While I grew up in suburbia, my house was not located in a development. There were many benefits to this but one thing lacking were other kids- aside from my immediate neighbors, there weren't many other playmates to be found. As a result, my neighbor and I made friends with other adults in the neighborhood. We hung around hoping to talk with people and eagerly awaited the offer to come inside their kitchens or play on their lawns. I like to think that this was my earliest experience of wanting to see what the insides of other people's houses looked like. That never dissipated.

I really hadn't given much thought to this part of my childhood until recently. Buying this house thrust us into a new form of domesticity that neither Lex nor I were completely prepared for. I get anxious and jealous when our neighbors fix up their front properties and want to fix ours. We suddenly are worried about the condition of our front and back stoops. We also have little neighbors.

The previous owners of our home began the tradition of talking to and playing ball with the kids next door over our shared fence. We've tried to continue it, having brief conversations with the six and eight year old, letting them reach through the chain link to ring Alexis' bike bell or sneak a leaf of our basil or mint. They are extremely interested in our cats (You have four? I want to see the fat one? Which one is Irving? Why does the little one live upstairs?). Now, after only a few weeks, we know their birthdays (and their mother's), they can recite our future kid's due date and they've already had a chance to check out our house and chase and scare the living daylights out of our feline brood. Mostly, though, they are obsessed with Alexis. When they see me outside they demand to know where he is (Why is he still at work? Tell him to come home.). He throws balls back and forth and talks to them about Star Wars through the fence. I usually listen to their conversations from the kitchen and smile.

This summer has been so different for us-- a combination of nesting frenzy and backyard relaxation, a near constant evaluation and reevaluation of who we are and where we're going, all the while preparing for an amazing, ever more tangible life change. It's the little moments, like the smell of fresh tomatoes and basil intermingling with the sounds of soccer balls bouncing on the pavement and Alexis and the neighborhood kids outside, that remind me how wonderful the evolution of adulthood really is.

It makes my favorite Mark Strand poem all the more relevant.

The Good Life

You stand at the window.
There is a glass cloud in the shape of a heart.
There are the wind's sighs that are like caves in your speech.
You are the ghost in the tree outside.

The street is quiet.
The weather, like tomorrow, like your life,
is partially here, partially up in the air.
There is nothing that you can do.

The good life gives no warning.
It weathers the climates of despair
and appears, on foot, unrecognized, offering nothing,
and you are there.

In the past few weeks you have started moving around a lot- and hiccuping! Perhaps my hormones are raging even more than ever, or maybe it's just me preparing to really become a mother, but every time I feel you move little daydreams of who you might be take over my brain. I can't seem to capture the incredible joy that I have been feeling- that chest squeezing, tear inducing rush of excitement and pride- all in anticipation of this new being made solely by myself and your father. It is just so...overwhelmingly wonderful.

Recently, during one of our talks about babies and parenthood, my mother told me that to this day she considers my birth one of her greatest accomplishments. I think I probably would have rolled my eyes at this at any other time except for now, partly because I am a sarcastic person but mostly because I would have wondered how something so natural could rank higher than other life achievements. But now I understand the statement completely (and I am sure that once you are here, once I have given birth to you, it will make more sense than ever).

Ten years ago I was floundering. I had no idea who I was or where I was going. I considered myself fragile, both mentally and physically. It was around this time that a former professor and good friend gave me this poem by Louise Gluck. I read it over and over again. In many ways, it became a mantra for putting my adult life together (for the first time and then, a few years later, from what seemed like scratch once more).

Yesterday I opened up Vita Nova again and re-read "Nest." For the first time, I felt as though my life had reached the end of the poem. As I type this, I am sniffling a bit and smiling. Little One, I see you as the culmination of the first piece of my life- and the beginning of sometime entirely new.

One day I will give this poem to you. I will tell you about my mother's words and the wise advice of an old friend. And some day, probably longer down the road, you will understand, too.

Poem after the jump.

Nest

A bird was making its nest.
In the dream, I watched it closely:
in my life, I was trying to be
a witness not a theorist.

The place you begin doesn't determine
the place you end: the bird

took what it found in the yard,
its base materials, nervously
scanning the bare yard in early spring;
in debris by the south wall pushing
a few twigs with its beak.

Image
of loneliness: the small creature
coming up with nothing. Then
dry twigs. Carrying, one by one,
the twigs to the hideout.
Which is all it was then,

It took what there was:
the available material. Spirit
wasn't enough.

And then it wove like the first Penelope
but toward a different end.
How did it weave? It weaved,
carefully but hopelessly, the few twigs
with any suppleness, any flexibility,
choosing these over the brittle, the recalcitrant.

Early spring, late desolation.
The bird circled the bare yard making
efforts to survive
on what remained to it.

It had its task:
to imagine the future. Steadily flying around,
patiently bearing small twigs to the solitude
of the exposed tree in the steady coldness
of the outside world.

I had nothing to built with.
It was winter: I couldn't imagine
anything but the past. I couldn't even
imagine the past, if it came to that.

And I didn't know how I came here.
Everyone else much farther along.
I was back at the beginning
at a time in life we can't remember beginnings.

The bird
collected twigs in the apple tree, relating
each addition to existing mass.
But when was there suddenly mass?

It took what it found after the others
we finished.
The same mateirals-- why should it matter
to be finished last? The same materials, the same
limited good. Brown twigs,
broken and fallen. And in one,
a length of yellow wool.

Then it was spring and I was inexplicably happy.
I knew where I was: on Broadway with my bag of groceries.
Spring fruit in the stores: first
cherries at Formaggio. Forsythia
beginning.

First I was at peace.
Then I was contented, satisfied.
And then flashes of joy.
And the season changed-- for all of us,
of course.

And as I peered out my mind grew sharper.
And I remember accurately
the sequence of my responses,
my eyes fixing on each thing
from the shelter of the hidden self:

first, I love it.
Then, I can use it.

~ Louise Gluck, Vita Nova

Thanks to those of you who made recommendations on simple website editors (both here and on Facebook). I decided to give WordPress a try, though instead of diving into the Cherokee Apartments right away I decided to play with an Irving theme (I needed something light to obsess over for a day or two).

Here is the result. So now Irving has his own website (and also his own fan page on Facebook, though I can't figure out how to advertise it here. Just search for Uncle Irving and you will find it). I am considering migrating much of the Irv narrative over there, partly because it's fun and partly because I am still unsure of the future of callalillie. We shall see.

HOME-WORK

99 bottles of beer on the wall...or should I say, 99 days of pregnancy left...

So, we're heading toward the 3rd trimester here. Deep in Lexacor world, the nursery is gaining color and my belly is getting bigger. There's no denying that there's a kid in there, hiccuping, elbowing and reminding me that she's there when I eat certain things (though I can't figure out if it's a, "Hey, easy on the spice!" or "Hey, I'm loving whatever you're eating!" sucker punch). Mostly, though, I am finding myself exhausted almost all the time, which is a complete bummer. If I walk for more an an hour or two or a few miles, my legs and feet are dead for at least the day. General house repair/work that normally is kind of effortless now puts me down for the count. It's left me feeling pretty damn useless during a time when I feel like I should be bustling about getting things done. I keep trying to remind myself that my role in this right now is to actually carry a child inside of my body, but sometimes it's hard to keep that perspective.

The weekend Alexis painted the nursery (my help: pulling the painters tape off the wall once it dried) while I worked on some other non-ladder related tasks. If you can eke it out from the photo above, I was trying to match the wall color to the blue dots in the lamp/sheets. I think we came pretty close. Next up: buy a crib and a changing table, then affix the white flock of birds on the wall.

WORK-WORK
As some of you might know, I have been researching the social history of the Cherokee Apartments for several years (btw, I hate that link but right now it's all I have. The information is a little inaccurate). I think that at this point I can confidently say that I have completed my archival research. The results will probably be my thesis (post baby), but in the meantime I really, really want to share the information with the wider public.

Here's my question for the internets: what is the best way to share it? Does anyone make regular, plain-Jane websites anymore? I don't think this is blog material. I don't have the time or the patience to make something complicated. Will just a regular, 2 or 3 page website suffice? Are there any new free html editors out there that are simple yet kind of Dreamweaver-like in the sense that one can make a site easily without a solid knowledge of code? I could really use some advice. The more pregnant I get, the less motivated I am, but at the same time, I'd love to give birth to this research baby before the human baby.

P.S. I yelled at someone on the bus the other day- the first time I have ever lost my temper with a stranger publicly. Hormones? Stupid people? Probably both. Story to come.

Things that I accomplished, Friday - Sunday:

• Removed mirrored shower doors from our bathroom, including the incredibly gross track that ran down each wall and across the tub. It took much more elbow grease than I expected to get the bottom track off, as it was glued down, and unfortunately the side tracks had been screwed in too tightly to the wall. I did a lot of caulking. This effort was part utilitarian (there was no real way to bathe a baby while the doors and track were there) and part aesthetic (if you recall, our bathroom is completely covered in hideous purple tiles- removing the mirrors at the very least reduced the number of times one sees said tiles in one bathroom sitting). Before & after. Little steps, people. Little steps.
• Hedge trimmer! If you were out and about in South Brooklyn on Sunday and saw some sweaty six month pregnant lady maniacally attacking her backyard tree with a hedge trimmer, that was me. I finally wore Alexis down and we bought a hedge trimmer so that I could even out our greenery. I can't tell you how happy this made my OCD side, though we did not have the energy to get out the ladder, so the bush kind of looks like it has a Kid 'n Play haircut. Next weekend I will even out the top.
• Part I of the office-nursery switcheroo. Actually, this was Alexis' accomplishment. He began moving his office into our spare room and together we moved his bookcase into the bedroom-- certainly not our first choice location, but a heck of a lot easier than humping it down two flights of stairs to the basement. Next steps- clear out the room completely, paint and...oh yeah...buy some baby furniture.

After reading this, I realize that it is a) extremely boring and b) a total explanation as to why I was completely exhausted each evening. I just wish I had enough energy to complete domestic tasks AND take long walks. Right now the 2.5 mile walk from our house to the park just about kills me. Those pregnancy books all say, "your energy will return in the 2nd trimester!" but fail to note that your ever increasing girth uses that energy at a much faster rate than usual. Pffft.

P.S. Our cucumbers are starting to grow funny. Now there are a whole bunch that are stubby and fat with little nubby reservoirs at the end, kind of like strangely shaped condoms.

P.P.S. My crazy summer class that has weekly 3.5 hour walking tours starts tomorrow. Wish me and my feet luck.

Dear Baby,

When I first found out that I was pregnant, I swore to myself that I wasn't going to get into the habit of writing to you on the internet. I really wanted to keep a hand written journal- something that I could give to you when you were ready to have your own child- but honestly, I haven't had the time or the discipline to write things down on paper. Between work and life, I will sadly admit that the computer keyboard has won out. So, here I am.

Here are a few things that have been happening lately:

Names. Your father and I have actually found a name that we agree on. Of course, that might not amount to much in the long run, but I find it exciting. If it were up to me solely, I'd give you that name right now for good, but your dad wants to meet you before sealing the deal and I respect that. In the meantime, we've been calling you Ro-Ro, as is Ro-Ro Robie, or Hey, yo, Ro-Ro! This has no correlation to the actual name.

Always moving. It feels like you are always on the go inside of me. I don't know if it's your feet or arms or elbows, but something is always moving and rotating. We can see you poking around through my skin now, which is kind of weird but entertaining all at once. Your favorite time to yoga stretch in my belly is when I am in meetings at work.

Your new environs Your dad and I have decided on a simple theme for your nursery. It's a teeny, tiny room- barely 5x7- and we plan to paint the walls a pale sky blue. A few weeks ago I bought these great white cutouts of a flock of birds which will start on the wall above your crib and stretch across the window frame and onto the opposite wall where your changing table is. Your grandfather framed two wonderfully whimsical prints for us- one of a city street and another of a cat smoking a pipe taking little cats to school. We are going to get a plush green rug for the floor. Hopefully we'll have this all assembled by late August. In the meantime, we need to figure out where to put all of the stuff that you seem to be accumulating.

Your big orange brother. We have been growing increasingly concerned about Uncle Irving. He is currently the big baby of the household, crawling onto my chest every night before bed and burying his face in my neck. We're not sure how to prepare him for your arrival but know that we need to do something. While I am sure at some point it might be possible to have a baby AND a cat nuzzling each side of my neck at the same time, I know that the likelihood of this happening right away is next to impossible.

Feeling more real. Over the past week or so, your coming into the world in October has begun to feel much more real. Last week we visited with our LA side of the family and I had a wonderful time watching your cousins run around and laugh. It still feels really strange to me that right now you are floating around inside of me, but in a year or so you will be running around with them. I had the same feeling this afternoon when I was weeding our front garden after work while watching our neighbor's kids run around in circles chasing one another. One of my favorite things about this pregnancy has been my ability to slow down, watch my surroundings, and enjoy thoughts like this. I hope that it's a habit that I keep once you are born in one form or another.

love,
me

When I was about ten I saw a movie via Wonderworks (remember that show?) called Daniel and the Towers about a little boy who befriends Simon Rodia, creator of the Watts Towers. I don't really remember much about the actual movie other than the towers themselves-- I was completely enamored by the structures. I remember feeling such an incredible sense of excitement over the fact that one man could create such a magnificent, fantastical thing, and particularly that it all could be constructed out of found materials.

Finally, twenty or so years later, I finally got to see the towers in person. They were just as wonderful as I had perceived them at ten years old. Hearing the story of how they were built sent shivers up and down my spine. I just love it when people create things simply for their community, particularly when they are built to last. Even more so, I love it when something continues to feel magical, even twenty years later. I can't wait to take our little one there.

##

On a completely unrelated note, something is drastically wrong with my laptop's screen configuration. The colors are totally off, screwing up all of my photos. How does one fix this on a Macbook? I feel as though I have tried everything with no success.

I am taking a brief breather at my desk at home. The sun is filtering through the front window and making Irving into a golden, glowing statue. In a few minutes I will head back into Manhattan. This trip home was unexpected; when I got to work this morning I discovered that I did not have my wallet. I tried to ignore the fact that it was gone for several hours, but the reality of dinner plans and needing to get on a plane tomorrow (with my license) won out. Of course, it wasn't lost- just left on the kitchen table by its absent-minded owner who continuously catches herself halfway down the block en route to work wearing her slippers. By this evening I will have spent almost four hours commuting back and forth into Manhattan. That seems something just short of ridiculous.

The one benefit of this extracurricular jaunt back to Brooklyn was seeing the sun glint off our garden. I really do not think that our plants have gotten a strong dose of sunlight in several weeks and I figure if that gets me down in the dumps, it must really bum out our tomatoes. When I arrived home the green stalks and vines were encased in golden afternoon sun. The yellow cucumber and tomato blossoms were tilted upward toward the sky and little green fruits hung from all of the tangles. I am so excited for our beans, peas, cukes, peppers, tomatoes and eggplants. Each time I look at the garden I beam.

This week I picked up my first pleasure book (as in a book read for fun, not work or school) since December. That must sound terribly pathetic..but I take what I can get. I absolutely love Novella Carpenter's Farm City. It is the perfect blend of humorous memoir and useful, well researched information. Mostly, though, the book has made me think a lot about process- or, more specifically, how different people go about learning and doing things. Shocker of shockers, this goes hand in hand with my dreaming of what our little one will be like.

I am a messy learner. I generally work backwards. Or sideways. Usually it's any method but the classic one. When I see a building that I'm curious about, I scour it for details first, then go home and research the crap out of it. When I wanted a garden, I starting digging...then I read about how it should work. I like learning by doing and am generally not afraid to bungle an effort, as long as the consequences aren't grave. Alexis, on the other hand, is a researcher to the core. When he wants to do something, he will spend weeks reading about every angle of the endeavor. Then, carefully, he will implement his plan. Sometimes we drive one another nuts, but mostly, we are oddly complimentary. The insanely impatient paired with the extremely patient. I can only wonder what Ro-Ro will be like.* And I am impatient for that, too.

*No, that is not her name, though we've taken to calling her that, as in "Hey Ro-Ro, where you at?" Ro-Ro Robie also reminds me of the Go-Bots. Remember them?

Garlic scapes, broccoli, Japanese turnips, spinach, lettuce, basil.
Full set here.

Ever have one of those weeks when you turn around to look at your to-do list and realize that you are way past your neck in work? This was one of those weeks for me. I looked at my planner and discovered that I have three side projects, five work projects and a whole bunch of home projects to hedge through in the next few months (and days!) and not a lot of time to get it all done. Which is probably why when my alarm went off this morning I feel back asleep and dreamed that I was trying to email my boss that I would be late for work. But it was already 11am and my email wasn't working. I woke up with a cat on my head and my hand clamped on my face so hard that I had an imprint for a while.

In short-

1. This weekend I, along with some volunteers (including my lovely Alexis who is going above and beyond husbandly duties to help me set up and coordinate professional video cameras, sound and lights), are interviewing NYC high school activists from the late 1960's (as in adolescents who were activists in high school, many fighting for student rights). This is a work project- but a fun one.
2. With great sadness: the collapse of Building C at Officer's Row.
3. A stray cat has found our house. We learned of this through Irving, who one night was sitting at the back window warbling loudly. At closer inspection, he was staring at a fluffy brown cat who was sitting in our herb planter chomping away on our catnip. Damn cat has basically obliterated our catnip crop. Note to self: grow catnip in a hanging basket next year.
4. Baby kicks! Alexis can now feel them when he places his hands on my stomach, which is an amazing feeling. It's the first time that we have both been able to experience the baby together, which makes me really happy.
5. Nursery planning! We've come up with an idea for the baby's nursery. We have decided to create a nature theme in her tiny little room, with light sky blue walls, white bird decals (a flock of flying birds that will stretch from her crib, around the window and across to the other wall where her changing table is) and a green rug. I am also looking for a really simple mobile with birds or planes or something sky-oriented. Now we need to transform the room...which I guess will start in the beginning of July and probably stretch through until August.

Hopefully I'll have some time to finish the 2 or 3 posts that I began this week but have been too distracted to finish. And to maybe take some pictures, as I haven't really documented anything in the past few months but our garden. In the meantime, I'm off to LA again next week, back in July, hopefully a bit more refreshed.

This post is admittedly darker than anything I've written in a while, so pay heed-- if you have little interest in parenting fears, mental health and/or pregnancy, feel free to skip this one.

When I was about eight or nine years old, I looked into the mirror in a department store dressing room and discovered that I hated the body that reflected back at me. To this day I can recall the gut twisting reaction that I had-- it was like an internal scream that did not stop until I was about twenty-five, with a few breaks here and there, a stop or two at treatment programs in my late teens/early twenties and a lot of well-worth-it therapy. To be honest, I thought that little version of me had long since been rectified-- that is until the past few months unfolded, and with it a labyrinth of emotions that I was completely unprepared for.

##

It is so strange how the brain can decompartmentalize things. While I can't say that I particularly enjoy being pregnant, I love the feeling that our child is growing inside of me. Now that I am showing, the emotions around this are all the more intense. Yet, despite this excitement, there is a darkness that lingers deep within my thoughts. For years I thought that it had disappeared, but in recent months I have felt its presence more and more. Sometimes there are days when it is an outright mental battle for me to push it away. In order to do so, I find that I need to take apart my feelings piece by piece, sieve out the irrational form the rational and file the former away. It is a ridiculous process-- one that I have not had to resort to in a long, long time. As silly as it seems in my head, the fact that I can and am doing it actually brings comfort to this situation. It reminds me that I am happy and healthy and aware enough of the fact that sometimes gears need to be switched in order to maintain balance. I just wish that that balance always came naturally.

##

There are very few things that frighten me about parenting. I think that Alexis and I are as ready as we can be and are prepared to tackle the myriad of unknowns that stretch out before us. We have incredibly supportive family and friends and knowing that they are there makes me all the more excited for the arrival of our child. I will admit, however, that my biggest fear lies in passing my darkness on to our daughter. I am so afraid that somehow, despite my best attempts to raise a child who is in touch with and loves her body, some sort of transference will occur. Thinking about this tears me up inside.

##

I guess is this my first admission of parenting fear. I'm sure there will be more to come!

I usually like a little life update between cat posts but, unfortunately, there just hasn't been time. Honestly, I've had a lot on my mind lately, mostly about pregnancy, and I just haven't decided how much I want to put out there. I've got a running post in my head but I can't help but wonder if it's just too personal. We'll see.

In the meantime, enjoy our little feline brontosaurus.

We loved the Cobble Hill CSA but there was no logical (or convenient) way for us to pick stuff up there in 2009 after our move. So this year we joined the Greenwood Heights CSA and were really happy with our first share on Saturday- almost all greens but great ones: kale, arugula, lettuce, bok choy, radishes and garlic. Irving was really excited despite the fact that we were in a giant rush to get the produce packed into the refrigerator so that we could leave for upstate.

This Saturday marks the first installment of Irving Eats Local. You can see the full set of this year and last on Flickr.

This morning we went for our 20 week ultrasound and found out that the baby is a girl! This will be following in the footsteps of two friends and one family member who have all had girls in the past six months.

Baby Girl Robie was squirmy and uncooperative, choosing to shy away from the ultrasound wand whenever possible (she could quite possibly take after her mother when it comes to having her photo taken). She was also facing my back, which made it hard for the doctor to see everything that he needed to. Eventually, after banging on my stomach and having me move around, we were able to coax her around and, exam complete, she received an excellent bill of health/development. She is about 8" long right now and moving around a lot.

Four more months to go!