Random Quote and Unrelated Photo of the Week

You . . . you equivocating like a motherfuck.

Bubbles
Season III, Episode 5
The Wire

Open Letter to My Body

Dear Body,

I know we haven't been on the best terms lately. I am big enough to admit that this is mostly my fault, though I hope you'll see your part in this whole thing. Yes, over the past few months, I have not been as gentle as you'd have liked. In what you might call a selfish attempt to get pregnant, I jabbed you with needles and swelled our ovaries with all those hormones. And yeah, you bore the brunt when the doctor took out those eggs and three days later put them back. Your distaste at the hormone injections was clear; the cramping and sharp stabbing gas made that pretty evident. The lumps in the buttocks were a nice touch, a subtle reminder that progesterone shots might not be your favorite part of our daily routine.

I have tried to make amends. The walks, the chocolate, the naps. I had hoped those would make up, at least a little, for what I have put you through. I hoped you would see that we were in this together, and help those embryos take hold inside you. I don't hold it against you that there was no pregnancy. I know no one has to do anything "wrong" for IVF to fail.

The thing is, I am coming to you to ask for help. I am trying again. No, I am not looking forward to the hormones and the stress, but I do want to get pregnant. You did such a good job with the pregnancy last time, I was hoping that you'd be willing to try it again. Just once more. I know it will be hard on you, what with the uterus stretching and increased pressure on the knees. But the labor was short last time, I gave you that, right? Help me with this and I promise not to complain about my hips shifting, or breasts growing then shrinking, or the waddle in my walk that I may never get over. I'll keep you moisturized, and maybe even get a manicure once in a while. What do you say?

Here's to a productive partnership,

Nora


This letter was inspired by Blogher's "A Letter to My Body" series.

Shake It Like A...

A couple of weeks ago I got an email from an Oregonian reporter who wanted to talk Polaroid. He was writing a story about how Portlanders are dealing with the loss of Polaroid, now that the company is giving up production of its flagship product. I talked with him and sent him a copy of this picture:

It is one of my favorite Polaroids, taken in Chicago on a trip after I'd moved away. Al's, and his sign, are on a busy street just outside the neighborhood where I lived for several years. I drove by this spot regularly, but it wasn't until I left town that I got around to snapping this picture.

I loved this picture so much that it led me on a Polaroid journey of sorts. I started to take pictures of other food signs. New England is packed with fun signs, for red hots, Del's lemonade and roadside diners admonishing guests to "eat heavy."* Armed with my trusty (purchased on a Brooklyn street for $5) Polaroid, I snapped my way through several years and many signs. Once that camera kicked it, I turned to my Holga and cell phone camera for the immediacy and snap-shot quality I'd loved in my Polaroid.

I think the reporter was a little disappointed when I told him that I now own a Fuji instant camera. In talking to Polaroid fanatics, he'd met people who were vastly more committed to the form than I could ever be. He talked to one guy who said he'd keep shooting Polaroids until the film rain out, then he'd abandon his camera forever. I like Polaroids, but I like a lot of media. If I can get film from Fuji, I will. Once I saw the guy's article - which focused exclusively on Portland-based "artists' " response to losing Polaroid - I felt less bad about not living up to whatever idea he had about how Polaroid fans were taking the news.

In any case, to see some more Polaroids, and read some stories from fans of the camera, check out the online companion to the story, which was published on Friday.

*The reporter got the facts wrong in his story, and assumed my "eat heavy" picture was taken in Chicago.

Stories Repeated

When my mother saw this picture:

She immediately thought of this picture, of me and my first "best friend" Hema:

The photograph is dated summer 1974, which makes me 2.5 (as Ada is in the prior picture). The note on the back of the photo says "To My Nora, From Hemi".

Hema is someone I remember only as stories. Stories about how cute we were, how close we were, how sad we were when my family moved away. As a memory, she is more important to my mother than she is to me. She is tied into my mother's memory of the toddler Nora, a person I can not know.

I understand my mother's nostalgia for this picture and the girls in it. I already sigh over pictures of Ada from last year, heck, sometimes from last month. The pictures are tied to memories, and I am sure that like my mother, I will be repeating to Ada the stories of her early years, telling her about her early interest in word play or the first time she drew a circle.

The stories of our childhoods are not our own, but they still shape us. I know that Hema loved me, that I liked to sit on Paula's dad's motorcycle, that I was quick to speak and slow to stop sucking my thumb. These are facts of my life, and I hope to be a faithful reporter to Ada about the big things, but also about the small milestones of her life that are so easy to forget but so important to us both as they happen.

Random Quote and Unrelated Photo(s) of the Week

So many demographics united through the magic of consumption!

Sasha Frere-Jones
Amy's Circus

Lazy Updates - Haiku Edition

Pink eye Saturday
Two hour doctor appointment
No dinner with friends

On birth control pills
Ironic IVF start
Hormones in the mail

Northwest holiday
We should expect rain by now
Living room egg hunt

Work still kicks my ass
Nights to catch up on "The Wire"
Once taxes are done

Ada loves bacon
She likes to wear band-aids too
Two pleasures in one

Self indulgent blog
nonlinear girl dot com
Now belongs to me

Random Quote and Unrelated Photo(s) of the Week

It's her eyes that transform what might have been a frivolous Surrealist premise (Pinup in Penisland) into something unexpectedly somber and unsettling.

Alexi Worth
Kusama Dot Com

Because Ellen Does Not Blog

Monkey Boy's version of I Gave My Love A Cherry:

I gave my love a merry-go-round that would not cry;
I gave my love a house that had no pie;
I gave my love a chestnut that would not open;
And I gave my love a noodle that had no stone.

Random quote and unrelated photo of the week

As Moffat elaborated by email, "Blabla = blah blah blah."

Caroline Weber
Fashion Emergency

Scenes from Life in a Poopy Fog

Monkey Boy was over and he and Ada were busy placing wooden beads in two containers. I helped Monkey Boy put his beads into an empty honey bear. Once the top was on, Monkey Boy declared: "OK! Now we have everything we need to hunt for poop sticks!"

Off the kids run, yelling "poop sticks! poop sticks!" A few minutes later I notice Ada has a green tinker toy stick in her mouth. I tell her to take it out, and she asks if she can lick it. I tell her "no, that is not a good idea." She counters: "But it's a poop stick." Maybe it's me, but that seems to undermine Ada's stance.

* ** * ** * ** *

While watching Chris play in his annual basketball tournament, Ada asked: "When does Papa get the ball?"

I explained, "They all have the ball."

Ada: "Yeah, that's sharing. Sharing is caring."*

* ** * ** * ** *

Ada: Why is this my unbrella?
Junie: Because you are the only one in your house who uses it.
A: You and Sarah have one.
J: Yes.
A: Why do you live with Sarah?
J: Because we love each other and we wanted to live together.
A: Yeah. Like Mama and Papa.
J: (no doubt considering how to explain difference between "roommate" and "girlfriend")
Yes, except that Sarah and I are not a family.
A: (pause, considering this) Yeah, because you don't have a kid.


*By the way, "sharing is caring" is one of those random things people tell young children, even though toddlers have no way to really understand what it means. I got it from Ellen, who learned it from her sister-in-law. Ada and Monkey Boy routinely parrot it back to us, but since they do seem to be actually getting the concept of sharing (not just of 'waiting semi-patiently until it is my turn') I won't worry too much about it. They certainly were sharing whatever poop sticks they found. Which is fine, as long as they don't share them with me.

I Heart Portland, Revisited

It is almost spring, when a woman's heart turns to thoughts of . . . how much she loves her town. Yes, that again.

I love walking Ada to nursery school (a mere 7 blocks from our house), past our neighbor's yards, hipsters heading to the coffee store for that first cup, trees starting to bud. Ada and I speculate about what is in the delivery trucks, aided by the pictures of donuts or milk jugs painted on the trucks' sides. Ada engages the orange-clad construction workers, informing them that we are going to school. She and I discuss the kids and their parents. (Ada sees a second grader and her toddler brother. She wonders aloud, "is she going to school? is he?") On the walk home I call out to a neighbor and smile at other parents herding their children to school.

I love that for the price of a cafe au lait or three, my colleagues and I can work for hours at a local cafe. The space is only half-full in the morning, and no one looks askance at us for staying too long or not buying enough (or shamelessly talking like the policy wonks we are). Plus, we get to admire the toddler with the beautiful curls eating breakfast with her mother.

I love walking down the street and seeing this:

It isn't my thing, but I love that Portland is still not over the hippie, earth-worship pagan fest. Can someone else go and let me know if they really raffle Michelle's heart?

I love that every year, in the middle of our notoriously rainy winter, for a week or more the rain is replaced by sunny skies. This year we had almost three continuous weeks of sun and warm weather. I keep telling our thrilled neighbors (recently relocated from San Francisco) that a reprieve lasting this long is NOT NORMAL. Three weeks is a amazing stretch of good weather in February and early March. Not that I'm complaining; it has been really nice.

Every day that it does not rain, Ada runs out the door and down the street to see her pal Lila. Even when they argue or Ada has a meltdown because she wants the mama monkey, no not the baby monkey! she still wants to run down the block for more time with her friend. Lila charmingly runs back and forth yelling "Play! Play! Play!" It is part exclamation, part instruction. All this outside time offers me a chance to work in the garden, a bonus on an unexpectedly sunny day.

What do you love about where you live? (I am interested, whether or not you live where I do.)

Random quote and unrelated photo of the week

Even philanthropists don't want to look greedy.

Rob Walker
Extra Helping

Favorite

Getting ready for bed a few nights ago, Ada asked: "Will do you me a favorite?"

My girl plays favorites. When I am headed out to work, she refuses kisses. When she and I are sitting on the floor playing and Chris says he is headed out, she barely acknowledges him. (Until he leaves. Minutes later she asks if Papa is going to have oatmeal with us, or if he wants to hide too.)

I am used to being Ada's favorite, her go-to playmate and support. Sometimes that role is a burden, the mama-love weighing on me. Much of the time I revel in her love, knowing she wants and expects my attention, my kisses, tickles and hugs. When the love that usually comes so naturally and so intensely is held back, I feel the sting.

This morning at breakfast, Ada repeatedly announced "Kiss!" and leaned over to plant a jam-coated smooch on me. When I gathered up my bag to go upstairs for work, Ada didn't bat an eye. Then I picked up the laptop, announcing "ok, I am going upstairs to work now."

That's when the wailing began. Not because I was leaving, but out of protest that I was taking the computer with me.

"Nooooo! I need the 'puter! I need Sesame!" Ada cried.

I think we all know what the real favorite is.

It feels way too early to be asking this

The blog, she's a toddler. No longer a baby, but not as old as my neighbor down the street, who recently declared that he could take care of himself, because he's four. (Oh, if only the blog would take care of herself. Or if she'd at least she'd update her own blogroll without my intervention.)

I mention the blog's advanced age not because it has just hit an anniversary. That was, I think, in January. I mention this because I am finally thinking about going to BlogHer. The first year, I could not imagine going. The blog was only months old, and there were so many other things to do, plus my glass slippers were so dusty.... Last year I wanted to go (and got a lot of pressure from a local pal to attend) but in the end I decided that it was too great an indulgence. I immediately regretted it. Fine, she was right, I should have gone.

So now I am ready. And I might even have someone to stay with. But I am still a little nervous. Having read a zillion pre- and post-BlogHer musings by many of you, I know I am not alone. So what I want to know is, are you going? Are you thinking about it? I'm not asking you to hold my hand for three days, but it would certainly be easier for me to make the leap if I knew I'd see some friendly faces. Especially now that Debbie keeps threatening to stop blogging, which might reduce her interest in attending the conference with me. Damn her.

So, who's with me? (early registration lasts until the end of March...)

Random quote and unrelated photo of the week

Incidentally, I am at work on a weight-loss regimen that involves eating chili con carne twice a day, a theory about the Clinton marriage that is going to change the way everyone sees it and a campaign to stamp out the fish fork.

Nora Ephron
Four or Five Things You Don't Know About Me

Violet, You're Turning Violet, Violet!

I recently remembered that our refrigerator contained a ziploc bag full of blueberries picked and frozen last summer.* As those of you who were readers in the summer may recall, Ada is a berry fiend, eating her weight in berries at any chance. One of the saddest things about winter is going to pick up vegetables at our CSA farm and Ada asking hopefully, "are there any strawberries today"?

In the summer the farm has a sizable strawberry patch, with berries free for the picking for children dragged along with their veggie-happy parents. Add that to the extreme joy Ada has found in hunting for Wilma, the black bantam hen, and trips to the farm can be as exciting as the zoo or an unexpected cupcake.

But back to the berries. I remembered this bag of frozen blues, and pulled some out the other day to top off the yogurt-granola-banana breakfast. Ada was smitten, and I saw an opportunity. Now Ada is so thrilled to get blueberries that we can get her to eat practically anything with the promise that blueberries will be forthcoming at the end of the meal. This is an especially useful little tool now, as meal-times have been especially subject to two of Ada's toddler quirks: (1) extreme pickyness about food (including foods she ate as recently as a few days prior) and (2) "I'm going to control things" episodes featuring those four little words every parent loves to hear: "I DON'T WANT TO". With the introduction of blueberries, most food tantrums can be quashed with the promise that blueberries are only moments away from defrosting, and eating that egg/vegetable/meat/thing-she-loved-yesterday-
but-now-can't-stand-to-have-on-her-plate will facilitate the defrosting process.


Several days into Project Blueberry Bribes, I have remembered one downside of giving Ada high doses of this magic food. The poop. For those of you without blueberry obsessed children, suffice it to say that, even more than before, I am wishing she was potty trained.


*Actually, our fridge contains numerous bags of frozen berries from this summer, but I have not gotten off my ass to make anything with them. Blueberries retain their shape pretty well when unfrozen, while other berries do not. This means that unfrozen rasp- or strawberries need to be cooked into something. Soon, I promise. The nadir of winter calls for berry desserts.

Once Upon A Time...

A couple of weeks ago, at the end of a stretch that included some intense tantrums and insane toddler demands, Ada offered up her first independently conceived and recited short story:



Once upon a time, there was a pillow.

And she went into the forest. To pick some more pillows from the picking bog.

Then it rolled down the hill. And it cracked open!

And inside was a mother chick and a baby chick.


After a pause, I asked: Is there more? Or is that the end?


That is the end.

** * ** * **

Something in the combination of the words "pillow" and "hill" reminded me of the Robert Louis Stevenson poem The Land of Counterpane. When I googled the poem title, I found an ebook of children's poems and stories called "Project Gutenberg's Childhood's Favorites and Fairy Stories." This ebook is not only free, but given the copyright status of the material and the Guterberg project, the distribution and free use of the materials is allowed and encouraged. All of which is to say that I happily put that picture in this post, with no guilt whatsoever.

Random quote and unrelated photo of the week

Every now and again, I'll run into someone who claims not to like chocolate or other sweets, and while we live in a country where everyone has the right to eat what they want, I want to say for the record that I don't trust these people, that I think something is wrong with them, and that they're probably - this must be said - total duds in bed.

Steve Almond
Candy Freak: A Journey Through the Chocolate Underbelly of America

Sadness, Love, Joy

I am feeling better than I thought I would. Maybe this is because it is too exhausting to be sad. Beyond the physical toll of crying (which I do easily anyway), being sad takes on a physical form, like a heavy coat you can't take off. Thankfully, this weekend's sunny weather was matched by my mood; the coat was left crumpled in the corner by our pile of shoes.

I thought I would need to give the sadness more room before I could shrug it off, that it would demand my attention for longer. This time, what I feel is more like a shadow, a small companion that pokes up at unknown intervals. I was braced for a crushing loss, but happily this feels quieter and frankly more gentle than I'd feared. Even more so than this fall, the disappointment about not being pregnant quickly gave way to a feeling that this is not the end of the road.

Don't get me wrong; I hate traveling this road. But as much as I hate it, I am not ready to get off yet. I have frozen embryos, and despite the low probability that even one of them will one day become a fetus, I can't walk away from them.

I may be able to have another full fresh cycle, too. Hours after hearing from Jill, I called my parents to tell them the news. After expressing sadnesses for the outcome and my feelings, my father asked what we might do next. I told him that I could not stop trying while we still had frozen embryos. He remembered that a fresh cycle was more likely to have a positive outcome than a frozen, and asked if we would do that again. Chris and I do not have the money to explore this option, but before I could say that, my father offered to help. He explained that he and my mother have the money, and if we wanted to use it for another try, that they would want that to happen.

In my moments of need, my father is unfailingly and so graciously generous. In offering his help, he never suggested that he expects anything in return, that we owe him in any way. I am so lucky to have family support, both emotional and financial.

We will talk to the doctor in a couple of weeks, and see what he thinks about our options. On Thursday Jill told me that if we wanted to start a frozen cycle, we could go ahead now. I doubt that the doctor will try to dissuade us from a fresh cycle, which is a better chance overall. If the quality of my eggs is consistent with last time, I imagine he'll endorse this course.

The trick now is to both plan for a fresh cycle, and for one or two frozen cycles if the fresh one doesn't pan out, while simultaneously recognizing the strong likelihood that none of these attempts will work. I am not now at a place where I believe in that my future does not include a second biological child. I am still hopeful that this child will show up. To get through the attempts to make this happen, I need to believe that there is a chance this will happen, but also be ready to fully embrace life without that other child.

Last night Chris told me that over the past few days he has more strongly appreciated Ada than he did before Thursday's news. Coming off a rough new year with Ada, both Chris and I have been in survival mode. We have held on while she has been a screaming, whining whirlwind of tantrums and experiments in increased control over her life. Thankfully, those week have flowed into a new period that mostly features sweetness and interest in others. The return to an easier time, right as we learn that we did not get the second pregnancy for which we'd hoped, that was a gift.

Even if Ada had not returned to her "normal" self, I think Chris would still have an increased appreciation for her qualities. He is better at loving what he has than I am. Luckily I have a lot to love in him and Ada.

No. No. No.

Things that I no longer have to worry about:

1. Will I go back to my job after 3 months leave?
   
2. Will I go back at all?
   
3. What will we do about child care?
   
4. What if there are two?
   
5. What if the next one is as colicky as Ada was?
   
6. How will I deal with 10 more weeks of projesterone shots?

This feels as bad as I thought it would.

Hugs for the New Year

I know that Chinese New Year is officially over, but I am just getting around to looking at my photos. Ellen, Jiro and I took the kids to the Chinese Garden last weekend to see the Lion Dancers. The kids enjoyed the drumming and dancing almost as much as they liked staring into the pond.


We actually had a great vantage point from which to watch the dancers, at least from the kids' perspective. Ellen and I accurately guessed that Ada and Monkey Boy might be a little freaked out by the dancers or drummers if we were right up against them during the performance. Sitting across the pond was perfect - we could see and hear the performance without anyone screaming that it was too loud or too much to bear.

The dancing itself was fun. Once it was over Ada decided that she HAD to have water, and since I had not brought any, we walked across the garden to the bathroom, where I scooped some water from the sink tap into my hand. She had a tiny sip and declared she was done. Pressing our luck, we decided to get a picture of the kids in the garden. This took some doing. Witness:

Ellen: Just look up for 2 seconds, and THEN you can dig for worms.

(If you object to this photo of yourself, Ellen, just keep reading.
There is one of me that is WAY worse. I promise.)

Almost...

Success!

With that triumph under our belts, we retired to a nearby Chinese restaurant approved by Ellen's restaurant-owning brother. The adults enjoyed all kinds of good stuff, while the kids picked suspiciously at their noodles, turned up their noses at the Chinese broccoli, and were only convinced to eat when they found out that they would not be allowed to eat their New Year's cookies and candy until they did.

Oh, and while Ellen and Monkey Boy checked out the facilities, the rest of us made funny faces:

See, I told you.

Peeps Show

How I could have missed this, I don't know. I do know that I am incredibly amused by the idea of a contest that has people creating dioramas featuring peeps.

Last year the Washington Post ran a peeps contest. This year the Chicago Tribune has one. Deadline is March 6, so get cracking, er, peeping. In the mean time, check out the winners of the Washington Post's contest. Made my day.

Halfway

One week down, one more to go of exquisite torture of being between implantation and any knowledge about the outcome. A lot of people are asking me how I am doing, how I feel.
I feel:

• not at all pregnant, but I wouldn't either way.
• hopeful.
• scared, mostly about feeling sad if I am not pregnant.
• tired. (Chris and I stayed up too late last night playing a dorky game with friends. It was worth it though, when I pulled out an 11th hour victory.)
• frustrated, mostly with Ada's current attempts to wrestle control over everything via tantrum. Today her burrito was "broken" (I argued that in order to eat the thing, you have to break it by biting it. After one bite, the thing is broken, right?). Other complaints: the burrito contained beans. The burrito was too hot to hold. She was not allowed to sit on my lap and scream in my ear. (NB: that Dr. Karp thing seems to be helping. Once I said: it is too hot! it is too hot! it is broken! she mellowed out some.)
• excited that a project I am working on for my job is almost ready to go live.
  
• nervous that a project I am working on for my job is almost ready to go live. (how do you professional web-folk not go crazy with perfecting these things?)
• thrilled that my sister got a fly-back for a job that she thought had passed her by.
  
• patient. For once I am able to let thoughts about the future flit through my mind, note that they are there and let them go out again. All the "what if" questions can wait a week.

So the answer is, I am fine, thanks for asking. How are you this week?

Random quote and unrelated photo of the week

Don't fight darkness - bring the light, and darkness will disappear.

Maharishi Mahesh Yogi

Fools Rush In

Chris: Today I told my students "if you choose not to decide, you still have made a choice". I asked them if they knew where that came from. No one did.

Me: This surprises you?

Chris: But Rush is Boss!

Me: The 20 year olds in your class were born in 1988. Free Will came out in 1980.

Chris: Hmm, right. Maybe I should let them know I didn't mean Rush Limbaugh.

Happy Birthday Photos

It is my pal Jiro's birthday, and he is off with Ellen on a child-free weekend. I hope they are having a great time.

While I am thinking of Jiro, here are photos of the fun he had with Ada and Monkey Boy and a huge box:

The intrepid box-scooting crew

Who knew that making a box move across the floor could generate such excitement?

I had to back up to get out of their way, the speed they achieved was that intense.


But speed has its price, and as the box started to disintegrate, the kids
jumped out. Jiro hung on to the game for a good hour or two after that, scooting around the house and yelling "woo hoo! who's with me?"

Random quote and unrelated photo of the week

Stories are, in a sense, a scam. There was never a clerk as unconflicted, docile and pathetic as Akaki Akakievich, but from the subterfuge that such a man could exist, Gogol made the wonder that is "The Overcoat." Ghosts don't show up to save the stingy, and many stingy die unsaved, but "a stingy guy stayed stingy, then died" is not a story, and is certainly not "A Christmas Carol." Princes don't invite their entire kingdoms to the palace, but if at least one doesn't, our story is "Once upon a time Cinderella miserably cleaned, forever and ever."

George Saunders
"Soviet Deadpan"

A token of his esteem

"you'll want to heat it up for a few seconds so that the inside gets all..."

"molten!"

(it did.)

T-minus 36 hours.

After the world's longest follicle-stimulation cycle*, at 7:30 Sunday I took the shot that will induce ovulation. The ovulation, and the retrieval of the eggs, happens Tuesday morning.

I don't remember my 2004 retrieval, probably due to the anesthesia. This is what I thought about it at the time. This time we have the added complication of an existing child, and getting to the doctor by 7 AM means doing something more loving with Ada than stashing her in our trunk with some cheese crackers and a Madeline book. Luckily we also have the world's nicest child care provider, who agreed to show up at 6:25 AM on a day she doesn't normally work for us, get Ada fed and dressed and over to Monkey Boy's house so they can both be cared by a different care provider. Juni's response to my request was essentially, "No problem, I am happy to do my part to help you have another child, so I can love it up." Did I mention what an amazement she is? I really don't know what we'll do this fall, when she'll be done with school and ready to move on to full time employment.

We also have the added complication of a lovely but intense friend coming to town tomorrow for his father's cancer work-up. I am sure he'll understand that I need to work around certain unavoidable appointments, as well as around work, family, sleep, etc.

The timing is actually pretty good as such things go. I don't usually work on Tuesdays and Fridays, and those are also days Ellen is around to help me out. Tuesday should be fine - Ada will be with Monkey Boy and a child care person in the morning and Ellen will feed and make sure Ada gets a nap. The trick is going to be Friday. I need to get over the guilt feeling associated with letting someone else take care of my child for most of the day. I am supposed to lay low post-embryo transfer. After the transfer a few months ago, I felt fidgety and could not really stand the idea of lazing about. A day off (especially one with no child) left me dying to clean up, start a load of wash, and generally engage in activities not conducive to quiet relaxation. This time I am feeling a little more superstitious about following the doctors' orders. I'll work on that this week, and just in case I will do laundry on Thursday.

As long as I am thinking about this, here is a shot of why Ada loves my fertility doc's offices:


Plus, the view includes several bridges and this ship-building dock, complete with huge blue crane:

(Not pictured, the "tram hut" at the bottom of the OHSU tram. She loves all things tram.)



*For those of you who know or care about such things, usually the stimulation is 8 to 12 days, 14 at the outside. Since my ovaries didn't cooperate until day 7, the docs pretended that was my day 4, and went from there. I have been on the meds for 16 days, and it is just in the last two days that my ovaries have started to feel incredibly huge and heavy. I feel like I'm carrying two bowling balls in there, instead of ovaries. Ok, maybe not full-sized ones, but at least the duckpin kind.

The things she likes

My parents were never big on doing the "fun" kid things that other people's families engaged in.

Let me back up. It might be helpful to point out the following: my parents like to remind me that I once said I was the product of a nerd marriage. They say this proudly, as well as teasingly. My parents are intellectuals and not interested in pop culture in almost any form. They could not name a single football player, they don't care who wins the Oscars, they probably could not pick Britney Spears out of a lineup. With this as my childhood normal, as an adult I often feel embarrassed and discomfited by mass-market and other child-centered entertainments.

I feel torn writing this. Just writing this seems to suggest that I resent the choices my parents made, but I don't. I love that they took me to museums and on hikes, rather than to whatever passed for gymboree in 1970s LA. In some ways it is less where they took me as a child, but the discomfort with pop culture that they instilled in me that I am working out. I mean, they made me the kind of person who would navel gaze about just this topic.

(I am not even sure "pop culture" is really what I mean. But what is the word for mainstream entertainments if not "pop"?)

Despite my innate discomfort with certain types of kid-entertainment, I have the sense that some of these things are fun, if not for me, than at least for Ada. (Two year olds being such discriminating connoisseurs of the finer things.) So I try to balance what I do with Ada, including the cultured and the fluff. Sometimes the things I think are going to be fluff are actually really fun. A couple of weeks before Christmas Chris, Ada and I hopped on the holiday train with Monkey Boy and his parents. This 40 minute ride involved a steam engine (and five cars) chugging slowly backwards down the track for a while, then returning (forward) along the same track. The train passes wetlands along the Willamette River, allowing glimpses of houseboats, herons and floating logs. The tracks parallel the Springwater Corridor bike path, so we also saw a lot of walkers and bikers (some wielding camera-phones).

Proof I am not the only documentarian in our little group

As much as Ada and Monkey Boy enjoyed the train ride, they were even more excited to see the engine up close. It was pretty impressive:


Ok, a ride on a holiday train, not so pop. So I pressed forward in my efforts. We live near one of those streets where not only does every resident decorate for Christmas, but where it is mandatory to do so. Despite the proximity to our house, I'd never seen the street in full light action before. I figured Ada would be into this, so I wanted all week for it to stop raining long enough for us to pack her into the stroller with hot chocolate and lap blanket and mosey on down to see the splendor. As I'd hoped, she loved it. Or, as she gushes, "I yuv it!" She also yuved the "choco".

This is really the first year her vocabulary allows her to enthuse with abandon, and she gushed about the lights, the santas and snowmen, the candy canes. For some reason a house with all pink and white lights really got her going, enough so that she mentioned it a couple of times on the way home.


And as a side note, she seems to have finally mastered the concept of "cover your mouth when you cough"!

All this is good for me, remembering how fun these things are for little kids not jaded about the world and what is cheap or cool or horrifying. I still feel kind of uncomfortable about some of the child-centered entertainments I see in advertisements and on parent blogs. I'll still be dragging Ada to museums and taking pictures of her with sculptures. I'm not buying tickets to Elmo On Ice just yet, but it is all about baby, er, toddler steps, right?

Casting a Wide Net

Today's doctor visit went better (I'm still on the slow boat, but I have 9 or 10 teeny egglets growing and my estrogen level is up. I feel good enough to share the following, non-fertility-related item.

Initially I thought this was just run-of-the-mill spam, but now I see it is more than that. It is spam, in that they guy found me by googling something like "nonlinear analysis" but as far as I can tell it is not a come on to get my money. My ideas, but not my money.

* ** * ** *

You are kindly invated to Participate and submit an Abstract to:

CHAOS2008
Chaotic Modeling and Simulation International Conference
(Chania, Crete, Greece, June 3-6, 2008)

Call for Abstracts/Papers (Deadline: January 31, 2008)

The forthcoming International Conference (Chaos2008) on Chaotic Modeling, Simulation and Applications will take place at the MAICh Conference Centre,
Chania, Crete, Greece (June 3-6, 2008).

The general topics (You will find the detailed list in the Conference web site: www.chaos2008.net) and the special sessions proposed for the Conference
Chaos2008 include but are not limited to:

1. Chaos and Nonlinear Dynamics
2. Stochastic Chaos
3. Chemical Chaos
4. Data Analysis and Chaos
5. Hydrodynamics, Turbulence and Plasmas
4. Optics and Chaos
5. Chaotic Oscillations and Circuits
6. Chaos in Climate Dynamics
7. Geophysical Flows
8. Biology and Chaos
9. Neurophysiology and Chaos
10. Hamiltonian systems
11. Chaos in Astronomy and Astrophysics
12. Chaos and Solitons
13. Micro- and Nano- Electro-Mechanical Systems
14. Neural Networks
15. Chaos, Ecology and Economy


More information from the conference secretary at: (email@address) or by using the facilities of the conference web site: http://www.chaos2008.net.

Sincerely

Name, CHAOS2008 Chair
Address, University
Chania, Crete, Greece

* ** * ** *

Sadly, I am not that kind of nonlinear girl. Then again, this looks right up Chris' alley.

Random quote and unrelated photo of the week

Neon King Kong standin' on my back
Can't stop to turn around, broke my sacroiliac

Grandmaster Flash and the Furious Five
The Message

Not what I was expecting

In all my worrying, one thing I was not worrying about was my response to follicle stimulating drugs. Knowing that Chris and I need IVF due to a, shall we say, difficulty encouraging individual eggs and sperm to get together on their own, I never spent much energy thinking about other problems that could keep us from conceiving. The first time we did IVF several years ago, I was a little slow to respond to the drugs, and the dosages were upped midway through the process.

After my "day 4" appointment this morning, Jill (my favorite medical assistant and apparently the bearer of all my bad news) called to set up my next appointment and let me know about the blood test results. She told me that my estradiol level was low - below 20. That didn't mean much to me, so I mentioned that the first time I'd been a slow starter too. Trying to help me understand the results, Jill said, last time my day four estradiol level was 45. At the time they'd considered that kind of low.

"Oh." I replied, just starting to understand what she was telling me. "So what do we do?"

"Just keep on going. We can't change the protocol, since you are already on the highest dose of the drugs. It is only day four, don't worry."

But I do. I worry about the low hormone level, and I worry that I didn't think to worry about this before now. How can I employ my vast powers of magical thinking to protect myself from bad things happening if I can't think of all the bad things that could happen? Why didn't it occur to me that this could be a problem?

The first time I had IVF I was 32. I am now 36. Still young-ish (at least by fertility doc standards), but no spring chicken. After each of the tests and procedures that led up to IVF, each one ending with a resounding "well, we don't know what's wrong but your fallopian tubes/ovaries/uterus, etc look normal," I started to believe that if we could just fix our one issue it would all work fine. We just had to find that issue. Eventually we did, and ICSI fixed it. But now I am forced to remember that fertility can be much more complicated. My body is important in this process, and is fallible.

* ** * ** *

One other thing - by typing the words "day four", IVF and estradiol, I will be found by a lot of other women going through what I am now experiencing. A note to those women, who invariably never stay long - I think I understand what you are looking for, and I know why you only stop here a few seconds. You want more than information, you want reassurance. I wish I could give it to you. I wish I felt it. Today I found myself googling "day 4 estradiol level" in a crazy attempt to figure out what a "normal" day four level is.

"Can I go from less than 20 to just fine in a few days?" I stopped myself before digging deep into google's mysteries. There are no answers out there for me and the other women who want to know more than what the "right" estradiol level is. We want to know whether we'll get what we want, whether we'll carry a pregnancy to term, whether we'll feel the happy exhaustion of labor. I don't know that, for myself or for my brief visitors.

Best of luck to us all.

(And thanks to magpie, who correctly identified that I was talking about estradiol, not FSH. Apparently more than my response to the drugs is slow these days!)

Random quote and unrelated photo of the week

He didn't have hair either, so he was called a redhead arbitrarily.

Danill Kharms
Blue Notebook #10

Another problem with living in a city that is 77.9% white

Chris and Ada were looking at the newspaper one recent morning. Ada noticed a photograph of two African Americans, one female and one male. Pointing, she announced: "Gordon and Susan!"

One last thing or two about the holidays

Jammed into one photo-filled post, here's my holiday wrap-up:

Crafty Holiday

Now that I have given my gifts out to friends and family, I am free to share what I made.

I got really inspired by all the ideas posted on Sew, Mama, Sew! during November. In addition to the apron I made for Ellen, I made a bunch of zippered wristlets:

I also made a bunch of heat therapy bags (muslin bags filled with orange-oil splashed rice). They can be tossed in the microwave and then used as heating pads for sore muscles. For each one I made a linen and cotton bag to go over the "ugly" bag. I had a lot of fun making these, but then completely forgot to take pictures. Luckily I realized that I actually made one more than I gave away. I made four in linen and cotton, and one in all cotton. The last one I didn't give away, because I thought the linen version made a better gift. After literally sniffing around the house for the orange-scented bag, I found it and snapped this picture:



I also made a couple of eye bags filled with lentils and lavender. No photos, because other than the nice fabric, these rectangles aren't much to look at. (Mike, if you are reading, know that I have one in my dining room with your name written all over it.) Here is a small photo of one of the trapesoid bags I made for a couple of women at work. I found a quick and easy "one yard, one hour" pattern for a lined bag, but it was so boring I ended up using velcro to adjust the shape a bit. I also made a great little bird shaped sachet for Ada (who had requested a smelly pillow after seeing me make the eye bags and rice bags). Sadly, I forgot to take a picture, and the thing is upstairs with her now while she sleeps. I got the idea from this tutorial.


Christmas Eve White Elephant, or was that Dusty Duck?

Chris's family always spends Christmas eve with his aunt's family. We catch up on family news over egg nogs, eat dinner (ham and turkey), and retire to the living room for a white elephant gift exchange. This is not one of those exchanges where everyone brings something nice and bland and cheap (movie tickets or bon bons). This white elephant is an attempt to out-weird one another. I was sure I had a winner with my Home Face-Lift Kit (picked up at a white elephant exchange last January), but then I was met with several really impressive entries, including a Ukranian sunflower plate, a set of cat-butt magnets, old-lady doilies, a sexual board game, and this:



As you can see from the finger-prints, this one had been in the garage for a while. My 12 year old nephew had three separate gifts stolen from him (part of the game, but really, he's twelve!), but one of them was some card games that my mother-in-law and I got back to him. All in all, a nice evening.

(My brother-in-law ended up with the duck, which he intended to take home as a "treat" for his family's cats. Ten days after Christmas, my sister-in-law reported that the duck was still intact. Apparently the cats are more frightened than delighted by the stuffed bird. Funny, so was I.)


Christmas was a success

This first year of Ada understanding that Christmas involved lots of food and presents went over well. Exhibit A:


She only ended up icing two cookies, because she could not understand why you would ice a cookie if you weren't going to immediately eat it.

Exhibit B:
My in-laws saved this Fisher Price town from when Chris was a kid. I had one too but mine went to a goodwill somewhere in LA the moment my interest in it flagged. Not only does it have the police car and fire engine, but a bunch of "little people", furniture and playground equipment. Plus, my mother-in-law made a felt park and, because she could not find the original letters that came with the set, made new letters. Each laminated letter is addressed to one of Ada's friends or family members. She loves delivering the mail, and the process has solidified her sight knowledge of her own name and that of a couple of other people named on the envelopes.




New Year, New Projects

Mostly because I have no idea what to get her, I am making my mom a farmers market bag. I stopped by my favorite fabric store today to pick up material for the handles, and found they were having a sale. I ended up buying a bunch of material for several planned projects.



Traci - the fabrics on the left are for the bag you hoped I'd make you. We can take it out in trade or blood, whatever works for you.

Karen - do you like either of the two middle fabrics on the right for a skirt? Depending on which one you like I will make myself a skirt with the other fabric.

The orange fabric will become a shirt from a pattern my essentially-sister-in-law gave me, and the bottom one will become a table runner for my mother-in-law. I will give it to her for Christmas next year, so I think I have a little time. (Yes, I can not resist a bargain.)

Somehow writing that all up was more exhausting than actually living it. I hope everyone is recovering nicely from their holidays.

(Chris - can you help me fix this dang blog so that everything I post doesn't end up like this, with edges trimmed in a messy and unwanted way?)