Laughter and Embarrassing Moments

As a balance to previous posts about my angst, I wanted to post about laughing.

I love laughing. I love when something tickles me so much that I can’t help but double over, tears streaming from my eyes and my breath coming in ragged snorts through my nose.

I recently picked up one of Taylor’s Teen Mags which regularly have a “most embarrassing moment” section. In these Teen Magazines, the embarrassing moment is usually about an audible fart or (oh the horror) leaking menstrual blood at an inopportune time.

As sophomoric as the reading material was, it made me think about my most embarrassing moment...which many of you have heard, but it is good enough to bear repeating.

Plus, I enjoy making others laugh, probably more than I like laughing myself.

Many years ago, I worked for a well-known adoption attorney. As you might imagine, our office was pretty serious, what with the business at hand. And it was made up almost exclusively of women.

I was newly divorced at the time, and to say that I was ready to dip my toe into the dating pool would be an understatement - I was ready to swan dive into the deep end.

I had gotten married and had my daughter relatively young and thusly had missed the dating craziness that many women experience in their early twenties. So I was ready to if not sow, but at least prune, my wild oats.

It was my job to sit at the front desk at the office. I welcomed clients, answered the phones and managed files on the computer and in the drawers.

One day, a group of electricians came through the office, to check on and replace lighting fixtures throughout it. Which is how a deliciously handsome, slightly scruffy, jeans-hang-in-just-the-right-way man was climbing a ladder right in front of me, in the waiting room, just outside of my welcome window, and just outside my grasp.

I craned my neck through the window and peered (towards heaven) upwards and asked “Would you like some coffee?” I batted my eyelashes shamelessly. He replied, “No thanks, Ma’am.” Non-plussed by this initial brush-off by my man candy, I continued to batter him with offers of coffee or (me) water. All of my offerings were declined and the young man seemed in a hurry to rush off, ladder tucked under his arm.

Through one of the office windows, I noticed the electrician’s van outside and its panels that were marked with the name of the company, and noted that they also offered air conditioning services.

During my lunch hour, I found myself riding in the elevator down to the ground floor with an older gentleman, who’s shirt bore the same company name as (the shirt on my heart’s desire) the van parked outside. During the elevator ride, I talked him up, asking about the young man with the (cute ass) brown hair and blue eyes. The older man sized me up and let me know that the (cute-ass guy) young man I was inquiring about , was 18 (EIGHTEEN) and was engaged to be married to the owner of the business’s daughter.

I coughed and stuttered and probably muttered, “Oh, that’s nice.”

Then I tried to really save myself.

Remembering the van outside, I thought I would tell him that I might need air conditioning work sometime (never) in the near future.

I opened my mouth. What I meant to say was, “When my Air Conditioner blows, I know who to call.”

What came OUT OF MY MOUTH was, “When my Air Conditioner goes, I know who to blow.”

The last four syllables of the terribly misplaced sentence were still being said, out loud like a cartoon character with the words hanging over her head...when the elevator doors opened - and the shocked, concerned (and frightened) face of my 18 year old man- candy was staring right back at me.

Man-Candy literally turned on his heel, and sprinted away. The older gentleman, sensing my need to be alone with my utter shame, quietly stepped past me.

I never saw either of them again.

So please, share your stories of complete embarrassment...let me know that I am not alone with my size 9 mouth.

Just Trying

My crazy, fast-paced, frenetic summer is coming to its conclusion.

I kicked off the summer with wedding celebrations for one bride (my friend Deb) and am finishing it off with the wedding celebrations of another (my sister, Michelle). I am Matron of Honor for both.

Sandwiched in between was Taylor’s Epic Trip (2 weeks at camp, several days in Maine and a glorious week in NYC), our family of 3’s cruise through the Western Caribbean and our Manhattan experience together.

Next on the agenda is our trip this weekend back to Maine to spend time with my husband’s family and friends during the Annual Pisquataquis County Fair, followed by a 4 day Bachelorette weekend for my sister in Key West, FL in late September.

October 2nd is my Sister’s wedding day which will punctuate the end of a whirlwind 12 months. It was just shy of one year previously that Deb got engaged and honored me with the request that I be her Matron of Honor. Michelle’s engagement and subsequent request came just a couple of months later.

In amongst all the wedding plans, special occasions and family trips, we have been living our lives. Sometimes I feel like we are barely holding onto them. The details have become buried under the avalanche of Important Events.

During these last twelve months, Taylor completed the 8th Grade, her final year of Middle School. After initially being denied for the High School Choice Program of her preference, she got in at the 11th hour and is now in her 2nd week at Boca Raton High in the illustrious STEM (Science Technology Engineering and Math) Program. In the last few weeks, I have become much more painfully aware of how much she is growing. Not in her height, but in her faux sense of maturity that can only worn by a young teen.

Donnie and I have both been nose to the grindstone at work. We are both exceedingly grateful for our jobs, but the increasing responsibilities, which are no doubt (and understandably) due to hiring squeamishness of our respective companies, have put us on professional full throttle.

This past year, I have also enjoyed a 6 month process of exploring my writing capabilities with a wonderful and wise writing coach. The process was extremely invigorating and enforced a discipline in me with regards to my writing. As I told her towards the end of our sessions, “I feel more like a writer now, and less like someone who is trying to write.” This was another small, but important milestone tucked into the crevasses of the Mountains of Important Days.

I am thinking of all of the other small, but important moments of the last 12 months. My Father losing his job, my Grandfather celebrating his 102 year, a cousin ready to deliver her second child, a friend in crisis, another friend losing her home, a sister dealing with unemployment, another sister in marital distress. All of these are important LIFE moments - and I hope that despite all of the ‘have-to’s’ that littered my calendar, I was an adequate enough woman, sister, daughter and friend to be present for all of them.

I really hope I was.

Me and a Model

Before last week, I had absolutely nothing in common with Gisele Bundchen. Actually, I kind of really disliked her.

Gisele was the leggy model who stepped into NFL Football star Tom Brady’s life when his former girlfriend, Bridget Moynahan was still pregnant. Gisele postured and posed after her boyfriend’s son was born and made very incendiary proclamations about how she loved the child “like her own.”

She and the NFL lothario got married and now have another baby. She then came under fire for proclaiming that childbirth was not the god-awful painful endurance that most women have believed it to be.

She said, “It wasn’t painful, not even a little bit. The whole time, my head was so focused—every contraction, the baby is closer, the baby is closer. So, it wasn’t like, ‘Oh, what pain.’ It was, ‘With every contraction, he is getting closer to me.’ I wanted to be conscious and present for what was happening ... I didn’t want to be anesthetized. I wanted to feel. The second day, I was walking, I was washing dishes, I was making pancakes in the kitchen.”

Reading her quotes was a bit unsettling, because all of a sudden, I have something in common with this freak of nature model who I had previously considered an insensitive interloper.

You see, I have always maintained (to mostly disbelieving audiences) that my experience during childbirth was (while not completely pain free) a really satisfying and exhilarating experience. Yes, it was hard work. Yes, there were some moments during it when I asked if I could take a break and finish later. But, I was an awake, alert and active participant in the birth of my daughter.

Just recently, Gisele exposed herself to more criticism when she stated in an interview that there should be a law that required new Moms to breastfeed their infants for at least 6 months.

The backlash and increased hatred towards her was immediate.

While a law for women to breastfeed for 6 months is certainly unreasonable and unconstitutional, I am now an unlikely ally of a widely disliked supermodel. (***Sigh***)

Because I kind of get where she is coming from.

First I will say that breastfeeding is not the easiest thing – it is a ‘learned art.’ Manipulating an infant’s tiny, searching and impatient lips into the “correct” position on your swollen, sensitive nipples within hours or minutes after delivery is just the first challenge. Continuing down the path of exclusive nursing is yet another.

It requires perseverance, patience and dedication to the goal of breastfeeding. But, once you hit 6 weeks, you are in the groove…in the ‘honeymoon’ phase. For some reason, nursing is pretty much seamless after that time mark and you and your infant become a nursing couple.

Obviously, I breastfed Taylor. It was more of a destiny than a choice.

My own Mother bucked the norm in 1969 and not only had her husband in the delivery room when I was born (during a natural childbirth,) but also chose to breastfeed. (Yes, my parents were wanna-be hippies)

My Mother went on to have 5 daughters. 3 were “homegrown” and 2 were adopted.

Mom decided when she was going through the adoption process for her 4th daughter, who she mistakenly thought would be her last, that she wanted to breastfeed. Just as she had successfully done before.

During the excruciating and invasive adoption process, she used a breast pump to reawaken her body’s reflexes. By the time our family welcomed 3 month old Lara into our home, Mom had successfully gotten about 50% of her milk supply to come in.

Baby Lara became part of our family, and Mom breastfed her with the assistance of the Supplemental Nursing System (SNS).

3 months later, my Mom learned that Lara’s birthmother was pregnant again, and requested that the new unborn child be placed in the same family as the first.

It took about 5 minutes of discussion between my parents. They wanted this newborn – who would be blood related to the daughter they already called their own.

After Lydia (the 5th sister) was born, my Mother then tandem nursed two babies, who had not been born of her body.

So of course, when I birthed my own baby…there was no question. - I would breastfeed.

My nursing experience was 22 months in length and not without challenges. But, I look back and am so grateful.

When I went to Taylor’s pediatrician’s office for her first illness, he commented on the fact that her file was so slim. She was a stranger to the doctor’s office…a robust and healthy 3 year old. (I quietly and secretively attribute this to breastfeeding.)

When I went to a birthday party for one of her friends when she was 6…I casually polled the other Moms, whose children were all in the Gifted program – they all had breastfed. I felt momentarily vindicated.

Now that Taylor is 14, and I am far removed from baby discussions…I get way less validations that my choice to breastfeed was right.

I look back at Gisele. She is a model, a Mom and she breastfeeds and she is outspoken about it.

While her sound bites may be incendiary, I applaud her and her convictions. I myself have had friendships challenged due to my convictions on the subject.

May every baby just get a moment at the breast.

Happy Breastfeeding Month