Off the Wagon

So I've been totally off the wagon with these blog entries. I admit it. I haven't been too busy or anything-- in fact, that's probably the problem. Do you really want to read about me puttering around the house, reading, writing, working, and cleaning? : )

I'm unreasonably excited about Thanksgiving. I've never been a huge Thanksgiving person~ it's been nearly two decades since I've eaten meat. But I do enjoy food, and gratitude is a good thing to practice. But I'm going to blame it on the estrogen this year.

It's a funny feeling to know we're going to have a little one around for next years' holidays. I think it means we're like, officially grown up or something. We'll probably even get a Christmas tree next year.

In the meantime, I've been thinking a lot about past Thanksgivings:

The one where we found out my uncle and his wife were expecting my fabulous little cousin, Juli.

The one where my brother and I danced to Fleetwood Mac in my grandparents' living room. I think this may have also been the one where we started calling my grandpa's wife "Yamma." And continued the yam word play, coming up with such delightful wordbites as "yampon."

The one the year after my brother died when we shared our meal with our two good friends whose husbands had also recently died.

The one after my grandparents moved to Sequim and I tape recorded the whole evening for a school project. That was the night my yamma busted out with the term "crotch crickets."


Well, those are some of the highlights. I've gotta go-- my honey's on the way home, and the tofu tacos don't be making themselves.

And me and Max, dancin' it up to Baby's got Back (and front).

Better late than never

Here's us on Halloween... as Angela from My So-Called Life... and TV's smoldering Magnum, P.I.

So the midwives warned us that pregnancy suppresses the immune system or something, so that I might find myself sick more often, or for longer, but this is getting old. I mean, there is only so much "America's Next Top Model" a lady can watch...

Scick

Still sick. Or as we say here, "scick." But just took a quick break from my scickbed (comprised currently of me, the kitty, and Grey's Anatomy DVDs) to make some carrot raisin bread. I am quite the little baker while knocked up...

Got myself another cold. Up for a quick bean burger then back to bed... thank God for DVDs.

Just trying to write at least something little everyday.

More soon.

Past Lives

I'm thinking a lot about how many lives we live in this one, sometimes. There's the process of going through all my letters and stuff from when I lived in Seattle 14 years ago. This morning a friend asked me and another friend to describe ourselves in high school. My initial response was "what year?" I was sort of a changling back then, trying on different costumes, music, and habits to see which ones fit. And there's the more recent past-- I had coffee last week with two of my volunteers from when I ran TIP. Or the other day I ran into the friend whose ex-wife set Scott and I up over 6 years ago. Even driving by our old house, just a mile or so away, where we still lived a year ago at this time, feels somewhat foreign.

As uncertain as I sometimes feel about what I'm doing with my life and what the future will look like, all I really have to do is look back to remember how unexpected and wild a ride it is. I am not the type who will have just a few careers-- I've already racked up more than a few. I used to fight this-- thinking there should be some one thing that I do with my time here. And there are throughlines-- writing is the biggest one. And though my interests change and all the cells of our bodies replace themselves every seven years, in some ways, in am still the same person I was with the bad perm or the short purple hair or the Guns N' Roses t-shirt.

And I could've no more imagined this life here in Maine-- almost as far away as you can get from Alaska without leaving the U.S. With a lovely old house and friends whose faces I never could've imagined and the funny, clean-cut boy who plays golf even in the rain and cold. And there is something so comforting about this to me. That we get new chances, that things change even when life feels so static. So when I stress about the future, I have to remember that I don't have all the facts. Not even close. My little vista is so very limited. There will surely be bad hair cuts and embarrasing outfits in my future, and people I love who I can't yet envision, and heartbreaks I don't want to.

So, could you remind me of this next time I'm freaking out about what to do next with my life?