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Actually this letter is about politics. HA! just kidding. Let me just sum up my take on current affairs.

1. Schiavo case: obscene and tragic.
2. Delay, Frist, Jeb Bush: tools.
3. Florida, federal, and Supreme Court justices: doing their jobs.
4. Schiavo parents: deluded and sad.

What else? Well, there’s the regular environmental looting and pillaging; the Bankruptcy Bill that gives the average American a gigantic Screw You from Bush and co; and the scary fact I read last week that NYC may be under water by 2050.

To be honest, that’s all the depth of political thinking I am capable of right now. So if you want to hear from women more articulate than me, let me recommend the following excellent blogs:

http://feministe.us/blog/

http://bitchphd.blogspot.com/

http://respectfulofotters.blogspot.com/

All women, all highly intelligent, all funny and very readable.

There. I’ve done my good deed for the day.

Now back to pregnancy griping. In short, I’m not digging it. I’m not digging the fact that I have to eat all the time AND that I’m nauseous as well, so I don’t actually WANT to eat at all. Nothing really looks good. But if I don’t eat, my stomach feels like it will eat *me,* and also, the nausea gets worse. So…eating goes from fun to work. Eating being one of my favorite pastimes, I find this hard to bear.

Many people think pregnancy is a festival of approved eating. Women on diets, myself included at one time, will often think how nice it would be to have to eat a lot, for it to be good for you and socially approved. But when you are pretty much eating two small meals between the 3 big ones just to keep from keeling over, it’s a pain. You have work to do, but here’s your gut, saying, Hey MA, it’s time for some protein. Or else. I tried keeping snacks at my desk, but those kinds of things (granola, chips) are mostly carbs, and they don’t seem to stick at all. This kid wants protein, and he won’t be satisfied with a little oatmeal based mouthful. So it’s cheese sticks, then a little lunch meat, and then my stomach’s upset, so I need some saltines, then I’m thirsty but water seems to upset my stomach so I drink diet Sprite instead, then maybe some more cheese.

So blah blah pitycakes. It’s all supposed to get better at 12 weeks or so, so I will just stumble around crankily in the meantime, hungry as a bear and repressing the urge to puke on passersby. And you know, trying to work and not bite Matt’s head off and occasionally wash a dish.

When you are feeling generally unwell all the time, something that makes you feel good, however minimally, will always be welcome. Frustrated at my continued lack of pants, I finally broke down and decided to try on–not buy, mind you–a pair of maternity jeans,the kind that have no snap or zipper, just a big wide band of soft fabric-covered elastic at the top. They had it over the fat pants in that they were cut like normal jeans otherwise, and not huge in the thighs. So I thought, well, I’ll try them on; probably they’ll be too big, but I’ll have a better idea of when I’ll need them.

Then in the dressing room…oh, heaven. I didn’t know how much my old jeans had been pinching me. And these were so soft, and while still a bit big, the elastic band kept them up, and it was designed to slide down and ride under my belly when I got really big. Under a shirt, they looked completely normal. And they felt so fucking good I didn’t want to take them off again.

Of course, being Target, they only had one pair in my size, but who cared. They were mine, motherfuckers. I wore them all the rest of the week, and I’ll go back next paycheck and get another pair or two. Because I need all the good feelings I can get at this stage.

Did I mention my bellybutton is numb now? Yeah, that’s new. And weird.

Speaking of weird, this week was Purim, which I knew nothing about. Thus imagine my surprise to see everywhere little Hasidic children in costumes–clown, princess, Little Red Riding Hood. Children dress up for this holiday and go to parties, which is nice, especially since they don’t get to do Halloween. But the weirder bit is that the adults are supposed to, by tradition, get utterly sauced at Purim. As in, guys in frock coats and side curls, weaving down the sidewalk, or leaning over balconies yelling at each other. It’s very disorienting, considering that I often feel like the Whore of Babylon for wearing pants in this neighborhood. Last night we could hear music and loudspeakers from some kind of street party, and even this morning little kids were still going around in groups dressed up in their outfits. It’s all calmed down now that it’s Shabbos, but I have to think that all those devout men going to temple in their finery might very well still be drunk or suffering severe hangovers.

I don’t know if the women indulge also; I would guess not, but you never know.

That’s all for now; I have a book to finish this weekend and sleeping to do in about 5 minutes.

Note to local deli: If you want people to eat your lasagna, don’t call it “Meat-containing lasagna.” Tell us what kind of meat is in there. I don’t want to eat pasta while wondering “is this what cat tastes like?” Thank you.

Today I outgrew my fattest jeans–had to break out the old rubber-band trick (loop a rubber band through the buttonhole and around the button, gives you a few extra inches). Haven’t used that since the Great Fattening of 94 (long story). Anyway, I guess part of this week’s paycheck must now be spent on fat pants. I’m not ready for maternity pants yet (and to be frank–they scare me. There are panels, and flaps, and hooks, and buttons in strange places. I’m not ready for that yet).

My mom suggested I switch to skirts, which are more forgiving, and it’s a sensible thing to say. But skirts and I have a bad history. Mostly it boils down to me never having skirt-appropriate shoes. For some reason, the only shoes that look right with skirts are uncomfortable ones–little flimsy wedge sandals that you stumble over, or high heels, or the abominable flip flops. Flats and skirts make you look dowdy, and besides, still require the wearing of some sort of pantyhose. I’m a socks and sneakers or sandals girl. At any rate, it’s still too cold for sandals, and by the time it isn’t, Matt will have to paint my toenails for me.

So I’m thinking—overalls? They’re roomy, comfy, big in the gut and butt. Also completely out of fashion right now, except for the pregnant ladies and house painters. So wearing them would be announcing my status to my office, which I’m not quite ready to do. So it’s probably back to the Lane Bryant for overpriced stretchy jeans (yes: Mom Jeans!) that I can wear with sneakers. And then to Target for fat lady tops, because nearly every top I own that once buttoned in front, don’t button no more, if you know what I mean.

I was home yesterday and caught a couple of episodes of TLC’s “Baby Story” which follows a couple around right before, during, and after their kid is born. One episode was a family that was expecting twins, and had been told they were both boys. They had the nursery decorated in baseball-playing teddy bears, blue this, blue that, sports-related baby toys, etc.

And they got two girls.

The dad didn’t seem too bothered–he was happy with it. Mom looked stressed by the news, and confused. As she was talking to the film crew a week or so later, you found out why–she was going to have to redecorate the whole nursery and exchange all the blue clothes for pink ones. The show ended with her rolling a pink flowery wallpaper border over the bears with baseballs, and slapping some of those horrible stretchy headbands on the bald heads of her daughters, now properly outfitted in frilly pink dresses. Thank God! How horrible it would be for two newborns not to be surrounded with the proper gender’s color scheme!

Baby clothes didn’t use to be gendered. Little boys wore dresses–actual dresses, with petticoats and matching hats–until they were 5 or 6 years old, until the early 20th century. To my knowledge, this was not followed by an explosion of The Gay, but the way we act now, it is of utmost importance to mark out a child’s gender the minute they are born. Or else…well, I don’t know what or else. Strangers might not know what sex they are? That’s really the worst that can happen.

Babies, of course, don’t care about anything but eating, sleeping, and pooping for quite a long time, so let’s not pretend we’re doing it for them. I’m not suggesting we dress boys as girls or vice versa, just that maybe, for a baby, an outfit need not be pink with flowers or blue with trucks. Covered with spit up, they don’t look all that different anyway. But I don’t blame the parents and families. It’s quite difficult to find non-stereotyped clothing and toys for kids, or even clothing that might assert, for example, that little girls can like trucks. Or little boys can like flowers.

Our kid won’t even have a nursery, per se. By the time we get a place where the kid gets a room of his/her own…it will be more of just a room. I might paint them a mural, put up cute/fun things, and make it into a kid’s room. But a boy is not going to get a Dallas Cowboys room, and a girl is not going to get the Pretty Princess special. They will see enough of that stuff without me doing it. Whatever roles they want to play, they will have to pick for themselves.

I don’t think all this gender-roles obsession does anything–it doesn’t ensure your kid will not turn out to have The Gay. They will or they won’t, and that shouldn’t matter anyway.

In the meantime, my mom wants me to call as soon as we know the sex so she can buy clothes. I’m hoping to talk her into some nice things in purple, yellow, and green. Just in case.

On the complaint side: I am hungry all the damn time, while at the same time slightly nauseated by food. I have, so far this morning, eaten a bowl of cereal and a large frozen fruit bar, and two large apple granola bars which I finished about an hour ago. Then suddenly, I am roaringly hungry again, like I haven’t eaten in two days—I dive for the Triscuits like a starving man. I don’t really want to go to lunch this early. Before I was pregnant, I even occasionally skipped lunch. If I tried this now, the baby would take its revenge and make me pass right out. You’d see me lying in the street, drooling and twitching until someone took pity and gave me some Cheetos.

I am craving pasta right now, but I think I’m really craving tomato sauce. I ate a whole can of stewed tomatoes the other day that Matt had bought for his chili (forcing him to go out to the store again—sorry, Matt), and it was heavenly. I think lunch is going to be tortellini from the deli, lots of sauce. My other choice, a super-large fries with extra ketchup, doesn’t seem like the healthiest idea.

On the non-complaint side: I find all my previous food/body issues have vanished for now. I’m too hungry to care about getting fat. And also, just let me mention that I think the diets in pregnancy books are full of crap. If the baby wants broccoli, I’ll eat it, but so far, no go. Vegetables still taste like dirt to me, unless they are sautéed in delicious butter and perhaps also covered in cheese. With a little bacon. Most of the pregnancy books still rely on the Food Pyramid, that agribusiness-sponsored bit of kerfluffery that tries to tell us we need lots and lots of grains each day so that our friends at Monsanto can sell it to us for a nice profit.

Or else the books attempt to sell me on the virtues of kale and chard, which, whatever. I am not a rabbit. I have nothing against the flavor-including vegetables like carrots or corn, or even against celery, which makes an excellent delivery system for salt, peanut butter, or cheese (mmm…pimento cheese. Man, that sounds good). But the leafy greens and I have yet to see eye to, um, stalk. I take my vitamins, drink milk and juice, eat fruit and the veggies I can tolerate, and refuse to feel guilty about any of it. If my child is born with two heads, it will not be because I picked pork chops over alfalfa sprouts.

Besides, I sit next to a strict vegetarian at work, and I have two words for you: constant gas. This person is a symphony of belches and other unpleasant, sometimes smelly rumblings. I respect his choices, but if vegetables are going to taste bad going in and cause pain coming out…well, I don’t need it, friend. I might live forever, but I will be very, very cranky. And smelly.

I think I have to wrap up, because this food talk is making me really hungry. Later.

Hey, I’m just a letter-writing fool this week. It’s to make up for all the times I neglected ya’ll, the readers who actually click on this instead of deleting it from your inbox. All four of you!

Anyway, I apologize for the Dark Night of My Soul tone of many of my recent letters—I could blame it on the kid, the hormones, blah de blah, but that would be a lie. If I hadn’t been a good little church kid, I would have been, if not a goth, then a Depressed Teen in Black. That’s just who I am.

But not all the time. The flip side of bleakness is constant amusement. When you see the absurdity of life, it can make you cry or make you laugh. I try to keep things weighted towards laughter whenever possible.

This is doubly important when you’re married to someone who is also still, basically, a Depressed Teen in Black. I find that part of my job in this marriage is to burst into Matt’s office, hug him, and sing him a silly song, something like this:

Oh! It is the Hub,
For whom I feel much love!
Lalalalala Hub!

Accompanied, perhaps, with dancing or hand gestures.

There are only two possible reactions to this: violent vomiting or laughter. So far, it makes him laugh. And I know I married the right person.

He reciprocates, of course, but prefers to just burst in and hug me, or perform his inexplicable pointy-finger dance (don’t ask) rather than make up horrible little songs. That’s MY special talent. I feel this will come in handy when the kid arrives, and I can sing songs about how he cries too much, smells like poo, is cute but cranky, has fat little feet, etc. Like dogs, it’s not so much what you say but how you say it, at least until they start to talk (babies, not dogs).

I think being silly when needed is a skill everyone should develop, but I think being the youngest child in your family makes it easier. Your earliest memories are of saying and doing things that inexplicably provoke laughter, turning you into a little ham, and of course, getting you more attention. All I have to do is remember back to that part of my life, and set aside any sense of dignity whatsoever, and I’m ready to go.

When do you consider yourself poor? I ask this question to myself a lot, because I often run into people, online or in person, who seem to have more ready cash than I ever have. But I have a place to live, clothes to wear (if I shop carefully) and more than enough to eat. So by the standards of much of the world, I’m not poor.

But if the place I live is small, the clothes I wear worn until they fall apart and replaced only at need, and the food I buy rules out my ability to buy other things I need—does that make me poor?

Perhaps we need another term—poor-ish. None of the things we go without bothers me as much as our lack of savings—a surprising number of Americans like us live without any real savings to speak of, no hedge against catastrophe except whatever’s left on our credit cards—and of course, that’s a temporary and expensive fallback. But after the necessities are paid for, there never seems to be anything left.

With the baby coming, we’re working harder on this than ever, and think we can be out of debt, if we’re lucky, by summer. Then we can save for things, like a house or a car, that we might need in the future. And pay for the kid’s upkeep, of course. Still, a musician and an English major are not two people destined to make a lot of money in their lifetimes. Savings will most likely always be a struggle for us—will entail sacrifices in what we pay for day to day. Should we have made different choices, ignored our preferences and gone into more lucrative fields? Would the unhappiness of working in say, insurance (as I once did, and made decent money) be a worthwhile price to pay for security?

The assumption is, there are lucrative fields and non-lucrative fields, and it’s the luck of the draw if you are born with a talent and desire to work in the lucrative ones. The compensation is supposed to be, poverty is worth putting up with for happiness. Or in our case, we find ourselves unable to give up our happiness to escape poverty. Are we weak or strong for making that decision? Does our happiness really make up for the fact that one medical catastrophe or something similar could bankrupt us? Should that fear be enough to make us drop what we love and find what will keep us safe? Are we right to hope that, somewhere down the road, we can find ways to make our talents pay more? Or is this pretty much as good as it’s ever going to get?

Human beings are a risk-taking species, with all the good and bad things that implies. But we also crave safety and suffer when we feel uncertainty and fear about the future. Too much stress can even shorten our lives. And poverty, of course, can and does translate into less health care and poorer nutrition for many, depending on how poor they are. My health insurance is good, Matt’s is minimal, and dental coverage is nearly nonexistent for both of us. So we go to the doctor, but it’s been years since either of us saw a dentist. We have just become fanatical about brushing and flossing instead, in hopes of keeping our teeth in shape. We probably go too long between new glasses and eye check-ups, too. These are the choices you make when you’re poorish. Choices many, many Americans make. So we have more than the poor of other countries, but compared to what it would be the healthiest to have, we still fall short. Thinking “people in other countries are even poorer than I am” isn’t really that comforting when you’re debating whether that persistent cough is worth paying for a doctor visit, or whether you can afford to have a test run that your insurance doesn’t cover.

It’s not really surprising that so many of us play the lottery. It’s the ticket off of the razor’s edge we walk, between happiness and fear, what we love and what we need.

There is still shame in being poor, a feeling of failure. Even if you know, intellectually, that you have worked hard and done the best you can, poverty seems to stamp all your efforts with a big fat “failure.” If you were really good at what you do, you wouldn’t be poor.

Which is ridiculous. But hard to fight, all the same.

So will we always be poorish? It’s hard to see a future in which that’s not true. But we can’t seem to change what we are. Mostly because we don’t really want to. We don’t want to be poor either. And yet, if those are the only two choices, then we’ve already made our decision.

But I can’t help feeling, deep down, that’s there’s got to be a way to make a world with more choices. I just wish it was here already.

(Title of this entry stolen from the Pretenders song “Back on the Chain Gang”)

Winter just won’t let go of us in New York. It’s March 11, and it snowed this morning. Just a little, just a reminder that hey, New York, you still have to wear your stupid coats and hats and scarves even though it’s nearly spring hahahaha. At least, that’s how I imagine Mother Nature saying it.

When I moved here, I loved snow. I still do, actually. Big fluffy flakes are beautiful, the way they make the city quiet and mysterious is beautiful, the bare trees against the snow are beautiful. In December, or January, or even February. But come March–no. I’m done with snow, I want some sunshine, I want to walk around with breezes on my face that don’t make it feel as though it’s being peeled off. I want to at least wear my smaller coat and no gloves. C’mon winter, give it up. Be over already.

***

For some more of that political blogging you love about me, here’s a great article via The Washington Monthly.

The author, Benjamin Wallace-Wells, talks about the danger of America falling behind in innovation to foreign competition–not just in cars or electronics, but in research science and new technology. But while this fear has been around ever since Japan cut into the Big Three automakers’ business, Wells traces it not to simple corporate apathy or American laziness, but to the whittling away of social programs and government investment. Key quote:

“The land grant college system, signed into law by Abraham Lincoln, provided the nation’s farmers with expert guidance on the latest agricultural techniques to improve their crop yields. No entrepreneur could figure out how to mass produce cars profitably,” writes Harold Evans in his excellent new book They Made America, “until Henry Ford fought an aggressive bid against restrictive patents. The pharmaceutical, financial, and airline industries blossomed thanks to the creation of the FDA, SEC, and FAA, which gave customers some assurance of safety when they popped pills, traded stocks, or boarded flights. The G.I. Bill provided a generation of veterans with the college educations they needed to build the post-war middle class. The creation of the federally-guaranteed 30-year mortgage proved the decisive tool in the growth of the post-war American suburb.”

Now this is something I’ve always thought, especially about the GI Bill. The prosperity of the postwar era was, at least in part, a direct result of the New Deal programs of Roosevelt. And yet Republicans, who speak in hushed tones about the fabulous 50s, are determined to tear away the very things that made them work–the ability of the lower classes to move up, for many of the poorest to leave poverty, for a whole generation to get a college education for the first time. It takes an astonishing ignorance of history to believe that social programs, that bugaboo of the right, had nothing to do with the prosperity of America in the 20th century. They had everything to do with it.

Anyway, the article is about a lot more than that, and worth the read. Enjoy.

Today I looked in the mirror and was startled. I appear to be blushing, even though I’m not embarrassed about anything. This is the “pregnancy glow”, I suppose, though it looks more like I’ve overheated myself trying to move a refrigerator. Chalk up another pregnancy symptom for the little critter, who has so far made me dislike chocolate, made me wheeze climbing the steps (hormones loosen the diaphragm, making it harder to breathe) and prevented me from staying up past 10:30 without pain and suffering.Oh, and given me headaches that make me feel slightly hungover much of the day,without benefit of drunken partying.

I’m calling the baby “the critter” for now, because it’s cute, and also because at this stage (6 wks, give or take), the fetus is kind of animal-like. And while I sometimes feel like I have a connection with whoever’s in there, I don’t know them as a person yet. They’re more of a…critter.

But symptoms or not, I don’t always feel a connection. Lately, I’ve been feeling a lot of hesitation when I think about the baby. A few weeks ago, my OB/GYN called me in for an emergency ultrasound. My progesterone was too low, which could mean an ectopic pregnancy or one that was about to quit on me. It wasn’t the first, and so far, isn’t the second. They put me on $50.00 worth of hormone supplements for a month to see if we can get it to stick, and so far it is…but I’m still a little shaken. I won’t be able to relax until we get through the first 12 weeks, which means I have a ways to go.

So we’ve been in a bit of limbo, not wanting to get hurt if this pregnancy ends. Miscarriages are very normal in this stage, and usually for a good genetic reasons, but that doesn’t mean you want to go through one.

Other days, I feel reassured (oddly, because I continue to feel lousy, thus, pregnant) and spend my spare time chatting online about strollers* or whether newborns need shoes.**

Tomorrow my task is to call the birthing center I want to use, one that is all about the natural, drug-free childbirth, with quick access to a hospital if something goes wrong. I need to switch out my OB/GYN, who is nice but old-fashioned about birthing (the More Drugs the Better approach), with a nurse midwife who will let me do this as much the way I want as possible. I am lucky to have insurance that will let me do this and not force me to choose between the hospital and trying to give birth at home.

Since we’ve been considering starting a family for years, I’ve done LOTS of reading on this topic–starting with Naomi Wolf’s Misconceptions and ending up with Ina May Gaskin’s Spiritual Midwifery. Birth is one of those things it’s possible to end up doing without really understanding what’s involved–how much what you do in a hospital is determined by their schedule and routine, not your own needs. I know I won’t have control over the whole process, really, but I want to set up as many things as I can to have it go the way I want.

The way I want being, not what my mom had with me–knocked out completely, the kid dragged out with tongs, alone in a labor room afraid and in pain, strapped to the bed and unable to help yourself. Ideally, I’ll be awake and dealing with the pain as bravely as I can, able to hold my baby the minute she enters the world, with Matt there with me and people who respect that what I’m doing is important and worthy of respect. Because it is.

I don’t know any women, in my own circle of family and friends, who have done it this way. My sister had her three by C-section, as did her daughter. My best friend had the traditional epidural and hospital birth. My sister in law had C-sections also, but then she was a tiny woman who had huge sons, so there was probably no helping that.

Something could go wrong, and I might need to have a C-section too, and I won’t feel any guilt if that’s the case. There is no guilt in doing what’s best for mom and baby. But I hope that my body will cooperate, that I will get to work with it in this terrifying, wonderful task.

Meanwhile, having all these deep thoughts, I just get up and go to work and eat little snacks to keep the nausea away, and don’t tell my coworkers anything, yet. It’s too soon, and when it’s time, I’ll know what to say, and maybe, how to feel.

*It’s worse than buying a car. There are model years, and umpteen different varieties, and product recalls, foldability, options with and without carseats–my head spins. Maybe I’ll just wrap the kid in a blanket and pull it in a little red wagon and call it a day.

**Opinions differ. All agree that socks do not stay on baby feet–so you need shoes or booties to keep feet warm. I personally wonder about spending money on shoes for someone who can’t walk yet. Maybe I’ll just duct tape the kid’s socks to his legs.***

***Yes, I’m kidding. Duh.