midwife appointment - January 11 - which also made me feel like I'd done something productive. If productivity keeps working like this at driving away nerves, you may arrive to the world's cleanest house. Not likely, but at this point, we are both free to look out at the distant shore and hope that what is there is exactly what we've been looking for.

Holy Crap on a Cracker!

Well, after a couple days of suspecting (first missed day was actually Christmas Day) and mostly keeping it to myself, I came home last night and took a pregnancy test. Which was positive. Which is definitely a good thing. We'd decided a few months ago that having a child was important to us for reasons that are now lost to me in my panic.

Don't take that personally if you read this some day, which you may very well do. (I'm pretty sure that once you get here, I'll always think of you as my best Christmas present ever!) After my mom, your grandma, died just before I turned fourteen, I found a stack of letters in her handwriting. They're on all sorts of different paper, in different inks, some very fully realized, while some trail off mid-sentence and are never resumed. They're all letters to me - to the me that I was when she hadn't met me yet, to the me that I was when she was waiting impatiently for me to move out already, and to the me that I became, the amusing distraction that kept her from finishing letters to the later me.

Other people reading this are probably thinking, "Oh, how sad," and it was, when it happened, but it's been a long time ago now, and I have to say I learned some important lessons from it. I hope to teach some of those to you - that you love people with your whole heart right up to the minute that they're taken from you, that you love them when they aren't always easy to love, and that your ability to withstand pain and sadness is so much greater than you can possibly imagine, but that when you need it, it will be there. But I also learned that life is unpredictable, and some day, as horrified as I am to admit it to myself, we may no longer be in the same place at the same time. (We'll always be together - the people you love and the people that love you are always with you. That's another one of those lessons.)

And I'd want you to know what I was thinking and to be able to look back on how I'd felt about you from the very beginning. I wish I had something better to report at this point than panic, but there you have it. It's not a terrible panic, and surprisingly, it's not a selfish one - I'm not thinking, "Oh, I'll never have a moment's peace again!" or "I'll not finish another book until 2025!" I'm thinking, "What if I screw up someone's life?" and "What if I make terrible mistakes?" Your father - you'll meet him later - is the kind of person who faces realities a bit bluntly. (In his defense, it was 3:10 in the morning when I woke him up in a tearful panic to question my decision-making skills and to inform him that I don't know the first thing about babies.) Anyway, his saying, "Well, you will make terrible mistakes" wasn't as helpful as he intended it to be, but he's the brave one. Or the one oblivious to enough of the world to be brave, says my cynical voice - sometimes looking closely at things only makes them more scary, and it's useful to have someone around with good gut instincts to follow when you start to cave in on yourself. When you meet him, you'll know that - that he's a good person to follow when you don't know what's best. (You can also thank him for not having a pregnancy test in your baby book - he made an "ew" face at the suggestion.)

From the minute I thought about having you, the world became a scary place. Not a scary place in terms of unattended swimming pools and lurking strangers, but scary in an everyday sort of way. I never noticed all the sharp corners and how easy it would be to burn your hand on the pellet stove and all the frightening openings between the railings on the stairs. Scary! There's the bathtub to slip in and the back deck to trip off of and a big bed to fall out of, and I'm going to be solely responsible for making sure none of that happens, which is an awesome responsibility, and if you are reading this years from now and don't see it as such, believe me when I say you're not ready to have children of your own!

But then I think about what a wondrous place the world is. Your grandma was so great at that - your grandpa too, about seeing how fascinating and interesting the world we live in is. To be able to share the mysteries of deciduous trees, to show you how tadpoles become frogs (your father was beside himself when he found out that next week you'll have arm and leg "buds" - he loves tadpoles and is so excited to be growing one himself), to explain hot and cold, to show you snow and flowers and birds, to be a tour guide to the most amazing place that we know about in the whole universe (at least at this point), that's exciting. People have children for different reasons - most of them egotistical, to be honest, but I'm not doing this because I'm excited about having grandchildren, or because I want someone to take care of me when I'm old, or because I just want to prove I can. I'm just excited about showing you where you're going to live and how incredible all of life is. Which is what I'm going to keep telling myself until the 3 a.m. panics subside!