Home!
Well, after 4 insanely long days away, Mommy is home. And she's very happy about that.
Indianapolis was exhausting, successful, and occasionally even lots of fun. Although the city had a less-than-charming smell of sewage, the people were incredibly friendly, the hotel was amazing, and the restaurants and bars were consistently very good--and waaaaaaay cheaper than DC.
On Wednesday, we did our set-up for what we call "Marketplace," which is essentially building from scratch a temporary--yet quite impressive, if I do say so myself--bookstore in the middle of the expo hall. My co-workers and boss were apparently terrified of something going wrong with my pregnancy on their watch, so I was limited to carrying TWO books at a time.
Two. Books.
And they actually enforced it. At first I thought they were kidding, and I blew off their concern with lines like "Do you know how many times per day I hoist my 30-pounder into a car seat, or carry her up the stairs? And you do know that I brought LUGGAGE with me to Indianapolis, right? Heavy, heavy luggage?"
But oh, they were dead serious. Finally, I just complied to make everyone feel more comfortable. Never mind that some women run marathons in their 8 month. I'd just carry two books at a time.
Events progressed. Between a stint at the busiest part of registration and 3 solid days of peddling books, I probably had verbal, perky, and smiley interactions with at least 500 attendees, if not more. Maybe more. My face hurt from constant smiles and I got tired of the sound of my own voice. However, the sheer scope of people I talked to revealed the it's-a-small-world nature of our small, small world. The fact that every book transaction took a friggin' year to complete (we were on a remote server connected back to everything at home, plus the data system requires about one billion steps), I had to fill a lot of time with chit-chat. Hence the game of small world.
For example, I met somebody who went to my high school (a couple decades before me, but still), crossed paths with a good old friend of my brother's who is currently a grad student at the University of Washington (actually, we had kind of arranged that one), informed every single person from UW that my brother and sister-in-law went there too, told everyone from USC that I went to Oxy and isn't Southern California just the best place ever for a college?, reminded people from San Diego that we'd be in their neck of the woods next year, asked people from Illinois if they had flown or driven to Indy, and every time I saw someone from Carmel, Indiana (and there were a lot), I used the line, "A good friend of mine grew up in Carmel. But she has lived in L.A. for the past 12 years, so you probably don't know her." Over and over and over again.
On Friday night, events ended early enough (around 7:00) that many of us were able to go out, which was fun. It would've been more fun if I could have actually added vodka to my dozen club sodas with lime that I consumed, but hey. I knew this Conference would be alcohol-free for me this year, and at least I was spared the week of detox that everyone else is probably undergoing right now.
I missed Charlotte terribly, but we Skyped as often as we could. At one point via Skype, she dug through my purse in the office, found chapstick, couldn't take off the the top, and brought it to the computer screen, saying, "Help, please, Mommy." Of course, I couldn't do a damn thing from Indianapolis, so I told her that Daddy could help her. Another night, she bonked her head on the desk, burst into tears, and cried, "Mommy! Mommy!" with her arms open to the computer screen. Daddy gave her lots of love, but she wanted Mommy. At this point in my trip, I was fried and exhausted, and just wanted to crawl through my computer screen and cuddle her. Instead, I cried a little myself. Like I said, I was tired. And seeing your baby screaming for you breaks your mommy heart. Fortunately, we were able to Skype again about an hour later, at which point she had calmed and eaten and we parted on much jollier terms.
Finally, let's spend a moment talking about airport security. For our Palm Springs trip in February, I had totally forgotten about the full-body scans, which obviously are fairly new. I had asked if they were safe for pregnant women, got the "absolutely" from TSA, and went through it at Dulles. Since then, I researched it a bit, and although I think they probably are completely safe, no long-term research has been done on pregnant women. A humiliating, public pat-down seemed wiser, and I knew it was within my rights to request one in place of the scan.
At Dulles, on my way to Indy, TSA did a bit of eye-rolling but accomodated me anyway, letting me bypass the full-body scan and go through the metal detector to subject myself to invasive (and, remember, PUBLIC) fondling by a stranger.
In Indianpolis, on my way home, I ran into the only rude Indiana-based person of my whole trip. The TSA agent motioned for me to go through the full-body scan.
"I'm pregnant," I said. "Can I please be searched or whatever separately?"
The agent sighed. "There's no radiation. It's safe. Please go through. It's not like it's an x-ray."
"No," I said. "There's a small amount of a radiation. I know it's very small, but . . . "
"Listen," the agent said, obviously losing her patience with me. "If it had radiation, it couldn't be out in the open. It's like a cell phone call."
"I understand that," I said. "And you're probably right, but . . ."
Before I could finish, a tall, older TSA agent who was manning the old-fashioned mental detector--he was maybe 60 or 65 years old--interrupted our exchange. "Ma'am," he said to me, "You're welcome to have a pat-down by a female agent if you prefer."
I wanted to hug him. "I don't mean to be difficult," I said, "But I'd be a lot more comfortable doing that."
He nodded. "Then come right this way through the metal detector, dear," he said.
I did, leaving the female agent to sigh with exasperation and call for the next poor schmuck behind me.
Once through the metal detector, the Friendly Agent told me stand right there and wait for a female agent to come do her thing. "I don't blame you," he said as we waited. "I work here and I won't go through those things. Not with all the MRIs and stuff I've had."
I laughed. And I loved that he was trying to erase any guilt I was feeling for being difficult. "I get that they're PROBABLY safe," I said. "But no long-term research has been done on unborn babies," I said.
"Exactly," the Friendly Agent said. "I'm mean, what are we supposed to do? Just blindly trust the government?"
God bless the red states!
"What are they gonna say in 20 years, if it turns out they're not safe?" he continued. "'Ooops, sorry. We were wrong'?"
Like I said, I loved how this guy was totally validating my decision. I mean, my job housing this ever-growing fetus is to protect him or her. I was feeling pretty vindicated and glad I hadn't given in to the first TSA agent's pressure. Conspiracy theorist or not, I felt this guy was just trying to make sure I didn't feel BAD about doing what I felt was best for my unborn kiddo.
At that point, ANOTHER super friendly Indianpolis agent (female, by law) retrieved me, grabbed my carry-on stuff, and very sweetly patted down every inch of me--and then some.
"Okay," she said. "I just have to go under your shirt a bit here. Alrighty, it looks like we have another shirt underneath---whoops, no, it's a maternity band!"
"Yeah," I said. "Just one of my contraptions to keep my pants up."
She laughed. "Well, I figured by the bump, but I never say anything until I see some sort of maternity waistband or something."
"You get mostly pregnant women?" I asked as she ran her hands up the inside of my legs. Obviously, we were bonding quite quickly.
"Lots of them," she said. That also helped me get over my being-difficult guilt. Apparently I wasn't the only paranoid woman-with-child out there.
Finally, I was free to go.
And finally, by 10:45 p.m. on Saturday night, I was home.
Home!
Sunday morning, Charlotte called through the baby monitor for Daddy. I wanted to surprise her, so I slowly opened her door and stuck my head in. "Good morning, little girl!" I said.
Charlotte instantly popped up, a huge grin on her face, and JUMPED into my arms. And held on tight.
It was pretty much the most awesome thing ever.
I got today (Monday) off, which I'll use to get my house back in order (Chris actually didn't leave it in too bad of condition, but there is so much that apparently only Mommy does around here) and (hopefully) catch up on some sleep.
In the meantime, as I've typed this post, I've gotten to feel lots of movement--for the first time--of my precious little unborn pumpkin. (I think this is the first time I've been still enough in the past week to feel it!) Yep, pregnancy is just as amazing the second time around as the first.
Indianapolis was exhausting, successful, and occasionally even lots of fun. Although the city had a less-than-charming smell of sewage, the people were incredibly friendly, the hotel was amazing, and the restaurants and bars were consistently very good--and waaaaaaay cheaper than DC.
On Wednesday, we did our set-up for what we call "Marketplace," which is essentially building from scratch a temporary--yet quite impressive, if I do say so myself--bookstore in the middle of the expo hall. My co-workers and boss were apparently terrified of something going wrong with my pregnancy on their watch, so I was limited to carrying TWO books at a time.
Two. Books.
And they actually enforced it. At first I thought they were kidding, and I blew off their concern with lines like "Do you know how many times per day I hoist my 30-pounder into a car seat, or carry her up the stairs? And you do know that I brought LUGGAGE with me to Indianapolis, right? Heavy, heavy luggage?"
But oh, they were dead serious. Finally, I just complied to make everyone feel more comfortable. Never mind that some women run marathons in their 8 month. I'd just carry two books at a time.
Events progressed. Between a stint at the busiest part of registration and 3 solid days of peddling books, I probably had verbal, perky, and smiley interactions with at least 500 attendees, if not more. Maybe more. My face hurt from constant smiles and I got tired of the sound of my own voice. However, the sheer scope of people I talked to revealed the it's-a-small-world nature of our small, small world. The fact that every book transaction took a friggin' year to complete (we were on a remote server connected back to everything at home, plus the data system requires about one billion steps), I had to fill a lot of time with chit-chat. Hence the game of small world.
For example, I met somebody who went to my high school (a couple decades before me, but still), crossed paths with a good old friend of my brother's who is currently a grad student at the University of Washington (actually, we had kind of arranged that one), informed every single person from UW that my brother and sister-in-law went there too, told everyone from USC that I went to Oxy and isn't Southern California just the best place ever for a college?, reminded people from San Diego that we'd be in their neck of the woods next year, asked people from Illinois if they had flown or driven to Indy, and every time I saw someone from Carmel, Indiana (and there were a lot), I used the line, "A good friend of mine grew up in Carmel. But she has lived in L.A. for the past 12 years, so you probably don't know her." Over and over and over again.
On Friday night, events ended early enough (around 7:00) that many of us were able to go out, which was fun. It would've been more fun if I could have actually added vodka to my dozen club sodas with lime that I consumed, but hey. I knew this Conference would be alcohol-free for me this year, and at least I was spared the week of detox that everyone else is probably undergoing right now.
I missed Charlotte terribly, but we Skyped as often as we could. At one point via Skype, she dug through my purse in the office, found chapstick, couldn't take off the the top, and brought it to the computer screen, saying, "Help, please, Mommy." Of course, I couldn't do a damn thing from Indianapolis, so I told her that Daddy could help her. Another night, she bonked her head on the desk, burst into tears, and cried, "Mommy! Mommy!" with her arms open to the computer screen. Daddy gave her lots of love, but she wanted Mommy. At this point in my trip, I was fried and exhausted, and just wanted to crawl through my computer screen and cuddle her. Instead, I cried a little myself. Like I said, I was tired. And seeing your baby screaming for you breaks your mommy heart. Fortunately, we were able to Skype again about an hour later, at which point she had calmed and eaten and we parted on much jollier terms.
Finally, let's spend a moment talking about airport security. For our Palm Springs trip in February, I had totally forgotten about the full-body scans, which obviously are fairly new. I had asked if they were safe for pregnant women, got the "absolutely" from TSA, and went through it at Dulles. Since then, I researched it a bit, and although I think they probably are completely safe, no long-term research has been done on pregnant women. A humiliating, public pat-down seemed wiser, and I knew it was within my rights to request one in place of the scan.
At Dulles, on my way to Indy, TSA did a bit of eye-rolling but accomodated me anyway, letting me bypass the full-body scan and go through the metal detector to subject myself to invasive (and, remember, PUBLIC) fondling by a stranger.
In Indianpolis, on my way home, I ran into the only rude Indiana-based person of my whole trip. The TSA agent motioned for me to go through the full-body scan.
"I'm pregnant," I said. "Can I please be searched or whatever separately?"
The agent sighed. "There's no radiation. It's safe. Please go through. It's not like it's an x-ray."
"No," I said. "There's a small amount of a radiation. I know it's very small, but . . . "
"Listen," the agent said, obviously losing her patience with me. "If it had radiation, it couldn't be out in the open. It's like a cell phone call."
"I understand that," I said. "And you're probably right, but . . ."
Before I could finish, a tall, older TSA agent who was manning the old-fashioned mental detector--he was maybe 60 or 65 years old--interrupted our exchange. "Ma'am," he said to me, "You're welcome to have a pat-down by a female agent if you prefer."
I wanted to hug him. "I don't mean to be difficult," I said, "But I'd be a lot more comfortable doing that."
He nodded. "Then come right this way through the metal detector, dear," he said.
I did, leaving the female agent to sigh with exasperation and call for the next poor schmuck behind me.
Once through the metal detector, the Friendly Agent told me stand right there and wait for a female agent to come do her thing. "I don't blame you," he said as we waited. "I work here and I won't go through those things. Not with all the MRIs and stuff I've had."
I laughed. And I loved that he was trying to erase any guilt I was feeling for being difficult. "I get that they're PROBABLY safe," I said. "But no long-term research has been done on unborn babies," I said.
"Exactly," the Friendly Agent said. "I'm mean, what are we supposed to do? Just blindly trust the government?"
God bless the red states!
"What are they gonna say in 20 years, if it turns out they're not safe?" he continued. "'Ooops, sorry. We were wrong'?"
Like I said, I loved how this guy was totally validating my decision. I mean, my job housing this ever-growing fetus is to protect him or her. I was feeling pretty vindicated and glad I hadn't given in to the first TSA agent's pressure. Conspiracy theorist or not, I felt this guy was just trying to make sure I didn't feel BAD about doing what I felt was best for my unborn kiddo.
At that point, ANOTHER super friendly Indianpolis agent (female, by law) retrieved me, grabbed my carry-on stuff, and very sweetly patted down every inch of me--and then some.
"Okay," she said. "I just have to go under your shirt a bit here. Alrighty, it looks like we have another shirt underneath---whoops, no, it's a maternity band!"
"Yeah," I said. "Just one of my contraptions to keep my pants up."
She laughed. "Well, I figured by the bump, but I never say anything until I see some sort of maternity waistband or something."
"You get mostly pregnant women?" I asked as she ran her hands up the inside of my legs. Obviously, we were bonding quite quickly.
"Lots of them," she said. That also helped me get over my being-difficult guilt. Apparently I wasn't the only paranoid woman-with-child out there.
Finally, I was free to go.
And finally, by 10:45 p.m. on Saturday night, I was home.
Home!
Sunday morning, Charlotte called through the baby monitor for Daddy. I wanted to surprise her, so I slowly opened her door and stuck my head in. "Good morning, little girl!" I said.
Charlotte instantly popped up, a huge grin on her face, and JUMPED into my arms. And held on tight.
It was pretty much the most awesome thing ever.
I got today (Monday) off, which I'll use to get my house back in order (Chris actually didn't leave it in too bad of condition, but there is so much that apparently only Mommy does around here) and (hopefully) catch up on some sleep.
In the meantime, as I've typed this post, I've gotten to feel lots of movement--for the first time--of my precious little unborn pumpkin. (I think this is the first time I've been still enough in the past week to feel it!) Yep, pregnancy is just as amazing the second time around as the first.
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