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Baby fat

50 pounds. That's how much weight I've gained so far...and with seven weeks left to go I'm wondering if I won't tip the scales even more. I have a giddy addiction, anticipation, excitement - whatever you want to call it - about stepping on the scale at the midwives' office. Mentally calculating how much more of me (and Nou) there is since the last time I stepped on. 175 was the last word, last week.

My still-skinny legs and ankles creak audibly under the new weight and my belly pokes out daily ever further - bringing my balance and my sense of just how much space is available until I run into things into occasional chaos. I sprained a wrist at yoga the other day, trying to hold myelf up in a Trikonasana gone awry and my husband acts as both massage therapist and forklift more than anything else lately - helping me maneuver out of our king sized pillow top mattress as if from the bottom of a well with a big heave-ho and then very patiently rubbing out complaints from each set of joints.

I am SO pregnant it's not even funny but loving every minute of it, and then some.

My husband is better than your husband

Last year while we were in Iran, driving through a small town on our way to Isfahan I found that I'd started my period and had none of my preferred leakage control products available. Rather than destroy the interior of the Samand I asked Hamid to pull over at the next pharmacy so I could pick up a box of OBs. Hamid didn't know the word for 'tampon' in Persian, bless his heart, so did his best to ask for what I needed. They brought over a hulking pack full of ultra-thick pads...my worst nightmare. We thanked them anyway and drove to the next pharmacy but again, there were no tampons available. Yet another stop, another frustrating and somewhat embarassing conversation with nothing to show for it. We understood at a certain point that this conservative Iranian town simply didn't stock tampons - a religious bent? I don't know. It was clear to me that this was a tamponless town. A town full of women straddling diapers once a month. I had to accept my fate.

We stopped yet again and this time acquiesced to purchase the offered bag of menstrual pads, each one the full length and width of Hamid's forearm. I widened my eyes in disbelief, took a deep breath like a diver preparing for immersion and ducked into the bathroom to rescue my white capris from a sorry fate. When I returned, waddling and miserable, I handed one of the monstrosities to my husband.

He obligingly took the pad and then quickly handed it back with a look of trepidation that asked: 'What do you want me to do with that??'

Since we'd arrived in Iran I'd been tantruming regularly about having to wear a scarf in the hot Middle Eastern sun...my daily mantra had been, 'If I have to wear one, so do you!' And he had. Hamid, always looking for a way to make me laugh, would dutifully wrap one of my scarves around his own head and neck and smile and coo and bat his eyes until I was in hysterics. It didn't change anything really, I still had to wear the scarf in the sweltering desert heat and he, of course, didn't - but it lightened my otherwise very dour mood on the subject and at least got us out the door without much more fuss. So, it wasn't shocking to him when I slapped the pad back into his open hand and spouted an emphatic 'If I have to wear one, so do you!' And you know what? He did. He went off for a moment and then returned, waddling himself right out the door and into our waiting car.

There goes the neighborhood...

Yesterday, a U.S. Census worker sat on our couch with her crummy little laptop asking the required questions and filling in the blanks. In between the government sanctioned inquiries she and I chatted a bit over the size of my baby belly, now a good 32.5 weeks along and an equal number of centimeters (almost there!). When she got to Hamid she didn't so much as raise as eyebrow at his being Iranian but when her computer wouldn't accept either that or 'Persian' as his defined 'race' (do they really STILL use that term???) she tried, ridiculously, to insist that we could file him away under 'East Indian' or 'Arab' - we both balked loudly enough at the idea that she continued to hack away at the program until it accepted the correct designation. She then turned to Hamid, welcomed him to the country, and asked him point blank if he was Muslim (I'm pretty sure religion wasn't on her list of questions...she certainly didn't ask *me* if I'm Muslim - although I, too, would have answered in the affirmative) and then she asked without batting an eye if we "go to church..."

I was stunned. But because our exchange thus far had been pleasant enough I let it go and informed her with a smile that we were less concerned about religion than we are simply being good humans - Muslim or otherwise. Hamid seconded the motion and we all left it at that. The rote questions continued until she paused yet again to look at Hamid to say, and I quote: "Well, you're going to have a rough time of it here...this community is extremely conservative..."

The tone I used to cut her off could not have been mistaken for anything other than thoroughly pissed off and I let her know just what I thought of her coming into our home as a representative of the United States Government, however lowly her position, and displaying such profoundly unprofessional and inappropriate behavior. She had no right to make a statement like that. The irony of her first welcoming my husband to the country and then informing him in the same breath that the town we'd chosen to settle in for now would be less than welcoming. Who speaks that way to a stranger? Who welcomes someone to the area with a warning that they won't be accepted??

I was so upset I had to leave the room, slamming the door upstairs as I paced in the bedroom - leaving a perplexed Hamid downstairs with this pathetic creature who was now penning her information for me so that I could file a formal complaint. When I returned she handed me the note with a flip 'You go right ahead and call my boss directly. You go right ahead and do your darndest to get me fired.'

Now that some time has passed I've decided to just let it go - the last thing I need is to get into it over the phone with some $8 an hour government office manager. And Hamid pointed out that this woman really has a sort of disability, seeing the world the way she does. I'm not sure if 'stupidity' is covered by insurance, but if it is she may as well retire early and start collecting now....

Home again, home again...again

When you live abroad for almost four years (and are admittedly horrible about keeping in touch with your hometown acquaintances) it's a natural phenomenon that you should return to find yourself depleted of friends and family to visit. Through the years that I was gone, my own list of contacts in the Emerald City dwindled considerably, and not necessarily for the worse; our three-day weekend in Seattle was a wonderful reconnection with those few individuals who do remain close to my heart. When I was 25 you could not have convinced me that fewer friends and social engagements would be desirable much less survivable - but here I am almost a decade later, the polar opposite of my previous social-butterfly self. Perfectly content to stay at home, living our new small-town life...not a stitch of boredom to account for.

Our recent trip to Seattle brought back many of those ancient feelings, albeit briefly; the need to be all wrapped up in other people, places, and things; the idea that the self isn't nearly enough without accessories and a million friends to show it all off to. The strictly metropolitan notion that a life lived faster is somehow better. But once that momentary lapse of reason had passed it also cemented for me the knowledge that I am once and for all a wholly different person. Changed completely, and not necessarily for the worse, either, I'd like to believe.

Now, as we plan yet another quick trip to Seattle (for Hamid's PHP engineer certification!) I understand that the city itself is also changed for me forever. No longer the mythical place of my leaving or something for which I yearn, it is simply the storyboard where all the life I lived before played out - nothing more, nothing less. Granted, one of the most beautiful places on the planet...but with a travel map now dotted by memories in hundreds of cities across the world Seattle fades into just another been-there-done-that - filed among the photographic postcards I've collected during my travels.

Waiting for Nou

Lately, I've been spending hours and hours in the room we've set up with the baby's things - she doesn't have much, honestly - but babies don't really need all the *stuff* the magazines and television ads try to convince you they do (although thanks to a new local friend via Freecycle she now has more clothes than I do!). There is no crib (she will sleep with us) but the fourth bedroom closet is stocked with many miniature hangers holding tiny pink, ruffled bits and pieces. There is also a changing table against one windowed wall complete with little towels, cloth diapers, wool soakers and receiving blankets. There are also a few stuffed toys, a tiny baby bathtub, and my favorite: an extensive collection of Burt's Bees Baby Bee creams, lotions, potions, oils, ointments, and other slatherables that smell absolutely divine. I stand at the window where these luscious little tubes and bottles reside and open each one in turn, smelling the contents with a deep, satisfied sigh...imagining the sweet scent of our little girl.

When I was in elementary school I had a new cousin, a baby boy. He was very cute; fat and squishy the way babies are supposed to be with big eyes and a tiny dollop of hair on top of his head. We all adored him and would jockey for keeping him over when his parents had something to do that required leaving him behind. But as cute as that child was he had the strangest smell about him...like sour cheese. His odiferousness permeated the few hours he spent with us each week and I can only imagine how much more adorable he would have been had his parents slathered him daily with Apricot Baby Oil and Buttermilk Lotion.

In any case, Nou is scheduled to arrive in approximately two months, on August 11th. And aside from dreamily handling all of her tiny things on a daily basis, I've been enjoying my weekly prenatal yoga classes and Hamid and I have also had the first of twelve Bradley Method classes (where we are learning skills that will help us birth this baby, totally drug-free, at home). Otherwise, there really isn't much else to be done in anticipation of her birth. It's one of those hurry-up-and-wait situations...where you've sprinted out the door and down the street, not wanting to be late for your very important appointment. You look at your watch as you stand outside the locked door - only 1,440 some-odd hours to go.

Who knew?

Who'd have guessed laundry could be such a life-altering experience. But here I am washing my daughter's first load of laundry...crying my eyes out over her tiny shirts and hats.

I am practically desperate to meet her - not wanting her to arrive too soon, of course, but desperate all the same. She jitterbugs across my right side all day long in anticipation of her entry to the outside world. In the meantime, we wait and fall more and more in love with the idea of her.