I'm thinking...

Really, I swear I am. In fact, it seems I spend most of my life staring off into space trying to force the gears to turn. Usually I just get a horrible grinding sound and then--nothing. I used to be able to carry on a phone conversation, an IM conversation, read my email, and make notes to myself about my latest literary endeavor at the same time. Now I'm lucky if I can carry on a phone conversation and do the dishes without those long, embarrassing pauses that last until whoever I'm talking to says, "Uh... Carolynn?"

I'm not even entirely sure where my brain goes. I know some mothers report their minds wander in pursuit of such philosophical dilemmas as "Is my toddler ready to poop on a real toilet? Because if not, I've gotta figure out a way to keep those diapers from stinking up my bathroom." My mind, on the other hand, just takes a little hiatus, forgetting to leave a forwarding address. It's an unsettling feeling for someone who is used to having her mind constantly racing to suddenly come upon a blank. It's the same feeling you get when you're running along and all the sudden there's a cliff--WHAT?! Where'd the ground go and where the heck do I go next?

Maybe I should start taking herbal supplements to fix my head; that's supposed to fix the hormonal imbalances supposedly responsible for my sudden disconnects. Another suggestion I've gotten is that I'm just too stressed out, so I ought to just relax--as if I can push a button and suddenly be carefree. Others tell me I need to make more lists (that excuse, at least, got me a nice new cell phone with calendar capability. Really, who needs coherent thought when they can keep their brain in their pocket?). My husband doesn't have any suggestions. I suspect he finds it amusing when his normally verbose wife cuts off mid-sentence and stares blankly at that grape juice stain on the carpet.

My personal theory is that my brain is simply trying to get some of that rest it feels it so richly deserves. After all, it's up all day and a good portion of the night. Maybe my body held a meeting and decided that since most of me can't grab naps as frequently as would be ideal, my brain would be the one responsible to make sure we rest. It does work. I not only stop talking, I stop moving. In fact, I'm kind of surprised that I don't drop things.

Perhaps what I should do is advise my brain to gather all its blank spots for a month, and we'll go have a spa day together. Then I can blank out all day because the nice girls will tell me where to go next, and my brain can have the break that it's obviously dying to have. Yes, I like this suggestion. Excuse me, I think I'll go try and talk my husband into this before one of those brain breaks makes me think what I really wanted was a day in the kiddie playland at McDonalds--

A Corner of my Own Mind

Interesting to look back over my first several posts--the baby that I "broke" at 6 weeks is now a very happy 18 month old who sleeps through the night (maybe that's why I lack inspiration these days; lack of sleep does bring on an almost hallucinogenic state of euphoric creativity) and asks for "jussss" when she's thirsty. We've moved across the country so my darling husband can take advantage of more schooling opportunities (probably means I should update the "about" section of this blog, too). And I've happily become a human incubator for the second time; little Baby StrawBee Grace is expected to "Grace" us with her presence sometime at the end of June, which is approaching much faster than I thought possible. I've started training as a medical transcriptionist, which gives me the vast advantage of typing faster than I did, which is saying something since I averaged about 80 wpm before. Ironically, there has been a direct correlation between how much medical homework I do and the decrease in writing and music in my life. A discouraging fact, but one I must face up to. Maybe next Tuesday.

Basically, my life looks very different from this side of 2009.

Still, through all of these changes, this blog has been at the back of my mind. Perhaps I've been intimidated after feeling like my last post came off so well. I know I'm not in any way prepared to tackle another deep subject any time soon.

I decided I finally had to come back this morning, however, while updating my profile on BabyCenter.com. It asked me where my favorite retreat was and I immediately answered, "A corner of my own mind." I did a double take at my own answer. Surely I have somewhere else to retreat to? A corner of my own mind seems pathetically small when there's a whole huge world out there for me to retreat to. I figured if I thought about it long enough, I'd realize there was a time and place I went to to be "alone."

I soon realized this wasn't the case. From 7 a.m., when Ladybug wakes up and Devin's already gone, until around 11 p.m. when I fall asleep I have to keep company with someone or something besides myself, whether it be Ladybug, chores, exercise, bills, or Devin. This feeling is intensified by the little stranger living amid my vital organs. I don't regret any of this--there's a certain satisfaction from keeping the home running smoothly; Ladybug usually makes me laugh; and I treasure every minute with my rightfully busy husband. But these days, even my mind is getting invaded. My birthing classes are training me to use deep relaxation and mental conditioning to prepare myself to welcome StrawBee calmly and gently--any moment alone with my thoughts that isn't involved in family and home is taken with meditation and reassurance to prepare me for that time.

All I have left is the one little corner of my mind where dwell "my" projects. The ones that don't benefit anyone else, just me and my creative urges.

Looking back over the last few months, I realize my husband has been trying to tell me this since my first stress breakdown around Christmas (there have been several since): I can't live my inner life in just one teeny corner of my mind. But I've been trying to as my sense of balance in life has been skewed by all the expectations I have for what I "should" be doing. I guess when he's encouraging me to take time to "do what I want," he really means to do what I want--not what's next on my "To-Do Before Ladybug Wakes Up From Nap" list.

Time to give that Corner of my Own Mind an airing, I think; a spring cleaning, even. Push out the cobwebs and refresh old projects, even if they (like this post) are really strictly for my own benefit. I have an inkling that I'll find this the most important (and beneficial) type of spring cleaning I could do this year, for myself and for those things that possess the rest of my mind.

Life... or, Death.

The two seem so closely entwined lately that I'm almost convinced they're practically the same thing. And really, religiously, they are practically interchangable. Arguably, I'm actually dead now and waiting for life to come to me in the next sixty years. Regardless, the two are certainly close relations.

Death first, then, since it's certainly more of a leper than my other topic, because no matter how comfortable we can be with death philosophically speaking, there's something terrifying about its coming near to oneself. And in the last two years, there has been a lot of death. At this time last year I was recovering physically from the surgery required after I miscarried for a second time, that time with a fetus I had carried for upwards of four months. Even typing it now brings bile to my mouth; I was a long time recovering emotionally.

That particular brush with death, however, is fairly mundane in the mere facts that 1) It happens to a lot of women and 2) Many people don't really consider it a brush with death. Within a few months of that, however, a man that I knew well from church in Missouri died of a terminal illness that killed him much more quickly than it should have. He left behind a wife and two teenaged children. Later in 2007, in mid-summer I think, a woman from my church who was my older brother's age was killed in a freak accident that left behind a husband and two children not yet school age. I remember watching her with her first baby and thinking that I wanted to be as warm and caring a mother as she was.

Finally, just five months ago (five months? Has it really been that long?) I received a phone call I'll never forget: my niece had died. Later, after a mandatory autospy, her parents learned that she hadn't died from croup or complications from intubation, as had been thought, but rather from complications of a respitory infection. She was almost two-and-a-half. My sister, whom I love with all my heart, will never be the same; neither will her dear husband.

Neither will I, of course. Moments like this make one realize that the veil between this life and the next is only one heartbeat thin. My grandparents are aging and ill; my husband commutes far distances on little sleep for work; my family is spread across the country; my daughter has to sleep in her own bed at night, all the way on the other side of the apartment from me. What if they were to breach the veil while I wasn't looking? It certainly wouldn't take very long.

With these kinds of thoughts chasing me day and night, you'd think I'd be depressed. Surprisingly, I'm not. Granted, I get more upset about certain things. When Devin was late home a few days ago and didn't answer his cell phone when I called, I was startled to realize my hands were shaking as I continued to prepare dinner. Even more surprising to me was when I finally got a hold of him and broke down in tears.

Ladybug thought it was pretty weird, too, from the look she gave me.

The good news is, though, that the thinness of the veil can only mean closer contact for us without actually crossing it. But where is the comfort in that for those who have lost? For them, perhaps, it is preferable to walk through that veil and draw those they love into their arms. If that is the case, how do you deal with such apparently meaningless, random deaths?

I don't pretend to have good answers to that. If you want good answers, I would recommend C.S. Lewis (A Grief Observed or The Problem of Pain) or any Latter-day Saint General Conference reports (available at LDS.org) as they always have at least one article on death, loss, and pain.

If, however, you'd like to hear my own conclusion, here it is:

Life.

It's really simple. Whether life really exists on this side of mortality or the other, the fact is that our lives are currently happening here, right now. We wish fiercely for someone to come back to us, but if that is all we spend time doing then we're really the dead ones because nothing is happening to us. I lived it for several months after that second miscarriage: nothingness. Oblivion. That's what you wish for. But you can't have it. So sorry, but your life -- time itself -- continues without your permission.

There, you see? -- I told you life and death were the same thing. If death is the cessation of mortal life, it merely means that life continues on in another way. As Neal A. Maxwell said: "[D]eath is not an exclamation mark, merely a comma."

So to redefine death: it isn't actually the dead mortal body, but rather the refusal to live the life you're currently experiencing. Therefore, as trite as it may sound, the cure for death is life. Even if you view it merely as a way to distract yourself until you can get to the other life, the one loved ones are living, you may as well fill it to pass the time.

And if you're going to fill it to pass the time, why not fill it with beautiful things?

My cure for death, at the moment, consists on the following:

1. My dear husband, who often drives me crazy. Surely he understands that dishes must be packed in precisely the way I say and no other! But he loves me to a distraction, and as long as I live I won't be able to resist that.

2. My spunky daughter who, at almost eleven months, has been walking for six weeks and apparently entering the terrible twos a whole year early (woo hoo, a prodigy!). Having recently discovered that communication actually works, she gets terribly frustrated when I don't understand her. Teaching her how to explain her needs in a way I understand is a constant challenge and, often enough, a joy.

3. Projects. Boy, do I have projects! 13 days and counting to moving day. I'll soon enroll in a medical transcriptionist course. I want to redecorate the apartment we're moving into. I have several songs rolling around in my head to record. I have two writing projects with my sister, and almost a dozen of my own -- my husband has recently let me know that he expects me to publish to support the family. Plus, Ladybug's first birthday comes up in one month. She gets two parties, since we're moving away from Grandma and Grandpa Dyer, and the first is tomorrow. A caterpillar cupcake cake is on the menu, and there's a frog cake coming up for the actual birthday (would you believe that my child -- my girl child -- loves frogs, lizards, turtles, and creepy-crawlies of all kinds?) that I'm having palpitations about already.

I can only hope that the whenever a jump to the next life strikes, as I know it will (and probably sooner than I would like, given my current philosophical frame of mind), I can remember to dose myself with life when I'm ready to leave behind my mourning. (Yes, I beg, please don't get from this that mourning loss is a bad thing. Anger, sadness, fear -- all normal and good. What I refer to is for when you're back on the horse, not for while you're still on the ground rubbing your rump.) And that when my own turn comes, anyone I leave behind will remember that the best way to hang on to the memory is to live a life that a loved one would not be ashamed or saddened to step back into.

Blouse or Bust...

...My bust, that is. And (I mean this in the nicest way possible) if you can't handle that first sentence, you may want to stop now. I imagine it's only going to get worse from here.

The problem: I cannot fit the top half of my body into a normal blouse. Not unless I want to risk an eyeball when one of my button pops over my buxom bosom. My bust currently demands a size 14, but my waist says it only needs a 6 or so. What's that you say? Why am I whining? Because nothing fits. Not a blasted thing. Even the most innocuous t-shirt buying foray turns into a battle between the forces of fit and style. Does it fit my bust without looking like a pin-up poster? Sure. Do I have a waist? No; apparently it's taken a vacation, perhaps to see the circus residing in the lower half of the t-shirt.

Sometimes I find myself wondering how this came to be. My body has always been rather unassuming. Nicely shaped, well-behaved; generally I dressed it and forgot about it. Ah, the teenage years.

Then I remember what happened. I went and had a baby. Multiply that by nursing for ten-plus months and you have a really good reason for my body to revolt. I just didn't expect it to take the form of a ballooning bosom.

Ah, and I can hear half of you yelling it now, "Hello, you're still nursing! Of course you're still huge!" I appreciate that thought, really I do, but I think I've just given up on it. It's been my mantra since I first measured in a size G bra (yes, as in DDDD). Yet I have gone from nursing my baby around seven ounces every four hours to nursing her not even enough to slake her thirst twice, maybe three times a day and I've only dropped one cup size. My band size has changed from 38 to 32, but those darn cups just won't shrink.

What's more, there's apparently some great fashion faction that has decided that slimmer girls simply do not have ample bosoms. I went through my bras the other day; I have outgrown over a half dozen of them in the last 18 months; most of them were special order because no one carries my size. Granted, of course, there may just not be enough girls who wear my size to make it worth carrying. My theory is that not enough girls know what size they should really be wearing, or think they shouldn't be bigger than a B or C, since apparently it's fashionable to have a small bust (see above comments about trying to find clothes that fit).

My theory about the Fashion Faction is that it's made entirely of women. I know that many complain that men must have come up with all uncomfortable/inconvenient fashions ever designed. However, after several discussion with my husband (who is a man, in case you missed that), I realized that if your run-of-the-mill man had anything to do with it, most fashions would feature curves, curves, and more curves. So I've decided that some group of women who want men to get as little gawking-pleasure as possible has taken it upon themselves to convince the women of the world that toothpick is the best way to look.

Not that I'm saying my figure is the dream figure by any stretch of the imagination. I freely admit that I'm still a few pounds overweight and should be clocking in extra hours at the gym. (Nor am I saying, by the way, that skinny is necessarily bad.) I do think, however, that there are more women out there than will admit it that can't fit their waist and their bust correctly at the same time. A button strains across the top, and the first thought is "Oh heavens, I'm fat!" Never mind the extra inches hanging off the waist.

But I digress. The point is that my bust is out of control, and I think that I must soon give up hope of its ever being under control again.

And yes, I already know that there are plenty of women out there who would love to have this problem... er, bust. Plenty of women, in fact, who would pay to have this bust even. I have but one thing to say to them: What on earth is wrong with you? First off, there's a good chance you really don't want it. You may think you do, but likely you want that perfect C cup that fills blouses just enough to look buxom. Second, my guess is that if there's money spent for implants, there's likely money for tailoring (and let's be honest, if I had money for tailored blouses and custom bras, I wouldn't be writing this). Thirdly, let me just put out there that implants are dangerous - maybe not health wise, but self-image wise. But that's probably a land mine best left for its own post. Conclusion: No one really wants a back-injury inducing, absolutely no-clothes-fitting, busting-out-of-or-drowning-in-everything-I-own rack, and that includes me.

What I am grateful for is that I'm finally comfortable enough with my own body to bash it with a sense of humor. We've been through a lot together, my bust and I particularly, as we've taken care of and nurtured a daughter who now spends half her time running away from us. The difficulties with my bust, and with every part of my body, have brought me to an unapologetic conclusion: my body is what it is. If the world doesn't make clothes to fit it, that's their problem. Only my husband will know how nicely my hips flare from my waist, and I'll keep the circus in the lower half of my shirt until I can find a tailor who takes charity cases. Ladybug digs the clowns anyway.

Sick and Tired. Literally.

Why is it that when we choose to stay up later than normal, something else in our lives chooses to wake us up earlier than normal?

I hit the sack about 12:00 this morning only to discover that, exhausted as I was, I couldn't sleep. So I laid in bed for an hour and finally started to drift off just as Ladybug was waking up to eat. Bless the child. Duly fed and changed, she went right back to bed and so did I. Only, she decided to get up again at 4:30 instead of our agreed upon 8 o'clock. Her pacifier convinced her to sleep for another hour and a half, but since then I've been sitting here on the couch, either feeding her or repeatedly replacing said pacifier to keep her asleep. Although why I should try so hard to keep her asleep when I can't sleep myself I don't rightly know.

And of course, on top of all this, I have some random bug rampaging through my body and gleefully making the most of my over-tired immune system. Oh well.

I've finally learned my lesson, though. For weeks I got frustrated on mornings like this. Now it's more of a stoic acceptance of the facts. Fact One: Ladybug is sort of asleep. Fact Two: I am not asleep. Fact Three: Devin has class so he gets to continue to sleep despite his protestations otherwise. Fact Four: It was my idea to have a baby in the first place.

I'm not entirely certain now why I got the idea in my head. I just did. And when I said, "Devin, I think we should have a baby," he shrugged and said, "Whatever you want, honey; it's your body." Darn right it is! And if I want to completely beat it up, he'll let me do that whenever I want!

A beating worth taking, I suppose. Sometimes I wonder. Fortunately for Ladybug, I spent quite some time uploading family videos to my computer yesterday. The very first one was taken while I was lying in my hospital bed and stuck with more needles and tubes than I wanted to know would fit in my body. Several hours later, we have her first out-of-the-womb movie debut. She was so tiny three months ago! And now she's almost twice her birth weight and discovering that those toes down there really do belong to her. The contrast is astounding and nothing short of miraculous. When I think that a year ago she was made up of two cells, the entire thing becomes mind-bogglingly impossible.

But my darling little beast awaketh, and I really don't want to miss a moment with her, especially an awake-and-pleasant moment. And although I'm fairly certain this post is mostly incoherent rambling, I'll leave it as it is. Proof that there is life after four hours of sleep!