away (updated) (with good news!)

There's another ultrasound this afternoon and, though I have somewhat mixed feelings about it, mostly I'm glad that Trish lives a plane ride away (well, really two plane rides, since there aren't any direct flights), far enough away that I really can't be there for every appointment.

All through Kyrie's pregnancy, on the drive to the doctor's office, I steeled for bad news and I never never managed to bring myself to look at the ultrasound screen. And now, even after going through a successful surrogacy, it's almost impossible to believe that things could actually work out this time, that I haven't used up all my good luck.

I'll update once I hear something.

update: And everything looks fine, wonderful, perfect. The baby (and see, I can even type that word) is measuring a few days ahead. Trish has lots of pictures (though I'm not up to looking at them quite yet) and the next appointment is on October 19. You have no idea what a huge relief this is or how thoroughly I'd convinced myself that we were going to be getting bad news.

another season

eating cake

And having it too. It's been quite a year and I can't help wondering where I'll be when I'm blowing out my candles a year from now.

(Don't worry. I'll post an appropriate birthday-themed picture soon.) done!

an open letter to my readers

Dear commenters:

You know I love you all and treasure each and every one of your comments like the precious jewels that they are. But, frankly, a few of the responses to my last post left me just a smidge puzzled.

So, can someone please enlighten me as to what exactly would be the rationale for commenting anonymously to tell me your freakin shoe size??

Just wondering.

hugs n kisses,
niobe

y is a crooked letter

If you've read this blog for any length of time, you're probably all-too-aware that I'm cursed with tiny, yet exceptionally wide and curiously flipper-shaped feet. As in: size 4 1/2 and quadruple (or, who knows, maybe quintuple) E. As in: the only shoes that even come close to fitting me are designed for ten-year-old boys. As in: they might possibly pass for cute if they were attached to a penguin. On the bright side, though, I have pretty good balance.

So, stealing the idea from Calliope, tell us what size your feet are (And I promise I won't be jealous when I realize that they're all far less mutant-looking than mine. Because (sigh) I'm used to it. Really I am.) And do you love or hate buying shoes?


eta: If you're not from North America, check out this handy international shoe size conversion chart. (you'll need to scroll down the page a bit to find the chart) My shoe size, you will note, does not appear on this chart. Why am I not surprised?

loud and clear

I know I've mentioned that the fates tend to speak to me through the medium of license plates. Now, of course, some days the message is something like 8145 TH. Which isn't exactly the number 73 marks the hour of your downfall. But still.

Today, however, the message was far from delphic. As I got out of my car this morning, I noticed that the out-of-state plate on the minivan parked next to me read TEQUILA. Point taken. Because, as they say, it's five o'clock somewhere.

So what message is the universe trying to send you today? If you're not quite sure, you're more than welcome to share mine. Or try consulting the glowing-eyed Oracle of Apollo and let us know what it has to say.

all gone

There's a fascinating (and quite lengthy) discussion going on in the comments to one of the previous posts. If you'd like to read it, click on the link in the previous sentence, scroll down to the September 2009 comments, then, to read the rest, click on the word "newer," way, way down in the bottom right hand corner.

As you'll see, the discussion focuses on one particular blog which has recently been deleted,* though a brand-new, invitation-only blog with a very similar address has been created. (many thanks to the anonymous who figured this out)

If you don't want to expend any more time or energy on the issue, please just ignore this post. Because, look! Over there! Something shiny! But I have to admit, this is exactly the kind of thing that piques my ever-so-insatiable curiosity. What's your take? (feel free to comment anonymously, if you'd prefer).

Or, here's a question: have you ever deleted a post? If so, why? And can you imagine circumstances under which you'd delete your entire blog?



*And if you happen to possess the mad internetz skillz necessary to retrieve the deleted blog posts (and, no, when googling, I didn't see a document helpfully labelled cached), inquiring minds want to know.

edited to add: Luckily, a nice, yet nameless person was able to email me all (or at least most) of the deleted posts. Hence, here's your tip of the day: What happens on the internet, stays on the internet. Forever. Consider yourself warned.

l'shana tova

lucky number

Gematria is a mystical system of numerology, one that assigns a numerical value to each letter of the Hebrew alphabet and finds meaning in the results.

The best known example is probably the Hebrew word chai (shown above), which means life or living and whose letters add up to 18. For that reason, 18 is considered a lucky number and, traditionally, gifts of money are given in amounts that are multiples of 18.

Which brings me to the point of this post, which is that not only is today September 18, but also it was exactly 18 years ago (on Yom Kippur, as it happens) that my son Gray was born.

gifted

It's not exactly leaping tall buildings in a single bound or spinning straw into gold, but my superpower, such as it is, is to see the world through the prism of metaphor. Everything reminds me of something else, everything means something else. Steve always used to say it is what it is. And I hated him for saying that because, for me, nothing ever is what it is.

Yesterday, even before I stepped through the glass doors and out onto the sidewalk, I saw the dark circle of suits blocking the way. I knew, and it felt like the twist of a garotte, that one of them was Steve. I knew that he wouldn't look at me, but he did anyway and I closed my eyes for a second and walked towards the parking lot and wished that I were prettier or nicer or smarter or braver.

And then my car failed inspection because of a problem with, yes, the rear view mirror.

So what's you special knack, gift, talent? Does the perfect parking space always open up for you or can you effortlessly memorize the lyrics of any song you hear?

What's your superpower?

fingers crossed

As you probably know, I'm a firm believer in jinxes and magical thinking and, basically, they'll be throwing ice skating parties in hell before I do or say anything that would even suggest that there's a chance that we'll be bringing home a real live baby at the end of all of this.

But I'll admit that I was looking at Trish's blog and saw that she'd posted one of those tickers with days and weeks and a picture of a baby and, whaddya know, looking at it actually makes me feel all happy-ish and almost hopeful.

learning curve

While using your two pointy little bottom teeth to gnaw on things is usually quite entertaining, it kind of ruins the fun when the gnawed-on objects turn out to be your own index fingers.

rear view mirror

One of my friends says “miracles happen all the time.” I’m not sure I believe that, but the outlook for my sister is looking infinitely better than it did yesterday.

This morning, it was dark and cold and, everywhere, flags were flying at half mast. But I’d driven almost all the way to work before I managed to remember why.


(photo by (and of) Gray)

fill in the blank

Cannibal grief devours itself, cracks its own bones, sucks out the marrow. I think about my sister and I don't seem to have room for feeling much of anything else. If you want to get a sense of what we're looking at (and it's pretty bleak) you can read this. (link disabled because it looks like, very, very fortunately, that's not what's going on) I'll let you know if there's any significant change -- one way or the other.

In the meantime, I'd love it if you'd humor me by playing the game that I used to play with her, one I blogged about once, a long, long time ago.

There are three kinds of people: those who can count and those who can't. My sister, who lives far away and has an important and mysterious job, introduced me to another system of classification, which she undoubtedly lifted, without attribution, from some other source. Everything and everyone, she explained, is either boring or annoying.

So, which one are you? Boring or annoying?

Now, this is no place for temporizing. I'm not looking for something like: "Well, sometimes I'm kinda boring, but not really. And other times, I guess some people might get the impression that I'm tiny bit annoying. But on the whole, I think that I'm a good combination of the two and you could even say that, actually, I'm quite interesting and charming." No, no, no. Be bloody, bold and resolute. Pick an unflattering adjective and wave it like a flag.

Are you boring or are you annoying?

I'll go first. I'm boring.

eta: And, really, don't feel that you need to say anything else. I know how hard it is to find the words for someone else's sorrow. I promise that a one-word answer is enough to let me know that you're thinking of my sister.

edited even more to add: Looks like the overwhelming majority of you are annoying. Which, honestly, is not what I would have guessed.

still

It's what we expected, but it's not what we wanted.

Little A is fine. Little B is gone.

I'm turning the comments off and, while I appreciate everyone's support, I'm asking you please, please not to email me. I just need to sit here alone for a while.

oversight

I almost managed to forget about it, but the next ultrasound is today. I'll let you know what happens.

the last day of summer

Yesterday, the news was good and the doctors were using cheerful phrases like "step down unit" and "CPAP trial." Today, the news is . . . not so good and everyone's talking in hushed voices and no one wants to say anything about what might happen next.


And, to shift the focus a little, although I cancelled this month's confession post, some people have been leaving new comments over the last few days on last month's confession post. If you're looking for something to distract you from all the tragic news that seems to be out there, click on the link and scroll down to the comments with dates from September 2009. Interestingly enough, they all seem to be on the same topic.

critical but stable

She's still unconscious and unresponsive, but, at least for the moment, no one thinks her life is in any immediate danger.

I can't tell you how much I appreciate all of your support. Still, I'm going to turn the comments to this post off. Because if I don't have any idea what to say, I can't really expect you to.

Thank you again.

you never saw it coming . . .

. . . til it was gone.

My sister didn't show up for work this morning. The lead story on the local news was about an unidentified woman taken to a hospital with life-threatening injuries. Yeah, it was her.

She's in intensive care, on a ventilator, but I don't have any more details. I'm flying down tonight.

For obvious reasons, the confession thread is cancelled.

incoming

Because I've been concentrating on, well, other things, I almost forgot that tomorrow is the first Friday of the month. Which means one of those posts where you can leave your true or not-exactly-true confessions. Previous editions are here, if you're looking for inspiration.

This month's confessional theme is "family." As in, this is your chance to report anonymously exactly what drives you crazy about your family members and/or your family's vibrant, yet mysterious, culture.

I tell you this for several reasons. First, so you can start thinking about all the annoying things that your annoying family does and says. Second, to alert you to where you'll be able to find a list of all the annoying things that other people's annoying families do and say. And third, so those of you (and you know who you are) who don't exactly care for the whole confession thing know which day you should definitely *not* click over to this blog.



(this photo, like the one from a few posts back was taken by Gray during his trip to India. If you look very closely, you can see what look like two Indian flags on the dashboard.)