3/1

Oh Happy Day!

A little while ago (ok, a couple of months ago), I mentioned that I was going be moving out of blogger and into my own domain.

Well...that day has arrived thanks to Dee at Voices in my Mind. From here on out, I'll be writing at: www.notsopregnant.com

To encourage the move over (and to make up for the annoyance of having to update the link to my page on your blog roll or memory), I'm offering a cute new video of Zac as a peace offering.

What are you waiting for? Go on over!

2/08

Ok, so there were a couple votes for the, "Never Been Married" topic, which might be interesting. I hesitate, though, because much like picking a url that denotes the presence of something (namely an inutero child), picking a blog topic about the absence of something (my lack of marriage/commitment status) might also change.

I can remember sitting across from one of my boyfriends trying to explain that I would never agree to get married until gays and lesbians had the right to marry their partners. I didn't want to support an institution that our government uses to bestow or deny rights and privileges to people based solely on the biological sex of who they fall in love with. Some men get that. To other men, I could have been speaking Farisi while inhaling helium. What I was saying about the cultural discrimination of marriage made that much sense to them. I just figured that I never would get married to a man since I never had the option of marrying a woman.

Much like Pamilia, I'm also not really a big fan of all the accuturements of a wedding. The conflict diamonds, the white dress with lace, the expense and the hysteria that weddings can cause those involved in planning the actual day don't seem to be particularly meaningful symbols to me.

Then the Massachusetts Supreme Court gave gays and lesbians the right to get married, even as Vermont voters were driving around with bumper stickers proclaiming the need to, "Take Back Vermont!" from the ill-begotten stepchild of marriage: the Civil Union. Hawaii had completely reversed its Civil Union policy and only pockets of towns in California were allowing gay marriages, pending review from the California state legislature and judiciary. Then one day, Canada made it ok to be queer and married, even while shivering from the extreme cold and contemplating chopping up the dog house for firewood. That was a beautiful thing.

Yes, somehow, the world didn't collapse when MA started allowing same-sex couples to be joined in matrimony. I found myself rethinking my views on marriage and I realized that it's difficult to give the world ultimatums like, "I will never do...until you..." It's possible and I applaud the people that can do it. I've had to be a little bit more flexible and forgiving of myself.

I could have never predicted that four years after graduating college, I would be a single Mom to an incredibly beautiful child. During my pregnancy, I mourned the loss of my dream of being in a committed relationship and raising a family. I had to forgive myself for my mistakes and embrace the joy and laughter that Zac brings into my life. It was a slowly evolving process to reach that conclusion.

It's the experiences that I've had as a mother and a woman that have forced me to re-evaluate where I stand on issues. "Equal rights for gays and lesbians," is so far from being actualized that somedays I want to look up to the sky and yell: "Why? Why are we letting this go on? Why does it matter to anyone who they take into their hearts and into their beds? Don't we have more pressing issues to deal with as a society?" and then I sigh and once again call myself a hypocrite for letting my coworkers and acquaintances assume that I'm straight.

Yes, I've never been married. To be completely honest, at 26 years-old, I've never even moved in with someone. I've been alone and there are days when I don't want to be alone anymore.

2/07-2

So, I might have a chance to start a paid blogging gig soon. The only problem is, I'm not really sure what I'd like to write about.

I get all of my mommyblog tendencies out on this site and there are already two other single and dating Moms on the other site.

My question is to you, gentle readers, if I were lucky enough to get you to read another blog of mine, what would you like to read more of?

Here are a couple topics that I'm debating writing about:
(A) Weightloss
(B) Mothers and Depression
(C) Working for a Non-profit
(D) Never been Married

or (E) Dear God, woman, don't even think about writing another blog because I can barely stomach this one and only read it because I know you in real life and you will occasionally turn to me and ask, "Did you read my blog yesterday? I wrote about this already."

Ok, here is the rationale. (A) is pretty obvious. I spend a lot of time and money trying to lose weight so it would make sense that I would blog about it. (B) Analyzing the intersection between "Mommy Guilt" and depression, especially generationally. (C) Well, I work for a non-profit and most of my salaried positions have been for non-profits. (D) This phrase tends to come up a lot when I first meet people. Marriage status defines us as individuals and I've spent a lot of time in the past year listening to people talk (endless sometimes) about their exes. I can even tell you the color of underwear and sexual proclivities of some men's ex-wives. Since I've never been married, listening to these stories is akin to listening to someone talk about a mountainclimb to the top of Kilamanjaro (Thank you Dora the Explorer for that reference). I can imagine and I don't really want to go throught it.

Of course there is option (F), which is any fantastic idea that you all have.

Please, please, please....leave a comment and let me know what you think. Otherwise, I will torture you all with more poop stories, so help me God!!!

12/14

Thank you all for your kind words to yesterday's post. It wasn't that I was necessarily thinking about stopping my blog, it's just that I'm struggling more and more with what to write about. I actually plan on moving this site out of blogger soon. I purchased a domain name and my amazingly talented friend (with impeccable taste in boots), Dee, has volunteered to help me (read: do it all for me because I'm a complete idiot when it comes to designing and coding a website) to get it up and running.

I can't even tell you how excited it makes me to have a domain name. It's mine! It's a dot.com! Ok, so it still involves the word "pregnant", but it's better than having a url that assumes I'm currently pregnant. Right now, everytime I give my blog address I have start immediately apologizing for my lack of foresight in picking a url. I have to lamely admit: "Sorry. I started this blog when I was pregnant. And then I gave birth....now I'm Not so Pregnant and still living in Texas...which gives me the horrible acronym of N-SPIT...and God Lord, stop harassing me! Why did I give you this stupid address anyways?"

It's a little bit crazy to think that this February will be my second anniversary of writing on this blog. I never imagined that I would find such a benefit to writing. I've made new friends here, kept in touch with old friends, shocked my Mother on a regular basis, posted embarassing pictures of my sister, Aunt Jen (and in my defense, I was also in those pictures and looked equally awful), and explored my identity as a woman, mother, and working adult.

So, I agree with Caroline and some of the anonymous commenters, I'll keep writing as long as I find it helpful. This site does give me a chance to vent my frustrations about trying to date as a single Mom, being puked on, Zac crying non-stop while I get ready for work, and my boss that never has time for me.

One story: Last night I was on my laptop waiting for a conference call to start at 7pm. Zac had been crying and whining most of the evening and the tv was on, but neither one of us were really paying attention to it. I notice that he had laid down on the rug and started watching the Wheel of Fortune. He never watches the Wheel of Fortune. For that matter, neither do I, but it was on and it gave me a moment to collect what was left of my thoughts before I had to do some work. He got very quiet and watched the television intently for 10-15 minutes. Suddenly, the smell of death comes wafting over to the couch and know that he has just dropped the biggest bomb in the history of constipated babies. Holy mother! Yes, of course, the toxic waste smelled awful, but more importantly, the moment reminded me that sometimes, just every now and then:

You need to lay down and take a dump. You'll feel better afterwards. I promise.

12/13

It's not that I haven't wanted to update today, it's just that I've been busy. I had a conference this morning and a luncheon this afternoon. Then I spent sometime reading other people's blogs instead of updating my own. It happens.

I've also been thinking a lot about the direction of this blog. I started it when I was pregnant so my friends and family could follow my journey through pregnancy and labor/delivery. Since I was one of the first in my group of friends to have a child, I got a lot of the same questions over and over. Answering them (and giving people waaaaay more information than they wanted to ever know about my uterus and cervix) on a blog seemed to make sense.

The more I think about it, the more perfect blogging seems for a pregnant woman. It's a time when complete strangers will inquire about the functions and performance of your body in intimate, minute detail. People are suddenly interested in your sex life (as in: When did you get pregnant? Answer: Drunk after a wedding party in New York. October 2004. It was a good month for getting laid) and whether or not you plan on using your boobs to feed the bebe (answer: yup, until I needed formula assistance from WIC and they demanded my breast pump back).

Now that Zac is almost eighteen months old, I'm just not sure that he and I are that interesting to read about. Sure, as Mr. Tugboat would say, the drama of dating as a single parent and watching stupid men (his words) go up in flames on the Internet is intriguing for a while. What if I stop dating, though? Then what do I write about?

I'll give you a story for today: Zac was so cranky last night that I finally caved in and put on the movie "Cars" just so he would stop crying. It worked instantly. He sat in his favorite corner of the couch and stared at the screen, occasionally pointing and shouting, "Car. Go car!" When I would turn to him to ask him a question about the movie, in my best impersonation of a parent that believes in teachable moments, he would just look at me with his eyebrows scrunched together and say, "Car, car, car!" and turn back to the movie. I'm assuming that's toddler speak for, "Shut the hell up, Mom. I'm trying to watch the movies about cars." I turned on my laptop and went back to surfing the Internet, looking up every now and then to watch animated cars cheer on other animated cars racing around the animated track.
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This whole blogging thing makes me wish I had an advice column. At least then I would have an excuse to continue writing every day.