away.

Christmas has come and gone. The days after always seemed kinda sad to me as a kid, all that excitement and then poof, its gone. My family was never really big with doing anything for New Year's. We'd stay up until midnight watching TV, but that was about it. A few times I'd stay with my cousin at my grandma's house. She'd let us buy all the junk food we wanted and stay up and watch cable. That was a big deal coming from a house where junk food equaled stale twinkies and we had no cable until 1999.

This year, we really didn't do any gift exchanges, all the money is being saved for the baby now. We did go to church with my dad and H's mom, which was nice. The past couple of days its also been nice just to operate on my own schedule. Eat when I want, sleep when I want, move when I want. Everyone keeps reminding us to enjoy this now, because once she gets here, its all over.

Tonight I've decided to start clearing out our extra bedroom. We don't really plan to have a true nursery for her, she'll stay in our room for quite some time. But this spare room is used as a junky office right now, and I want to try to utilize all the space we have in the apartment. I cleared out a file drawer and started looking through old papers from classes I taught during the Spring.

Spring 05 I was teaching composition and literature courses and eagerly awaiting to here about my PhD application at the place I applied. I was very different then, for lots of reasons. Some good, some bad. In just a matter of months, I'm in awe at how quickly things can change. And, at how I have so little control over any of it. Six months ago, I was looking for a full time job so that my husband could finish his Masters full time, work part time, and save up enough for our move because of my acceptance into a PhD program. I felt like I could do anything, and that I had it all worked out.

I got a full time job, and within in a month of that, found out I was pregnant. I still felt like I was on course, could finish working the job, husband could finish degree, hey the baby would even be at his graduation. About two months after that, my husband's mother was diagnosed with breast cancer. We started to think about whether or not we really could move so far with this diagnosis. Granted, the move was still 6-8 months away, but I had to let the school know for sure whether or not I was coming. The doctors couldn't tell us anything other than that she would need chemo after the surgery, and with the surgery not happening until late December, the chemo would not start until the end/beginning of February and we didn't know how long it would last. With the baby due in April and the move scheduled for June, I knew it couldn't be done. I told them I wasn't coming.

So much of the angst and anger I felt initially came from selfishness, I wanted my plan to work because I had created it and I liked it. Nuff said. Then I became angry because I started to feel stuck. Stuck in this city where I've been all my life. Stuck in a job I dread going to every day. Stuck with so few opportunities to actually do what I love, teach and write and research. I just got angry. And then I got sad. So sad, there would be days when I'd have tears in my eyes as I worked. Days when I would cry and half the time not even really understand why. Looking back on it, I know that some of the time this was probably my hormones, but it also comes from this disorder I have. The constant need to be in control and the feeling that I can think myself out or into anything. H says its comes from school, the idea that I can read a book and think or mull over something and come up with an answer in no time flat. I agree, I am so addicted to school and reading that in some ways it probably does affect me socially, but for so long, its just been all that I know.

And now, I know that I don't know. I'm not sure that I'm okie with that, but I've come to that realization. There are just some things I don't know the answer to, and no amount of reading or thinking on my part is gonna give me an answer. If you had told me a year ago, that I'd be pregnant, a full-time secretary, not going back to school anytime soon, and going through the illness of a family member all at the same time, I' d have frozen. And in some ways I have frozen. I have days where I don't quite know what to do, what move to make, and its like I just find myself going through the motions. But I have to believe. I have to believe that all of this is happening at this very moment for a reason.
And I can't ask why, or I can ask but it might not be revealed.

Tonite there are so many different parts of me that feel so far away; my writing self, my teaching self, my worry self, my planning self, my just-make-do or half-ass self. Some of those selves I miss, some of them I don't. This pregnancy has taught me to honor myself and not be half-ass with anything. I want to do my best because I want to set a good example for my daughter. But I miss the teaching and writing selves. I'm not able to dedicate myself to those things right now, there are too many other things I have to tend to. I don't miss the worry self, not at all. As weird as it may seem, this pregnancy has provided me with a calmness I never felt before. It gives me reason to stop and feel. Not only to feel what's going on inside of me, but what's going on around me as well.

That other person I was months ago, just feels so far away from me right now. I want part of her to come back, but I don't know if she will, or if she should.