More Randomness

After work I’m finally using a gift certificate Nate gave me for Christmas. It’s to Salon Pompeo where I’ll get a hair cut, facial, and an eyebrow/lip wax. Fancy. I’d been “saving” the gift certificate for some reason, until Nate asked me why and I realized I had no idea. Saving it for what? It made me think of a friend of mine who inherited a beautiful set of china from her dying mother-in-law. The mother-in-law gave my friend the china (along with some other things) a few weeks before she passed away and said, “Promise me you won’t save these for company. Use them every day.” So my friend does. That’s a good philosophy, I think. Why save? Why wait? Why not enjoy it now?

I’m trying to enjoy this period in my life, this being-an-incubator time. I’m just now (at six months/28 weeks) starting to feel uncomfortable. The baby’s stronger now and her kicks sometimes hurt. I imagine that discomfort may increase with time. But I also know that even as I become more eager to have my body to myself again, to not have a big ole belly preceding me everywhere, I will also miss her. It’s been a very interesting (and cool) experience to have another person be a part of me. And while I’m starting to get very excited and impatient to meet this new person, I’m sure I’ll miss having her with me. And when she’s a teenager, and I’m waiting up because she’s late for curfew, I’m sure I’ll really miss these days when I knew exactly where she was all the time.

The nursery is progressing pretty well. We hope to finish this weekend because next weekend, both of my sisters, my parents, and my nephews will be in town, as well as Nate’s grandparents, brother, sister-in-law, and nieces. And an aunt! Somehow this is all happening on the same weekend as my baby shower, so we will have a lot of family participating. Funny how life works out that way sometimes.

I’m also trying to muster the motivation to make the cuts to the novel. It’s sort of like standing at the foot of a mountain you’ve climbed before. You’ve done it. You know you can do it again. But because you’ve already done this before, you know how much work it will cost you to get to the top. This period is sort of like taking that deep breath before you start walking uphill.