A quick word about 6 year olds

Ok, granted my daughter isn't quite 6 years old yet, but this is relevant. I was at Queens College last Saturday to watch a performance that my very awesome friend Veronica was in (as was her boyfriend). Before the show started I was listening in on the conversation of the two ladies sitting behind me. What else was I going to do? Put my fingers in my ears?

Well let me tell you that I had to work hard not to turn around and butt in. One lady was talking about how she went to the Ballet to see Swan Lake or whatever, and says that behind her were sitting a group of moms with their 6-yr old girls. Which I, when I heard that, thought was fantastic! To be able to bring a young, impressionable girl to something as culturally high-end and spectacular as the NY Ballet. But the lady goes on to complain that one girl kept asking questions and, this is not the end, that the mother kept answering the questions! O M G. A six year old had questions? And the mother was terrible enough to answer them? The lady then said something along the lines of, "if you take a kid to the ballet you have to make them shut up!" Shut up??

Don't get me wrong. The lady did not mention the content of the questions, nor the frequency of the questions; if they were about what was for dinner that night, or if she could stay home from school or whatever, then that's not appropriate, but say for instance, in the case of MY daughter, I KNOW she'd have been asking questions about the ballet. In which case I would have gladly answered as quietly as I could.

For all I know, the kid could have asked 2 questions the entire performance and the lady was just exaggerating. On the other hand, the kid could have really been non-stop about non-ballet themed issues. I don't know. But what I DO know is that 6 year olds are naturally inquisitive. They are young, impressionable (yes I know I used that word already), and eager to learn. And not just learn in general, but learn from you. Each parent has an opportunity to either answer their child's questions, or shut her up and let her simmer. Shut her up one too many times and the next time she has a question, she won't ask it. I believe that the hushing option will eventually kill my child's love of learning. I do my best to give her honest answers to everything she asks me to the best of my ability and in a simple way she can understand.

Ok so I guess that wasn't really that quick, but I had to get that out before I didn't feel like writing about it anymore. I'm glad I did. I feel better now.

This Title Sucks

How can I keep coming up with different titles for my blog posts, when really the only one that fits 90% of the time is "Gosh I haven't updated in a while. Here's some news." That's basically what it all boils down to. Which means I'm not a very good blogger.

Tomorrow starts the newest round of Get Sparked! My partner and I have chosen to be partners again since we've found so much inspiration in each others' works and will be collaborating on hopefully many future projects. I'm excited! Though I've left writing a new poem for her to the very last minute as usual. I'm sure I'll be able to come up with something fantastic late tonight (if I can manage to stay up later than 9:00!).

On another strand, I'm a little more than half way through "Journey to the Centre of the Earth." I'm enjoying it immensely! It makes me sad to think that I nearly forgot how much I love reading. I used to be a voracious reader, but over the past few years that has definitely changed. So many other things to do that I feel like when I'm reading I should really be up doing other things. Having Caelyn to take care of doesn't help the cause for reading either. Reading has become a leisurely luxury that almost makes me feel guilty for doing it. How horrible! I must put time aside for reading, just as I've been putting aside time to crochet. Though crocheting is a little easier since I will have something tangible to show for it when I'm done. Reading? Not so much.

On yet another strand, I've paused my Insanity work outs to focus on what I specifically need to work on in order to pass the APFT that I have to take on the 25th. Push ups, sit ups, and a 2-mile run. I'm on course right now; I ran on the treadmill this morning and I'm feeling pretty confident about it. If I can keep it up I'll have no trouble passing.

And, last thing I figure I should mention... My diploma is en route! I checked the status and it was mailed yesterday, woohoo! I was an official college graduate as of January 31st, but it will be even more official once I have that all-important piece of paper in my hands. And my parents ordered a diploma frame for it (as a birthday present). It's on back order, but I'll get it eventually, and like I told my mom, my diploma won't go bad waiting for its frame.

Merry Christmas and all that Jazz

Just a warning, this is going to be a long one. A lot has happened and I have a lot to catch up on. I probably won't even be able to touch on everything.

I'm blogging from MY ROOM in the big house! It's exciting! Kind of. It's strange being here. It doesn't feel like it's for real yet. I'm loathe to unpack my boxes and put my clothes in the closets and dresser drawers because it would feel too permanent. I'm not sure I'm ready for that. It still feels like I'm just up here for a vacation. Like next week I'll be back 'home.' But I known that this is 'home' now. Weird.

I can't wait to set my desk and computer up in the office and start working again. I need to make some moolah. I'm pretty much broke right now. I don't like being broke. I am also looking forward to doing my taxes ASAP this year so I can get my refund. One of the only upsides of not making a lot of money and having a kid and not having to file jointly with someone. Also paying tuition gets me some nice education credits. At least it did last year and I'm hoping for a repeat.

Tomorrow I'm driving back down to Jersey with my dad so we can do a last clean-out of the apartment, and pick up his car. After that, it will be completely done. Nowhere to go back to. I've already done my change-of-address through USPS, and changed my billing address on everything that matters. Including my college records so they mail my diploma to the right place.

In other news, I have to go to the high school on Monday when the schools reopen so I can register Caelyn. I was going to do it before they closed for the winter break, but it snowed, and we had no snow blower for a day, and we didn't shovel out til it was too late. I figured Caelyn wouldn't mind a couple extra days of no-school. And it would give her some more time to get acclimated to LIVING here, and not just act like it's a vacation. Well, it sort of is a vacation, since it's technically "Holiday Break," but eh, we gotta get back into a routine. At least time-wise. Going to sleep at midnight is not good for a 5 year old, especially if she is gonna have to get up early for school.

And I was thinking, I'm not sure if I like having moved up in winter. It does give us a good excuse to stay in and unpack and organize and rearrange stuff, but it also doesn't make it easy to get out and DO stuff. I'd like to explore town and get involved in things; make friends, get to know people and all that good stuff. It's way too easy to isolate up here, especially in the winter. Maybe I'll sign up to be a class mom, go to PTO meetings or whatnot. Idunno. I'm thinking cleaning out all our stuff as we 'move in' will create a need to have a garage sale in the spring, and boy do we have the perfect driveway to have a garage sale!

On another note, I need a night stand. My "desk" where my laptop is now is against the wall by the foot of my bed. What I really need is a taller table to put a lamp on, and also so I can put my glasses on it when I go to bed. Also, I think I want a nice comfy chair in here with a tall lamp behind it, to read. And a bookshelf. I must have a big shelf for all my books. I've got boxes and boxes of them. I'm sure I won't be able to put all of them out, but at least my favorites will be able to breathe again.

And to end on, before this gets any longer (I will try to blog more often, about interesting things!), Merry Christmas everyone! even though it's a few days late. I hope everyone also has a fantastic New Year's Eve. And don't think too hard about all those resolutions. Mid-way through February we'll all forget about them anyway. I've never stuck to one in my life and don't see it happening this year either.

Well, that's about it, wishing you all every kind of holiday cheer from my new abode north of the Adirondacks.

PS, I knew I'd forget something... I registered for NYC Midnight's Tweet me a Story contest! Registration was free, so I figured, why not? I won't lose anything from entering and it should prove to be really fun! I'll probably post about this again as the event gets closer.

I'm DONE

With school, that is. Last final and paper were due on the 20th, but due to the whole moving thing, I spent yesterday doing my syntax final. Today I went to campus to hand it in (ie. slip it under the professor's office door), then went to the library to write up my phonetics lit review. It took about as long as I figured it would take due to the fact that though the title of the article made it sound very easy and cut-and-dry, unfortunately the content was very hard to understand. The actual writing of the summary didn't take very long; it was all the understanding and interpreting of the data that took a long time. And it was freezing in the library. I'm sure this affected my performance to some degree... Get it? Degree!?

Hah. That is the state I'm in right now. I'm done. Completely done. My syntax final is out of my hands and the lit review has been emailed to the professor. That's all I had left to do in both my classes. Then I went over to the parking office to get my refund for my parking pass. Apparently, my final audit for GRADUATION that states that my conferment is January 2011 was not enough for them to say that I'm GRADUATING in January and would not be attending Montclair State any longer. I had to go to the Registrar and get a separate document stating that I was expected to graduate January 2011. So I did that. No big deal, but really, my audit wasn't enough? Really!? Oh well. So I handed in my parking permit, filled out the form, and in 6-8 weeks I shall get a refund check. For some odd reason I was expecting to just get money back today, but alas, I obviously expected too much. But at least I'll get the money eventually.

And now I'm home, blogging. It kinda seems a bit surreal. My head hurts. I'm tired. And I can't believe I'm done with school. All I have left to do now is to wait for my diploma to arrive in mid-February and then it will be even more official. It's been a long road from beginning to end with a lot of stops on the way. But here I am, on the cusp of moving to boot, looking toward the future and a new beginning.

It's December!

Well, as my title suggests, it's December. It seems I'm averaging about two blog posts a month. I'd like to change that. And I don't mean give up altogether. I would really like to keep blogging, but I'm not sure what my direction is. Talking about myself every time seems so trivial and boring. But I suppose that's why people create personal blogs, amirite?

I'm currently sitting in my Phonetics class not paying attention. If anyone says anything, I'll just show them my collection of A's and leave it at that. It's not really that difficult and the professor lays everything out for us pretty thoroughly. And this current section seems only slightly harder [for me] because it looks like it involves more math and numbers. The heading on the power point slide that's showing right now is "Average vowel spectra values for several male speakers." Oy. Syntax is going along swimmingly as well. I can't wait for this semester to finally be over already! Finals should be a breeze. The only thing I actually have to do work on is an article summary for which I haven't read the article yet. Twelve pages of drivel that I must summarize in one paragraph. No biggie. The hardest part is trying to understand all the technical verbiage of the experiment that it's about.

But let's forget school for a while. Like, forever. The bigger, more important thing that's happening this month is MOVING. Yes, my dear New Jersians (Jerseyans? Jerseyites?), I will be heading north (WAY north) on the 20th of this month. I'm excited and sad at the same time. I love North Country, the mountains, the trees, the clean, fresh air, the lack of light pollution, the list goes on. I'm excited about this being almost like the start of a new life, a fresh start to everything. But I'm sad because, well, I've lived in the same place for 28 years, pretty much my entire life. My daughter is going to the same elementary school that I went to at her age. It's all so nostalgic! All my friends whom I've known my whole life are here. I'm going to miss the diversity of practically being a suburb of New York City. I'm going to miss the City! I was never one to go to the City very often, but in the past 2 years I think I've gone there more than I have in the whole rest of my life combined. I'm going to miss this mecca of culture, the sites and sounds of the city that never sleeps.

More trivial things I'm going to miss is good Chinese food. A good slice of NY pizza. I'm going to miss a good bagel! As much as I hate the kids in the neighborhood running rampant, I'm going to miss it, too. I'm going to miss telling Caelyn to just go outside and play with her friends. That population density is really a pro of living in an apartment complex sometimes.

If I had any confidence at all in finding a job (in like, a week) that would give me a salary conducive to living in Bergen county, I probably would be more inclined NOT to move. I've thought about it every which way, and it's just not meant to be. Right now. If I ever, EVER, have the opportunity to move back to Bergen county, I probably would.

Trying to find a plus side, I will be very close to Canada! Trip to Montreal, anyone? Another plus is that the house is HUGE. Plenty of room for guests. (hint hint). Also very close to an Indian Reservation. Gambling and Bingo, anyone? But really, I shouldn't have to lure anyone to come visit me with promises of flashy lights and travel across the border, right? RIGHT?? I kid. But really, six hours is a long way away, so I guess I'll have to get used to video chatting? Skype, anyone?

At any rate, I'll probably talk more on moving in a future post, probably about actually packing (boy do I have a lot to say about that), and hopefully an uneventful final trip up, leaving behind an empty apartment and arriving at our destination. Not the final destination by any means, but a destination nonetheless. If I don't blog again until after the move, I shall see you all on the other side, as they say.

A Few Short Thoughts

I'll go in order of how I remember them, because there were a few things I wanted to say but didn't think each one individually warranted its own separate post.

1. When parents say "I wish my kid would stop getting so big!" it bugs me. Not because I don't feel the same way. I do. Time goes so fast and I barely remember my big 5-yr old when she was a tiny infant. I barely remember cradling her in my arms, and now she is independent, she wants to go outside and play with her friends before she gives me a welcome hug and kiss when she comes home from her dad's, she's in school for christ's sake!.. What bothers me about this "I wish my kid would stop growing" sentiment is one small passing comment my mom made to me when I said that to her about Caelyn. She said, "There's only one way for them to stop growing." And of course she was referring to my sister Katie, who died of a cancerous, inoperable brain tumor when she was only 6 years old. She will ALWAYS be 6. And that kind of "stop growing" is something I wouldn't wish on my worst enemy. So when someone says, "My kid is getting so big I wish he would stop!" I hold my tongue.

2. Does taste in coffee mature with age? Or does it somehow reflect our current mood and emotions? I've been pondering this recently because I've found my taste in coffee choice radically changing. I used to be the Breakfast Blend or French Vanilla extra light extra sweet kind of coffee drinker. Now I find that a light brew almost tastes like water. I find myself putting less sugar and less creamer in my coffee, and prefer to drink a darker brew, a French Roast or some other such "dark" type. Is this my maturing of coffee taste? Or maybe it's me being stressed out and so needing a deeper, richer jolt in the morning? My other thought about this was a little more disturbing: The coffee I'm drinking right now almost tastes like DFAC coffee... and I like it. *shudder* Don't get me wrong, though, I still crave a light and sweet iced coffee every once in a while, but for the most part, dark and bitter have been suiting me just fine.

3. I bought a class ring. Not the wisest decision given my current financial status. But I did it. I'm graduating this semester, barring any failing of classes, and I really feel like after a 10-year journey to this damn degree, I want something, for myself, to show for it. Besides the requisite diploma, of course. The only other thing I want is the tassel. I totally missed booking a sitting for yearbook pictures. Not that I'm going to buy a yearbook, I don't know anyone else in my graduating class and I wasn't active in anything on campus to make me want to fondly remember my college years. Which I've spent half of being a part-time commuter just wishing for it to be over already.

4. I'm sure there was one more thing I wanted to put down here, but I've forgotten. My memory is very bad, so that is all!

Pregnancy and Infant Loss Awareness Month

This is my first disclaimer: if you get queasy about girl-part details, don't read this post. Just wait for my next blog post.

Also, before I get to what I want to write about, let me first state that THIS POST IS NOT MEANT, IN ANY WAY SHAPE OR FORM, TO BELITTLE, DEMEAN, OR IN ANY OTHER WAY DIMINISH THE EMOTIONAL AND/OR PHYSICAL HARDSHIPS OF LOSING A CHILD WHETHER THROUGH MISCARRIAGE, STILL BIRTH, OR OTHER MEANS AFTER BIRTH.

That was my second disclaimer. Because it's true, and some people may get sensitive about my seemingly heartlessness. Because what I'm thinking about this month, since October is apparently Pregnancy and Infant Loss Awareness Month, is why I don't feel sad or think about my own loss. Granted it was six long years ago, but even a year after, even two months after, I did not feel any deep sadness or grief or emptiness.

And let me say that when it happened I DID feel terrible. It was excruciatingly emotionally debilitating. For about a week. Seriously. I cried my eyes out while waiting to go in for the D&C, I broke into tears when I talked about it. I cried at the damn mall when I passed the maternity stores because I wasn't pregnant anymore. It hurt to watch other prego-bellies walk in and out of the store buying fat clothes that they will only wear for the next 4 or 5 months because I wasn't one of them anymore.

But then I was fine. Maybe it was because of my lack of involvement. Here's how it went down: I conceived in April 2004. Presumably due in January '05. No insurance. No ob/gyn. Set up an appointment at the clinic at the hospital, but they couldn't get me in until the end of July. I guess I thought this was ok. That would have put me at around 4 months pregnant. Mid-July I started having slight cramping pains in my uterus-area, and started to spot lightly.

Up until that point I believed my pregnancy was going fine, that I was having a normal non-complicated pregnancy. Sure I felt sick quite often, but I put it off as just morning sickness. And this is what I mean when I said "lack of involvement." I was not involved in the pregnancy. I was stressed out (relationship issues, which is something I will probably never go into), and did not have a doctor to communicate with about what was going on. No blood tests, no ultrasounds, not even a blood pressure test to tell me if I really WAS having a healthy pregnancy. It was four months of mindlessness.

At any rate, the cramping (and by cramping I mean a slight pinching feeling every 5-10 minutes) continued for a few days, during which time I went on vacation with my family. I told my mom about the spotting, and I think she figured it out then, and I think I had it figured out as well, but I wanted to believe it wasn't anything serious.

Two more days went by and I wake up and both symptoms had gotten a little bit worse. Worse meaning the cramps, though not any more painful, had gotten to about 2 minutes apart. My mom insisted we go to the hospital. Two minutes later and there would have been a very bad mess in the car. We got there, I got admitted, I was asked to give a urine sample (and at this point I was still only lightly spotting), and when I went to go pee in the cup... Let's just say all hell broke loose. Literally. I felt like I was dying; the gushing just wouldn't let up for a minute (and that includes the tears from my eyes and boogers from my nose). My mind was completely in denial. All I was focusing on was giving that damn urine sample. I had the cup in one hand, and ball after ball after ball of toilet paper in the other, trying desperately to clean myself enough to put some clear pee in the cup. It wasn't happening.

I guess finally the nurse came in and gave me a huge gigantic pad to wear (which didn't help really, I think they changed the absorbant pad under me no less than five times), and they decided that the only thing to do was to put me under for a D&C because it was obviously too much for me to pass on my own. And in case you don't know what a D&C is, it stands for Dilation and Curettage. They surgically scrape out all the stuff inside (like scooping seeds out of a pumpkin) so your body doesn't have to do it on its own. It's basically what they do when you have an abortion.

I remember talking to the anesthesiologist, then I remember waking up and feeling really hungry. Painless. I ate a really awesome hospital meal of chicken, gravy, and mashed potatoes, and then was free to go home. They couldn't tell me the cause of miscarriage. By all counts I should have been 4 months along already, that would have meant a definite fetus. There was none. All the paper I clogged the toilet with made it impossible for them to get a sample of whatever was left. What they scraped out was nothing definitive either; just blobs and lumps and clots. Their best guess was that it was a missed miscarriage, where the fetus dies very early on, never develops because of chromosomal issues, and my body just hadn't felt the need to expel it until then.

That was it. I think I moped around most of the rest of the day, and the next day we went out for my dad's birthday. The next day I drove myself home and cried all over again (and got drunk. Really drunk). I may have had no more than 2 more complete break-downs about the ordeal.

The other reason I think I recovered so quickly is because I got pregnant only two months later and went on to have my daughter, Caelyn, the following June. And that is not to say I felt like she replaced the one I lost. I just never felt like I lost a child. Under the circumstances (which I have so graciously detailed for you), it never felt like a child. To me, there was no face, no footprints, no heartbeat, nothing. It was just globs of bloody tissue that had to get scraped out of me. I never felt a bond with that unborn being, I never got to think of that unborn being as a child growing inside of me. My mental thought process was "yay pregnant. wtf miscarriage." Period. End of story. And that may sound extremely callous to some. Maybe to most.

Let me also add that I was not in a happy relationship. I was not in control of my life. There was no focus, no long-term goals, no aspirations. I dropped out of college. My life was a real mess. I had no room to stress about bloody clots that I never thought were a baby to begin with.

All my sympathy goes out to all the women who have dealt with loss in a real way. Not my way. I will never understand those feelings, those emotions of grief and mourning because I have never truly felt them myself about experiencing my own loss. All my sympathy also goes out to all the women who have lost young children, because I watched, and lived through, my mom losing her daughter, my sister, Katie to cancer at only 6 years old. Now THAT still affects me to this day. She was in my life for almost 7 years; I watched and experienced her growing from a baby into an amazing little girl. And while I will always weep her passing, I will also remember the good times we shared together, and the brightness she brought to the world for such a short time.

And perhaps that is a third reason I don't mourn my own loss. It was a mere blip in my life compared to the pain and agony of watching my sister deteriorate from the moment of her diagnosis to the moment of her death almost exactly a year later. Bleeding for twenty minutes and then having surgery to erase what I had never even seen is nothing compared to watching my young sister, (and mind, I was 15 at the time) who was in my life for almost half of it at that point, take her last breath. My loss seems insignificant compared to that.

So, yes, I have all the sympathy in the world for those who mourn, for those who grieve, for those who have lost once or multiple times. Because I can do that, even though I don't mourn my own. Recognize, Respect, and have Sympathy for those who have ever lost this October, Pregnancy and Infant Loss Awareness Month.

School

Well, my last semester has started. I had a couple of issues with how to pay for it, but thankfully things have worked out for the better. I won't say best, because the best got lost a long time ago, but better is better than working out for the worst, wouldn't you agree? I thought I was getting grant money, then I wasn't. Then I was again, then not as much as I had hoped I would get. In the end I took out a dreaded student loan (I REALLY did not want to resort to that, but it's not a lot) to cover the rest of what I owe for tuition, and the rest will be enough to finally pay off my car with some left over (I say finally like I've been at it forever, which isn't true. It hasn't even been a full 2 years on a 6-yr loan. Go me!). At any rate, I will feel a whole lot better not having to worry about a car note (with an astronomical interest rate because my credit is less-than-shiny), and to be able to work on paying back a student loan at a lower interest rate with lower monthly payments. And that's not to say that I will only pay the minimum, it's just a relief from having to pay quadruple that amount on my car.

Am I getting too personal into my finances? We all have our troubles, and I admit mine aren't all that bad. A few credit cards, and soon to be a student loan. Which I plan on paying off ASAP. Which may not be as ASAP as I hope. All speculative at this point, so I won't dwell.

On to more interesting things: my actual classes! I think I had my expectations reversed. I fully expected my syntax class to be the harder of the two. So far it seems pretty rudimentary, and there will be a LOT of discussion and reviewing of material so I'm not worried about maybe not understanding something. Slow and steady seems to be my professor's mantra on this one. Phonetics, on the other hand, while not as "slow and steady," still looks like it will be relatively easy, but not as easy as I had first thought. As long as I get to look at the charts, I'll be ok. I did look through the text book and saw a bunch of waves and confusing math-y looking equations and let's just say that it didn't make me smile.

I just have to keep in mind that THIS IS IT. No more school [for now]. I even went to the registrar to make sure I didn't have to do anything else to be able to graduate. Which I don't. Hooray! All I have to do now is pass these classes and I will be an official graduate with diploma in hand by mid-February!!

And now my daughter. She started Kindergarten last week! I can't believe she's going to real school now. And I already have the first fund raiser of the year, AND I'm volunteering to help out with the book fair next week. I guess I just think it's weird that it's the school that I attended, and her principal is my old middle school principal. It also seems that all the K-age kids' parents have been around the block before, have older kids so they already know each other, or have younger kids and already know each other.

I suppose it's mostly my fault for not being more active in my community. But really, I'm not the most sociable person. I'm actually not very sociable at all. Plus we're moving at the end of December, so right now I feel no need to create lasting bonds with anyone here. I guess as long as Caelyn behaves herself, I get her to do all her work, and get her to bed early enough to not be a cranky cry-baby in the mornings, we'll be OK.