So much to blog, so little time!

Working backwards from today: WAY TO GO CALIFORNIA! I promise not to say anything bad about you ever again. Even if I do feel fat every time I visit. (Ok, really, thats about Southern California. But I’ll still quit talking trash about you, California.)

About 5 minutes after hearing the news that their State Supreme Court legalized same-sex marriage, in a really strong and fantastic opinion, I started wondering when we could go to California to get married.

A few seconds later, I had a brilliant idea: BLOGHER is in San Francisco this summer. I wasn’t going to go, because I’m going to be ~7 weeks shy of my due date and traveling that far that pregnant kinda sucks. Plus flying cross-country is expensive.

But I had a great time last year, and even though my posse the LadyBlogs won’t be going, I would still have a good time.

The idea of going AND GETTING LEGALLY MARRIED became irresistible in about 4 seconds. My fantasy caught fire and all I could think about for the next 5 or 10 minutes was how to convince Jill.

Then I looked at a calendar.

My cousin Kirsten, the last unmarried cousin in my family, is getting married the same weekend. In Milwaukee.

I’m not skipping a family wedding to go to a conference, no matter how cool the conference is. And I’m not skipping a family wedding for what is a super exciting piece of paper, but not for us a “real wedding.”

Our real wedding was February 22, 2003. 

Our immediate families and many of our friends and extended family were there. The only thing missing from that wedding was acknowledgment under the law — and while I certainly want that, exactly when I get it is not that important to me.

We ratified that wedding once through a Vermont Civil Union when we were in New England for Dave & Lizzie’s wedding, but only because we could easily get the exciting piece of paper on Friday and drive to the wedding on Saturday.

So yeah, no BlogHer wedding for us.

Now I’m fantasizing about the 4th of July. Wouldn’t that be cool and symbolic?

(Thought: Is there any chance that being legally married in California would annoy a Georgia court sufficiently to interfere with Jill legally adopting Esmerelda Freugenspeigal? Our civil union was viewed as a good thing, but The M Word sometimes causes strange reactions. Check with the lawyer here before actually doing it.)

YESTERDAY:

Last night, our dear friend Peter Mulvey was in town for a gig. He came over for an early dinner, and stayed at our place after the show.

Noah cracked us all up throughout dinner, and again this morning, with his constant refrain of, “Man? Man? Man!!!” to get Peter’s attention. (Neither “Mr. Peter” nor “Peter” seemed to stick.)

We tried to get Noah to tell his knock-knock joke, and to those of you who know Peter and our mutual friends…I’m afraid Noah’s joke telling ability may rival Scott’s.

Even more exciting than Peter himself, was Peter’s Big Bicycle which parked in our front hall overnight. Noah was beside himself with glee that Peter let him “fix” the bicycle with his yellow plastic hammer and orange plastic wrench.

I got to go to the show, which was fantastic. It’s fun to see how his performance has evolved, and I loved the some of the stories he told. Especially the story about his Dad emailing him stories about a character named Dynamite Bill, and the story about his wife Meredith.

I won’t give away the plot of the Meredith story, except to say that never in the history of the universe has it been funnier to imagine offering someone a sandwich.

The other thing I came to realize in the course of the evening is that I think Peter has the most well-rounded education of anyone I know. I want to be in a book group with him. I don’t know anyone else who reads history, biography, religion, poetry, and apparently astrophysics.

LAST WEEKEND:

Grandma was here! And Noah had a great time. Some combination of Noah and the rest of us went out for dinner, and to music class, and for tricycle rides, and to the zoo, and to see trains.

Noah hasn’t stopped talking about Grandma and her visit since she left. Especially the part about the trip to the zoo, and seeing the elephant pooping. But he loves the toys and books she brought, and he asks about her now that she’s gone.

And Jill and I got to have a much needed date night. We had a nice dinner and saw the movie Baby Mama. It had cute moments, but didn’t live up to the comic potential of the awesome cast. We didn’t really care.

TOMORROW:

Tomorrow is Noah’s last day at Miss Heather’s for day care. He likes it a lot, and we will totally try to use her for backup and/or if there is no space at the church day care when I go back to work after Esmerelda Freugenspeigal is born.

What? You still read books? You haven’t posted a review in so long that we thought maybe it was because all you read are board books with Noah?

What are you talking about? I posted one just a few weeks ago!

Ok, true, but it was the first one in like a year.

I’m still reading. I’m just not keeping track of what I read like I did back in 2005, before I had a baby. Or writing about it. Also, I’m in this weird phase where I re-read the same books over and over. And not just to Noah.

Huh. You know that’s weird, right?

Shut up. It works for me, and besides, I’m trying to talk about a new book, ok?

As I was planning to say, before I got caught up in that imaginary conversation with you, I’ve just finished reading Marjorie Greenfield’s The Working Woman’s Pregnancy Book. I read it as part of the MotherTalk book tour. (They gave me a free copy of the book, but I was not otherwise compensated for this review.)

When I signed up, I expected The Working Woman’s Pregnancy Book to be pretty much like the myriad of other pregnancy books I obsessively bought when I was pregnant with Noah, only with some additional information on the Family & Medical Leave Act, and maybe some additional suggestions for staying healthy in different work environments, plus hopefully some advice on managing returning to work.

It isn’t.

The first three chapters are about your health before you even try to get pregnant. And the next two are about trying to get pregnant — and how/when to proceed “When Nature Isn’t Working.”

And while the next four sections are divided into the three trimesters and the actual birth, the week-by-week fetal development information ranges from a few paragraphs per week, down to a chart of key milestones.

Instead, the focus is on things like:

• How to Choose a Doctor or Midwife
• Communicating About Your Pregnancy at Work
• Second Trimester Prenatal Testing
• Arranging for Maternity Leave
• Your “Birth Plan”
• Natural Childbirth/Epidurals/Other Pain Relief Options
• Cesarean Sections

Personally, my biggest fear/annoyance about pregnancy books is that they will be ALL about the unacknowledged assumption that the reader is in a heterosexual marriage. Not that there’s anything wrong with that! But not every pregnant person is either married or straight, and you would think that authors would remember that.

I liked how this book handled that.

Right up front in the Preface, on the first page of text in the book, Greenfield says:

I also want to explain what may seem like assumptions about gender and sexual orientation. In this book, I used the male gender for the partner, since that is the most common arrangement, and alternated male and female for the baby (by chapter). In places, I assumed that the mom was heterosexual and in a long-term relationship, but I tried to address other arrangements when it made a difference.

See how easy that is? Authors don’t need to engage in awkward writing OR to ignore the diverse circumstances under which women get pregnant. Speaking to your specific imaginary reader is totally fine — just acknowledge the fact that your actual readers will be in many different circumstances, and when that makes a difference, address it! Good job, Dr. Greenfield!

A few other things I liked about this book:

• There were lots of great quotations from moms, about their experiences, throughout the book. (Although some of the “anonymizing” was silly. Like “Jane S., state governor. Gee, I wonder who that is.)
• Non-judgmental tone in discussing emotionally charged issues like c-sections, circumcision, and breastfeeding/use of formula.
• Use of quotation marks around “Birth Plan” and explicit recognition that your birth is not going to go according to anyone’s plan. I really think that the moms who are the most attached to their idea of how birth “should go” are the ones who are the unhappiest with their actual experience. (That’s NOT what Greenfield said, but I felt validated in my opinion by her quotation marks. Certainly she agrees that you should talk with your health care providers about what you want.)
• The chapter “Crawling Up the Learning Curve” about the exhausting emotional roller coaster of the first few weeks home with a newborn does a good job of setting a new mom’s expectations. (But does anyone ever believe how crazy it will be?)
• The information about pumping at work, that pumping is a learned skill, and that your workplace may or may not do a good job of supporting your need to pump, are things I think very few women think about in advance — and it would be helpful to do so!
• Finding a health care practice — great information explaining the different types of options, including OBs, Family Doctors, Certified Nurse Midwives, and various other types of midwives, as well as RNs, Nurse Practicioners, Doulas, and Maternal-Fetal Medicine specialists. Also excellent information about how to figure out if the practice is the right fit for you. I had a hard time finding a practice to deliver Noah, and it would have been reassuring to have something concrete like the list of questions this book provides.
• Great appendices full of information about infertility treatment, interpreting various prenatal tests, and additional resources both online and in print.

This book would be most useful to someone who is at the very beginning of the process of trying to get pregnant.

While readers who are or have dealt with infertility treatment will quibble with some of the assumptions in the chapter “Trying to Get Pregnant,” for an average, fertile, healthy, heterosexual woman in a relationship, the information is WAY MORE useful than we got in high school sex ed, and probably works for most people.

The next group of people I think would find this book valuable are professional women in urban or suburban areas. We are the people most likely to be able to make the wide range of choices about health care, work for employers covered by the FMLA, and likely to buy multiple pregnancy books.

Yeah. Multiple pregnancy books.

Maybe I’m unique, but in both of my pregnancies, I’ve wanted more details about both fetal development and the changes happening to my pregnant body than this book includes. That’s ok, all those other books have that. And most of them don’t have the breadth of information in this book.

If you are pregnant for the first time, or hope to become pregnant for the first time in the next six months or a year, I recommend picking up these two books: The Working Woman’s Pregnancy Book and Bun in the Oven by Kaz Cooke.

And if that sounds like you (or you just want to read it), leave a comment. One random commenter will be the lucky winner of this book. (You can’t have my copy of Bun – I’m re-reading it for the week by week details!)

I am feeling gray with tired.

(So why am I blogging? I miss you. And at least in my mind, you miss me too.)

The thing about growing another human being from scratch, inside your body, is that it takes an unbelievable amount of energy.

And for some reason, probably little Esmerelda Freugenspiegal pressing on my bladder, I’m waking up every few hours even when I am asleep.

Yet life goes on. Noah needs baths and diaper changes and to eat. We need groceries. (Today, we were out of approximately 40% of the things we normally eat, or had enough left to make it maybe 1 more day.)

Where was I going with this? I don’t even remember. I better go to sleep, because I’m going to be up late tomorrow.

Yes, yes I am. And I’m super excited about it, because I’m going to be hanging out with and then watching my friend Peter Mulvey perform at local “serious music listeners” venue (so Jill tells me) Eddie’s Attic.

I’m so tired that I can’t actually remember the last time I saw Peter. My brain says “Reunion?” But then it shows me a picture in cold weather. Anyway. It doesn’t matter, because the answer to the question will be “in May, at my house” pretty soon.

Goodnight.

Dear Noah,

On Saturday, you turned 2 years and 3 months old.

You sing your ABCs almost every day. If we sing along, you make it through the entire song with pretty good accuracy. If we watch you sing, you generally skip from about G to W, belting out the “next time won’t you sing with me?” And then you yell “Yay!” and clap enthusiatically.

You love identifying letters, especially when they’re written in bright colors. “That a D! That a red B!”

Even more than letters, you seem to love counting. You can reliably count objects, in real life or books, to about 6. And you can reliably count to 10 if you are counting for it’s own sake, not concrete items.

You love testing your independence, wanting to brush your teeth, cut your food, turn on and off the lights, and put on your shoes yourself. “I do it! I do it! I try! I try!”

But when you hit a wall — too many new people or experiences, or too tired — you hit it hard. Then all you want is for me to carry you, your face buried in my shoulder.

I think you’re at your best balance of loving and independent when we’re out in public in a place that’s new to you. You’re willing to hold Mommy’s hand, and even Grandma’s. But you gleefully pull us along to see the next exciting thing, whether that’s crossing the street or seeing another animal at the zoo.

Incidentally, speaking of the zoo, it would be totally ok with me if you quit talking about seeing the elephant pooping.

Your mommies love you.

love,

That Mommy

I’m guessing that most of you already knew that Mother’s Day was this weekend. And technically, of course I knew too. It’s just that I only actually realized that Mother’s Day is the day after tomorrow about one minute ago.

You can guess how much preparation we’ve done. Although to be fair to us, we have been cleaning. Especially the room and bathroom that my actual mother will be sleeping in/sharing with Noah beginning tonight.

I guess the thing for me is that I’m just not that much of a “random holiday” person. I love my mom and would be just as excited if she were visiting last weekend, or next weekend. And I love this insane parenthood roller-coaster more and more as Noah’s personality continues to emerge. I’m pretty sure that Sunday will not be a peak experience on that front, though.

One thing I do want to acknowledge, in honor of Mother’s Day, is how glad I am to have companionship on this crazy ride.

I don’t know how single moms do it. Without my wonderful wife Jill, Noah and I would be in much worse shape. The idea of him becoming a big brother without having his This Mommy is inconceivable to me.

Thank you, This Mommy. I love you.

While she is the most critical person with whom I’m sharing this wild ride, we are not alone, and I don’t think we could do it, or at least not well, without a lot of other wonderful companions.

How cool is it that my nephew, Maxim, is almost exactly half-way between Noah’s age and Esmerelda’s? I think that especially as our kids get older, having them so close in age will also bring me and my sister Anna closer together.

Other real-life Mom friends, like Erin, Madelaine, and Liz, have been wonderful sanity-savers and reality-checkers, in spite of the hundreds of miles between us.

Local Mom friends, like Emily & Katherine, Lesley & D, my co-workers, and the women of my LLL group, have also been great sources of support and fun.

Last, but certainly not least, I have to thank my friends in the Mommy-blogosphere. I’m afraid of linking, because I’m sure I’m going to forget important people. PLEASE don’t take it personally if I don’t like to you. Eeeee! Noah is awake and running around. No more time to link. You know this world is much larger than just the 4 I’ve linked to already.
Some people I’ve met in real life. Some I have close friendships with based almost or exclusively on reading and commenting on one another’s blogs and other online media. And some…the relationship is probably more like that we have to favorite newspaper columnists. They know “we” are out there reading them, but they no more know that I’m that reader than they would know if I were in line behind them at the grocery store.

Living as far away from family and long-term friends as we do, those mommy-bloggers sometimes provide the human contact, sympathy, empathy, or laughs I need to stay on the right side of the edge of insanity.

Also, this seems like a great time to announce that I’m joining a new group of many of those moms I’ve only read until now! The amazing group, Silicon Valley Moms, is about to launch DeepSouthMoms.com. Look for an official announcement here in the next few weeks!!!

I saw the baby move today!

This afternoon, at work, she kicked a spot about 4 inches to the left of my navel, and slightly below. Three times in a row! I could see them, just looking at my belly. I think I actually saw it in my peripheral vision just before I really looked, and that’s what made me look down.

And this evening, while I was resting and hoping that Noah was not going to get up again, she gave a few more thwacks to a spot about an inch closer to my navel.

How much fun is that? I think watching the baby move inside my belly is my favorite thing about being pregnant.

No, it doesn’t make me think about the movie Aliens. Thanks for asking.

In other news, I’ve been doing really well on the fruit & veg front. Yesterday, I had about 2 cups of fresh fruit salad for lunch, and a bunch of roasted carrots & cauliflower for dinner.

Today I had another cup of the carrots & cauliflower, some amazing bread with dried cranberries, walnuts, and orange zest. I’ll probably have an apple or a banana before bed.

Yesterday, I had a very funny experience that drove home for me how much less like a geek I look in real life, than I do in my mind.

I went out to a late lunch with a co-worker and a former co-worker, both big Science Fiction fans; indeed, people with specific roles and responsibilities at Dragon*Con, the largest science fiction convention in the world.

Current co-worker doesn’t actually look like Meat Loaf, but you can’t really describe him without making reference to the musician. Imagine a dark skinned Meat Loaf with black hair that goes half-way down his back, normally seen in public wearing all black, including a black leather trench coat.

Former co-worker is also a big beefy dude, with a shaved head and scruffy goatee.

In the parking lot after lunch, we were giggling about a bumper sticker near our cars. Actually, a combination of stickers:

Yes, My Tits Are Real: So Is My Penis

Right above a commemorative license plate acknowledging the car owner’s status as a Veteran of the United States Army.

And then a bumper sticker reading:

Jesus, Save Me From Your Followers

As it turns out, my co-worker has a podcast in which he mostly interviews people with unusual kinky sexual interests.

He decided to leave a note, asking the car owner for an interview.

While we were standing around in the parking lot, another car pulled up next to us. I noticed the high end car seat in the back before I noticed the man getting out — until he said, in a voice full of concern, “Liza?”

It was a dad from our old day care, the father of Noah’s friend Maggie. We really like him and his wife, and their daughter is a sweetheart. But they do make us feel really old — we don’t know for sure, but we think the age difference is more than 10 years, could be 14.

“Oh! Hi Chris! How’re you? How’s Maggie?”

“Is everything ok here?”

I suddenly saw the scene from the outside:

Pregnant suburban soccer mom in a pink floral dress standing around in a parking lot with Meat Loaf and his similarly intimidating-looking friend.

“Were you in a car accident? Do you need a ride?”

“Oh no — everything is fine! These are my co-workers, Dave & Kevin. We were just having lunch. Did you see these bumper stickers?”

We had a few more moments of reassuring conversation while Meat Loaf finished his note to the other car, then all parted ways. (And did I mention that I’m absolutely charmed by Chris’s chivalry?)

Meat Loaf and I got back in his car, and he asked, “What was that guy’s deal?”

In that moment, I also saw what I’ve always loved about hardcore geeks, and why so many of my closest friends in high school were the teenage versions of these co-workers.

Hardcore geeks might be skeptical when they first meet someone who looks like me, but when they see that I read the same books they do, share a quirky and intelligent (if unusual) sense of humor, and speak at least a dialect of their language, that becomes who they see. Not the appearance of the pregnant suburban soccer mom, or in high school, the preppie upper-middle class girl.

In high school, I refused to see anything odd in the way it looked when I ran around, usually alone with group of scruffy guys in army surplus or leather jackets. God forbid that you should have described me as preppie. My head would have exploded, and I’d probably ripped yours off in the process. Ignore the fact that I was wearing a turtleneck or button-down and a nice wool sweater approximately 75% of weather appropriate days. Or one of my mom’s suits on debate meet days.

What’s nice is to have the perspective, now, that I can no more change my ordinary and comfortable way of presenting myself than I can change my quirky sense of humor, intelligence, or enjoyment of science fiction/fantasy reading material.