Echoes.

Tragic.
I’m really sick of tragic.
I’m sick of things happening that are because of some short slip of judgment, because of some moment of fate, because of just some tiny infinitesimal THING that changes the world.
I’m angry with people that change lives on some bad day of theirs.  That do something that they can’t ever take back.  That hurts so many.

Today was a memorial service for a 22 year old kid.  A good, fun kid that was about to marry his girlfriend of many years, a kid that was finally working a Real Job and making his way in the world.  He was growing up and becoming and because he was stupid when drunk, he’s gone and no one will ever get over it.  Certainly not his girlfriend, who had an upfront and personal view of his violent passing.  Certainly not my parents, who held her screaming in the middle of the street while the police and coroner worked in the house.  Certainly not his parents, woken up in the middle of the night with the worst news any parent can ever receive.

And I’m angry with him.
He was too good for this.
Too fucking good for this.
And I feel this overwhelming weight and sadness at this – this price of living.  Running into tragedy and unfairness even as you run into happiness and miracles.
The mixture is nauseating and overwhelming at times.
And I’m just so mad.

But mostly sad.

I gave birth to an octopus.
I’ve never seen such a baby.
She’s like a ninja.
A cord-eating ninja superhero with the ability to move faster than the speed of light.

At least she’s cute.

I’ve closed the news sites for now.
It’s 1:00 in the morning and I’m still so completely overwhelmed by the events of ten years ago that I am numb on the inside with goose bumps on my arms.
There’s a slight tingling feeling – as though movement is anticipated but impossible.

It’s addictive, looking at these stories.
So completely damned addictive because part of my OCD brain feels that if I look at all of them, every single one, that somehow that gives some closure to someone somewhere.  That I can HELP.
But that’s insane.
And looking is making me insane.

Ten years.

Generations from now they’ll study this in detail in history class the way I studied Pearl Harbor.
They’ll have analyzed and rewritten texts over and again and know so many more answers than we knew – know – now.
The longer term effects will be known.
The health problems of the responders will hopefully be covered.
Perhaps terrorism will be less of a problem.

I hope so.

For me now sleep seems impossible.
I wonder how many others out there are sitting at their computers feeling the same way.

What was once a favorite past-time is now a forgotten hobby.
Ah.
My dear blogging friends.

I’ve no idea how Ms. Erin manages to update as frequently as she does, because her child actually moves about under his own steam at the moment and I’ve had one of those – it takes tons of effort to keep up with them.  In fact, when those of that age are quiet, that’s when you worry!

What is it with parenting anyway – I’ve worked three jobs and gone to school and had more energy than I do now, sitting at home daily with a baby that is pretty much content to sit in my lap, poo through her diapers and chew on her fingers.

Oh.my.gosh.
The poo.
I could write novels about the sheer amount of poo this child is able to shoot from her body.
Women, you know how our weight varies from day to day by a few pounds or more?
Molly’s varies from diaper to diaper.
And you know it’s coming.
Her face starts turning red, marking the beginning of the Olympian effort to comfort her… stomach?
And the grunting noise – like a jet engine mated with a dying hippo.
You can’t forget it.  It’s unmistakable.

And I’m glad my child is healthy.
I’m glad she’s gaining weight prodigiously and I’m glad that my body is producing enough of the right kind of milk for her to continue to be healthy.
I’m equally as grateful that laundry stain remover was invented so my child doesn’t have to wear bright orange garments everywhere.
Because baby poop is ALMOST as good a dye as aircraft paint.

And I know one day Molly may run across the above paragraphs and require therapy and bribery to ever speak to me again.
And I’m okay with that, because as far as I’m concerned, the three days of labor and hellish pregnancy means that we’re even.
Plus, she was doomed to therapy with my genes anyway.
Batshit crazy family that I spring from.

Still – cheesy moment here – I’m loving spending this time at home with her.
I dread ever seriously thinking about going back to work and find myself praying/hoping/wishing on a daily basis that my husband would get a 5 figure raise and this life could continue for the foreseeable future.

Until that time, I’ll leave you with this:  (if you have access to Instagram, upload the app – it’s fantastic!)

The time passes for me rather quickly these days.
I’m not sure if it’s because of the chronic insomnia or the mind-numbing commercials that make their way across the tv screens during my bed rest moments of the past two months.

Today I’ve been back at work 3 days and the mixed blessings of adult conversation and paychecks come  head to head with the sheer motivation it takes to drive across town and walk out in this unholy heat that has blanketed Memphis for the past couple of months.

Baby baking is going much better.  I carry around meds that rattle when I walk – a grand total of 5 or 6 prescriptions with several doctor’s suggestions on over-the-counter medications.  I’ve lugged them all around in a knitting drawstring gift bag, an effort that makes me look both cutesy and poor as hell.
But, I’m not sick like I was.  I just simply have to avoid most foods with taste, barring the few foods that are pregnancy staples – beef jerky, pickles and the like.
Potato soup is my friend and I will eat it until I reach the bottom of the bowl and perhaps further if the soup warrants it.  McAlister’s Deli potato soup has led me through a table or two recently.  It’s delish.

And boy is this an active baby.  Moving early, moving late.  Moving where others can feel it.  I’m only 16 weeks, so this is early… and I can move him – him as a pronoun simply as a guess.  I won’t find out the sex for another few weeks… it’s perverseness of denying me enjoyment in fried foods simply has convinced me it’s a boy.  But I can move him – and must move him, for this baby and my bladder have bonded in a way that cannot be allowed to happen for the next 5 months.

I’m carrying low.  Very low it feels like, especially in comparison to carrying Abbey and every movement is slightly painful in the tender way and causes me to rush to the bathroom in the urge to pee.  The urge the may not have been there a moment before, but the bond that I mentioned struck true again and now get out of my way!  It’s my turn again.

I haven’t felt this sick 100% of the time since… 14 years ago.
Hello, pregnancy.
It’s been a long time.

My parents like to make fun of my absolutely psychotic fear of severe weather.
Not in the mean way, more in the ‘if you don’t turn off that weather radio right now I’m going to stuff it in your ears!’ kind of way.

And sometimes I understand.
I go way over the top.
And the damned this is LOUD.

But last weekend, about 1-ish in the morning, the tornado warning siren came off and I hurried to their bedroom to warn them as I do every time it happens.
Right as I reached them this hellish sounding wind hit, bringing torrential rain so loud that I jumped.  It was terrifying.

The storms continued but we were left mostly unscathed.

It wasn’t until during the week that we found out a tornado hit about a mile away.  To the southwest of us.  A tiny one – only EF-0 but a mile long path of destruction.
The wind and the rain were the remnants that hit my house.

Had that been a stronger storm I’d have never made it the 100 feet in time to warn them.  Or to reach shelter.

How sobering is that?

So while I am paranoid, and the damned radio is too loud… and I’m so aware of the limitations of the meteorologists’ abilities at night with just radar to guide them – I think I’ll continue my craziness.  And probably rudely insist that they move faster next time than the drunkenly-tired movements I inspired on Sunday.
Every second is one more chance to make it to that hallway, that basement, that bathroom.

And it matters.

What a way to make that perfectly clear to me.  In a way that the tornadoes I’ve been through haven’t.

Just realized that my blog has been set in the wrong timezone for forever. 
Meaning that if I’ve written an entry in the morning, it says it’s after 5 or so in the evening.
I was off by about… oh, lots of hours.

But it’s fixed now.
So.  Go me.
Apparently that setting button is supposed to be used for something.