I lay in bed last night greedy in utter darkness. Since having Sun, we keep a nightlight on in her room and sleep with our bedroom doors open. It’s never dark enough for me at night anymore. Or quiet enough. Every time I stir in the middle of the night, I automatically look for that light and listen for the quiet to know Sun is soundly sleeping.

Sun spent the last two nights at my sister’s house, and I’ve had the luxury of darkness. And quiet. A quiet that is different from the quiet that comes from a soundly sleeping child. This quiet was of the knowledge that your child was soundly sleeping and that someone else with whom you have complete confidence is charged with the duty of listening for that break in sound sleeping. I didn’t have to keep my ears cued, my arms ready to welcome a Sun awoken by a bad dream (maybe of an evil witch in her fairy tales?), my eyes adjusted to having a light in them all night.

I lay in quiet thinking, “This used to be the quiet I heard every night.” And although at first blush it may sound the same as the quiet of a soundly sleeping child, any parent can tell you (while holding back a chuckle) that it is NOWHERE near the same.

I miss my Sun. And am delighted to be seeing her in a couple of hours. But, oh, how I miss my nights of darkness and quiet.

We love people for who they are on the inside: how they treat us and others and how they make us feel. We want so much to have that love in a tangible way—so we can touch it, feel it, know it is real—that we fall in love with the person’s very humanness: You love the gentleness of the soul and find that gentleness in the shape of their fingernails. You love the person’s capacity to forgive and see that in their deep, beautiful eyes. You love their voice, the words they say and find that beauty in the curl of their lips. You love how well they listen to you and find your fingers outlining the curves of their perfectly shaped ears.

When I fell in love with Captain Sarcastic over a decade ago and hitched my wagon to his star, the only regret I had was the knowledge that if this was IT, I’d never fall in love again. Sure, you re-connect and re-fall in love, but it isn’t the same as finding someone new and falling in love with their humanness for the first time.

No one ever told me that the romantic notion we have about falling in love is every bit applicable to the love you feel for your child. I smell Sun’s hair or milky breath, I hear her say “Nite, nite, Mommy,” I feel her holding my fingers and plucking my fingernails, and every aspect of her humanness, and my discovery of it, has my earth shaking beneath me. I want to squeeze her and never let go. And when her thin little arms snake around my neck and return my hug, I melt. There is nothing less in the skipping of my heartbeat now than when I first fell in love with my husband.

And THAT is the truest gift of motherhood.

Last week we attended a funeral out of state.  The trip got me thinking good and hard about what family really means.  You hear talk about family being that which you create.  But what of those people whose blood you share?  Who really ARE your kin but with whom you have no relationship for reasons not entirely your own: What meaning do you give these relations in your life?  What do they deserve?  Or, are you cheating yourself by giving only what is required and no more?

I saw a picture of a small child on the wall of the deceased’s home.  It stunned us how much that child looked like Sun.  That child is now an adult; she’s never met her half-sibling; Sun has an aunt, well, two, actually, of whom she has no knowledge.  Even if we want these women in our lives, how do we go about working on relationships 25 years later than when they should have started?  How do you evaluate whether it is now worth the emotional homework to bring them into our lives?

What of uncles that you’ve met once or twice and adult cousins you’ve never met?  How do these out-of-towners ever become non-strangers?  Friending them on Facebook?  That’s hardly enough.

How do you not get suspicious when there’s a hint of being cut out of that to which you are legally entitled?  Even when the same people, your relatives, are being so generous, thoughtful.  How do you give the benefit of the doubt to folks that have only blood to tie you together?

My mind kept thinking of the opening of one’s heart, one’s life, to an adopted child.  And how, as the corollary, blood alone isn’t enough to hold a relationship together.

What does it all mean? Anything at all?

I returned again this year to the Open House of the grammar school we want Sun ultimately to attend.  I walked away confident in our decision to send her there for grammar school but prefer where she is now for preschool.  However, I have since learned that her current school does not offer a 3-day-per-week program like it does for toddlers. Soooo, either school, we’ll be paying for her to attend five days a week.  And since her current school would then cost TWICE as much as her new school, the decision has been made to make the switch in the Fall.

Every time I even think about that last sentence, the air surrounding me evaporates.  I am not ready.  I fear she isn’t ready.  Ok, I think she’ll do fine. Me? Not so much.

I’ve been living these past couple of days wrapping my head around returning to work five days a week; of losing my two weekdays not in the office; of not being with my daughter two full weekdays every week.  Alas.

Since Sun will be going to school five days a week and all of three years old, we feel strongly that she not attend after-care and turn her days into 10-hour ones.  And since her class will start at 8am, 3pm seems a long enough day.  With no after-care as the goal, CS and I plan to rotate picking her up from school, leaving our jobs early on alternating days to get her and do what work we can from home once we get her.  I expect I’ll be picking her up three days a week.

I am currently in the office about 24 hours a week.  Give or take.  This new regime will have me arriving earlier, but every day, and leaving early three times a week.  I expect it’ll get me in the office about 30 hours a week.

Going from 24 to 30 hours in the office, I know, seems like nothing.  And I KNOW many moms work 40 hour weeks away from home and I should be grateful. And I AM.  I AM.  But I still will miss those two golden days I have now that are mine spent at home.  I do laundry, play with Sun, garden, cook, clean, work, nap with Sun; I do whatever Sun and I are up to, and that’s usually just puzzles and dolls and tv and housework.

I fear going into the office every weekday will stifle the decadent golden time I’ve had these two-plus years spent in my garden, in my kitchen, with my young daughter, with time to burn.  I fear it will be a struggle to get into the office an hour or more earlier each day (I HATE mornings) and to get out of the office around 3pm (my afternoons are so productive!).  Can I shift things around and really make the hours mean that more time in the office will equate to more hours being billed?

I have voluntarily worked a reduced load since Sun was born, and it has worked on all levels (well, that reduced income wasn’t wonderful, but, oh, so worth it).  I know I am not good with change, even with change that is good. But I’d expected this three-day a week routine to continue with Sun until kindergarten, and then maybe even beyond for me.  And this sudden about-face has shaken me up.

Our choices, though far more than many families, are not unlimited, and this isn’t the ideal choice for me.  But really?  I KNOW it’s the right choice:  For Sun, our family, my career, and me.  But oh is it gonna be a hard adjustment!

This holiday season was certainly seasoned with ups and downs.  I wasn’t much up for the big bash we usually host and so my sister graciously stepped up to the task.  My in-laws came in and spent two weeks with us.  That would prove to be the brightest spot of the holidays.

And let me take a moment here to say that I’m relatively certain that a certain relative knows of and reads this little blog of mine.  So, em, HI!  I’ve pondered whether to ask or down right tell this relative about this corner of the internet.  But I feel weirded out about them possibly knowing and not telling me.  So we’ll keep pretending in real life if that’s what needs to be.

I am too exhausted to go into the details, but on the eve of Thanksgiving, things with one relative were edgy.   In the end, CS and I spent the day at home with Sun.  We ate ribs.  And relaxed.  It was nice.

Then Christmas Eve found another relative upset with me.  Apparently this has been months in the coming.  At least, that’s what their behavior towards me would indicate.

Then there were some harsh e-mails.

Then the Thanksgiving rough relations flared again on New Years Day.

Lovely, eh?

I see now why some people do not like the holidays and avoid family gatherings.  But the thing is, I LIKE my family members. I don’t like all of them all of the time, but generally speaking these are people I’d chose to be friends with if they weren’t family.  In fact, I think taking that family obligation out of things would make our relationships better.  So I am not shying away from family gatherings any time soon.

My sister commented to me (the way only a sister can and get away with it!) that I am a little… she struggled with the word.  “Not catty,” she said, “I guess demanding. You can be demanding.”  And (okay, pay close attention, I am about to be brutally honest) she’s right.  It’s not demanding, so much as just not polite about asking those close to me for something.  For example, if I were at your party and I needed to know where the napkins were, I’d ask you, “Excuse me, can you tell where your napkins are?”  To my family, I say, “Hey, where’s the napkins?” or worse, “Hey, I need a napkin…” And leave it for the person to know I am asking them to STOP WHAT THEY ARE DOING, including any conversations they may be in, and get me a napkin.

Manners, people. Manners.  Mine aren’t that great around my family.  Ok, there. I admit it.  And this has been seen as me being rude, disinterested, disrespectful.  And dammit I can see their point.

In any event, this leads me to my New Years’ resolution: I resolve to be better mannered, NICER, less sarcastic, especially with my family.

What’s your New Year’s resloution?

It’s never good when my posts are named for Police songs that are 15 years old.

And therein lies the whole of man’s plight. Human time does not run in a circle; it runs ahead in a straight line. That is why man cannot be happy: happiness is the longing for repetition.

~Milan Kundera, The Unbearable Lightness of Being.

The Police and Kundera? This post may be a tad maudlin. And rambling. Feel free to abort now. Oh, you’re going to read more? Kind reader, you’ve been warned.

Last week, discovering I had miscarried and was pregnant on the same day, and having the hormonal roller coaster that such a thing brings upon a woman, I’ve given this “do I have another child” question YET ANOTHER good hard look. Same result. Not the point of my post.

I mentioned one day to my mother-in-law that having another child would mean less resources (time, money, energy) would go to Sun and to my relationship with CS. This was one of many reasons I was espousing.

The next day, she picked up this thread and said, “When I was thinking about having another baby after my first, I didn’t think of it as less time with the first or less time with my husband. I saw it as an opportunity for us to come together even more.” She wasn’t criticizing my logic. Not at all. She was showing how my logic, which is right for me, leads to a far different answer on the family-size issue than her logic lead her.

That conversation opened my eyes to how so many women (and men) view having children (plural). But really it showed how, well, I am not sure if “skewed” is the word, but it showed me how skewed my outlook is. Truth is, I couldn’t handle another child. On any level. And that’s hard to admit. It leaves me feeling a bit broken. To know I am so very different (and, in my mind, deficient) from the majority of people walking the earth.

Coupled with this irritant is that my workload is currently light. Again. And although this was a blessing last week, this week it feels like a curse. Something about “idle hands” but in my case it’s an idle mind.

And that brings me to the Kundera quote. I’ve asked this before (oh, how ironic), but why can’t I just find peace and happiness in having all I ever wanted? Dammit. I’ve got two advanced degrees being put to good use, a wonderful husband and child, and even a mother-in-law who I adore. (Mostly) Satisfying Job: check. Health: check. Good Relationships with Friends and Family: check. (Mostly) Financially Secure: check.

Kundera would say that it’s the human condition to “have it all” and not be happy because human time runs in a straight line and happiness is the desire for repetition. Having it all is NOT repetitious. Once you’ve got it, you’ve got it. There’s no more challenge, no more striving, no strife or struggle even. That’s all in the past, on that straight line. But so too are the moments of joy that accompany the attaining of it all.

I don’t know the answer for my own situation. I don’t know how to allow my straight line of time to hold on to the joy of the accomplishments my struggles in life have given me. I just know that, at least for now, my life is lacking pizazz. Or something.

We’ve dropped my mother-in-law at the airport after a three-week visit. What a crazy three weeks it’s been. And now I am home and Sun is napping and my small house feels large, cold and empty. And that mirrors my heart. Mia is from New Orleans and her love of the city rivals mine. She, like her son, is someone I can sit and NOT talk to for hours. We just enjoy being together more than we enjoy being apart.

When I was dating, the mothers of the boyfriends I’d met were all my mother’s age or older. And I always impressed them as a girl you’d keep around. And I always felt a pseudo mother-daughter relationship with these women.

When CS and I were dating, I refused to meet his parents until I had a commitment from CS. His parents live in Ohio and we were told we’d have his sister’s room to ourselves if we visited. There was NO WAY this old fashioned girl was going to share a room, A BED, in her boyfriend’s MOTHER’S house. And when I did eventually meet his youthful parents (I am the youngest of 5, my mother had me when she was 29; CS is the oldest, his mother had him when she was 20), I didn’t envision them as parental figures. Instead, we became friends. And this visit firmed up that fast friendship that began some eight years ago.

Mia wants to return to New Orleans. Her husband is agreeable to a move if he can find work here. I just keep hoping it will somehow happen. It seems impossible. That it isn’t meant to be that Sun will have her youthful grandmother near her the way I had mine as a child.

I know I’ll feel better day by day as the post-visit blues pass. But dammit. I miss her to pieces.

Sun cried in the middle of the night. We called her to our bed and all three of us went back to sleep. A few hours later, I awoke with Sun in my arms. There was peace. And I thought, “what was that bothering me yesterday?” Then I remembered. And the obligation of guilt kicked in.

Morning rolled in, we all rose a bit later than usual. I returned to the hospital to have more blood drawn then drove in to work for the first time since. I knew I had to get two sets of documents drafted and have lunch with a peer that I’d postponed on Tuesday. I couldn’t face the challenges of the day. Or so I thought. I finagled in my mind how to get things done in the office without my presence. The first step was postponing lunch. Again.

I turned on my computer and the email was already in my in-box: “I’m still on for lunch. Are you?” And I couldn’t bring myself to be weak and say no. Again. So I said yes. And then I got busy drafting my documents.

And work was my saving grace. The time zipped along. It was lunch time already. I met my new friend. We exchanged the married with kids info. He asked, “Just one? Are you going to have another?” And the pang to be honest beat in my chest — tell this stranger about your week, thought I. “Nope, just the one is enough for us,” I answered, not revealing too much to this unsuspecting stranger. “I think that’s great. My mother was an only child. And all the only children I knew did quite well. I am not sure why folks make such a big deal about only children.”

And just like that. My train was put back on its tracks. I felt normal. I wasn’t thinking about what had happened. I was sipping a glass of wine and enjoying the talk of family, law, nice weather in NOLA.

This “it” affected me, is affecting me, in ways I never could have imagined it would. But time is doing its job. And my train is on the track again, chugging along, even if slowly.

Things DO work out. Heh. What a wild ride this week has been.

Looking back, the signs were there.  But when you aren’t looking, how can you see them?

So today when my period turned angry and stopped me in my tracks, I assumed it was what I’m told about ALL my new ailments: It’s yet another sign of aging.

Then the flow got really heavy.  No worries, just a desire for good meds.  Then clots appeared.  Doubt crept in. Could I have been…?  Am I now…?

My mother-in-law is staying with us, and we canceled our afternoon plans so I could wear sweat pants and suffer at home.  She also got me to call my doctor.  He asked if I was sure I wasn’t pregnant.  And then the math hit me.  I mean, it was possible, albeit improbable.  So he asked that I take a pregnancy test and if positive go to his office tomorrow to be sure “nothing’s left behind.”

I called CS at work and explained things and asked him to bring me home a pregnancy test.  And that damn thing showed “Pregnant” faster than I had time to even come close to bracing for such a result.  Stunned, I walked out of the bathroom.  My mother-in-law was walking past the door.  I tossed the stick to her.  She read it and said, “NO WAY.”  Then she brought it to CS, who was running Sun’s bath.

I then went into the bathroom where CS was (and Sun wasn’t yet).  We stared at each other.  Stunned.  Then we talked a bit.  And I realized that CS was under the mistaken impression that I was carrying a viable pregnancy.  I clarified there was NO WAY I wasn’t losing it — hadn’t already lost it.

Then I went to the den and sat down.

Stunned.

Dazed.

Relieved.

I know I’ve posted about our decision to have no more children.  To do no more fertility treatment.  We were coasting along on a “if it happens” mentality.  But when you KNOW it won’t, can’t, happen, you accept it.  And although we felt that we DID have the ability to have another child, and it WAS our decision not to, there was a nagging hint of doubt.  What if we could easily get pregnant?   Have we just decided we don’t want another because of the stress/cost/etc. of fertility treatment?  Were we just “deciding” what was already a foregone conclusion without intervention?

And before I took that pregnancy test I thought, it doesn’t matter what it reads.  Either way, I am NOT having a baby now.  It won’t MEAN anything.  We have no attachment, no expectation.

And then I saw the one word. “Pregnant.”  And my hand shook a bit.  And my nerves shook a lot.

And I sat on the sofa.  Marveling at my own girly parts.  Our fertility doctor had said that if we’d wanted another baby, we’d maybe not even have to do fertility again because my hormonal dysfunction could sort of “re-set” itself after a healthy pregnancy and delivery.

And then I realized that for the past 3 or so years that I thought, no matter what that fertility doctor may have said to me, that I’ve ALWAYS been infertile and could NOT have another child without intervention, that I’d been wrong.  That yet again I’d underestimated myself, my body, and assumed the worst.  That I was just temporarily infertile!  That we really DO have a choice to have another child.  That our decision NOT to have another child is real.  And that decision is mutual.  And right for us.  So instead of tears, there was a small smile.

Tonight, I was liberated.

I CAN, DID, get pregnant without a doctor in the room!  And we really, truly, choose for me not to get pregnant, for us not to have a baby, again.  That nagging doubt?  It too flowed out of me today.  Once and for all.

With this recession going on, and what we me gardening and all, oh, and having a terrible two on our hands, we decided to STOP eating out.  We’ve cut eating out down by about 90%.  Seriously.  I’ve been cooking a lot more, and so has my husband.  We’ve been so thrifty!  I even lost a decent amount of weight on this new plan.

But it was all pretend.

We were play-acting being thrifty.  We were spending less and reallocating money to other sources (like Sun’s college plan).  We didn’t NEED to be thrifty.  And you know what?  It’s kinda fun to pretend to be thrifty.

Then the sluggish economy finally caught up with the businesses of both my husband and me.  And we are each tied financially to what “we bring in the door.”  And although we aren’t eating Spam yet or cutting cable out of our lives, we are facing thriftiness FOR REAL.  We now need to think twice about dropping $5o on a meal.  On occasion, we still do it.  But it’s rare.  And quite the occassion.

And now that I know I need to cut back on spending, I am suddenly on eBay buying crap (mostly nickel and dime stuff for Sun), and buying NOLA books.  And CRAVING eating in a restaurant.  Of course, I KNOW this is my psyche rebeling against this current financial tightening. But I am losing sleep and finding reasons that I need the crap and cannot possible cook yet again.

*Sigh*

In the end, my career (as are most legal careers) is ebbs and flows. I am an expert at being in a Flow and preparing for an Ebb.  There’s always squirreled away something, somehow, to help when that Ebb arrives.  And I KNOW we will ride this recession out, adjusting our work lives and personal lives accordingly, and come out whole and in tact.

But there’s no denying I will miss sushi in the interim.