highs and lows

Pregnant best friend had her baby boy last week. I was able to make it out to her (a time zone and a plane ride away) in time for my little nephew to be born. Her labor lasted over 33 hours, and seeing my friend in that much pain shut me down while I was trying to be there for her. I couldn't make the pain stop, I couldn't make the doctor hear what she was trying to say, I couldn't force her body to cooperate with the things they were doing to ease her pain and support her body. Nephew was eventually born by c-section, with his cord wrapped around his neck 5 times.

The emotions ran wild in me. I was elated to see this much loved little boy who was long hoped for, much wanted, and who already had fans all over the world. I was so proud of my friend's husband for bring a dad so quickly and easily. He's normally a wishy washy kind of guy, and he was immediately asked to make some big decisions about the baby before m.y friend was out of recovery. He made good choices for his family and I was so proud to see him fill the role he wanted so badly. While we were watching Nephew get his first bath and a proud but tired dad take hundreds (literally) of pictures, I almost started crying again at the thought of my friend alone in recovery. All the maternity recovery rooms were full, so they sent her down to general surgery recovery to be monitored. I was sad because no one was allowed to be with her and we had her baby who she had barely met, and they were tears of relief that the baby was here, and tears of sadness that they were suddenly so far apart.

I think I cried more in the first few days than she did, although now that the post-partum hormones are kicking in, she's totally got me beat. I miss being with my second family, but I'm so happy for them it hurts.

Meanwhile, my own biological clock is beginning early negotiations with my husband for a dog. Mmm, puppies.

Published with Blogger-droid v1.6.3

Overwrought

I'm feeling very emotional needy. Things that I thought I was over and done with have been sneaking up on me for the last couple of days. Last night, when mold was found on my guest bathroom toilet seat, I kinda flipped. It was just short of actual tears being shed, but it took a long time to fall asleep after that.

I spent 6 hours yesterday helping a friend move. It was exhausting, and they were still working on it at 10am when we ran over to collect the air mattress we'd lent them (they'd packed their bed already).

There is an impromptu LAN party for Civ 5 at our house today. Troll and husband are hosting, and they are on turn 252 of 500, so they'll be here for quite a while still. Troll is using my desktop computer, but there's not a ton that I can't instead accomplish on the laptop. It's only skills are browsing the internet, but that's really all I'm doing today. I have poked at the library, and have made a reasonable dent, and that is a start.

I am still waiting for best friend to have her baby, she was due 5 days ago, so every day is a little bit exciting :) I think she's ready to get him out of there too, at this point.

Tidbits of a Thursday

Husband, Troll and I were watching Glee last night on Hulu (it is on a 1 day delay, and totally worth it to not have to have watch it at a certain time on a certain day). There's a scene where a character's girlfriend tells him that he has to choose between her and being on the football team. Being much older and wiser than we once were, there were choruses of "dump her!" that cycled around the room. I wonder if I'd ever been put in that situation in high school what I would have done.

This morning, as I was pouring the milk into my cereal bowl, I happily sighed "Happy Friday." My husband piped up from the other room, "I hate to be the one to tell you, but it's Thursday."

I am currently tackling the disaster I call a home one small little bite-sized project at a time. Last night it was sweep all the floors, and put away anything on the floors that shouldn't be. Tonight, much less ambitious, is to wash all the knives. Which leads us to a potentially dangerous question... why am I missing knives? Maybe I should check the Troll lair, I hope they're there, but he rarely uses ours, typically stealing only his own.

I watched older cat eat a whole stalk of steamed asparagus tonight, along with several mushrooms. Either he has better taste than my husband, or has more appreciation for the juices of the scallops with butter that they were cooked in.

Sunday Morning

A friend said to me recently that she really loved coming over to our house on Sunday mornings because it's just so cozy. It might be because I have an obsession with bacon, and only allow myself to make it on lazy weekend mornings. It might be because of my amazing coffee maker, which I put out actual sugar and creamer for, in their appropriate containers. It might be because listening to Prairie Home Companion replay on MPR and futzing around on the computers it just the perfect solution to a long week.

I came home on Friday night and was just completely and totally overwhelmed. Several glasses of wine, homemade pizza, and hot-from-the-oven flourless chocolate cupcakes (via Martha) thanks to the wonderful U, I figured out why it had been such a stressful day. It wasn't because any of my patients or clients were particularly challenging, although it was in no way a piece of cake to get through my day. Instead it was because of interpersonal staff issues. Guys, our job is tough enough. We are with people at some of the most wonderful and most difficult times of their lives, it is very emotional. Even our day to day drivel is emotional, and occasionally time-consuming and challenging. We do not need to fuss at each other while coping with this. A work-place should be a place of respect. You should understand that while there is a loose hierarchy in terms of who has more schooling, it's more divided into who has the best skills to do each job. We all have the same boss, and as long as you are not endangering anyone's health or screwing up what people are supposed to pay, he really doesn't care.

I vented a lot, drank a little more wine, and called it a night after playing some wonderful games. Saturday at work my optimism had returned. I was the only one, but baby steps are sometimes all you can get. We missed a friend's going away party yesterday because I can't read an e-mail (it was 12-5, not 5-12), and that made me a teensy bit cranky. Best Friend isn't in labor yet. Today I slept in and had bacon for breakfast, which brings us back to the beginning. But this time, I'll tell you that I have Bailey's in my coffee.

This may be the start of something new.

It's been days since I saw the sun. Well, maybe only 2 or 3. But still, that's roughly an eternity when you're solar powered like me. As I held my husband and whined to him about the lack of the rays-what-burned-me-to-hell last weekend, I remembered that I am sitting 24" from a sun lamp, formulated specifically to keep me from whining about this problem. I forgot to turn it on when I got home.

I just finished reading Alexa Stevenson's book, Half Baked. I was torn between cracking up, wanting to read parts out loud - even things that made even less sense out of context - and wanting to curl up and admit defeat to humanity. In short, it was an amazing book. I usually turn around and give my copy of books like these to the closest person who would enjoy it. But since it turns out Alexa LIVES IN MY STATE, I'm holding on to mind in the continued hope that she will accidentally fall into my lap one day and sign it. A girl can dream.

My challenge with blogging is feeling like I have to write something monumental every time. Now my uncle has started an awesome blog, and I have this renewed sense of wanting to observe the world around me, and record it for me to look back on in the future.

That is if Oberon (older cat) doesn't knock over my water bottle in his ongoing quest to lick everything in the house at least twice and making my whole computer cry.