The Zog Blog

I went to sleep on the 16th pregnant, filled with excited thoughts of the baby I’d seen in ultrasound a week earlier. Heart flickering, little proto-limbs flailing. I was weeks further along than I’d thought, but the doctor assured me that it looked perfectly healthy and my spotting was nothing to worry about. Come back in next week and we’ll get a better handle on your dates, he said, but it seems like you’re somewhere between 8 and 10 weeks.

I woke up on the 17th ready for my ultrasound. Ready to get the worry behind me, ready to get on with the rest of the pregnancy, ready for the end of the spotting I’d had for over a week. As I was walking out the door, blood. So much blood. Panicked, I stuffed some toilet paper to preserve what could be preserved of my clothes and sped to the doctor. Amid my worries that I’d bleed all over the chair, an ultrasound confirmed the worst. Our active little bean was floating peacefully in the amniotic fluid, his/her little arm buds perfectly still. No hopeful flickering of a heart. No hope.

I went to sleep that afternoon, empty of everything but the vicodin/valium cocktail they’d given me for the procedure. I’d lost the baby, I’d lost my long-planned trip east for a fiber festival, I wanted nothing but sleep. I slept for four hours with no dreams.

I woke up feeling surreal. I clearly wasn’t pregnant anymore–the causeless anger/random weeping combo I’d been dealing with for over a month was gone. I felt almost chipper. I walked around the house in a daze while Jon and Jacob finished their nap. I needed to get away for my weekend as I’d planned, figure out how I felt about things, try to get some perspective again. After securing the okay with my doctor, I threw things into a suitcase, rushed out the door. I don’t remember if I spoke much to Jon or Jacob, or what I said. I fell asleep on the plane dreaming of a weekend of escape.

Boston’s morning fog gradually lifted into a crisp, sunny fall day. The leaves were riotous with color, the air smelled clean. I felt, like I always do when I return to New England, at home. More at peace. More hopeful. I filled the weekend with enjoyable distractions, took some space to feel like myself again, actively tried not to think of any of my problems. By the end of the weekend, I felt like I was actually capable of returning home and getting things back in order.

So, I’m back. We’re partly unpacked in a new house, our finances haven’t been closely maintained in a month, internet is still spotty, the months until we can start trying to have children again seem interminable, my aunt has just been diagnosed with fairly advanced cancer, I’m behind on my work. But thanks to a break, I’m here, with my son and husband, slowly picking up the pieces. And that’s all that really matters.

Now that the difficult fast of Yom Kippur is over… well, let’s be clear about one thing first. The fasting is actually not so bad. Going without food and water for 26 hours? Not so difficult, as it turns out. Going without caffeine for 26 hours? Ye gods, please just run me over with a truck.

Ahem. Anyway, now that Yom Kippur is over, our thoughts turn to Wednesday night, when my personal favorite Jewish holiday begins. Sukkot is a harvest festival, a time of one of the long-ago great pilgrimages to Israel, and to celebrate it we live* in a ramshackle hut for 8 days. The hut is called a sukkah, and is usually decorated festively in the harvest theme.

*”Live”, since we’re Jewish, means “eat”.

After our rather ghetto attempt at a build-it-yourself sukkah last year, this year we decided to order an aluminum kit with canvas walls. Jacob was, uh, a little excited when he realized we were FINALLY going to open those EXCITING BOXES.

(That’s him saying “oh ho ho HOOOOO” over and over again, by the way.)

The frame was disgustingly easy to put together, and while the shiny metal ensures our sukkah will have a little bling this year, it’ll be nowhere near last year’s debacle.

Tomorrow, walls and a roof! Wednesday, decorations!

…and, apropos nothing, in the “He’s totally going to kill me for posting this, if he finds it later on in life” category:

(Don’t worry, kiddo. Your folks aren’t morning people, either.)

Well, I think it’s pretty safe to say we’re all immensely enjoying the new computer. One of Jacob’s favorite parts is the new Photo Booth program, which lets you take pictures through the built-in web camera. It’s not exactly an SLR, but it is mighty handy for taking quick family snapshots.

It’s so much nicer to use than the old computer that I’ve had a much easier time doing… well, everything. Blog stuff, here and on my knitting blog, photo manipulation, work, email, music… everything. It’s just such a joy to use.

There are other changes going on, too. As I may have mentioned here, we’re moving to a different house in a sunnier part of the Monterey peninsula (very close to where Jon works) in a few weeks, and we’re all pretty excited about that. I’ve started working for my old company part-time, now. I have a babysitter coming in 15 hours a week to play with Jacob while I work. I have mixed feelings about it, to be sure–one of the big advantages of this move was supposed to be that I could quit my job and just raise Jacob. But we really need the money to accomplish the things we want to accomplish in the next couple of years, so honestly there’s not much choice. And I do fully recognize that this is the best possible way to work: few hours, from home, with my child here having fun and being cared for as well as I would care for him. Still, I have good days about it and bad ones.

One of the down-sides is that we’ll see less of our friends in San Jose this way. They’re just about the best part about living here, so we’re trying to make extra effort to see them on the weekends. This weekend we went up and played D&D on Saturday, and spent Sunday at a local Japanese garden/petting zoo/amusement park. Jacob had a lot of fun with the animals, but was actually more interested in the machine that dispensed the feed. I think the goats might have been offended.

He refused to go on the rides–sometimes he’s unbelievably timid–but greatly enjoyed the waterfall in the Japanese garden and the train tracks that ran through the picnic areas:

This weekend is Yom Kippur, the Jewish day of atonement. We’ll be fasting and praying. I’m trying really hard, with all of our upcoming changes and plans, to start the new year off right. I am not usually one for resolutions, but I’m going to do my best over the coming year to focus on only the best parts of our lives. There are many. And even if things aren’t always the way I wish they could be, I have a lot to be thankful for.

Our little iMac, nearly 6 years old, finally died earlier this week. We’d been crutching it along for months, because financially speaking it wasn’t the right time to upgrade. Eventually, though, we had no choice. No computer at home == no work for me == much less money to go around. So, like it or not, we had to buy a new machine, and we went with a new iMac. It’s sleek, fast, and a pleasure to use. I didn’t like spending the money, but I’ll sure enjoy using it.

That’s only one reason I haven’t written in awhile, though. The last couple of months have been fairly unpleasant, and I just don’t enjoy posting glum messages. So just know that we’re here, we’re all healthy, and we’re working to make things better. We miss you all and think of you often.

At this rate, the JetBlue people are going to start remembering me. I’m headed back (alone) to Boston on a whirlwind trip to take care of stuff at the condo, since we got some new tenants (hooray!). I’m sort of late in getting ready to leave, so in lieu of an actual update, I’d like to direct you to this:

• Unity ‘08, a citizen-based movement attempting nothing less than to change the character of politics today, and
• The excellent article where I heard of it.

My emotional gut reaction upon reading the article was “It’s about fucking time”, and I hope you agree.

While you read, Jacob will be practicing his fashion model skillz.

See you Monday!

Happy birthday to you,

Happy birthday to you,

Happy birthday, dear Jacob,

Happy birthday to you!

It’s impossible, but there it is. Friday, Jacob turned two, and we celebrated with our dear friends the Laughlins and Gayle. There was cake, fingerpainting, presents, wily antics on the part of the little ones, and a lot of laughter. It was so nice to capture a relaxed and wonderful birthday weekend, after the stress of last year. (We arrived in CA the day before Jacob’s first birthday.)

Jacob is nothing if not ready for the twos. Talking, doing simple jigsaw puzzles, singing, dancing, running, playing games, imagining up a storm, demanding book after book after book. In some ways, I’m much less suited to being the mother of a toddler–nothing much bothered me about baby care, but whining gives me a headache within the first 0.02 seconds. On the other hand, this is such an exciting and wonderful time that I can’t imagine missing it.

I’m sure I’ll feel that way about every age, though.

I’m flying back to Maine for the funeral this weekend, alone. I haven’t got anything more public to say, really, just some private leave-takings of my own and a need for time with my family.

It will be the first time I’ve been away from Jacob overnight since his birth almost two years ago. He’s changed so much over the last two years I can scarcely contain it all in my head. He’s still my little baby, in my head. Here in the real world, though, he’s absolutely becoming his own articulate and capable person.

We’ve been preparing him for the weekend the way we prepare him for everything, by talking about it endlessly beforehand. The other day, out of nowhere, he looked up from his trucks and said:

“Mommy fly Maine in airplane for weekend… funeral?

Um, hello? Was I ever really worried about him speaking late?

Grammie Lo-Lo has been a part of my life for as long as I can remember. I spent a huge part of my childhood in her warm, clean house–being read to, then reading to myself, playing Legos and dress-up, running wild in her back yard. I am like her in many ways, and we always got along very well. We shared a love for all things orderly and clean, for tasks completed well, for baking, for crafting, for keeping a house running smoothly.

To an impressionable young grand-daughter, she was almost more force-of-nature than woman. She ran her house and her life (and yours too, when you were there) efficiently and smoothly. She could do anything, from paper dolls to a magazine-worthy set of gardens to perfect grilled-cheese triangles with tomato soup to flawless stuffed animals with movable heads and limbs. On precious few resources she raised three children, helped care for and raise six grandchildren, and lived to enjoy eight great-grandchildren.

She was one of several role models in my life of strong, independent women. She knew what she thought, wasn’t afraid to say it (tactfully, of course, as we must maintain decorum), and encouraged me to develop my own opinions on things. She was always happy to listen while I worked out some problem or another, sitting me down at the bar in her kitchen and giving me milk and cookies while I talked. As I got older, my problems and interests varied, but she was always there. I’d keep her company in her garden, in her sewing room, around the dinner table. In high school, with more activities than anyone could keep up with, I’d often spend part of an afternoon or dinner-time at her house (five minutes away from the school). I felt as comfortable there, with its wooden floors and cabinets and hand-braided rugs, as I did at home. (More comfortable sometimes, to be perfectly honest, because it lacked my brother and his noise.)

We kept close through my many moves–to California for college, back to Maine for a few months, to several places in Massachusetts, and even this last move (though she was so sick by then that I’m not sure what she really grasped). She helped me tremendously after mom’s death, a dark time I barely remember now. Later, we made my wedding veil together, and when I got pregnant with Jacob she talked me through all of the worries and joys an expecting mother goes through. She even remembered and shared a few things about my mother’s pregnancies, and those times with her are worth more to me than gold.

I know that to some people, she was a difficult woman. I’m not sure she really enjoyed humor, and she could be quite stern and opinionated, but I loved that about her like everything else. To me, she was a constant and indestructible and very loving grandmother. I was very lucky to have so long with her, and I will miss her greatly.

Life with a grandfather continues to be quite a lot of fun for Jacob. (And quite a lot of exercise for my dad, I think. Me, I’m just happy to get the break. :) Yesterday, we drove a few miles down PCH 1 to Big Sur and hiked our favorite hike, to Pfeiffer Falls. Dad enjoyed the drive, although I think he sometimes wished I weren’t quite so comfortable with the twisty road. He certainly loved the views when we stopped along the way:

Pfeiffer falls itself is beautiful and tranquil, even on a busy Sunday.

There are also some big trees there. I think Dad was most taken with the smell, which is wonderful and fresh.

After that hike, we were all getting pretty hungry so we had a great lunch with a view at Nepenthe, and then motored on home. Where, of course, there was more fun to be had. Pop-pop is the best at playing telephone.

And today, Dad firmly established himself as Jacob’s Hero by taking him to the local fire department to visit some engines.

Jacob was a little afraid of the loudspeaker announcing local incidents, but was extremely impressed by both the five fire engines at the station and the firefighter who showed him how everything works. I found it pretty interesting too, I must admit (and not just because the firefighter was thoroughly and completely hot himself). He spoke most lovingly about a very nifty flamethrower they use to clear out areas in brush fires. While I found the discussions of their gear and what it does the most interesting, Jacob only had eyes for things with wheels.

I bet we’ll be going back.

This has been a banner week for Jacob. First, his friend Asher came to visit overnight and helped him move the chair:

Then, the babysitter let him into the magic closet and he found a tricycle.

Then, Mommy let him help her take some pictures of her new sweater:

And today, Pop-pop arrived. Seriously, what could be better than that?

Jacob lost no time in showing Pop-pop the most important features of the house.

It’s really, really great to have Dad here. Even if he is already scaring away the neighborhood deer. :)

…Jacob would like you to know that:

Friends are cool,

Trains are OMG FRICKIN AWESOME,

Challah is yummy,

And baths are sad.

*****

Also, we’ve now both finished reading the new Harry Potter book and expect that vaguely important things like eating and showering will resume shortly.

It’s been something of a transition, coming home this time. The weather has been gray, there have been a few (minor) crises here, things have been busy with chores.

But I feel like this weekend, we finally came out the other side and things are looking sunny-side up again. Although it’s just email at this point, we’ve had some interest in the condo for the next year (starting 1 September, if you know anyone who is looking!). The garage is manageable again. The house is immaculate. The laundry and financial management chores are caught up. I’m back in the saddle on my contract work. Jacob is healthy, happy, and very talkative.

I still miss New England, but I’m no longer plotting ways to hop on the next plane. I hope you’re all doing well, too.

Oh, New England.

How I’ve missed you.

(Yes, yes, of course there were baby pictures too. Go take a gander at the whole set, if you want.)

Looking forward to some fun in the sun. See you all in a few weeks!