Living in the Shadows...

Mine is such a common story I'm sure, but to me it is anything but...after 7 long years, 4 miscarriages, and a doctor who told us that there was no way I could even conceive, I was able to get pregnant with what seemed to be a healthy pregnancy. 
I made it past the 12 week mark, which to me, was a complete milestone.  I've never made it that far before.  Surely this was a good sign?  Sure, the doctor increased my blood pressure meds (thanks Daddy for that genetic good fortune..), but I felt great.  Better, in fact, than I've ever felt.  Walking on rainbows..
We heard the heartbeat.  Momma was at the doctor with me that day and we both teared up...such a beautiful moment, to hear that strong little heartbeat.  After that I began to take those obnoxious, "Here's what I look like with my belly this week" pictures.  At 19 weeks, we found out it was a little girl.  Here.  Everything I had ever wanted.  Ever.  A healthy little girl with a heartbeat like a young Marine.  She began kicking, moving about, and I realized we were on the same sleep schedules already.  She was my little buddy..just like me.  Liked to sleep in and come out and party when it became dark.  I started looking so forward to our little 2am "just me and my baby" parties..when she'd really start moving around.  
She loved listening to music with me.  When I'd sing, she'd really dance about.  I started singing to her in the wee hours in the kitchen, dancing around with her moving all around, just me and my trimikins. 
Christmas came and went...baby clothes, LSU baby socks (natch!), and maternity clothes.  Momma and I went maternity clothes shopping for the first time in my pregnancy.  I have to say, I looked damned cute in those stretchy top skirts and tie-above-the-belly shirts.  I figured, hell, we're past 12 weeks, heard the heartbeat, and I'm now in maternity clothes.  Home free right?  And like everything else in life, just when you feel comfortable, fate flies right in and sweeps everything out from under you.
The early morning hours of Friday, 4 January.  Instead of the wonderful dance party I was used to with baby trimikins, I felt some strange pains.  No matter how I turned and tossed in the bed, they didn't change.  Not a good sign.  I honestly tried and tried to unfeel them.  Sat in the floor and prayed for a good hour before I woke Marine. 
I'll spare you the details of the ER check-in, the doctor's face when he examined me, and the nurse seeming more like a grandmother to me than a health professional...hugging me, touching my face, and fretting over my covers in my hospital bed. 
Needless to say, "You're already 5 cm" is NOT something you need to hear at 21 weeks.  The only thing I can think of that is worse to hear is what I heard next.  "There is nothing we can do to stop this..."  My life, my world...came apart.  Came.  Apart.
The absolute worst thing in the world is to go through labor with nothing to show for it on the other side.  It was like toiling over building a house brick by brick by hand just to see the end result smashed by a big torpedo. 
There was beauty in these moments however.  My family was by my side.  My sister was a complete angel to me and I honestly don't think I could have gone through it without her.  She held my hand the whole time, and when I felt that out-of-body-I'm-about-to-just-DIE feeling, she started singing.  Sounds crazy, I know..but it saved me.  She held my hand and started singing "House that Built Me."  Her voice and love carried me through that horrible moment.  And, for her part, I have to say, there was not a dry eye in the house.  Even the doctor started crying.   Ames, we should totally market this properly.  You have a future in "singing to a person while in labor." 
My beautiful Sophie Elizabeth was born, and asended into Heaven, at 1307 on 5 January.  She was a beautiful little thing.  So tiny.  So fragile.  Marine and I spent an hour or more with her, just us three.  I sang Daddy's songs to her..kissed her...and told her just how very much I love her.  Made an agreement with her...I'll let her go if she'll promise me to meet me o'er Jordan's Shore.  She promised.  She'll meet me there, when it's my time.  I have to believe that.  I have to. It's all that keeps me going. 
Looking in the mirror tonight, I see that this experience is showing.  Dark circles under my eyes, haven't eaten in 2 days..and a discontentment with life in general.  When I sleep, it's fitful.  Still wake up around my "me and Sophie" time, 2am...with a hollow in my body that is almost cartoon-like.  Like when the road runner puts an Acme brick through Wile E Coyote. 
Today hasn't been a good day for me.  I know that bad days will, in time, be overcome by good days.  Clinging to that hope.  Clinging to hope in general.  Any hope.  There will come a time when I can feel again..feel something other than pain and loss.  I owe my family that.  I owe myself that.  I owe Sophie that.  Just very grateful that God allowed me to be the keeper of that precious baby for 21 weeks.  I'm so very blessed for that.  It's more than any of us deserve.  To be the keeper of such a beautiful gift.  Guess I need to look to that instead of looking at the negative.  For 21 weeks, I was the keeper of a princess.  A goddess.  My daughter.  For 21 weeks, I kept the world. 

This is my rifle...there are many like it, but this one is mine...

So very sad - the news about the shooting in Colorado. Even sadder is my realization that the American public, in less than a month, will have learned dick from this tragedy. In less than 2 weeks, everyone will continue as if nothing has really happened.
We'll have candlelight ceremonies full of people crying..there will be pictures splashed all over the news. CNN will interview at least 2 families who lost someone, and 2 people who were spared. Obama will talk about politik (behind on this point..he did that already..), and we'll all stand around wondering how this happened in our nation.
Some idiot will run around DC talking about gun control. Our 2nd Amendment rights will be front and center. "GUNS KILL PEOPLE!" Enter idiocy via Westboro Baptist. As many guns kill people as forks kill fat people with type 2 diabetes. So tired of a world of alternative causality. Cowards kill people in theatres. If more people had their concealed carry license, that bastard would have been dead before he got off the 50-60 rounds he apparently did.
Our world is full of crazies, if nothing else. Being able to defend yourself intelligently against the crazies...well that's our right. Who knows if I would have made it out if I would have been there..but at least I should be given a fighting chance. Off to bed now...I have to go to the range tomorrow. Target practice for the assholes I may meet in a theatre.

To A...

So happy to hear about the baby girl! Congrats!!!! Love to you and yours. I didn't even know you were expecting. So many great memories...and many more to come.
-a

Taking stock...

I'm officially 36 today..I've been 36 for an hour now. I don't feel any different, but I FEEL differently. I was feeling pretty down earlier today. Thinking I haven't accomplished what I should to be the age I am. Thought about what Daddy had accomplished by the time he was my age...the band programs he rebuilt, the things he changed, the person he was...and I felt honestly, just...empty. Like I hadn't done anything in my 35 years. So I looked back at my last year of life, trying to find something worth SOMETHING.
Exactly one year before today I moved my entire family, house, and belongings over 8,000 miles. I helped my husband pick a town to live, I found us a home to live in, I found a job as a teacher, and I found a good school to put Kchan in. I fixed breakfast for my Kchan every morning. I got up and went to school where I taught Special Education students. I cried because I missed Japan. Oh how I cried. But still..I went on and came home every night and fixed dinner for my family. Then I kept my house clean. Like, crystal clean. So clean R. Lee Ermey could walk up in my house and be happy clean. I did meaningful things with my Kchan and my Marine on the weekends. We went fishing, we made necklaces, we went for our first visit to Chucky Cheese..we took pictures. I took Marine to a Jamie Johnson concert..and after Jamie sang "In Color", he leaned down and handed Marine his guitar pic.
I helped this family make the transistion not only from military to civilian life..but from Japanese to American life. We still eat Japanese food. When Kchan gets loud I still say, "shizuka ni!!" When we pray, we still pray in English and at the end we say "itadakimasu". We have kimonos on our walls right next to our Country Livin' wall art. Most of all..we do it all together.
Living in a foreign country for any amount of time will make you take stock of what you have. When you have no one but each other you rise..or you spectacularly fall. We rose. I like that. I like to think I had a hand in that.
So maybe I haven't rebuilt a band program or become the Teacher of the Year. Maybe I'm not my Daddy. But I think my Daddy would be pretty damned proud if he could see me now.

Because the Doodlebug is The. Smartest. And. Coolest. EVER.

We went to Shogun's on Saturday. Had a great time, and missed our beautiful Japan. Meanwhile, at the next grill, someone asked the chef where he was from. Of course, I know that most of them aren't Japanese, because they speak only a bit of Japanese, but still..we all paused to hear the answer. The chef said, "I'm from Laos." The idiot at the grill eating (with A FORK), immediately said, "Yeah, well where is that?" Kchan immediately said she needed to go to the bathroom. When we walked in, she looked at me and said, "Momma, are there really people who don't know that Laos is in between Vietnam and Thailand? REALLY??" Then she shook her head in disappointment. I wanted to go back and tell the guy WHO WAS WEARING A BACKWARD RAZORBACK HAT AT THE TABLE what a tool he was. Instead, I just laughed. Then I hugged her..until she squeaked. Because my kiddo is gangsta. And I'm so blessed to have been blessed with her. Just so blessed.

Upon wishing for facebook if only to post this one message...

I have a dear friend that I worked with in Oki (though she was at the BOC), who also loves the Oxford comma. Wish she could see this. I laughed until I almost cried. :) Long live the Oxford Comma...and also? Cool, intelligent friends who just "get it."

Movin' on...

An anon poster sent this to me today..and I cannot explain in regular English language the way it made me feel. I have some platitudes in Japanese which might fit...but they are just that...platitudes. To whoever this anon is - you have NO idea the difference you made to me today. When I felt like a complete waste, you made me realize that I'm not that bad after all. And plus? You quoted something that included a letter to my beautiful Ginsburg..which makes you all the more intriguing. You know the way to my cold, dark heart ma! Thank you. Hyakuman times. Thank you. La Vie Boheme...dance in the rain. I'll be sure to. And I'll be thinking of whoever you are all the while.

The ending quote of the beautiful message:

"But This is just shit. It's happening. No blame. Happening and on the rise it would appear. What can we do to delay it? Probably zilch. To stop it? Likely less. But to survive it? Now that sounds more promising. There is evidence of bad shit having been survived before. Ancient Advice Left in cave by Wise French Caveman: "When Bigbad Shit come, no run scream hide. Try paint picture of it on wall. Drum to it. Sing to it. Dance to it. This give you handle on it." So Twister is my try." Letter From Ken Kesey to Allen Ginsberg (August 1993)

Just sayin'...I really am.

I'm no longer an American Girl in Japan. I'm an American girl, who loved Japan, and is now back in America feeling like a Japanese girl. Either way, I'm looking forward to the next chapter in my life.

It's cold, hard facts rainin' up in here...

Momma, in a recent tiff, told me that I should call Grandma more. Truth be told y'all, I love my Grandma more than my own life. And after I lost Daddy, I just couldn't stand the thought of losing anyone ever again. I didn't call her as much as I should. Mostly because I couldn't be reminded of the love I have for this woman. She is everything I have ever wanted to be, and is proof of everything that is beautiful in this world. I couldn't stand to feel such love and closeness for someone who will not live as long as me.
When Momma said this to me, I almost died, then promised my only New Year's Resolution would be to call my Grandma, at least 2 times a week. I called her today, and we talked for at least 2 hours. At the end of the conversation she said, "Ash, I was feeling down, and I wondered what 2012 would bring. Then you called me, and now I know that this New Year will be great."
What a blessing y'all, and how damned selfish have I been by not just calling when I missed her so much I could die? I love my Grandma so much...she is truly my soulmate. I promise I will never make the mistake of not calling again. I'm no longer scared to live life..I'll live it as long as the good Lord has me on this Earth, and I promise I'll call my Grandma every week. I think Daddy would be proud.

An open letter to the madness of housewifery,

Dear 10 loads of laundry,
you are freaking KILLING ME. No really. KILLING ME. Who in the HELL wears this many sets of outfits when they're at Aunt Lisa's house? Apparently my family. That's who. And who has "special consideration" pieces like us? Tutus, only cold water pants, only dry clean, only have to sneeze once before you wash, etc. Again. My family. If this is servitude then servitude can kiss my a%s! I bet honey badger doesn't have to do this.
love,
me