Ms. vs. Mrs., viz. Rose Focht

As I filled out an online order recently and paused before selecting a title to go with my name, it dawned on me that I no longer have to shrug away a slight sense of guilt as I click decidedly on Ms. Somehow over the past few years, my tastes have gradually changed, and although I'm sorry for all the politics behind the title, I can't help the reasons other people may have for liking or disliking something. I never thought I'd say this, but I actually like the title.

Of course my first preference for address will always be Miss, just as it's far better to be a princess than a queen, but granted that that's no longer an option for me (other than the charming southern salutation of Miss Rose, which I still get from little children and absolutely adore), far and away my second pick is Ms. Why do I feel this way? Am I not happy and fulfilled to be claimed at last, to be set apart and duly noted as someone's wife?

Of course I love being married, but I also love accuracy, and as such it is grammatically imperative that I not call myself 'Mrs. Rose Focht,' which technically means 'The wife of Rose Focht,' Mrs. being an abbreviation for Mistress. That leaves 'Mrs. Michael Focht,' not only a difficulty when one is buying a plane ticket or other item where it is imperative that the names match the driver's license, but also a check to my personal sensibilities.

I don't like the thought of being someone's mistress, even in the proper old-fashioned sense (just as I'm always trepidatious about reading aloud that passage in The Prisoner of Zenda where Sapt tells Rudolph to go in and make love to the princess - in the charming, old-fashioned sense, of course, meaning to woo and win her affections). And I'm not even sure I like the idea of being described simply as someone's wife. (I know, I know, I need to go out and read a marriage book about how being a wife and helpmeet IS a calling and there is nothing 'simply' about it.)

Seriously, I love being Michael's wife and I embrace the thought that our fates and fortunes are irrevocably linked; I am glad to have taken on his last name and there was never any question about retaining my maiden name; and I fully accept my destiny and my role as his companion and helper. But that doesn't mean that my married name has to imply the lack of a complete personal identity and an existence only in his shadow. I like my name, which already reflects my new identity as a wife, since it is a combination of my Christian name and his surname, and I'm proud to use it. Indeed it was a bit of a sacrifice to take on his name, both of my names now being so very monosyllabic, but I did it gladly as a symbol of the uniting of our two lives and the creation of a new household wherein we function as one unit. But within that union are two very different people, not just Mr. Michael Focht and Mrs. Michael Focht, which sounds a little bit like Michael Focht 1 and Michael Focht 2, like Thing One and Thing Two from The Cat In The Hat.

Besides, Mrs. just sounds so matronly and...stout. Or backwoodsy. ('The Missus is in them thar kitchen fixin' up vittles while I smoke this here pipe. Want a chaw?') It used to be that someone whose name started with Mrs. was just grown-up. Now that I'm on the other side (and indeed the grass is green), I would feel like such an impostor pretending to be a Mrs. Like I'm grown up already! Just because I have a baby and a husband!

Who, me? Cute?

Little pink riding hood

Family portrait

Pretty in pink

Me Jane, you camera.

Here, Papa, let me help.

Ballerina-to-be

Bright eyes

Happy anniversary!

Back in business

It's been wonderful to have family in town to visit, but it's so nice to have the house to ourselves again! Kind of like the Awana calendar - I love it when the Awana year starts afresh, and I sure do love it when it ends! We had a fabulous visit with Michael's mom and sister, and they think Jane is just the cat's pyjamas, of course. (I may be paraphrasing for them a bit, but that was the gist of it.)

The first week of the performance was spectacular. I was able to attend the Saturday matinee, and while I expected a good show and intended to be impressed by virtue of my husband having a starring role in the wedding scene, I was far and away captivated by the splendidness of the show. It was SO well done! Seldom have I been so entertained and impressed by a play (although, of course, I haven't been to enough live plays in my life). Between performances we dashed out for a quick visit upon which I will elaborate in a future post when I have pictures to accompany. Then Michael's mom and sister brought Jane down, where we traded off and they stayed for the evening performance. A grand time was had by all.

Tuesday was our second wedding anniversary. Amazing to think that it's been two years already! Michael's mom watched Jane for us again while we went out for dinner, drove around in search of chocolates and cotton robes (under the traditional system, the 2nd anniversary is cotton; under modern, it's china; but best to play it safe and fall back on the Focht Anniversary List of chocolate. Works every time, and that way we won't have to keep on keeping track of years), stopped by the library, and took a walk in the balmy air. It was a perfect evening and a fine conclusion to two superb years of marriage. And they say it just gets better and better? Bring it on!

Drama, drama, drama

Upon learning that his mother and sister had never seen P&P and didn't know the story, Michael insisted upon showing it to them over the course of the past two nights. (Yet another thing I love about this man - contrary to stereotypes, Michael isn't afraid to be honest about his tastes, and if he likes something he will want to share his enthusiasm with others without worrying about image or machismo.) Afterwards the following conversation ensued:

Me: So would you call this a chick flick?
Stephanie: Absolutely. It has romance, drama, and costumes.
Michael: Most period piece costume dramas would probably be classified as chick flicks.
Me: Oh, you mean like Braveheart? Where they dress up in Scottish costumes of a different period and talk with foreign accents?

This day in history

Three years ago today was the day of Elena's baby shower. I went to PHC, played with her dollhouse, and afterwards begged myself off on Courtney (or she begged me to come, I forget which) and we slipped in to the premiere showing of LOTR, the private screening to which Ryan had been counting down for I don't know how many weeks. It was the most hilarious fun in the world to stay up late and watch Fellowship with a roomful of teenage guys, who made the movie all the more funny by their goofy commentary. When the avalanche falls on the Company at Caradhras: 'Hate it when that happens.' When the orcs come charging out of the woods at the end with all that weird face paint: 'Freedom!!!' When Boromir dies and Aragorn makes that strange gesture over his body that looks like he's crossing himself but left off the cross bar: 'Ah, he's Catholic.' Absolutely priceless, and utterly worth losing sleep over.

I wouldn't mention it and probably wouldn't even remember it except that, the next morning, I was questioning my prudence in having gone for the adventure, as I dragged myself reluctantly out of bed and faced the prospect of flying down to Atlanta for the GA conference. It's not good to be burning the midnight oil on the front end of a conference, and I regretted putting anything less than my best foot forward. However, the weekend obviously ended on a high enough note to make all second-guessing moot. The obvious moral is that people should watch LOTR more often.

Curtains

Opening night came off splendidly, and I am SO proud of Michael, whose bottle they changed of sand at the last minute and who STILL turned in a stellar performance. He's the star of my show every day, so no surprise there.

The wretched lawn, which I had put off mowing for two weeks in anticipation of brother Benjamin being down last weekend and able to do it for me only to have it rain torrentially when he got here and thus render him unable to do it while the grass grew like crazy and I stared out the window and fumed (well, actually, we were out shopping a good bit of the time, it being Georgia's back-to-school tax-free weekend, so I wasn't THAT inconsolable, but still), is at long last shorn. It took the last three nights to do and looks like a hatchet job - if it were a person it would demand a refund and go elsewhere for haircuts from now on - but at least it's done. For now. Sometimes I don't even bother crossing 'Mow lawn' off my to-do list.

Houseguests arrive tomorrow and settle in for the next week+, so access to the computer may be sketchy. Which reminds me that I must go off and do all those little last-minutes things. Here's to life!

Love is...

Often I am minded to quote John's epistle, beginning 'That...which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we have looked upon, and our hands have handled, ...declare we unto you.' I love his introduction to what follows, the confirmation that this is an eyewitness account. I believe every word of it, have complete faith in the gospel account, and know without a doubt that God loves me. Yes, but.

Up until three years ago this week, when I was still happily single and Michael and I had never even met, I knew all about God's love in a theoretical sense. I believed in it, knew I was the recipient of it, and tried to show it in my daily walk. But God, in His infinite wisdom, knew what a tangible learner I was and went one step farther. He gave me a hands-on experience of it.

I think one of the most incredible things about marriage and parenting is what an amazing image each one is, in its own way, of God's perfect love for us, using imperfect humans in the most profound object lesson.

There is simply no better way I could see Christ's love for me brought to life in a more tangible way than to see it acted out before my very eyes in the way that Michael loves me. I did not choose him; he chose me, he pursued me, he expended time and resources just to build a relationship with me because he wanted to know me better. While I was still uncertain of my feelings toward him, he risked the consequences and without giving thought to the cost to himself he committed himself to going out on a limb in the hopes that I would accept his love. I didn't even know at the time what a great guy he was, yet now the more time I spend with him, the more I marvel that he chose me and the more humbled I am at how much he put forth just to win me so we could be together the rest of our lives.

Sometimes if I am tempted to think that my life is too perfect and our marriage, fairy-tale as it seems, is too good to be true, I stop and wonder in awe (and what a tragedy, by the way, that 'awe' doesn't come in active verb form!) at the fact that, yes, it is too good to be true, but that's only because God is so good! If I think marriage is great, just how much better can the Real Thing be?

Parenting brings in a whole new dimension. This helpless child, who did nothing to win my affections through works of her own, who requires constant care and vigilance just to stay alive and who is utterly dependent on me for her every need and yet is entirely devoid of gratitude as if unaware of the huge debt she owes me, has nonetheless captured my heart. I love her as I never thought possible, and I want nothing less than to protect her from all ill. To that end I am willing to sacrifice my comfort, my convenience, my possessions, and, if it came down to it, my life for her. I know she will disappoint me. I know she will let me down. And yet, I know without a doubt that it will not shake my love for her and that I cannot, no matter what happens, ever stop loving her. When I think this through, and realise what an incredible gift God gives me in allowing me the ability to experience such depths of emotion, I want to cry, because it's exactly as if He's tapping me on the shoulder and pointing out, 'You see that? You know how much you love Jane? That's how much I love you. That's the way I feel toward you. That is exactly why I sent My Son to die for you...because I will never stop loving you, My child.' Wow. I still can't believe it.

My all-time favourite joke

Q: What's brown and sticky?

(See end of post for answer. And no, that's not my all-time favourite; I just had to start it here so the punchline wouldn't be given away accidentally.) Here's my favourite:

So Rene Descartes is sitting at a bar. He finishes off his drink, and the bartender asks him, 'You want one for the road?' 'I think not,' he replies, setting the empty glass down regretfully. And with that - poof! - he disappears.

Ha, ha, ha! To this day I can never hear the phrase 'I think not' (so much more elegant and refined, by the way, than 'I don't think so') without my mind silently chiming in 'Poof!'

On the other eyebrow (if that was too high-brow humour, then try this for 'igh-brow - or low-brow, whatever) is the also-very-funny joke starting off this post. For punchline, scroll down to the end.

I think of this because today is Jane's three-month-old birthday, and recently I was catching up a bit in her Baby Book. There were lines for everything, and there was one section on 'The World You Were Born In.' I was delighted to find that the pop culture questions didn't stump me, and happily filled in answers until Michael laughed to see that, under Popular Music Bands, I had put down U2.

Michael: U2 is an 80s band, love.
Me: Well, Rachelle recently posted about going to one of their concerts! If that's not current, then I don't know what is!

Anyway, in another section there was a line for Funny Stories. Since the line didn't specify whether the Story in question had to feature Baby, I gleefully put down the one about Rene Descartes.

A: A stick.

Alaskan winter

We have entered that long dark period of dreariness where the sun of Michael's face will barely shine upon us for the next two weeks. It is officially playtime.

Rehearsals have been stepping up the pace for some time now, but so gradually that one hardly noticed them coming, except on Thursdays, which were very long days since Michael rarely made it home between work and rehearsal, and Sundays, when he'd be gone most of the afternoon and evening. But it started in earnest last week, with Wednesday and Thursday blocked off, and Friday evening being his last free evening before the end. Saturday was an all-day affair, Sunday was longer than ever, and there are dress rehearsals and run-throughs every night this week until Wednesday, which is Opening Night, also the day Jane turns three months old. Performances are every night this week and weekend, twice on Saturday, and then next week as well (though I think not every single night). It's been such fun, and a great time is being had by all (I do love it when I can stay for a rehearsal, and enjoy watching the practise and watching everyone else watch Jane), but it will be a relief when it is over. Yesterday was dress rehearsal run-through, and I stayed all afternoon at the church to watch. It was a very long day, but it went by much faster than it would have if I'd gone on home and pined away.

On the drive back Michael asked me if I could write a poem using the words Motel, Hodel, and bottle. 'They sound so similar, they're just begging to be written into a poem,' he explained. So I packed the following in his lunch box today:

Down at the wedding of Tzeitel and Motel
Perchik broke rank and was dancing with Hodel.
I had no date, so I danced with a bottle.

Language barrier

Jane has started to talk in earnest now, beyond the occasional inarticulate coo and murmur. It started rather suddenly on Saturday, when out of the blue she started talking up a storm in some obscure Scottish dialect:

'Oo 'aw? Aye, oo 'aw i' oo eh 'aw ee ewe 'aw (hiccup). Wi' eh 'aw ewe - aye, 'aw ewe.'

Hitherto our daily conversations have been either all on one side, or else very slow paced, with me making a clicking sound or a syllable and her taking ten seconds to screw up her face in an attempt to replicate the sound before giving up and falling back on the all-purpose charming smile. Now, having got the hang of it, she prattles on merrily without much regard to punctuation or even pausing to let the conversational ball be thrown back. Try to slip a word in edgewise and she keeps shooting, like one of those tennis instruction machines.

Michael: Now that she's started, she will never stop. She'll be talking constantly for the rest of her life!
Me: No, I think she'll take after me.
Michael: Ha!

Marriage Q&A

So last Sunday in class we all answered a questionnaire in anticipation of a marriage panel of experienced married couples who will give advice and answer questions in a couple of weeks. We were supposed to fill them out anonymously, and I decided that we needed at least four sheets between the two of us: one for me to fill out secretly, one for him to fill out secretly, one for us to fill out together and mull over, and one for me to fill out flippantly with goofy answers. I didn't mean to peek at his sheet, but in handing the baby over I couldn't help noticing that on the first section, where we had to rate our marriage on a scale, Michael had filled in B for the first line, Communication.

Now, this shouldn't be surprising, since Michael is a perfectionist and his reasoning includes the fact that if C is considered average, B is better than average and therefore to be desired, as well as the fact that answering A is dangerous because it implies that there is no possible room for improvement. Plus his temperament calls for thoughtful, well-reasoned accuracy rather than grand sweeping bombastical eloquence. Now I would put down an A as an expression of my overwhelming enthusiasm, since you can't possibly apply the bell curve to relationships, as you do in scoring ice skating. In fact, in this context I would probably prefer a much broader scale of measurement, such as a scale of 1 to 10, so I could go off the charts with an unexpected 15 here and there, or even a million (and you would think that, with my math/verbal dichotomy, I'd prefer the traditional letter grade system!) So I understand completely why Michael might put down a B, and in all seriousness and sincerity mean it as a genuinely pleased account of the state of our marriage. To him, there is nothing ho-hum about a B. Nevertheless, this came up later in the day (yes, at the end of that awful day, when the guests had left, the baby was asleep, the dishes were done, and all was well with the world once again).

Me: So, I noticed that you gave me a B in Communication.
Michael: I wasn't grading you. The question asked me to rate our marriage. I was evaluating myself as well.
Me: Oh. (Pause.) So what's wrong with our Communication?
Michael: Rose, you know that saying we have an A in Communication means that there is no further room for improvement. Now I am prepared to state that our level of communication is better now than it has ever been yet, but that doesn't mean that I want it to stagnate right here.
Me: Oh. (Pause.) It was the song this morning, wasn't it?

(Explanatory note: On the drive to church that morning, Michael had quietly begun to hum a tune. It seemed rather aimless, as I continued to point out billboards and make words out of license plates right through the humming, but at one point it almost sounded familiar so I asked him what it was. He didn't answer but continued to hum, so I assumed he 1) didn't know 2) didn't care 3) wanted to fiendishly torment me. So I started loudly singing my own song. Attempts at conversation after that rather fell flat. It turned out it was a tune that he played for me on our honeymoon, and while he hadn't noticed he was humming it at first, once I pointed it out he wanted to see whether I would recognise it. And I, instead of picking up on the romantic and sentimental mood, went off on a short-attention-span I-can-be-independent-and-tough-like-Dr.-Dobson-says raucous singing jag, which was rather laughable once we sorted it all out, which we always do because misunderstandings in our marriage always stem from just that - misunderstandings, premised on different ways of expressing ourselves - and not from malice aforethought. Problem solved before it can begin to simmer and erode our marriage. Or so I thought. I never thought problems would simmer and pop up to haunt us on marriage questionnaires.)

Michael: What? Oh, no, that had nothing to do with it. I just thought that, to be completely honest, we should always allow for room for improvement.
Me: Is there something I should be doing to listen better? I wish you would tell me these things instead of letting them fester and putting them down on marriage questionnaires.
Michael: Oh, boy. Guess who just dropped to a B- on Openness to Criticism.

Proving once again that he is my match - nay, my superior - in arguments, in character, and in deftness of humour. What did I ever do to deserve such a man?

Glasses half full

I've never been one for pricey sunglasses, since the risk of losing them in my purse, inadvertently sitting on them, or otherwise scratching them is too great. So for the past two years I've worn the same pair that Michael bought for me at a cute little (but inexpensive) boutique right before our wedding. I blithely ignored the increased rattle, the buildup of scratches on the lenses, and the habit of the metal nose rests to snag my hair whenever I coolly pushed the sunglasses up on my head. But when the sidepiece finally snapped off, I knew the time had come to take drastic measures. Right before our Oregon trip over the 4th of July, I went to the Dollar Store to buy new sunglasses.

They were sleek, black, and almost Matrix-like - to their credit. To their discredit, they gripped my head too tightly and tried to slide up too far on my nose, thus impeding my blinking mechanism. But I stoically bore with it because they looked so cool and because I had spent good money on them. I went off to Oregon, had a great time not getting blinded by the sun, and enjoyed pushing them up on my head whenever I went indoors because I had cleverly purchased an all-plastic pair, with nothing to snag in my hair.

Then I managed to lose them the week after we got back. I went to the County Courthouse to pick up Jane's birth certificate, and somehow in the process of unloading my purse for security and traipsing through the building in search of wrong departments I misplaced the things (or thing. Plurals are such fun! Like, is a two-pack of underwear a pair or not?) This did not distress me as much as one would suppose, because it gave me an excuse to go back to the Dollar Store and buy another pair, this time devoting greater attention to fit. My new pair doesn't look nearly so Matrix-like, but they do look sleek and black. More importantly, the hue of the shade is on the lines of the warm spectrum, infinitely preferable to the cool tones of blue or green. I like the view very much. In fact, as I announced to Michael with great delight when he came home that night:

'I now see the world through rose-coloured glasses!'

THAT sort of day

So yesterday was supposed to be a day of rest. And, in the end, it really was a nice day. But there was a point at which, had I had the time, I would have dashed in here to blog about it, simply because it was so unbelievably awful, and ended it up with

'I simply MUST scream.

'AAAAUUUGHHH!

'There. I feel much better.'

That post did not have time to get written, but I will chronicle it in all its gory details, glossed over and brushed up by the light of day.

The backdrop involves the cheap diapers we've been using for Jane, about which we can't complain because they were a gift, but which are so bad at - ahem - containment as to be virtually worthless. It's gotten to the point where feedings are interrupted at the first indication of a grunt on Jane's part, while I whisk her off to the changing tabe in an attempt to catch whatever there may be before it gets onto her clothes and then, in quick progression, onto me, the chair, the boppy, the carpet, etc. At night it's simply a - well, a nightmare. I will inevitably awaken her for her middle-of-the-night feeding to find yellow goo overflowing through her clothes and usually spreading itself through the blankets, which involves a trek to the bathroom to start the water running (and the hot water takes a lo-o-o-o-ong time to reach the second bathroom), peeling off her clothes gingerly in an attempt to minimise smear over any of the rest of her body which may not yet be affected, hoping I remembered to turn off the baby monitor so Michael won't be awakened by the din, having to turn on all the lights to clean things up so it ends up that she's good and awake and has to be put down altogether again...all in all, it turns into a grueling ordeal on a much more regular occurrence than it should. For all this, I might as well be using cloth diapers.

And that's only setting the stage. Saturday night had been such a night. I awoke with one count against me. Off we dashed to church, after which went out to eat at a nice Thai place that we just discovered, which has excellent prices and delicious food. Unfortunately my goal of talking all about the marriage questionnaire we completed in our Young Marrieds Sunday school class was thwarted by Jane getting fussy in the restaurant, of all places. For such a perfect baby to suddenly go weepy on me in public (and I don't even believe in taking young children to nice restaurants unless they can behave themselves properly) made me feel all Ugly-American-ish and apologetic and flustered. We dashed out of there, lunch wrapped to go, which meant, of course, on such a hot day, that I mustn't linger along the way. Back to church to drop Michael off for Fiddler rehearsal. Last week's rehearsal, a complete run-through of Act I, lasted over six hours. The director informed us that this one would be much shorter. I dreamily contemplated a nice long afternoon nap and a pleasant dinner with friends who offered to bring Michael home after practise. But it was not to be.

Traffic to get to the highway was backed up, so I took what should have been a shortcut and ended up spending nearly half an hour just getting to the highway, fighting idiot drivers who couldn't make lane changes or run green lights in crummy neighbourhoods while Baby whimpered and then cried for her long-overdue lunch from the backseat. Car still hot. Food probably spoiling rapidly. Back home at long last, where I spotted the glass of chocolate milk I'd poured before leaving for church sitting on the counter, of course rotten by now. At least managed not to spill it on the carpet while dumping it down the drain before headed to Baby's room to take her out of car seat, only to trip over pile of messy blankets left in doorway to be dealt with later. Suddenly remembered baby outfit soaking in yellow goo in guest bath sink, messy diaper left unfolded and thrown away on changing table, and lack of clean onesies to change Baby into as said onesies were all in the laundry basket in laundry room, some washed, some not. Off to the laundry room to dig through laundry basket. Did I remember to take ground beef out of freezer this morning to make casserole with which to feed guests tonight? Oh, and must pack Michael's lunch before said guests arrive, as no telling how late they may stay. Message machine blinking, which reminds me suddenly that yesterday I told someone to call me today at one, completely forgetting that it would be Sunday, which means that I now have to return a phone call which would NOT stress me out under normal circumstances but, dash it all, can't things have the goodness not to all happen at once?? Back to the nursery again, only to trip over the rocker which has no business being there. The boppy falls to the floor, meaning I must bend over to pick it up, and I still haven't changed out of my Sunday clothes yet or kicked off the uncomfortable sandals....It was at this point that the camel's back broke. It wasn't the day itself that got to me so much as the thought that I might have days and days on end like this, and the thought that the doorbell might ring in the midst of it all instead of Fate leaving me to wallow in my misery in private. So that's why I wanted to scream, to banish all that nervous tension so that I might get on with feeling better all the sooner. Instead I simply toiled away at the grindstone until all the fires were put out, and had to content myself with feeling better by degrees. There was no nap. But there was sparkling cider and a game of Clue at the end of the day, so it was a happy ending after all.

And, by the philosophical light of day, I must remind myself that if that sort of day is so unbelievably bad and out of the ordinary as to merit notice, then I really must have it all right. Trifles, trifles!

How much fear is safe?

Recently I was reading an article about the dangers of posting pictures of your children online, and how, regardless of whether strange people actually track them down and molest them, it's still a danger to their souls to have it out there. Certainly it's a valid concern, and I always find it sobering to be seriously confronting the dangers of the evil world out there. Generally I tend to be laid-back about risks, and until I met Michael I never locked my car, my front door, or shredded my personal papers. He has a very admirable sense of safety and caution, due I think in part to his perfectionistic personality and in part to his military training. As far as regards myself, I think I'd tend to dismiss most concerns as mere paranoia and conclude that it's better to take a few risks than live a life of fear and trembling. But when you start bringing my child into it!!!

This all came up right in the throes of the capture of the Wichita killer, about whom I'd never heard before but read with fascination how a generation of Wichita women grew up checking the phone line whenever they entered their home...just in case....Suddenly I began to wonder whether our home was safe enough, and for several days my mind has been processing worst-case scenarios of how to react if I discovered someone in our house. At what point do I decide to make a run for it or to call 911? How desperate must it be for me to elect to go through a window? How should I shield my face from the glass while providing maximum protection to Jane? (I even asked Michael what I should do if I found someone bending over the crib, threatening to kill Jane unless I dropped the gun. Michael's response: 'You shoot him. He's going to kill you both otherwise.')

It has been awhile since I shot off a gun, so Michael gave me a refresher course on loading and checking the safety lock. I have my concealed carry permit now, so this would be the ideal time to get a small firearm to carry with me, but I'm still thinking through the practical ramifications of what that actually means. For someone who's always losing her car keys in her very own purse, I'm not sure I want to accept the responsibility of carrying a loaded gun around with me, especially while manhandling a car seat and diaper bag.

So the article did give me pause to consider. I know it wouldn't be too hard for some determined creep (in the II Timothy 3:6 sense, leaving off the part about the silly women) to track us down, considering the clues I've carelessly dropped throughout the past year+. One thing I did do promptly was to edit my profile, cutting down on personal info and no longer allowing my blog to be accessible to the public. I had only just added this feature because I just noticed it, not being one to tinker much with the behind-the-scenes stuff; but I had added it after noticing that when someone posts a comment on someone else's blog and the name appeared to be a link, I could click on it and discover a whole new chain of events! In fact, it was under just such circumstances that I discovered this sobering article in the first place.

But I've decided to swear it off: much as I could enjoy expanding my horizons, the temptation would be to spend way too much time reading blogs while I should be devoting my energies to the duties I signed up for when I embarked upon marriage and parenthood. (NOT to sound bleak! At different times I have had to curtail my IM time-wasting or email time-wasting when I had a job, too. One can get carried away to excess in practically anything.) And furthermore, I don't care if my profile leads (even would-be friendly) strangers to a dead end when they try to discover my identity from some comment left on someone else's blog. The people who need to read my blog know how to find me. It's an interactive conversation for a tightly-knit group of friends, not an ego prop for a statistics junkie who agonises over the number of hits on his meter and the number of 'mentions' his blog elicits from other, famous-er blogs. (There are people who actually do this! I read a whole article on it last week in my blog perambulations...but no more.) (And, my friends, if any of you check a statistics meter, seriously, no offense! Of course it's normal to wonder if anyone's reading your creative genius. This article bordered on obsession, I swear.)

Back to the safety dilemma. Ultimately I have to remind myself that our lives are in God's hands. We can take the necessary precautions (and I'm still stuck over what precisely that means in this scenario) and must trust Him to carry out the heartening promise in II Timothy 1:7- For God hath not given us the spirit of fear; but of power, and of love, and of a sound mind. I SO need that power and sound mind!

Tummy time

By Jane (Baby) Victoria

Almost every day now, Mama brings me into her room and sets me down while she collects a pile of my clothes from that big white machine that makes that funny noise. She must really enjoy this, because she keeps telling me how fun it is. 'Soon, Jane, you will be able to do this all on your own!' But then, she says that about a lot of things, too. 'Look, Baby, I'm unloading the dishwasher. Pay attention because you will be doing this yourself very soon!' 'See, Jane, Mama is putting muffin liners in the muffin pans. This will be your job one day.' 'Baby, watch Mama vacuum. Isn't this fun?'

Anyway, I can always tell when she is about to start playing with my clothes, because she brings one of my blankets first and says, 'Now we are going to have some Tummy Time.' Then she goes on to explain that she calls it Tummy Time only because she likes the alliteration, and not because it's called a Tummy. 'It is very important that you use the correct names for things, Baby. See, this is your Chest and this is your Abdomen. Or you could just say Front for the whole thing. Tummy and Belly are not specific enough to use. No, a Stomach is an organ.' Ha! She means so well, but obviously it must be a Tummy, since that's what Papa calls it. I like Tummy Time, since I can lift my head up and I get to look around, although often my Tummy makes embarrassing noises when I lie on it. Oops. But Mama doesn't seem to mind. She just says, 'Good girl, Jane! I was hoping you would say that!' and goes right on playing with my clothes. But if she's trying to make origami, I think it's really boring - always the same old shapes!

I am NOT yelling

Which, according to modern-day online parlance etiquette, consists of using all-caps. I find, however, that using caps is a convenient way of expressing emphasis when the traditional underline, italics, and bold are not available. As far as I am concerned, the recommended practise of setting off type for emphasis by using *asterisks* is not effective. Asterisks imply ethereal and dreamy thoughts that drifted into the paragraph almost by mistake, and then settled down for a wistful and somewhat noncommittal visit. *sigh* I mean, the very sight of them implies stars or wispy clouds, not a multi-purpose cross between bold and underlining augmentation. In my opinion, there is NOTHING wrong with using all caps as long as one's tone is held firmly in check. If I had any thoughts of yelling I would indicate that by using an exclamation point, preferably several! And even then, my intention would not be express anger or impatience, but merely exuberance!! The more punctuation, the greater the exuberance!!!

That's all??

I just found out that port is simply wine from Portugal. How very boring! Here I thought it was some classy drink that all proper English gentlemen had on their side-tables, and it's merely another variation on alcohol.

We just finished the bottle of Mountain Rose wine that we bought on our honeymoon. It was a very sweet wine as wines go (and as wines go, it went), although I still cannot drink alcohol in any form without cringing from the aftertaste. I'm still working (all work still being in the theoretical sense, and not the practical sense) on patenting a splendid invention, a cross between sparkling apple cider and champagne: the exciting taste of the former with the happy after-effect of the latter.

Things that go bump in the night

Sometimes I can be very easily creeped out by things. Especially when the house is dark and I am home alone, it can be hard to repress the lurking suspicion that a dead body or a skeleton may fall out of a closet onto me when I open the door, or that a cold hand may reach out and grab my ankle when I walk past a bed or dresser. I was explaining all this to Michael last night, and he, kind man, wanted to be sure I had as little cause for alarm as possible. He even offered to go through the house with me right then and there, opening doors and proving there were no corpses behind them, but I hardly felt that necessary. After all, the creepy things wouldn't be foolish enough to be caught lurking about when he was there.

This morning I was changing Jane's diaper when I heard a loud shuffling sound approaching. I peered down the hallway and saw Michael, who should have been asleep in bed.

Michael: Just letting you know I'm coming so you won't be alarmed.
Me: Yes, but that's also the sound mummies make.
Michael: Silly! Everyone knows that mummies can't be seen by day. In the daylight they turn into sand.

I did not know this, as it happens, but it's a great relief to hear. I feel a whole lot safer now.

Triskadeckaphobia, anyone?

Recently Michael taught me the phonetic alphabet used by the Marines. (I suppose it's also used by the airline industry, the rest of the military, and anyone else who has to communicate over airborne soundwaves.) It begins Alpha, Bravo, Charlie...and has interesting words like Foxtrot and Tango in it. Needless to say (but I'll say it anyway) I like it very much. In the Marine Corps, various groups (I still haven't sorted out all the designations, so I don't know the hierarchy governing what constitutes a battalion, troop, or division) are assigned different letters for purposes of distinction, and they are therefore nicknamed their corresponding phonetic letter: Easy Company, Delta Company, etc.

Now I find this next point very interesting. J is Juliet, and R is Romeo. However, when assigning letters to groups of soldiers, J is inevitably passed over, like the thirteenth floor on every elevator. Fascinating, eh? I asked Michael why this would be. Duh! No guy's gonna want to belong to Juliet Company!!! Straight from India to Kilo it goes.

I suppose this does prevent various difficulties that might arise if, say, Romeo Company and Juliet Company got sent off to perform maneuvers together:

'Romeo! Romeo! Wherefore art thou, Romeo?'

'Idiot! We're supposed to be sneaking up on them!'

Can you tell that I really, really, really missed my computer?

I just noticed, from typing an email too fast, that if I accidentally move my hands over one space, signing my name sounds like I'm suppressing a bloodcurdling yelp: EIAW!

~Eiaw

Speak not of hurricanes from the midst of the whirlwind

On Saturday I had the delight of attending Catherine's baby shower, which felt a bit like deja vu since she hosted one for me a few short months ago - at which point we had no idea about Jane - which in turn felt like deja vu since it was the exact repeat of Jenna's baby shower a year and a half before, which I attended directly after moving down to Georgia - and it was Jenna co-hosting this shower - which just goes to show you that running around in conversational circles only works if you talk very fast, as I explained to Michael recently. Before eating Jenna had us all hold hands while she prayed for the food. At one point she prayed, 'And we thank you, Lord, for inventing such a wonderful way of starting people.' A subdued snicker ran around the room. She went on to say, in the most reverent tone, 'How special that we all start out as precious babies - and please help us to welcome this little Garner baby into the world.' It was a lovely thought, but the damage had been (quite innocently) done, and we were all smiling still as we filed in to eat.

Full house

So we had barely gotten our toes back under us from the trip to Oregon when Oma came to visit us for the weekend. We had a wonderful time with her, during which she got us a baby monitor, a bath mat, and a napkin holder. Oma's not keen on surprises, so the advantage of shopping with her for presents is that you always get exactly what you want and need. She duly admired Jane, and was sorry to go on Sunday evening. Michael attended Fiddler rehearsal while I took her to the airport, and then we came home at last, intending to finally recuperate this week.

Then yesterday morning I got a call from a VA friend, saying that her daughter's connecting flight to FL had been cancelled and she was stranded at the airport. Could I rescue her? Of course! Down went Jane and I to the airport, and we had the nicest impromptu visit, during which we taught our guest how to play Clue.

Michael: Well, I'm going to make a real shot in the dark here...
Me: Ah, ha, ha! Let me guess. It was the revolver!

Fortunately the flight was rescheduled. So this morning I drove to the airport for the fourth time in five days. It has been lovely, but the computer's residing in the guest room means that I've been going through severe email and blog withdrawal for many a day, with only hurried snatches here and there to admire Meredith. I'm looking forward to having Life return to normal.

Saviour, like a shepherd lead me (and give me a man who will sing me to sleep)

Last night I found out that one night, during our engagement, after I fell asleep while riding back from a date, Michael sang to me all the way home. This came up while we were reading Isaiah, and something reminded him of a song, which he sang to me in full. 'Remember this one?' 'Nope, never heard it before,' I told him. 'Yes, you have, but you may not remember it,' he said, and then proceeded to enlighten me. We had gone to Shepardstown (sp?) to listen to the mountain music, and while I fell asleep Michael drove on and sang. I don't remember any of this, but it was so sweet to know. 'I am so glad I married you!' I told him.

Speaking of Isaiah, we just read about Sennacharib and Hezekiah (to whom the Lord said, 'Set your house in order, for you are about to die,' at which he turned his face to the wall. What lovely turns of phrase!), and I was reminded of Lord Byron's poem beginning 'The Assyrian came down like a wolf on the fold And his cohorts were gleaming in purple and gold,' which of course leads directly to Ogden Nash's delightfully funny spoof Very Like A Whale: 'In the first place, George Gordon Byron had enough experience To know that it probably wasn't just one Assyrian, it was a lot of Assyrians.' Very clever man, Ogden Nash!

So, after I had got through admiring Michael for singing to me without my knowing it all those months ago, I remarked, 'Candy is dandy, but liquor is quicker.' He gave me the blankest look. 'Where did that come from?' Usually he knows that when I'm quiet for more than five seconds in the middle of a conversation, I'll be miles away by the time I speak again.

Thicker than water

This past weekend has been an absolute whirlwind in terms of time zones and social activities, but a total breeze in the way of childcare. Jane never lacked for loving arms clamouring to hold her.

The premise of the trip was to surprise Grandpa (Daddy's father) for his 75th birthday. Out of his seven children, he thought five would be there (four live more or less locally and one had already planned to fly out over the 4th). Little did he know that his son and family from Washington would drive down and that his other son and co. - including great-grandchild - would also be there. It was a masterpiece of a surprise and a complete coup d'etat.

Michael and I flew out Friday night - or Saturday morning, rather, as our 9:00 flight didn't actually leave the ground until after midnight. Jane was mainly angelic, although an annoying flight attendant with a droning voice somehow got hold of the overcom rather more than was necessary and kept startling her awake. I swear, he must have skipped the elocution lessons at flight school. I think the only line he got right the entire flight was, 'Flight attendants, prepare for cross-check and arrival.' But all was well that ended well, and as what goes up must come down, we landed at last and none the worse for wear.

All the out-of-town contingent assembled in Dallas, and then we descended en masse upon the park, where the others were staging a party for Grandpa in the park. Somehow they distracted him, and while his back was turned we piled out of various cars, dashed across the grass, and broke into 'Happy Birthday' behind him. His expression alone was worth the whole trip - it truly was the best birthday present anyone could have given him!

The rest of the weekend was far too short, of course, and consisted of the classic Garber pastimes of eating, talking, and talking about food. I love being with family, and miss all the relatives so much. It was so wonderful for Michael to get a taste of what it was like growing up in the thick of all that. Garber family gatherings are sort of like My Big Fat Greek Wedding, except nobody's big, fat, or Greek. All weekend long we kept quoting the exchange: 'Are you hungry?' 'No.' 'Okay - I make you a sandwich.'

There were too many witticisms and special moments to recount, but one comes readily to mind from Tuesday morning at breakfast. Michael and I came to Aunt Rosanne's to pick up Leah, where she had stayed the night before, and had breakfast with Rosanne, Aunt Amy, and Leah. Just before our arrival, Rosanne walked into the living room and announced, 'Here are the choices for your dining pleasure this morning: a flop, and a probable flop.' And then, as she explained it to us when we arrived: 'The biscuit batter was all mixed up when I discovered I'd left out the egg. Now, a slimy egg is not something you can mix into a preconceived notion like that, so I just made another batch.' We tried several biscuits and couldn't even tell them apart.

Jane was the toast of the town, of course, and received widespread acclaim from all her uncles and first-cousins-once-removed, some of whom are barely eight years old. I only wish we could visit more often.

Bon voyage!

And we're off on Jane's first plane trip...well, the first one on which she has to deal with ear pressure, anyway. It's going to be a splendid weekend, albeit much too short.

Some fun facts about Oregon:

- Michael and I were both born in the town of Dallas. Only, for him it was Dallas, TX, whereas for me it was Dallas, OR.

- The flight from Atlanta to Portland is five hours long. From Atlanta to Amsterdam was nine hours, meaning it takes more than half as long just to fly across the country as it does to fly across the Atlantic. (Years ago, when we lived in Oregon, relatives from Holland came to visit my grandparents in Maryland. One day, while they were planning their itinerary, they said, 'Oh, let's go over to Oregon and see Jon and Olga.' What a surprise it was to them to realise that not all distances in the US are as easily drivable as in the Netherlands.)

- Oregon was admitted to the Union on February 14th, 1849. So this day always has special significance to me as Oregon's birthday, and not as some romantic holiday. (As I've told Michael, however: I'll still take the chocolates.)

Churches and anecdotes

As we drive to church each Sunday, we pass a huge billboard for a large and popular church in our area. The picture is a close-up of an electric guitar, and the tagline is 'For people who don't do church.' I've received flyers for this church in the mail, all of them touting its coolness, acceptance, and non-traditionalism. If you think church should be fun, without the hassle of conscience-pricks or pleas for money, then this is the place for you!

It occurred to me that part of the problem with watered-down theology and worldliness in the modern American church can be traced to personal laziness. We keep hearing, as churches push the limits and leave the sacred and the traditional for the cool and hip, that it's all in the cause of reaching the lost.

But is this a proper application for the church? Or shouldn't the church be sending out disciples and ambassadors into the world for that very purpose? After all, the church is defined as the Body of Christ. Throughout the New Testament, the church is described as consisting of the gathering of the Believers. Church, therefore, in the corporate sense, should be concerned with feeding the flock and edifying the saints.

I'm not saying that evangelism shouldn't be on our plate - it should be. So much so that nourished and edified saints should be so full of love and enthusiasm that they cannot help but tell others of Jesus Christ and bring these new converts in droves to church with them. We are supposed to go find them and convert them, not lure them to us by pretending to be like them and then - surprise! - trick them with a bait-and-switch.

I don't think the church is an appropriate place for unrepentant sinners. After all, we're actually commanded to excommunicate unrepentant back-slidden Christians and have no fellowship with them. That doesn't mean that we shouldn't be loving and accepting toward those who are searching - just that our mission to them should be outside the church, not in.

Making church a fun place to hang out, proffering the excuse that it's a great evangelistic ploy, is an easy cop-out from true evangelism. After all, it's so much easier to invite someone to church (a hit-and-run seed-sowing, if you will, as contrasted with the years of one-on-one discipling Jesus modeled) than to actually bare one's soul and talk about the Gospel. 'Hey, you want to come to church with me this weekend? Don't worry - it's really cool. You won't feel out of place. It's so fun you won't even know you're at church!'

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I'm moving more and more away from the model of using anecdotal evidence from Scripture to justify doctrine. Perhaps this caution comes from an overdose of this kind of Biblical interpretation when I was younger, when I accepted all these theories as principles at face value. I'm not suggesting that we can't learn from others' examples. We should do exactly that. That's why so many of those stories were written: as an example for us, as Scripture itself says, not as common law precedent. We are supposed to learn from them, not copy them.

The most misguided example of this kind of extrapolation, in my opinion, involves the teaching that dancing is wrong because, among many other things, we read of Miriam leading the women of Israel in a dance after the defeat of Pharaoh's armies and the very next time we hear of her, she is teaming up with Aaron to challenge Moses' authority. Clearly, dancing gave her the uppity spirit of independence, so it was wrong for her, and it is wrong for us to dance. Now that's a real stretch. Are you going to argue that since Aaron got off the hook with a mere slap on the wrist, we should all join the priesthood to enable us to get away with sinning, because it worked for him? Nonsense! You can extract all kinds of morals from any given fable, which is why you can't rely on stories for building a creed.

The specific application of this particular train of thought came to me when I was pondering the best kind of tax system, and had just about concluded that a poll tax was really the best. 'And it's even Biblical!' I thought with triumph. Then it dawned on me to question whether, just because it was how God assigned taxation for the children of Israel in the Old Testament, it was necessarily the best system for America today. I think it has a lot going for it. But such a system should stand on its own merits, not be our first choice just because It's In The Bible.

What I really need...

I was always inventing things when younger which, if they had come off, would have been an enormous boon to the world. Actually I didn't really invent them, merely conceive the ideas and wish that someone else would come up with the specs for such things as magic wands, individual flying machines, shrinking/enlarging machines, invisibility bubbles, and the like. No one has stepped up to the task, however, so I submit a revised list of helpful things to invent:

- 'Polite' setting for car horns. The fear of being thought rude all but renders the horn useless, since its original intent as warning device has been so abused as a mouthpiece for frustration. What I want is something the equivalent of a car clearing the throat, so I could tap on it when the car in front of me has sat at the same light for five seconds together.

- A reverse dictionary. It's all very well and good to look something up if you know what you're looking for, but if you can't remember the word, or don't even know what it is, then you're left seeking both the dream and the interpretation thereof. It's no use looking it up, because online dictionaries may not use the same words to describe it that you do.

Gripe of the day: I dislike this new trend to describe all babies as 'she,' simply as a cheap refuge from having to use the generic male pronoun or the grammatically correct but rather cumbersome he or she. Parenting Magazine does it all the time, but it's everywhere these days. Ugh. How is that not sexist in the opposite direction?

Oh, I remember now

The other thing I was thinking about (that was my rant, and now this is my rave) was a question of income and choices. Now, I don't want to judge others for the choices they make in life. But I do want accuracy in conversation, and that's why it irritates me so much when people mistakenly make the assumption that it has to be a certain way. I've heard this repeated many times in my life, but I've gotten it especially within this last year, when people heard that I intended to quit my job to raise my child: 'Oh, you're so lucky to be able to stay home. I wish I could, but I have to work.' And I smile politely and think, Not so!

Please don't get me wrong. I am not criticising these families' decisions. I am simply pointing out that it is, in fact, a decision they are making. With very few exceptions in today's world, there is probably no reason why any family could not live on one income. Of course it would require certain sacrifices. What these ladies really mean is that they are not willing to make those sacrifices to live on one income. Sometimes it could mean really drastic sacrifices. But it is, ultimately, a matter of priority. Basically, what they mean to say is that they cannot afford to stay home and support the lifestyle to which they are accustomed, or even one which they would prefer. I know it's not always easy, and I'm not implying that everyone two-income family has a plush and extravagant lifestyle. But I do wish to insist that it can be done.

Thursday (but it's really Wednesday)

On Saturday we trotted off to the portrait studio to get our picture taken, because I'd a coupon for a free sitting and free 8x10. This one had the advantage of applying to any number of persons, so we made it a family portrait, which meant, of course, that I wanted Michael to shave. Which threw his schedule off for the whole rest of the week, because instead of Sunday, Tuesday, and Thursday, he skipped Sunday, shaved Monday, and shaved this morning. All of this to say that when I smell aftershave during our good-bye kiss in the morning, I know it's a Tuesday or Thursday, so I'm off this entire week also. And this explanation really only makes sense if you base your life on trivialities and habits, like Miss Bates in Emma. 'Remember, Mother? Not Jane's Day. Oh, sorry - napkin.'

Hard to believe we'll be flying to Oregon in just two days!

While the sun does not stand still

First, I've been mulling over the issue of abortion. It saddens me in a general sense that so many people are making the common-enough mistake of the Right, that of allowing their opponents to define the terms and arguments and trying to argue back. We shouldn't have let them set up the premise that it's us v. them, the baby-lovers v. the women-supporters, because then all we can do is lamely try to argue that, well, a baby's life should be more important than a woman's convenience, the matter of life having been sufficiently drawn into question as to muddy the waters on that score. But more importantly, we have failed as Christians to communicate God's love effectively. Yes, it's true that God loves all His creatures, and that we should protect the innocent by championing the cause of the babies. But that stops far short of agape love. Shouldn't we express the love that God surely feels by pointing out that we love women too, and that's why we want to protect them? Making them the enemy ('baby-killers') is wrong, as is any wholesale condemnation of fellow sinners who could also be saved by grace, but it's also politically stupid. What we need to do as policy-makers and conservatives is to redefine the playing field to extend our championship to the women in these situations, as Christians should surely be doing. Actually, you can see this in the private sector in the form of pregnancy care centers, but that attitude needs to be pursued in the realm of public policy. So when the charge comes up that we are just agitating about the fetus and don't care about the woman, we need to be able to reply, 'No, we do care about women, which is why we are calling you accountable for this terrible exploitation of women and the incredible cover-up. You are not interested in helping women, you are interested in prolonging policies that will enrich your cause, and you know that there's big money in the abortion industry. You know that abortions do not help women, and it's because we care about them and want to protect them from the proven physical and emotional consequences of this terrible experience that we want to help them.' Then we should call their bluff. If all they really care about is helping women, then turn the abortion industry into a non-profit and see how long these passionate doctors and policy-makers will cling to their chosen charity if there's no money in it. Are they really doing it out of the goodness of their heart? Of course not.

Second....oh, bother, I've forgotten the second thing. I know there were two things I was mulling about...can't remember it now.

Well, anyway, it's been a busy week. Last night I was on the way to bed when I noticed Michael studying a spider which had built a web between two stalks of gladioli I had brought inside. It was pretty neat, actually, to see how quickly the spider had constructed his parlour, even though I detest spiders. Michael fetched an ant, and threw it at the web, and we both watched as the spider scampered over and tied up its victim. This was so fascinating that I ran off and caught an ant too, and this time Michael got a magnifying glass so we could see in detail how quickly the spider worked, spinning its victim around and around as it threw more web over it and produced a tightly-trussed ant in no time at all. Really amazing. And if I had noticed the spiderweb first, I would have shuddered and thrown out the flowers! Things like this convince me anew what a great father Michael is going to be to our lucky kids.

Random thought: I detest the phrase 'Just a gleam in his father's eye.' Why shouldn't a mother's eye gleam, too? Ugh. I hate stereotypes.

Long thoughts on the second-longest day of the year

But, when it comes down to it, I haven't time to do them justice. So I will defer them until tomorrow, by which time the title will be obsolete.

Friday frivolity

Owing to a recent trip to the library I'm all stocked up on reading goods, and I've much enjoying some Wodehouse. One description of London mentioned Piccadilly Square and Charing Cross Station, and I felt so homesick thinking, 'Yes! That's real! I've been there!' I did a double-take when I came across a mention of the Drones' Club, though. My first thought was, 'Wow! So it wasn't made up for Bertie and Jeeves, after all! It's a real landmark, like all the rest!' My second thought recollected that I was reading Wodehouse, and pounded my humiliated little first thought into oblivion, burned it alive, and kept it on bread and water for six weeks.

When we were in England I stumbled across a missing linguistic link. As our picture was being taken, the photographer announced, 'Smile, everyone! Say Cheers!' 'Cheehs!' responded my British fellow posers in impeccable British accents, thus paving the way for the American and not-nearly-so-elegant-sounding counterpart Cheese.

At her six-week check-up yesterday, Jane discovered that she is now 9.25 lbs. and 23 inches long, up from 7 lbs. 6 oz. and 20.5 inches at birth, which puts her squarely in the 89th percentile for height but only 37th for weight. I strongly fear I am succumbing to dotage, in the Doting Mama sense. I actually painted her toenails yesterday, and then went outside and took still-life pictures of flowers on her toes. Only she was very much alive, and not very still.

Speaking of pictures, I've gotten so dreadfully behind at posting them (or at saving them into a temporary folder so Michael can post them later) that it is time to post some more again. Which means, as most long sentences - especially those punctuated with interjections and detours (cleverly designed to distract the reader from the main trunk of the diagram) - do, absolutely nothing.

Thursday thoughts

Ode to tonight's dinner, dressed down because Michael is once again going to Fiddler practise:

The sun is hot
And so am I
And like as not
There is no pie.

Another list which interests me, invariably short because I haven't written down anything else:

Annoying Things Which I Have Seen In Writing, Caused By People Who Haven't Read Enough And Are Just Guessing At What They Hear:

-Could of
-Taken for granite

I still can't come up with a grammatical sentence in English for the first one. You may think I have a heart of stone, but I will not be taken for granite!

Wednesday wonders

I wonder whether the mail has come yet. I could go out and check. It would be good exercise. Nah, too hot out. I'll just get it tomorrow morning.

I wonder whether the roasting pan has stopped soaking from last night's chicken. I should probably go scrub it out. Oh, well, I'll just let it soak a little longer.

We had a discussion at breakfast about slap-wrap bracelets. I peeled the thing off the lid of the milk carton, and when it retained its shape, Michael remarked that it could be a bracelet for Jane. 'Or a slap-wrap bracelet,' I added, trying to slap in onto Jane's wrist, which didn't work. And Michael didn't know what a slap-wrap bracelet was! Wonder of wonders!

Me: Are you kidding? They were all the rage in 1988! I would go around slapping them on everyone's wrist!
Michael: In 1988 I was 18 years old.
Me: And I didn't come up and try to slap one on your wrist? Obviously our paths never crossed back then.

Tuesday trifles

Yesterday evening, being not yet six weeks old, Jane discovered the fun of blowing spit bubbles. There she hung, draped over Michael's arm, placidly blowing bubble after bubble and enjoying (I suppose) the resulting spray each time one broke. Where did all the drool come from? I don't know, unless she's teething three months early...perhaps not so unlikely, considering how precocious we think she is. =)

Michael: Hey, little girl, you're getting my foot wet!
Me: Oh, don't worry. Baby drool is the most innocuous substance there is.
Michael: Yeah, well, if you had gallons and gallons of it, you could drown in it.

This morning in honour of her six-week-birthday we tried taping a few of her adorable signature moves. Michael held the camera while I narrated. The result was something like this:

Me: Now we're going to show off her little chin wobble, a really cute trick. (I pull her arms gently, which always has succeeded in inducing the chin wobble in the past. Jane remains placid and expressionless.)
Me: Well, first we're going to show off her strong muscles. Stand, baby! Stand! (I lift her up and balance her so her feet can support her weight. She's been 'standing' like this since week two. I try to get her to stand up, but her legs collapse. Nothing doing.)
Me: Actually, let's show how well she tracks movement. Here, Jane! Look! (I flutter my fingers and move my hand around, trying to catch her eye. Her face remains fixed on the strange thing Papa is holding.)
Me: Well, today we're just going to show off what a good, well-mannered baby she is. What a sweet temperament! How peaceful and quiet she can be!

Monday madness

It's a pleasure to have a baby that I can actually take care of properly, now that I'm old enough to understand why we take care of them the way we do. Obviously my younger brothers all turned out fine, so it's a moot point now, but I have vivid memories of scraping off their cradle cap, scratching away their peeling skin, and prying open their eyelids while they slept. My mother told me not to, of course, so I did it while she wasn't around, because it was too fascinating to resist. The question is how to protect my younger children from the ravages of their curious older siblings. Of course, the older sibling in question is going to be Jane, as we now know, so if we can just get her to set a good example for the younger ones then all will be well. It's rather odd to realise that all our hypothetical conversations about 'our kids' now apply to at least one person, who is now revealed to us as Jane, and that when I think about 'how busy it would be with a baby and a toddler,' for instance, that toddler would be Jane. And six weeks ago today we didn't even know her!

Tips for helping your team win at Taboo:

-Yell 'Graceland!' or 'Leftovers!' whenever you're not sure what the word is. There is a possibility you might be right, since those words are in there. (Note: 'Kleptomaniac' and 'Cleopatra' work the same way for Guesstures.)
-When it's the other team's turn, if one of their team members says something that strikes you as remotely funny, play it up (loudly) and don't let the matter rest. 'Turkey! Ha, ha, ha. That's a good one! That's hilarious. Turkey! Ha, ha, ha! How funny!' (If you start talking loudly on a random topic, the other team will suspect you of running a blockade and call a time-out until you silence. As long as it's game-related, and you appear to be uncontrollably amused, you will probably get away with it.)
-Don't get in the habit of saying, 'Okay...' when you flip to a new word and are pondering how to describe it. It's fine as a stall tactic, and more eloquent than 'Ummm...' but it could have tragic consequences when the word is Wyatt Earp.

Rainy Sunday

...on which my husband is rehearsing for Fiddler on the Roof, my daughter is sleeping soundly, and I should be taking a nap. But I'm never sleepy when the baby is!

It puzzles me no end how the bottle-craze of the Forties and Fifties ever took such widespread hold. It seems to me that between boiling the equipment, buying the formula, mixing it up, heating it over the stove (because microwaves create dangerous hot spots), and washing all the bottles, you have absolutely no net gain in convenience. Nursing is portable, convenient, healthy, and - best of all - free! I think it must stem from the all-too-common human assumption that of course the medical establishment knows best, and that any advance in science must be an improvement on the status quo.

Yesterday we attended a wedding that must be the shortest ceremony I have ever witnessed. We arrived during the gathering music, just before the processional. I don't remember exactly what time we arrived, but the wedding was supposed to be at 2:00. At 2:14 the bride and groom were recessing. Jane (who was invited, fair and square: the inner envelope we received weeks ago was addressed to 'Michael, Rose, and Baby') was as good as gold the whole time.

On the way to the wedding we passed a sign for the town of Braselton.

Michael: Did you know that Kim Basinger owns the town of Braselton?
Me: What about the people who live there?
Michael: Yeah, she owns them too.

Of ships and shoes

Yesterday I spent an hour on the phone tutoring my brother Thomas on math. I told him about the concept of pi, and discovered that he is on the third grade Bob Jones math book, which is the exact same book that I learned from and in which I doodled mustaches. (The theme of the third grade book is ships; hence the title of the post, which I was going to use anyway, but this was a nice tie-in.)

I've been wondering all week which shoes to wear to a wedding on Saturday. Traditionally I wear my purple silk dress to weddings and on my birthday, but since I was great with child during my last birthday I couldn't wear it. One night earlier this week Michael caught me trying on clothes in the closet. 'I'm trying to decide what to wear to the wedding,' I explained, to which he pointed out that the wedding wasn't until Saturday. But still!

Presents for Jane continue to trickle in, and it's so exciting to open them and get all happy for our baby all over again. It reminds me a bit of our wedding, when I was writing thank-you notes for months afterwards, because I tried to open the gifts a few at a time so I could savour them properly. It worked: to this day I remember each friend who gave me each gift whenever I use it. I hope I'll have such happy memories of generous friends each time I put Jane in the stroller or dress her in a particular outfit. 'I've written off the last thank-you note!' I told Michael triumphantly last week. 'No, you just caught up. It's a temporary condition.'

'Good news!' I announced happily last night. 'I figured out which skirt and sandals I'm going to wear to the wedding. Now I just need to decide on a blouse.'

Soaps, silks, and bon-bons

Well, that's not exactly the tenor of my days now. (And thanks to reading Eats, Shoots and Leaves, I now know that the comma after silks is known as the Oxford comma - believed to be unnecessary by some, but extremely elegant in my opinion.) But since Jane's 11:00 feeding just happens to coincide with the 11:00 re-runs of Frasier, and since I'm sitting in the rocking chair anyway facing the TV, I've taken to watching the show. It's quite clever, really. I've collected some delightful lines in the last week or so, such as the following exchange:

'Did you know that [blah, blah, blah]?'
'I do now, it seems.'

Last week we were happily settled in when Jane's hand crept stealthily up my side. My first inkling was a faint tickling sensation, which felt exactly like a huge, hairy spider had crawled up under my shirt and was making for my neck. Naturally I sprang up in alarm and almost dropped the poor child before realising my mistake. Oops. Where would such a huge, hairy spider have come from anyway, I asked myself in retrospect. Oh, well. Somehow in such cases instinct always gets the better of reason.

One trend I have noticed, though, from watching daytime TV, and which annoys me excessively, is the assumption that all people who watch daytime TV are complete idiots. This must stem from the belief that anyone who sits around with nothing better to do at 11:00 in the morning must inherently be a loser. The two ads that I see the most recurrently are: 1) a law firm insisting that if you are an accident victim, you must call them in order to get the settlement you deserve; and 2) various colleges promising you an exciting new career in whatever field your heart desires with less than a year or so of classes, and bright-eyed guarantees of job prospects mobbing you as soon as you graduate. D people really fall for this nonsense? Alas, yes, which is why the commercials keep running and targeting their underachiever audience.

Maternal musings

I wonder whether all parents are convinced that their children are geniuses. It seems so obvious to us that Jane is one spectacular baby, because she's already rolling over (so what if it was on a little bit of a slope?), holding her head up, smiling consciously, and frequently wrinkling her brow in obvious deep thought. She could practically be a model for Rodin's Thinker. But one thing she hasn't quite figured out yet is how to eat quietly, slowly, and calmly. The unfortunate result of her bad table manners is the frequent inadvertent ingestion of excess air. Often this situation can be addressed by a few minutes of brisk back-patting, but sometimes nothing avails. What a pity that there's no sure-fire way to coax unnecessary air out of the digestive system. Once, when I lived on a farm in Oregon, our cow got into some overripe apples. She expanded, rolled over onto her side, and lay bloated and mooing. We ran a garden hose down her throat and sat on her side, which cured her. I shared this anecdote with Michael, but it seemed to have no relevance to the present case.

Overheard on the drive

Me: What's that lighthouse-looking building? Is that new?
Michael: No, it's been there for quite a while.
Me: Well, I've never noticed it before. And I'm sure I would have noticed it if it had been there.
Michael: Oh, yes. The world revolves around Rose. (Later) Have you ever noticed that building over there with no windows? That's the Archives.
Me: No, that must be new too.

The lost roll

'Lost' is such a delightful adjective, conjuring up misty sensations of mystery, wistfulness, and regret. I do not use it lightly here. Indeed I am sufficiently devastated to go off and write poems about it~

Where, oh where, is my lost roll?
I thought my col-lec-tion was whole.
But now, alas, I see my lack.
I wish I'd gotten my roll back.

~Or maybe not.

Anyway, over the last few days I've taken on the project of sorting and filing my pictures. This is a task I've neglected for the past few years, merely stuffing envelopes of developed film in a drawer and vowing to get to them later. Later has now come upon me. The legendary nesting instincts, which never struck beforehand to tip me off that I was about to give birth, have now struck full force, and I've been catching up on long-dead projects with a vengeance. Ideally I would like to enter all my pictures in a scrapbook, with intelligible captions and complimentary stickers. But I must pragmatically face the brutal fact that I am never going to get around to scrapping twenty+ rolls of film, save that happy thought for the wedding album, and simply resolve to slip the photos into boring but acid-free sleeve albums.

It's not at easy as it sounds, actually. First I had to look through all the rolls and sort chronologically. Then I had to place the photos in albums in a well-thought-out order. Straight chronology won't work here, since I need to take into account such aesthetic considerations as horizontal v. vertical shots, appropriate sequence, etc., all while maintaining a reasonable sense of historic accuracy. Each time I approach the goal, I discover another stash of pictures that someone has sent me, which now need to be worked into the books. The one drawback of sleeve albums is that there's no easy insert. I figure I've moved each picture about three times now.

But it was nearing completion, and I was reviewing the books to double-check everything when I noticed an eight-month gap during which no pictures document events in my life. I am fairly obsessive about taking pictures, so the thought that I simply didn't find anything worth snapping for eight months at a time is ludicrous. What happened to me between my post-graduation trip to Arkansas in May 2000 and the inaugural ball in January 2001?

I know my grandfather died in June 2000. I know I started a new job in July 2000. I know Darren and Sara got married in September 2000. I know student life was...alive and well, shall we say...during October-November 2000. I know I attended the office Christmas party in December 2000. But why don't I have any pictures of all this?

It finally dawned on me that I lost the roll of film. So just like that, a huge chunk of my life is missing. Now all I have of that time are memories...

All right, it's not so bleak as all that. Considering that I got my first camera at age seventeen, there's a much bigger chunk of my life missing off the front of my albums. But still.

Overheard at breakfast

Me: Why, Jane, do you have the hiccups?
(Silence)
Me: Well, never mind. It was a rhetorical question anyway. You didn't have to answer it.
Michael: Isn't there a line in Pride and Prejudice about conversation with Lady Catherine being so easy because she answered all of her own questions?

Word play

Once I saw a delightful little puzzle that involved guessing famous places and landmarks based on a (somewhat) descriptive phrase that - admire the clever intricacy here! - began with the same letters. For example:

Staunch Old Lady (Statue Of Liberty)
Big Humps (Black Hills)

I wish I could dig up that puzzle and play it again. I can remember only a few:

Great Crack
Giant Parallelograms
Commons Paramount

It annoys me how some words lose their meaning through constant misuse. There are thousands of examples of this, but the one to arouse my particular ire is the instance of specified use, where a word that really means so much more is relegated to the inglorious task of holding down only one job. I thought of three examples earlier, and have already managed to forget one, but the other two are:

-Slavery (involuntary servitude without wages; it's been around for millennia, and emerged in countless cultures, yet today it's almost synonymous with the importation of African slaves to the ante-bellum American South).
-Moon (generic satellite or orb; yet the word practically means the waning and waxing one we see in the sky).

Twenty-Five by Thirty

Sara once wrote a clever little piece entitled 'Twenty-Five by Twenty-Five' or something along those lines. It presented the notion that one should compile a list of Twenty-Five Significant Things to Accomplish By the Time One is Twenty-Five , and documented Sara's attempts to produce such a list by the required deadline. I remember reading it, laughing over it, and determining to write my own list as a good mental exercise - one should set goals and all that, after all! But there was no rush. Twenty-Five (or 'Five-and-Twenty,' as my eighteen-year-old self liked to call it) was safely a long way off.

Now it suddenly dawned on me this weekend that I am actually Twenty-Five already, and I still have no list. How tempus fugits! However am I going to determine now if I've accomplished all the goals I (should have) set for myself all those years ago? How will I know if my life thus far has been wasted or well-spent?? At least, those are the questions my former self probably would have posed, casting up her hands in melodramatical despair. At this point in my life, my response is more along the lines of, 'Ooops.' And let's see if we can't come up with a list, really quick now:

Twenty-Five Significant Things to Accomplish By the Time I am Twenty-Five (In No Particular Order):

1) Buy a house
2) Get married
3) Have a baby
4) Quit my job
Ummm....
5) Learn how to spell 'Renaissance'
6) Wear contacts regularly
7) Develop a filing system for credit card bills and receipts
8) Burn candles
9) Look up and learn the words to 'On My Own' from Les Miz
10) Read The Importance of Being Earnest aloud to Michael
Oh boy...
11) Cut my hair
12) Schedule a dentist appointment
13) Paint my toenails
14) Fill my car with gas
15) Make the bed
16) Wash the dishes
17) Run the laundry
18) Change light bulb in office. How can I type in the dark??
19) Move pile of papers off desk. Grr. Need to clean office.
20) Clean office
21) Check email
22) Eat a muffin
23) Check email
24) Empty the trash
25) Contemplate Life

Whew, it looks like I'm ahead of the game and have successfully accomplished all the goals I set for myself earlier in life! What, it's cheating just because I knew when I wrote that list that I'd already completed it? Ah, but that's another trick about growing older: one loses one's ideals; one becomes cynical and pragmatic; one learns the devious shortcuts that make the world go 'round.

And to think it will soon be June!

But no more slogging through the mud or wishing for my old hobbit-hole for me!

Jane's been with us for less than a month and already I can't imagine life without her. She very much belongs, although I'm still not sure I actually feel like a mother or realise that she's our baby. She still almost feels like a cute, adorable baby who's come to live with us. I love this stage (she's starting to smile naturally now, meaning she actually smiles in response to my smile, not merely an unconscious twitch of the mouth in her sleep) and mourn the fact that they grow up so fast, even though I am eager to see the kind of personality she is going to develop. Michael is looking forward to the age when she begins to respond more, such as talking to us and catching the baseball when you toss it to her. 'At this point,' he observed, 'she's more like a really cute pet.'

Her first brush with grandparents is scheduled to occur in four days, when my parents are flying down for the weekend. I think we'll go out and have a picture package made. Thus far not a day has gone by that we haven't taken a picture of her, and we've been emailing updates faithfully to my family every day.

I finally checked out Eats, Shoots and Leaves from the library. Now that the fuss has died down, I can actually get my hands on it (last summer the waiting list exceeded 27 names). I've been reading it in bits and pieces during meal-times (Jane's) and enjoying it immensely, even though it is a bit of a jar to keep stumbling across the British convention of placing the commas outside the quotation marks. ('But aside from that', she acquiesced, 'it's a very jolly book indeed.')

Sleeping Beauty

Jane has happy dreams, judging from her expressions while sleeping. The closest she's come to smiling has happened in her sleep, and I'm always just too late with the camera to quite do the smile justice. But it's very heartening, betokening peaceful thoughts and idyllic childhood.

Babies do have the most reprehensible table manners, and Jane is, alas, no exception. I keep telling her that there's no need to rush and that she should take daintier swallows, but she persists in her desperate gulps and gasps and gags as if anticipating an impending food shortage. This invariably leads to a certain discomfort a few minutes later. So I sit her up and pat her back until she yields the appropriate sound effect. 'Good girl,' I tell her. 'That's exactly what I wanted to hear. Happy now?' She gives me such a surprised look that I have to explain my commendation. 'Yes, I know it's not the most ladylike thing, but there are exceptions to every etiquette rule. This is one of them.' Ah. Having had that cleared up to her satisfaction, she drifts off to sleep and starts smiling.

On top of the world

We're listening to the soundtrack from The Parent Trap, and it just occurred to me that the lines 'And the love that I've found Since you have been around' sound exactly like the the lines 'A smile, a smile, to make this life worthwhile' from the Smile Song. Coincidence? Cheap rip-off? One wonders. We listen to music nearly every day, and - since I don't mind hearing good music again and again - pretty much all day, alternating between classical pieces for the improvement of Jane's IQ and fun CDs for the advancement of her well-roundedness. (Michael insists that the song Bad to the Bone comes from Terminator, when anyone can see it's from The Parent Trap! I heard it on the movie - during the poker game scene - and it's on my Parent Trap CD!)

In bits and snatches I'm working on writing in Jane's baby book. Poring over my baby book was a favourite pastime of mine as a child, and I'm grateful to my mother for taking the time and effort to record so much of my early life. I wonder whether my early memories really are as strong as I think they are or if their original fuzziness was enhanced and bolstered by my access to all those pictures and stories. Anyway it was a great source of fond memories and fun times, and I want Jane to be able to page back through these early days, looking at pictures, seeing what Michael and I were doing and thinking about her, touching locks of her hair, and learning about herself. (Okay, maybe I won't go so far as to save her toothbrushes. Scrapbooking should go only so far.)
Some things I do not miss about pregnancy:

- Having to shift three pillows every time I want to roll over in the middle of the night. Now I can actually roll over in my sleep again.
- Spilling water all down my shirt. I never used to be a messy eater, so my theory is that with all those excess square inches in front, my odds of spilling things on me went way up. Now if I spill water, it actually hits the floor.
Some things I expect I will miss about pregnancy:

- The phenomenal fingernail and hair growth.
- Getting escorted to the front of the line at airports. (Okay, so this only happened once.)

Eau de Baby

Recently Michael handed Jane to me after a diaper change. I noticed that she smelled really, really nice...like baby powder, only we don't use baby powder on her. Obviously something else was at work here. I was on the brink of an amazing discovery. My thoughts ran rampant in giddy exultation. Why did I never notice that she smelled like this before?...My baby has her own distinctive, signature scent and I don't even discover it until she's two weeks old...Or maybe it's not distinctive - maybe it's generic Baby Scent, and all babies smell like this, and that's why they patterned the classic baby powder scent after this...Wow, I raised five younger brothers and I never noticed that they exuded classic Baby Scent!...Or maybe this is classic Baby Girl Scent, and the boys didn't exude it, which would account for my not having noticed it then....Finally I pointed it out to Michael. 'Did you notice that Jane has begun to develop her own signature scent?' I asked. 'She sure smells nice, doesn't she?' He gave me a funny look. 'That's the baby wipes smell, love.' Oh. Well, anyway, it was an interesting theory.

Overheard at the changing table

Michael: Now, Jane, this isn't going to hurt a bit. So don't even bother wrinkling up your face to cry.
Jane: WAAAHHH!
Michael: Yes, that was a bit cold, wasn't it? And you know why? Because your parents are too cheap to buy you a wipes warmer!

Mazel tov

Michael recently auditioned for the role of a bottle dancer in our church's summer theatre production of Fiddler on the Roof. The tryouts were two weeks ago Sunday, when I was (unbeknownst to everyone else) in early labour; the first read-through was a week ago Saturday, at which Michael received his copy of the script and found that he had indeed been cast as one of the four bottle dancers, whose role is to perform an intricate and complex Jewish folk dance while balancing a bottle on the head. (This being a church production, all references to alcohol have been cleverly eliminated; thus when the innkeeper - not bartender - offers his guests a drink, he doesn't add 'of vodka' in our script, nor does he lament having 100 unfinished barrels of the stuff to get rid of at the end of the play.) I've gone to both practises with him, partly to admire his performance and partly to show off Jane to the other cast members.

Initially he was not listed as being part of the ensemble, which would be a random townie who gets to sing in all the general songs. Somewhat disappointed, he talked to the director to ascertain what was lacking in his singing during the tryouts. 'It's all right,' he told me afterwards. 'They took me off the list because they thought they would make it easy on me, with the new baby and all. But when I told them I wanted to be part of the ensemble, they put me back on.' 'I should hope so!' I told him. 'My word! Catherine pitched you to me as someone who can sing and dance!' (Catherine certainly did her best to show us each to best advantage to each other the night we met. According to Ron, her matchmaking style consists of the following formula: 'You stand here; you stand here. Stay right there while I go get the vise.')

Jane's umbilical cord fell off this morning. She is embarking on her third week ex utero, so that seems about right. Meanwhile we still continue to live off the generosity of friends, who have provided us with meals so thoroughly that I still haven't cooked since coming home from the hospital. If you ever wondered whether it's worth the effort and thought to bring a meal to a new mom (or anyone under duress, for that matter), rest assured, it is. What a blessing this blissful time is! It's not that I can't cook, but that it is so wonderful to be able to relax and enjoy this time with my baby instead of having to dream up what's for dinner, shop for groceries, and stand at the sink peeling potatoes or whatever. I always thought that bringing people meals was a nice thing to do, and now I know from the inside that those feelings of righteousness and nobility from doing such a grand deed are completely justified. =)

I had a whole slew of funny stories from early in pregnancy, when the Scatterbrain Hormone was at its highest, which I didn't post because we were keeping things quiet until past the first trimester. However, I am gratified to note that new motherhood has its own brand of Quirky Hormone, involving such scenarios as removing the box from a picture frame with the fire poker, using a candle to burn the legs off a pair of nylons, and rooting through last week's garbage to find a return address that got inadvertently thrown away before the thank-you-note was written. As the Neverending Story most annoyingly said, that's another story and shall be told at another time.

These are the days of miracle and wonder

Jane Victoria is ten days old now, and it's hard to imagine life without her. Last Sunday Benjamin and Amanda came over to bring by some meals for us (it's been SO wonderful - I haven't cooked a meal yet since coming home from the hospital!) Benjamin told us later that he mentioned to Michael, 'So how is...um...the baby doing?' and thought afterwards, 'Wait a minute. Michael and Rose have known her just as long as I have. They don't remember her name any better than I do!' Her nickname to us is often Baby, because that's what we called her for so long. And not to be a tiresome doting Mama, but she is SUCH a model child! She is really and truly sleeping through the night now, weighed eight lbs. on her one-week check-up, hardly ever cries, smiles in her sleep, and loves her car seat.

Motherhood is such a fulfilling and satisfying role. I know that having children is supposed to polish us up by highlighting our areas of selfishness, but so far there's been so little suffering involved that I'm questioning the value of having children as a character reformation device. =) I expect that things will change as the novelty of having her around wears off and the reality of her sin nature asserts itself, but for the present she is absolutely lovable and I want to serve her and take care of her, and don't mind the sacrifice a bit.

We still get out of the house every day, and it's such a fun thing to gad about with her. She hasn't slowed us down a bit, which is exactly what I had hoped for, because I value my independence so much that I couldn't imagine being laid up for weeks according to the old-fashioned notion of a decent period of confinement. I often think of the A.A. Milne poem that begins, 'Wherever I go, there's always Pooh; there's always Pooh and me.' She's my little buddy, and even though our conversations are a bit one-sided at this point, it's delightful to have her as a daily companion.

Meanwhile this article (http://www.worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=44210) provides interesting food for thought. One thing I appreciate about Buchanan is that he is so not a pandering politician; he is not afraid to speak his mind and to speak out honestly. The disadvantage is that his forthrightness is often just too forthright. Sometimes he has valuable things to say, but he blunts his effectiveness by being so abrasive about it. Plus sometimes he's just plain wrong. This time he really misses the boat. For one thing, to say that Germany didn't invade France/Holland/Belgium until after Britain declared war on Germany is ludicrous, because he had every intention of doing so: he just hadn't gotten around to it yet. Here Buchanan invokes the logical absurdity post hoc ergo propter hoc. As if Hitler would have stopped at Poland had Churchill had the sense to leave him alone! For another thing, we didn't enter the war with the intention of swapping one cruel dictator for another. At the beginning of the war, Russia was still our enemy. The alliance with Stalin was a necessary evil to get the job done. Now, I'm not happy with the agreement at Yalta either, but to equate the results of that summit with the motivations for fighting the whole war is incredibly naive and simplistic. Buchanan needs to study up on his history a bit more.

Bringing up Baby

It didn't even have to be Mother's Day yesterday for me to realise how wonderful this life is. I'm reveling in the throes of motherhood with all my might. Jane is such a practically-perfect-in-every-way baby that it really seems almost too good to be true. She doesn't cry very much, is generally happy (meaning she's not crying; judging from her expressions of furrowed brows she's profoundly puzzled and slightly detached from this world) when awake, almost slept through the night the last two nights (meaning she lasted for 3- and 4-hour stretches at a time, and I was the one waking her up to feed, which at this age is as close to sleeping through the night as you can get), and is adorably cute to boot. Moreover we both (Michael and I) feel great despite having not caught up on sleep yet, and I'm gradually easing back into all but the most fitted of my pre-pregnancy clothes, and I haven't taken any of those painkillers they sent me home from the hospital with, and the weather is beautiful and the flowers are in bloom and the birds are singing. Things are so good that I'm half worried lest we break out in boils presently and our cattle and sheep all get slain by the Amalekites.

Yesterday we went to church, after much deliberation about germs and such. We decided to risk it since by leaving Jane in her car seat/stroller combo, we could open both canopies and shield her from the adoring public in a virtual incubator. Plus I was sure I would win the Mother's Day prize for youngest baby. And would you know it, they asked all mothers to stand and just gave everyone a book! I felt so ripped off. But later we were standing in the hallway talking with Joy, another young mother whose baby is nine months old. Joy was exclaiming over how disappointed she was that the only mothers they recognised were the youngest mother and the oldest mother present. 'And if only that 22-year-old hadn't been there, I so would have won!' she exclaimed to the associate pastor. 'Look at Rose. If you'd given the prize for youngest baby, she would have gotten that! Five days old and they bring her to church!' 'Wait here,' the pastor told me, and came back with a whole stack of Dr. Stanley books for us!

Today is my first day of parenting solo. Reality set in at last and Michael had to go back to work today. But I am relieved to report that after one hour of being alone with the Baby, post-partum depression has not set in, so I think at this point we are safely past that risk. We are going to have a splendid time together, and already have a fun week lined up. As soon as JC Penney opens this morning, we're going in to get Jane's portrait taken, courtesy of a really wonderful coupon I got from Parenting magazine, the one useful contribution that circular has made to my life. (Rachelle learned the hard way that you look at the fine print very hard to make sure there is no hidden sitting fee. This was going to be a family portrait until I noticed that only the first person is free.)

Random political thought of the day (proving that I can momentarily tear my mind away from Jane and notice the outside world): Hmmm, and I thought Chippendales was a furniture store.

Tuesday's child

We are pleased to announce the birth of Jane Victoria Focht, who graced us with her arrival yesterday morning around midnight. She weighed 7 lbs. 6 oz., measured 20.5 inches long, and looks, well, like a standard baby as far as we can tell. (Of course we think she's the most adorable one in the world, but it would look a bit partial for us to make that assertion.)

All went well. We came home from the hospital today, and are doing splendidly except for a colossal lack of sleep. Pictures to follow soon.

Stork watch

Meaning, as Michael pointed out, that none have been sighted yet, although conditions are ripe.