Make it a good day.

Sometimes I feel like I am sifting through life up to my eye balls. It's like sand, growing heavier and heavier with every stroke. It's not that I'm not strong, it's not that I lack motivation. But oh how it can be exhausting. I thought today that in having motivation it only makes the journey that much more tiresome, because I am trying so dang hard.
Tonight was a very rare night off that was so needed I feel I have collapsed on the couch unwilling to do anything but breathe.
Of coarse life is not always this way. I actually like being busy, but often I am overwhelmed by how much this new job of teaching really requires. Hours of phone calls with mothers and juggling the ups and downs that come with teaching their teenagers . . . it was more than I thought came with the job. But I love it. There are three recitals coming up that we're all working hard for. The outcome will be fantastic, but the work has me running from one event to the next, working long and odd hours, and pulling myself up to face it all with a will that often feels like a breeze running through all the core parts of my fibers: Somewhat hollow.
Lately I have neglected the details . . . . phone calls that didn't get returned, neighbors that I drove right past without stopping to chat, people I was impatient with because time sometimes seems so fragile . . . I hate it when I neglect the details. There is a reason why the Lord gave us a day of rest . . . . I just keep wondering where that day goes when you are busy running around doing church things on Sunday. Any comments on this?
On the upside, I did find a doula. She is wonderful and I am now feeling like I am on my way to being prepared to go through the whole "having a baby" episode.
A friend of mine is a therapist and on her answering machine, right when you expect to hear the cliche "Have a good day" she instead says "Make it a good day". I love hearing this. There is decision there, firm resolve. It's not about control, but actually the lack of it, and taking responsibility for what we can. So everyone, in the midst of all this chaos, and especially me until after May 9th, then June 1st, then June 14th, and after the thing that will come after that . . . Make it a good day.

Brent the Super Hero

Throughout remodeling our home we have diligently gotten bids, watched for sales, and asked around as to how much we should expect to spend. When the handy man packs up his tools and gives us that pink paper saying how much it would cost us to hire him, Brent undoubtedly looks at me and says "I think I can do this."
Brent's method of choice is his stare. He can stare for hours. As he stares, his brain formulates a plan on how to get all components of the house working and functioning together without a glitch.
When the woman with chalky dry hands in the tile department at Home Depot heard that we were laying Travertine for the floor instead of ceramic, and that we had never done it before, she shook her head. "Not one I would recommend for a first-timer." She smiled, trying to soften her honesty "Travertine is a bear to lay. Go with tile. You could do tile".
The next day I left Brent in the kitchen staring as I took off to play a gig. I returned several hours later to a kitchen where every square inch of floor had been carefully covered with perfectly laid Travertine. I never even saw him open a box. One minute it was seemingly impossible, the next is it was done. And done well.
This is after he had completely rewired our kitchen to allow for more outlets when I cook, knocked out a wall to allow for more space, built a fence for the backyard from scratch, textured both the ceiling and the walls of the front room and painted them the perfect color, sanded dozens of times the hard wood floor and then stained and sealed it, torn out window frames and reinstalled new shiny ones, torn plaster off brick to expose a wall, actually moved where the kitchen plumbing would be so we can have the sink under the window, installed base boards and crown molding, rewired the electrical so we can have dimming lights in the front room and under-head lighting in the kitchen, ran wiring through the house to a room that didn't have any lights, and then continued by installing canned lighting in the ceiling, moved washers and dryers, and then moved them back again, and installed the dishwasher.
So. Today, after all these months of watching his miraculous work, I had to give him credit for his latest endeavor. Brent is saving us thousands of dollars by cutting, shaping, and installing our granite counter tops. Imagine raw rock in the middle of a granite yard. Now imagine Brent with goggles on, evenly cutting that granite into large slabs and loading it on a truck to be delivered to the house where he has set up a work station in the backyard that he toils at until after dark: polishing and rounding corners, cutting out where the sink will lay, and measuring each end so it will fit perfectly.
sigh. He's amazing.
What more can I say?

sigh.

Ever since I met my dear friend and professor in France I have been terrified for one moment: telling him that we're having a baby. He prepped me for the entire two months that I lived there: baby = end of career and much disappointment for him about me. He must have mentioned it to me at least 3 or 4 times a day.
Honestly, this was a factor that weighed very heavy on my mind as we began discussing starting a family. Imagine how I procrastinated telling him when we finally made the decision.
So.
Last week I sent him an email with the news. I admit, I was too chicken to do it over the phone. But a possibility of him showing up in May for business made me finally break down and do it.
A week went by and there was no word. Of coarse there was a looming feeling in my gut telling me I'd been cut off and abandoned.
So this morning we surfed the phone lines across the world and gave his cottage a ring. I was shocked to discover that he was not indeed upset, but very pleased and happy for us. He's been to busy with three students in International competitions to write back. Maybe it has something to do with all the buttering up we have been doing beforehand. :)
Anyway, a HUGE sigh of relief.

10 Best things about the first 17 weeks:

10. It puts a deadline on when the house remodeling has to be finished by.
9. Many people recommending many great books (and stories, and advice, and council - all of which I love and need to hear.)
8. Feeling grateful and appreciative of any woman who has ever gone through this before me.
7. Lots of people give you lots of stuff.
6. An understanding of something I have never experienced before.
5. The feeling of selflessness that comes with sacrifice.
4. Sympathy for the smallest things.
3. Everyone takes a huge interest in your life.
2. Finding an awesome midwife and doula.
1. BIG boobs (or, in my case, actually having them at all :) )

10 Worst things about the first 17 weeks:

10. That extra fight with being tired.
9. Craving crazy foods at all the most inconvenient times.
8. Slowly getting bigger . . . and bigger . . . and bigger.
7. Worrying about things like "how the heck am I going to pull off being a mother?"
6. All things that were hard before just got harder.
5. Pregnancy brain: you know, forgetting, forgetting, and then forgetting that you forgot?
4. The humbling experience of feeling slightly out of shape and much like a weakling even when I'm still working out everyday.
3. All feelings of nausea.
2. Realizing (as my face blows up and my butt gets as big as my new very round stomach) that no matter how hard I try, I am NEVER going to be that skinny, cute, even sexy, pregnant model.
1. The unfortunate and frequent event of having to convince some people that:
A. I want to have a child, I have not been brainwashed, and my career won't suffer.
B. I want to have a child, I have not been brainwashed, and continuing to work is not going to ruin my family.

Declaration

I'm very happy to announce that I, after MUCH searching, worrying, and wonder, have finally found a midwife.
It sounds so old fashioned - I know. But after several books and a thousand conversations with experienced mothers, I have determined that giving birth with a Midwife at the hospital instead of a OBGYN is the best thing for me.
This is not to say I think anyone who does it differently is doing it wrong. I just know I'm going to be happier in this set up. (for those that would like a detailed account of why and what's the difference, call me).
So. Dr. Demeter it is. Turns out she is amazing and everything I had hoped for in the last three months as I've worried about this.
The next step is to find a Doula so Brent is off the hook, because he says the Bradley method is just not for him, which I have to agree with. I'm meeting at Wild Oats on Tuesday with a woman who was recommended to me. I know. Can you get any more natural?