Skip to main content

Mostly I Never Cry At All


This is one of my very favorite pictures. It was taken in October 2004 at a pumpkin patch farm near our house, just a few minutes after I realized I was pregnant again.

Whatever do I mean by that? Partly it was that – sorry, I hate this expression – we’d just started “trying” and conditions seemed favorable. But mostly it was that there was country music being playing in the background at the farm and I kept getting weepy. At one line in one particular song, something about “living here in Arkansas working at a Wal-mart” I got actual tears in my eyes. Because I’ve never lived in Arkansas, nor want to, nor worked at a Wal-mart, nor wanted to, I wondered at my bizarre sensitivity to this song for a few moments before thinking, “Hey! I must be pregnant.”

Crying at odd moments defines pregnancy, for me. (Although the first warning sign of Mallory was an out-of-the-blue craving for cocktail wienies.) One night when I was pregnant with Mallory, Chris and I saw a segment on a Food Network program about a dog who, every day, got an ice cream cone from his neighborhood ice cream truck driver. Something about this happy dog and his unconventional treat just really got to me and I just started to bawl. Chris has probably never laughed so hard at me. Fortunately he wasn’t around to witness what happened with Phoebe – I was driving to work one day and suddenly remembered that Cheerios Christmas commercial. You know the one, with the grandma sitting with a baby in his highchair, and she’s pushing Cheerios around saying, “This is your uncle in Dallas” and “Here’s your cousins in Cincinnati” and then she pushes two O’s together and says, “But we’ll always be together at Christmas.” Oh my how I cried at just the memory of that commercial.

Anyway, I was right, that day at the pumpkin patch – I was pregnant. And now we have two little girls to take to the pumpkin patch this year, and I couldn’t be happier.

Comments

Anonymous said…
Funny! Especially about crying over a memory of a commercial.

I knew the instant I was pregnant with Noah the day I was hungry all day. I could not eat enough. That night, I looked at Seth and said, "I'm pregnant." He didn't believe me, but I was right.
5:37 PM
MomofK9s said…
The song is "Little Rock" by Collin Ray. I get misty every time I hear that song and I am not nor have I ever been pregnant! so what is my excuse? :-)
4:07 PM
Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

I ask you

This is my garden: Or rather, this is the patch of soil that was my garden last summer. It produced millions of tomatoes, dozens of green peppers, a handful of cucumbers, and two puny watermelons. I do not wish to repeat last summer's vegetable bounty, because most of said bounty went to waste. Nor, however, do I want this patch of soil to remain brown and bare throughout the summer, because it's unattractive. So, what do I plant here, in the shrubbery/flowery vein? Keep in mind that I do not have a green thumb. Also, I don't want to spend a lot of money. Also, this area is in full sun most of the day. And it's really hot. And sometimes we get rabbits. Any advice? To thank you in advance, I give you these goofy photos of my children and their homemade parfaits (which Mallory persisted in calling "specialinis").
5 comments
Read more

the closet

Amy has challenged me to list 8 things that are hidden in the back of my closet. I try not to actually look to closely at the back of my closet, so these are my closest guesses: 1. At least three no-longer-needed diaper bags. 2. An outfit that I've been meaning to return to Land's End for at least six months now. 3. One of our wedding pictures, which has a broken frame which I keep meaning to replace. 4. Shoes, shoes, shoes, shoes. 5. Possibly a pair of fuzzy slippers. I miss those fuzzy slippers. Maybe I should brave the mess and go try to find them. 6. Baby blankets. 7. A few small toys that I meant to stick in the girls' Christmas stockings. Maybe next year. 8. And I'm guessing, a bunch of mismatched socks. My closet isn't very interesting, I'm afraid.
1 comment
Read more

The Golf Course

There was a miniature golf course in my grandparent’s house. There were, in fact, lots of cool-if-kitschy things in my grandparents’ house. There were swinging saloon doors between the kitchen and the master suite. There was a toilet seat made of transparent plastic, with ticket stubs from horse races embedded therein. There was a globe wine bar (pictured!). There was a mounted goat head (the goat was named Bucky) on whose antlers my granddad hung his golf caps. There was a stuffed pheasant whose chest feathers were smooth as silk. There was a kitchen bar of green marbled formica and swively kitchen chairs of red pleather. There was an automatic ice dispenser on the refrigerator, which was a rare and awe-inspiring thing in the 1970’s. There was a mirrored tray holding bejeweled perfume bottles with atomizers in the guest bathroom. There were two huge oil paintings – one of my aunt, with beautifully frosted hair, holding a Pug, one of my older sister as a toddler sitting on a John De...
7 comments
Read more