October, 2011
This has not been a very good week. I'll just leave it at that.
To reward myself for surviving, I decided that I should get my hair cut and colored. This is a serious treat for me (I usually cut my own hair and haven't had it colored in a year...I know, what a sacrifice-that's sarcasm in case you couldn't tell).
Anyway, I couldn't bring myself to pay the standard $130 salon price for a cut and color, so I decided to be brave and go to WAL-MART. That's right ladies, Wally World.
Before that I drove to Port City Java, my former place of brief employment, to get an Americano. It was wonderful.
When I got to Wal-Mart, there was an overzealous Manager posing as the Greeter, yelling around him and asking, "Where's ma greeter???" That wasn't a spelling error just to clarify.
I had some returns to make, and while I was in line I scoped out the beauty salon to see if it was open, and it was. There was a large African-American woman working there who was probably in her 50's. I thought there might be a conflict of interests (with weaves and all) and so I decided to skip out and do it another day. I didn't feel like it was racist since I'm sure that African-American women would much rather have an African-American woman do their hair because the typical white woman wouldn't have a clue where to start.
But then, on the way out, I remembered how bad my week was and so far, my day, and decided that even if I walked out with purple hair, that it would still probably put me in a better mood. It even made me feel adventurous and I wondered what kind of stories I'd be hearing from this woman (because beauticians always have a story to tell if you don't feel like talking).
And wow! She did. I knew more about that woman's vagina before I left than probably anyone else in the free world.
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October, 2012
A few weeks later I found out that I was just over 4 weeks pregnant. It was the beginning of Fall, the day after my deceased Father's birthday. His sister was visiting us, and morning after she arrived I jumped in my car to head to Wal-Mart. I had been unusually emotional and I wanted to take a test just to be sure. I knew it would be negative. We hadn't ever used birth control and I had resolved long ago that we were undoubtedly called to adoption. I was blasting Rita Springer in my car, singing the words with sincerity. "I am in this forever", a simple phrase which sung by Rita Springer turned into something of a Holy anthem.
When I got home, I went straight to the bathroom with the pregnancy test secretly in tow. I wondered if anyone was suspicious. They weren't. My aunt was out in the backyard sunbathing and my husband was in his studio on the computer.
The test was positive.
I think I whispered an expletive just because I was in shock, but I was very happy. I had to control myself to not run downstairs to tell my husband, so I walked briskly with the test hidden in my pocket.
I walked into the room and whisper-yelled, "Sweetie!" I had to yell a second time because he's hard of hearing (it's true and he's finally excepted it after a few years of denial). But, in his defense, it was a "whisper-yell". He looked at me with slightly widened eyes, and I whipped out the test for his eyes to behold. "I'm pregnant!" His usual "expletive" is "Holy crap!" which he whisper-yelled when he put the two pieces together.
I remember that we were both excited, but it was obvious that we were trying to not get TOO excited. If you've read my previous blogs, then you know that we had an ectopic pregnancy a couple of years ago. So, we were saving our true joy for the day that we would see our baby in the uterus on an ultrasound.
And we did, two weeks later.
It was a way better medication than a Wal-Mart hairdo.
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