Life with a Flower Child

Happiness is not a brilliant climax to years of grim struggle and anxiety. It is a long succession of little decisions simply to be happy in the moment.

~ J. Donald Walters

The quote was too big for the subject line, so I paraphrased the gist of the post.

There are big decisions to be made, and I’m not sure if I’m ready for that yet. I saw the OB/GYN today, to start my yearly screenings and get tested for the return of the myomas (it sounds like a bad 80’s movie). She examined me and told me that everything looks good, but took some blood for testing and scheduled an ultrasound for March anyway. She told me that since the myomas are genetic and will continue to return as my body continues to heal from my surgery, the best time to have another baby would be now. Now. That’s a big deal.

The reasons are that as time goes by, the myomas will get larger, there’s no doubt about it (there are already 3, albeit very small, they aren’t going away without surgery). And once they get to a certain point, I can’t get pregnant unless they’re removed. Since they already took part of my uterus during my first surgery, there’s a high chance that if I need to have surgery again, they’d just do a hysterectomy. So the longer we wait, the smaller our chances are of having another baby. We’re kinda in a race against the clock…at what point can we wait just until it’s too late? The doc’s answer? Most likely within the next year. So that means that sometime before 2010, I would need to get pregnant. She also mentioned that  you can start planning a second pregnancy a year after c-section, which is where I’m at right now.

On one hand, I want to get my classes done. If I schedule it right, I can be done by next May. That would mean that I’d have to start trying sometime in September or October, to be able to make it so that I can be done with classes before my brain goes into mommy-mode (aka fried). Then I’d have the comps the following January (so if the baby was born in June or July, that would give me enough time to regain my brain and study well). However, although I “suffer” from pregnancy amnesia (or, I don’t suffer), Greg reminds me often that I had a terrible pregnancy that was extremely hard on me both physically and mentally as well. I can remember the really bad parts…do I want to be in my 3rd trimester as school ends?

The next question is…do we want to have another? Normally, I’d adamantly say “yes!”…but really I don’t know. I mean, I do know, I do want Violet to have at least one sibling. But we could adopt. For the longest time, we thought we could only have one child, so I had emotionally prepared myself for just little Violet. After she was born and the doc said we could probably have (just) one more baby, it changed our entire outlook. It’s only been about 10 months since we’ve known this…compared to the 2 years prior, of which we had accustomed ourselves into being parents of an only child (which several cousins, hopefully).

I just don’t know yet…there’s a lot to think about. I’ll be able to know more in March, hopefully.

~ Oscar Wilde

It’s my last weekend before the start of a new semester. I had hopes of getting all sorts of stuff done during the holiday break, but I only got about half the items checked-off on my list. Since I know it’s not possible to check off the rest of them and go to Greg’s company’s holiday party tomorrow, I’m hopeful for the few holiday-Monday’s that are coming up (Pres Day, etc). Maybe I can get 3/4 of my list checked-off before May.

Speaking of May, we’ve figured out when we’ll be travelling to Washington. Violet and I are going to be gone from early May to mid-June. It’s very exciting and I’ll be able to see all of my friends and family! I know I’ll be visiting Spokane as well, but I’m not sure exactly when.

We received our rental renewal papers in the mail today, which is rather ironic, considering that we’ve been thinking about moving to New Jersey. In fact, until yesterday, we were positive that we’d be moving to New Jersey sometime around April or May. Then we sat down and did a cost analysis and discovered that it would cost us more to move than it would save us in the next year (even over and above the new rent amount here). There were several incidentals that we hadn’t thought about (such as re-licensing the car) that made it all add up to too much. So, we’ve decided to stick with our current apartment through next year and see how it goes from there. We may end up staying here up until I’m done with courses, depending on how soon I can get through my courses.

I also really need to get my Master’s done. Or at least start working on it so that I can get my results. I think I need to write up my proposal for the IRB and get the lit review out of the way. I’ll probably work on that this semester and maybe some this summer. I’m not sure how long it will take to go through the process, and I need to make sure I have some time to get the actual thesis done (so my research needs to have been done by that point). Since it’s all supposed to be done by next May, and it’s something that will probably take me a long time to write, I need to get my marbles in their gears! Which means I need to find someone who can design video games. Sigh. On the plus side, I’m hoping that maybe I’ll be marketable to Microsoft. Fingers are crossed.

Maybe I can intern there next summer? Who  knows.

~ Timothy Leary

I’m very excited! I got my grades in today and they’re all “A”s! Not that I’m much surprised, that’s the thing with Grad school – as long as you try, you pretty much get an “A”. Still, it’s very nice to see. Granted, I got some A-’s (not for lack of trying, I assure you), but I still count those as “A”s, because that letter is in the grade.

I received my first homework assignment yesterday. So much for taking it easy this week with just work. Ah well, I knew it would start soon. I guess it’s work and homework and housework…too much work!

Violet went to the doctor today for her 1 year checkup and had to get a blood draw. I thought they did it the foot way (where they poke the foot and then collect the blood), but no – it’s done the standard way, through a needle in the arm. The same size needle they use for my arm. I couldn’t do it – I had to have Greg stay with her while I cried down the hall. I’m such a baby with needles…I really think she did better than I would have.

Oh, and she walked to the car today, from the apartment door (down the street)! So exciting!

~ Everett Dirksen

I saw this quote on the top of my Gmail this morning and thought it was funny. It really resembles the public attitude towards the economy right now. In all seriousness, what is real money? To me, it might be a couple hundred dollars (or depending on the time of the month, under a hundred) that would mean the difference between living tightly and struggling. I’m thinking a lot about money right now, as my student loans are going to be dispersed soon. <big sigh> Ahh…how lovely the prospect is of using loaned money to support ourselves…but we must do what we must do. I still haven’t seen a legal dime yet from my job, but I can’t complain too much – my boss sent me an advance right before Christmas that helped a lot (paid a lot of bills and bought Violet a few presents). Hopefully the real paychecks will come soon – but first I’ll have to pay back the advance. Also, I hope the professor keeps me on for this semester, I haven’t heard from him lately.

On another similar note, with Violet starting to walk (she took her first assisted steps a few days ago and is now ‘walking’ constantly) we have to really think about covering up the radiators and hot steam pipes. We’ve been talking about it for awhile now, but in the hazy reality that is “when Violet walks.” I’ll probably have to take part of my loans to cover this, but we’re going to try and build them ourselves. The majority of the loans go to daycare, with a small portion left over for paying bills that Greg’s paycheck doesn’t cover. Hopefully next year I’ll get a stipend and a TA position (or a RA position…I wouldn’t mind either), and I’ll have more income. My fingers are crossed.

My semester is going to start next Monday, and I’m very excited about it. Not excited because of it, but because it’ll be over, and as soon as it’s over, we’re going to Seattle. Greg’s ticket is already purchased and I’m just waiting to find out when the semester is over and when my summer one will begin, so that I can schedule my ticket. Violet and I will be staying as long as possible (and visiting relatives/friends in Spokane as well). I can’t wait!

I am an audiophile, in as much of a sense as I can think of being one. Not only do I love music, have tons of it, I feel it (if it’s really good). A good song that I fall in-love with becomes my anthem for a short time (depending on my mood) and I sing it incessantly. When I look back on my life and my experiences, I look back with a soundtrack. I also wake up every day with a song in my head, and generally go to sleep with one too. If I could sing, which I’m sadly bad at, I think I would love to be an artist. Alas, I must instead have a solid relationship with iTunes (I force myselft to be on a budget and am not allowed to buy more than a certain amount per month, because I would literally bankrupt us with songs if I could). Anyway, that’s a short little tidbit about me that I thought I’d post about today. The reason for this post is that I bought Greg a Tarja Turenen CD for Christmas (one of his favorite artists), and he started playing it in the car today. Now I am totally in-love with her song, “I Walk Alone.” It’s not my usual taste, but right now it suits my mood. It’s a song that’s sort-of about the transitioning of the phoenix, going from a dark time to a newer, better time. That’s how I feel about myself right now. I went through a dark, depressing time when we moved here, and now I’m working on transitioning into a brighter time. Anyway, just my thoughts for today.

For some strange reason, Blogger decided that my old blog was spam. They’ve locked me out of my account twice since November, threatening me with deletion if I don’t mend my spamourous ways. I have no idea why, as I don’t post any direct links (only hyperlinks), and have added many personalization’s to the blog (unlike most spam-blogs). However, according to all the Blogger forums (instead of actual people you can email/call/etc to ask for help, they give you forums in which to post your question and pray for it to be answered someday), once your blog has been ‘detected’ as spam, the lock-outs will occur on a frequent basis, without any support from Google (who owns Blogger). All of the forum posts regarding frequent lock-outs have never been commented by any Blogger employees, and it sounds like all have gone their unhappy ways to different blogging sites. As Violet’s blog hasn’t been put on spam-notice yet, it will stay where it’s at.

Hope you all have a happy 2009!