An Experience Beyond Words

Big D and I have been together a long time. I mean a loooonnnnngggg time and by LA standards even longer. When you have been married as long as we have or, to be more exacting, when you have been a married woman without children for as long as I have been you hear a lot of comments such as,

"I thought people only got married to have kids"

"When are you having kids?"

"Oh you have to have kids, it's the best."

"When are you getting pregnant, it's the most amazing thing ever!"

I could go on but you get the idea. When people who I know and care about inquired, I generally didn't mind the probing. In fact, whether or not you are going to have kids has been and continues to be a topic of conversation that I have with many of my close friends and family members because it is such a big part of the human experience. But when people who could care less about who I am as a human being, like women from the work pit, asked, I often wanted to retort something like, "Well, I'm infertile, if you must know" or "Well the cocaine habit isn't so great for fetuses I've heard and my husband has low sperm count" I mean, what if I really did have a fertility issue or a drug habit or my husband had low sperm count? Wouldn't these questions then be considered incredibly insensitive? Fortunately, none of these were an issue for us. In fact, having gotten pregnant after one cycle off the pill after being on it my entire adult life pretty much squashed my long held fears of infertility and Big D is clearly a stud in the sperm count department and my drug habit was generally limited to red wine and dirty martinis.

But now I realize that there is something more to the questions. Pregnancy is something you can't quite put into words. You can talk about the growing belly, the morning sickness, the aches and pains, the kicks and turns, but it is impossible to fully explain what it feels like to have your body become an incubator for another human being. Before I got pregnant, I knew it would be something to experience but I didn't get the glow in the eyes of mothers asking when I was going to have a baby. I never really got the way they would tear up when recounting their own pregnancy and motherhood or why they would have such an interest in my own reproduction timeline. But I get it now. My cynical rational side tries to keep me in check...It's something any woman can do. It's not like it's finding a cure for cancer or running a business or being a gold medal athlete. But I am in the club now and I get it. It is powerful beyond description and women inquire about other women's pregnancy status because it is their way of sharing this experience beyond words.

I have to admit that I have caught myself recently doing the same thing in conversations with couples who don't yet have kids. I've actually heard lines such as this come out of my mouth:

"Do you guys think you'll have kids?"

"Pregnancy is the most amazing thing ever"

"It's really something you have to experience"

I've limited the conversation to those people that I actually know and care about and who are interested in taking part in a conversation about this. I'm not running up to recently married co-workers and asking them to get on the baby track. Although I did give an extra copy I had of What to Expect When Your Expecting to a co-worker who was just about to get married. But she had informed me that she was on the baby track before I offered so that's OK isn't it?

Wall Street Journal--Tell Me Something I don't Know

Wall Street Journal selected my friend M's blog (see it in my links?) as one of their favorite expat- in-Paris blogs. And while I agree, I'd take it a step further and say that she is one of the best bloggers--no scratch that---writers in the blogosphere. And while her blog is filled with life in Paris imagery and anecdotes, it is her command of language and her ability to balance sadness and joy with deep personal introspection that makes me laugh, cry, and think with every post. I keep telling her to write a novel because I am greedy.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB121510408347526897.html?mod=At-Leisure-Main

From the Wall Street Journal...

The Parisian Expat Life

Can't find your Passport? Pas de problème! More and more expats are blogging about their lives in France. Here's a selection of our favorites. --Lauren Mechling

Les Confessions Douces-Améres D'une Femme Dans La Trentaine: A single, literary, thirty-something, living cheaply and thinking deeply on the banks of the Seine. http://www.bitterlovesweetsex.blogspot.com/
Les Confessions
This American in Paris chronicles her days of racing down Avenue de l'Opera to meet a deadline, entertaining an inebriated man named Fabio at 2:30 a.m., and turning down a marriage proposal from an eligible Canadian who failed to make her heart skip.
Sample passage: At dinner yesterday my friend Marie Pierre, a fifty-something, listened to me as I complained about how difficult it is to be a woman alone in the world as I downed three ice cold shots of Polish Bison-flavored vodka at her apartment in Montreuil to the East of Paris. I had wanted a whiskey and Marie Pierre was ready to pour me some, but her husband, Claude, a curmudgeonly law professor with red hair and a complexion that betrays his seething anger, shouted to her that whiskey is a digestif and we shouldn't be having that before dinner.

The Weeks of Our Lives

My life is being measured week by week at the moment. I'm at nine weeks or am I supposed to say in my ninth week? I haven't quite figured out that nuance out yet. Week seven was scary because I had the flu and was sick for ten days. Then during week eight, I had light brownish spotting on Tuesday and totally freaked out. My doctor's office was not concerned and told me this is pretty normal during the first trimester. I haven't had any spotting since and my other pregnancy symptoms (nausea, sore boobs, extreme exhaustion) seem to be progressing right along. One of the weirder aspects so far is that I welcome things like nausea and indigestion because they are my only markers right now that everything is going right.

Jason brought his one-year-old daughter over yesterday afternoon. We sat outside (well we sat and little A explored our yard--she is fearless) and enjoyed the SoCal weather--70's and clear blue skies. They are moving out of state soon, which makes Big D and I pretty sad, but we are really happy for them. Big D and I have also had some serious conversations about leaving Los Angeles. My work schedule is so crazy that I know things will have to change. And frankly, I've waited long enough to have kids, I really have no intention of turning my baby over to a stranger for ten hours a day while I go off to a job I hate. The main reason that I am still there is because my health insurance is through my job. Our hope is for Big D to find a new job with health insurance so that I can be on his plan. But even still, Los Angeles is so expensive and our modest home i.e. mortgage combined with outrageous student loan debt make it necessary for both of us to work to survive. Out of state, we would have so much more wiggle room financially plus the possibility of living near family, which is something that I crave more and more the older I get. With many of our friends leaving Los Angeles, it's starting to get a little lonely around here.

I Could Have Been Somebody

Morrissey...
We Hate It When Our Friends Become Successful
We hate it when our friends become successful,
We hate it when our friends become successful.
Oh, look at those clothes,
Now look at that face it's so old,
And such a video,
Well, it's really laughable,
Ah hahahaha etc.
We hate it when our friends become successful,
And if they're northern
That makes it even worse and
If we can destroy them
You bet your life we will destroy them.
If we can hurt them, well,
We may well.
It's really laughable,
Ah hahahaha etc.
You see, it should have been me.
It could have been me.
Everybody knows, everybody says so.
They say, "Oh, you have loads of songs,
So many songs,
More songs than they can stand --

Liz Phair...
Shitloads of Money
Louis is probably thirty years old but he looks like a solid 45
Louis says he's got a headache
I look in his eyes, and I believe him
The big L.K.'s and the gangster disciples
Louis can't think of who else could take over, but he just can't
Get up in the morning
A genuine face, braced for survival...

It's nice to be liked
But it's better by far to get paid
I know that most of the friends that I have don't really see it
That way
But if you could give 'em each one wish
How much do you wanna bet?
They'd wish success for themselves and their friends and
that would include lots of money

Don't know how many times you were stuck in the morning
You just couldn't move, though your mother was calling
You know what you need
Is a Lotto revival
A train flashes by and you're lost in a spiral...

Take the train on up to the zoo, don't look back
On what you've been through
Cause everyone's got a Monday...
It looks like shit and it must be America

It burns so quick, then it must be America

We all need a shitload of M-O-N-E-Y, money

Personally, I love it when my FRIENDS become successful because it somehow validates me while I wallow in my loserdom. But I really really hate it when those less talented than my friends become successful. I hate it when my enemies become successful--and usually just because they started out with shitloads of money.

Talkin' 'Bout My G-Generation

I went to two different b-day parties this weekend. One on Sat. One on Sun. Both for 1-year old girls. One of the girls is the daughter of old friends, college days, undergrad. days. The other little cherub is the daughter of new friends, neighbors.

Both parties were sweet and low key and made up of friends eating cupcakes and singing happy b-day. Joyful and loving and simple. And I am proud of my g-generation. Gen-nice.

I Never Really Cared Until I Met You

Big D's younger brother is a man of few words so when he speaks, the room quiets and settles onto him. One evening several years ago while the room was flipping through channels, Young Bro stated, "Celine Dion is the perfect woman."


But Heart Rocks!

Hey M, the next time your in town we so have to K this song. I promise to try to not be sick and lack voice and be dripping snot.

Moving On (Not Me)

My dear friend Bee got offered a new and better position at a school that is so not in Los Angeles. I am thrilled for her but it just hit me today that she will be leaving. We have worked together for five years and have become good friends. She is one of those kind of people that you can count on--and she takes that seriously. She will be moving soon.