Well that kinda sucked.

It is the end of the long weekend in the Wavis household and we have survived. Seriously. We survived. What was going to be a lovely long weekend of family time, spent partly in MA, partly in ME, with TWO GRANDMOTHERS to help with the child, was spent primarily in confinement in Arlington.

Let me back up. Partway through Thanksgiving dinner, the hubs turned to me and said "I don't feel so good" Cue the vomiting. Actually, we made it home before it began, but it was like nothing I have ever heard and I'm pretty sure, like nothing he'd ever experienced. Generally the stomach flu isn't such a big deal. You feel like ass for 24 hours and then rebound. However, going into this as tired and drained as he was and as dehydrated as he was made allllllllll the difference.

A few moments after the puke fest ended, the muscle cramps set in. In his back. Like, all over his back, causing not quiet yelling to emit from his mouth. Ultimately, he requested to go to the ER. Also fine, but what do you do with a 1 year old who is sleeping peacefully in the other room? I called Grandma and she and Grandpa hauled on over to stay here. Then, I called 911. There was no way this man was going to get into an upright position and ride in a car. Truth be told, I did not want to clean puke outta my car either.

So, he got a ride in a super cool ambulance over to Mt. Auburn where we shacked up in the ER from 11pm to 5am. 3 bags of saline and 2 kinds of nausea medicine later, we returned home. The hubs went to bed and I lay down for 15 minutes before the Shorty got up for the day.

Let me say that again. I LAY DOWN FOR 15 MINUTES BEFORE THE SHORTY GOT UP FOR THE DAY. Yes, I got no sleep on Thanksgiving night. The grandparents had stayed up until 3 thinking we might be back, so they were pooped and not in a position to really come back and do anything. Fortunately, my former sister by marriage came in the afternoon to take the Shorty for 2 hours and let me get some rest. And, my mother-in-law very, very, very kindly, canceled her plans to go to ME and came by every day of the weekend to take the Shorty for some length of time so we could either rest or go do something.

My tank was feeling pretty empty going into this holiday. I hadn't really wanted to go away in part due to the work of getting ready to go, but also knowing it was going to be less than fabulous sleep for the little one and by extension me. Staying in a non-babyproofed house was also not going to lend itself to my being relaxed. However, I would have taken that over this.

So, here we are at Tuesday and back to real life. It is a blessing that only one of us got this bug and he is more or less back on his feet. There are two more weeks of teaching in the semester and then I'll have a break. I can't tell you how much I'm looking forward to having some days of being home while the Shorty is at daycare. I can get some Christmas shopping done, we can have a cleaner, more organized home, dinners can be made at a decent hour because I'll have time to prep in advance. I might even, GASP, take a nap once in a while. It'll only last for a month or so, but I'll take it.

I like to give thanks for things on Thanksgiving and this year, I gave thanks for survival. Never thought about that one before, but it feels like a gift to have made it through the weekend.

Round Two

For the second weekend in a row we went to a town where Ben is interviewing to scope things out, have lunch with the search committee and just get a feel for things.

What a difference this was from last weekend. It is much closer (only 40 minutes - albeit in no traffic early on a Saturday morning) than last weekend. There is an actual town with many people - 13,000 as opposed to 5,000 last weekend. There are stores and restaurants and all that located in an area sort of like the rte 9 strip, but then you leave that and enter into this lovely town where there's space between the houses and there were people out in their yards with their kids. There's a new high school being built, there are lots of horse farms and walking trails. The beach is 2 towns over. There's a fabulous Y with tennis courts and a pool.

This church also has a parsonage where we'd have to live, but again, soooo different. I totally fell in love with this house even though it will never be mine in any way. Built in the 1850's it has all kinds of charm, but has been kept updated. Lots of nice space, good storage, 4 bedrooms, 2 and a half baths, a kitchen I could totally live with in a very happy way a nice deck and backyard as well as a 2 car attached garage. I could see having parties here and having our kiddos running around all very happily.

All that said, there are still drawbacks. It is far enough from where we are that I feel somewhat fearful to leave. The house isn't in a neighborhood so easily meeting some people isn't there. My close friends are in the city and while I don't see them often, I can just call them up and meet somewhere easily. My professional life is here and my commute would become pretty long. In general, the time our family has together will alter significantly if Ben were to go back into the ministry. I don't relish not having family weekends and not seeing each other every night. We also wouldn't be buying something which is what we really want to do - having your first mortgage in your 50's is not all that appealing, frankly. I suppose we could buy either an investment property now or a retirement home, but that seems a bit more on the complicated side.

So many decisions and so much information to ingest as all of this moves forward along with a few other professional irons he has in the fire. I'm anxious to begin making my own professional changes and hope, hope, hope, we'll know something soon.

Learning

Yesterday was a big day. We went to one of the towns where Ben has been interviewing for a ministry position for him to do a second interview, me to be taken on a tour (and I know I was being scoped out for my role as his wife) and a lunch. It was enlightening. I think we both went in thinking, okay, this is it for us, we'll love it and want to move here.

The more the day went on, the less it seemed that way to me. This place is remote. If we wanted a summer home, it would be fantastic. Quiet, removed, on the water and really, really nice. But, SMALL. And when you think about spending your years somewhere, that small is not what I want. In our lives outside work we love to try new restaurants, go to shows, hear live music, visit museums. There is none of that there. There isn't even a funky coffee shop in the center of town. There's no Trader Joes or Whole Foods closer than 45 minutes away. The parsonage was by no means our dream home. What I would do for work is very up in the air. I was told by the woman who drove me around that most moms are stay-at-home. That isn't what I want to be and I think that it could be hard to find a group of women I relate to. The school system is good which is great for Ella, but there is nothing outside of the school system to give her additional opportunities. I want her to be in a more diverse area where she can learn about the world.

So, it was a long, 7 hour day of being on and smiling and talking, but it was worth it as we left with a decision for ourselves and more knowledge about the kind of place we want to be to settle down. There are two more spots on the horizon and we'll visit one next weekend. Maybe one of them will be it, but if not, I know the right thing will come along and show itself to us. I think we are both feeling ready to make final decisions on this stuff so hopefully that means the Universe is going to cooperate and show us the final deal soon!

A long, long month comes to an end

It can't end soon enough. October has been a rough month round these parts. I left for a conference early in the month, having just had one cold, only to come down with another that morphed into a freaking upper respiratory/laryngitis-y thing that is STILL lingering. I wake up with no voice and when it finally comes in later in the morning I sound hoarse with all the crap in my throat. Mix into this a cold for Ella that ended up with a fast moving ear infection that caused her sweet little ear drum to burst, a second cold and then, dreaded of all dreaded, a stomach bug this past weekend. And the same awful cold for Ben that he is still fighting.

Okay, those who know me know I HATE THROWING UP. I will do anything to avoid it. I prayed to every God imaginable when pregnant that I would not have morning sickness. In the same vein, I don't enjoy listening to others throw up (maybe from all the years of listening to my brother hurl every morning of high school but that's another story). So, while minding my own business at Head of the Charles this weekend, while out with my friend Lisa, I was amazed to look down at the little one and see that she had thrown up ALL OVER HERSELF in her stroller. Seriously, it was everywhere. She seemed remarkably un-phased as I contemplated what to do and tried to avoid looking closely at the tofu and pear marinated in stomach juices that adorned her like a weird beard.

It was my lucky day that after dropping us off Ben had decided to stay close to the square so he was able to come and get us. She made it home without booting again, but then did like 9 times all over each of us at varying times. We covered ourselves in towels to try and contain it, but the result was like 7 loads of vomit covered laundry.

As usual the whole thing seemed way worse for the parents than the kid who was incredibly chipper in between barfing episodes. However, it meant we had to cancel her first birthday party which was sad. We'll try again next weekend.

She's now back to her normal self, the ear infection has hopefully cleared up, the cold is abating and GOD willing we will all be healthy through the next little bit. Seriously. I don't think I can take one more illness for any of us. Please, let this last week of October pass quietly and have November be a more calm, healthy month for all of us!

I haven't blogged for a while because I've been a bit busy with all the school start up, illness, travel and life fun that's been transpiring. But, I'm blogging now because...well....because I'm procrastinating. Tuesdays I work from home on a data project that I can do at my leisure. Two and half hours in this morning my eyes are going loopy and I'm not sure I can take anymore.

Time is marching on, but I feel like I'm in a gigantic holding pattern, circling around the life that I want. Okay, okay that's a bit extreme, but I am waiting for the *part* of life that I want *next*. That is to move to a town where we will settle, buy a home, contemplate when the next little Davis will join us and become involved in our community.

In all likelihood, the holding pattern will switch on its landing gear (how far can I take this metaphor?) before the end of the year. The 3 options Ben is looking at will come to resolution (and hopefully to a new job), we'll get the money we are inheriting from my grandmother and start to map out a move. A few weeks ago in a fit of frustration with the smallness of our place, I suggested we go to a few open houses. If one particular job happens for him, we would likely stay in Arlington so, we looked at some bigger condos that would be near to the train. Neither of them were really our next place, but it felt nice to look and start talking about what we want.

I am anxious to sort out my own next professional move. Since I'm the one who will work part-time and earn less, I can't dictate where we go so I'm waiting, oh so very impatiently, to make any move.

Over this past weekend I was out in Ohio presenting a yoga for singers workshop and it was fun to be back. The three years I spent there were three of the happiest years of my life. I was so engaged with what I was doing and loved learning new things. It made plain how disengaged I feel about what I'm currently doing and how little I'm learning and growing in my current job. There are so many moments that I question staying in voice teaching, but I know it could be very different if I taught at a different place. Do I hang on and try somewhere else, or get out while the getting is good and find a job that will be less influenced by the economy and provide a more stable situation and make me feel like I am learning and growing?

Plus O Magazine had a section on figuring out what you want to be when you grow up. Do any of us ever figure it out? I don't want to spend my adult days wondering rather than doing, but it seems hard to sort it all out. I just have this nagging feeling what I am doing isn't 'it'.

Now I'm just blathering because my brain is running and there are things I need to attend to: Laundry, vacuuming, making quiche and banana bread for dinner, steaming my head to try and get my voice back. Fun way to spend one's lunch hour, no?

Taking Issue

There's a post circulating of a letter written to a paper in Jackson, Mississippi from an ER doc in 2009. In it he details having to provide care for a woman who has a gold tooth, multiple, expensive looking tattoos, wears an expensive brand of tennis shoes and has an R&B ring tone on her cellphone. The patient received medicaid. His letter stated he didn't like that he was paying for this patient's health care when clearly the patient is choosing to spend her money on vices rather than getting herself health insurance and taking care of herself.

I find so many problems with implications made by the doctor in a letter like this, I'm almost not sure where to begin, but what I think it comes down to race and class.

The doctor doesn't name the patient's race, but gives enough cultural related hints, I think, for the reader to assume that she is black. This article from CNN.com discusses study findings of how doctors view and subsequently treat black and white patients differently. If this doctor were presented with another medicaid case of, let's say, a white woman who has a gold tooth and maybe some other non-typical items for a poor person, would he feel so resentful? For the record, my 93 year old grandmother is on medicaid, has a gold tooth and has many times needed care at the hospital that there is no way she could have afforded to pay for.

Does the doctor know where the patient's tattoos came from? Did the patient tell him she went to the city's best tattoo parlor? Or, did the patient do some jail time and get ink on the inside? There are so many ways they could have happened, that who knows and why try to imply something?

A quick look on the internet tells me that the current cost of milk per gallon is around $4.50. You can buy a 12 pack of Pepsi for $3.69 and a 12 pack of Natural Light Beer for $7.99 (this price was from a Mississippi liquor store). Does the extra $3.50 spent on beer rather than milk give the patient enough to pay for her own health insurance each month? Having provided my own healthcare in the past to the tune of nearly $500 a month, I'm guessing that answer is no.

And what about her food choices? There is a modified version of the letter circulating on Facebook that references the woman's eating fast food take out. While snopes.com puts that letter into the false category, someone thought it was worthwhile to ramp up the evils committed by this woman. Surely people know just how easily it is for the poor community to just walk down the street to Whole Foods and get high quality food at a low cost as well as finding nothing but fresh fruit and vegetables at their local convenience store. There is a reason why the poor are obese. Little Debbie swiss rolls cost $1.33 for 12 at Kmart.

Is she on medicaid because she isn't working and is just living off the system? There are an awful lot of people out of work in our country right now and that may be the case, but there are also a huge number of 'working poor' who can't afford healthcare even though they are employed. The doctor in his letter didn't seem to know how she ended up on medicaid, but again the implication is there.

First do no harm, doctor, which would imply to me you won't judge your patients, you will work to educate them and provide them with the care they need. Be aware of your own racial biases and perhaps inform yourself about what comes along with living in poverty before you pass judgment on another poor woman who comes into your ER.

Mystery on Allen Street

A nice young family lives next door to us. They moved in a year after I did and last year, moved to the upstairs part of their house and rented out the first floor. When they moved in I would smile and say hi, but they really, really kept to themselves. Sometimes they'd nod, other times, no response at all. That isn't all together out of the ordinary in New England. We aren't exactly open and friendly folks all the time, so I didn't think much of it. But maybe I should have.

You see, when they moved in, they had two boys and now they only have one. I'm not kidding. The older boy is no longer there. The younger one is now about 2 and I see him get into the car to go to daycare with his mom in the mornings. The older one was maybe 4 or 5 when they moved in and he's gone. His bike used to lean against the side of the house, next to his dad's which was outfitted with a seat for the infant to ride in. Now, no little person bike, no running around in our driveway. Nothing. I'm not sure how long it has been since I last saw the older boy, but I hadn't really thought about it until this summer when E and I would be out and I'd see the mom out too, but she was always with just the younger boy.

Over the years we've become a bit more friendly and will say hello and chat briefly when we see each other outside. They had a yard sale earlier this summer and the mom came over to tell me the day before and said that she'd set aside some toys she thought would be good for Ella. I went over in the morning and got a bunch of great stuff. We were talking about kids, daycare etc. I commented that I couldn't imagine doing it with two. She just sort of looked at me blankly. I quickly moved on, but it made me realize there really isn't another kid living with them who would now be about 7 years old.

Um, where did the kid go? I can see two options. He was either a product of an earlier marriage and lives with the other parent (the husband has a foreign accent, so maybe the kid is on another continent?) or something awful happened and he died. I would think the neighborhood gossip would have gotten that one around, but who knows. Most of the talk around here centers on the geniuses who miss the one way sign at the end of our road and get yelled at by the old lady across the street who site out on her porch as they drive by (as though they can hear her inside their car).

There is no polite way to ask a question that would get the answer, so I quietly hypothesize and keep my eyes peeled for his bike to return. Now that I wrote this, I totally feel like Harriet the Spy. Or my mother, I'm not sure which.

Day Care, We Does It

It was a big old week here at the Wavis homestead. The Shorty packed up her lunchbox (along with 14 million other bags of diapers, clothing changes, sun hats, butt paste, bottles and formula) and trekked off to school. Well, daycare, but we call it school because she is learning stuff while in a place with 6 other little people all clambering for the same rattle.

We visited the day before she began and stayed for an hour. She was totally content and I felt good about the decision to send her there, regardless of how poor it is making us. Then, that night, it hit me. This whole being home and raising her is coming to an end. I was no longer going to be the sole caregiver for my little girl. When she has a boom, I won't be there to scoop her up and get her laughing again. I'll have to figure out how to get me ready and her ready and out the door with a nutritionally sound lunch that wasn't just rustled up from the fridge. It made me sad.

When the Hubs came home and announced that he was sad she was going to daycare. It made me mad. Who was he to feel that way? His life wasn't changing? He wasn't having to figure out anything new and refind his professional self in between diaper changes and nighttime wake ups.

Then I calmed down and realized he had a right to his feelings too and really, I was just needing to embrace this next change. I knew a part of me was yearning for it. It is HARD to be home all day, alone with a little one. Starting when we were would allow for some shorter days and a slow rolling start before I have to go in to school to teach was a good thing. Waiting two weeks was just delaying the inevitable and would add to the stress level in the long run.

The first day I stayed for half an hour until she seemed suitably distracted and I took off. When I picked her up that afternoon, she was on the floor, chattering away while playing with a book. She heard my voice and crawled at warp speed over to me. Yesterday, I just dropped her off and left and when I picked her up she crawled over to me but wasn't really anxious to leave. I stayed and chatted with her teachers until she sat next to me and threw her hands up in the air saying "all done" in sign and we left. Both days she did short naps but was totally over stimulated from the day and an exhausted mess by bedtime. Today, I could tell she was tired when she got up. When I dropped her off, she kind of gave me this 'there is no way you expect me to do this another day' kind of look and she burst into sobbing tears. I restrained my own tears and exited quickly, figuring they have a better shot of distracting her when I'm not around.

I've kept my cellphone close these 3 days waiting for the call to come get her because she can't stop crying, but it hasn't come. The kid is just ready for this (despite the fatigue, presumably she'll learn how to nap in a noisy environment soon). She loves being around people and has already buddied up with a little boy who is about at the same physical stage (despite being 2 months younger and about 5 pounds heavier) and the two of them crawl around together.

It is hard to believe we've made it here, but here we are. It is daycare for 3 days a week and mom and daughter days for 2. I'm hopeful that this is a good balance for everyone.

Thank you Universe!

The world works in strange ways, no question. As the rest of the country is, we are watching our budget carefully. Starting Ella in daycare means an additional $1400 a month (OUCH) for 3 days of care. It is somewhat of a gamble because I have no idea what I will earn this school year from teaching and who knows about next summer. Anyway...we've been talking about my desire to get back to singing and contemplating how to finance lessons which don't come cheap. We'd negotiated between ourselves that I would try to do 2 a month and factor in an hour of practice time on the days I'd teach. It is a far cry from weekly lessons, coachings and daily rehearsals, but I'll take it.

Just as we settled on this, I got an email from my uncle saying that a great uncle who died probably 4 or 5 years ago had an additional life insurance policy that no one knew about. He died without a will, which, when you live in Delaware means they hunt down all of your living blood relatives and divide the estate up between them. I'd already gotten my initial payout years ago, but this amount will pay for 5 months of lessons twice a month for me without having to touch our other income. The check arrived yesterday and my first lesson is in 2 weeks!

Thank you Uncle Ross!!!

Accomplishment!

Here it is: I actually made dinner at a decent hour last night.

Throughout Ella's life I've not figured out how to make dinner while she is still awake. In the early days dinner time was her meltdown time and now a days, she is on the move, so I can't exactly plunk her somewhere and go off and do something else.

Yesterday, it dawned on me to try putting the pack and play in the kitchen, load it up with toys and see if she'd hang out in there while I cooked. It worked!!! We had some music on, she bopped around, sometimes standing up to peer over at what I was doing and then plopping back down and playing with her favorite toy - measuring spoons.

The bottom line is I had dinner all assembled before feeding her dinner and was able to put it in the oven at 6:30 and we ate at 7, right after she went to bed. My whole being is happier with that plan - I'm not so hungry I'm crabby and I've had enough time to digest that I don't get reflux which messes with my chances of singing decently. She even stayed in long enough for me to wash up prep dishes so the kitchen wasn't an utter disaster to clean up.

And, the most fun of all, was I held out some of the pasta, put some sauce and parm. cheese on it, tore up some chicken we'd had the other night and it was her dinner. There is something of a huge relief to me to have her move into eating table food. She loves it and the mess it makes and I love seeing her grow and move towards a bigger kid.

Now if we can just get her to sleep until at least 6am again.....

had it, having it and whatall...

I'm not sure if I'm still in the process of 'having it' or if I've just officially 'had it' with working for other people.

This week's adventures make me think it might just be time to hang out my own shingle and go it alone. I long, yearn, pine, drool over the possibility of having a manager who wows the world with communication skills, negotiation abilities, management talents. Thus far, I've come up with diddly on that front.

The aforementioned adventure went from simple, to odd to all out clusterfuck (SUCH a great word). It began as a meeting in which it was recognized that I've been donating my time for about 4 years to run the program I teach in and it was suggested that I should receive a stipend for said work. All good. A meeting was held, an amount was proposed and agreed on and everyone walked away happy. Except one person who, the next day, fired off and email saying I should be paid 80% less - at a rate I haven't been paid since probably high school. I replied and said as much and a bit more.

Things continued until last week when I was asked to put together a list of tasks and estimate time and dollars and my supervisor would get back to me with what the potential stipend would be and I could say yay or nay. I followed through on my end. What did I get in return?

What did I get in return, indeed.

What I got was a mass email sent out to all the teachers yeaterday about starting up in the fall and rolled into the middle of that email was, 'oh, by the way' Person X (not a voice teacher and definitely not me) will now be the Director of the Program'.

Uhhhhhhh.....you know, it saves me load of administrative headache to not have to coordinate things, but that was NOT the way to tell me about the decision. I have been ridonkulously helpful in providing info, setting up the meeting for alumni to talk about the financial side of the program, done this that and the other, was lead to believe we were simply dickering over dollars and THIS is what I get. Communication from someone who appears to be in over his head, with no idea how to manage employees.

Bring on the school year, I can't fucking wait.

All of that had me lying awake listening to my child cry randomly at 4am and thinking, perhaps I should just escape the whole working for someone else and work for myself. Launch a venture that will be workable from home, have some childcare to keep my sanity and just fuck the work world. Sounds pretty appealing if you ask me.

Feeling Grateful

There are many days when I long for a dear friend to get together with to talk about life and what is going on in it these days. I miss having girlfriends who are experiencing parenthood at the same time I am and who know me well.

In my pre-marriage and Ella days I had friends who were married and had children, but most of them lived in adjoining states - New York and San Francisco to be precise. Locally, I cultivated friendships with other single women - many of whom have no desire to have children or probably get married. Since having Ella, I still see them, but I think we'd all agree it is different though they have been my friends for 15 years. My life has simply moved onto a different track and while we do get together for dinner or a pedicure once in a while, we won't be taking girl's trips to Spain together of going, spur of the moment, to a local watering hole to hang out.

I know I'm the type of person who tends to have fewer, but closer friends that I've known for a long time. Being casual acquaintances with people was not something I ever did well. My mom will be the first to say it was hard to plan birthday parties for me as a kid because I only wanted my best friend there. College was the first time that was ever really required of me and I can't say I felt totally successful at it. I never enjoyed going to dinner with people I didn't know well. In all honesty, I would rather have eaten alone. Over the years I've gotten better at it and have a fairly big circle of people that I know and enjoy, but those I hold near and dear are those I can get close to and form a lasting bond.

Today my desire was fulfilled when I got to chat with my friend Bronwen. We met 19 years ago this month when we started college and lived in good old Marshall Dorm. It is amazing to me that we've known each other that long, when in some ways college feels like just yesterday.

I so appreciate her friendship because our relationship has stood the test of time, relationships, distance and a whole host of other things. There are plenty of years when we probably haven't seen each other more than twice a year, but we've always caught up by phone and it is as though no time has passed no matter how long we go between chatting. Though we've been there for each other over the years, I think in the past 5 years we've really come to appreciate the friendship of the other in a way we never had before. Though our lives are so very different in some ways, we are similar people in our core.

In any event, it felt like a spot of my soul lit up when, after weeks of phone tag, we were able to catch up. There is just something wonderful about getting to talk with a person who just gets you and knows your history so there's no back story needing to be filled in when you talk. It makes me grateful for the friendships I have invested in and so glad to talk with someone who has a life that is somewhat like mine.

Vacation

Who doesn't love a little vacation in their lives? We are fortunate to a have a free getaway in my in-laws second home on Kezar Lake in Maine. This summer as we conserve our finances a bit, we decided to take full advantage of the family friendly spot and spend two different weeks here.

This is our solo week here. It has been the most gorgeous weather. When we arrived temps were 78 in the day and 54 at night. That is weather I can get behind. If somewhere has weather like that year round, I'd move there. I'm a fan.

For the first weekend we were joined by the LaRowe's, some of Ben's friends from college and their twin 3 year old girls. We swam, we boated, the Shorty slept little and it was a blast. Once all children were down for the night, we indulged in some good grillin' and had some amazing meals - among them, Grilled Chicken and peaches with chipotle peach dressing and grilled pork chops with cherry relish - both recipes are on epicurious.com

We've done small trips, called 'spotitions in our family, each day now that we are here alone. One day we went into North Conway and shopped for The Shorty's fall wardrobe - buying her clothes is WAY more fun than buying them for myself. Plus, you can get like 9 outfits for $100. We also went to the local nature preserve for a walk in the woods and yesterday hauled ourselves over to Bethlehem, NH so Ben could see where I grew up. The trip across 302 was spectacular. We could see the top of Mt. Washington and all the other mountains around.

Today we are awaiting the arrival of my mom who, bless her heart, offered to come up to do a few days of childcare so we could have some time to ourselves. Really, what I think we both ought to do first is take a long nap, but I suspect we'll go hiking, for boatrides, kayaking, swimming, play tennis and just enjoy ourselves some child-free time.

No question, vacation with a 9 month old is a very different experience than vacation with just two adults, but I don't think we'd change a thing. Having this place to come to where she has her own room with a crib, a rocker and space to play and we can be in our own room makes everything do-able. We are grateful and we are blessed for this vacation!!

Tough

Yesterday I caught a few moments of MTV's show 'Teen Mom'. I saw a few episodes when pregnant and I was curious to see what has transpired for these girls since last year.

The show profiles 4 high school age girls who are pregnant and follows them through becoming new moms. Many of them now have children who are around the same age as the Shorty (according to when the show airs, I'm not sure what the delay from tape to air is).

As I watched I found myself having the same feeling I get when I read stories about infants and young children dying in horrible accidents or being diagnosed with cancer or whatever. It made me feel sick to my stomach. And that feeling was mostly in relation to the empathy I feel for the girls who are new moms.

I have a great marriage, a supportive family, my own place to live that is wonderful, a job I can earn good money at and it is STILL hard becoming a mom. I can't even fathom dealing with all this at age 17, 18, 19 when I'm still in high school, have a boyfriend who may or may not be present and supportive, parents who are probably not so in favor of me having a kid (and in one case, potentially heading off to jail) and no prospects for a job in the near future.

My heart just broke not only for the girls but also for their children as I wondered what kind of a life is ahead for them. I'm a big believer in children reflecting the kind of parents they have (anxious moms have more anxious children, laid back moms have more laid back kids etc.) You could see these little babies acting out and behaving in ways that have to be at least somewhat related to the world they experience around them.

All of that made me feeIt made me feel profoundly grateful for what I have in my marriage, my home, my extended family and my child. I know there are days that are hard for me and I'm not trying to discount anything that regular old grown ups go through in transitioning to parenthood, but this just put it all in perspective. I am able to create an environment in which the Shorty will thrive. I'm a pretty calm parent and I have a very calm baby.

The bottom line is I wanted to scoop them all up and hug them; talk with the moms and help them so they wouldn't feel like they were going through it alone and give the babies what they need in the way of structure and consistency so they can thrive.

No more of that show for me!!!

It must be me

What is it about me that I attract these working situations?

My last job, that I held for almost 7 years, came with a boss who was a disaster. He had zero interest in changing and making anything run better. The world was all about him and what was best for him. If I had a dollar for every time he tired to make me do a project that would put more money in his personal pocket...well, I'd have more than a handful of dollars now. There were issues in the program and I worked very hard to right them. We needed to brand the program and so I did. All our publications became unified, I had a logo designed, we got letterhead. We had a professional appearance. All for the good of the program. I wanted a boss who would meet with me weekly and be interested in what I had to bring and what I had to say. Instead I saw him once a semester and he was not interested in the least. Let's face it, he sucked.

Here I am, in my current consulting gig, working for a small non-profit foundation that wants to bring music in the form of a cappella to the school age populations who have had their music programs cut. I'm so all about that. Great idea, great cause. The program has been around for a few years, but it has floundered in a stop and start kind of way, working at some schools, not at others. It needs a review and a reflect phase before trying to build to understand what works and what doesn't. It needs a curriculum that teachers can use to teach urban youth about singing that will meet some of the standards set by the education world for teaching music. It needs an administrator who works more than 3 hours a week. It needs a guaranteed income source and budgeting talks that covers every possible expense that could be incurred. It needs a foundation that communicates and responds quickly.

Bottom line, it needs someone like me who can take in large amount of information, process it quickly and come up with a viable model to roll out and test. Every time I meet with the person in charge of this program's committee, it comes down to this: "we want 3 more schools and 3 more teachers by September". I don't think he sees the need to examine, reflect and learn from what has been past. He doesn't find a problem in sending college age students into an urban middle school to teach music with NO GUIDANCE. He fails to see value in looking at any one of the many music outreach programs in the Boston area to learn from their successes and failures before moving forward for this one.

They've contracted me for 60 hours of work. Do you know what I could do in 60 hours? More than hire 3 teachers and find 3 schools. But, that's what they want. I pushed back one more time this morning to see if they would go for me doing some work that might help this program in the long run, not just add more schools where teachers will fail and the program will falter after a year.

Sigh. What is it that I need to learn to keep from finding myself in these jobs?

Taking Responsibility

In the days that have passed since the oil explosion in Florida, two articles have caught my eye and made me really think.

One was on NPR (I can't find it on their site now) where a reporter went to upstate NY to talk with people to see whether they felt any personal responsibility for the oil spill - by and large, they didn't. The other was an Op-Ed Column in the New York Times that also addresses the topic of responsibility - and was inspired by a letter a man wrote owning some responsibility for the dependence on oil, that creates situations like the drilling that went awry.

It is my belief that as individuals who drive cars we each bear some responsibility to what happened. As a society we don't seem to get it that oil is a finite resource. It isn't something that will just go on forever and ever. Regardless of where it comes from, we are overly dependent on it. It baffles me to see people driving giant SUV's and trucks (especially in the city, but that's a whole 'nother kettle of fish). What on earth makes someone buy a car that isn't fuel efficient? If you have 9 kids, I kinda get it, but if you have 3? What happened to station wagons and mini-vans? Why do we keep sending the message to car manufacturers that what they are making is a-okay for us?

There are so many elements that tie together for me in looking at the significance of this oil spill. It is time to address the level to which we have become fat, lazy Americans. Our bodies and lives have supersized as corporations sent us the message that they should. Dinner plates went from 9" to 12", our homes were scaled up to massive proportions, the standard deck-of-cards size serving of meat has more than doubled. In fact, fast food vendors even offered to 'super-size it' for us. It stands to reason then, that the evolution of the SUV went hand in hand with all that. The rise of wealth in the 80's and 90's meant more people with money to burn and a desire to show it off to the Joneses.

Now, we have a country full of people who never walk to do an errand, who rely on fast food full of unhealthy meat, chemicals and crap to feed a family, need big cars to accommodate their big asses as they drive to every place they need to go and are going to require major levels of health care to deal with the health issues that come with obesity and aging. And when we drive, we head out in big, huge vehicles that leave major carbon footprints.

I've also read the controversy over boycotting BP stations as they are owned individually and then a small business owner suffers. Well, I think it is time to question working for corporations that employ unethical practices - don't we each have a responsibility to question the ethics of places we are going to work and patronize? Perhaps these BP station owners would like to explore becoming retailers of biofuel or something else?

Why are we, as Americans, so resistant to letting go of our addiction to oil? Why are people meeting the Cape Wind project with lawsuit after lawsuit because it will mar their view or encroach on supposed tribal territory or simply add a few cents to the energy we pay for? Shouldn't we be saying 'great, let's go for it and let's explore how we can capture the energy of the ocean current at the same time to bring in wind and ocean energy together for even more power'?

It baffles me. I walk to do errands whenever possible. I keep the thermostat as low as my husband will allow so we conserve oil. I hang my laundry to dry. Lights are turned off when not in the room. Most things are plugged into power strips that can be turned off when not in use. I shop at the farmer's market to eat locally and organically when possible. Meat is consumed minimally and we don't eat red meat in this house to avoid the antibiotics and e-coli that come with cattle slaughtered when they are covered in the manure they've just stood in up to their bellies for their entire lives. For the most part I try to eat food, not food products each day. I exercise regularly to stay healthy.

Do I think I own part of the disaster in the gulf? You bet. Does it make me think twice when I get into my car to drive? Without a question. Am I motivated to use less energy and oil so we might leave a planet that isn't about to implode to my daughter and her children? Without a doubt.

What kind of responsibility do you accept?

One Wish

If I had one wish for my daughter it would be that she never sprouts facial hair.

I know our culture is a bit obsessed with hair removal, but on the topic of facial hair I am so right there. I'm enculturated. I believe. I agree. And I admit I don't totally get it, but am willing to play along nicely.

Standard eyebrow waxes aside, there is something that transpires as one ages. It is the phenomenon of finding a 3 foot long whisker somewhere in your facial region, that you are sure wasn't there yesterday and don't understand how it didn't poke your train seatmate in the eye, blinding them. The phenomenon must be linked to the hormonal transitions a woman's body goes through as she ages. Though menopause isn't likely to hit until you are in your 50's the decline of estrogen is a slow, steady one. There must also be an element of genetics at play. Some people are just born more fuzzy than others. As a result of all this I don't know a woman over the age of 30 who hasn't invested in a good pair of tweezers and spent some time every morning surveying the landscape to see what may have grown overnight. God forbid you skip a day, because that's the day you'll find it in the middle of some important meeting and suddenly feel like there's a spotlight on your chin.

I wish for my daughter to not have to deal with all that. Sadly, though, given her genetics, she probably will. Maybe by the time she's 35 they'll have advanced laser removal and you will be able to just walk in and zap whatever you want, not discover it in the middle of the day and wonder how long it has been there and no one has told you.

If you just read this and said 'oh gross' it is because YOU AREN'T OLD ENOUGH. Or you are descended from some tribe of hairless individuals and I don't want to be your friend anymore.

A meeting of my minds

Yes. Those. My two minds. The one that is educated, outspoken, progressive, a fan of women's rights and then the other that is a fan of all things pop culture; in particular the Real Housewives of Wherever....

I've watched them all, - OC, New York, Atlanta, New Jersey. Bravo recently aired a season of the New York housewives which I dvr'd and watched on the sly, knowing that the hubs has ZERO interest in any of what he would likely refer to as 'drivel'. The New Jersey ladies are just starting their new season.

I would be hard pressed to put my finger on what it is about the Real Housewives that I like. The women couldn't be further from who I am. Their lives couldn't be further than mine. Yet, I find it intriguing. In a train wreck kind of way. I start rubber necking at what I see on the screen and I can't turn away.

This morning as I started to watch the New York Reunion Part 1 episode my other mind decided to speak up. It didn't really have nice things to say. The reunion episode brings the housewives of each season together for a live look-back at the episodes. As is no shock, they focus on the conflict and what is shown in retrospect is brought to life with new vim and vigor in the studio. What my second mind began to shout at the first is, "They've made the grown up version of mean girls. Turn it off, turn it OFF, TURN IT OFF."

These women do nothing but snipe and back bite and bitch about each other. They pass judgment on how each other lives, on the choices they make in men, on the clothes they wear, on whether the other is crazy (Um, hello, pot? This is kettle....).

As soon as mind 2 shouted at mind 1 the whole damn thing just lost its appeal. I can't pretend anymore that I don't see the horrible message the show is sending to the world about women and their relationships. It paints women in an unflattering light and in particular, I think, hunts up these women who are bound to have conflict with each other, thus making for good TV for suckers like me.

So, I turned it off.

Day One, Ground Zero

Yesterday was a big day. Got my voice examined to see what has happened since last July when my reflux was so bad that I couldn't sing above an E5. That reflux stayed throughout the pregnancy and continued a bit into nursing. Right now the biggest challenge comes from having to eat dinner so late because I don't start cooking until after I've put her down and not many hours elapse before I'm comatose for the night.

The good news is it was all good news. Structurally, things are fine. There is much less swelling and the inter-arytenoid area is only mildly red. The doctor was pretty pleased and also commented on how nice it all looked given what he usually sees.

The biggest challenge is how to get back to singing after being away for nearly 2 years. TWO YEARS. Wow, how did that happen? Well, I know how it happened, but still! My goal is to spend 10-15 minutes warming up most days of the week.

Today was day one. I put Ella in the living room where she could see me, surrounded by toys and headed to the piano. I did some laryngeal massage as I know my neck is tight from my shoulder/arm tension from holding her so much. Then I did some lip trills, slides and runs gradually extending from the A below middle C, up to F5. Since I have no gigs on the books, I'm not pushing anything.

I suspect this experience will feel a lot like going back to exercising after having a kid. In that, my body felt so very different and foreign.(SIDEBAR: Now, though, almost 8 months post-partum, I'm running farther, lifting on a more regular basis, have a waistline to speak of and am THIS CLOSE to getting into all of my old clothes again. Tops fit, but some pants are still not able to be buttoned up.) This morning it was another new experience of this body. Breathing is different, my ribs are different. I'm just different! So, I'm going to put on my persistent hat, celebrate the small victories and slowly return to being a singer without focusing on what I'm going to do with it, why I'm doing it or how I'm going to make it happen. It just will be.

Talking my way out of a circle...

It is easy to get caught in a loop that seems to have no exit. I feel that way about my work life right now.

In the fall I'd like to work 4 days a week earning enough money to pay for daycare and bring money in over and above that.

Right now voice teaching at Harvard is my only concrete thing and that has some significant cracks. My former thriving studio of 22 students shrank down to 14 this term and 6 of those just graduated. There are some other issues in the form of space to teach. I have space for full days Weds and Thurs and a partial day on Tuesday, but nothing on Monday. The teaching is also only for 20 weeks of the year. Not exactly a full year's work.

Now, I could conceivably find another school to teach at for 2 days of the week and just try to fill two days at Harvard. However, applying for a voice teaching position means I need 4-5 songs prepared to sing as part of the interview. The obstacles here are: I still have reflux and not much of a voice. Practice time is also non-existent in my daily life because I am with Ella all day. I'd hoped to do some voice lessons this summer, but my voice teacher is about to have vocal surgery and isn't sure when she'll be back to teaching. I need to get my voice looked at but have to make an appt. and then find a sitter - which has thus far not worked so well for things like the dentist where I've had to cancel and reschedule several times just so I can go. If I need to do speech therapy to get back on track how do I find a way to get there at least once a week? Given all that how do I get my voice back?

Right now daycare centers are signing up for fall 2010. I'm in the position of needing to commit to daycare which will range in cost from $1200-$1600 a month without knowing that I have guaranteed income to at least pay for it let alone bring the over and above in. So how do I sign up for daycare?

Despite spending a lot of time each day contemplating (worrying, fretting, whatever you want to call it) about my work life, I can't find a way out to make things work. Are these obstacles that can be overcome or do I throw in the towel on the world of singing and voice teaching and look for a regular 9-5 desk job? I hate the idea of walking away from something that I'm highly trained in and pretty good at but what's a girl to do?

Add in to all of this my frequent somewhat desperate desire to feel like myself again in some part of my life. I don't know what piece comes first and go in circles rather than stepping off the continuous loop to take a step forward.

Not So Much

Last night was interview number 2 with the Bubs Foundation. I like what they are trying to do. Much of the position would offer an interesting professional challenge. The board members seem friendly, committed and like good workers. The big, big problem, is that their conception of the job is one that would only require 3 hours a week. BUT they want the moon. They seem to have no sense of how much time anything will take to do things right and move the operation from grassroots to something that could be rolled out nationally. They also have limited funds and probably need to do some fundraising targeted at funding this position before really rolling it out.

I need a job that will provide me with 2 days of work starting either now or in the fall and will pay me enough to make it worth putting Ella in daycare. And, sadly, this position ain't it.

It is back to the drawing board on the job front.

Whining for a moment

Here's my whiny moment: I CANNOT get rid of the last 8 pounds of pregnancy weight. I've upped my exercise and try to go 4-5 days a week and the scale does not budge. Instead it dips a few pounds, goes back up and so on.

Over the past 6 months I've tried to adopt a more laid back attitude about the weight loss, telling myself, it'll come off in time etc. etc. But, here we are entering the summer season where I have, count 'em, ZERO items of summer clothing that fit on my bottom half. As it is, I have 2 pairs of pants and one pair of jeans that currently fit me and they are now a bit big because I bought them 5 pounds ago. I have some t-shirts from early pregnancy that I can wear, but I'm still nursing a bit so my upper half is also not its regular size (and, Oh. My. God. the sag!!).

Let me be clear, I do not think I am obese. I am well aware that I am within the normal weight range for someone who is my height. The issue is I have a freakin' closet full of clothes that I like and cannot wear. If we were completely wealthy I'd probably just say screw it and go buy a wardrobe of clothes for this size and then I'd just have them. But, I'm not, and don't feel like we have a ton of extra right now for me to invest in clothes. It seems most expedient to just lose the weight, but my body is not cooperating (or isn't yet).

While I know I'm not fat, I also know not being able to fit into my regular clothes makes me feel bad about myself. I don't feel particularly attractive in general right now, what with the constant bags under my eyes, bits of spit up etc on me in random spots (cuff of my pants right now from a little projectile spit up while E was in my lap), dull skin. When I so much as mention any of this to the hubs I get a response in his annoyed voice about how I look better than most women who haven't had babies etc. Because he seems to get annoyed with me whenever I bring it up, I tend to keep it to myself, but once in a while, I spill and talk about it. It never has a good ending.

Today I went and bought another tshirt, but I tried on pants and the shape of my lower half is just weird and places I used to purchase pants, have pants that don't currently work with my shape. So, back I go to do some working out and attempting to lose the remainder. Several people have also mentioned that your body holds onto a bit while you are nursing, so hopefully as this month winds down and Ella is switched over to bottle feeding some of the rest will come off (at least my boobs will shrink, right?).

Eeesh, if women have to go through pregnancy and childbirth, you'd think mother nature could reward us with bodies that just return to size quickly and easily in repayment for what we just made.

I'm pre-sewing in my head

About a year ago, I bought some fabric on a whim. It was a bunch of colors I loved, in batik style. The fabric sat around and periodically, I'd pull it out wondering what to do with it, look at it for a few days and then put it back.

About 3 months ago, I realized I had taken a photo when walking down my street on my way to the airport to fly to Paris in 2005 of some ivy that was hanging on the elementary school wall. The colors in the picture were just darker versions of the leaves as they turned color. Fast forward to two weeks ago and you'd find me in the fabric store with picture in hand, looking to get more fabric. You see, my mother-in-law turns 70 next week and I thought I'd make her a little art quilt that used the fabric and somehow took inspiration from the picture.

Here's the rub. My little creativity streak still has a desire, but no ability to coalesce. I have looked at the fabric, looked at the picture, looked at the fabric, looked at the picture...well, you get the idea. I CAN'T COME UP WITH ANYTHING TO DO WITH THE DAMN FABRIC.

Now, the birthday is closing in and the extent of what I've done is cut out a template of some ivy that I found on google images, but I didn't love it. I keep thinking about it, but no idea really seems to strike me as the 'ah ha that's what I'll do' idea. Boo.

Maybe something will come to me this weekend, but I'm gonna have to work fast to pull it off.

More from the Annals of Breastfeeding

I find this fascinating.

An important bit of info to this story is that the American Academy of Pediatrics recommends that babies be exclusively breastfed for 6 months and then continue for at least a year.

A friend of mine is a pediatrician. She has a baby and just went back to work and needs to pump milk for her daughter When you pump you need to do it every 4 hours that you are away from your child. So let's say you work an 8 hour work day, that is 2 pumping times. Though your pump will remove all the milk in 12 minutes or so, there is set up time, cleanup time, storage time, so really you need to allow 1/2 an hour so you can do it all and not spill what you just made.

Her employer told her she could pump during her lunch break - probably many women do this. You get a hands free bra so you can eat your lunch while hooked up to the milker. Not the nicest way to spend your lunch break but so be it. For 8 and a half months you can spend your lunch break locked away in a room pumping milk.

However, they wouldn't allow her to take more time to pump. When she pushed they said they would give her more time, but dock her pay...she pushed more and they gave her 15 minutes and no pay dock and told her not to ask for more.

What does it say about the world that the very people who espouse breastfeeding to their patients don't make it easy for their employees to breastfeed their babies??? And, this is in the state of MA, where breastfeeding in public is protected by law.

I just don't get it.

Throwing it all at the wall

This is my new job search tactic. So much of our lives are up in the air that I can't think of any other way to go about it.

I'm just throwing everything at the wall and whatever sticks is what sticks.

To that end, I have an interview next Tuesday for a job I applied to a few weeks ago. It is coordinating an outreach program being launched by the Beelzebub's Foundation. They are the a capella group from Tufts that was on the TV show Sing Off. So many Boston schools are having their music programs cut that this group wants to send teachers in to run a capella programs so the students get some exposure to singing. Sounds interesting to me.

Thursday night I am meeting with the owner of a yoga studio in Belmont about teaching a few classes. She hasn't seemed exactly on top of things and that sends up a red flag, but I'm curious to meet her in person.

I've also started to put out that I could take on private students this summer and in the fall hopefully keep some private students to possibly expand my teaching.

Something in there has to take and come into a work situation that will feel right. I'm leery of being pulled in too many directions when I know my real attention is with Ella, but Harvard teaching has reduced greatly and if it can't pay the bills, I'm not staying there. I don't know that yoga teaching will produce much income, but since I'm trained in it, it seemed worth pursuing.

Whatever sticks is where I'm going.

Coppin' a 'Tude

It has taken my just over five months, but I think I have finally gotten to the point of knowing what perspective I need to have on my life right now. There's no doubt I've dealt with some hard stuff in the past. In each situation I've reached a place where I decide that I'm going to emerge from the experience stronger than I've ever been; rising like a Phoenix from the ashes.

So, here I am in a very happy place but also a very hard place. No doubt life presents some challenges these days. I can, and did last night, get myself turned in such circles. I find myself wanting so badly to be who I was before; to have my body back, be in shape and able to do the yoga I did before. I want my voice back to be ready to sing for job interviews and do concerts. I want to know where we will be living and what I will do for work in the fall so I can figure out daycare for Ella. It seems, at times as though everything hinges on everything else - my physical fitness plays a role in the support for my singing, nursing Ella keeps the reflux around and that effects the singing, not knowing about work makes looking for daycare tricky and on and on and on. Last night after getting myself worked up, I managed to have freaky anxiety dreams for most of the night.

Today, while teaching, I realized that I must adopt the attitude of coming out of this experience stronger than I've been before, physically, mentally and spiritually. Being the person I was before isn't an option because now I'm Ella's mom and I wouldn't give that up for anything. I can, however, be a new version of me who brings new depth to her singing not only because I've had such a profound experience in becoming a mom, but because I've experienced my body in a new way though being pregnant. I can approach yoga with a new appreciation for my body as well. Recently, I got Sarah Powers' new book, Insight Yoga and it offers just what I need now in my yoga practice. As I sang today at work I discovered some new colors and also found that I was more willing to explore the expression of the emotion of the song.

So, let it be noted. I don't know who I'll be as I emerge from this major life change, but like the Phoenix, I'm rising and moving onward and upward.

Poop Watch, Day 5

Much to everyone's delight we started the shorty on solid foods three weeks ago. She ate rice cereal with reckless abandon for the first week. We moved onto green beans after being told by friend Elisabeth, pediatrician extraordinaire, to do green first or they'll only ever eat sweet things as babies. Um, green beans are gross. The smell alone sent me back to my childhood days eating the crap food served in the dining hall at White Mountain School. I have a strong memory of the smell of the yellow wax beans that came out of a can and appeared randomly on our plates and this was that smell. I couldn't blame her for not liking them.

The downside of solid foods in the increasingly irregularity of her poop. I know, I'm talking about my child's bowels on the interwebs, but for those of you who don't have kids, poop is an all consuming subject. I mean, we already talked a fair bit about trips to the 'office' in our household before the baby arrived. Now it is like over the top. God forbid we ever go somewhere where we need to act like civilized human beings. We're screwed.

She was fine the first week and then the second week went for 4 days without pooping. That's a lotta food in and nothing out. When the situation resolved itself I just about fell over. I have never seen such a diaper full of, well, poopy nastiness. It was like poop peanut butter. Seriously.

Are you still reading, cause I know this is gross? She then pooped just fine for 3 days and then stopped. For five. I busted out the prunes. She gobbled those suckers up. 3 days of prunes. No poop. This morning we broke out peaches - all P foods are helpful to the system, except peas, which bind.

It was no secret there was poop in there. The grunting straining while she had her bottle last night accompanied by the red-faced, my-head-might-explode looks kinda gave it away. Not to mention the farts. Oh. My. God. The farts. I thought my childhood dog Rigby had perhaps been reincarnated as my child. That dog could clear a table with his farts. Sadly, I could go no where as she nursed and tooted away. Fortunately, once again, magic mobile did the trick.

For some reason this kid is happy to poop in her drawers when she watches her mobile. I don't know why, but anytime there's been a poop issue, we put her there and thar she blows. So, the situation, on day 5 of poop watch, came to a close with another hideously poopy diaper that ALMOST went up her back.

I know it probably only gets worse from here. I'm steeling myself for the year and 7 months ahead of diapers and already counting down to potty training.

Focus on What You Can Do

After my downer post of Friday night, I went to yoga Saturday morning. It couldn't have been a better thing for me to do. It was taught by a woman I've been to a few times, who works with Barbara and I love her teaching. The classes are relaxing and she has a gentle approach that is underlaid with challenge and resolve. I knew it would be 'attainable' for me - in other words not too hard and still enjoyable.

She started the class off by reminding us to focus on what we could do not what we couldn't when approaching individual poses. It was just what I needed to hear. I left the class feeling refreshed and as though I had gone to the church of my choosing. The spiritual side of yoga is as important to me as the physical. It was so nice to do poses as she talked about elements of the yoga sutra. I felt connected again.

I've held onto her advice about focusing on what we can do as I've approached this week. Especially as I've thought about my body. I have healed most of the diastisis and have started to do the exercises again I know work best - something I can do. Though I had begun going to the gym before the two week illness that sidelined me hit, it is now nicer weather and many days I can walk outside, or at the mall as I did yesterday (almots 3 miles!!). There is also a jogging stroller in Maine that will hopefully come to live with us soon. Ella will be big enough to go in it and I can experiment with working back up to running.

Mostly, I've tried to remind myself that I can choose how I approach things and can choose my attitude. I'm trying to make good choices and focus on what I can do whether it be about a personal interest project (I started sewing a quilt as a baby present for a long time friend of Ben's who had a little boy), my professional life (I've started working on my CV and putting together a proposal for a job that I'd like to have created for me at MGH) or even things around the house (I try not to focus on what didn't get done, but on what I can do each day).

The best thing is this Saturday is also spring break and therefore I can go back to yoga class.

Gotta Go There

I don't like this, but the reality is, I hate the changes that have happened to my body as a result of being pregnant. I realize the reward of having a child is the lens through which to look at these changes, but it is hard.

For one, my feet. They swelled a bit at the end of the pregnancy, but courtesy of the relaxin hormone, they also spread. Now none of my old shoes fit and I'm needing to replace them. I've delayed doing it and as a result I have several toes that hurt pretty badly. My feet are also very painful to walk on when I get up in the night to go to Miss Ella and feed her - I'm not sure what the source of that pain is. Now isn't really the time when I feel like we have a bunch of expendable income to spend on a new wardrobe of shoes for me.

My boobs. Because of nursing I know they are headed south to begin with and probably will eventually shrink to smaller than what they were before being pregnant. I've watched it happen to other friends and it will probably happen to me. Not to mention that my personal nipple mauler leaves them hurting 7 times a day.

My abs. I have the abdominal diastisis that happens to many women when pregnant. Your rectus abdominis separates when the size of the uterus gets so big that it pushes the two halves apart. The problem is the two halves don't like to go back together so you end up with a poochy belly. I've got pooch. It pooches most around your belly button. Check, got that too. I did the exercises I was supposed to do after giving birth and do my usual set of crunches, but I just read something about how those crunches can exacerbate the problem (how many times can I use the word exacerbate in one post? So far, 3, apparently.). So will I have a 'mummy tummy' forever? Sigh.

My lady bits. Let's just say that they've healed but not really healed. It isn't comfortable and who knows when it is going to get better.

My overall fitness level is in the toilet. Things jiggle like they t'ain't never jiggled before and I hate that feeling. I am so tired and have so little time that figuring out how to get back into shape seems insurmountable at times. Just walking isn't going to cut it. The occasional knee pain that I felt prepregnancy has also been exacerbated after carrying 40 extra pounds and having my gait alter. Sometimes my knee is fine and other times it is so painful I step and grimace. Will I be able to run again? I'm afraid to start when I'm this out of shape as I know a portion of my knee issue is muscle strength/balance related.

I have to admit, accepting that I'm not ever going to have my pre-pregnancy body back makes me feel like total poo. I liked my body a lot before. I was comfortable in my own skin. Now, not so much. I want back what I had before and don't know if it is possible, let alone how to get there.

Okay, enough of my little Friday night black cloud. I'm going to bed.

What a day!

I was gorgeous here today, people. GORGEOUS.

Wherein my marriage is laid plain

We decided that the exchange we had last night pretty much sums up our marriage:

Scene - while watching the Oscars, Ben sees Maggie Gyllenhal and her husband Peter Saarsgard and asks me if they are a couple to which I say, yes.

He says, "Huh."

I say, "It's a good thing you have me around."

He says, "I wouldn't have it any other way."

I say, "Did you fart?"

And life just continues on here.

This sums it up

Recently, I've given a lot of thought to what makes somewhere the right fit for me job-wise. I felt a huge window open in the Universe when I gave my notice for my Choral Administrator job. I am happy to be only teaching at this point, but on more than one occasion, I've wondered if teaching at Harvard is really the right thing for me.

The Harvard Magazine just came out and this article really hit home about why this particular school isn't a good fit for me. To save you from reading it (unless you are super interested), the title is "Nonstop" and it goes on to document how Harvard students do too many extracurricular activities in an attempt to build their resume and be the best person they can be. The article touches on the movement of our society towards this über-busy-ness and how parents often begin their child's life by over scheduling them into too many extracurricular events in an attempt to get them into the pinnacle school....Harvard...where the cycle continues. While I have met my share of extraordinary students at Harvard, there is one message that never seems to get across to the students - you might actually have something to learn. If they audition for a singing group and don't get in, they go out and found their own. I know, I know, that's how empires were built, but sometimes, when you get the message of no, the right tactic isn't to plow forward and just make your own way, it is to drop back and see where you need to shore up your sides. Okay, now that I've probably wrongly mixed too many badly worded metaphors, I'll go back to my initial point with this blog entry..

There are those of you out there who are currently rolling your eyes and saying "Uh, Sarah, you are just like that." You wouldn't be entirely wrong, but one thing I think I've learned at least on the intellectual level is that there is such a thing as being too busy. You can have too many things on your plate and the end result is always the same; too much stress, too little sleep, fatigue, burn out and the awful feeling of being stretched too thin. Most of this lesson I've learned from yoga where so much of the practice is meant to encourage being focused in the moment. Being present to life means you actually experience it and can actually say whether you are enjoying it or not, and not just wanting to get through it so you can get to the 19 other things awaiting you.

And, as with most things in life, it is easiest to see your own shortcomings in others. So, I observe this in my students. I see how constantly harried they are. I watch as they get cold after cold, stay up all night long and then wonder why in their voice lessons they can't sing as well, come to their lessons without music because they haven't had time to find it and even if they had, they won't have practiced because there isn't time.

I've realized that there is value for me as a teacher in working at a place where singing isn't necessarily the only thing a student is doing, but it is a top priority. They would take lessons for credit and to progress you have a jury where pieces are to be memorized and performed. I have a desire to do less in life and find it difficult to spend my work time in a place where that is never encouraged.

If I continue in teaching, I'd like to switch to a school where students actually experience life rather than live it as a means to and end of building their resume for whatever next great opportunity comes along next.

Wotion

Do you read O Magazine? This month the cover says in large letters. DE-CLUTTER YOUR LIFE! Well, there's nothing I like better than a little decluttering so I read with eager anticipation.

Oprah started with her shoes and weeded out a few pairs. It got me to thinking. Where might I have, um, more than enough of something and suddenly it hit me...

WOTION!

For those who don't know this about me, I had a small obsession with lotion when I was a tot. I think I asked for it for Christmas when I was about two and paraded around the living room with my pink bottle of Johnson's Lotion, saying "wotion, mommy, wotion". That obsession has never really faded and it was joined when I became a teen by a love of shampoo, but that's another story. It still makes me happy to go to CVS and smell all the lotions before picking one out (BELIEVE ME, I recognize just how lame I am). This morning while putting things away, I decided to amass all the lotion I have in the house. It is featured in the above photo. Just so you don't have to count, there are 13 different containers of lotion.

Now my disclaimer is that one is for Ella and one is for Ben. The other 11, mine. All mine! Some are to go in a handbag. One lives in the bathroom for use after showering. One lives on my nightstand to put on my feet if they need tlc. One is on my dresser so I can use it if I forgot to put the one in the bathroom on after showering. One was on my desk when I had an office. Well, I won't spend any more time justifying my 11 lotion containers (yes, one is unopened - it was a gift and I don't really like the scent of lavender).

How to organize and de-clutter your obsession? I started by throwing away two purse sized Jergens. They were both old and I have found that Jergens becomes a bit like glue after it has been around for too long. Okay, so that was as far as I got with it. I couldn't part with any of the others (*). But, I have committed to using up all lotion before buying more.

Would anyone like some lavender scented lotion? It comes with shower gel....

(*) While pregnant I struggled with nausea triggered by smells. I was given shea butter lotion by a friend to prevent stretch marks. It gave me hives so I chucked it. I bought a nice smelling shea butter based lotion from the Body Shop, but within minutes of putting it on it became very chemical smelling and made me nauseous, so I threw it out. I'm counting those in as decluttering work. There WOULD have been 15 if I hadn't been proactive months ago.

Humpf

I totally had a blog entry drafted in my head yesterday. And, today, I can't for the freakin' life of me remember what it was about. Oh well.

Today is Ella's four month appointment. We are a week ahead of her 4 month birthday, but she's been with us for 16 weeks. Go figure, I know, the math is weird. I am so excited to see how much she weighs - not that it matters, she has clearly gained weight and grown, but I'm curious. Given how small she was at birth she'll probably still be 10th percentile for weight. Also, we can talk about when to start her on solids - the lovely rice cereal goop that babies get. Once she starts eating solids that means the demands on my boobs will be slightly less and I think that'll be the boost I need to get through breast feeding a little longer.

I read a blog entry yesterday on Ain't No Mom Jeans about the political-ness of breast feeding and it does fascinate me how yet another female function has moved from the personal to the political. The Lactation Consultants, heretofore, to be known as the Nipple Nazi's, shove it down your throat in such a way that when you think about not doing it, you immediately feel guilty. Studies have shown the benefits of breastfeeding range from better immunity, lowered diabetes risks to fewer allergies to increased intelligence. For the mother there are benefits of losing weight faster, and lower cancer risks for your lady parts. All good, but can anyone really point to people in society and say "oh, she was formula fed", as though those people have a scarlet letter on their chest? No, of course you can't. And, exactly how much lower are those risks for the child - 1% or 50%? No one ever seems to say.

I admit guilt is part of what has kept me nursing her this long. I have milk galore, but getting it out of me and into her is the challenge. She is a great eater, but a craptastic nurser. I pump (painful, painful, painful) at work so I can provide bottles. I do see how comforting it is to her to be able to mangle my nipples on a regular basis. I also like the idea of feeding my child food, not manufactured stuff that is basically a bunch of chemicals you mix with water.

The bottom line is this is one topic that has me more conflicted than I've ever been. I long to stop, but I don't know how to (no Nipple Nazi will help you figure that out), but I also long for it to become what I had hoped it would be and suddenly be easy, painless and fun. So, I plug away, setting little goals for myself and see how I feel when I reach them.

well, since I couldn't remember what I was originally going to write about this will have to do...

Lesson Learned

Here's the lesson I learned this week: When I have a conundrum, call someone else.

My brain just doesn't problem solve so well these days. Not sure if it is fatigue, hormone craziness or that I am suffering 3-6% brain loss because my omega 3's go to build Miss E's noggin.

In any event, two situations arose that left me feeling as though I was standing around with my thumb up my butt, unsure of what to do....

First, we had our first post-baby date Friday night (woot!). We were going to symphony which required being moderately dressed up. Earlier in the day I went to the Mommy and Me class at Healthworks that turned out to be a 45 minute step aerobic class (ouch) that made me sweaty. I'd worn my last clean nursing bra, not knowing I'd be bouncing around (ouch, again) and it needed to be washed so I wouldn't smell on my date. Fast forward to the late afternoon. After nursing Ella I did a quick calculation of time to wash and dry and decided I should start laundry and get the thing clean. After coming up from the basement I looked at the clock and realized it was 10 of 4, not 10 of 3 as I'd thought. Umm, so I needed to leave at 5 and was not going to have bra to wear. Honestly, I had no idea what to do. So, I will admit, I wore my sleep bra, which really is like no bra at all and called it a night. In the car on the way, I called Kat to chat and she said I should have just handwashed and thrown it in the dryer. Right. Next time I'll remember.

Second, I offered to bake some things for our friend's Kelly and Evan who were having their daughter baptized this Sunday. Meanwhile, I also asked my friend Lisa to come for dinner Saturday night and I was going to make lasagna. Dilemma number two I realized while on the way to the grocery store: both food items needed the 13x9 pyrex dish and I had only one. Fortunately, I was then on the phone with my mother and mentioned the issue, which at that point had started to stress me out because I was running late and didn't want to be up until midnight again because of baking things. Her response: get one of the tinfoil pans at the store to make the lasagna. Again, right.

Okee dokee. Be on the lookout people. The next time I have a problem, I may call you and you can tell me how to solve it because clearly I am completely incapable at this point.

A Fitting End

I stopped in to my now former office this week to survey what all I needed to take home with me. There isn't much left, just some things on the wall and picture frames. There was also one piece of mail addressed to me in all handwritten caps. I opened it and this, with all spelling mistakes intact, was what was inside, typed on a piece of paper. It just seemed so fitting as my final piece of mail in that suck ass job:

THE KINGDOM OF GOD WAS HERE BEFOR DEMOCRACY. IN 1607 THIS COUNTRY WAS DEDICATED TO GOD FOR HIS GLORY. WE WILL TAKE BACK THIS COUNTRY AND REDEDICATE THE LAND AND ITS RESOURCES TO THE KINGDOM OF GOD AND ITS MISSION, FROM THIS LAND SHALL GO FORTH THE GOSPEL OF JESUS CHRIST TO ALL NATIONS AND ALL PEOPLES, SIN IN THIS LAND WILL BE VEHEMENTLY OPPOSED. THE WICKED AND THERE ANTI CHRIST AGENDA SHALL BE STOPPED, THOSE WHO REFUSE TO ACCEPT JESUS CHRIST AND REPENT OF THERE SINS SHALL BE PUNISHED IN THE END, AND NO ONE IN THIS COUNTRY IS BREATHING FRESH AIR WITH OUT JESUS AND GET AWAY WITH IT, THE KINGDOM OF GOD PREVAILED OVER ROME, WE SHALL PREVAIL OVER THIS REPUBLIC AS WELL, VICTORY IN JESUS IS COMING GLORY TO GOD GLORY TO THE KINGDOM GLORY TO JESUS THE SON OF THE MOST HIGH,

I mean, does it get any freakin' better than that? Someone spent 44 of their pennies to send that through the mail to me. Awesomeness.

The Future is Now

In two days I will be putting on my semi-professional wear (read: pants with a zipper) and returning to work. A part of me wants to leap for joy at this. I will very happily get on the fuggin' bus and sit and read a book with two hands and enjoy the damn silence. Another part of me does not care to ever return to the world of work. It seems way too complicated to figure out how to get myself out the door in the morning, let alone stay coherent for several hours in a row and actually teach people shit. Shifting my mind away from what Ella needs to what 14 voice students will need is going to be monumental.

It is truly a moment of being betwixt and between. The past 13 weeks have left me unsure of what exactly needs to happen in the morning when one goes to work (as it is, I am writing this in my PJs at 10am because I haven't had a chance to shower. I want to work but I don't want to work. Ya dig? Work is not to be confused with 'time to yourself'. It is not that. It is work, where they pay you to know stuff and impart it to others. I guess being a mom is the same thing except you don't get paid except in smiles and giggles.

Somewhere in my mind, I figured you got 3 months of maternity leave because at 3 months your child would more or less have a schedule and things would fall into a rhythm. Well, that beat turns out to be always changing. Ella has no schedule to speak of other than a loosely constructed, eat when you want - usually ever 2-3 hours, sleep when you want - usually about 12 hours a night and 4 mini naps a day. BUT, sometimes she nurses for a 5 minute snack and most nights she's up only once, but last night it was 3 times.

Right now she still seems so dependent on me that I feel somewhat badly to be leaving her. I think the half days will be easier than the full days. Ben will be initiated by fire when he is home with her on those days. Our moms will be with her another afternoon while I teach. We are so lucky to be able to keep her at home and have family stay with her. Daycare would push me over the edge, I fear.

I suppose this dilemma will probably always stay with me as I try to balance my professional life with being a mom. But, I've still got another full day before I become professional again, so I'm gonna enjoy my sweatpants and midday showers until the very last second.

Gainfully Unemployed

This was a big week. I resigned from my administrative job at Harvard. After 6 and a half years, I was more than ready to go. In many ways the actual resignation was something I dreaded. Over the years my boss has been known for his outbursts and all caps emails. Though rarely directed at me, I had seen the way he had reduced students to piles of sniveling mess and I had witnessed many behaviors from him that bordered on unethical. It was clear he had no idea how to manage and no ability to work with me as I grew to be sure the job grew in responsibility and pay grade comparably.

Technically my maternity leave ends in a week and with the turn of the new year, I knew it was time to take action. I set up a meeting with a colleague at OFA who had listened to me over the years and provided support and help in dealing with my boss. I told him of my intention not to return and he couldn't have been more supportive. He is also a dad to a 4 year old and understands the shift in one's universe when you factor a baby in. He has also worked with my boss a fair amount and totally gets the difficulty of dealing with someone like him.

So, having met with him and having been told to simply send an email (I had thought it was something to be done in person and maybe it should have, but the cowardly way out was just fine with me) informing those who needed to know that I wouldn't be returning.

It really was just that easy.

Several people responded saying they would miss me and good luck. My boss responded in his typical over-the-top fashion, proclaiming me a 'spectacular humanoid' (whatever that is) and only about a third of the email was in all caps. He seems to think I will help with the 'transition' from now through the summer, but, ah, I have to say that is so not how it will work. He will have to figure it out.

As for me, I'm going to enjoy taking the pay out of my 8 weeks of vacation that remain and work 2 days a week as a voice teacher for spring term.

Come summer, who knows. We may move to be close to a place that Ben gets a job, or stay in the immediate area. Either way, I closed one door and hope a new one opens in due time.

I thought the crazy dreams ended on October 26

Truth be told, I never really had crazy dreams when I was pregnant. Okay, except for the whole Eddy Murphy handing me a baby in the ocean one.

One night last week I had a dream that I have to relate here. Because it was ridiculous.

In the dream I was at Tom Brady's house that was somewhere in the suburbs of Boston. We had quite the conversation, Tom and I about his boys, especially his newborn. Then we took a tour of his apple orchards where we discovered that the Oakland Raiders had picked all the apples off of his trees and sliced them in half as a way of trying to intimidate him before the upcoming weekend's game. Feeling badly for poor Tommy, I offered to make pies out of all of his apples and got a wheelbarrow to collect them. Then, I was inside the house hangin' with Giselle and we talked about losing the pregnancy weight. She commented that it was her goal to get down to 1500 pounds. I said I thought she meant 115 pounds but she insisted she meant 1500. Somewhere along the line I started to wonder where Ben was because he would be far more interested in talking to Tom about football than I was about apples.

Then I woke up.

I could not make this shit up if I tried.

Something to Work On

I've probably posted about this before, but here I am, thinking it again and therefore, writing it again.

I am the queen of being in a situation and wanting to be at the next step - as in, while pregnant, I thought "wow, I'm so not enjoying this, I'll like it so much better when she's on the outside.' Now, Miss E is here and I think about breastfeeding 'wow, I'm so not enjoying this, I'll like it so much better when she is no longer needing me for sustenance.'

Ya know what? She will be done with breastfeeding someday and I would bet you any amount of money that at that point I'll find something else I wish weren't going on and think I'll be more content when it passes. Shit.

That is all so very yogic of me to realize. Or maybe it would be yogic if I actually did something about it. Realizing it has to be the first step, I 'spose. The lesson in there is probably that the present moment is just fine. It will pass and then there will be another moment. And then another and then another. Moreover, none of those moments are going to be perfect. Life isn't going to be better, it will just be different because life isn't really bad now.

Okay, that's enough deep thought for me. Surely it is time for the Real Housewives of the OC or something.

Throwing it out there

Yesterday I got an email from my workplace and it caused a visceral reaction. The kind that makes you go hmmm, and it wasn't a good hmmm. It was an 'oh my god I don't want to deal with that place any more' hmm. Taking a cue from the hubs, I noted that reaction in myself and kinda sat with it over the course of the afternoon.

It made me realize that if I'm going to leave E to go to work, it had better be work I feel inspired by and feeling is meaningful. So, I contemplated my 'skillz' and also my desire to be great at what I do.

I think I'm a good voice teacher, but I don't think I'm a great one and I don't think I'll ever be. I'm great at some parts, but those parts aren't actually music related. I know I'm not the world's best musician, which comes largely from lack of training - on the subject of theory, history etc. I can listen to the voice and have ideas about what needs to happen, but not always the ideas of how to to get there. I more or less know the repertoire, but no where near the way people who are my contemporaries do. Part of this is also that I'm not challenged in my current situation. I deal with mostly avocational singers who are not ever going to be anything but choral singers (nothing wrong with that, but very different to teach someone who has aspirations to be a solo performer). What I am great at is giving students confidence to try and to make changes and creating a situation where they explore themselves and gain a better sense of self.

I do think I could be a great yoga teacher which is also something that I find really rewarding and meaningful. Once I had that thought I emailed the women I went through yoga training with to ask them about how they'd hunted up yoga teaching opportunities and decided to post on Facebook that I'd love to teach a yoga for singers class, was anyone interested in hiring me and a woman I know who runs her own studio in Dedham, MA said she'd like to talk to me about it! Cool!

In that spirit I'm posting on my blog that I'd love opportunities to teach yoga - to both singers and non-singers alike. Any takers are welcome to contact me.

When your travel mug becomes a bottle warmer: How everyday objects get transormed when you have a kid.

So, my lovely Ohio State Mug that for years transported tea while I commuted has been transformed into the object that gets filled with hot water to heat her dinner time bottle.

I realized one night while filling it that all your old stuff is subject to transformation when a little one arrives. Like: the use of a wooden chopstick to fish bottle parts and pacifiers from the boiling water used to sanitize them. And: When I started giving Ella baths, we had an infant tub, but she had to be put in the newborn sling to use it and so was not down in warm water which lead to much unhappiness as she was cold. Soooo, the little tub I've always used for doing hand washing became Ella's tub. It was the perfect size to fill with warm water and sit her in. On the car radio we now have a station programmed on the am dial that is just static - perfect for turning on when you are at a stoplight and the child who loves the car when it moves suddenly awakens and howls. Same goes for the hairdryer and vacuum that do dual duty as their usual household role expands to become baby soothers when she is fussy. It cracks me up that the closer I get to her with the roaring vacuum, the quieter she becomes.

Anyway, there are probably other items that have been converted that I'm forgetting and some that have yet to discover their true purpose.

In closing, however, my glass of wine is still my glass of wine.