Back to Work, January Blues

I'm not going to lie, the past week has sucked.  We are all healthy so nothing major has happened but adjusting to our new quarters while trying to get ready to be at work and be gone for two weeks has been more difficult than I expected.  

I will be moving again in the next few months to a location yet to be determined.  C and I decided to end this dismal relationship and he's basically kicked me out of the new apartment.  In a way, it comes as a relief to finally close the door on this chapter of my life and move on.  There's just one catch I've been pretty quiet about--I'm 23 weeks pregnant.  

Yes, I hadn't mentioned it because of my past history of failed pregnancies and my general lack of enthusiasm as the pregnancy progressed due to the aforementioned dismal relationship.  C and I are miserable together so why'd I have to be so stupid as to get knocked up again?  Now I'm going to be a homeless, unemployed single mother with two kids.  

Eliza is excited so I've tried to share in her excitement.  I enjoy feeling the baby kick and grow inside me and I'm sure once I see her, I'll  realize that this must have happened for a reason.  But for now, I'm simply terrified and feel completely inadequate and unable to care for two children.  I guess even people from stable families feel terrified by the prospect of two kids.  I am grateful that so far the pregnancy has progressed smoothly and all test results (CVS, anatomy scan) indicate a healthy little girl.  And when you have health, you have everything.

On Christmas Eve, my little cousin Bobby had a heart attack.  He's 38, I think.  His mother died of a heart attack at age 40, he has the same heart problem that she has and due to the fact that he's been in and out of jail for the past ten years, he problem hasn't taken care of himself.  Bobby's the family black sheep and I can't say I particularly like the person he became but when I found out he'd suffered a heart attack, all the bitter feelings went away and I remembered the time he called on my birthday and did a surprisingly good imitation of my grandmother.  Or the Christmases we spent at my grandmother's house and the time he moved me out of one of my college apartments.  That's my little cousin--he shouldn't be having a heart attack.  They expect he'll make a full recovery and I'd love to say maybe he'll take this time to clean up his act but I doubt it.  So I not only mourn his poor health but the mess he's made of his life.

Two days later, my grandfather had a stroke.  He's 102, yes I know he can't live forever but that doesn't make this any easier.  He is out of the hospital and not paralyzed but can no longer walk on his own.  I so wish he lived closer so I could see him more often.

Now that I have you thoroughly depressed, let me hit you with the kicker.  I also found out last week that one of Eliza's little playmates has cancer.  He's three, we were all at his birthday party in December and all was well.  It turns out he has a tumor on his kidney that burst and he had to have emergency surgery on December 26th.  His cancer is stage three and as with any of these things, there are no answers at the moment, only treatment and hope.  I am devastated and disgusted that a three-year-old kid has to go through this, not to mention the hell his parents are living.  He has to be well, he must get better; I can not imagine a world without him in it.  I can't say that I'm close to his mother but I've known them since he was a baby, happily watched him take his first steps at only eight months, I've been to his birthday parties and he's been to all of Eliza's.  I feel like I've been walking around in a daze since I found out, a bundle of anger and fire and helplessness, trying to imagine some way I could make him better.  

I remember the second time I found out my mother had cancer, some one told me that at moments like this, I had to surrender to a higher power.  I'm more or less agnostic so I took no comfort in the idea of my mother's fate being out of my hands.  My mother's cancer turned out to be stage one--both times.  We were lucky in that regard.  

I keep thinking about the children's story "The Snow Queen."  To summarize; a little boy is kidnapped and taken to the North Pole by the Snow Queen.  His best friend Gerta travels a perilous journey to find her friend.  When she discovers him in a palace made of snow, he does not recognize or want her because the Snow Queen has frozen his heart with ice.  Gerta collapses at his feet weeping and her tears melt the ice around his heart and bring him back.  She saves him not just with ingenuity and fortitude but with love.  

I long to throw my arms around this little boy and cry tears that could magically erase the evil that lurks quietly inside his little body.  

"Well you don't smell good so..."

The other day, while spending some more of my hard-earned cash on the lovely Eliza, I leaned in to hug her and she said "You smell bad."

I backed up, allowed her to see that I was hurt, and said "Eliza that's a terrible thing to say to Mama.  It's mean."

She shrugged and looked at me rather innocently, completely unaware that she'd hurt me.  "Well, you don't smell good so..." I'm afraid I can't how she finished the sentence.  No, I'm not trying to censor my daughter, I simply didn't understand what she said at the time or I don't remember.

I didn't smell, by the way.  I'd taken a luxurious shower a few hours earlier.  We were visiting my mother at the time this wonderful statement was made and my Mom thought perhaps she said this because while I was enjoying said shower, Eliza was downstairs with my Mom, crying for me.  My mother told Eliza I needed to take a shower or I'd smell bad.  When this line of talking didn't quite work, my Mom then told Eliza that I had to take care of myself in order to take care of her.  I think she still kept on crying.

I wonder if she is learning these kind of statements from her peers at school.  Today, while I clipped and polished her tiny toenails, she said "I can't go to school with my toes looking like this.  I can't let the kids in my class see my toes like this."

I wasn't aware that she was showing off her feet to her classmates but I suppose well-groomed toenails can be added to her list of worries.

Not much more time to write so to summarize the past week--C and I moved all of our stuff out of our old apartment last Tuesday, slept on air mattresses and then moved our stuff into our new place on Wednesday morning.  I shouldn't say we moved it because we had a team of movers do the dirty work but it certainly felt like I'd done quite a bit.  We spent New Year's Eve unpacking.  Thursday, I unpacked all my clothes so I could turn around and pack a suitcase for a holiday visit to my parents for the weekend.  It was a bit too much and I'm happy to be in my new home for the moment.  

All is well and Eliza returned to school yesterday, thank goodness.  It was really tough having her home from school and no babysitting relief while we packed and prepped for the move.  But we are more or less settled.  The kitchen is unpacked and both bedrooms (yes, Eliza has her own bedroom for the very first time!) are in good shape.  However, the living room is a sea of boxes and I've pretty much run out of places to unpack and put things.  We had several big closets in our old apartment that made up for the fact that we have no bookcases or entertainment center.  While this apartment is spacious by New York standards and the kitchen is the best I've had, there is very limited closet space and no shared storage space.  So bikes, the car seat, suitcases, etc. are in full view.  

Several boxes filled with books, cds and dvds are also polluting the living room but until we have some kind of enormous bookcase/storage unit in place, I don't expect this problem to be rectified.  But I don't care, I've no problem living amongst boxes as long as I can cook in my kitchen.  It drives C crazy, but not enough to invest in said storage unit.

Right now is the honeymoon period in our new place but soon, I expect he'll be screaming that these boxes are not unpacked.  

But right now, I choose to be happy in my new home with my girl.