So, Indiana

Expectations are really insidious little things. I thought I was completely prepared for this huge, major life change and that I would CHOOSE to be happy and positive and ride off into the sunset toward our new life. But still, after 32 years on this planet, I let my own expectations cripple me. I tried a Pure Barre class expecting to love it and be good at it, because hello, 18 years of classical ballet training. I didn't and I sucked and I still really don't understand why anyone would want to do those things with their body. I thought my apartment would be new and great, but it's old and the people downstairs have two large, loud dogs in a one-bedroom unit. Yes, I am judging them. However, it's cheap as hell and we won't be there for more than a year. I enrolled Elliott in a very fancy, very regimented early preschool and for the first week I felt like a shitty mom. I didn't have the right size Ziploc bags for Elliott's extra change of clothes and he was the last kid picked up on his first day. I also put off thinking about Halloween for too long and now I'm scrambling to get something together for him to wear to school on Friday (I settled on a homemade Hamburglar costume. He can forward his future therapy bills directly to me.)

I got a job far quicker than I anticipated. I imagined that I wouldn't start working until November and that I would have a solid few weeks to do fun stuff with Elliott and explore the city. But I walked out of my first job interview with an offer that I would be stupid to refuse. Now I find myself working full-time and doing all the parenting, which is basically what was making me so miserable in San Francisco. I had to remind myself, when Elliott was running away from me as I was desperately trying to get pants on him, that this is all temporary. My husband will be here soon to take a huge load off my shoulders, and even try to help coax Elliott out of the kitchen cabinet he attempted to stuff himself into because he just couldn't bear the thought of putting on pants and going to school. Sometimes I failed at reminding myself and I snapped at Elliott, because dear God, I couldn't handle another 7:00 a.m. meltdown that was one long, incoherent run-on sentence of "No, I don't want [insert waffles/pants/school/backpack/milk/everything]!!!," plus snot. So much snot.

Driving to work yesterday morning, I drafted a top ten list of all the things I hate about Indianapolis (people text and drive with reckless abandon; the local NPR affiliate is in the middle of a pledge drive and one of their broadcasters could not figure out how to pronounce "Dia de los Muertos"; everyone tells me that I'm going to need a warmer jacket because I'm from OMG California -- I KNOW, but it's not snowing yet, back off; Styrofoam cups and plastic bags are in rampant use...). Then I got to work, went over my calendar and saw that it was yoga night. Yay! I let go of the stress and the resentment and focused on my job, but I did stew for a little while. I mean, Styrofoam? Really? It's 2015, Indiana.

Now I don't want to end this post with you all bummed out, so here are some Indy highlights. I mean, it's actually fall and the leaves are literally changing colors. What?!

Aunt Heather made Elliott a house out of cardboard boxes and taught him how to cut with scissors. I put up some art.

Don't tell anyone, but he secretly loves school (they give you pumpkins); a fancy Totoro teacup for work; hi from Dad.

Oh, Indiana, you're a few months too late; selfies while waiting for french fries and milkshakes; stuffing himself into the above-referenced kitchen cabinet.

Raking Grammy's leaves and eating donuts is exhausting.

And here are five things I'm grateful for:

1. The yoga teacher played "Hello" during the last, intense flow before savasana. *dead*
2. My mother-in-law and her cozy, happy house.
3. Elliott's humor and ever-expanding vocabulary.
4. Elliott's preschool teaching him stuff in a week that I would never have had the time to think of.
5. My husband and his impending arrival with our fur babies.

First Everything

It was a long weekend of firsts. My son turned one on Thursday. We had a party in the park for him on Saturday. On Sunday, I went to the emergency room (for the second time in my life) and received eight stitches (the final first). Here's how it all happened.

All three of us woke up on Thursday morning, business as usual. I got Elliott up and into his highchair, with a bib and a sippy cup of fresh milk. Instead of reaching into the freezer for the usual whole wheat waffle, I reached into the fridge and retrieved a chocolate cake with vanilla frosting, made the night before from a box purchased at the corner store. I cut a small square out of the cake and placed it on Elliott's highchair tray while Lane began filming on his iPhone. At first, Elliott just wanted to feel the cake, squishing it between his fingers, smearing it across the tray, and then inspecting the results. Despite it being his first ever birthday celebration, it was a weekday and we had to get off to work and daycare, so I grabbed a bit and offered it to him. He took a big bite and a pause to evaluate the new food, then happily shook his head and looked to me for more. I gave him the rest of the piece in my hand and he grabbed the remaining chunks off his tray and horfed them down in two fell swoops. Happy birthday! Lane gave him a thorough wipe cleansing and we proceeded on through our morning routine.

On Saturday morning, we rose with celebration in mind again. We did some housecleaning and then delved into preparing to host our first birthday party as parents. There was a lot of chopping and slicing of vegetables and putting them into Tupperware tubs for transport to the park. I baked another cake from a box (this time from Target rather than the corner store, which was out of Funfetti mix) and managed to time it so that I was frosting a cool cake and not making a mess trying to apply the stuff to warm layers and also not crying. I decorated the cake with sprinkles and candles and a few small plastic animals. Lane drove over to Nob Hill to pick up the balloons I ordered while I finished some final preparations and got Elliott and myself dressed. The morning was not without its challenges, especially because Lane and I were on completely different clocks and while I was feeling the pressure of the ticking clock, he was intending to make a trip to the hardware store for supplies to fix a wonky cabinet door. So there was some tension and even a few poisonous glares, but once we got to the park and people started arriving, we were back to normal. Elliott, naturally, fell asleep in his stroller on the three-block walk to the park. We let him sleep for half an hour and then cruelly gave into temptation and picked him up when his eyes fluttered awake in what was probably just a break in his sleep cycle. He sat silent and stone-faced for a good 40 minutes in my mother's lap, wearing a green felt crown decorated with his name and animal buttons. He ate a few crackers and a piece of celery and perked up. More baby friends arrived and he kissed them and stole their crackers and chatted with everyone. The wind picked up as it does on San Francisco afternoons, so we did our best with the candles. There was enough cake for everyone and folks began to make their exits as the temperature cooled. We stayed another hour catching up with friends before packing up the Tupperware tubs and the wrapped gifts. Our punishment for interrupting Elliott's nap was a one-year-old boy who partied until ten o'clock that night. 

So, Sunday and stitches. Everything was going great. I went to my RCIA class, met a few new people from the parish and successfully completed the Rite of Sending without saying the wrong thing or tripping in front of the entire church. We all were to meet at St. Mary's Cathedral at 3:30 for the Rite of Election that officially launches us into preparation for baptism/communion/confirmation at Easter Vigil. I couldn't find something to wear that was simultaneously understated chic and flattering on my once-again round postpartum belly (must be all that cake). I was also hungry, running late and nervous about the Rite. And I could not find my fucking keys. I looked everywhere I could have put them and then started sliding magazines and old New York Times Business sections off the coffee table. Then I pulled out couch cushions, dumped out toy baskets and got down on my hands and knees to see if they had been flung under the couch. They had not. I put Elliott in his Pack 'n Play because he was feeling my frustration and anxiety and getting a little overwhelmed too. My searching became more manic and I threw a throw pillow at the bookshelf. I finally lost it and kicked the nearest soft thing -- a paper grocery bag full of old newspapers for recycling. But the bag was not full of just newspaper and I discovered this as I pulled my left foot away, screamed and began bleeding all over the kitchen floor. I grabbed a towel, applied pressure and tried to find the house phone. I couldn't and momentarily panicked until I found my iPhone and called the emergencies-only number at the restaurant. By some divine intervention, Lane picked up and I sobbed into the phone that I had hurt myself terribly and that he needed to come home NOW. He said he'd grab a cab and be there as soon as he could. I texted folks from church who were anticipating my arrival at the cathedral and received words of comfort and offers of prayers. I called Lane again because Elliott was scream-crying and I couldn't lift him out of his playpen and I was scared and still bleeding. He made it home ten minutes later, assessed my injury, then washed it and wrapped it in gauze, a clean kitchen towel and electrical tape. We drove up to the ER at UCSF where I was triaged, x-rayed, cleaned, irrigated, numbed and stitched up. Lane drove us home, put Elliott to bed, made sure I had what I needed and went back to the restaurant. I looked at the bag I had kicked and saw a bent and broken curtain rod sticking out of the bottom, right where I had aimed my left foot. Lane had replaced it on Saturday in his home improvement offensive and it is what sliced into my foot, deep enough to reveal tendon. I shuddered, wiped up my blood with baby wipes and went to bed. Just as I was stepping gingerly up into bed, I saw my keys on the floor, partially hidden by a muslin baby blanket.

I read Joan Didion until I fell asleep with my foot propped up on a throw pillow and called an end to the weekend.

Managing Your Anxiety While Shopping for Probably the Most Important Dress

Whoo-whee is my mother ever patient and kind. Today was our first wedding dress reconnaissance trip and I made it through without crying, acting like a brat or having an anxiety attack. I do not enjoy shopping for clothes and I always seem to have a meltdown when I'm looking for something specific. My mom, having known me since birth, is well aware of the potential for a meltdown. She has witnessed some of the worst during back-to-school shopping in Mervyn's and getting me to look less like Charles Manson in pre-high school dance pictures. Shopping and posing for pictures turn me into a raging maniac, basically. You should ask my dad about the time I ugly-cried in Nordstrom because the prom dress sales lady told me I had a "mature figure."

We started at Britex, which is a four-story fabric store downtown that houses everything you need to sew anything and the kindly Russian ladies and men in embroidered satin vests to show you just how to do it. Starting on the third floor, we flipped through all the pattern books from Vogue, McCalls, Butterick and Burda. I haven't looked at a pattern book since sometime in the mid-90s, but it used to be a favorite weekend pastime, right after spending an afternoon at the roller rink. While my mom would go off and disappear into the notion aisles or whatever she did for an hour at the fabric store, I would sit myself down at the long table that held all the huge, square pattern books with the heavy cardboard covers. I'd start with the Halloween costume books, even if it was April, because a kid always has to be prepared. Then I'd move on to the regular books, going first for Evening and Bridal, then the "hip and with it section," and perhaps I'd check out the nightgowns and crafts. I thought 80% of the content of these books were hideous and I got a creepy sort of enjoyment out of making fun of the illustrated, knockoff Barbie and Ken models in horrible hand-made clothing.

My mind is much more "mature" (fuck you, Valley Fair Nordstrom lady) these days and I picked up the pattern books and began a surgical strike. I only looked at the Dresses and Evening and Bridal sections, not even giving myself time to inwardly chuckle at the more unfortunate looks. We picked out three possible patterns that will be  amenable to hacking towards our needs. We then headed down to the first floor to look at their silk selection and that's where I got the first little twinge of anxiety. I do not have the talent my mother has that allows her to look at a Vogue pattern and a bolt of silk and come to the conclusion that the color would look too brown and it wouldn't drape right. I just see pretty shiny fabric that I want to rub on my skin. We're leaning towards a champagn-y, pale ballet pink charmeuse. I don't know what charmeuse is but it's lovely.

We had a relaxed lunch after our fabric store trip and I realized the reason why I didn't lose my shit was because we took our time and there was no pressure to find THE PATTERN and THE FABRIC RIGHT NOW. We were just looking at options and my mom was gently guiding me in the direction I wanted to go without too much pushing. I showed her four dresses that all looked to be in the same general vein but she told me no, those are definitely four different dresses and then asked me what I liked best about each. And she never once was all "SARAH YOU ARE INSANE DO YOU NOT HAVE EYEBALLS TO SEE THAT EVERY DRESS YOU SHOW ME THAT IS THE ONE IS DIFFERENT." That's why she's making this dress.