out of Kadesh

ACCESS TO THE WORLD WIDE WEB! I CAN DO ANYTHING RIGHT NOW!

I never realized how completely debilitating it is to be without an internet connection in my home until now. Everywhere I’ve lived previously we’ve had internet pretty much immediately, and if not we could always find someone with unprotected access. Like in Arlington we stole wifi from BOOBIENET until Comcast finally came out to install our modem. But everyone in our new neighborhood, it appears, has protected themselves from wifi thieves, and AT&T is all “oh yeah we’ll be out whenever we feel like it and our technicians get off their arses and put the ham sandwich down long enough to flip the switch MUAHAHAHA WE’VE GOT THE POWER!” And therefore a pregnant lady can’t check her email, or worse, look up what to do when carpel tunnel syndrome wakes me up at 2:40am and makes me think I’m dying.

No, seriously. I HAVE CARPEL TUNNEL. I think this is what karma smells like, because carpel tunnel is one of those illnesses I always associated with pussies. Like I only ever imagined real nerdy guys with no sex lives getting it from surfing too much porn or playing too much Tron and then having to wear dorky looking braces on their wrists for a week or whatever, so I admit it, I scoffed. I mean what kind of middle-class, American problem is CARPEL TUNNEL, right? People in other parts of the world have REAL illnesses. So now I am reaping what I have sown, Reader. Apparently 80% of pregnant women are affected with it because of swelling in their joints and fluid buildup in the wrists or something. And HOLY SHIT, IT HURTS. I literally started crying last night because of the pain in my left arm, and I can’t even tell you the last time I cried because of physical pain, other than when I get giant zits under my nose and popping them triggers some tear duct and my left eye starts totally leaking, but that doesn’t even count. I mean I was in so much pain that the only relief I could get was to start sobbing like a freaking tool. I CRIED BECAUSE OF CARPEL TUNNEL. And then I woke Lance up because this pain was pain I could not deal with on my own. I finally got back to sleep after consuming the entire contents of a bottle of Tylenol. (I’m only kidding; I only took half the bottle on account of the fetus, so calm down. It’s the liter of Vodka I washed the Tylenol down with that you should be worried about anyway.)

So now we know that I am supposed to elevate my left arm on a pillow as I sleep, and obviously I shouldn’t sleep on my arms. Oh, have I mentioned that I’m also not supposed to lie on my back? Yeah some central nerve can be crushed by the weight of my humungous uterus, cutting off blood supply to me AND the baby. Oh and also, I can’t sleep on my belly, because well, have you ever tried lying on top of a basketball? It’s impossible. So how I’m supposed to sleep NOT on my back, belly, OR sides is a mystery to me. Anyone have any suggestions? I mean I’m not great at geometry but it SEEMS like that pretty much eliminates all my options. I guess I’ll sleep sitting freaking STRAIGHT UP IN A CHAIR until it turns out that my ass contains some central artery or it starts going numb because of Carpel Ass Syndrome or something. Then I’ll just go float in the tub until I fall asleep and drown, which would honestly be better than never sleeping again, which is the direction I feel my life is going.

Other than the Carpel Tunnel and never being able to sleep anymore and the fact that my dog hates our new pergo floor because it causes her to slide all around, so she just sits on her bed day and night, crying and refusing to get up for anything, including the piece of cheese I dropped into her food bowl, things are going pretty great. So far I love Nashville. Everyone is really friendly, including Ma and Pa who live next door to us and are actually so friendly I avoid them because they kind of creep me out. The barista who just made my soy latte was asking me when my baby was due and telling me all about his kids. He was saying things like “yeah, my son is just so easy man. It’s totally awesome. My wife is expecting our second in January and man, it’s gonna be so fun.” And he was just so chill and he still looks all young and cool and fresh and I was like thinking “dude, I hope I can be as awesome as you when I have two kids. Even if it means growing a scruffy beard and ultimately becoming a Nashville hipster which is pretty much inevitable since I have no sense of style on my own anyway. I wish you’d hurry up with my latte. This is a pretty cool place, AND it’s right around the corner. I wonder how often we’ll frequent it. I bet we’ll be like Niles and Frasier always coming in here and getting to say ‘I’ll take the usual.’ Except Niles and Frasier were brothers and Lance and I are definitely not brothers. So we’ll be like a hip married couple with a kid who doesn’t ever cry and always just sleeps in his car seat while we hang out and blog and whatnot. Yeah right, haha, I wish.”

Ahem.

So that’s what’s going on. As soon as I find the box with my camera cord in it and I have access to the interwebs from my house, I will post pics of my unbelievably fat belly. BTW, Blueberry is doing just fine. He’s exactly where he needs to be apparently. I, however, have gained 34 pounds and Blueberry still has another three to five lbs to go before he’s ready to exit the vagina. (Couldn’t resist. Any chance I get to remind you, Reader, that I’m creating human life in my uterus and he will enter the world via my vajay-jay, I’m going to take it.) Anyway, I’m pretty sure all the rich, greasy southern food I’ve been stuffing in my face since we moved back is to blame. That, combined with no longer belonging to a gym and walking feels like someone is pushing me over backwards with every step so I kind of don’t do it very much any more. I’ll also be posting before and after pics of the house as soon as I have the after pics to take.

One last thing: I have to express the absolute goodness of God. Everything I asked Him for happened, and then some. We were going to be living on about 200 bucks until this Friday (which was pretty much gone after we got our U-Haul anyway), but we got some dough back from the FHA, which enabled us to not only buy groceries, but buy some things we wanted, like paint and a shower caddy and laundry detergent and stuff you don’t realize you need until you move into a new house. Also, we had help from so many people. Moving a 17-foot truck full of crap into our house only took like an hour and a half. Thank you to everyone who got sweaty hauling sofas and beds and dressers and boxes of books up so many steps to get them into our front door. Also the night before we moved it thundered and rained and rained and I was so stressed out about it that I woke up with every bolt of lightening to petition the Lord to please please stop the rain, just for the day. There were flash flood warnings all morning, so I figured God’s answer to all those many prayers was like “um, no. Nashville farmers have been asking me for it to rain for like two weeks so just get in line with your weather request lady.” But by the time we started moving stuff, the rain stopped. I tried to say thank you to God as many times as I had asked Him to stop the rain, but I’m pretty sure I failed.

Hey! I feel at home already y’all. Come on over if you’re in town. There’s plenty of paintin’ and unboxin’ to go around. I’m heading back to my house now to wallow in self-pity over not having any portal into the outside world.

I realize I’ve neglected writing about the OTHER thing that occupies all my brain space, which is the fact that I’ll be pushing a kid out of my vagina in OH, TWO AND A HALF MONTHS. And really, thank God summer is almost over since a) the southern heat and humidity is making my skin peel off and b) my belly is now so huge that I can no longer bend over far enough to shave my bikini line. (I figured I’d get all the TMI out of the way in the first paragraph, but who am I kidding? I’m sure there will be more coming. I mean come on, why do you come to this blog anyway, right? Right?)

So, Vanguard. The truth is I won’t be filing a class-action lawsuit, since that would require me shelling out tons of money, energy, and time just to expose them and it wouldn’t really get me anywhere anyway since probably the whole world already knows they are the reason your panties keep creeping up your butt. No lie – from now on anything bad that happens I’m going to be thinking about how VANGUARD is to blame! Also I won’t be filing a class-action lawsuit since I don’t really have a case other than this: THEY SUCK. Also I don’t really know what “class-action lawsuit” means, and I’m sure that’s important. Seriously though Reader, you would not BELIEVE the two days that we have had. It’s like there is a committee of people who sit around going “let’s figure out all the ways to screw people and make them feel like they’re being ass-raped.” And then they do each of those things. It’s too much to even talk about on here and to be honest, it’s too soon to rehash with any sense of humor whatsoever and I don’t think you decided to read this post just to be subjected to a bitch-session, so I’m done. Actually, one more thing: if your retirement happens to be with Vanguard, I highly recommend getting that money in competent hands STAT. Ok, done. On to the kid out of the vagina thing.

My belly is now so huge I can no longer see my feet, and apparently Blueberry still has 3-5 more pounds to put on before he emerges. (Did I mention the emerging is going to be happening in 10 weeks?) The nesting instinct has hit me hard and I haven’t been able to do anything about it yet. I spend countless hours online, shopping for nursery items, which I then email to myself with subjects like “rugs” or “bedding.” I have 17 unread messages in my inbox, all from myself, all full of links to baby stuff. I bought a changing pad this weekend, just because I really wanted to cross something off my list. Yes, I have a list. It’s four pages. And I keep having these dreams where the baby is born but hasn’t been able to eat or be changed or we can’t take him home from the hospital because we don’t have a car seat because all our stuff is in storage. I have never felt so unprepared for anything in my whole life.

I have my first OB appointment in almost two months tomorrow morning. Before you all start freaking out that it’s been almost two months, let me first say that you could in no way be freaking out more than I have been. You can not freak out because I have officially freaked out enough for the entire state of Tennessee. And secondly, the baby’s kicks are strong and frequent, hitting the hardest around 7:30am when I am SO not ready to be jolted awake by the power of a kick from the inside. For those of you who have never been kicked from the inside, I can only describe the feeling as a long-fingernailed hand grabbing a wad of muscle tissue every couple of minutes. It doesn’t hurt per se; it just feels really, really, freakily weird. Sometimes I think he just stretches out because I feel this claw-like tissue-grabbing pressure on either side of my belly and I’m like holding my breath subconsciously, waiting for him to finish stretching and curl back into a convenient little ball… waiting… until I push on his foot or whatever it is and he retracts. How’s THAT for alien-life form? The creepiest thing he does is like some kind of roll or something I guess, which literally takes my breath away every time he does it. All that to say I know he’s doing just fine in the incubator, even though an OB hasn’t checked my uterus for almost two months. (See? More TMI, there it is!)

The sad part about being so pregnant is that I had to take my rings off yesterday. My fingers are like fat sausages, something else compounded by the heat. I struggled for several minutes and finally managed to squeeze them off, and while my fat sausage-like finger pulsed blood back into that place where the symbol of my marriage just was, I put my rings away for the remainder of my pregnancy. And until I find a SIZE NINE sterling silver band somewhere, I’ll just look like my child-to-be is a bastard with some Baby Daddy somewhere who left me for someone hot. Which might be until after he’s born, because who carries SIZE NINE wedding band-looking rings? Whatever, I can deal with judgmental stares. It’s called being raised in the south.

Today I’m spending the day packing up the four suitcases, dog and cat equipment, various baby paraphernalia that I’ve accumulated, ponytail holders, and non-perishable food items that are currently scattered all about my parents’ house. I’ll start on THAT daunting task as soon as I waddle into the kitchen to find something else bad for me to eat and scarf it down in record time.

The scene: I’m in the kitchen with my teenage sister, who is sitting, cross-legged, on a chair, staring at me while I take out spices, pots, and pans.

Me: “Hey, you want to help me make dinner?”
Her: “Well, I was planning on straightening my hair.”

The scene: We’re talking about my sister’s love of photography, and how she wants to go out and take some pictures for her portfolio.

Me: “Just go ask Dad if you can go.”
Her: “Psh, I know if I go ask him he’ll just say like, ‘have you finished your math homework?’ or something.”
Me: “Well, have you finished your math homework?”
Her: “No…”

The scene: I’m standing outside the bathroom door, my bladder about to explode. 20 minutes go by. 30 minutes. I pound on the door.

Me: “OMG ARE YOU HAVING THE MOST GIGANTIC POOPISODE EVER IN THE HISTORY OF POOP!? What could possibly be taking so long!”
Her: “I’m doing my makeup!”

The scene: I realize I need one more ingredient for dinner. I’m wearing sweats and haven’t taken a shower or combed my hair all day.

Me: “Want to run to Kroger real fast with me?”
Her: “YES! Hang on!” (She goes into the bathroom. Repeat the scene from above. She emerges looking like she’s on her way to prom, complete with a prom dress.) “So, am I driving?”

The scene: I’m blogging. She’s watching TV. She turns to me.

Her: “Hey, let’s do something today.”
Me: “What do you want to do?”
Her: “I don’t know, SOMETHING FUN.”
Repeat this EVERY DAY.

I just ate an artificially flavored banana nut muffin. Swear to God, it said it right on the label. I considered hard before I ate it but it looked so damn good that I went ahead, but then the whole time I was eating it I was all thinking “Dude, what am I eating right now? Like what is in this muffin that is tricking my brain into thinking it really tastes like bananas and nuts? What is this anyway, the Matrix? Why is someone bothering to artificially flavor a muffin??”

It weirded me out so much that I washed the muffin down with a pop-tart.

O.M.G.

Lance just found this amazing hand-written list on my parents-in-law’s refrigerator, hidden behind a couple of magnets.

In case you can’t quite read it, allow me to detail what my mother-in-law has written here: “Megan does not care for: marshmallows, popcorn, raisins, cool whip, slaw (then, in my father-in-law’s handwriting, “on plate” – Lance hypothesized that even though I don’t enjoy cole slaw, I must have eaten it on a bar-b-que sandwich one time and it was duly observed and noted), bananas, jello, (separate column) watermelon”.

I think tomorrow morning, I’ll casually slip into the conversation how much I hate prunes and see if by nighttime, prunes have made it on the list. I feel a kind of warmth and proud responsibility to this scientific method, like I should help their observations of my feeding patterns as much as possible by altering some of the experimental data. If you didn’t notice, there is room on this paper for more. IN CASE THEY NEED TO ADD TO THE LIST OF THINGS I DO NOT CARE FOR.

Can you hear my laughter all the way from here? Lance and I already had to change our pants from peeing the original pairs.

In the south, segregation, though not legally enforced, still exists. There are schools that are predominantly “black” schools and schools that are predominantly “white,” according to the people giving us advice about schools. As we drive through the neighborhoods, we see all-hispanic, all-black, and all-white people populating them. There is no integration within neighborhoods.

Lance and I went to a Panera Bread for lunch while we were looking for a house in Franklin, and it was eerie to look around and see nothing but white faces. It made me think, “I don’t want to live in Franklin if it means raising my son to not know that other races and nationalities exist.” I also had the sudden thought, “but would I be comfortable right now if every other person in this restaurant was a different race than me?” I realized that no, I wouldn’t be comfortable. The thought was disconcerting.

In DC, I never thought about this. Lance and I looked for an apartment, found one, and moved in. I saw each of black, white, hispanic, asian, and middle eastern people in my neighborhood on a daily basis. There was never a question of living in a neighborhood of all one race; such neighborhoods didn’t exist. I always defined a “rough” neighborhood by the condition of the houses, the amount of junkiness in the area, the way people were dressed. But moving back to the south has made me more racially aware than I have ever been.

Is it true what they say? Is everybody just a little bit racist? How would you feel about being the only person of your race to live in your neighborhood or go to your school?

Good old southern woman: “So, you’re moving to Nashville!”

Me: “Yes.”

Good old southern woman: “You know, my daughter lives in Nashville. She works with the homeless. You know there are so many homeless in Nashville. I just feel so much compassion for the homeless. What do you do for a living?”

Me: “Well right now I’m not working, but I was working in the marketing department for a regional theater.”

Good old southern woman: “You do acting?”

Me: “I enjoy it, but it’s not what I want to do for a living.”

(this is where it really gets good)

Good old southern woman: “You know my daughter has a friend who is in drama and she was a wonderful actress. What was her name? For some reason it’s slipped my mind. Anyway she acted with this English gentleman and she was just WONDERFUL. She stopped acting to have a baby; she had a little girl named Elaine. And a couple of years ago I was invited to Thanksgiving dinner with her and her family and they were just the nicest family! It just goes to show you. Oh… what was her name! Anyway the father of this girl ended up killing the mother. Can you believe it? He was biking with this group of cyclists, and someone noticed he slipped away and what he did when he slipped away is he killed her mother, and because someone noticed him slip away that’s why he got arrested. But you know what he did after he killed her? He just came right back and finished the bike race. Isn’t that just awful! She was walking towards him, and he shot her three times. Oh it was just terrible. My daughter’s friend was devastated. Anyway the Lord wants us to forgive but can you imagine forgiving a man like that? But she did; recently she got back in touch with her father who of course is in prison. Probably for life. And her husband wrote that father the most touching letter.”

Me: “……….Oh……………….”

Good old southern woman: “Anyway that girl, what WAS her name. Well she was just a FABULOUS actress. Bless her heart.”

Me: “Whoa – according to this, right now my uterus is the size of a basketball!”

Lance: “You tryin’ to turn me on?”

Me: “Wait till I start talking about how my hands and ankles are going to start swelling up.”

Lance: “Mmmmmmm.”

Seen at a gas station during a pit stop:

That’s. What. I’m. Talking. About. You can see why I missed the south, right? RIGHT!?

I like Coldplay. A lot. They don’t get old no matter how many times I hear those same songs! I know I’m not the only one. Come on, who’s coming out of the closet with me!? It feels SO GOOD.