Chasing A Child: From cat puke to fleece

The nice thing about having so many blog friends is that on mornings when you wake up an hour early because a cat is puking at the foot of your bed, you can use the extra hour to catch up with a bunch of people you care about -- without having to leave the house or put a bra on!

And then, if you're like me, you can declare yourself a holiday and tell work that you'll see them next week.

Y'all have been asking me just how broken up I am over our little flirtation with the California baby. Honestly, not very. The Mister says this wasn't really a loss because it was such a long shot, but I know that yes, it is probably a loss of a sort and that it is important to recognize it as such. However, the plain truth is that we were so busy with work and the election that we didn't have time to put too much hope in our baskets about that situation. I mean, yes, the grind of hope and loss does get very old -- it's like I'm a bowling pin that keeps getting set up and knocked down over and over. But you get used to it, and pretty soon it doesn't hurt -- it's just another day in the life: oh damn, that cycle/procedure/pregnancy/adoption didn't work -- oh well, neither did any of the others, so what else is new? The Mister was actually much more hopeful about it than I was. I closed the door in my mind and told myself it wasn't going to happen, and then it didn't happen and I wasn't surprised. It would have been too easy, and life doesn't come easily for me. Everything always has to be a struggle.

Plus, I simply do not have time to mourn all the losses in my life. From where I sit right now, my whole life has been a string of losses (well, except for that last presidential election; that was a big fat win) and bad decisions, and if I took the time I needed to mourn all of it, I'd never leave the house. Truth.

For instance, my period started last weekend. That completely fucked me up emotionally, and will probably continue to do so every month until my body gives up and slides into menopause. I was supposed to be 8 months pregnant by now and I'm not and will probably never be again. That (daily) loss is still much more real to me than the California baby. In fact, I'm not completely convinced that anyone will ever give us a Pacific Northwest baby either (yes, I know intellectually that it will happen, but I don't believe it in my gut).

I had a dream last night that I was holding my new baby and when my new 4-year-old (where did she come from?) needed my attention, I put the baby down and forgot where I put it. So even in my dreams, things are difficult and everything goes to hell just when I think I'm safe. Which is why I do my best to not expect miracles, even when people tease me with the possibility that they might occur. My experience has been that miracles don't happen for me, so I don't expect them, and then I'm not disappointed. And when something good does happen, I watch for all the ways it could go wrong, so that when it does, I'm prepared. This is what the Mister refers to as my "glass half-empty" personality. I prefer to think of it as being a realist.

It's comforting to know I'm not alone in this outlook. Our new neighbors came over for drinks last night. He's a lawyer from Idaho; she's a writer from Russia. We drank a lot of wine and had a nice time. However, the Russian writer definitely has a dark side; in fact, the Mister says that she might be more negative than me. I think he was a bit shocked to realize that such a thing is possible!

He never met my friend J, who I worked with at the Big City law firm. She was one of the darkest people I've ever known, and I learned a lot from her about expressing negativity in a way that makes people laugh (which distracts them long enough that they forget to ask you if you're sure you don't need therapy). In fact, some of my better blog phrases are stolen from classic J-isms. Recently, the group that she works with at the law firm jumped ship to a Big Fancy Law Firm that half the lawyers in the Big City would give their right arm to work for. Is J excited? No, she's mad as hell, because now she's going to be expected to act like a Big Fancy Lawyer, and that's just a pain in the ass. She emailed me on her way to her first day at work to tell me that she was headed to "god knows what." I know her well enough to understand that implied in that phrase is "and they'd better not fucking expect me to put on fucking heels or a fucking skirt suit, because I have 3 kids and no time for that kind of crap!"

And speaking of skirt suits ... the ex-corporate lawyer in me loves this site! Much as I love being comfortable, sometimes I really really really miss being around fashion that doesn't involve fleece. Here's how bad things are -- I actually slipped up and wore a fleece vest to work last week. Aak! My office is very cold in winter, but I'm never going to do that again -- I felt frumpy all day -- and no matter how bad things are, there are certain standards that must be maintained if one is going to live a civilized life!