what a baby feels like inside my belly

at first, a butterfly. a flutter. a first kiss. like that feeling when you first drop off the tall part of a roller coaster, but this time the feeling is so brief you wonder if it's just an odd gas bubble or an effect from yesterday's yoga class. but then it happens again, and you can recognize that it's different.

later, a twitch. like when your eyelid starts twitching and you can't stop it and it sort of tickles. 

then a thump. like when the dentist has your mouth all numbed up but the anesthetic is starting to wear off and you can feel pressure, so you flick your cheek with your middle finger to make sure it's still attached. it's like that.

later, a jab. most people say, "oh, she's kicking." she does kick, i suppose, but how am i supposed to know if it's a kick or a slap or a kiss with a fist? so, it's a jab. i'm not sure what body parts are moving which ways, but all of a sudden there will be a pretty decent knock to the belly wall coming from the inside. this one's hard to explain because i don't think there's anything like it. but, you can feel it on the outside by now.

sometimes, a strum. imagine if your ab muscles were stretched to tension, like guitar strings. and then a little tiny foot or hand or knee moved quickly across one of them, catching just slightly so that if it was an instrument it would produce a loud, clear note. it's not comfortable, but not painful. she's quite the musician on my insides.

lately, a bucket of lizards or snakes or eels or other slithery reptiles who are wrapped up in a knot like those snakes on that one Indiana Jones movie that they tried to serve for dinner. imagine what that big snake felt like with all those baby snakes writhing around inside. across the belly to the left, and then a flip or a spin, sliding all about. and you can see it and feel it from the outside. to dan it feels like a flutter, to me it feels like a zoo.

lately, a constant combination.

and i still have three months left.

thanks, El Jefe, for reminding me to write this stuff down.

daddy complex

i hate Dan's jeep.

it's a bit out of character since i do love a big engine. pretty sure my soft spot for high horsepower originated with trips to the city dump alongside D in his 1960-something black Chevy when I was too little to see over the dash. or it could be those visits to the railroad yard to visit D on those rare occasions that he could take time from conducting the train to show us around. a soft rumble, hinting of danger and courage and smelling like metal and oil, there is nothing quite like a string of idling 3,000-horsepower diesel locomotives in the morning.

it seems fitting, then, that Dan is cruising around the skies in his own twin-engine war machine. i've lost that loving feeling? get me within 100-yards of a fired-up strike eagle and I'm practically sliding off my chair. whoop!

but I still hate the damn jeep. it's a paycheck guzzling petrol-aholic with a mess of mechanical issues and inexplicable rattling noises that rival the mini for their frequency and mystery. not only that, but it spent the entire summer at Randy's Good-Ol-Boy Garage getting wrenched and greased to the tune of you-don't-even-want-to-know.

thanks to Randy, i didn't even get to enjoy the summer jeep-owner perk of looking cool while riding around Goldsboro topless (the jeep, not me) in my daisy dukes catching the eye of the locals. (on second thought, i live in Goldsboro and no one over 21 should be wearing daisy dukes, especially me. you get my point.)

my distaste of the big, loud 1984 CJ-7 with a rebuilt Chevy 350 is reminiscent of my own mom's dislike of D's 1972 Chevy K5 Blazer with its 350. she was constantly nagging D to sell the thing after it diverted funds from the family budget or sat idle for a winter or more. as I neared my Sweet 16, I joined the nag-fest because I began to see the Blaze King as the only thing standing between me and something silver and zippy with a big red bow (and we all know how that dream turned out).

but history does repeat itself.

Dan took a page out of D's old playbook to alter my position.

It's so simple: They just let me drive.

This season, Renegade is the new black.

emotions? hand me a bottle

author's pre-post-script: ewwwww...this seems un-quippy and not at all funny.
don't read it. and if you do, let me know if i am a stupid sentimental POS.

------------------------------------------------------------------------

not the drinkin' kind of bottle. the hide-away-your-feelings-until-they-suddenly-burst-out-unexpectedly-at-your-mom-husband-or-friend bottle. you know, that kind of bottle.

or maybe a bucket.

this may seem like an odd topic. and maybe it is. maybe i am not sure where i'm going with this. let me think....

ok, well first, i realized today as i was driving that there is nothing like seeing your life as reflected by others to help appreciate it. the grass here is so green. the lorries are like box faced, not like semis at home with their long noses. the road is curvy, for no reason. the clouds are huge and puffy and when the sun comes out it makes you wonder why you are wearing the blue scarf you so carefully picked out. but then it goes back behind a cloud, and you remember.

the hedges make it impossible to sight see, but then there is a sudden break and i see my favorite spot in england. it's nothing special, really. just a stone church in the back of a field of this green-all-year-round grass. in the field there are two bay horses, always grazing.

it is a standard charming spot, but to me, more because it is like a flash as i drive along the hedge-lined roads. a peek. a spot too dangerous to stop and take a photograph, but that makes it more special because every time i see in, i feel happy about england. my life here.

why was i so emotional as i drove along belting out a pop song from 2004? i think it was two-fold. first, my parents just left. all of these familiar things that i have begun to take for granted, were new to them. charming. exciting. british. i could explain things like funny road signs and Norman architecture. i shared stories about my coming to this place and growing as so i could begin to take it for granted.

and second, because dan was supposed to be home sunday afternoon and isn't home. not monday. maybe not tuesday. i was upset when i heard this on sunday morning. not devastated. not my-life-is-over-without-one-more-day-with-him hysterical. more irritated, frustrated.

this morning when i found out it would be yet another 24 hours, or more. i actually laughed. it was silly! how can we have this? why is one more day after months so much harder? ha! haha!

then i got in the car. i popped in a CD from '04 and saw my commute to run errands as my parents saw it last week. saw this extra 24 hours as a way to get all of these emotions, that i would ordinarily tend to bottle up or burst forth (both unhealthy, i might add) just exist. i sang! i got teary! i laughed at how silly i felt! i put my face up to the sunny window and really took a minute to let my cheek get hot. i let myself miss dan. i let myself get excited for him to come home. i noticed things. i let irritation, frustration, anxiety, sadness, happiness, silliness, sing-a-longy-ness, and aloneness, especially aloneness, all exist.

now i just feel strange, like after a good cry, and right before one, too. it's a good feeling. a jumble feeling. i can have a most fantastic day under an un-fantastic circumstance. how odd. maybe like when people laugh and tell jokes at funerals or cry at weddings...i'm waging my battle against sentimentality or melodrama or co-dependence or hysteria or ungratefulness. dan will come home. maybe not tomorrow, but sometime. and, really, my life is f*ing awesome. i am happy. that's ok. i am sad, and that's ok, too.

for now, i'm glad to be a bucket full of good ol' fashioned jumble.

catch up

it seems that whenever i am with dan, i am too googly-eyed to concentrate on blog writing. i think i was overwhelmed. we got to spend 10 days together and he only had to go to work one of the days. to the average couple, 10 days is no big deal, but to people in our little world, 10 days is very important. needless to say, we needed to make the most of it. often.

muerte las vegas
"smut, smut, smut, smut, smutsmutsmut." --dan
yeah, i am pretty much over sin city. i did enjoy the all-you-can-eat sushi restaurant and the "adult only pool" where i could bring my own bottle of whatever, but other than that i would rather be in any other sunny city.

visiting k-town
dan hadn't seen his parents, siblings, nieces and nephew for 18 months. (actually, anna, one of the nieces is only 12 months, so i guess he hadn't seen her ever.) we stayed at the in-laws new mansion and were treated like visiting royalty. full meal service. late sleeping. big screen TV for college football. a hot tub. and baby poo.

owen and kathleen are hovering around two years old and are so funny to chat with and listen to. like little parrots, they repeat everything you say (this can be tempting). but they know a ton of their own words, too. on our first night home owen says, "poopie in my leg." which meant nothing to us. how can someone poopie on or out of their leg? impossible. but he persisted. "poopie in my leg." and he starts shaking his leg.

sho' nuff' out comes poopie in one perfectly shaped pile right out the pantleg and onto the carpet. i guess his little diaper came undone and poopie was, in fact, in his leg. disgusting, yet hilarious because i wasn't a part of the cleanup crew. uncle dan and aunt holly are still on the five-year plan.

family update
gramp's flyswat has been repaired. he found out that wal-mart was all out for the season after "accosting" two employees, so he taped his back together. i will try to post a photo. so freaking hilarious.

go ducks
just as soon as i go cold turkey on college sports, i get stuck in a room with a 50-inch flatscreen, surround sound, and a case of bud light. how can i kick the habit under such pressure? suddenly i am at fred meyer picking out my new ducks t-shirt, brushing off my gator visor, memorizing game schedules and discussing rankings. i almost got off the plane in chicago and hitched a ride with a trio of duckies to the purdue game. but don't worry, pretty soon a torn ACL or broken ankle will send me back into recovery -- at least until march madness.

back on the island
after an amazingly glitch-free day, i am back in bury. all three of my flights were on time, i made it within seconds to the early bus (saving me two hours of sitting around), and arrived safely home to an overgrown garden, a clean house (thanks huz), and the pouring rain.

hopefully my luck will hold and i can pick up my parents tomorrow and enjoy some rain-free touring with them over the next two weeks.

signing off
can you tell i've been up for 27 hours? ugh. my guts are hurting and i am tired. trying to stay awake. tryeng. trng. tr....s;dafjgsdn.

identity crisis

so, i recently read a blog post of my friend erin, who is also on an American vacation and staying with her parents in Alabama. she mentioned that she feels like she is at home for college summer break. i totally get that, too.

it is so surreal -- living in my old bedroom in my old house, hanging out with my high school peeps, doing chores with mom and dad. dad referred to me by my maiden name and i did a double-take because at first it didn't seem odd.

last night my friends kimmy and tara came over for a BBQ and to challenge my mom and i to a rousing game of Monopoly - Electronic Edition. other than the half rack of BL that we tore through, it felt like second grade when tara and kimmy would come over for slumber parties and rousing games of Memory and Go Fish.

it is nice to be old enough to be comfortable being a kid again. i am not compelled to bar hop at the Howdy Doods Tavern or the Kaz-Hole. i don't want to socialize for the sake of. i just want to have slumber parties, play board games, and maybe stay up past bedtime. plus Bud Light, of course.

i only have a week until i'm off to see dan for the first time in six weeks, and i hope that i easily adjust to adulthood as i've adjusted to childhood here at home. but, just in case i'm packing my night light.