Blog Rule #5: You’re An Idiot*
Here’s a new life lesson: If you happen to be getting ready for your first IVF cycle and have a blog, do not post anything about it unless it works. Especially if it’s anywhere within 100 feet of Christmas. I know you will be hopeful and scared and wanting to include everyone, but don’t. JUST DON’T. Because you will get a LOT of lovely, amazing people very, very excited.
These people will leave you wonderful comments. They will send you encouraging emails. They will mail you handwritten Christmas cards speaking hopefully of baby presents next year.
Which you will open the same day as the statement from the clinic that details the fact that you spent every last benefit dime on a procedure that did. not. work. And you will stand there looking at your Christmas card table envisioning setting the whole thing on fire, thinking, ‘what the hell do I say now?’.
Instead of figuring that out, anytime soon, you will go to a party the next day and get very, very drunk. You will be very, very hungover at your husband’s hockey game when one of the wives announces she’s pregnant. You will get up and move to the other fucking side of the arena in order not to murder anyone. You will go to your own going-away party and drink some more. You may start a kick-line in the middle of the city attorney’s living room and spill wine all over her wood floor. You will get up the next morning and start drinking as much damn coffee as you’ve ever wanted In. Your. Life. After which your neighbor will shoot the shit with your husband while he puts up lights, and casually mention that they are pregnant, too. Again. For the third time. OH, THE WOE.
You will be angry. You will be sad. Then you will be numb. Every time you try to write a post, you will be too tired, too worked up and entirely too unreasonable to make any sense at all. But if anything else, you will be 100% sure that saying any of this would only make those wonderful people feel bad. During Christmas.
So you will say nothing.
*Dear readers, just in case it’s not clear: I love you, love you, love you. I’m not calling YOU an idiot. I’m calling ME an idiot. Via the timeless wit of the Wedding Crashers.
Holiday Wishes More Cunning than Turnips
Christmas at our house has been a minimal affair this year, due to the whole IVF project…thing. In appreciation of my weird sense of humor, Mom sent a copy of Black Adder Remastered. Trav got me a knife sharpener and a can opener to replace the three prehistoric pieces of junk I bought this year; I filled the photo frames he bought 8 months ago and cooked a Ham dinner. Other than the fact that my boss stood in line with 350 people at the HoneyBaked Store on Christmas Eve (because she was picking up her turkey, too) dinner as a gift didn’t sound nearly so exciting to me until I stood in the street yesterday talking to neighbors I hadn’t seen in a month, all of whom asked how the bacon potatoes turned out.
Keeping up with the Past
Early this year I created a facebook group for my family, the John A. Adams family. It is by far, one of the biggest reasons I love facebook so much. In the last 9 months I have ‘spoken’ with more of my relatives more frequently than I have in the last 12 years. Which has been wonderful for me, because I forgot how much I really missed that.
Recently, I announced my intention to update and republish the expansive genealogical work that was my grandmother’s masterpiece, “The Adams Family: the Ancestors & Descendants of Frederick Shields Adams*”. There are more than fourteen generations of family history in her book. Since it was printed in 2000, several people have come and gone, with new or longer stories to add. Many relatives who would like to have this book do not. So I am retyping it. And expanding it. Page by page.
With every page I type, I’m reminded that these are the stories that show us for who we are. These are the stories that should be shared. And people shouldn’t have to wait a year or so to read them in a book only a few will be able to buy**.
So I’m making it a blog: “Aspire, Persevere and Indulge Not”.
At least once a week I’ll post a piece of the book, a new informational find, or photographs. If you’re into historical material, feel free to check it out. If you’re family, feel free to send me questions, material or let me know how I’m doing. I hope you love it.
*One change I’m proposing to the book (and have applied to the blog) – is moving the title up one generation to read, “the Ancestors and Descendents of John A. Adams”, as the full work encompasses all four of his children, of whom Fredrick Shields Adams was one, and their descendants.
**Once the update is complete, I’ll release our book on Blurb. The book will be available to every member of the family – but as it will include biographies of living relatives, it will ONLY be available to family.
Box of Hope and Hell
I’m working on a recap that’s gotten bigger than I ever intended, and I’ve quickly realized that I’m not going to be able to post it today. So until Monday, I’m just going to leap to the end of that “Things I’ve Been Up To Since August” list and shout out the biggest topic on it. More than anything else that’s happened, I’ve wanting to write about this one thing. And at the same time, have been utterly afraid to.
Afraid to be angry. Afraid to be sad. Afraid to sound bitter. Afraid to make other people feel bad. Afraid to lose friends. Afraid to look bad to potential employers. Because ALL of these things have happened.
But you know what? I HATE being afraid. It’s pointless and wasteful and doesn’t do a THING for you unless you’re directly being threatened by axe-murders or vampires or sexy-beast werewolves. In that case, yes. RUN YOUR ASS OFF.
Last week, this ginormous box of IVF drugs arrived at our house. After 3 months of waiting and testing and several sessions of crying.
Today I started taking them.
