.ebb and flow.

The space inside my head is a tangle of webs and spiders.  Webs catch whatever is good and the spiders work quickly to drain, leaving behind dried husks that blow away with the slightest breeze.  I try to dip inside and pull out something meaningful or at least something worth rummaging around for but all I come up with is soft gauzy wisps of nothingness and dessicated remnants.

Two clear days are followed by a day nailed together with gloom and self-loathing.  Today I am carrying with me my hammer. 

I'm not sleeping well.  I can hear the hands from a not-really-there alarm clock ticking, ticking, ticking.  Only I don't know what it is ticking toward or if I should be worried.  

My baths are so hot that they turn my skin pink.  I tell myself to relax.  To breathe.  Everything is going to be fine.  But I know that there are no guarantees.  Statistics are our bedtime stories.  Fairy tales.

After three days spent back "home" Leif is excited about things to come.  Right now I am just relieved that he is here with me.  Safe. 

I think I am too indulgent.  That was the word I was looking for all this time.  Someone else found it and presented it to me without even knowing that she did.  Her words giving a form to my thought.

Today I am the mangled mess of metal and rubber that people slow down in their cars to look at and cringe.  That girl is so broken. 

.now with 50% less words.

I haven't felt much like writing here this week.  At least not about cheery topics like my dead baby. 

Maybe it is because I've been walking a lot, like as in many, many miles nearly everyday.  It is like I just discovered that you can get to Place B from Place A using only your feet.  Imagine that?  I just put in my headphones and my life is suddenly accompanied by a soundtrack of songs from The Shins, Circulatory System, Radiohead, and Elvis Presley.  Is it possible that I work out all the stuff I need to during those walks without having the need to do it here?

Maybe it is because my board exam is coming up in just over two weeks and I have entered survival mode.  The place where I can function with only one goal in mind; do not fail this exam, oh please, oh please, oh please.

Maybe it is because I have something to look forward to in our upcoming vacation.  Sandy beaches and warm water.

Maybe it is because my heart is slowly making scars around the places where I had to stitch it back together again after it shattered into a million pieces.

Maybe I am just exhausted. 

.video kitties.

Strays from leif on Vimeo.

Pretty good, husband, pretty good.

.thar she blows.

Isn't she lovely in all her gaudy glory?

.thirty-something and a few more wrinkles.

I can't really be sure yet but I don't think much has changed in me since yesterday except that yesterday I was thirty and today I am thirty-one.  Yesterday I was thirty and today I am thirty-something. 

Turning thirty was a big deal.  Only it wasn't.  I had a birthday party at a bar.  I got drunk.  I ate red velvet cake.  For the week leading up to my birthday I laughed with my husband that he should buy me therapy as my gift and if not psychological therapy then medical therapy- as in botox.  I was joking.  Only I wasn't.

Hours after waking up on day one of my thirtieth year of life I was like, This is it?  This is thirty? This is what the fuss was all about?  I'm taking back the botox and therapy and exchanging them for a sensible pair of shoes.  Ones that won't blister my feet.

Thirty was twenty-nine only with longer hair and a great deal more tears.

Turning thirty-something wasn't a big deal.  Only it was.  I woke up and ate Leif's tasty pancakes made from a recipe for waffles.  I found a velvet painting of a tall ship at a thrift store.  I had lunch with my family and ate ice cream at a Baskin Robbins.  I cried because I wished my baby was alive and because I wasn't supposed to be having this birthday without him.  For the week leading up to my birthday I wished that I could just skip it and get another shot at making thirty consist of 100% less death than it had the first time.  I was joking.  Only I wasn't.

Hours after waking up on day one of my thirty-first year of life I am like,  This is it.  This is thirty-something without him.  This is what all the fuss was about.  I'm exchanging my sensible pair of shoes for more sessions with my therapist.

I'm keeping my fingers crossed that thirty-one will be twenty-nine only with more employment and only a moderate amount of more tears.

.irene.

Tomorrow my grandma would be 94 years old. 

She died in December of 2006, six months before Leif and I got married.  When I think about our wedding I also think about how she wasn't there to celebrate with us. 

The last couple years of her life her memory was starting to fade and so she would often repeat her favorite stories, which I think is the prerogative of anyone over the age of 80.  Every time she saw Leif she would faithfully comment on how his name was very Swedish, which made her Swedish-Irish self very happy.   But her favorite story and the one most commonly heard was the one about how she and my grandfather met.  She was working at a newspaper and he came in one day, for a reason I can't recall at the moment, and asked her if she would like to go into the darkroom with him.  He was an amateur photographer and the offer was completely innocent (I think, but grandma was a looker so who knows) but it was funny in its inappropriateness. 

She was also a pilot, which was no small accomplishment in those days, and was very close to joining the Women Airforce Service Pilots of WWII.  Instead she got married and moved with my grandpa, a petroleum engineer, all over the US and later the world.  She raised three children while living in Lebanon and Libya.

Once, years after my grandpa died she told me how she still dreamed of him every night. 

When George died one of my thoughts afterward was of grandma and how much I wished she was still around.  I thought maybe she would have something to tell me that would help ease the pain a little bit. 

This was the second to the last time I ever saw her.  We were celebrating her 90th birthday. 

She was pretty amazing.

.now we just need more guests to sit in them.

Our flea market chairs are finished.  Huzzah!!!  I feel strangely accomplished, even though I didn't do much of the work myself aside from choosing the upholstery and a wee bit of staining and sanding.

This is what the rocker looked like after we (by we I hope you know I mean Leif) finished most of the sanding.

I think we messed up on the measurements for the back cushion on the rocker because it is about three inches too tall.  We also want to get the base fixed with webbing so it is more comfortable but...it has taken us forever to finally get these done.  So I'm not sure if I just want to call it a day and be over with it for now.

Also on the list of things I would like to change but don't want to spend the money on it right now is a new rug.  That blue one was supposed to go into George's nursery but, well, you know the story and now we have this rug and so it is acting as a placeholder.