Texas Anniversary

At 4:00 am on September 30, 2015 we rolled into T. Texas after leaving everything we knew, sending our belongings along to some unknown residence, calling two locksmiths, being stopped by two police officers, breaking one AC, nearly hitting several deer, and Christian-cussing-out a paper, fold-it-up Texas map that tried to send us to Mexico. The journey entailed 35 of the more miserable hours of our young lives. But there we were.

And here we are. One year later.

In some ways, it feels like the construction of a new life has been a much speedier process than 365 days. In other ways I can't believe it's only twelve months later.

In the last year I have had to be an adult, and make big adulty decisions, and kill big adulty bugs that I didn't have to kill when I was a kid.

In the last year we bought a new house, a new chreuck (as a Hannah with a rapidly colonizing Texas accent calls our Ford), and an antique store's worth of new old furniture and decor... including a chicken box, which still sits ever-so-judgmentally on our breakfast table.

I've visited 15 different churches, found one to call home, and made sweet friends there, who challenge me, and forgive me, and love me. Which mostly makes up for the three months of ridiculous theology I endured in every whack-a-doodle sanctuary in central Texas.

I wrote a Bible study. I attempted to get said study published. I baulked at the soul-crushing horrors of the modern Christian publishing market, and ate lots of chocolate to get my mojo back. And then I wrote another Bible study. Because maybe it would be better the second time?

I drove myself to an unknown city, navigated through said city to find an unknown zoo. Watched my two minions fall in love with said zoo, and drove back twenty more times. For a woman both horribly shy and directionally challenged, this was quite the feat.

 Justin gave CPR to infants. So I fell in love with him again and more.

I put my flipflops in every water feature in central Texas. This was the summer of wet sandals. Splash pad, water park, river, lake, pool, water guns... you name it, it soaked us. Sounds fun? Sure, as a necessity for survival in the Texas summer. It was fun in the same way that breathing is kind of a gas.

We played at every park in central Texas. We walked to them; we drove to them. We played in the rain, in the wind, and in the sun. We played in a house, and yes, with a mouse.

We spent over $4000 on car repairs. I had inexplicable excruciating headaches for a month. Justin had heart palpitations. Hannah got some weird Texas disease. She was also cured of all her allergies except peanuts. Noah started school. We bought a grill. And a truck. And a chicken box. We lived life.

I loved my God, who does not abandon His exiles. I loved my kids, having the opportunity to be with them all day, every day... every day... all day. I loved my husband, who I see anew and all the more amazing every day. I loved my church, though probably not half as much as she has loved me.

All in all, we could probably do another year.

30 quotes on 30

"The only time you really live fully is from thirty to sixty. The young are slaves to dreams; the old servants of regrets. Only the middle-aged have all their five senses in the keeping of their wits."
Theodore Roosevelt

"Yeah, but 30! You get crow's feet and chicken chin. Your nips start heading south and your bum turns to yogurt!"
Northern Exposure

"Thirty was so strange for me. I've really had to come to terms with the fact that I am now a walking and talking adult."
C. S. Lewis

"There is a difference between twenty-nine and thirty. When you are twenty-nine it can be the beginning of everything. When you are thirty it can be the end of everything."
Gertrude Stein

"At twenty years of age the will reigns; at thirty, the wit; and at forty, the judgment."
Benjamin Franklin

"After thirty, a body has a mind of its own."
Bette Midler

"It is well for the world that in most of us, by the age of thirty, the character has set like plaster, and will never soften again."
William James

"All that I know I learned after I was thirty."
Georges Clemenceau

"Doctors tell me I have the body of a thirty year old. I know I have the brain of a fifteen year old. If you've got both, you can play baseball."
Pete Rose

"Everyone is the sum total of past experiences. A character doesn't just spring to life at age thirty."
Kelley Armstrong

"Don't trust anyone over thirty."
Jerry Rubin

"This country has a complex about age. It's unbelievable. If you're over thirty, you've had it in this country."
Eli Wallach

"There's an 'Everything must go!' emotional liquidation feel to the end of your twenties, isn't there? What will happen if we turn thirty and we're not 'ready?' You don't feel entirely settled in any aspect of your life, even if you are on paper."
Sloane Crosley

"My greatest enemy is reality. I have fought it successfully for thirty years."
Margaret Anderson

"A woman over 30 knows herself well enough to be assured in who she is, what she is, what she wants and from whom. Few women past the age of 30 give a damn what you might think about her or what she's doing."
Andy Rooney

"When you turn thirty, a whole new thing happens: you see yourself acting like your parents."
Blair Sabol

"A poet more than thirty years old is simply an overgrown child."
Henry Louis Mencken

"Time and tide wait for no man, but time always stands still for a woman of thirty."
Robert Frost

"I’m turning thirty this year. And you know the saying, a woman over thirty is more likely to get hit by a bomb than find a man."
Fanny Fink

"A man thirty years old, I said to myself, should have his field of life all ploughed, and his planting well done; for after that it is summer time."
Lew Wallace

"The body is at its best between the ages of thirty and thirty-five."
Aristotle

"A woman over 30 will never wake you in the middle of the night to ask, “What are you thinking?”. She doesn’t care what you think."
Andy Rooney.

"After thirty the world becomes softer."
Bonnidette Lantz.

"Before thirty, men seek disease; after thirty, diseases seek men."
Chinese Proverb

"Can I keep the presents and still be twenty-nine?"
Rachel - Friends

"I keep being asked about it like I'm meant to be having a nervous breakdown, and I didn't realize I was meant to be having a nervous breakdown. I've got a lot of friends in their 30's and they all seem alright, so I'm sure I'll be fine."
Keira Knightley

"Life doesn't begin at thirty it just begins to show."
Anonymous

"Women over 30 are dignified. They seldom have a screaming match with you at the opera or in the middle of an expensive restaurant. Of course, if you deserve it, they won't hesitate to shoot you, if they think they can get away with it."
Andy Rooney

"30 was the best year of my life until the next year and then the next. Every year since 30 has been the best year."
Bonnidette Lantz.

"Let us hear the conclusion of the whole matter: Fear God, and keep his commandments: for this is the whole duty of man."
Ecclesiastes 12:13

Paying Through the Berry

A friend at church gave us three little strawberry plants a few years ago for our garden. They turned sad and brown, and gave us no strawberries the first year. Thankfully, we were too busy with babies, homework, clinicals, and having no life what-so-ever to rip the wilted plants out in the fall. It snowed on them a few days later, and we considered this to be nature cutting us some slack. However, the next year, the plants miraculously turned green! Little white flowers sprang out. And on a midsummer's night eve we picked the fruits of our labor: six little red strawberries. This was not even enough to have with shortcake. I think we devoured them before they even made it inside to be rinsed off (ah nature! It's all organics and proteins.).

This year, the plants have multiplied like bunnies. They have taken over a third of our garden, sending runners down both fences. We finally have a healthy crop of juicy, tart, delicious strawberries! Although, it is a crop perhaps too healthy now. (What, you expected me to be satisfied?)

In order to reap our harvest, we settled on child labor, and hired a couple migrant workers who were passing through town (otherwise known as our living room). We promised to pay them in strawberries for their work. The boy worker was quite helpful, although we did notice that not every strawberry he pulled from the vines made it into the basket. The girl worker was almost no help at all, and seemed to not even understand that we pick red strawberries, not green ones. Although, she did help by eating rocks out of the garden at an alarming rate. (My daughter, the only child who prefers rocks to berries.)

Once the fruits were cleaned, we set them down for the workers to glean their just rewards.

He was overwhelmed by the possibilities...

But soon they got down to eating their delicious paycheck...

 

                                      

                 

And we discovered with Noah around, there is really no crop of strawberries too generous. Maybe next year Justin and I will get our long awaited shortcake. Sigh.

         

An Embarrassing Moment for Any Vampire

Recently, I had my annual physical. This is the first annual physical I have had in four years. I was pregnant or having follow up appointments (or inexplicable dizzy spells) for the majority of these last three years, so I felt like I was living in the doctor's office. When I received my clean bill of health, six weeks after having Hannah, I swore off physicians except under extreme duress. And then I'll try meditation, herbs, and teeth-gritting before they drag me to a hospital.

As part of my health insurance plan at work, you can earn points for healthy activities. If you amass 50,000 in one calendar year you get a $25 Amazon gift card. A physical with lipid/cholesterol testing, the "fun" she-exam, and blood work all together earns you 10,000 points.

So I went and had my physical.

Because I am an American.

Meaning: you can tell me that getting annual health screenings can prevent me from getting diabetes, detect cancer while it is treatable, and possibly save my life, but I just won't be able to carve out an hour during the year to do it. But you offer me $25 to spend at Amazon, and suddenly my schedule is wide open. Oh, and you want a kidney too? By all means. I have, if nothing else, my priorities straight.

My red white and blue self pulled on a little gray dress (figuring this would be the easiest way to receive all manner of testing without having to don a hospital gown made out of dinner napkins), and drove across town to my doctor's office. All went according to plan for a relatively healthy, stubborn, too-smart-for-her-own-good, 29-year-old, with fair skin and a proclivity toward spine curling. The doctor left and the nurse came back in with the dreaded "tote". The "tote" is the carrier for all manner of doom: alcohol wipes, vials, rubber bands for the torture of biceps, and, most dreaded of all, needles. Again, since being pregnant, needles don't really scare me anymore. After eighteen hours of hard contractions, an epidural needle could be the size of a medieval javelin, and I would still have been begging them to cram it into my spine (which is made all the more fun by having anesthesiologists attempt to weave said javelin around rods and hooks and the web of cybernetics in my spine, and then actually miss and have to give it two more go's. Yet, somehow, at the end of it all, I still got a bill for his splendid work).

The nurse asked which arm I wanted bled, and I plopped down the right one. She cinched up my bicep and started poking around in my elbow joint. She poked for awhile. She poked until unable to contain my curiosity I too began squinting studiously at my arm. As an explanation she offered, "You have small veins." I didn't know how to respond. "Thanks?" or maybe "Sorry." or maybe "Haven't you done this a thousand times? Would it help if I got out and pushed?" But it's best to not irritate the woman on the giving end of a sharp implement.

Finally, squirmily satisfied with her selection (which she indicated by tapping out what appeared to be the Gettysburg address in morse code on my forearm), she wiped it down, and slid the needle in. "Oh shoot." she muttered. Cause that's the first thing you want to hear from a medical professional. "I blew the vein." I glanced at my arm in concern as she slid the needle out, half expecting to see an explosion of blood as the vein burst outward. She grabbed some gauze and pressed down on the chasm she just created in my arm... pressed down hard... like a desperate Abi presses down on the slushy dispenser nozzle at the end of a long day. "This will keep it from bruising," she explained with an embarrassed smile.

Mean Abi: No, I'm pretty sure as soon as you let go I could still make quite a few bruises with this arm. This is my dominant hand, and I have a mean right hook, and I know I can make all kinds of bruises.

Actual Abi: No worries.

Then the vampire swept over to my other arm, banded it, had me fist pump, and commenced once again with the relentless poking. "Ok, here we go," she said and wiped the spot with another alcohol wipe. Before sliding the needle in she actually told me, "You can just go down to the lab and have them do it there if you want." The second thing you want to hear from your medical professional. But, I ain't no quitter. I wanted to see this girl squirm. The needle slid in. Another heavy sigh. "I didn't get it."

At this point I started composing the blog in my head. The squirmy vampire was playing the staring role, poor dear.

From there I was sent to the lab. She assured me that the vampiric brood in the basement, "Always gets it the first time. They are the best." Excellent. Let's give fate a challenge, shall we?

The lab folk got me positioned in a nicely restrictive chair (in case I suddenly decided getting skewered a half dozen times wasn't how I wanted to spend my Friday). After more poking, the lab tech filled a rubber glove with hot water, "Maybe if we warm you up some your veins will pop out." ... no part of this sounds good. She tossed the water glove back and forth a few times then put it down on my forearm. I instantly flinched... as human beings are wont to do... when they are being scalded alive. Noticing my jump, the nurse lifted the heat pack and saw the bright color red the area of my arm under the glove just turned. She hesitated.

But at this point I was taking no prisoners. I blinked at her with wide eyes, allowing her time to discern whether she would need a lawyer... or a plastic surgeon. She let the pack cool somewhat, then tried again. Finding a vein that she thought would work, she wiped it down with alcohol again (my forearms were just about plastered at this point), and put the needle in. She hit the vein, but only a few drops of blood came out. This seemed bad. "Well that won't work." Back out with the needle.

"You have small veins" she said.

"I heard." I replied. Actual Abi was losing her composure, Mean Abi was breaking through, all green and hulky around the edges.

From there she called the other two lab techs back and all three of them studied my arms, poking now and then, whispering, conferring. "Well, we could go in through her hand..." one of them suggested.

Oh, do let's.

The only difference between having blood drawn from your arm and having it drawn from your hand is that from your hand hurts... lots more. The similarity is that they couldn't get any.

If you're keeping score, the tally is now, Abi's tiny veins: 4, vampires: 0.

The head vampire, now tried to warm my left arm again. And then she said it. I am introverted and struggle with change. Even after this many sticks I would continue going to the same doctor's office. It wouldn't be worth the hassle and speech required to find a new physician. Five needle pokes would not drive me away. But she just had to say it:

"You're too cold; because you're wearing basically nothing. You're probably dehydrated too. When did you last eat, you need to eat before you give blood."

Translation: This is not my fault. This is your fault. How dare you have small veins! How dare you be a unique creation of the King! How dare you dress for the weather when it's 85 degrees outside. Didn't you know we keep it a balmy 64 degrees in here. How dare you wake up with your children at 4:30am and eat breakfast at 5:00am. You are making me look bad!

At this point I was staring straight ahead. And the fist clenching was happening completely involuntarily now. Maybe that helped because she muttered, "I think I can get this one." She slid the needle in. She missed. She dug. The needle wiggling and skittered about under my skin until finally the little tube attached to it filled with blessed crimson blood. My teeth were clenched, but not with pain. As soon as they wrapped the florescent pink bandage around both of my arms, I stood, and gathered my things, and fled before I gave my God a bad name.

I don't get angry often. Generally, God has given me a good sense of perspective. I have very little to be angry about. I have a beautiful home, a loving family, a healthy body, and a decent sense of humor when it comes to this world and it's annoyances. But this one time, something that they said blew the little fuse in my head. I need to locate that fuse box and somehow re-dedicate it to my Savior. I am glad I did not spit vile words at these women, but even knowing that vileness is in my head is discouraging. For every step forward I take in my faith, I am reminded of what I was and what sometimes, the world tries to make me again. Somehow I have to remember that the same grace that forgave me once with the shedding of blood, is the same grace that can carry me through when my blood will not shed.

Achievement

A few weeks ago Justin suggested that every week we should each make two goals for ourselves. Accomplishment of these herculean feats would result in a venturing out for delightful delicacies of some kind. (And since the Husband hasn't pulled a paycheck since October [despite the fact that he works harder than most of the population], Taco Bell and Chik-fil-a are the delicacies we are talking about.) These aren't global-axis-altering projects, just stuff we meant to do at one point six months ago and never got around to. My goals for last week were two and a half hours of Bible Study and making two scrapbook pages. I am starved for food that I don't have to cook, so I try to make my goals very attainable. If I said something like run for three hours every morning and develop a workable plan for the eradication of Ebola in West Africa, I wouldn't get my chalupa on Sunday. Priorities, folks. If you aim high you miss the nachos.

I saw a few days ago that my singularly sensational sister-in-law has a chalkboard up with goals for her family as well. Kiddos are not immune, and her trio of delightful munchkins have lofty objectives too. Her son's goal is to be kind to his sister. Her daughter's goal is to eat all of her dinner. And Baby Max's goal is to sleep through the night. While I find this brilliant, I cannot include the children in our goal making process; because I would like to get the chance to eat out at some point this year. If I did, I imagine our aims would look like this:

Justin: go running 3 times, 2 hours of Bible study
Abi: clean out the storage room, 2 hours of Pilates
Mr. Noah: Don't open-mouth kiss the bulldog, show a little backbone
Baby Hannah: Don't terrorize your brother, limit falls to one every ten seconds
Dumpster: be fat and lazy in more than one room of the house, don't eat anything that doesn't belong to you (including remote controls, gift bags, Christmas lights, shoes, measuring cups, and batteries)

Spinning

I awoke last Wednesday morning to my usual alarm at 4:30am. Ruefully wondering what could be accomplished in this world if everyone had to crawl out of bed and emerge zombie-like into the cold shadows of morning at such an ungodly hour like my own nearly undead self, I threw my covers back and landed my feet on the floor ... and then I fell head first into my closet. Thankfully (?), the door was closed to keep out unwanted bulldogs and other vermin. I suppose this means I did not fall into my closet, but rather against my closet ... with my skull. And somehow the thunk did not wake the husband, nor did my subsequent crash-tastrifies. If I hadn't been otherwise occupied, I would have checked him for signs of life.

After recovering somewhat from the concussion, I turned and walked into the bathroom. Like any woman, I sometimes struggle with self-esteem. I say 'walked' because that connotes refinement, which makes me sound spritely and graceful. In truth, like a pinball in an arcade game, I bounced off the the foot board of the bed, smashed into Justin's closet, ricocheted into the dresser, and finally, hands clutching desperately at the walls I stumbled into the bathroom like a hungover frat boy. (No alcoholic beverages were injured in the making of this blog. Remember? I'm running a family blog here.)

Now, I had a decision to make: answer the usual morning call of nature, or vomit profusely. (Okay, not so family. Sorry.) After throwing up nothing (because there's no sickness like empty stomach sickness [which any proper kind of pregnant woman will confirm]), I crawled on my hands and knees back into the bedroom. With trembling muscles I scaled our bed (which thankfully Justin fixed just last week, so that instead of a mattress on the floor I could fall gratefully into, the solace of sheets and pillow stands a loft a pinnacle on a lonely Japanese mountain, only ascended by the most pious of meditators). As I fell to my back and squeezed my eyes shut, I watched the darkness swirl in great curling loops above me. It goes without saying that at this point I felt I had a temperature of about 2804 degrees Fahrenheit, and was deep-breathing, trying to settle my raucous and confused anatomy. The breathing woke Justin.

Insert eye roll.

After a few bleary-eyed moments Justin shifted into nurse mode. He got me water, orange juice, and cereal in case it was related to dehydration or low blood sugar. He proposed that perhaps my blood pressure dropped, and we should try a change of position. (Which, when Abi is not all spinny and nauseous, would have earned him a suggestive little joke and an eyebrow wiggle, but at this point just earned him a couple groans and a dirty look.) And he kept starting to say 'nauseous', but always quickly replaced it with 'nauseated'; because at 4:30 in the morning when the universe decided Abi should wake up on the Mad Tea Cups, she really cares about grammatical propriety. (Sadly, not an entirely sarcastic statement.) Very professionally, he asked me if it felt like I was still and the room was spinning or if the room was still and I was spinning. I answered with a dry heave, and that mostly put an end to the dizzy morning interrogation.

Despite all of this, Justin was truly wonderful. He got both kids out of bed, changed, and fed. He took them to my folks, he checked in on me every two minutes, and he called around to find a clinic open. We drove down to the clinic, and he didn't complain when I kept bumping into him on the way in. By this point I was starting to feel better. The nausea was gone and the spinning was intermittent now. We saw the doctor, and he told us he suspected that it was benign paroxysmal positional vertigo, but wanted to rule out anything more serious first. This ruling out of possibility mortalities included a neurological exam.

If any of you have had a neurological exam, you probably know the purpose is to test the 12 cranial nerves in your brain which control motor function throughout your body. And while this sounds all very prim and proper, the actual performance of a neurological exam is most like participating in a five-year-olds' dance improvisation class after flunking a breath-a-lizer test.

At this point I am too dizzy to sit up straight, and Doctor Dance with his tutu and magic wand is asking me to touch my nose, and wiggle my eyebrows, to kick out the right leg and the left leg, and perform the Macarena (which by the way I am awesome at, dizzy or otherwise). About halfway through the exam I got the giggles. I am sure after we left, Doctor Dance began softly pounding his head on the wall. The finale of the neurological performance is to stand up, feet all the way together, eyes closed, and arms extended out in front of you. At this point I am shaky, spinny, and giggly. I closed my eyes and immediately tipped to one side. I tried again and immediately spilled to the other side. Justin had to stand behind me and set me back on balance every few seconds until Doctor Dance was assured that I did not have a stroke, a tumor, or a brain cloud.

So there was the diagnosis: BPPV. No idea where it came from, how I got it, or when it would subside. So for the next week of my life, I spun. Lots. And I threw up. A couple times. And I got the giggles. More often than I'd like to admit. This Wednesday morning, just as suddenly as it arrived, BPPV made it's exit. With just as little explanation. (Although I suspect, Noah tackling me and smacking the back of my favorite head into the floor while Hannah threw herself lengthwise over my face may have been part of the cure. Thank goodness they don't understand gentle yet.)

Advanced Plumbingly Disinclined

In a Sunday school class on marriage I said that the Husband is not a fix it guy. I meant this as a great compliment. When I am distressed, when I have a problem, when I just need to rage, he listens with patience and tenderness, he holds me, and he does not fix it. When I am done being despicably dramatic, then he will sit down with me, and we will set about putting the universe right. But at the start he is singularly the most comforting, empathetic creature on our planet, like a big panda bear... except chiseled out of granite like a Greek god... like Panda, the lesser know god of being an incredible husband and patron guardian of softball players... I digress.

What I did not mean is that Justin does not fix stuff around the house. He does. Oh, does he. It's part of his divine character. ... I am not sure if I mean that statement in a christian way or if I am referring back to my earlier pagan reference. Somehow this all went very wrong.

The Husband fixes cars, he digs up and repairs sprinklers (Often. There are two seasons in our house: Winter and Lowe's.), he lays carpet, nails up dry wall, balances washers, sews up couch cushions, and clips dog claws. He unclogs toilets, catches mice, hangs shelves, and threatens our Apple T.V. box with various hammers and mallets, until, quite embarrassed (and terrified), it starts working again (under the threat of Mjölnir). The fact that he has had to do all of these things, and most several many times, is really just a little sad.

The thing is, he just doesn't have that kind of time anymore. Time not spent studying, eating, or sleeping (or some combination of those three) is stolen for his wife, children, and brief stints as a church drummer. Most of the time now shelves remain unhung, the Apple TV stays haughtily broken,  the mice have to catch themselves, and the washer spins tipsy-turvy making that joyful, repetitive thunking sound - you know, the one that makes you want to gather your children and put out a For Sale sign. I don't know how to fix anything, and after a few misadventures, Justin prefers I just not try. Our home owner's insurance just doesn't cover acts of idiocy.

So when the bathtub started filling up, I ignored it. With water sloshing around my ankles, I sang a happy song in my head and kept my eyes up. When Dumpster jumped in the tub after showers and drank his heart's content, I closed my eyes and backed away. When the tub gurgled Liquid Plumber, like a child gurgles Cool-aid, sipped it down and remained stubbornly un-drain-y, I took deep breaths and contented to ten.

Finally, the Husband had enough. He took three minutes to assess, plan, and implement a solution.

Voila:

And yes, oh yes, that is a golf tee. I have no idea what the red thing is, but I am sure it also served a purpose for which it was not designed.

Oi. I don't know what else to say. This is where we are. And by grace we have golf tees from carefree spring days.

Sometimes through the haze

It is not easy.

When Hannah has already finished her cereal, but is still crying, Noah is burying his head in his blanket refusing to eat, and Dumpster is barking at the door to go out. When I have Bible study to finish, but I have to schedule meetings at work, but I have to clean the house, but we haven’t had any food in our fridge for five days (and I mean, no food, unless you want to eat plain pureed pumpkin with hot sauce). When I hug Justin hello and kiss him goodbye within the same five minutes. When Noah has a cold and does not sleep all night (again, not exaggerating, the.boy.did.not.sleep!), Hannah is having a growth spurt and demands milk at 2:00am, and the mice wonder why I won’t just leave Dumpster’s food on the ground like a decent hostess. This is when it is not easy. We are living in the haze.

One of my very dear friends got excellent, fantastic, the-best-possible-news this week. While others weep for joy, dance for jubilation, and sing an anthem to our Yahweh, I smile softly as if far off, watching a butterfly land across a field. I experience joy for her as if glancing at another universe, strange and distant, behind billows of ‘this isn’t easy.’

I miss my husband. I’ve been thinking of sending him postcards at the hospital. My son is a heart-breaker when sick… and I’m pretty sure he knows it. I don’t know how to provide for my daughter after she turns one (which is ridiculously, ludicrously soon). I don’t know how to follow at this moment, when I am watching my feet drag one front, and then the other, and then, hopefully, usually, the other.

I know it isn’t plague. I know it isn’t war. I know it isn’t need and famine and death and any other horses being bridled back by the long-suffering hand of a compassionate King. But it is alone. And it is weak. And it is not easy.

But sometimes through the haze…

Hannah dances. She takes a few wobbly steps, throws her head back and forth, claps her hands, and falls straight down to her bottom. She grins up at me and blows a kiss. And just this once, Noah decides instead of pushing her out of the way, he will kiss her on the cheek.

Noah will recite his alphabet, which as we all know goes “A B C D P Cu(Q) S S S E F G…” and so on.

Dumpster will curl up at my feet when I lay down to sleep because Justin is not there, and a bulldog makes you feel, if nothing else, secure.

I will catch a glimpse of my husband, and he will be the same strong, smart, fun, godly man I remember, if a little more tired, and I will be engulfed in love for him… so much so that I can’t speak.

Sometimes through the haze, God will woo me back towards the light, through the jaws of distress, with moments of miracles and breaths of truth in the wind. His Word will stand. His promise, His Son will stand in my life, and there is no haze that can contain the Captain of Light.

How to Have A Morning

Wake up at 3:00am. Roll first on your right side, then on your left side, then your right side again. Recognize, even in your bleary state that those are lyrics from mewithoutyou. Try to return to sleep. Fail. As the alarm "waca waca's" a beckoning call at 4:30 sit up (it's not graceful, but no one is awake to judge). Realize that your right ear is completely plugged. Shake your head, amazed, that no one told you pregnancy induces deafness. Determine to write a book for all young women after you, explaining the truth about pregnancy. With a sigh, realize this will probably bring the world's population boom to a staggering halt. Can't have that on your head.

In the process of getting ready, realize that you have no clothes that fit, and so determine to rescue a work appropriate outfit from the washing machine. In the dark, forget you put up the gate for Noah, find it with your shins, nearly tumble head first down eighteen stairs into the basement. Express gratitude to your Maker that you and Hannah are not now dead. Hurrah!

Complete the getting ready process, scoop up your sleeping boy, and head out for Nana's house. Stop to get gas. This is not relevant to the process of Having A Morning, but will perhaps seem an ironic reference point in the future. And it's cheap! Woohoo!

Drop off your boy, kiss him and request he behave as best he can. Realize that you rather need to go to the restroom, but determine that getting on the road and getting to work is far more important. It can wait.

Close to the freeway entrance notice that the temperature gauge on your Subaru is reading rather high. Flip the heater on high, and comfort yourself: it always goes down once you get moving. Drive. Watch the gauge climb. Pray. Pray hard. Hear a football commentator in your head: "She's at the yellow... she's at the orange... she's in the red... BREAK DOWN!" Push on the gas and get no response. Crank the wheel with all your might to navigate the sputtering Behemoth off to the shoulder. Smoke will pour out of every crevice in your car. It will smell terrible, and probably give your unborn child cancer. But it's kind of pretty.

Did you mention it's snowing now? Full on blizzard? Can't leave these important details out.

And you still really need to go to the restroom. Just not on the side of the freeway in a blizzard illuminated by the scowling headlights of oncoming mac trucks and your own trusty flashers. ... You can't find the flashers? Well, there's only one thing to do: scream. When no flashers turn on, scream again, just in case they didn't hear you the first time. Whimper.

Call your husband. Put on your calm, wise, optimistic voice. Ask him very kindly what you should do. Smile and nod often; because people can hear a good attitude and a happy demeanor through the phone. (Stop almost crying!) Be very grateful to your Defender that you have a liter of water in the backseat. Listen as your husband instructs you to pop the hood, poor said water into the coolant tank, let the whole thing cool for five minutes, and then try to limp it off the freeway. Pretend you are not utterly terrified by every step in the process he just outlined. Wish him goodbye (hopefully, not forever), climb your nine month pregnant self over the center console to get out on the passenger side so as not to be flattened by early morning traffic, and then remember the hood-popper thing is inside the vehicle. Climb back over the center console, pop the hood, climb again, and stand to face your smokey Suba in the snow.

It is now snowing heavily. And it is cold. And you still need to use the restroom.

Locate coolant tank. Unscrew cap. Do not get sprayed in the face by boiling coolant. Do be very thankful for that point. Empty a liter of water into the tank. Realize it is not enough. Sigh. Climb back over the center console once again, start up the car, pull into traffic, and start praying. Hard. Manage to limp the traitor vehicle to your parking spot across from the train stop. As you stop, ridiculous amounts of smoke will pour out again. And the lights will not turn off. Oh, you can try, try all day if you want, those buggers are staying on.

Notice how haunted your car seems with the snow swirling down around it, smoke billowing from under its hood, the rebellious lights eerily glowing in the night. Suppose that if your car is haunted that would make you the ghost. That can't be right: ghosts don't have to go to the bathroom really badly. Understand that the only other reasonable option is that while owned by you here on earth, this car is the property of the anti-christ in the spiritual realm. Consider a nickname for the demonic Subaru: the anti-christ mobile. No, that's not very catchy. The Beast Wagon! Haha, Beast Wagon. Think yourself very clever. Pray for the demolition of your pride.

Walk through the driving snow to your train, climb aboard. Despite the fact that you are pregnant out to here, no one will offer you a seat.

Have contractions.

Put on a face of deep discomfort, even moan a little and hold your belly. No one will offer you a seat. Curse them. Curse them, we hates them! (Turn into gollum in your mind. See yourself shrinking, getting skinny and vile.)

Pray. Pray hard. Pray that your worldly, diabolical self will go up in smoke. Smoke. Haha. Think yourself very clever. Pray for the demolition of your pride.

Arrive at work: still deaf, still needing to go to the restroom, smelling of engine and forest fire, still contracting. Wonder what exactly you are going to do at the end of the day (or if you go into labor). The Beast Wagon is parked fifteen minutes away, filled with all manner of demonic intentions. Don't care. Really, don't. "For who of you can add a minute to his life by worrying." Just have some breakfast, drink some cool water, trust in Your King of Glory, and for goodness sake, woman, go use the restroom!

28

I don't feel twenty-eight. I lived my entire twenty-sixth year thinking I was twenty-seven and then tried to reverse the process for the following year. It didn't go well. I ended up being twenty-seven for two years, and now I'm having a difficult time breaking the habit. But whatever age you are, celebrations must ensue on your birthday, so here's ours.

Breakfast at Mimi's with the husband and Little Man. It was delicious, Noah only threw down all of his toys about 400 times each, and, I am happy to report, I kept it down... all the way until noon. Wahoo.

We took Noah to Farm Country at Thanksgiving Point. He seemed most interested in the goats. The horses scared him, and the chickens were rather concerning. Goats seem safe. (And yes, from the previous post, this is where I cried at a goat. For no particular reason at all. Poor goat: crazy lady crying at him and a baby boy pulling his ears. [It must be difficult to distinguish between a Dumpster, who's ears you can pull, and every other smelly, overweight creature out there.])



And what does an Abi want for her birthday? ...

Nothing. Absolutely nothing.

To end the day we went into the canyon to cook S'mores with the family. And somehow, although I can't stomach soup, crackers, or water; S'mores are no problem. I'm going to be living on Hersheys and marshmallows until November. Here's Baby Noah with his Grandma and Nana playing in the mountains:

All in all a grand birthday with only a little unsightly vomit. Now to figure out how to be twenty-eight years old...

A Proper Tea

I’m not the tea party type. Lace gloves make no sense, tea has never been comforting or satisfying, and I believe sandwiches should not be finger foods, they should be foot longs. Growing up, my favorite color was olive green (the kind found in camo), my favorite pants were two sizes too big, and my single greatest joy was showing up the guys in… everything. Sitting and chatting with the girls over a steaming brew with little dried out biscuits sounded rather like punishment or at least a waste of a Saturday better spent looting, pillaging, or otherwise pirating.

But somehow, the tomboy got herself put in charge of the Ladies Spring Tea at church.

This evening I am off to purchase lace doilies, fake crystal bowls, and bright table clothes. I will spend some night soon figuring out how to make tissue paper flowers. (God help me.) Cute little scentsy door prizes need to be acquired soon as well. I will decorate with flowers and ribbons and glitter. I will set plates with little tarts, adorable cookies, and bite size cucumber sandwiches. I will play Celtic stringed hymns in the background with little bunny slides flashing on the power point screens.

And a little part of me will die inside.

Only to be reanimated Friday evening as I kick dirt, swing a bat, masticate unsightly amounts of Big League Chew, and throw like anything but a girl.

Because God made me a woman, and then He made me an athlete.

Catch Up

Since I wasn't blogging for awhile, allow me to catch you up:

For his eight month birthday Noah decided to have a cage pillow pen wrestling smackdown brawl with all his fluffy friends. The aftermath:

 

The sad thing is, even though he was wrestling inanimate objects, I'm not sure who ended up winning.

Whilest I was not blogging several other things of note occurred:

• Justin got his second 4.0 in nursing school. Am so very proud.
• I threw up... lots.
• We saw our first ultrasound of new baby Ririe.
• I threw up some more.
• I took on the Ladies Spring Tea at our church.
• I had 8 migraines, which caused me to throw up.
• Noah progressed to army crawling faster than the Flash can run.
• And I threw up.

10 pounds later, I am still blessing my God for working miracles in our lives. There's just much less of me to worship Him.



Sweets and sit-ups

In order to maintain my Pilates certification I have to take continuing education credits and not eat cookies. (It's in the requirements: "Trainee will pay us a lot of money, work out until her belly throws up its hands in surrender [or just throws up], and not eat cookies... Until the day she dies"). This month the trainings were "Ring Around the World" and "Small Ball Magic". ... I know you're all thinking it, but this is a family blog. Shame on you!

What the trainings should have been called and are referred to as by the goblins of fitness are "Beater" and "Biter".

After six hours of Pilates focusing on hamstrings, core strength, scapular stabilization, and mental overload, the mind encased and nurtured in said beaten and bitten body, starts to waver in its stalwart conviction that life as we know it should go on. It starts to not care that the fingers it is moving just ended that last sentence with a preposition. It starts to wonder if controlling lung expansion and contraction is really as necessary a function as hanging the mouth open and letting drool trickle out. The mind starts to mistrust a body that is so maliciously inclined that it would take a metal ring, stuff it between its own ankles and do 800 variations of Teaser followed up with a Jackknife chaser. Then it says "Ow" and whimpers... and picks up its child because six hours of abdominal curls later, it's still a mommy.

 TeaserJackknife

Justin and Little Man picked me up after the Inquisition. I noticed a plastic container in the cup holder, but didn't think much of it. The husband usually has some form of coffee within arms reach at all times. Just in case the worst should happen. A few minutes into the drive he said, "We stopped at the SweetTooth Fairy. You can help yourself." It was a plastic cup of cake bites.

Oh, I'm going to go to the special Pilates hell.

The Ick

For the last three weeks we have been embroiled in Ick. The weathermen call it Inversion, but it's really just Ick. For those of you who don't live in Utah, who aren't surrounding on all sides by mountains, who don't have an enormous smelter biting off entire mountains and chewing them to rubble, delving too greedily and too deep, I will kindly explain Inversion.

This is what Inversion looks like:

And this is what Inversion smells like:

And this is what Inversion sounds like:

And this is what Inversion feels like:

My mornings start very early, and in the midst of the Ick I had to drive across the valley. My mind wandered as I drove, and with a start I realized I had no idea where I was. I glanced about for familiar landmarks. Yet, I could see nothing around me but Ick. No billboards, no street signs, no buildings. Only gray and lifeless fog, the flickering flames of hazy tail lamps and the dreaded thick Ick. I suddenly realized where I must be: No color, no beauty, red flames, and the hopeless stench of a sunless sky. I was in hell. "Now just a minute!" I cried out in my mind. "I'm signed up for the eternity in Paradise plan. I fear there's been some horrible mistake." It began to dawn on me that I was not in fact in hell. I was in Utah in mid-January in the Ick. "Our situation has not improved."

I was born in Miami, and there are days where I remember that I was made to be a Florida girl. Days where 95 degrees and 95 percent humidity sounds down right divine and palm trees seem better scenery than sage. Mostly these days occur from January 7th to February 28th.

Dark Subaru

The Transformers franchise is not a narrative based in reality. I’ll buy that aliens came to earth looking for a shiny rock they lost. I’ll buy that little itty bitty cars can suddenly morph into enormous walking, talking robots with way more moving parts than would fit in a standard Chevy.  I’ll even suspend my imagination long enough to buy that Shia LaBeouf would have a turkey’s chance on Thanksgiving with Megan Fox. Where they cross the line in terms of believability is when they suppose that some of these cars could transform into good guys. This is a complete impossibility. All cars are inherently and undeniably evil. Frozen in the lake of burning ice next to Satan the Dragon cast down from heaven by the hand of God himself will be a Subaru Outback.

Our Subaru Outback…

May it burn forever…

After we don’t need it anymore…

First Blog: "I'm Going on an Adventure"

I had several people ask me if I was going to keep a journal or a blog while I was pregnant. Honestly, it would have been a very dull read: "Vomitted again today. Am swollen." "Vomitted again today. Am congested." "Vomitted again today. And again. Whee." It gets old after awhile. I have heard there are women who just love being pregnant. I'm sure there are psychoactive drugs for this kind of mindset. For nine months I swore Noah would be an only child. I'm still not convinced he won't be.

However, now that the morning sickness is over (still vomiting, but more on that in posts to come), and I am able to hold the most beautiful baby boy ever fashioned, I'm realizing I need to record every amazing thing he does. And there's just no space in the baby book to write that he buzzed his lips spraying mommy in the face with saliva for fifteen seconds straight. And we really need to record this for posterity. Or at least for when he is dating.

So we're going to try blogging. I like to think I'm at least a tolerably good writer, so we'll try to keep this as painless as possible. No promises are being made here. I'll probably fail to blog for months on end. There probably won't be an audience for years anyway. All I offer is that I'm going to make a valiant effort to record the comings and goings of the young Ririe household, if only to use as evidence in future court cases.