So, I tried drinking raspberry tea. I tried walking a lot. I tried being calm. I tried being stressed. I tried reverse psychology: "I think that I might not ever deliver this baby... She's just gonna stay where she is until she's an adult or so..."
I've tried everything but chili. My mom said not to try chili. It would induce labor, but it would also cause extraordinarily unpleasant gastric side effects, at least if I took the recommended dose, which is approximately one stock pot full.
And still no baby. Or rather, still no baby that's available to be poked at by the general public. *sigh* That's fine, I was late too. I was too busy using my energy reserves to cause Mount Saint Helen's to erupt.
So, it's the first of the year and all that. We celebrated last night with a pie. And a noise-maker, which we used to answer the frantic noise-maker calls of our neighbors. Mostly, it feels like any other day to me. I'm not really all that impressed.
It has been a fairly weird year for me, though... I mean, weird even by my standards.
My year in review...
Started out living with my ex and his family. Studied more than I ever have in my entire life, and kind of slacked off on numerous other things. Frequently pissed off most everybody I knew by speaking aloud about the stuff I was thinking -- which was also, frequently, the stuff I was studying, since I didn't have time for anything else...
Taught lots of kids to write. Discovered -- over and over again -- that American kids don't really give a damn about the language they speak, but that foreign kids are fascinated by it. And actually try really hard to learn stuff. American kids are astonishingly lazy and apathetic, comparatively. Most of them.
Located Neil, almost by accident, after two and a half years of random attempts. Realized I hadn't ever really fallen out of love with Neil. Was thinking of trying to opt for a "virtuous" solution to the problem of being in love with somebody other than the person I was engaged to, when my ex hacked my email, discovered my internal dilemma, and spent the next two months alternately telling me he needed me, and screaming at me that I was the scum of the earth. Really, this was kind of an extreme example of the way things had been all along, so I tolerated most of it.
Found out I was pregnant. Got thrown out of the residence I had almost considered home. Found myself kind of bouncing from one place to another for a few days. Ended up in a battered women's shelter.
Spent my days there listening to the horror stories of other women. And watching the staff abuse and psychologically torment the women further. And gossiping. And stealing away during the days to go to classes, check my email, and generally avoid the shelter. The rest of the time, I spent either walking around on the moon and dreaming about Neil, or whining about how I couldn't wait for my next date with Neil in Seattle.
Graduated from The Evergreen State College, homeless and pregnant and with the equivalent of a 4.0. And nobody was any wiser.
Spent a day every week or two weeks with Neil. Got to know him again. And discovered that the two of us must have been formed from the same section of the universe: a section with lots of still-glowing stardust in it. Spent hours and hours grinning stupidly at him in front of fountains, over coffee, down at the waterfront, over B&O blackened chicken sandwiches... Found out how good it is to be in love, and to be loved in return by the only person I'd ever really, really wanted to love me.
Got kicked out of the shelter, ostensibly for not doing my chores. I suspect it had something to do with the fact that I'd tried to play whistle-blower when staff did nothing about allegations of sexual abuse in the shelter. Moved out of town.
Regained a sense of myself that I haven't had since I was 17. Actually began to feel the part again. Began to recover from several years of being made to feel deficient, bitchy, and unworthy. Started to think that maybe I'm not so awful, and that I'm not going to be an awful mother -- or an awful wife.
Went to lots of doctor's appointments. Got told maybe there was something wrong and they had to do more tests. Went through more tests until it was determined that there was absolutely nothing identifiably wrong. Went through testing for damn enar every possible ailment known to modern medicine. The baby and I came up fine. She kicked the doctor a lot and has a strong heartbeat. She's a fascinating little creature and I adore her.
Lost my wallet and my CDs, but got the CDs back.
Did some coupon-clipping, and some begging from government agencies, and some dumpster diving (a good deal of dumpster diving, really, which is much more fun than one might suspect), and actually had enough food most months, without my stomach rumbling by the end of the month. Still got glared at by strangers on busses and passers-by in grocery stores, sometimes for being young and pregnant, and other times for being one of them po' people. Decided that Washington really isn't such a friendly place as it seems when one is sheltered by a liberal arts college.
Got my name run through a police database to make sure I didn't have a criminal record. I didn't. They let me go.
Had a date with my beloved Neil, during which we had coffee and cocoa in Washington's answer to a diner, gazed dreamily at Christmas lights, and picked up our marriage license. Decided that nothing could be more right than to spend my life with Neil and Bean. Or rather, decided to accept that nothing could be more right -- the universe has been trying to tell me this for years, and I haven't been listening.
Planted a Yuletide shrub in a coffee can in the living room.
Sort of cleaned. Sort of.
Woke up this morning in good company, and felt delighted to be alive.
I didn't really make a New Year's resolution. I don't so much like the New Year. I prefer things like solstices and equinoxes, which are far less arbitrary.
I am not interested in making a resolution about losing weight, or quitting smoking, or cutting out one or two gangbangs per week (uh...), like it seems everybody else does. I suppose that this whole year, I've started EVERYTHING over again. And most everything's good.
I suppose that if I were to make a New Year's resolution, it would be to try to have as many good times as possible, and have good days as often as possible.
Eat your vegetables.
~Helena*