On: The People from Our Pasts

I've been thinking a lot about my past. Maybe it's because children always make you reflect on life. Maybe it's because, I often wonder how I got to this place. How I made it to the person I am today. 

It would be a joke to think I'm here today solely on my own merits. 

I'm here, the person I am in the place I'm in, not only because, of who I am inside, but because, of the people who touched my life in the past. 

There have been dozens, maybe hundreds, possibly even thousands of people who have changed the course of my life, just by happenstance. However, I rarely think of them.

 Every once in a while, when major changes happen in my life, I find myself thinking about a girl I used to know. 

We'd grown up in the same town, went to the same high school, and participated in the same activities, but we weren't truly friends until after the thrill of graduation, and the realization that the friends we'd made in school weren't friends who could go the distance. 

After my first marriage deteriorated and I found out I was pregnant, she's the person who drove through the night with me from the bright lights of California to the towering trees and cloudy skies of Washington, to escape the unhealthy situation I'd found myself in. 

Two months later, she held my hand as my body fought to save a baby that didn't have a chance, and I lost my son to a medical mistake. 

She is the person who grabbed me by the heart and forced me to start living life again, when all I felt capable of doing was hiding in the dark and crying. 

 There are hundreds of photos of us together. Moments of our lives captured, frozen in time forever. I have them in a box in the closet. I can pull out a photo and remember the exact moment it was taken. A pretty neat trick considering most of the photos were taken while alcohol was flowing freely, and we weren't feeling any pain. 

During those times, my only plan was to live life without true emotion. To have fun, to smile, to have a good time, but to never dig too deeply into my heart, because that is where the darkness would overcome me. I drank to have fun, I drank to be fun, and I drank to hold off the memories of dreams I'd only begun to have. 

Our party days had to come to an end sometime, and that happened when I eventually opened my heart enough to let it heal. I got married to the Marine, moved to Hawaii, and life slowly began again. 

We maintained our friendship through several moves--from Hawaii to Virginia, but when I finally moved back to the same coast, back this time to California, things changed. 

She had her third child, a son, and I wasn't there for the birth. I hadn't been the first person to hear about the pregnancy, and I found out about the birth weeks after the fact. 

We never had a falling out, never had a blowup of any kind. We just got caught up with our own lives. I wish things could be different, but they're not. Life goes on, and some people aren't supposed to be there forever. Some people have a specific job to do, and once it is done, they move on. 

When I think of her, there is a tinge of sadness for the memories of long ago, but there is mostly happiness. 

Happiness, because of the life I have now. The choices she helped me make. The adventures we had that led me to where I was supposed to be. 

I only hope, I helped her as much as she helped me. 

R.S.

Do you have someone from your past that you think fondly of? I'd love to hear the story.

On: A Letter to a Long Ago Friend

I was thinking about you today, and then pictures of your kiddos popped up on my newsfeed. As a person who hasn't ever particularly thought people's kiddos were cute, I've got to say, you and Andrew have made some gorgeous little ones.

I've missed talking to you, and wish that we could have stayed in better touch. I often wonder how it is that we managed to remain close the whole time we lived on opposite coasts, yet as soon as we're on the same coast our lives seemed to have taken us in different directions.

I realized today I no longer know what you do in your spare time or what interests you. The person who was with me through some of my most difficult experiences in life, I don't know anymore.

I'm sure you're just as amazing as you were then, but I find at times it feels like a piece of me disappeared when we stopped talking. 

I'm happy and healthy, and I have a great life. A life so much better than I ever expected it would be after losing G.

I gave birth to my son just under seven hours before G's ninth birthday. I like to believe one brother helped the other into the world.

I hope your life is as happy as mine, and that your dreams and goals are everything you wished them to be all those years ago.

Maybe someday, we'll be able to catch up again, because even though I've made new friends, great friends, there is always a place in my heart where you belong.

R.S.

On: CSI NY

I've spent the last couple of days snuggled on the couch with Boy Wonder, working on posts for my various blogs, and watching CSI:NY on Netflix.

First it was Miami, now it's NY. I'm addicted.

Maybe there's a twelve step program I should look into.

A couple years ago I actually met Gary Senise when he and the Lt. Dan Band came to our base for a concert. He's actually a really nice guy who came off as being very quiet. After posing for the typical fan photo, he asked me to thank The Marine for his service to the country.

What are your favorite shows?

On: Reading, Re-evaluating, and Relaxing

As of tomorrow, Boy Wonder will be one month old. It's amazing how quickly they grow and change, and how quickly they grow and change us.

I'm reminded how important my goals, plans, and dreams are, because each and every one of them are for a better life for my little ones. I'm also reminded, daily, that things take time, and I need to be patient.

There are so many things I want to accomplish, and I'm anxious to get started.

 Anxious to get words on paper (or screen).

Anxious to get back to my pre-baby body, again. Hopefully this time it won't take me four years. It shouldn't since I'm only ten pounds shy of my pre-pregnancy weight and still have two weeks before the six week-get-off-my-butt-and-workout date of July 18. I've been doing what I can to start the process. Eating right, walking, and doing daily yoga.

Unfortunately, I'm still not getting as much sleep as I'd like, but that too will change in time.

So far, my routine doesn't involve as much of my goal oriented focus as I would like. Instead it is full of snuggling with my little man, catching up on all the reading I didn't have the mental focus for while I was pregnant, and taking it easy. These are all important things, and I cherish these little moments, because they won't last long. Boy Wonder won't always want to snuggle, or sleep curled up on me.

I have a tendency to stress myself out when I'm not moving toward a goal, so I spend a lot of time telling myself that each day, every snuggle, every nap, is getting me one step closer to where I want to be mentally, physically, and monetarily.

Not to mention, nothing makes me happier than snuggling with Boy Wonder and reading a good book while he softly snores.

Life isn't always simple, but when it is, it's important to enjoy the simplicity.

R.S.

ON: Getting on With Life

Again, I've been a horrible blogger, but I'm not going to apologize this time.

Instead, I'll try and do better.

Boy Wonder is three weeks old today, and we're still trying to get our routine down. Having a newborn is a huge change for me. It's been almost six years since we had a newborn in our home. Everyone has experienced a learning curve this time around.

For some reason, the first time seemed easier.

Maybe, because the first time, I had nothing to compare it to. I didn't know what to expect, and this time I did. Of course, knowing what to expect doesn't mean things are going to go as expected. Every child is different.

Boy Wonder is no exception.

He's gorgeous, and solid. There is no chub on him other than his cheeks, but he's got some serious weight behind him. If he keeps his body style, he'll be perfect for football. Something I don't even want to contemplate.

However, for the first two weeks he had his schedule backwards. Night was day, and day was night. It was miserable for me. In a house full of early birds, having a night owl proved to be complicated and difficult. When he puts his mind to it, BW can sleep like nobody's business.

He's finally figuring out a better schedule.

Now that things on the sleep schedule front are getting better, I have hopes that we'll get a routine down that will allow me to balance all the other responsibilities in my life. Like writing.

I've missed it.

I realized the other day that a novel I'd written two years ago, but never edited or published, has been niggling at my brain again. The characters want their story told. I hope soon, I can make that a reality for them.

There are also other writing projects I've been sitting on for a while. Some I actually made a little progress on during my maternity sabbatical.

My plan was to have them published before the new year. I'm honest enough with myself to say that is highly unlikely. Getting pregnant and having a baby tend to put a crimp in plans and New Years Goals. I'm pretty sure I'm not going to hit any of those goals mentioned here. Good thing, I'm flexible. That's the thing about goals. They don't go away just because the date changes.

What has been going on in your lives? I'd love to know.

R.S.

The Finish Line: Boy Wonder Arrives

It was a typical sunny day in the desert, and the weather man promised excessive heat for the next four days. I was thirty-eight weeks pregnant, and like every other day of the past nine months my stomach dictated what I wanted to eat. That’s what brought me to the base’s Starbucks at 1107. Before I’d reached the door I could taste the delicious brownie I had my heart set on.

Then my water broke.

In front of six Marines who barely looked old enough to shave.

If things happened the way Hollywood portrayed them, those Marines would have had a story to tell their buddies when they got back to work. Luckily for me, when my water broke, nature took its course and the water was more of a trickle than a gush.

Knowing what was important, I still got my brownie.

The drive to the hospital took six minutes--an eternity when every bump and stop caused a fresh gush of fluid to escape. When my sister and I secured a coveted ‘expectant mother’ parking spot we hustled, or in my case, waddled with a sense of urgency, to the labor and delivery floor.

Labor and delivery at the base hospital is a lot like any other place in the military. A lot of hurry up and wait. Once I was secured into a room and strapped into an uncomfortable bed with monitors and IVs, the real fun started. 

By fun, I mean the lying around waiting for the contractions to actually start doing something.

Five hours after I arrived, the doctor pushed Pitocin into my IV, in an attempt to move my labor along. Every hour a nurse came in and upped the amount of the drug dripping into my body, and every hour was the same. A lot of waiting without change. 

It wasn’t until nine hours and half a season of Veronica Mars later, something finally happened. My contractions stopped playing nice and sent a pain through my body so intense the world went black. It felt like something had broken. The Marine later told me it was probably his wrist cracking when I put him in a wrist lock.

I rode the pain of each contraction, silently for the next hour. Veronica Mars was still playing on the television, but I couldn’t focus on what was happening. I no longer cared whether she was with Logan or some other guy. With each contraction, the pain escalated. By the time I was ready to give up on the idea of a pain medication free birth, the doctor informed me I was too far along. My son would arrive within the next two hours.

For those of you who have never experienced child birth, two hours is an interminable amount of time. It might as well be nine months. I didn’t want to contemplate another two hours of my insides being torn apart by Edward Scissorhands or my own personal torturer--Freddy from Nightmare on Elm Street.  

As it turns out, Boy Wonder wasn’t interested in hanging out that long either.

 Thirty minutes later I demanded, to the room at large, to get the doctor, because the baby was coming. I’m not sure who went for the doctor, or hit the call button, because at that moment I was hoping to go numb from the waist down. Blacking out would have been okay too.

Within moments the room was packed like a frat house on a Friday night after finals. Aside from my three person morale team that included the Marine, my sister, and my dear friend (and work husband), Corpsman K, there was a fleet of medical personnel: A doctor, a nurse, and three Navy Corpsmen. The perfect beginning to a joke.

It was a regular party, and I was the girl on the table.

I pushed for thirty minutes, and during that time I realized some very important things.

 I’m stronger than I gave myself credit for.

 It is possible to silence an entire delivery room with a single look directed at Corpsman K when he made a comment about his arms being sore from fanning me off with a clipboard.

The song Ring of Fire has a whole new meaning to me now.

At 2215 on June 6, 2013 Boy Wonder came into the world. Six hours shy of nine years to the day his brother was born an angel. On the anniversary of D-Day. To the sound of Taps playing across the base.

For the third time in my life, I experienced love at first sight.  

On: The Final Stretch

I've become the worst type of writer and blogger. You know the type. The one who hasn't bothered blogging. To be honest, until a few moments ago I didn't realize it had been quite so long. The days are all blending together.

That might have something to do with the day to day life of a pregnant woman. There just aren't enough hours in the day, enough energy in the body, or enough motivation to keep up with anything more than the basics of living.

There is a light at the end of the tunnel though! I'm nearly there. Boy Wonder is due June 10th, but there is just as much chance he'll be born earlier, because he's showing signs of being more than ready to make his appearance. After spending a delightful day hooked up to monitors in Labor and Delivery last week, the doctor told me she'd be surprised if he didn't come much sooner. It really all depends on him.

Now, I haven't been completely away from the writing bug. I have been working on a new project. Different from my usual writings, but hopefully just as good. If only I could find the motivation to work on it more. Even my motivation to do all the crafty things I've been doing in preparation for my son's arrival, have waned. Luckily, this happened after I finished the diaper bag, the changing pad, the burp cloths, the blankets, and the car seat wrap.

Everything is ready. I'm just waiting on him.

How have you all been?

R.S.