We have a new (used) car now. And it has a working CD player! Glory! I busted out some dusty CDs--remember CDs? The only person who uses them much at our house is Liv, who loves to sit by the portable CD player and work her way through our ancient collections. She's been lingering on R.E.M. today after declaring Camelot, "too scary."
My Livvers loves music as long as I'm not singing it. Although she claims not to like rock'n'roll, she usually favors the pop princesses on the radio over the ballads--pretty much anything current that she can car-dance to will do. (It's all in the shoulders.) She guides me through the dial when we're in the car together and I suffer through the occasional Katy Perry mess for her sake, just enjoying this time before she understands lyrics. That's not to say that she doesn't sometimes pick up on stuff. I had a Nanci Griffith CD in the other day, one I hadn't listened to for what felt like years, and after Nanci sang, "You know that drinking always makes me sad," Liv demanded: "drank what, Mom?" To which I replied with some version of my usual, "How should I know?...We've never met....Your guess is as good as mine..." or something like that.
One thing we all agree on: Michael Jackson is The King. If one of them really likes a song, she or Ally will often ask if it's Michael Jackson. Strangely, it very often it is. The DJs on my programmed stations all really seem to like MJ. Yesterday I heard 3 of his songs on my drive to Target.
Thank goodness for music. We need the distraction and the rest and the fun. The frantic first days of school are over and this week our days at home have been quieter, slower, punctuated with short bursts of nesting energy during which I try to get the basics accomplished: launder baby clothes, organize/eliminate clutter, and tick off the days until this baby gets here. Always in the background is this looming subject of baby brother. When will we get to go on our sleepover, Liv wants to know. When will I be able to take stairs two at a time again, I wonder. WHEN'S IT GONNA HAPPEN? All these unanswerable questions (well, really just the one) have a way of escalating toward restlessness. With Ally away at play dates this week, Liv and I are left to make all the decisions.
And so, the music.
When I was in high school my mom had a CD of calming instrumental music produced by the excellent, very relaxed people at Windham Hill. It had a way of balancing me when I was overwhelmed with school, work, college applications, and all the rest. I remembered that feeling, so when Ally was being born I popped it in the CD player in the delivery room and put it on an all-day, all-night loop. With dim lighting and calm midwives it made for a peaceful delivery (that and the epidural, obviously). That memory was so nice that I took the same album to my delivery with Liv.
I never realized how new-agey "A Winter's Solstice" is until I burned another copy to ease me through labor #3. Now I hear it: harps and guitars and all the other instruments you make out of cat guts. This stuff is pretty crunchy, but I tell you what. The s&$* calms me down. We've been listening to it a lot and I wonder if it triggers something for Liv. The first two times she heard it she said, "Mom! This is the music you got me for my birthday!" She is literally correct, whatever she actually means.
Now that we're close to declaring another holiday in our house, another birthday, I'm glad it's an autumn one, even if he didn't come on the autumnal equinox. That would have been cool.
Wednesday, September 25, 2013
Sunday, September 1, 2013
Out of Tune Together
Let's not talk about why I cry all the time lately (pregnancy is a good enough answer to that). My record of our summer trips to Yosemite, Utah and New York can wait a few days too. I just feel.... That's all. I feel. I don't like it. I like to explain and feel rational, and I don't like to lean on emotions; they fall apart. Emotions cannot be trusted! I have always known this to be true, and yet. They trick me!
I like a plan, to a point. But only as much as I like to throw out one plan in favor of another. And right now, in trimester number three, this need to accomplish on a turbo level is tormenting me. Too many plans, not enough energy. Like anyone planning to welcome a new family member, I have an idea of how things should be (the house, the family, the brilliant daily existence, the future) and I'm reminded again of the ideas I had before my other baby girls were born. I have to wonder how true I have been to my vision; how many of those plans I've been able to realize and to what extent. Failure is obvious, merciless and real. Introspection is the worst! Stop doing it!
Trying to rationalize and explain brings me to this: a lack of focus threatens me in summer, and this summer more than most because I'm growing a human while also trying to be a human. Yeah, I miss my mom at these times and feel pretty weepy about it. And yeah, my blood is flooded with hostile hormones. I might argue that this is not a good time for introspection. And yet.
I fear I am wasting my life, and I hate waste.
But that's silly. But still. Don't you sometimes feel this way? Isn't feeling the absolute worst? I resolve to cut way back when my chemicals are back in balance. In the meantime, I will be over here brooding and watching broody movies about death and endings; you know, to prepare for my newborn's first breath.
On the subject of movies, check out Christopher Walken's speech to a group of music students at the beginning of A Late Quartet (see Netflix, thank you very much, Netflix). And imagine us on a Sunday afternoon: me brooding and lethargic, the girls a bit lost without an anchor of activity or purpose, and a husband thinking (who knows what?) trying to simultaneously keep things going and get a little weekend rest. It's a melancholy recipe, all of us going slowly out of tune together. I write this down because I figure my daughters will eventually--and maybe soon--start to notice on a conscious level that I spend whole afternoons acting out a funky silent soliloquy, like a ghost in the house. And they're going to want to know why, and I don't want them thinking it's anything more than what it is: a pause between movements when the musicians need to stop and tune their instruments.
***
This post is symbolically, but not literally, archived under the forgiving subject heading, "The Pregnancy Diaries."
Please forgive me.
I like a plan, to a point. But only as much as I like to throw out one plan in favor of another. And right now, in trimester number three, this need to accomplish on a turbo level is tormenting me. Too many plans, not enough energy. Like anyone planning to welcome a new family member, I have an idea of how things should be (the house, the family, the brilliant daily existence, the future) and I'm reminded again of the ideas I had before my other baby girls were born. I have to wonder how true I have been to my vision; how many of those plans I've been able to realize and to what extent. Failure is obvious, merciless and real. Introspection is the worst! Stop doing it!
Trying to rationalize and explain brings me to this: a lack of focus threatens me in summer, and this summer more than most because I'm growing a human while also trying to be a human. Yeah, I miss my mom at these times and feel pretty weepy about it. And yeah, my blood is flooded with hostile hormones. I might argue that this is not a good time for introspection. And yet.
I fear I am wasting my life, and I hate waste.
But that's silly. But still. Don't you sometimes feel this way? Isn't feeling the absolute worst? I resolve to cut way back when my chemicals are back in balance. In the meantime, I will be over here brooding and watching broody movies about death and endings; you know, to prepare for my newborn's first breath.
On the subject of movies, check out Christopher Walken's speech to a group of music students at the beginning of A Late Quartet (see Netflix, thank you very much, Netflix). And imagine us on a Sunday afternoon: me brooding and lethargic, the girls a bit lost without an anchor of activity or purpose, and a husband thinking (who knows what?) trying to simultaneously keep things going and get a little weekend rest. It's a melancholy recipe, all of us going slowly out of tune together. I write this down because I figure my daughters will eventually--and maybe soon--start to notice on a conscious level that I spend whole afternoons acting out a funky silent soliloquy, like a ghost in the house. And they're going to want to know why, and I don't want them thinking it's anything more than what it is: a pause between movements when the musicians need to stop and tune their instruments.
***
This post is symbolically, but not literally, archived under the forgiving subject heading, "The Pregnancy Diaries."
Please forgive me.
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