FEBRUARY
MARCH
NEW OFFICE
I love my Nikki McClure calendar, and will buy one every year for as long as she creates them. Each month has a word, one powerful word, and a cut-from-paper-with-an-Exacto-knife illustration to go with it. I find them to be horoscopic, if that’s even a word (oh good, it is).
February was EXCAVATE: a blue and black image of a heap of dark matter with two hands, arms, and shovel emerging from the top. Specks of dirt fling back and away from the shovel. Someone is digging deep; someone is immersed. Burrowed away in herself for February, this short strange cold month, over so quick, suddenly dropping you in the third month of the year, and New Year’s Eve still seems like something that happened a few weeks ago.
FEBRUARY. EXCAVATE.
Inward, in depth, gazing down and unearthing. And I realize that is what I’ve been doing for the past 28 days. When people ask me what I’ve been up to, I get a bit tongue-tied, unsure—what to say?
Have I just been sitting around on the couch, staring out the window, drinking tea, looking at the cats and the internet and sometimes the TV and walking the dog and eating?
Writing letters to my baby, writing about being pregnant. Reading vampire novels and baby blogs, searching Craigslist, napping, being sick, enjoying the rain. Reading Ina May Gaskin's Guide To Childbirth and Beth Ann Fennelly's Great With Child and various other books.
Watching reality TV shows about cooks, bachelors breakdancers and fat people. Gchatting and Facebooking and texting and playing music on the iPod for the baby, listening to music constantly. Beatles and Joni Mitchell and Joanna Newsom and Alela Diane and the Smiths and Yo La Tengo and Nina Simone and Bonnie Prince Billy and Iron and Wine and Bob Dylan and Ani DiFranco and Tori Amos and Stevie Wonder and all these classics, old favorites.
Talking to friends near and far, describing how I’m feeling, what’s going on, how’s the midwife, what’s the latest. Wanting to hug them all, these future Aunties, hoping that I get to see them soon. Talking to and Skyping with the soon-to-be grandparents, our excited and thrilled and wonderful parents, the women who once carried us around in their wombs, who felt our little kicks, who grew and stretched and marveled at this all. Kickboxing and stretching and rubbing my belly, oil and cocoa butter and shining and big.
Going to my parents’ house and reclaiming my baby clothes, my Fisher Price toys, my tiny baby shoes and favorite books. Going for walks with Aubs, hearing about her waitress adventures.
Teaching once a week, going out on occasion, saving money, eating in.
Feeling guilty for not writing more, not being more productive, then looking down at my round belly-buttoned moon and reminding myself that I am in fact producing a human, and that’s a pretty big deal.
But still: write more.
Looking at houses, thinking about houses, searching the internet for houses, talking endlessly with Jason about home-buying and owning and money-saving and money-spending, exploring new neighborhoods, considering Oakland, homebuying, mortgages, home, home, home, own rent own.
Feeling her twitch a bit, then feeling her kick, now feeling her thump and roil and rock out. Finding out it's a her. Utilizing feminine pronouns, buying pink things, picturing girl. Saying the word daughter. Our daughter.
Spending my days alone but not alone, imagining and contemplating and envisioning this new life in all its phases and forms. Spending my evenings with Jason on the couch, in bed, eating dinner, gazing at each other with big eyes and sometimes giddy smiles, constantly amazed by what we’re doing, what is happening. Buoyed by love and endlessly excited for the challenges and difficulties and wonders on the way. Understanding what this means, what we’re doing, becoming.
Reading through old notebooks and journals, cleaning out my files, throwing away and shredding and recycling years of receipts and bank statements and papers and ephemera and making new files and cleaning out the office, moving it to the back room. Buying a lovely blue crib from a sweet rich Rockridge family with two girls and getting that tiny glimpse of future (minus the rich and Rockridge parts) and setting up the crib and putting my baby blankets and stuffed animals in it and beginning to make the baby room, moving furniture and hundreds of books and hanging up the tiniest beautiful baby clothes on the little mini hangers.
And sometimes yes just sitting there staring out the window, doing nothing, eating popcorn watching Oprah walking the dog letting time pass and pass and suddenly it’s 5, 6, and Jason’s home and it’s time to workout, make dinner, watch TV, sleep. Sometimes, yes, doing nothing. But usually aware and feeling and thinking. But sometimes I suppose, just wonderful nothing.
Feeling clumsy, butter-fingered, beautiful, strong, supported, loved. Proud and confident. Yes, sometimes freaked out, in brief moments that feel good and necessary. Feeling bigger and heavier but not necessarily big or heavy and looking long-nailed and blood-filled and clear-skinned. Finally feeling pregnant, noticing it when I get up from sitting or lying down, just a bit more challenging, feeling it when I work out, slower, gentler, plank position so much harder. Actually looking pregnant, showing, noticing it in every reflective surface, every time I get dressed, pull my beloved BellaBand over my belly and over my unbuttoned jeans so that I can still wear my ‘normal’ clothes. My friends who haven’t seen me in a few months, weeks, days even and they say You’re even bigger than you were last Friday! Showing everyone, now, that this is a thing we are doing, is happening, everyday.
That’s a lot of excavation.
And then realized that today is March 1. Time to turn the page.
RESUME
RESUME
And a woven nest with one single white egg sitting in the middle.
On this rainy lovely Sunday, as I sit in my newly relocated office in the back of the house looking out the windows at our lush, wet, green yard, the grey sky, the wild trees and weeds and growing things, feeling inspired and calm and finally uncluttered, clear, productive, ready to write more, write more—this seems the perfect word, the perfect image to accompany this month.
I now resume.
February was EXCAVATE: a blue and black image of a heap of dark matter with two hands, arms, and shovel emerging from the top. Specks of dirt fling back and away from the shovel. Someone is digging deep; someone is immersed. Burrowed away in herself for February, this short strange cold month, over so quick, suddenly dropping you in the third month of the year, and New Year’s Eve still seems like something that happened a few weeks ago.
FEBRUARY. EXCAVATE.
Inward, in depth, gazing down and unearthing. And I realize that is what I’ve been doing for the past 28 days. When people ask me what I’ve been up to, I get a bit tongue-tied, unsure—what to say?
Have I just been sitting around on the couch, staring out the window, drinking tea, looking at the cats and the internet and sometimes the TV and walking the dog and eating?
Writing letters to my baby, writing about being pregnant. Reading vampire novels and baby blogs, searching Craigslist, napping, being sick, enjoying the rain. Reading Ina May Gaskin's Guide To Childbirth and Beth Ann Fennelly's Great With Child and various other books.
Watching reality TV shows about cooks, bachelors breakdancers and fat people. Gchatting and Facebooking and texting and playing music on the iPod for the baby, listening to music constantly. Beatles and Joni Mitchell and Joanna Newsom and Alela Diane and the Smiths and Yo La Tengo and Nina Simone and Bonnie Prince Billy and Iron and Wine and Bob Dylan and Ani DiFranco and Tori Amos and Stevie Wonder and all these classics, old favorites.
Talking to friends near and far, describing how I’m feeling, what’s going on, how’s the midwife, what’s the latest. Wanting to hug them all, these future Aunties, hoping that I get to see them soon. Talking to and Skyping with the soon-to-be grandparents, our excited and thrilled and wonderful parents, the women who once carried us around in their wombs, who felt our little kicks, who grew and stretched and marveled at this all. Kickboxing and stretching and rubbing my belly, oil and cocoa butter and shining and big.
Going to my parents’ house and reclaiming my baby clothes, my Fisher Price toys, my tiny baby shoes and favorite books. Going for walks with Aubs, hearing about her waitress adventures.
Teaching once a week, going out on occasion, saving money, eating in.
Feeling guilty for not writing more, not being more productive, then looking down at my round belly-buttoned moon and reminding myself that I am in fact producing a human, and that’s a pretty big deal.
But still: write more.
Looking at houses, thinking about houses, searching the internet for houses, talking endlessly with Jason about home-buying and owning and money-saving and money-spending, exploring new neighborhoods, considering Oakland, homebuying, mortgages, home, home, home, own rent own.
Feeling her twitch a bit, then feeling her kick, now feeling her thump and roil and rock out. Finding out it's a her. Utilizing feminine pronouns, buying pink things, picturing girl. Saying the word daughter. Our daughter.
Spending my days alone but not alone, imagining and contemplating and envisioning this new life in all its phases and forms. Spending my evenings with Jason on the couch, in bed, eating dinner, gazing at each other with big eyes and sometimes giddy smiles, constantly amazed by what we’re doing, what is happening. Buoyed by love and endlessly excited for the challenges and difficulties and wonders on the way. Understanding what this means, what we’re doing, becoming.
Reading through old notebooks and journals, cleaning out my files, throwing away and shredding and recycling years of receipts and bank statements and papers and ephemera and making new files and cleaning out the office, moving it to the back room. Buying a lovely blue crib from a sweet rich Rockridge family with two girls and getting that tiny glimpse of future (minus the rich and Rockridge parts) and setting up the crib and putting my baby blankets and stuffed animals in it and beginning to make the baby room, moving furniture and hundreds of books and hanging up the tiniest beautiful baby clothes on the little mini hangers.
And sometimes yes just sitting there staring out the window, doing nothing, eating popcorn watching Oprah walking the dog letting time pass and pass and suddenly it’s 5, 6, and Jason’s home and it’s time to workout, make dinner, watch TV, sleep. Sometimes, yes, doing nothing. But usually aware and feeling and thinking. But sometimes I suppose, just wonderful nothing.
Feeling clumsy, butter-fingered, beautiful, strong, supported, loved. Proud and confident. Yes, sometimes freaked out, in brief moments that feel good and necessary. Feeling bigger and heavier but not necessarily big or heavy and looking long-nailed and blood-filled and clear-skinned. Finally feeling pregnant, noticing it when I get up from sitting or lying down, just a bit more challenging, feeling it when I work out, slower, gentler, plank position so much harder. Actually looking pregnant, showing, noticing it in every reflective surface, every time I get dressed, pull my beloved BellaBand over my belly and over my unbuttoned jeans so that I can still wear my ‘normal’ clothes. My friends who haven’t seen me in a few months, weeks, days even and they say You’re even bigger than you were last Friday! Showing everyone, now, that this is a thing we are doing, is happening, everyday.
That’s a lot of excavation.
And then realized that today is March 1. Time to turn the page.
RESUME
RESUME
And a woven nest with one single white egg sitting in the middle.
On this rainy lovely Sunday, as I sit in my newly relocated office in the back of the house looking out the windows at our lush, wet, green yard, the grey sky, the wild trees and weeds and growing things, feeling inspired and calm and finally uncluttered, clear, productive, ready to write more, write more—this seems the perfect word, the perfect image to accompany this month.
I now resume.
3 comments:
Ahhh! I love this post! I am so excited for you and Jason. And so excited for your little girl. She is so wanted and loved already and she doesn't even know how lucky she is. I can't even wait to meet her!
the office is SO nice
omigod you're so rad.
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