Family visits

We've been here less than a month, and we already have one family visit planned for the week of Wild Man's birthday. Yetta and Pita will be here; Yetta for the entire week, and Pita only for four days. I'm honestly feeling a bit of frustration over this for a few reasons.

• First, I have a major dissertation deadline at the end of October that I have to meet if I'm going to defend in May and graduate in August. I do not have time (nor do I have the inclination) to take the entire week off and show Yetta the sights, which, despite what C has said to me, will be what happens. Yetta will step off the plain with a list of things to do, and she will passively aggressively say "Well, whatever you need to do, but I'd really love to see X, Y, and Z. But if you need to work, I understand."
• Second, aside from that, I actually enjoy spending time with my MIL. Yes, I am aware that my comments here would indicate otherwise, but I really do enjoy my MIL. We have a fairly good relationship, and when it is just the two of us, I can talk fairly honestly with her. I am actually the one who found the cheap ticket for her, called her up, and asked her to come that week.
  
• Third, Pita called a day after Yetta purchased her ticket and asked C to find her a ticket for the weekend of Wild Man's birthday. Now, Pita has internet access and has the ability to search for tickets herself, but she never does. Her presence complicates things a lot. She and her mother have a highly codependent relationship. They have to be together all the time, can't do anything without the other one knowing about it, and are highly competitive. So for the four days their visits over lap, there will be lots of comments along the lines of "Wild Man asked for me; did you hear that, Mother?" "Yes, Pita, but last night he said 'I love you, Yetta.' Did he say that to you?" It's all very annoying and tiresome.
• Fourth, food is a huge issue when either comes to see us. Both are obese and both have serious food issues. The first thing they will want to do is go grocery shopping, even if I have stocked the house to the brim with food. Yetta will graciously offer to pay for everything, and I will graciously refuse. If I can I'll figure out how to avoid taking either to the grocery store, but somehow one or both of them will end up with me. Pita will pay for her own junk food (and I do mean junk food), so there isn't much I can say to her. Yetta will slip stuff into my cart and then later she'll give C cash to cover the cost of it. That means my grocery bill will double, and I'll end up with stuff in my house like candy bars, chips, brownies, and diet soda (does anyone understand the logic of drinking a diet soda while eating a candy bar? I sure don't.). For their week long visit while I was doing research in June, they did something similar. C told me he spent the entire week policing the food they tried to give Wild Man. They don't understand why we don't just give Wild Man whatever he wants or that we are consciously not using food as a reward or as a comfort. We both want Wild Man to not have an emotional relationship with food. I'll be tense the entire week about food.
• Fifth, Pita is already asking me what we're planning to do for Wild Man's birthday. In all honesty, after the huge party we had last year, I want it to be low key this year. On top of that, we don't know anyone here. We may ask Blue Eyed Girl, the neighbor Wild Man has played with a few times, and her baby sister Brown Eyed Girl to come over, and we may ask Dr. and Mrs. Nice Guy and their teenage boys. But that would likely be it, and it may just be the five of us. I want it to be low-key, mainly because I don't really have the energy for anything big right now. And, as I said, I'll be a week or so away from a major dissertation deadline, so I don't think I'll be up for huge party. They are going to be disappointed with my plans, and you can be I'll hear about it.

All that said, at least C's family is planning a visit. I have no idea when my family will come. My mom did actually get her passport, but neither my father nor brother have. In fact, my father has pointedly refused to get one, telling my mom (I refuse to talk to him about this because really, I don't need any more stress in my life) that he can't afford to take time off to visit us so why get a passport. This, incidentally, is an outright lie. I know how much money my parents make, and while Yetta is in a much better financial position than they are, my parents are not paupers by any means. My dad is retired and is currently working full-time, and my mom works as well. They can afford to take a week off and the airfare to the nearest major U.S. city (which is about $500 cheaper than flying directly into CU Land and only about 120 miles away). My mom has told me she wants to come visit at Christmas, but convincing my dad is another story. My sister does have a passport, but her kids don't. That isn't such an issue in my mind, however, as my sister may be moving about 6 hours away in the near future. I know if she's that close we'll see each other a lot more.

So family visits are a huge issue right now. C's family's visit will bring lots of complications with it, but again, at least they are already planning a visit. Oh, and the questions about our next visit to Home State have already begun. . .

Our new home

Here are some much requested images of our new home, specifically images of the main floor (the town home has 3 floors). Notice the kitchen curtains, which I made one day while Wild Man took a nap. Please ignore the laundry in the middle of the living room; C took these as I was bringing laundry up from the laundry room to fold it and put it away. Wild Man is watching Beauty and the Beast in the background, a film he's been obsessed with for almost 2 months now. I'll try to post images of the bedrooms once we finish painting our bedroom and my office.

Odd things in CU Land

Some things in CU Land are just strange odd to us. This is an image of one such strange thing. Can you tell what it is?

*Both Jennie and Supadiscomama guessed right! This is a bag of milk, although it isn't organic. I still can't justify the $8 for organic milk since Wild Man goes through a gallon and a half in a week. In the province we live in, milk is sold in bags. We purchase 4 liters at a time, which is a bit more than a gallon. The milk is divided into 3 separate bags (so about a liter and a third in one bag) and packaged in a large bag. The grocery stores sell these open pitchers, and apparently most people just put the entire liter bag in the pitcher and snip off the end of the bag, pouring the milk straight from the bag. We, however, are using a more traditional plastic pitcher; we pour the entire liter into the pitcher, which has a lid.

More odd things to come!

Play dates and naptime success

This morning Wild Man and I had our first Canadian play date. One of our new neighbors has a little girl, and they graciously invited us over to play this morning. Wild Man had lots of fun playing in his new friend's play kitchen. In fact, he's had lots of fun playing in play kitchens recently, so much so that C and I are planning to get him one of his own for his birthday. I had a nice time as well chatting with our neighbor and her friend, who has a little boy 9 days younger than Wild Man. We played for two hours, and then we walked home for lunch. Wild Man played so hard that he was falling asleep at the table! So today, for the first time in weeks, he went down for a nap at his normal naptime and without putting up any fuss. I'm off get some work done while he's down.

I have a new hero

Add Christina Applegate to the short list of celebrity women I admire. Applegate, who is only 36 years old, was recently diagnosed with breast cancer. In an interview with "Good Morning America," Applegate announced her decision to undergo a preventative double mastectomy. I admire this decision for a number of reasons, and here are a few.

• Applegate works in an industry that values beauty above everything, and she has willingly "sacrificed" a part of that beauty for her health. She has decided to have reconstructive surgery, but with this decision, she is saying that her health and her life are much more important than her boobs.
• Applegate is going public with this very private decision. To me, this shows that she isn't concerned with her image; rather, she wants to let other women know that this decision, which many individuals and doctors often view as radical, is a viable option. While others on the Situation have argued that celebrities have a responsibility to the public to disclose when they undergo certain medical procedures, namely fertility treatments and plastic surgery, I am not so sure I agree. They are, after all, people too and are entitled to keep their private lives private (although I would argue that the moment you show up at a club opening not wearing panties you have relinquished your right to privacy). I don't believe Applegate is under any obligation to share this information, but I do believe her decision to share it will help many other women facing a similar decision.
  
• She is going so much farther than simply putting a face on the disease. Many celebrities have been open about their battles with various illnesses. By talking about her decision to have a doulbe mastectomy, Applegate is attempting to change (or at least I hope she is) the public's view of breasts. Consider this: she is famous for playing Kelly Bundy, the sexy, buxom nymphette who would have flashed anyone her boobs. Now she is letting it be known that she had said boobs removed to prevent her cancer from recurring. She is much, much smarter than her roles would suggest.

For these and many other reasons (remember when she personally bankrolled the musical "Sweet Charity" because critics lambasted her and the producers wanted to pull out; not only ws the musical a success but she was nominated for a Tony), I am adding Christina Applegate to the short list of celebrity women I admire.

Early Morning

This morning Wild Man woke up at 6:30, and he promptly asked C, who went to check on him, "Hold you, Mommy. Hold you, Daddy." In Wild Man-ese, this means "Father, I'd like to get in bed with you and Mother." Since Wild Man has been waking up between 5:30 and 6:30, we've taken to letting him get in bed with us (another bad habit we'll have to break at some point, but as we've all been through a lot these last few weeks, I happen to think a little family snuggling is in order!). Generally Wild Man snuggles between C and me, by which I mean he takes over the majority of the bed while C and I struggle not to fall off. He then goes back to sleep for at least 45 minutes. This morning, however, he was more interested in whispering secrets to me, so I decided to get up with him, allowing C to sleep in--something he allowed me to do Friday morning.

And you know what, I don't even care that Wild Man woke me up so early. I don't even care that I was up until well after 11:00 helping C put together a desk that had no written directions, only a very complicated diagram. We had to take it apart twice before we finally got it together! I don't care at all. And would anyone like to know why? Because last night, for the first time in our new home, Wild Man did not struggle to go to sleep at all. In fact, he willingly followed our traditional bedtime routine, and he fell asleep by 8:00 precisely. On top of that, he slept straight through the night! I swear I can do anything when I've had 7 hours of uninterrupted sleep. I'll happily wake up with him every morning at 6:30 if he goes to sleep without fuss and sleeps through the night!

Getting to know CU Land and other random thoughts

Yesterday, C, Wild Man, and I did some exploring in CU Land. We found a wonderful farmer's market that is open all year round. I am especially excited about the market as groceries are somewhat more expensive here than they were in Southwest College Town. There was a particularly lovely meat counter (yes, I realize it is odd for me to talk about a meat counter as lovely) with organic meats that are cheaper than the two grocery stores we've visited. Organic milk and yogurt has been cut from the budget though, as it is double the cost here. This means we'll be able to continue buying organic produce and some organic meat. The market also has a nice bagel shop, so we may make having breakfast and shopping at the market our new Saturday morning ritual.

There is a nice riverside park within walking distance of the market, which has lots of nice flower beds, a splash pad, and a playground. We took Wild Man over in the hopes that he'd burn off some energy, but he's been unusually shy in public recently. Today, we decided to continue our explorations, so we visited a local historic site, which includes an actual 19th-century village. Both C and I felt sure Wild Man would have lots of fun wandering around the buildings, seeing the animals, and running through the pastures. He, however, hung very close to us. He actually preferred to be held than to walk. He began to loosen up after the 30 minute wagon ride around the entire site, but he is still being much more cautious around new people than he's ever been. Of course, when we stopped at the small cafe in the village for lunch, he immediately drew the attention of a very pretty 4-year-old girl named Alexis, who promptly asked us if she could talk to the "cute boy." Once she checked with her mother, we invited her over to our table. She tried to get Wild Man to talk, but he steadfastly refused, preferring to bat his eyelashes at her from underneath the brim of his baseball cap. When she returned to her table to eat her lunch, Wild Man began hollering at her "Lessis, come play!" We tried to get him to use his inside voice, but to no avail. He continued to holler at her, embarrassing her and making her parents laugh. He, of course, didn't want to leave after that. Apparently it takes a full belly and an attractive older woman to bring my son out of his shell.

C and I are both feeling more comfortable in our new home. Each day we've discovered something new about CU Land that we really like, so a lot of my anxieties are slowly evaporating. Wild Man is also getting more comfortable, and his napping is improving. Both C and I realized that he seems to have stayed on Central Time; he's waking up around 7:15 or so, which is an hour later than usual (although he's actually waking up at 5:00 and going back to sleep with a little coaxing). He isn't falling asleep until 8:30 or so either. So I'm no longer certain he was (or is) regressing in terms of his sleep. I think he may not have adapted to the new time zone. For the past two days, we've moved nap time back about 45 minutes, and both days he's been asleep within 15 minutes, giving C and I some much needed time to ourselves.

Next week I finally get access to my office, which I'm sharing with someone, and to CU's library. I have a list of about 20 books I need to check out so I can move on to my next dissertation chapter. Somewhere in the middle of everything C needs to find time to write lectures, I need to start rereading the novels I'm teaching, and I also need to finish my Phelps chapter. Getting back to work will feel good, though. I think it will make me feel like we're really getting settled.

Battle of the Wills

As we speak I am involved in a battle of wills with my son. For the past hour and forty minutes he has been refusing to take a nap and I have been trying every method I know to get him to take a nap. Sleep has, once again, become an issue in our house, and frankly, it is making me, once again, feel like a failure as a mother.

Wild Man has been out of school for exactly one week, and every single day in our new home I've fought with him either to take a nap or to go to sleep at night. Yesterday afternoon I was in tears. Monday night he refused to go to sleep until he was so exhausted that he finally fell asleep at 9:30 sitting up in the corner of his crib. Today I started our normal naptime routine at 12:40; the routine was interrupted because he told me he had to poop so I rushed him to the potty (we're giving potty training a shot on top of everything else). After he successfully pooped on his potty, I laid him down on his mat and began to rub his back. It quickly became apparent that he was not going to sleep, and since C was at CU, I was left to deal with it myself. I left him alone in his room for 5 minutes, only to return to find that he had emptied an entire box of wipes. Wild Man generally naps on the floor on a quilt as this has been what has worked for us in the past, but after that, I put him in his crib and let him cry. I then checked on him every 10 minutes. When C got home, about 20 minutes ago, he tried, unsuccessfully, to get Wild Man to calm down and go to sleep. He is still standing up in his crib crying for me, but frankly, I'm spent. I do not know what else to do. I told C that we've been keeping him at home fulltime for a week, and I'm already exhausted. I just want him to take a decent nap so he isn't impossible to deal with in the afternoon. And, frankly, I need a break in the middle of the day to get some work done and to recharge my own batteries. I know he is just testing his boundaries, but I'm at my wit's end. I feel like a failure.

*Wild Man fell asleep shortly after I wrote this, and at C's insistence, I took some time for myself. Granted, I ended up wandering around Home Depot looking at light fixtures and paint, but I still needed some time away. We had a nice dinner, and Wild Man fell asleep with out incident by 8:20. C and I talked about the nap time frustrations, and he thinks part of the problem is that I've been trying to put him down too early. He typically doesn't go to sleep until 1:00 when he is at school, so tomorrow we're backing nap time up 20 minutes and C is putting him to sleep.

I'm tired

That sums it up. The last week has been a blur of unpacking, running errands, and filling out paper work. I said it before: moving to another country is a pain. We've filled out so many forms at various places that it is ridiculous. On top of everything that I'm trying to remember (new address, new phone number, new email, new directions) I now have to remember the Canadian equivalent of a Social Security number. Oh, and the room in the house that is now my office is tan with a weird pink stripe down one wall. Have I mentioned that I can't wait to paint it?

I have a kitchen!

This morning C and I plopped Wild Man in front of the TV, let him watch Beauty and the Beast all the way through, and organized the kitchen. I have absolutely no guilt about letting my kid watch an hour and a half of uninterrupted TV either since I can now cook dinner without searching through cabinets that my brother-in-law (he flew up before Wild Man and I got here to give C a hand with the unpacking) haphazardly organized.

Tomorrow we have to figure out a desk for C as we sold his before we left Southwest College Town. Once we do that, he can finally unpack all his books, which puts us one step closer to order. We're taking it easy, at least for us. C got a lot done before we arrived, so we really only have organizing to do. I figure we'll be all set in about 2 weeks, give or take.

Leaving

Wild Man and I leave Southwest College Town today. We're heading to the nearest big city where we will stay with a friend overnight. We fly to CU Land tomorrow. I have to admit that I'm ready for this to be over. This experience has been exhausting--mentally and physically. It feels like I've been tearing off a huge bandaid as slow as possible, and frankly, I'm ready to be done.

I want to say something to all the friends I didn't have time to write a tribute to, particularly Sarah and Amy Reads. I wish we had been able to spend more time together recently, but as John Lennon sung, "Life is what happens when you're busy making other plans." I hope you both know how much I love you and how much I will miss you. This move is, as I've said many times, bittersweet. I'm so excited about what we will find in CU Land, but I'm very sad to be leaving Southwest College Town.

I also want to add a note to my virtual friends, particularly Jennie and Lillian. You've both been so supportive that I find it hard to believe I've only met Jennie once and I've never met Lillian. You're both very dear to me, and I hope to continue our virtual friendships for a long, long time.

And as both Amy Reads and P-duck said to me yesterday, this isn't good-bye.

To L

Dear L:

As with all the other tributes I've written in the past few weeks, I find myself struggling to write yours. As you know, I'm rarely at a loss for words, so I'm just going to write from the heart.

In many ways, your friendship was so unexpected. On the surface, we have little in common except the fact that we were both pregnant at the same time. In fact, we met because of our pregnancies, and our friendship initially focused on our children. You were my "mommy friend." Wild Man and R were so much alike as infants that I knew I could turn to you after I had endured 5 sleepless nights. You wouldn't just sympathize--you could empathize, as you'd likely been up almost as long (or even longer with R). Being able to talk to you about how exhausted I was, Wild Man's struggles with sleeping, my desire to stop breast feeding even as I loved to do it, and so many other things has been wonderful. Frankly, I'm not sure I could have survived my first year as a parent without you to talk to--at least not with my sanity in tact.

As our boys grew, so did our friendship. I look forward to our daily emails, weekly breakfasts, and pool sessions. As your wonderful husband said to me a few days ago, leaving is hard because our friendship came so easily, so naturally, so effortlessly. I'm also sad to leave because I feel like we won't get an opportunity to know how close we could have become. But I know that isn't true, either. I know we will continue to talk daily, to cheer each other's parenting successes, and to help each other through the frustrations.

Love,
M.

Oxymoron

Dear Oxymoron,

Writing your tribute has been difficult as well, my friend. But difficult in ways that writing the previous tributes were not. When I think of you, Oxymoron, I find myself not wanting to cry but smiling. I find myself thinking of all the outrageous moments we've had together, and I realize there are far, far too many to count. So, in your honor, here is a list of our top ten moments.

M & Oxymoron's Top Ten List

10. Our first beginning of the year party in Southwest College Town: you joked that you needed someone to count the number of beers you were drinking to ensure you didn't get intoxicated and then try to talk to any professors. Mid-way through the evening, you and C were standing around the keg (yes, even faculty parties in Southwest College Town include kegs), and I walked over and said: "Oxymoron, that makes 3, so be sure you don't talk to any professors now!"

9. Fussee hommes!

8. Movie night with the Mormon missionaries: "We're already familiar with God, and we're getting to watch a movie. Could you come back later?"

7. "Oxymoron, could you please close your curtains before you take off your clothes?"

6. Shirley Manson & Freddie Mecury, not to mention a wine-swilling Cyndi Crawford, Wham!, and Ozzy Osbourne

5. The Listening Room

4. Beer Bongs

3. Your naked ass, along with Harrogate's and C's, pressed up against my sliding glass door, followed by you scrubbing my sliding glass door with Windex.

2. "So, I think I knocked up Mrs. Oxy on the day that you and C announced you were pregnant. . ."

1. Balls, balls, and more balls

These memories will keep me laughing for a long, long time. Thanks, Oxymoron.

Much love,
M.

Empty, but blessed

Our house in Southwest College Town is empty, except for the few things we need to make it through the night. Tomorrow, we will get up, have breakfast at our favorite restaurant, take Wild Man to school, and then C will hit the road with our two cats and our turtle. I will then clean out our rented house and take some things to our friends' house, with whom Wild Man and I will be staying until I finish teaching next week.

C and I had a long talk today. He has asked me (well, actually he shouted it because we were both feeling a lot of frustration today) to try to change my attitude about this move. I've been, as most of you know, emotional for the last few days, and that emotion has had more of an impact on my husband than I realized. He thought I was angry with him and blaming him for the move, which couldn't be farther from the truth. Admittedly, right now, I'm not thrilled with the idea of moving, but I do know this is the right decision for our family. CU is an excellent place for C to begin his career as a tenure track professor, and if things continue to work in my favor, this may also be a really good move for me professionally. It is hard to leave people I love so much. But I am so proud of C. He has worked so hard for this, and I really do like CU Land. It is hard to remember that as we say good-bye. So for the rest of my time in Southwest College Town, I'm going to try very hard to remember how blessed I am--blessed to have a wonderful husband and son, to have a terrific group of friends who have become my extended family, and to have really supportive "virtual" friends.

Packed

Other than a few odds and ends, we are packed, and frankly, I am amazed. Two men packed the contents of our entire house in just over 8 hours. Even more amazing, C received a phone call from the person driving the moving van, and the moving van will be arriving in CU Land late Saturday afternoon. This means that we will have furniture by the time Wild Man and I arrive next week. C called me with this news as I was leaving the gym, and my entire mood changed. I went from anxious to somewhat relieved. Now I do not have to figure out how to keep Wild Man occupied for any length of time in an empty three-story town home. C will be able to set Wild Man's room up for him, which will make the transition much easier on him. Now I don't feel like I'm putting him through something horrific.

The Movers . . .

. . . have arrived, and they are methodically packing our house. In the 2 plus hours they've been here, they've already packed our entire kitchen and living room. It is equally nice and disconcerting having someone else do this for us.

I'm thinking and feeling lots of things right now, but my primary concern is Wild Man. He was fairly upset this morning when I left to go teach, and C said he had to stay with him for about 20 minutes before Wild Man was willing to go to his teacher. He apparently kept asking for me, and C thinks Wild Man thought I was going away. That is a fair assumption. He did see me putting clothes into a suitcase this morning. My plan this afternoon is to keep him away from the house as long as possible. Judging from the way the guys (did I mention there is only 2 of them) are packing, I'd say they'll be done by 6:00 or so, if not earlier. I know it will be disconcerting for him to see boxes everywhere, but I'm hoping he'll be able to deal with that better than seeing people packing up all of our things.

P-duck

Dear P-duck,

I've been thinking for days what I wanted to say to you before I leave, and I'm still not sure what I want to say. There is so much to say that I'm having a hard time getting it into a letter.

We've been through a lot together--both good and bad. We've held each others' hands through some fairly awful experiences--car accidents, deployments, and sick babies to name only a few. I want you to know that I wouldn't have had it any other way. I wouldn't have wanted to have anyone else by my side, and I was so glad that C and I could be there for you and Mr. P-duck when you all needed us.

I hope you know that we will be back in Southwest College Town in an instant if you ever need anything.

I love you, my friend, and that really says it all.

M.

To Harrogate

Dear Harrogate,

Yours is the second in the series of tributes I have planned in the next week, and given your relationship with Supadiscomama, it seems appropriate that yours should follow hers.

I love you, my friend, because, despite (or perhaps in spite) of your cynicism about all things political you always manage to find the best in those you love. Your inability to see or even say anything negative about those you care about is so wonderful, and as much as I have mocked you for it, it is the thing I love best about you. But there are so many things I love about you, and I want to share a few with you.

• You are always happy to offer a hug, and as a hugger myself, I appreciate that.
• You constantly remind me that I, in fact, can do what it is that I've set out to do at Southwest College.
• You are one of the few men I've ever met who is willing to let me (or any of your female friends) cry on your shoulder without showing any signs of discomfort, and you often join me when I need to cry.
• You laugh, love, and live with your whole heart.

I want to share one of my fondest memories of you, Harrogate, keeping in mind that there are far too many to count. The day your son was born C and I visited you and Supadiscomama at the hospital. As I held Supadisco-T in my arms, several of our friends asked me about my decision to give birth Wild Man, with whom I was about 6 months pregnant at the time, without medication. The discussion got uncomfortable, and I was upset by it. I tried hard not to show it because I didn't want to take away from the obvious joy you and Supadiscomama felt. But as C and I left, I remember that you pulled me aside and you said, "M, ignore them. If that is what you want to do, you can do it." I will never forget that on one of the happiest days of your life when you had so much more to think about you took a moment to encourage me. I will miss being able to walk down to your office for that (sometimes daily) dose of encouragement, but I know you will continue to offer it up in other ways.

Love,
M.

Supadiscomama

Dear Supadiscomama,

I'm writing this to you because I know that you will tell me to shut up if I attempt to tell you any of these things in person. And frankly, I don't think I could get through this without dissolving into tears if I attempted to tell you in person.

I remember the first day we met, almost 5 years ago now. Your then boyfriend introduced us, and over lunch during orientation we chatted about grad school, life in Southwest College Town, and moving. I doubt either of us realized how close we would become and the life experiences we would share in the next five years.

I could go on and on the things we've done together (too many margaritas and cosmos to count; shopping for shoes and then baby clothes; wedding showers and baby showers; Sex and the City finales and premiers; disagreements and reconciliations; lots of gossip and even more laughs). I simply want to tell you that I will miss you more than words can express. I will miss everything about you, my dear friend, from your blunt way of putting things to the tender way you pick my son up to the way you inspire me to get to the gym. Most of all I will miss just talking to you.

As we have done so many times in our relationship I will rely on Sex and the City to say what I find I cannot say.

In Season 6, as Samantha is battling breast cancer, Carrie tells Petrovsky the following: "Samantha is my friend. She's my family. My insides. She will be fine because she has to be fine. That's how important she is to me." That is precisely how I feel about you.

Love,
M.

Do men really find pregnancy sexy?

I'm still thinking about sex and pregnancy. But now I'm wondering whether men really find pregnancy sexy? According to Angelina Jolie, Brad Pitt finds pregnancy incredibly sexy, and while I do realize she is trying to promote an image of herself and of them as a couple, her comments have made me consider the sexiness of pregnancy from another angle, especially after reading "Pregnant sex brings thrills, fears." I'm not sure what I want to say about this, but I am thinking about it. Perhaps later I will have something more insightful to say, but for now, I'm throwing this out there (and I'm hoping that the few men who read this blog will actually comment): do men (and I mean real men, not Brad Pitt) actually find a pregnant woman sexy? Do most men want to have sex with their pregnant wives or girlfriends? Do men find pregnant women, whom they have no connection to, sexually attractive? I also want to point out, as Academama did in her comment on my original post, there is a difference between finding someone sexy and wanting to have sex with someone.

Freaking out

That sums up how I'm feeling lately. I'm making a concerted effort not to look at the calendar because if I did I would be forced to reckon with the reality that we will have movers in our home in under 2 weeks, which means that C leaves for CU Land in exactly 2 weeks and that Wild Man and I will be moving in with our good friends Supadiscomama, Supadiscodaddy, and Supadisco-T in 2 weeks. All of this means than in 3 weeks from tomorrow Wild Man and I board a plane for CU Land and we will be leaving all of our friends we love so much (in fact, these people are not my friends; they are my family and I really, really mean that) behind.

Add to that the fact that I have to get this damned chapter finished by the beginning of next week so I can focus on getting my house organized for moving and the million other things that have to get done, and I'm freaking out more than a little. In fact, I need to quit blogging and go to work right now. At least if I stop blogging I'm a lot less likely to start crying.

Yard sales . . .

are a pain.

That said we got rid of some junk and made some money. But I'm glad it's over.

Mommy-love

This is a common refrain in our house right now. In fact, it is usually followed by "Away, Daddy!" This means C is often left out of snuggles, hugs, and kisses as Wild Man is very much preoccupied with me. This also means that I cannot check email, sit on the couch, water my plants, wash dishes, or even go to the bathroom out of Wild Man's eyesight. I'm glad my son loves me so much, but sometimes I just need a bit more space. I was reminded of this need for space this morning as I was editing a passage of my Phelps chapter. In The Story of Avis, Avis, who is a painter, is forced to lock her young son out of her studio at one point just so she can steal a few hours to work on a painting. When she unlocks the studio door, "Van, all paint and patience, like a spaniel lies curled upon the floor, with his lips against the studio-door. The stout little lover, faithful in exile, has lain and kissed the threshold till he has kissed himself asleep."

The Sexiness of Pregnancy

I logged on to People.com this morning (yes, yes, I know; I'm colluding in the celebrity nature of our culture.) and saw this headline: "Jessica Alba on Pregnancy: 'I Never Felt Less Sexy." This comes after Vanity Fair's recent interview with Angelina Jolie in which she declares "[Pregnancy] makes me feel like a woman. It makes me feel that all the things about my body are suddenly there for a reason. It makes you feel round and supple, and to have a little life inside you is amazing. . . I’m fortunate. I think some women have a different experience depending on their partner. I think that affects it. I happen to be with somebody who finds pregnancy very sexy. So that makes me feel very sexy.” This got me thinking; does the average woman (and no, I don't think either Jessica Alba or Angelina Jolie are the average woman) feel sexy during pregnancy?

I enjoyed my pregnancy with Wild Man (for the most part), and I suppose I felt sexier for a period. But by the end, which I think is really the part that most women remember the most vividly, I felt far from sexy. Is it now fashionable to spin pregnancy as sexy, or is it, indeed, sexy for some women?

Weaned

Wild Man has been officially weaned for well over a month now, and to be honest, I've avoided blogging about it because I've been surprised by my reaction. I didn't want to wean Wild Man, but as I discussed here I felt like I needed to wean him prior to the research trip I took in June. I didn't want to be away for a week, leaving C to figure out how to handle Wild Man's requests for Mommy and to nurse. By the time we weaned completely Wild Man was only nursing in the evening, but he was still nursing to sleep at least three times a week. Before we could wean completely we had to teach him how to put himself to sleep, which was surprisingly easy. Our trip to CU Land, however, delayed the process because we were in a strange place, and Wild Man was sleeping on a pallet on the floor, not in a crib. In fact, during that trip, he ended up sleeping with us a lot, so even though we had planned to spend that week weaning completely, we didn't wean him until the week before I left for my research trip.

While I was gone, Wild Man apparently only for Mommy a few times at bedtime, and he didn't ask about nursing at all. When I returned, however, he immediately asked to nurse at bedtime, and he wasn't too pleased when I replied "No, you're a big boy, and you don't need to nurse anymore." This continued for a few days, but by the end of the week, he seemed to have forgotten about nursing altogether and hasn't asked about it since. His reaction didn't surprise me, but mine did.

Leading up to my trip I had dreaded weaning. I did not want to wean him, and I knew that if I wasn't going away for a week I probably wouldn't have. I expected to miss those quiet moments we shared together in the evening. I expected my breasts to fill up, to need to pump while I was gone, and to leak for weeks afterward. I expected to cry. And I expected that I would need to fight the urge to nurse him when he asked for it. But none of that happened. I did (and do) miss that time with Wild Man, but I didn't cry, I didn't feel emotional, I didn't miss the actual nursing itself. My body didn't respond at all either--no swelling, no engorgement, no need to pump, no leaking. I didn't want to start nursing again as soon as I saw my son either. In fact, what I felt more than anything was an overwhelming sense of relief. After 9 months of pregnancy and 19 months of breastfeeding, I felt like my body was my own again. And I like that feeling. All in all, I'm pleased that weaning was much less traumatic on both of us than I had anticipated.

Sensitive Boy

Last week, when I picked Wild Man up from school, one of his friends Emmie was crying. She had just woken up from her nap about 10 minutes before I arrived (I so wish Wild Man napped as long as Emmie does; 3 plus hours on average! The teachers often have to wake her up so she can join the other kids for snack time). She was crying because the teacher had asked her to put her puppy in her cubby so she wouldn't get him covered in strawberries, which was the snack time food of the day. When Wild Man noticed Emmie crying, he immediately walked away from where he and I stood by the door and gave her a hug. He then returned to me and told me "Emmie sad, Mommy." I thought "how sweet," told his teachers good-bye, and took him to the car. About 5 minutes into our drive home, Wild Man began crying. When I asked him what was wrong he said "Emmie sad. Emmie need hug." My sensitive boy was crying because he had left his friend crying and he wanted to make her feel better. I again thought "how sweet," and I immediately shared the story with C when we got home.

I've thought about this event a bit over the past few days, and the more I think about it the more it bothers me. Here's why: I see so much of myself in my child. He is thoughtful (well, as thoughtful as a toddler can be), sensitive, kind, independent, determined, curious, and loving. But he is also willful, stubborn, demanding, abrupt, and sensitive. Yes, I listed sensitive twice, which I admit seems sort of odd, especially given that I've listed it along side the not so great traits my son and I share. I do want my son to be sensitive to other people's feelings and sensitive to the world around him. But I do not want him to be overly sensitive. I was an overly sensitive child--I would cry at the drop of a hat. I would cry when I was in trouble, I would cry when I was mad, I would cry when I was sad, I would cry when my friends were in trouble or sad. You get the picture: anytime I felt any sort of emotion (other than happiness) I would cry. And I don't just mean a few tears. I mean loud, blubbering crying that left my face red and blotchy for hours. My siblings, in fact, called me "cry-baby." This wasn't just a phase either. I reacted this way well into high school and college. As I've gotten older, I've become able to control my tendency to cry (especially once I realized that many people regard crying as a form of emotional manipulation, even though I don't cry on purpose; it truly is an emotional response in my case), but I am still a self-described crier. But I don't want my son to be so sensitive that he cries at the drop of a hat; this is one trait that I don't want him to share.

C and I talked about this recently, and he asked me point blank if this is a gender thing for me. I seriously considered that: would I be concerned about crying and sensitivity if Wild Man were a girl? Am I concerned that he will be labeled the overly sensitive boy, a label that could be damaging for various reasons? The answer is no. This isn't about gender for me; if he were a girl, I'd likely be more concerned about sensitivity and crying. I don't want him (or any subsequent children, assuming we have more) to be as fragile as I was as a child. I want him to be sensitive and aware of his emotions without allowing them to overwhelm him, as I really think I did. I don't want people to be fearful of telling him things because they're concerned he'll start crying. I want to figure out a way to preserve his sensitivity while encouraging him to have a thicker skin than I did.

Being "Smart"

Anastasia has a very interesting post about telling her daughter Kizzy she is smart. I won't try to sum up her point, but it got me thinking about my own childhood, how C and I praise Wild Man, and what traits of mine Wild Man has inherited.

As Anastasia points out, many academics were told as children they were smart. While this wasn't the case in my family (my parents are not big praisers; I can count on my hands the number of times my mother has told me she was proud of me, but that's a separate issue), I can relate to this. I was told in school that I was smart, my grandparents told me I was smart, and I was on the advanced placement track in high school. I knew I was smart. School was something I excelled at, plain and simple. In retrospect, I excelled at lots of things, but I wasn't really encouraged. Since doing well in school didn't force my parents to get involved in other activities, it was acceptable. I put much more pressure on myself than my parents ever did. In fact, my mom tells people that I was never punished for bringing home a bad grade because I would always come home in tears and immediately begin studying harder. In contrast, my sister, who is also very smart, didn't care a lot about school. She wanted to have fun and be with her friends (things I also wanted to do, but as my friends were as "smart" as I was, we usually ended up studying together). My sister could have done much better in school if she wanted to. At some point in our childhoods, my sister decided she was the pretty one, and I decided I was the smart one. These labels have haunted us through adulthood and make our own relationship difficult.
My sister has passed some of these hang ups onto her own kids by constantly telling her daughter how pretty and smart she is, and telling her son he is so handsome and smart. I know that she is trying to give them the sense of positive self-esteem that she feels our parents, particularly our mother, didn't give to us. But I've always found her constant mantras of positive self-esteem somewhat troubling and, truth be told, irritating.

With Wild Man, C and I do not tell him he is smart. I mean he is a toddler, so he doesn't yet understand smart. We do praise him when he figures things out, and we do teach him things. But we don't try to pressure him at all. When Yetta and Pita were here a few weeks ago, they constantly commented on how smart Wild Man is and how much he knows in comparison to his cousins. I felt that their statements were more about the way we parent as opposed to the way C's brother and sister-in-law parent than they were about Wild Man. On the day before she left, however, Yetta told C and I that she really thinks Wild Man has above average intelligence and she really thinks we need to encourage that as much as possible.

Here's the thing: it is impossible to tell how "smart" Wild Man is right now. He is 20-months old. Yes, he is learning his letters, his shapes, and his numbers. He listens really well, loves to draw, and will "read" books for up to an hour. He has a rather large vocabulary and is beginning to be able to identify feelings. But he also loves to run, jump, and tumble, and he still has temper tantrums, mood swings, and meltdowns. I was really put off by Yetta's willingness to label his as "extraordinary" because most of his abilities are a product of being in our house. C and I are both academics, so we encourage him to read, to look at pictures, and to figure things out on his own. I don't want him to be labeled as anything--at least not right now. I definitely don't want him to label himself in comparison to others as I did. I want him to know that he will succeed and fail at many things in life, and all of those successes and failures will make him a better person. Most of all, I really just want him to figure things out for himself. I don't want a role or an identity to be imposed on him. So C and I will try not to emphasize one trait over another.

*Incidentally, C was known as an athlete, and even almost 20 years after he graduated from high school, the people he grew up with still think of him that way. And while he loves sports, he feels like this was a path that was chosen for him. As a result, his decision to become an art historian wasn't received very well by his parents (especially his father) or lots of his hometown friends. He also wants Wild Man to figure out things for himself.

Women and Fertility

This morning I clicked on MSNBC's Women's Health page, as I often do, to peruse the headlines and see if there was anything I wanted to read. I found an article entitled "Not ready for baby? Protect your fertility." Before I could stop myself I clicked on the link and read the opening paragraph:

You've yet to hear a single tick-tock, but lurking beneath your killer abs is a biological clock that will start buzzing eventually — and you can only hit the snooze button so many times.

The rhetoric of these types of articles makes me livid for several reasons. I am really tired of the rhetoric of fear that pervades all articles, news shows, and even many commercials about babies, children, fertility, and women trying to get pregnant. Most women know that if they want to have children they have a limited window. Do really need to remind them that they "can only hit the snooze button so many times?" Is is possible for a writer to invent a better (and perhaps more appropriate) metaphor? Can we have articles about men needing to have babies before they're at risk of throwing their backs out when they pick them up?

Granted this article actually focuses on proactive ways women can "protect" their fertility, but even the use of the word "protect" creates the idea of fear. This sort of rhetoric is troubling to me because it implies that women are supposed to have babies, that women who have children when they're older are abnormal, and that all women are dying to have babies. And this just isn't the case.

Jennie

A few weeks ago, one of my bloggy friends, Jennie, and I realized that we actually live with in driving distance of one another. Since I'm about to relocate to another country soon, we decided we should seize the opportunity and meet. So on Saturday C and I loaded Wild Man into the car (and all the paraphernalia that it takes to keep him amused for an hour and a half car ride), and we spent a wonderful day with Jennie, who blogs at My Handful, and her family. It was so great to actually meet Jennie, although it felt a bit odd to know so much about someone I've never actually met. We had a delightful time chatting while the boys played together. I was a bit sad leaving though, as I really think we could become good friends if only we weren't moving to the wilds of Canada.

Thanks for having us over, Jennie. We all had such a good time--in fact, C is trying to convince me to buy Wild Man a slip 'n slide to use for the rest of the summer. But I actually think he wants one for himself.

A love letter to C

Today is C and my eighth wedding anniversary. As I said to him yesterday, some days it seems like only yesterday that we were married, and other days it seems like we've been married forever. I honestly have to struggle to remember my life before C was a part of it. We started dating over 11 years ago (the 12th anniversary of our first date is in October). I realized yesterday that we've spent over a third of our lives together. He is a wonderful husband, father, and friend. I love him for so many reasons; here are just a few.

• I can be a bit much at times, and he reminds me not to take myself so seriously.
• He is my biggest supporter, especially in terms of my work. He often listens to me expound on my academic inadequacies, but he also encourages me to remember that I am smart, capable, and hard-working.
• He makes really good grilled cheese sandwiches.
• He fries an egg just the way I like it.
• Sometimes he gets up with Wild Man (who tends to wake up at the ungodly hour of 6:00 am), closes the door to our bedroom, and lets me sleep in.
• He gives me a big hug when I do the same for him.
• He tells me to go out with my friends more often.
• He goes to the grocery store.
• He stays home with Wild Man when he is sick so I can keep working on my dissertation.
• He wipes off the floor under Wild Man's chair every night after dinner.
• He hangs clothes out on the clothesline for me.
• He rubs my feet regularly and rarely complains that I almost never return the favor.
• He recently apologized for making me move to another country.
  
• He is my partner in every sense of the word.
• He loves me, with all my quirks and neuroses and oddities. In fact, sometimes I think he loves me because of those things.
• I love him because he is C.
  

Holy Cow!

I just read an article titled "Oh Baby! Newborn twins tip scales at 23 pounds." I've always been glad that Wild Man weighed a modest 7 pounds even at birth. Thinking of carrying twins, one who weighed over 10 pounds and the other who weighed over 12 pounds at birth, makes me nauseous and hurt. I will likely never say what I'm about to say about childbirth ever again: thank God for C-sections!

300 Posts!

Apparently some time last week, I posted my 300th post. Yay for me!!

Text Messages

If my sister sends me one more text message today, I'm going to reach through my cell phone and strangle her. I appreciate that she is busy and often doesn't have the time to call, especially considering when she does call I inevitably end up on the phone for over an hour. But I am also busy, albeit in a different way. My sister's job is high stress at various times of the day and the month; during off times, she has work to do, but she is not swamped. Thus, she has time to send 45 text messages on certain days. I'm not kidding; she wants to have entire conversations through one-line text messages. It is really, really annoying.

I know she doesn't call because she assumes I am working--as I have been today. But what she doesn't seem to understand (despite the fact that I have told her this at least twice) is that it takes a lot of time to read and respond to her text messages. And I can't just ignore them because when I do that she sends the same message over and over again until I respond. I've actually taken to telling Wild Man's teachers to call me on my office phone if there is an emergency rather than on my cell so I can turn my cell phone off and ignore my sister.

Confusion, Crying, and then Clarification

While I was on my research trip I received an email from the head of the Women's Studies program at CU, with whom I met when we visited CU Land. During that visit she had asked me to teach 1 course this fall, which I happily agreed to do. Last week's email asked me to teach a course in the fall and in the spring--courses I haven't taught before, but ones I can easily teach. Needless to say, I was very, very excited and responded immediately, telling her that I would love to teach both courses. I felt a huge sense of relief too; I felt like I had a reason to move to CU Land--not just that I was moving because my husband got a job there.

I checked my email a little while ago for the first time since Friday morning, and there was a message from the head of WS at CU Land telling me that due to operational issues she wasn't able to offer me what she told me she was going to be able to in her last email. She then told me the upper-level course on Women's Slave Narratives we'd discussed would be available for the Fall, although she didn't specify which Fall. Given the nature of the email, I assumed that both courses had been nixed due to budget issues and that she was asking me to teach in the Fall of 2009. I emailed her back and told her I understood and asked her to clarify when she wanted me to teach the upper-level course. I then called C, who is teaching today, and explained the situation to him and promptly started crying for a bunch of reasons. First, I haven't not worked since I was 18, and the idea of not working has been creating a bit of an identity crisis for me. Second, C is making a really good salary, but Canadian taxes are high. Over a third of his salary will go to taxes, so the extra money, although not essential to our survival, would have been nice. Third, I really feel like I'm coming into my own as a teacher; I'm at a place where I am confident in my teaching abilities, and I want to keep teaching. Plus, I'm a happier person, and thus, a happier wife, mother, and dissertator, when I'm teaching.

As C was listening to me and trying to reassure me that everything would be fine, I received an email from Dr. Philosophy (this is the best pseudonym I can come up with right now since I don't know this woman very well; about the only thing I do know is that she is the head of the WS program and she teaches philosophy). Apparently I overreacted to her vaguely worded email. She does want me to teach, but because of budget reasons she can't offer me the one-year, part-time appointment which she had worked out. So I will be teaching the upper-level course in the Fall. There are no guarantees for the Spring, but if the course generates interest, I will likely be offered a course in the Spring. It all worked out in my favor, thankfully, but I'm still feeling a bit frustrated that her email was so vaguely worded as to make me think I would not have a position in her program at all this year, and I also wish I was not so prone to assume the worst.

Home

I am home. It was well worth getting up at 4:15 this morning to make a 6:00 flight; I walked off the plane in Southwest College Town at 12:30. C was holding Wild Man, and it took him a few seconds to realize I was standing in front of him. When he realized it was me, he said "Mama," laughed, and literally jumped into my arms. He spent the rest of the day making sure I didn't leave his sight. We even took a nap together this afternoon. He is asleep now, and I'm looking forward to a quiet evening with my husband. I will, of course, probably be asleep very soon, but it is good to be home.

I miss my son

This is the longest I've ever gone without seeing him, and I miss my son. I've gotten a lot of work done and have a lot of fun with D, but I'm ready to go home and kiss my boy.

*Note I did not write all of the following posts today, although it does appear that way. My internet connection has been spotty, so I've written these throughout the week and have only been able to post them today.

New Haven, Day 4

Someone just handed me the original manuscript of The House of Mirth. I am in literary heaven. . .

I also just learned, after spending 45 minutes looking through the letters Wharton wrote around the time she published The House of Mirth, that I can't read French as well as I thought. Apparently if I want to read these letters I need a translator.

As I flipped the letters over I realize that Wharton reused her old typescripts. Several of the letters her secretary wrote for her in 1919 had fragments from The Age of Innocence on the back of them.

New Haven, Day 3

After a rather harrowing morning, we finally made it to New Haven. D isn't the most energetic of individuals, and she opted against going to check on the car last night after we had dinner. She didn't want to walk "that far." Her logic was that she'd parked it at the end of the block around 4:30; following the 2 hour rule, the car was safe until 10:00 this morning. When she went to get it this morning, it was gone. She called me on my cell, and I walked down to help her look for it. I read the street sign on the telephone pole right in front of where she said she'd parked it. It read "Street cleaning every 2^nd & 4^th Wednesday, April 1-Nov. 30 8 am -12 pm TOW ZONE." Yes, her car had been towed. She knows me well enough to know I was annoyed at her laziness, and I know her well enough to know that if I said too much she'd be in a foul mood for the rest of our time together. So we walked back to the apartment; she pulled out the phone book, and I got on-line. Within 5 minutes, she found the department of the Boston Police to call about towed cars, and in another 5 minutes she knew where the car was. She said she was going to take the T (the Boston subway) to get it, and I just gave her a look. (Last night, I outlined my research plan for the rest of the week, and I really didn't want to spend anymore time than was absolutely necessary to get the car back; I really wanted to get to the Beinecke in time to get through the letters Phelps wrote to George Eliot today). She caught my meaning, and she said she'd take a cab if I'd help her hail it. So we went outside, and I got her a cab; she was back with the car in about 45 minutes, and we were on our way to New Haven.

As soon as I started reading the letters Phelps wrote to Eliot, I was no longer annoyed. I hit the jackpot. Not only to these letters directly reference the publication of The Story of Avis as well as the emotional and physical toll writing the novel took on Phelps, but they include some fairly blatant statements about marriage. Most of what is in the letters is expressed in the novel itself, but having it in Phelps's own words will make my argument stronger. My entire trip was worth it just to see these 4 letters.

Tomorrow I will spend the entire day with Wharton, and although I don’t really expect to find anything new, I am so excited to look at this collection.

Phelps to Jewett

Here is a letter, which I transcribed this morning (Tuesday) that Elizabeth Stuart Phelps wrote to Sarah Orne Jewett on 14^th June 1888:

Dear girl:
Are you there? Are you anywhere? How are you? What? Where? Why? Whence? Are you strong again? Do let me know. And when will you come to see me?

Yours always lovingly,

E.S.P.

I love this letter from one friend to another. I especially like that Phelps dispenses with all the usual niceties. She just begins and asks Jewett how she is before demanding to know when she will come to see her.

Boston, Day 2

I think I should have skipped the Ph.D. and just gotten my MLS. This job looks like lots of fun. . .

Boston, Day 1

I spent the day going through the many letters of Fanny Kemble that the Houghton Library has. I'm a bit cross-eyed from trying to decipher her handwriting. I'm not sure at this point if any of the letters I transcribed will be useful in my chapter on Kemble, but as several discuss her divorce from Pierce Butler in detail, I am hoping I will at least be able to use something from them to contextualize the publication of her 1838 journal.

D and I wandered around Boston a bit this afternoon before having dinner in an Irish pub. I'd forgotten how much I like Boston. I lived an hour and a half from the city while I was working on my MA, over 8 years ago. I spent some time in Boston then, but I haven't been here since I finished my MA. It is much calmer than New York, which is a city I also love. It feels smaller to me somehow, which I know doesn't make sense. But as D pointed out, the buildings are smaller, which makes the city feel more open than New York.

This evening D let me use her computer, which has a camera installed, to chat with C and Wild Man. It was good to see my little boy, but he got a bit upset when he realized he could see me but couldn't touch me. When our connections ended abruptly (the apartment we're staying in has a very slow connection speed), he started crying, which made me want to start crying too. He seems to be doing well, and Yetta and Pita, who, for once, isn't living up to her name, are following most of my instructions. C keeps saying, "No, Wild Man can't eat that." Otherwise, things are fine. Tomorrow I start on Phelps. I'm hoping I can finish up at the Houghton in the morning before heading over to the Schlessinger Library, which is part of Radcliffe. Here's hoping I actually find something useful.

Sex and the City: The Movie

I saw the movie on Friday, and it was fabulous. It lived up to my expectations, and in some cases, even exceeded them!

Research

I left this morning for my long planned research trip to the North East. This week I will be in the archives of Harvard and Yale. I'm looking forward to the research (I mean, I'll be looking at the original manuscript of The House of Mirth and letters that Elizabeth Stuart Phelps exchanged with George Eliot), but leaving this morning was not easy at all. C's mom and sister are in town to help C out with Wild Man (I am, by the way, loving the fact that they both had to come to do all the stuff that I do!) and to keep him distracted from my absence. Wild Man knew something was up when he saw me wheel a suitcase down the hall, but he was happily playing with Aunt Pita when C and I left for the airport. I talked to C a little while ago, and Wild Man has only asked for me once. I'm happy to know that he's happy.

My friend D, who was my roommate when we were both completing our MAs, lives within driving distance to Boston, so she's decided to hang out with me for the week. While I'm at Harvard's various libraries, she's going to be finishing up the last chapter of her dissertation. Then she has graciously offered to drive me to New Haven and hang out with me there. I'm glad to have her to distract me. . . right now six days feels like an eternity.

"Sexism and the City"

My good friend Supadiscomama, who blogs at The Rhetorical Situation, and I are having a SATC extravaganza this Friday night. Along with some other lovely ladies who love the show almost as much as we do, we're going to see the movie and then have cocktails while we dish about the movie. Mr. Supadicomama and C are both fans of the show (granted neither is as ardent a fan as either of us), and both want to see the film. Given this, I was interested in the article entitled "Sexism and the City" published in this week's Newsweek. I have read no reviews of the movie and surprisingly little press (I am a fan; I didn't want to be disappointed or angered by "bad" reviews), so a lot of the article was surprising to me. Are most men so anti-SATC as this article describes? Are men so threatened by a film that has 4 women in the lead roles that they have gone on-line to give a film bad reviews, a film that most haven't seen? I don't know what to do with this. I'd like to believe that American men are more mature than this, but I have a feeling I may be wrong.

Baby-sitter success

Despite our worries, last night was a rousing success. Wild Man's baby-sitter, Miss A, who is a teacher at his school, arrived promptly at 6:00, and she listened to all of my neurotic instructions. I kept apologizing for telling her so much; I mean she took care of him for 6 1/2 hours a day for 6 months before he moved to another room. He loves her, she loves him, and they know each other. Still, C and I were both concerned that Wild Man would give her trouble, especially when it came to bed time. But he went to bed fairly easily. And as far as we can tell, she followed our instructions perfectly. She did let him stay up a little later than usual, but I had told her that was ok. Miss A played with him while C and I finished getting ready, and then she started giving him his bath just as we were leaving. Wild Man apparently conned her into reading way more than the allotted 4 books before bedtime, but he was in his crib by 7:40, which is only a little later than usual. He didn't fall asleep right away, which isn't out of the ordinary. He didn't, however, ask for me or ask to nurse, which is huge. He was asleep by 8:00, and Miss A said she spent the next hour watching TV. As C and I drove away, we looked at each other and said, "This is really weird" at the same time. I kept my cell phone on the table throughout dinner, which was super tasty, but she never called. After dinner, we walked around a local fountain for a bit and just talked. It was so nice to put on perfume and a heels, to have a nice meal and to drink a fancy cocktail, and to talk to my husband without worrying if Wild Man was going to try to eat the table cloth, dump ketchup on himself, or have a meltdown. I'm not sure why we haven't done that before, but if Miss A is willing, we're definitely going to do it again.

All in all, it was a wonderful birthday!

A night out

Today is my birthday, and C and I have decided to be extravagant. We've actually hired a baby-sitter, something we've never done before. Wild Man and I just spent the last 45 minutes going through my closet determining which shoes go best with the dress I'm going to wear. Yes, that's right--I'm wearing a dress and heels, we're going out to a fancy restaurant for my birthday, and we hired a baby-sitter all in the same night!

Notes from CU Land

Overall our trip to CU Land was a rousing success. It was stressful, as we tried to cram as much as we could into the 4 days we were there. We looked at about 20 town houses/houses with a real estate agent and 2 rental properties; we visited 3 schools for Wild Man (I wanted to visit another one that was highly recommended by one of the faculty members in C's department, but we ran out of time); and we drove over the entire city at least 3 times in the process of accomplishing these things. Wild Man had a few meltdowns, but overall, he was a dream. I mean, by the end of every day, I was a bit cranky by how much time we'd spent in the car, so I totally understood why he was cranky too. Here are a few highlights from our trip.

• The chair of C's department, whom I am naming Dr. Nice Guy, and his wife, Mrs. Nice Lady, were wonderful. They went out of their way to make us feel welcome and to answer any and all questions we had. Dr. Nice Guy even drove C around town one evening and helped him determine the best areas for us to look at homes.
  
• First, Dr. Nice Guy convinced one of the grad students in the department, who is out of the country for the summer, to let us stay in her house so we didn't have to stay in a hotel room. This was extremely generous of this woman, especially considering all her furniture is vintage (on a side note, the house was cute, but the interior looked like a page out of Architectural Digest circa 1950; everything was retro-modern, including the 1950s toaster that I'm certain she stole from my grandmother!), and one of the house guests was a 19-month-old. Having a kitchen and a yard made our lives much, much easier. In fact, we only ate out twice during our entire stay, and Wild Man burnt off lots of energy pulling Dr. Nice Guy's son's wagon around the back yard.
• Second, Dr. Nice Guy pestered the dean into pestering the head of the Women's Studies department into meeting with me. I went into this meeting with no guarantees of a job and came out 45 minutes later with the promise of a part-time gig. It seems that CU doesn't have anyone who can tackle both race and gender in literature, and apparently their Women's Studies students are very interested in such issues. I quickly explained that I had in fact taught all the courses on my CV. The head of Women's Studies was confused because technically my title is Teacher's Assistant; she thought I had graded for all the courses (about 8 different courses). Once I explained I had taught every one of them myself, she said, "Well, so tell me what you can teach at CU." After brainstorming for about 10 minutes, she asked me to teach a course on Women's Slave Narratives, so I'm very, very excited. She's supposed to get back to me by mid-June to let me know if I'll start in the Fall or the Spring, but either way, I know I will be teaching sooner rather than later.
• Third, Mrs. Nice Lady, who is a teacher at a secondary school in CU Land, explained the Canadian school system to me. By Wednesday, I was getting very, very frustrated with our real estate agent, whom I felt was being dismissive about my questions regarding school districts. She kept saying, "Well, it all depends on where you want to send him. . ." and then would change the subject. It seems that CU Land only has 1 school district, which is very, very good (Mrs. Nice Lady has sent me the stats via email, and I'm really impressed). But we can choose to send Wild Man to public school, Catholic school, or French-immersion school. Catholic schools are fully subsidized by the provincial government, and many of these are very good. I didn't know this, so every time the real estate agent said, "It depends on if you choose public or Catholic school" I wanted to throttle her. Once Mrs. Nice Lady explained this, I suddenly understood: I was asking the wrong questions. C and I have since learned enough to decide that if we're in CU Land long enough we will send Wild Man to the French immersion school, which is essentially a magnate school. It is part of the public school system, but we have to sign him up for the school about a year in advance.
  

Overall, I returned to Southwest College Town relieved. CU Land is a place we will be happy. Now I just have to prep for my upcoming research trip to the Northeast, pack up our house, and finish the Phelps chapter and make good headway on the Kemble/Wilson chapter before we move in August.

We've returned

We got in late last night (well, 9:00, but that is late when you have a toddler with you!) from our trip to CU Land. I'll be writing a lot about it in the next week. After several frustrating days of looking at horrific townhomes and houses that need major renovations, we finally found a 3 bedroom, 1 1/2 bath townhome on Thursday morning (our last day in CU Land) that we loved. In fact, it was so much nicer than anything else we'd seen that we put in an offer. We heard from our real estate agent late yesterday afternoon, and our offer has been accepted. Barring any complications with the mortgage, we have a home! And to make the trip even better, I found out that I will be teaching a course in the Women's Studies Department. I am equally excited and relieved about our upcoming move.

The Moving Saga continues

We leave on Sunday to visit CU Land; we will be there until Friday. The list of things we have to do while we're there keeps getting longer and longer. In an attempt to stop thinking of all of this so I can actually get some work done today I've decided to compile of list of moving issues that are currently stressing me out. I'm hoping that getting all of this down will ease some of my stress so I can get a few pages written today.

• On Sunday evening, as we pass through customs in CU Land we have to apply for C's restricted work permit (he is only legally allowed to work at CU), my unlimited work permit (mine will be attached to his, and I am allowed to work any place that will hire me), and Wild Man's visa (I'm not clear on what sort of visa this is, but apparently he has to have one to be a part of the Canadian health care system). We land around 6:30, which is dinner time for Wild Man. We have no idea how long this will take, and apparently the entire process is contingent upon our customs agent. If we get a nice customs agent, it will go smoothly; if we get a mean one, we could be there for hours.
• C spoke with the movers yesterday, and he learned that we may not be able to take our car into Canada. Apparently, Canadian Customs can refuse to allow a car that was purchased in another country and has a loan through said country into their country. I totally get the purpose of this; Canada is trying to prevent its citizens from crossing into the U.S. to buy a car without paying Canadian taxes, which are substantially higher. But come on! We're already decided to get rid of one car. There is no way we can afford to buy a car once we get to Canada, so this also has me freaked out. C has to fill out a million customs forms on our car, but apparently we could be told that we can take our car into Canada only to be told no at the border. I'm learning that border agents and customs agents have a lot of power.
• We've decided to buy a town house. We've done lots and lots of research on this and feel fairly confident this is a good idea and will be a good investment. We've rule out a house because to get into the school district we want we can't afford a house, but we can afford a nice town house. I'm getting stressed out about trying to find a house we like, put a bid, and do the paperwork in 4 days.
• We also have to look at schools for Wild Man. This was a difficult process when we did it in Southwest College Town, and he wasn't even born then. We visited day cares and selected the one we liked the best when I was 8 months pregnant. I've spent so much time on-line researching schools in the past two weeks that I'm beginning to think I could write a dissertation on daycares in CU Land. This is a big source of stress because he is so happy where he is. I really hate that we have to move him.
• C was finally given access to CU's library database, and I spent about an hour on-line yesterday trying to determine how extensive their literature section is. Let me say that C will be ILLing a lot of books for me. I'm also asking my parents to give me cash for my birthday so that I can start buying the books I use regularly. Apparently CU isn't so big on nineteenth-century American literature. Go figure.

Well that helped more than I would have thought. I am now going to try to figure out what I have to say about Phelps, nature, and transcendentalism.

Wild Man's Entourage

A few months ago, on a trip to Old Navy, Wild Man picked out a stuffed dog that he quickly became very attached to (brown moppy animal pictured in the foreground of the picture). Within days of purchasing said dog, which Wild Man rescued out of the clearance bin, he was carrying it around everywhere and sleeping with it. He became so attached to it that I had my mom, who lives in a different time zone, scour her local Old Navy for extras. Luckily she was able to find two, so Wild Man also keeps a "Puppy" at school and we have a back-up.

About 3 weeks ago, Wild Man decided he needed to sleep with extra friends, and slowly, he began adding animals, positioning them in key places around his crib. First he added Patches the Bear and Ox the Ugly Doll; then came Bob the Brachiosaurus, Chompers the purple T-Rex, Pop, Duckie, Pooh, and Paddington. He then added Penny the baby doll and Spot the kitten. He still holds Puppy while he sleeps, but he also needs all of these friends. If one is missing or not in the correct place, he won't go to sleep. Yesterday he was home with a stomach bug, and he insisted on carrying each animal, individually, to the living room so they would be near him while he colored and we read books. My son has an entourage.

Moving

So here is the reality of my life right now: moving sucks. I know that most of us feel this way, so let me add another element to it: moving to another country sucks.

Don't want to work

Despite the fact that I submitted part of my Phelps chapter to my advisor yesterday and that she has already read and commented on the first 10 pages, I really just don't want to work today. My advisor pointed out an organizational problem that not only helps this chapter but will also help the rest of my dissertation. One would think I'd be excited and ready to get to work. I'm not. I'd rather be doing any number of things. Instead I'm reading and taking notes on Catharine Beecher's A Treatise on Domestic Economy. My life is so exciting.

I wish I had been there!

Sex and the City: The Movie had its world premiere last night in London, and I so wish I had been there!

From 37 pages to 46 pages in the blink of an eye

At my friend Lilian's advice, I decided to figure out what Southwest College's rules on formatting the dissertation are sooner rather than later. I figured if I set my margins now that is one less thing I have to do later. Suddenly my Wharton chapter, which has been stalled at 37 pages for months (as you recall I left Wharton behind to work on Phelps), is now 46 pages, and my Phelps chapter, which was only 19 pages, is now 25. All of a sudden, I feel like I've made some serious progress today. Thanks for the tip, Lilian!

Happy Mother's Day!

Happy Mother's Day to all of the mothers I know and love!

Oh, Canada!

As most of the regular readers already suspect (and many of you know), we are moving to Canada. C was offered and accepted a tenure-track position at a medium-sized research university in Canada. CU (Canadian University) is in a medium sized city, which is relatively close to the U.S. border. We will be returning to the Eastern time zone, although we will not be returning to the East Coast, which is ultimately where we'd like to end up. C received word yesterday that CU has mailed the contract to him; he should get it on Monday. With that knowledge, I feel a bit more comfortable revealing the approximate location of our new home. Frankly, I was a bit worried about jinxing everything!

We are alternately excited and stressed out about the move. Our lives are going to change dramatically. C will be making significantly more money than both of us are making now (but, given that I'm a grad student and he is a full-time adjunct, that isn't really hard to do), but we're still a bit worried about finances because the cost of living in CU Land is somewhat higher. I have good leads on adjunct work, and there is a serious possibility that the English Department at CU will offer me a part-time position for the Spring. The Dean of the College of Liberal Arts is a from Southwest College State, and she has a nephew who attends Southwest College. She seems very eager to help me given this connection between our families. She has, in fact, shopped my CV around at the affiliate schools (CU seems to operate a bit like Oxford or Cambridge; it has affiliate schools for specific areas, including a teaching college and a women's college. Each of the schools has an English department, so I'm keeping my fingers crossed that one of these schools will show interest in my CV and want me to teach at least one class there in the fall.). But for the time being, unless something else comes up, we've decided that I will stay home and focus on my dissertation. Daycare is significantly more expensive in CU Land, so Wild Man will either be staying home with me or he will go part-time. C and I have talked endlessly about a schedule, and I'm fairly certain we can make such a plan work (after all if our friends Solon and Megsg-h at The Rhetorical Situation can make it work while both of them are dissertating, we definitely can!). The Dean has also assured C that the English Department will consider me for partner placement when I'm finished, so that is even more motivation for me to keep on task and get work done.

For now, we're trying to figure out our living situation (we're debating whether to buy in the first year or wait a year) and determining what it means to be Americans living in Canada (we've still got to figure out how to get absentee ballots as CU wants C to apply for permanent residency as soon as we get there). C asked me last night if this makes us expatriates, and I told him I have no idea (Lilian, any thoughts on this?). We are, apparently, emigrating, which is not something I'd ever thought we'd do. I do know that we're in for one interesting adventure.

Summertime

Summer has arrived in Southwest College Town. This past weekend we took Wild Man to the splash pad, and he had lots of fun. In fact, we had to forcibly take him away from the fountains as he was visibly shivering but didn't want to stop playing. Looking at these pictures made me smile so much that I wanted to share them.

Have I mentioned recently how much I love my child?

*Poof! These photos have disappeared.

Sinking in

The reality that we're moving in just over 2 months is beginning to sink in. With that realization, I'm experiencing a lot of mixed emotions. I'm genuinely happy about this move for more reasons that I can count. The biggest reason is that this is a smart move for C, for his career, and for our family. Regardless of whether or not I'm ever offered a position at University X, this is a great job for C's career. If I'm not offered a position and we do end up moving again in the next few years for my career, this job makes C incredibly marketable and will make him much more attractive to any school that would hire me. I'm also excited about this location, about getting to know a new place, and about living in a new environment. The list could go on and on.

Despite my excitement and my belief that we are making the right decision, I'm not excited about leaving the Southwest College Town we've come to think of as home. When we moved here almost 5 years ago, we never would have thought we'd be so happy here. It is a relatively conservative community, in a very conservative state. It doesn't feel like a college town at all; in fact, it feels more like Strip Mall Town. It has all of the negatives of small town life, without many of the positives of living in a city. But it has many things that we've grown to love. We have a community of friends, many of whom we've come to think of as family. I can name about 12 people that I will be heartbroken not to see on a regular basis. In some ways, I think of these friends as people I've grown up with. We've all weathered the many dramas of graduate school together, had children around the same time, and become an integral part of each others' lives. I also have a lot of affection for this place because it is where C and I decided to become parents and where Wild Man was born. It is impossible to drive around this town without thinking "That's where Wild Man did X for the first time." Leaving SCT will be one of the hardest things I've ever done. One of the things that bothers me most about the profession we've chosen is that it requires us to move to places that we may not want to move to, to put down roots in said place, and then to leave that place. C and I love what we do, but I truly hope we don't have to move too many more times in our careers.

I really hate it when . . .

I can't remember why I thought I needed to consult specific books. I've spent the entire morning skimming 5 different books (2 of which I recalled) that I checked out of the library, and I'll be damned if I can remember why I thought I needed to look at them. Each is interesting and has shed some light on the time period I study, but none have yet proven to be specifically helpful to me. I have no idea what I was thinking.

Are you Carrie, Miranda, Charlotte or Samantha?

Since I'm focused on all things Sex and the City lately, Supadiscomama from The Rhetorical Situation directed directed me to a quiz that helped me determine which SATC lady I am most like. I am 50% Miranda, 40% Carrie, and 10% Charlotte. I'm sort of disappointed that I am not at all like Samantha, but I think I knew that already. Given my tendency toward cynicism, I'm not really surprised by the results. Miranda has always been my favorite character. And given the results of the quiz I took yesterday, it makes perfect sense?

Oxymoron, I'm dying to know which SATC lady you most resemble!

One more question

Here is another question that I'd love to hear from all my family and friends about our upcoming move:

When can we visit?

Only 28 days . . .

until Sex and The City: The Movie opens, and I am so excited. In fact, this morning I went to the website and read everything I could about it. I even took a very, very fun quiz to determine which SATC man I would be most compatible with. No surprise (especially for those of you who personally know C): I am most compatible with Steve. If you're a SATC fan, take the quiz and let me know who your most compatible with.

Questions to ask

At Academama's suggestion, I've composed a list of questions to ask the spouse of someone who has just accepted a tenure track position.

• How fantastic! Are they willing to consider partner placement? (Ok, so this question assumes that the questioner has some knowledge of academia.)
• What are the schools like?
• What sort of exciting things are there for us to do when we come to visit you in your new home?
• Will you be able to afford to take some time off and focus solely on your dissertation?
• When can we come visit?
• Do you need any help moving?
• That sounds like a really great opportunity for your family. Are you excited?
• I bet you're really excited, but I imagine you're also feeling a little overwhelmed. It is going to be hard for you all to leave College Town, isn't it? (I'd only welcome this question from someone I know really well, as it would likely make me burst into tears, but more on that later.)
• Wow! Won't you all have fun teaching Wild Man to build a snow man?
• So, when are you going to let Wild Man start participating in extreme winter sports?
• M, you have to wear a sweater in an air conditioned room! Should we go shopping for some warmer clothes?
• Do you think Wild Man will adopt the local accent?

Ok, so admittedly, some of these questions are pretty lame, and I have to say probably not the humor that Academama was looking for while she recovers from her recurring neck problems (sorry, Academama!). But these questions are supportive and understanding and suggest that the questioner is actually excited for us and understanding that this has not been an easy process or decision for us.