Um, yeah.

Okay, so I really can’t believe I left the last entry as the one about eating poo.  What is wrong with me?!

Rachel and I went to see “The Lake House” last weekend, and it was fabulous.  I recommend it to anyone who enjoys chick flicks.  Much better than I expected!

Magnus and I have been communicating more about our expectations with the baby.  I keep reading scary information about how much work it’s going to be.  Plus, people keep telling me about how hard it is to take care of infant.  I have been really worried that I won’t have the support I need from him because he won’t realize how hard things are going to be.  However, I had Magnus read an article about this, and he looked up at me with shocked eyes and said, “I’m terrified!”  Somehow, even though it makes him feel worse, it makes me feel a lot better.  I know he will do what it takes to help me, and I know that if we keep communicating, we will figure this out.

I think part of the concern I feel is due to still being pretty tired from the pregnancy.  It’s hard to feel capable of caring for an infant when you can barely get it together to make dinner or do the dishes as it is.  But I just keep reminding myself that I probably won’t be anymore tired with the baby than I was in the first trimester.  And Magnus was a huge help there.  So for right now, I’m doing okay with that – until I read or hear the next scary baby story.

I told Magnus that this will be like baby boot camp.  If we can make it through those first couple of months, we will be able to make it through anything (with the possible exception of the teen years).

Okay, so due to the caffeine I’m currently consuming, I actually have some ideas.  They may not be interesting, but at least they are something.  Hurray for Dr. Pepper!

Our family has recently come up with a new survey question.  The answer is very telling (though what exactly it tells you is kind of hard to determine). 

How much money would it take for you to eat a level tablespoon of human feces from an unknown source?

Here are the answers below:

Toby:  $200,000

Heather:  No price

Rachel:  $1,000,000

Gus:  $1,000

Kate:  $1,000,000

Magnus:  $200,000

Phyllis:  No price

Mike:  No price

Philip:  No price

Corinna:  No price

What does this say about the Miller value system vs. the Wells value system.  It seems that the Wells are less mercenary than the Millers.  And Gus, well, it says something about him, but I don’t think it says anything good.  So readers (both of you), how much would it take?

Thank God for Dr. Pepper.  I just drank another third of a bottle, and I think I can actually muster up the energy to write something.  No promises that it will be interesting, but it’s worth a try.

The last few weeks seem to have passed very quickly for everyone else.  I think this may be the first summer where that hasn’t been the case for me.  From the time I was a kid, summer always flew by too fast.  Even in the last few years, when fall no longer meant an end to freedom or the need to leave the comfort of home, I still greeted it with surprise and wonder.  Summer has always seemed like the fastest season.

But that’s not true this year.  I think this is the longest July I have ever seen.  Even with work and travel and weekend activities, it seems to stretch on and on.  I seriously feel that it has been July for three months now.

Why?  Well, the easiest answer is that the baby has made me so tired that every minute, even at home, feels like those endless days at work when there is nothing to do and you must somehow appear to be occupied.  I fill up the evenings with watching TV and talking on the phone.  But really, I don’t think this entirely accounts for the slow passage of time.

It’s also like the way children feel about those weeks before Christmas.  They count down the days, and each day passes so slowly because they wait for the excitement of the gift-laden tree and overstuffed stockings.

The baby is my Christmas.  I have wanted a baby since I wasa baby.  It’s like I’ve lived my whole life knowing that at some point this would come, and now it feels like the very begining of December.  Six more months!  It seems like forever.  So as July slowly passes in its daze of exhaustion, I wait for next February when my whole life and world will turn on the single moment of seeing my baby for the first time.

In the meantime, we get to hear its heartbeat in six more days….

We finally decided to put Ozzie to sleep yesterday.  He had just been getting gradually worse, and we were concerned about how he would handle being left alone for a week while we are camping.  I think we made the right decision, though I really, really miss his purring and just his constant presence on my lap.  It was especially hard last night, but I think it will get better over time.

Greg was so great.  He asked how we were doing several times and was really sensitive to making Ozzie as comfortable as possible.  He supported our decision completely, offering all kinds of reassurance that we were doing the right thing.  He let us sit with Ozzie’s body for a long time afterwards and even offered to bury him on their property if we wanted him to.

We are having him cremated, and we will bury his ashes on the South side of our house, where he will get lots of sun.  He always liked to curl up in a patch of sunshine.

The best things about Ozzie:

- his loud purr

- the way he followed me around and sat on my lap all the time

- his intelligence

- his lineage, which is always interesting to relate to people

- the fact that everyone but me found him totally disgusting

- his athleticism

- his croaky meow

Okay, this will probably be somewhat baby-centric, but I suppose any post is better than nothing.  Maybe.

Trying to survive the exhaustion.  I’m so tired that I sleep 16 hours a day when I can and just lie around the rest of the time.  Between the exhaustion and the hormones, I’ve been something of an emotional wreck.  Poor Magnus.  He is doing so well.  He’s started making dinner every night, cleaning the kitchen, doing the grocery shopping, plus taking care of the lawn and working full time.  I feel so bad that I can’t help him a little more.  I did do a bit of cleaning this weekend, though.  Anyway, I think I have the world’s best husband.

My dad had a good suggestion that I use an affirmation to cope with this whole thing.  Usually, I think affirmations are a load of crap, but in this case, it might actually help.  So my affirmation is this:  “I do what I need to do each day to take care of myself and the baby.”  I like that because it puts me in an active role, rather than just reacting to the tiredness and hormones (which is probably closer to the truth).

And heck, at least I’m not puking.

I’m catching up on some good TV too, since all I do right now is watch TV and work on hand sewing.  I know how lame that is in the summer, but I guess that will be my life for the next 4-6 weeks at least.

We are not doing the deck project, since I just don’t have the energy to worry about the detail of it.  That’s kind of a relief too.

Oh, we also went to the first midwife visit on Monday.  She’s fabulous.  She said the exhaustion is normal, though.  But she stressed how healthy I am, which I think is the first time I’ve ever heard a healthcare provider say that to me.  You usually go to a doctor when you’re sick, and with my asthma, there is always a lot of focus on that stuff.  It was really nice to hear that I am healthy.  I think that was kind of an affirmation in itself.  I’ve never thought of myself as a healthy person, and I like changing that.

Sorry for the disjoineted entry.  Having a hard time stringing thoughts together, but this is the best I can do right now.  Look for better writing in 4-6 weeks.  In the meantime, I’ll try to post some drivel on a regular basis (just to stay in the habit).

Sorry about the lack of posting.  I just felt that I didn’t have a lot in the way of interesting thoughts to share.  Mostly, these days, I think about baby stuff and sleeping.  Neither of those things are all that interesting.

We are building a deck.  My parents are coming to help the weekend after this one. 

Ack.  Too tired to be creative.  I’m so sorry!  I will try to post something good sometime soonish.

I was listening to NPR this morning on the way to work, and they mentioned the military's latest operation in Afghanistan.  It's called "Mountain Thrust."  That's right.  Say it out loud if you don't see why the name is hillarious and so freaking ironic. 

That's it.  Just thought that was too precious not to share.

I have resisted writing anything lately, since I don't seem to have anything especially significant to offer.  Maybe it's the complete and sudden lack of caffeine. 

So for those of you who don't already know, I'm pregnant.  We are very excited, nervous, skeptical, crazy, and hopeful.  In general, I'm mostly just trying to believe it and to believe that I have what it takes to be a good mother.  There's a part of me that doesn't try because of fear of failure.  I don't submit poetry for publication.  I purposefully waited until after the deadline for my first choice college.  I just feel so…unprepared.

I guess that's why we get nine (or eight) months, though.  There's time to figure out how to be a mother.  I do really feel that I was born to do this.  It's just that if I screw up the thing I have always wanted most, what does that say about me?

I have always pictured myself as a more together person at the time I have kids:  you know, someone who keeps her bedroom clean and doesn't freeze up when talking to new people.  I was looking through a box of my grandma's photos, and I came across this Christmas photo where I'm about seven and staring directly at the camera.  I'm not smiling, and it looks like I was caught in the middle of an anxious thought (which I probably was).  I still feel like that girl most of the time.  And how would anyone expect a 7-year-old to take care of a baby?!

But on the other hand, I've managed to make a great living, love and marry a fabulous man, and own a beautiful house.  So it's not really like I'm seven.

Speaking of my fabulous man, I just have to describe my grandma's response to the baby news.  I told her I was pregnant, and the first thing she said was, "Wow!  He's quite a man, isn't he?"  Cracks me up!

I was driving home from work the other day, and I heard this great NPR feature on the Dixie Chicks.  Now, I am by no means a fan of country music, and that's how they described their sound.  However, I try to be open minded.  Anyway, they have a new album out, and one of the songs was written for one of their grandmothers who is suffering from Alzheimer's. 

The song is called "Silent House," and they played part of it on NPR.  The chorus is as follows:

And I will try to connect
All the pieces you left
I will carry it on
And let you forget
And I'll remember the years
When your mind was clear
How the laughter and life
Filled up this silent house

I cannot imagine stating it more perfectly.  I thought about writing a poem, but really, they've already done that.  It's not my idea, anyway; it's theirs. 

I will carry it on/ and let you forget.  That is exactly how I feel.  In a lot of ways, people are their memories and perceptions.  For as long as I can remember, I asked my grandparents about our family history.  I memorized the names of the people in the oldest family photographs.  This family history is wonderful, but it is also a burden that someone needs to carry.  It must be preserved because it tells us who we are.  It applies to now.  It applies to us.

My grandma keeps starting stories and getting stuck in the middle.  The other day, on the phone, she talked about how nervous she was on her wedding day, how she sat down on the steps in my grandpa's family home and cried that she "didn't want to get married."  She got confused then, so I finished for her:  "And then Eva (Papa's mother) came, and she told you that Papa was a good man and everything would be okay."  I have heard that story at least a dozen times.  I was happy to pick up the burden.

But what about those things I'm missing?  What about the stories I never heard or the ones I've somehow forgotten?  I try to think how I can organize it all, write it down somehow.  I'm so grateful I had the forethought to make a video interview with her.  At least those memories are preserved.  But the things I don't know will just be…gone.  Dead. 

The Dixie Chicks song says the same thing, more or less:  I will try to connect.  All I can do is try.  But, the thing is, with something as huge as two people's entire lifetimes, how could I possibly suceed?  On some level, to some extent, I will fail.  Part of what makes this whole process so hard is that I know that, and I can't help mourning the loss.

Just finished Anne Tyler's new novel, "Digging to America."  It was wonderful.  I love Anne Tyler; I have loved her for years.  She's my favorite living author, and I have read everything she's written.  In recent years, her novels have been missing something.  I'm not sure what it is.  I still buy them in hardcover (because I can't wait for paperback); don't get me wrong.  But this one, this novel, is as good as her very best work, namely, "Breathing Lessons," "Dinner at the Homesick Restaurant," and "The Accidental Tourist."  The characters are fabulous and real, and you get to know them so intimately.

I looked Anne Tyler up on the internet after finishing her latest novel.  There isn't much out there, actually.  She prefers to live a very quiet life and do only very rare email interviews.  This makes it all the easier to relate to her, actually, but that's beside the point.  The point is, this is some of what the greatest living (imo) novelist says about the writing process:

I spend about a year between novels. My decision to start a new one is just that, a decision, since I never get inspirations. I'll say, "It's time I stopped lolling about. I'd better think something up." Then for a month or so I'll jot down desperate possibilities. "Maybe I could write about a man who does such-and-such. Or wait: I think I already did that. Well, then maybe about that woman I saw in the grocery the other day. What was she up to, exactly? What might her story have been?"

Eventually, one of these possibilities will start flowering in my mind, and I'll manufacture what's initially a very trumped-up, artificial plot. I'll write maybe one long paragraph describing the events, then a page or two breaking the events into chapters, and then reams of pages delving into my characters. After that, I'm ready to begin.

My writing day has grown shorter as I've aged, although it seems to produce the same number of pages. At most I'll spend three or four hours daily, sometimes less. The one ironclad rule is that I have to try. I have to walk into my writing room and pick up my pen every weekday morning. If I waited till I felt like writing, I'd never write at all.

I do write long, long character notes—family background, history, details of appearance—much more than will ever appear in the novel. I think this is what lifts a book from that early calculated, artificial stage. One day, around chapter 2 or 3, I'll be slogging through some dialogue and all of a sudden a character says something that makes me laugh. Where did that come from? I'm not funny! Then another will flatly refuse the plot contrivance I've designed for him. I'll write a scene this way, write a scene that way; it slows to a crawl and stops. Finally, I say, "Oh, all right," and I drop the contrivance and the scene falls into place and I see a motive I'd never guessed and I understand where we're going. It's as if someone else is telling me the story. I don't want to say I hear voices; well, actually I do hear voices, but I don't think it's supernatural. I think it's just that when characters are given enough texture and backbone, then lo and behold, they stand on their own.

It's interesting that Anne Tyler is so human.  From what she's said in this and other interviews, it's as if she sees herself as a medium through which her characters can speak and interact.  She listens to the characters, feels their presence in her writing room.  She has said that she tries to write so that she puts nothing of herself into the novel.  The characters aren't her, aren't anyone she knows.  She says she wants to be invisible so the characters can shine through. 

I cannot imagine the kind of modesty that must take.  I show off when I write.  I write for an audiance.  Anne Tyler said she first writes as if no one will ever read it.  It's so simultaneously confident and humble.  If I could be like any writer, I would choose to be like her.  Yet, this interview and others give me pause.  Could I ever be like that?  I don't think I could.