NAVEL GAZING

I was sitting at the dining room table, and Mikey was in the other room sprawled out on the new couch, both of us mindlessly scrolling through our phones. “Not really, why?" 

"Just, do you ever think about what your life would have been like if you didn’t meet me, or if one of those random dates from your early twenties turned into something else?” The question wasn’t really about another woman, but lately I’ve been thinking about the set of small decisions and diverging paths that led us to here. To six and a half years, a home, a daughter, some cats, new couches. Stuff. Chores. Unspoken rules and preferences for how things are supposed to be. Friends that aren’t your friends or my friends, but our friends. Shared Google calendars. A life that’s completely intertwined with each other, a history built on shared blocks. But what if—? 

What if I’d stayed in London for grad school after all? What if we never went to the same party at that bar? What if we’d both continued dating the people we were casually seeing then? What if I had instead somehow become the kind of cool single person who went out dancing at nightclubs? Or someone who joined Tinder, or smoked weed, or was a Christian? Who would we both be, were we not our current selves? 

Sometimes the what-ifs take me far far away. What if we never got to meet at all because I got stuck in Europe with my dumb college band, trapped in a shitty other life with the person who almost ruined me? 

What if he had moved into that basement apartment he once looked at before we met, the one pointed out every time we drive up to Northern Liberties for haircuts? What if we never learned how to grow into a first apartment, a series of apartments? If I hadn’t been so consumed by the ladder of adulthood and debt, could we have untethered ourselves entirely and become one of those couples who backpacks around the world for a year? 

What if I had kept writing my food blog? What if I got famous that way? If I hadn’t already been imagining a future with children, with him, would I have stayed in journalism after all? And then what if I never took this job? What if I kept working at the gym, became the kind of person who worked out five days a week and did not, as it stands, have a soft belly like rising bread dough. 

What if we stayed broken up, those couple of times? What if we’d moved to another city together? What if we didn’t adopt all these cats? What if we were dog people? What if he’d never been assaulted that night in the dark, would we have stayed in the city? Would we live in a loft, be DINKs, go on Instagram-worthy vacations to Iceland? 

What if I didn’t get to stay pregnant? Surely the darkest timeline would be one in which our lives stayed separate, because Cora would not exist. 

First of all, produced a human child from my own body -- but also:

Cooked a meal for organ donor families at the Gift of Life House

Refinished a vintage bookshelf and my great-grandmother’s manicure table

Flew to San Francisco and led a media campaign for work

Performed a classic burlesque fan dance in my third trimester 

Mourned my sweet old dog

Designed the branding for a professional conference from scratch

Fed that human child that came from my own body with my own body for over 8 months (and counting)

Played the entirety of Halo 5 while holding or breastfeeding a tiny newborn

Celebrated two years of secret marriage, and one year since our wedding

Experienced postpartum anxiety and depression

Went back to work even though I was afraid

Hosted a Galentines Day brunch to toast lady friendship

Ran a half marathon and set a personal record by seven minutes

Voted for Hillary Clinton in the Pennsylvania primary

Produced the second annual Philadelphia Burlesque Festival, then stepped down from year three

Breastfed or pumped in many public places (including the backstage dressing rooms of said festival next to industry legend Jo Weldon)

Bought a house and moved to New Jersey

Shaved a lil’ undercut on the right side of my head

Marked 10 years since graduating high school; instantly regretted adding former classmates on Facebook

Finally surpassed in height by my gigantic 11-year-old brother

Went to a joint BLM/Orlando/Dallas vigil and ugly-cried with my coworkers

Went on weekend trips to Maryland, Virginia, New York City, Boston, and Scranton to see family, friends, and new places

Saw Hamilton, cried thrice

Asked for a promotion

Hatched a Pikachu out of an egg on my cell phone because the future is now

Learned what it means to be “in love with” a baby, and was entirely consumed by that love every day, every minute, every sleepless night. Learned about boundless joy, melancholy, sorrow, fear, sometimes in the same afternoon. Learned about exhaustion, but how to keep going. Learned about wonder. Fell even more in love with the husband who drives me crazy and also drives me everywhere. Was grateful. And tired. And happy. 

“‘How do you juggle it all?’ people constantly ask me, with an accusatory look in their eyes. ‘You’re screwing it all up, aren’t you?’ their eyes say. My standard answer is that I have the same struggle as any working parent but with the good fortune to be working at my dream job. Or sometimes I just hand them a juicy red apple I’ve poisoned in my working-mother witch cauldron and fly away.” — Tina Fey 

“There is an unspoken pact that women are supposed to follow. I am supposed to act like I constantly feel guilty about being away from my kids. (I don't. I love my job.) Mothers who stay at home are supposed to pretend they are bored and wish they were doing more corporate things. (They don't. They love their job.)" — Amy Poehler 

“For me, being a mother made me a better professional, because coming home every night to my girls reminded me what I was working for. And being a professional made me a better mother, because by pursuing my dreams, I was modeling for my girls how to pursue their dreams.” — Michelle Obama 

I’ve always loved checking those websites where you can determine exactly how many weeks, or days, or hours between two dates. Between now and when this baby emerged exploded from my own self, we’ve now had 33 weeks—or 233 days to get to know each other. (It was 231 days when I started writing this post. Also, by contrast, this was me at 33 weeks pregnant, give or take a few days. Wowzaaaa.)

So many milestones are happening at once that’s it’s hard to keep up with them! We keep forgetting to mark things in the baby book and having to go back into our terrible recall systems. Did she start doing that at 6 months, or 7? When did that trip happen?

This baby is crawling now. Or rather, “creeping.” She starts out on all fours and then belly flops her way across the living room at an alarming speed. 

The other day I watched her chase Tigerlily in a full circle around the room, pulling herself forward with her arms while laughing and screeching. That poor cat—I can’t tell if she loves the baby, or hates her, or if it varies by moment. When I was pregnant, Tigerlily slept curled around my stomach or in the crook of my legs every night. Now she does the same, but also prowls back and forth between our bed and the crib. TL doesn’t run away when Cora is crying, but isn’t so keen now that her playmate is mobile and grabby. 

Other fun things: she’s using her wooden activity cube to pull herself up to stand. Cora can go from lying down to sitting up to crawling to sitting up, like nothing. She loves laying on her back and rhythmically slamming her legs down as hard as she can—SLAM, SLAM, SLAM—in the crib or the floor. When she sits at a table, does the same thing with her hands. SLAM SLAM SLAM, with a chorus of dadadadas and grunts. She slaps my chest like that, too, when she’s nursing. 

Nobody is sleeping but we’re OK.  

As of Sunday, I felt the sharp buds of two teeth peeking through her gums. Last year I grew her from scratch with my own body and then her own little body grew these things, like it was nothing! Then I felt those from-scratch teeth sink into the flesh of my boobs and well isn’t thiiiis something.

On Monday we’d barely made it to work when the daycare called, first my phone and then Mikey’s when I didn’t answer. A fever, 101. How did we miss it? Her teacher promised to call back if it was worse, which she did not even a half hour later. A wild thunderstorm was rolling in, DNC protestors were swarming the subway, the heat was already oppressive and the baby’s fever was 102. So all three of us just went home for the day. 

Everyone napped, I managed a tiny bit of work, and then we went to wander around Target while the storm raged on. We eyed up some fancy lamps and craft kits, and bought more cool jewel-toned toys “for the baby.” God bless Target forever, amen. 

Here’s my strategy: don’t buy the baby books. Instead, find intelligent, interesting internet strangers and pretend they’re your real life friends. Read their mom blogs that used to be running blogs. Subscribe to a dozen TinyLetters. Send each other encouraging messages about breastfeeding or work. Heart their chubby baby pics on the ‘gram. Care about them even though you will likely never meet. 

Because sometimes, exactly at the moment that you need it, they’ll share something so deeply true to your own experience that it’s like, “wow, maybe I’m not literally the first person in the world to make a baby. Huh.” 

That’s what happened this week, at the same time I was knocking around a bunch of #momthoughts in my dumb ol’ brain. This one’s a leeeetle heavy. 

I remember so many significant milestone days that involve blood in some way or another. Breaking my nose for the first time (and second). In my shoes from marathon training. Periods arriving on the first day of supposedly romantic vacations. Seeing beads emerging beneath fresh tattoo ink. Being covered in it for hours from birthin’ dat baby, obviously. 

And as of two Fridays ago, the first time Cora got hurt and bled on me. 

It was something so simple, us posing for a moment with a donkey statue installed for the DNC—in an instant, she went from smiling and waving her arms to screaming, having sliced open her finger and palm on an unsealed piece of mosaic. 

Babies are “hypervascular,” according to the kind ER doctor who later put blue skin bonding glue and an $100 bandaid on Cora’s little hand while her idiot parents sat gray-faced. Who knew that means the smallest cut, barely a quarter of an inch long, could bleed enough to drip down my shoulder as I ran to a coffee shop, saying nothing to the staff and slamming the bathroom door behind me. Who knew that would mean she’d still be bleeding for a few hours, bleeding through paper towels and bandaids and my shirt, even though she stopped crying the instant I turned the bathroom tap water on. 

On the worst day of my life, it started with a gush of blood in the dark. A startling amount of it smeared on our thighs and on the sheets. I remember sitting in the bathroom, shaking, blinded by the too-bright vanity cabinet bulbs, and unable to focus my eyes past the red on my fingers. We washed it away and went back to bed to wait. 

What could be done? I was only 8 weeks pregnant, had only just seen the first gummy bear version of her on an ultrasound two days before. If something was wrong, it wouldn’t matter if we found out at 1 a.m. or 8, so why not just pretend to sleep for a while. 

I can’t really remember why I was alone that next morning—an important meeting, or some work obligation that kept Mike at the office. Just me, just me and my stupid body. My footsteps became please please please. 

Onto the subway among the usual commuters, wondering why none of them seemed to notice that everything around us was nothing, just blackness and white noise. Just me and my stupid body waiting to be swallowed up by the pit, waiting to confirm what I was sure was true: your baby is dead now because you told too many people that you were pregnant, congratulations. 

It took six hours until I could be seen by a doctor, until they found her little hummingbird heartbeat and the vice grip on my chest finally let go. The answer: sometimes you just bleed. Go home and rest, try not to worry. 

Sometimes you just bleed.

I never told anyone about that until so much later, when I started running with my new friend Jessica and learned that the same thing had happened during her first trimester, except on an airplane. Over the ocean. (Yes, I agree, the clear reaction to that is a hearty fuuuuuuuuuuck.) 

When I told her that I’d also faced a “threatened miscarriage” but never talked about it, she said “No way, I started telling everyone! Because it’s super common and nobody tells you!” Why is this? Why do we not talk about the messy struggles, the things that are apparently so common but so unspoken? I never told people about the bleeding incident because 1. who would care? and 2. it seemed silly to be so upset about “nothing” when ultimately it was fine. The only real outcome was that I had to stay home from work for two days, and skip the Broad Street Run. Surely it’s not worth mentioning. So I didn’t.

This act of self-silencing happens all the time and I’m so sick of it. I do it in life, on Twitter, on my own damn blog. 

I didn’t tell people I was upset about going back to work, because why would anyone care? Most new parents eventually have to go back to work, so why is my problem important?

I didn’t tell people I was experiencing postpartum depression because I couldn’t put a finger on exactly what was wrong. Is that even the thing that I have/had? Or am I just a complainer? Everything I’d heard about it meant that you had trouble connecting with the baby, not that you loved it too much and stopped caring about everything else in the whole world. That you couldn’t fathom ever caring about the things that make you you again. Plus, I passed that little questionnaire at the doctor. 

“Everything’s great, she’s beautiful, no she’s not sleeping, we’re just so busy.” All of that true, but also still not the full story.

I didn’t talk about feeling unsafe in the city, or struggling to stay awake at work, or worrying about money, or feeling left out, or that in my head I was (am) constantly running through lists of ways the baby could accidentally get hurt or we’d get stuck in some kind of public crisis and it’ll be all my fault. 

Until earlier this week, I didn’t tell people that Cora went to the ER. It’s this thing that women do, where we’re always trying not to be a bother. Because I didn’t want to make a fuss. Because there’s more important things going on in the world. And mostly because I want everyone to think I’ve got my shit together all the time. Because most of the time I am totally fine and in control and very happy. Until I’m not fine. 

So all of these thoughts just get swallowed whole, the glob that gets lodged in your throat. 

It was a graduate student at work who made me think differently. When I told her about the donkey statue, she immediately found out who was responsible for the project and gently forwarded the contact info. Someone needs to know about this. Tell someone. 

At the same time, we’ve been talking about the concept of creating a brave space for students, rather than a safe space. In a brave space, we can have difficult conversations and step away from comfort in order to learn new ways of looking at the world. In a brave space, we tell stories and we listen. In a brave space, we are open to changing our minds.

I told someone. The statue got removed until the glass mosaic could be fixed. I tweeted a little bit about some of my #feelings and for once did not delete everything. And then I’m telling you all of this now.

I want to be a brave person. If not for me, than for her. The awesome little girl who stopped crying even though she was hurt, because she saw running tap water and that’s a far more interesting thing to focus on.

See, she’s fine. Not even a scar. My clothes are still stained though.

Around the web:

Some very good aforementioned Tiny Letters to read: Stretch Marks //  Everything Happened // Ashley Says Things // I’ll Be Right Back // Madame Ovary

I’m obsessed with the wigs on Key & Peele and here’s an interview with the woman who just got an EMMY NOMINATION for it

Pokemon Go-ers make me so happy

“Your princess is in another castle” - my friend Peter is a full-time parent to a future programmer and writes wonderful things about the experience of raising a daughter with new aspirations 

Why did this piece on six strategies for re-evaluating “stuff” fill me with low-grade dread? WHO KNOWS. Good advice in this.

Hey, we took our first trip involving an airplane! We went to Boston over Memorial Day weekend, but I keep forgetting to post photos. 

Cora was great (breastfeeding and then asleep) on the flight up, and wide awake on the way back. I got a fever that lasted the whole weekend. Mikey ran a race with our friend Steph. We stayed in an MBA student’s apartment near Boston Common, and got used to the slow pace of traveling with a baby. 

We flew up mostly to visit my best friend and her family and finally see The Castle in action. You’ve got to see this place. 

The Castle is a board game cafe, where for a few dollars, you get to play ALL THE GAMES YOU WANT all day long. I’m rarely in a board game mood, but this place just makes you want to play. The staff will teach you something new and help pick out suggestions, whether you’re playing with two people or 10. With a bonus prize of great coffee, delicious gelato, and a beautiful handcrafted space to hang out. I’m so so proud of them. Can you tell?

 The last time I’d seen Ryn and Kevin was early last July when their kiddo was just one week old. Now he’s a big guy, already walking and climbing all over everything. Looking just like a tiny Ryn, a tiny Kevin, but also his own unique self. In the photo above, he’d climbed up out of his high chair, walked across the table, and climbed down backward into Cora’s stroller. Because it was there to be conquered. 

This trip was big for Cora, who decided that she was done being floppy and way into sitting up on her own thankyouverymuch. It was just shy of her six month birthday, a month that came and went with a burst of physical mobility. 

This city babe also learned about GRASS. Did you know about grass? It’s delicious and also perhaps, not to be trusted. See: 

First of all, we bought a house. 

That was not something I expected to happen this month. Or this year. Or maybe ever? We hadn’t yet figured out the sticky answer to “city or suburbs” and kept assuring ourselves we had time.  

The answer is suburbs, evidently. That’s just how it works — I don’t have a solid opinion or plan on anything until it’s already happening, until the giant boulder is already set in motion and we’ve got to run with it.

It was like that with getting pregnant, too. Should we have a baby? Oh wait, no time for hand-wringy blog posts because I’m already pregnant. Guess we’re doing this, then. As an aside, this is not the approach I want to take to if/when/ever there is a second baby. But who knows.  

As a child of HGTV and TLC home-swapping shows and divorce, I’m constantly browsing real estate listings, constantly daydreaming about the concept of “home.” 

Our lease is almost up and everywhere you look in our tiny South Philly rowhome, there’s just stuff. In piles, in baskets, shoved into bookshelves, thrown into the basement, shoved under the bed, taking up walking space. Stuff that will soon be obstacles for a baby on the brink of mobility. STUFF! 

So I kept daydreaming and started checking listings with a little more purpose.

When I found our house (before it was Our House), I sent this email. That’s about how quickly the rest of the process went. Sent documents to a mortgage place the next day, went on a tour that night, rejected a handful of other houses for good measure, made an offer the following week, cycled through stages of mild to severe panic, moaned about the realtor, did inspections and reinspections, blah blah blah blah blah and now we have the keys to a bigger container for All The Stuff. 

We bought a house! We’re moving to New Jersey! AHHHHH. 

That was all of April and May. But also, a million other things happened at once. Here’s some of it:

Yesterday I was browsing Target on my phone (a favorite stress relieving activity) and daydreaming. Making mental wishlists of cutesy linens for Cora’s room, fake-MCM end tables, a bright teal hammock for the backyard. Typical nesting/Pinterest addict type behavior. 

But it’s also Mother’s Day this weekend, so there was a list of “helpful” gift suggestions. 

Y’all, I do not want a vacuum. 

Do not be persuaded to buy your mother, or any mother, a vacuum as a gift. I hate chores. I already spend most of my precious post-dinner, post-bedtime hours doing chores. I pushed a whole dang person out of one of my top five favorite body parts—please, on this one day, I do not need to be reminded about my lazy approach to housework. 

It’s a theme I’ve noticed and laughed about with Mikey this week. We’re being assaulted with awful, gendered, cliche content and most of the ideas are just different ways to do more housework. DAD! You like mowing the lawn, right?! MOM! Have another crockpot! I know you love the kitchen, because you spend so much time there!

It’s still early, but to my knowledge we haven’t yet morphed into our marketing-prescribed archetypes as parents. Like, it’s been five months and Mikey barely ever goes fly fishing or grills or drinks beer with a novelty koozie. What do you even do with that.

It’s a little late, but here’s a few (somewhat generic) gift ideas that do not suck. YMMV.

None of these are affiliate links, I just like sharing independent artists that I’ve found and admire. Why not support small biz?

Matching t-shirts. But cool ones, that you could still wear on your own. Like this, this, or this.

Art. Something a little different!

This cross stitch hits the right balance of cute and sentimental without being too precious. Depending on your interests, there are also some fun modern-looking kits or more elaborate custom stitch pieces out there. I’m into this trend, when done well.

The prints above are from my favorite place in the gayborhood, Open House. It’s also where I got my favorite inspirational print by Emily McDowell Studios. Or peep this posi little mini print from Josh Lafayette!

Something to wear. If you want to go down the jewelry route, be a little more thoughtful about it. Less of this, all around.

This handwriting necklace is one of the more beautiful custom pieces I’ve seen (it reminds me of the tattoo on my collarbone of my mom’s writing).

You’ll find a ton of birthstone rings around, but none of them have met my criteria so far. I like pieces that are a nod to motherhood without screaming I HAVE A MINIVAN. Like this lovely letter charm necklace -- subtle, sweet, and great color choices.

Things to put on my face or in my face. Being a parent is exhausting, and my face/personality/body generally reflects that. I’m guessing this is universal. 

One of the most thoughtful things you can do for someone in this situation is to 1. feed them and 2. make them feel good. (If we’re talking about me here, please tell me I’m pretty and attractive and not tired.) 

Buy a nice travel mug and fill it with a coffee gift card and some tasty snacks. Or some nice lotion, or face moisturizer, or the fizziest Lush bath bombs. Spend $20 on the honeysuckle soy candle. Or in my case, my dude’s fancy hair pomade. Whatever floats your partner’s boat. A little bit of pampering and self care goes a long way.

A nice-ass card. May your love be expressed as deeply as the letterpress. 

(Nods to Brim Papery and Betsy Ann Paper, shops both run by rad moms and bloggers. They make good things, as pictured above.)

I am pretty excited about my first Mother’s Day. 

It coincides with Cora turning five months old, which is astonishing. She keeps growing up despite our numerous requests to stay tiny. Weekend plans include getting a massage (!!!), taking the beeb to the art museum to see International Pop before it closes, and probably still not having a full night’s sleep. But I want for nothing.

I did, however, get this masterpiece as an early gift. It is the best.