Tuesday, April 24, 2007

Shopping

On Sunday, I ventured to the mall. I hate the mall and I never go, but right on schedule my face has turned into hamburger with angry red zits all over my chin and those horrible, big, giant ones that hurt to touch. I am one ugly pregnant woman--I don't know where all this glowing business comes from. Not from me, that's for sure. So, anyway, I needed to hit the Proactiv kiosk and drop 50 bucks on face soap. Yikes, but it works, so what are you gonna do?

On my way out of the mall I walked by the Motherhood store, and just stood there for a minute and debated whether to go in or not. Nate was a winter baby, so all of my maternity clothes are jeans and wooly things. It's already 80 degrees here and the lure of cute, short-sleeved tops took me into the store. I picked out a top and some khaki capris and went to checkout. Which went like this:

Girl at the Counter: "Have you been here before?"
Me: "Yeah." And I give her my name after she asks.
Girl: "When is your due date?" Her fingers were poised over the keyboard, ready to imput this information.
Me: I don't tell her. "Umm, am I going to be getting any mailings or anything like that?"
Girl: "Well, yes. Don't you want any?"
Me: "No, I don't." And I could have stopped there, but I didn't.
Me: "I don't want any because they are extremely upsetting when something goes wrong."
Girl: "Oh, absolutely, I'm sorry."
And here again, could have stopped, didn't.
Me: "You know, getting Pampers coupons that say 'Valuble Coupons for your 12 month old!!' is just pretty crushing, really." (As far as Pampers is concerned, my son is happily toddling around soiling diapers with wild abandon. I'm using cloth diapers next time. Any company that makes me cry isn't getting my business. And they've all made me cry over the past year.)

The girl makes some hasty strikes at her keyboard. "Okay,"she says, "you shouldn't be receiving any more mailings." She hands me my bag with a sympathetic smile. I'm red in the face and embarassed over what I had just said, and I knew that other customers heard my rant. "Sorry I was so neurotic about that," I said as I took my purchases from her. I walked out of the store with my head down, realizing at that point that I really should just do my shopping off the internet. Either things aren't easy like they used to be, or I'm just making things hard for myself. I'm inclined to think it's the latter.

Saturday, April 21, 2007

Yikes, it's been awhile since I've written anything and I hate posting links to stuff when I haven't been writing. It makes me feel lazy. But I read this article in my town's paper this morning and I thought that I'd share it with you.

Mourning Reproductive Loss

I'll write a real post soon. I've got a lot to talk about and nothing to talk about at the same time, so that's been my conundrum.

Wednesday, April 11, 2007

Wow, and all before 9 am.

Do you think that there might be days where the universe just screws with you? Like it's thinking, "Hey, let's have some fun with Laura today." Leave the house, stay in the house--you're still going to be blindsided no matter what you do.

I was straightening up the family room this morning after Tom left for work--there just seemed to be stacks of crap everywhere. I grabbed the copy of What to Expect to put back on the bookshelf and two pieces of paper fluttered to the floor. One was the warranty registration for Nate's stroller and the other was the list of names I had made when we found out we were having a boy. Back when things were completely, totally normal. The list was written in blue pin and beside about ten of the names was my husband's check mark in pencil to mark his favorites. I had written the name and then in parentheses I wrote what we'd actually call him (unless he was in trouble, that's when we'd use the whole name.)

The three at the top were:
Samuel (Sam)
Gabriel (Gabe)
Nathaniel (Nate)
All three had my husband's check mark.

I just sat there this morning and stared at that list. I hadn't seen it since I stuck it between those pages, which was probably quite awhile before Nate was even born. I'm sure that I just stuck it there and forgot about it. But here it was again. A list of names that every pregnant woman in the universe writes out with so much love for that baby inside and so much hope for his future. This is a very important task--he will have that name for his whole life long and someday, years and years from now, it will be carved on his headstone. When we named Nathaniel, I felt confident that he would have a name that would carry him through his life--it was a name that he could run for president with. My little boy with the big boy name.
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And so, after crying in the fetal position in the recliner for twenty minutes, I got dressed and went downtown to pick up a copy of Nate's birth certificate for this year's taxes, because you know, I was in great shape to do something like today. But I had to go do it--taxes are due-what?-next week or something and I've been putting this off for a long time. I'm thankful that I'm able to have one for Nate, but I knew that it was going to be very difficult to go and get it. That's why I hadn't done it yet. When I received the certificate, it looked totally normal, just like any one I've ever seen and I was glad for that. His certificate looked just like any baby's--but then I looked in the upper right hand corner where the word DECEASED was written in block capitals. Oh.
I'm sobbing again as I walk through the lobby to the parking lot and to my car. Oh shit. I had just calmed down from the last incident and here I go again. When I reach the door to my car, I look into the passenger seat of the car parked next to me and on the seat lay a newborn diaper and a picture of a very pregnant, very young woman smiling broadly, her arms wrapped around her belly. Really. Why both of those things? I guess I could see having a diaper there, but why a picture of your pregnant self? I guess that will teach me not to look in other people's cars.
Now I'm going to go to the grocery store and pray that I don't run into anyone from my childbirth class.