9.12.06

If you wanna hear God laugh, tell Him your plan

Wow. Ok, so it has been what, like a week? Man, moving and unpacking and cleaning and taking care of an infant really takes up, oh, a hundred and fifty percent of your time.

Where was I? Ah yes, Steve had just proposed to me. About a week ago, we had plans for a big date after Leila had gone to bed for the night. (Yes, she has started to sleep through, but that will be a different paragraph.) We were going to share a bottle of wine on the deck. I put her down and peed and brushed my teeth and went outside. Steve was already there and I poured wine into my glass and noticed that my glass was sitting on a little blue booklet. I picked up the booklet and read the words Polar Ice Diamonds. I opened it up and there was a Canadian government certificate of authenticity and a pamphlet from the jewelry store. I had not really clued in by this point and was confused. I turned around to ask Steve what all the stuff was and he was down on one knee. I gasped and he asked me to marry him. I said Of course, we kissed and hugged and I put on the ring.

It is absolutely beautiful and just what I wanted. The stone is a small round brilliant cut and a perfect fit on my hand, and the band is narrow yellow gold. I take it off to sleep and run and that is about it. We have been smiling and calling each other fiance and talking about our wedding plans. Tomorrow I am going to start getting a hold of churches. We are thinking the long weekend in May, here in Kingston, with only parents, siblings and the people standing for us, jetting off to the Grand Canyon for our honeymoon and then a large-ish reception in NS in late June.

On another note, I think that I can officially say that that past fourteen months have been the most eventful, life changing and eye opening months of my life. A list, shall we?

1. My dad was diagnosed and survived cancer.
2. I got pregnant.
3. I moved out of Nova Scotia for the first time in my life.
4. We bought a house.
5. I turned 25.
6. I had a child.

There are things that happen in your life that make you stop and pause, and then there are things that are so big and happen so quickly that you do not really get that minute to check yourself and evaluate your beliefs before your life changes completely. It is safe to say that this past year has been full of those moments. A pregnancy that was slow and relaxing and beautiful has been replaced with a chubby baby girl who demands all of my time, almost all of my energy and more love than I ever dreamed of feeling. Her chubby cheeks and her amazingly blue eyes fringed with long dark lashes. Her chuckles and smiles and the expression she makes when she tries to sit on her own, or figure something out.

And then there is my father, who has not only survived cancer, he has come out smiling and shining and an example of finding strength in the face of adversity. He has continued to run and to grow tomatoes and to cook salsa and to work too hard and travel too much.

I could go on and on tonight, about this past year, because it feels sometimes, that I have not really had a minute to sit by myself, staring out of the window, or down at the lake and digest it all. That I have not had a chance to look to see where my path is taking me, since I am in a different direction than I imagined I would be a year ago. But Leila is teething now (three at once!), and pictures need hanging, and I try to pray at night, before I fall asleep, to say thank you and I appreciate all of this.

There are the dark thoughts, of course, that nothing this good can last, and what is it about me that made me so lucky in every single aspect of my life when other have suffered the loss of children, the loss of love, missed opportunities, loneliness, financial volatility with absolutely no explanation handed to them. I try to shake these thoughts off as soon as they come, because nothing good can come of them.

Leila has been doing amazingly well, sleeping through until at least six on most mornings, seven thirty a few times, and always for at least eight hours. She has her regular crabby times but the past few days was cranky and crying and we could not figure out why until I saw a little white spot on her bottom gum. As we inspected further, we found another white spot right above it, and since then have felt a couple other spots where teeth may come in soon. We put some 0raje1 on her gums and the crankiness has all but abated and we are left again with our happy little girl. Tomorrow is a big day at the doctor with her first set of shots. She will be three months old the day after tomorrow, and I am anxious to see how much she weights and how long she is.

I have been having thoughts about weaning at six months, and thoughts about keeping at it a little longer than that. The days when she screams and arches her back and refuses to eat are emotionally draining and I am left feeling like it is something that I have done and it would be better for all of us if Steve could just give her a bottle. But once I thought about it logistically, I realized that Steve will be back to work once she is six months and it will be me feeding her all day long anyway, so I may as well continue. And also, the thought of her having formula breaks my heart a little. Compared to the yummy sweet milk she has been eating for the last three months it just seems so. . . cold.

But the babe has been sleeping for an hour, we have gotten in our quickie today (good news! My sex drive is starting to re-emerge!) so I am going to maximize on this last hour before my bedtime to take a long warm soak in the tub and read my book about fourteenth century England and enjoy being off baby duty for a few more hours (hopefully seven tomorrow morning!).

wunderwuman at 8:52 p.m.

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