Jun
25
I forgot to mention, the other day when driving out to Fredericksburg I spotted this post office out of the corner of my eye. The friend had mentioned she needed stamps, and I really just turned around to get the errand over with. I did not realize that it was the coolest post office I have ever been to!
It’s actually an historical building, out on Highway 290, and the entire interior, save the one desk from which they conduct postal duties, is an antique shoppers paradise. I loaded up on a certain series of books which were all marked down to a few bucks each. I have driven down this road a handful of times before and never spotted this gem until now, and only because I was on the lookout for a post office. If you haven’t, and you are out there, keep your eyes peeled (it’s on the left if going west, just after Johnson city I believe).
Jun
25
“Holy Cow look at those cheeks!” is what the ultrasound technician said to me this morning, when I found myself at the tail-end of a very impromptu three hour visit to the OBGYN.
Liam is a fantastic mover, so when he did not move at all yesterday it definitely upset me. I tried all the tricks that I know to work: caffeine, talking, music, lying on my side. Nothing worked. I pulled out my secret weapon: Dark Chocolate (all for him, of course) and still nothing. So this morning I gave a call to my nurse first thing and within fifteen minutes of that call I was hooked up to an electronic fetal monitor, lounging in a thirty year old recliner and leafing through Scholastic magazine. They said twenty minutes but they kept me on it an hour. There were whispers of the baby not moving like they would like, even though his heart-rate was perfect. They started handing me saltines and juiceboxes, and turning me on my side, in an effort to get him to move around. Eventually, sluggishly, he woke up.
The doctor said that he is fine, but she seemed slightly concerned that he was so “sleepy,” or that he took so long to move, given the tight belt around my uterus and the sudden sugar in my bloodstream. She also wanted to know if I had felt all those contractions. Say what? Yes, apparently I am having contractions. I do feel a pain, but I had never thought that it could be a contraction. I also have had many back cramps, but doesn’t that just come with holding a 20 pound basketball over your pelvis?! Well, apparently those are contractions.
I’m not dialated one bit, but I am secretly hoping that this means he’ll be arriving sooner than later. (Did I say secretly? Who am I kidding.) Add to that the new information that I am measuring a week ahead of schedule (which I actually put no stock in because a week ago I was measuring 34 weeks and this week I measure 37!?). On the inside I gave a little yelp of joy when the nurse said, “There’s a meeting you should attend on the 6th…(pause for a wide smile)…unless you already have your baby by then.” I know that I have no control over it, and I really shouldn’t get my hopes up, but I latched on to that almost smirky glimmer in her eyes and have carried it with me for the rest of the day.
From there I went on to an impromptu ultrasound. At this point he really woke up, and we both agreed it was like taking your car into the mechanics…under the ultrasound everything was perfect and there was not a problem to be found. What we did find were some damn chubby cheeks. Jonathan is clearly going to get his wish for a chubby baby… I just hope this doesn’t indicate a general largeness in his overall size too!
Jun
25
This weekend marked our first year anniversary of married life. Given how we started, so quick to live together given the circumstances, and the general gut knowledge that I/we had that “this is it” pretty soon after meeting, it sure feels like a lot longer than a year. And oh, hey, if you count the secret marriage beforehand, it really has been much more than a year.
As I was working on the wedding album for the Puerto Rico wedding I photographed, Jonathan asked if I would make one for our own wedding. Honestly, why didn’t I think of this idea sooner? I guess I had, but what really kept the project from ever starting was the fact that my post-processing/editing skillz in photography have grown immensely from where they were a year ago. So, if I were to do this it would truly mean sitting down and re-editing all the photos for the album, or I just wouldn’t be happy.
With the nugget soon to arrive, and how excited Jonathan sounded at the idea, I decided to give it a go. I have been editing all week and I am excited to see it come alive. One thing I did was to get out my journal from the wedding week. Now, recently I have been reading through my huge stack of journals chronologically. I made it up to about age 18 and still felt, wow, except for a few scary and dramatic sentences I really just wrote a bunch of mindless drivvle. I am very tempted to throw that whole batch out once I copy down those more tantalizing sentences, since all it is mostly just “Kelly is having a sleepover on Friday and I don’t know what to wear” kind of writing.
Given this recent experience, I was amazed to read what I wrote the week of the wedding. I am so very, very glad that I wrote it all down. In fact, I wrote it all in scribbled bits on napkins and brochures and the back of an extra wedding itenirary, and then painstakingly recopied it into my journal a week later. But I am so very glad I did. The details I wrote down are more vibrant and real than the photos can ever be.
And I also wrote down some great quotes, which I no doubt would have never thought of again. It was worth the cumbersome task of rewriting all those notes just to lay in my bed last night and read “At dinner Cecilia says to Eliane (Jon’s aunt who does not speak a word of English), in halting French, “Jonathan say ‘Belly Button Liquid.’” Eliane then looked at Jonathan across the table and asked in rapid French, “Is she on some kind of medication?”
Or,
Esther (my godmother) told me this morning “You weren’t lying about this hotel being adorable and cute.”
Without missing a beat, Dad chimes in: “Which we all knew meant small.”
My brother adds: “I have some really cute construction going on outside our window.”
I had also completely forgotten that we had to take apart an entire bed and move it via the world’s smallest elevator to my brother’s room, because there was only one twin bed for him and my father in it when they arrived, as well as only one towel (and if you’ve spent the night in a European towel, you already know it was slightly larger than a hand-towel). It’s so unfortunate that I cannot put that elevator trip, crushed behind a mattress (there was no hotel personnel to help) into this photo album.
Somewhere in the middle of my writing I stopped to remark on the fact that having all of these American visitors made me see the town of Neuchâtel as if I was a visitor too. It really was at its best at that time, mid June and full of the sounds of children playing, plates clanking on outdoor café tables, people slurping espressos and the sun bouncing off yellow buttercream buildings. I’d lived in it for a year and a half and at some point, I lost the sense of wonder that overtakes us on our first trip to Europe. I still saw beauty, and marveled at certain cultural idyocyncrasies, but I no longer got that indescribable feeling of “wow” around every corner. Showing the place off to the group brought that back to me, and that was one of the best, and most unanticipated, outcomes of the whole wedding week.
One thing I wrote was that, on a certain day, it had been “A Postcard Day.” I wrote that I knew all days could not be like this one, and so I was especially thankful.
Rereading that sentence a year later, I wonder, “Why can’t they?” Or at least, “Why can’t we at least strive for that daily?” The more I think about it, especially these days, a postcard day is less about a trip, a cool new sight or a fancy meal. These days a postcard day is just the kind of day we spent all weekend.
This weekend, we woke up early and went for a long walk. We bought a book for Liam and I splurged on two magazines. We stopped for donuts at a place that clearly has been overlooked by health inspectors. He made me a homemade cappuccino before setting off to work on our bookshelves in our garage, while I laid on the couch reading those magazines, and a book that inspires me to speak French with our son. We made a simple dinner from the grill and ate it at the table, scheming on a dream vacation. We did not turn on the television. We slept in the next day. We lounged by the pool and flirted in the water. We went for smoothies in a cool little coffee shop and mapped out a plan for a celebratory dinner. For our anniversary meal we made homemade crab cakes and homemade crab ravioli. We folded and creased in unison, side by side. We put our pajamas on at 6 p.m. We didn’t clean and we didn’t turn on the television that night either.
A year into marriage, I am happier and more in love by the day. I know begin to understand the phrase “Each day is a gift.” Drifting off to sleep Sunday, exhausted from the weekend of relaxing, I realized that it had been a postcard weekend. Perfect in so many small ways, except for the small fact that it took a “special” date - the notion of celebrating - to pull us away from everything external and to really give in to the day, rather than trying to master it. This is something that should change. I want more days like this weekend: Postcards of Simplicity.
