Tiny getaway! One of the big things in the “pro” column on the pros & cons list for moving back to Vermont was the proximity of East Coast weekend getaways.  Sean had never seen Boston, so we headed down.

I used this app Hotel Tonight, which is pretty amazing last minute hotel deals (if you enter the invite code tferro you’ll get $25 off your first booking & I get credits if you use it, but it IS ACTUALLY AMAZING OR I WOULD NOT SUGGEST IT.) ALSO amazing is the fact that it was a huge huge deal for me to let go of my control freakiness and actually be ok with not knowing where we were staying until 12 noon the day of. Granted, I’d been checking their Boston hotel choices for a week to make sure there was always something I liked, so it wasn’t TOO much of a control freak breakthrough. I’ve seen XV Beacon come up a few times for 1/2 off so I’m going to stalk it and just take off when I can get a weekend there. Hi! I love hotels. Did I mention that? White sheets! Room service! Tiny shampoo!

Saturday we started at the Isabella Stewart Gardener Museum, sitting on the edge of the courtyard until I got yelled at for taking photos, then having a really nice lunch and a mimosa in the museum café while we waited for it to be time to figure out where we’d be staying. We ended up at the Ames, which was really cute. Then, a trek around the North End, with café stops and actual historical things like the Paul Revere house. Did you know Paul Revere Sr was actually named Apollos Rivoire, and changed his name to Paul Revere? How great is that name?

Sunday was both of our first times on Cape Cod – a lot of house peeping & shell finding with a little estate sale-ing thrown in. I’d definitely go back to soak in the lilac covered, salt-water weathered shingle houses & beach times. When’s my next weekend away?

(oh yeah, THIS is why we moved back. please excuse the iPhone shots.)

I’ve been thinking lately about fear and just how directional it can be – a rudder in life steering you toward or away from what you need to be doing. When I thought about writing this blog post it basically made me want to throw up, so that means I should do it, right? I’m not even sure what I’m going to write, only that after reading Leah’s post about Infertility Awareness Week I felt like maybe I should just keep writing until the knot that is my chest softens, at least slightly. I don’t know why we don’t talk about this publicly, or why women feel so alone. I know it’s brutally, brutally hard for me to put something this personal into the world.

But. Here we are. One year and one month since we decided to start trying to have a baby.

That subject line is something my aunt would say to me when I was small. “What’s it like to want?” I always thought it was a particularly cruel question to ask a child. And I’ll tell you. It sucks. It takes up all your waking thoughts. I can tell myself to just forget it and to relax, it doesn’t work. I can eat right and take herbs and feel like I’m being super proactive, and it doesn’t stop that nagging want, or the deep deep feeling of failure and depression.

When we first started, I had no idea what I was in for. I’d been accidentally pregnant before (in Sept 2008) & even though that ended in a miscarriage I at least knew I had the ability. I got the go ahead from my doctors after fibroid surgery, with nothing but “You’re fine! You’ll be pregnant in no time!” & since then, every doctor I see says the same thing. I don’t understand why I can’t find the faith that they have, that my mother has, that my friends have, that my husband has. I’m 7 years older than my husband, and it feels like a century these days.

There’s this strange thing where I allow myself to get my hopes up every month, and yet when I try to summon a feeling of faith and hope and power and serenity I just feel desolate, depressed. Every action and moment seems tinged and through this lens. You don’t realize how many damn pregnant people there are in the world until you’re trying, and I finally had to let some of my co-workers know because I couldn’t take the relentless teasing about me being next to have a baby, as the only non-mom in the office. The simplest statements turn into knives.

We’re now at the point where we have to make the decision to take the next step into expensive medical procedures. The thought of it makes me feel very panicked and strange. It’s a big decision, and my age and this difficulty brings up birth defects and risks that we have to consider as well. I really don’t know what our next step will be. Maybe it’s time to stop trying and to come to peace with it. Maybe I won’t have to make a decision.

There’s a room in the new house that was clearly the nursery, pale lavender with moons and stars. I keep the door closed but I’ve unpacked my most precious children’s books into the built in shelves.

So my lovely friend Lynda‘s been talking about Baby Alpaca forever and I’m like “whatever, I like tiny fuzzy hoofed animals” but then I finally clicked this link (click it! it’s not letting me embed!) the other day and realized I’d been missing out. Do you like how all the music I like these days is totally 80s? Yes, you do. Shhhh.

Image modified from Brush Factory

I’ve been having a bit of a grump lately. That’s an understatement. A sick-of-winter-want-sun-sick-of-the-flu-sick-of-paying-taxes major depresso-fest is more like it.  Since we moved to Vermont I’ve gotten more colds than I think I picked up in the whole of my living in California, and the trees are still bare and spiky, with snow squalls at random. I had no idea I had seasonal depression until now, but in the “fake summer” week of March I was deliriously happy.

So I’m trying to redirect the grump to some Spring-time resolutions, focus points to get me out of the bad news cycle of regret & stress – my biggest enemies!

1. Be kind to each other.

Our friend Kate, who’s Scottish & charming and polite in a way that’s basically alien to me, often gently remind us (me) that her #1 marriage tip is to “be kind to each other” – I’m really a beast when I’m grumpy. Remembering to be kind to yourself and others goes a long way to stopping the cycle of grump.

2. Grow things.

Sean is the gardener in this relationship, but I’m spending these sick, dreary rainy days with Smart Gardener, which is great for people like me who have no idea what we’re doing. Just thinking about sunny days grubbing in the dirt cheers me up.

3. Spring nesting

The house is crazzzzyyy torn apart from the hallway renovation, and the sewing room is been half painted  - getting things unpacked and put away and getting the little renovations done will help a lot, and once the sewing room is done I can Etsy one million things & make space and feel less scattered. Yes.

What are your tips to get through the final push of winter?