The Choleric Atheist

"A man is but the product of his thoughts.  What he thinks, he becomes."  --Mahatma Gandhi

There are religious people who believe I am atheist only because I am angry and bitter toward God.  In the part of the country I live in, this seems to be the prevailing attitude.  I am not angry.  What do I have to be angry about?  I am not bitter because I was raised in an overly religious home.  I certainly have had horrendously rough periods in my life, but I don't have anything to blame for those except nature, poor choices, bad genetics, and chemical warfare.  There are certainly things that do anger me about religion, but that anger has nothing to do with any and everything to do with the way people choose to interpret their god's supposed message.  I can't be angry with a deity because I feel like that would make as much sense as being angry with Santa Claus just because someone else thinks he is real instead of a fictional character or being angry with a newspaper that reports about a crime instead directing the anger toward the person who committed the crime.

Mostly, though, I am not angry because I choose not to be.  Anger is a counterproductive emotion.  It drains us of our energy and transforms us into writhing little packets of hate.  Anger cannot coexist with happiness.  I used to be a lot more passionate about my negative beliefs, but it was detrimental to everything in my life.  Now I try to take things as they come and respond to them in a more appropriate manner.  If you lash out at someone because of their beliefs, they automatically build a defensive wall and no reasonable dialogue is possible.  I hate all manner of attack ads, whether it be by religious or non-religious groups or political candidates.  They really turn me off the idea of being associated with that group at all and makes me wonder about the motivations of the people who are.  Friendly discourse and communication is far more effective.  Tell people what you stand for without attacking the other sides.  If people agree with you, they will come to you.  I see too many attacks from groups I have no idea of the ideals of because all they do is attack and never explain their motivation.

My calm is nowhere near perfect, but I try to direct my fury appropriately when the need arises.  If your religion or belief system advocates the submission of women, discrimination or violence against gays, nonconsentual body modification, forcing your laws upon others, coerced conversion, theocratic governments, halting scientific progress, hurting children, waging wars in the name of a god, or threatening those who do not believe the same as you -- yes, you will be an object of my wrath as those things have absolutely no place in a peaceful and advanced civilization.  If you aren't doing any of those things, than whatever.  I don't care what you believe in and you shouldn't expect any flack from me as long as you don't expect anyone else to believe the same as you.  Beliefs are highly personal ideas and are meaningless if they are expected to be universal.  People should be allowed to come to conclusions on their own without the threat of fire, brimstone, and violence. 

I'm not of the "bomb first, talk later" mindset.  I know a lot of people who are, and it applies to every aspect of their lives.  How can we call ourselves intelligent beings if we are not open to diplomacy ?  I know as well as everyone else that the world is not all sunlight and rainbows, but an attack should be the last resort and not the first.  I don't even think automatic retaliation is appropriate.  There is no reason to counter hate with more hate or death with more death.  It just cycles on and on and on and spirals further and further away from any hope at a meaningful peace.  We can keep going and self destruct both on a personal and whole-world scale, or we can grab the rope and pick and climb ways out of the ravine.  Yes, it is uncomfortable and difficult and slow, and it will probably leave us sore, but when we reach the top of that canyon, we will finally be able to look around and see the whole landscape, see that there is so much more to the universe than what we saw when we were stuck down in that angry hole.

I've been accused of being an idealist and a pacifist like those are dirty words which should only be spoken in whispers behind closed doors.  Whenever I am labelled by one of those terms, I just smile and say "thank you." It is a compliment after all.  It means I think before I act and I have the problem solving skills to explore the solutions beyond the obvious.  I would love for more people to be of the same mindset, but I am not going to invade their lives with a forceful attitude, threats, or attacks on their beliefs.  I am trying to influence by example and bring a little peace to my corner of the world, a world that still equates anger with passion and war with peace.

The Writing Mayfly

I started writing blog as a place to dump the thoughts which didn't belong in my books.  I express myself best through writing, especially when I am inspired and stormed in the house with a million thoughts and scenarios ricocheting around the green vortex of my imagination.  I was shocked today to see that I have been found by so many people.  I am socially awkward enough that I never know how to respond to people who compliment me, so all I can think to say is -- Thank you for taking a little time to explore a little piece of my reality.

I don't get to write on here as often as I would like, but most of my writing requires a degree of inspiration and epiphany that doesn't come out of a standard, boring day.  I'd rather write something meaningful on occasion than something mundane every day.  My inspiration also gets eaten up by art projects, crocheting, playing with my toddler, and the small collection of books I've written in the past eight years.

I am firmly planted in the real world, but I also have an imaginary world.  I can usually only get lost in my imaginary world after 10pm.  I have to wait until my family is asleep.  Only then can I fully get into character and jump into a fantasy world full of strange characters and even stranger situations.  I am not delusional, dreaming, or a role-player.  I'm just a writer. 

I'm getting close to the end of my nightmare chronicle Mayfly Requiem and I've found myself being able to write before 10pm for the first time since my son was born.  Between late nights, nap times, and distracted play times, I've written 50 pages in the last four days.  My son usually doesn't nap, but he's making an exception this week to fight off the nasty colds we've all come down with.  I just haven't been sleeping much.  The insomnia rotation of my narcolepsy has been in full swing for several weeks.

I write because it wouldn't make sense not to.  I have so many thoughts and ideas in my head.  If I try to keep them in, they eventually migrate to the surface and express themselves in different forms than what I intended and something gets horribly lost along the way.  I'll have painting in mind, but end up doing metal work.  It can still be beautiful, but I can't help looking at it and knowing that it is not at all what I had in mind.  I've been working on Mayfly for two years now, which is frustrating me because the first two drafts of my previous book (coming in at 1200 pages) only took six months.  However, I have to be happy I'm getting it finished at all.  I've been interrupted by marriage, home ownership, a baby, and accepting and 19 months later quitting a job that kept me in a lab six or seven days a week.  They've all been worth it, but Mayfly has been eating away at me the entire time.  I wrote the first draft by hand in four months, but the deciphering of my scrawl into a workable transcription is still ongoing.  It is nice that I can see the end.  I am halfway through the second of two notebooks, so I still have a quarter of the book to write, but being able to flip back and actually see where the end is in relation to where I am is a relief.

Honestly, I don't know if my books are any good.  I haven't tried publishing them yet because I am still tweaking them a little bit.  I'm an obsessive editor and the evolution of my world requires a progressive attention to detail.  The books are are interconnected but take place in different worlds with different characters, though there are a few linking characters.  It doesn't matter if anyone else finds them to be either good or a waste of time.  I'm only writing them for myself.  If anyone else reads them and likes them it is a bonus, but  I'm not writing for that sort of gratification.  I write because I like to, because I have ideas and characters in my head that I want to put down on paper to keep them from rattling around in my brain any longer, because it is a nearly free hobby, and because it gives me a tremendous sense of accomplishment when I reach the end of a manuscript and realize I am in a place not many people have been.  I've heard a lot of people say how much they would like to write a book, but I actually have.  I finished what I started twice already, and what I started was on such a massive scale that when I look back I can't believe I pushed myself through it.  They are a labor of love and often loathing, but that is no different from most of life's accomplishments.


Writing gives me the freedom to explore perspectives and personalities, magic and fantastic locations.  I am inspired by my travels, my experiences, and the people I've met, but I can also be inspired by something as simple as a flower or a rainstorm.  I have to write down things as I think of them or those exact thoughts will be lost forever.  I guess I'm a bit obsessive about it, but it is impossible to finish any large project without a lot of obsession and ambition.  Talent doesn't matter so much, as long as you're obsession doesn't extend to a desire of fame and renown.  If you write for yourself but leave your ideas open for others to explore, sometimes interesting things start happen.

My Pantheism

I spent pieces of today in a debate with someone I didn't know.  I wrote the following to explain my beliefs to her.  I admit I plagiarized myself a little bit (using bits of things I posted on a message board), but some things I think I said right the first time so I didn't need to explain them a different way.

I see the universe as divine in itself, without the need for a higher power.  We are only at the zygote state of what we know in science, but that doesn't mean what we know is wrong.  Newton's theories are technically wrong, but they still apply to certain problem scales.  We modify and move on.  Nothing in science is absolute because we know that there is more than what we are seeing.  We strive to find out what that more is, and we find it, sometimes slowly and methodically, and sometimes through epiphany.  We do not assume that what we know now is all there is.

No matter how advanced our human science gets, we still won't know everything.  Particles react in strange and sometimes unpredictable ways and you have to keep breaking them down further and further to see what is going on underneath.  We used to think that protons and neutrons were fundamental particles, but now we know that they aren't.  They are made up of quarks, which are the only known particles to experience all four fundamental forces (strong, weak, electromagnetic, and gravitational).  In quantum physics, you can keep looking and looking, but you keep finding that there is always more to see.  Complexity and perfection.  Love is the gravitational attraction between two bodies, and it, along with duct tape, holds the universe together.

There is a lot of perceived chaos in the universe, but also balance.  Cause and effect balance out into a teetering stability.  An outside reaction tips the balance, and what looks like chaos is just another effect.  Many religious people look at the universe and believe there is more -- heaven and hell and some form of afterlife.  I look at the universe and think "This is all there is, it is more than enough, and it is magnificent."  I see heaven in the formation of a new star and the birth of an otter, hell in a volcano destroying an island and a supernova consuming orbiting planets.

My moral code is simple -- If what you are doing hurts yourself, another person, an animal, or the world around you, then it is wrong and you shouldn't be doing it.  I respect life in all forms and try not to leave a detrimental impact on my surroundings.  I am trying to leave my world a better place than it was when I came into it.  There is such beauty in the world, but it is often overlooked in the course of being human.

My beliefs are dynamic.  I believe that bosons are not subject to the Pauli exclusion principle, but I am open to a theory that proves something else.  Everything proven has the potential to be disproven, but that doesn't mean that everything we know now is incorrect.  The universe is a vast and strange place.  As for a higher power, I do not believe in one.  Nature is all the power I need to believe in, and nature is not a sentient, omniscient, or omnipotent being.  Anything I don't know, I try to learn more about.  I open my mind to epiphany, to new possibilities and ideas.  That inner growth is very important to who I am.  Nature is my temple and science is my translation.

I Bought My Son a Baby Doll

My one year old loves babies.  He loves to say "baby", he loves to look at babies, even pictures of babies, and he loves to play with babies.  Lately he has been "borrowing" dolls from a couple of his playmates.  He was playing with one yesterday at a playgroup and was talking as he examined the hands of the doll.  One of the other moms I was with realized what he was saying -- "fingers."  When the doll's owner took it back, my son crawled over to a younger baby, patted him on the head, and said "good baby".

I decided to take him to the toy store after my yoga class this morning.  I have to say it is very difficult to find an appropriate doll for a one year old boy.  I had a whole list of mental criteria -- no small parts like removable shoes, no bottles, soft body, not too feminine, no batteries, identifiable body parts (fingers, toes) for teaching.  I was looking for a boy doll, but the only one they had was way too big for a toddler to carry around.  I wanted to find him something fairly small and cuddly, but it still had to look like a baby.

There were lots of dolls and lots of pink.  Lots of names like "Little Mommy", and every doll was geared exclusively toward little girls.  Boys had action figures, guns.  All hard plastic and nothing soft.  Rowan loves soft stuffed animals, but animals aren't very good for teaching a toddler about human toes and noses and shoulders.  He ended up picking out his own doll, a little baby doll wrapped in a blue blanket.  It has a soft body and molded limbs and head, and Rowan's eyes lit up excitedly when he saw it.  It is a girl baby, and I didn't realize it was dressed mostly in pink until we got home.  That's all right.  He might have a little sister someday anyways.  He is curled up on the floor sleeping with his new friend right now.  A quilt of NFL team fabric is keeping them warm.

It perplexes me that so many parents wouldn't allow their little boys to play with "girl" toys like dolls, kitchens, and crafts.  I want my son to know how to mend torn clothes.  I want him to be able to prepare a tasty meal.  I want him to be nurturing and know how to handle babies.  He'll be a big brother eventually, after all.  He is a very rough and tumble little guy, so learning how to be calm and gentle with a little baby is a necessity.  I'm currently trying to teach him not to hit babies or poke their faces, and since we aren't around babies more than a couple times a week, a doll is becoming the stand-in for a real baby.

I think some of the things "girl" toys can teach are basic life skills -- cooking, mending, household chores, child care.  Why are those things marketed as gender-specific.  If we eventually have a girl, I won't think anything of her wearing her brother's blue hand-me-downs, playing with trucks, and participating in sports.  We draw the line at guns for both genders, since I won't let my children play with inherently violent toys.  I want him to play house because he will eventually be living in a house or apartment of his own.  I want him to play with stuffed animals and dolls because he might decide to have a pet or have children.  I'm going to teach him how to sew and cook because his grandmother never taught her boys such things and so they never learned.  It gets a little frustrating for me that my husband cannot even prepare a simple meal or sew on a button, especially if I am sick in bed and those things need to be done.

Our society is still so hung-up on gender roles that often people can't see the incredible merit of treating all toys as gender-neutral.  I am not turning my little guy into a sissy.  I am giving him another opportunity to learn, an opportunity for imaginative play and mental growth.  He is learning about communication and responsibility.  He is learning not to hit people with plastic bats or drumsticks.  There are appropriate toys to hit with those objects, but a baby doll isn't one of them.  He is learning how to be a big brother before he becomes one, and hopefully that eventually translates into him being a respectful adult, one who doesn't expect his partner to do all the chores, one who cleans up after himself and is gentle with other human beings and animals.

It is a very long process to instill such traits in a child, but children learn best through play.  If they are allowed to play with a variety of toys, it helps prepare them for the rest of their lives while still allowing them to be children.  I don't want my son to act like an adult just because he has a doll, a set of megablocks, and a drum.  I just want him to learn and grow and explore the world so that in seventeen years, he will be slowly transformed into a responsible young adult.  I am letting him grow up to be whatever he wants to be, and I am giving him the tools to do so.  A little guidance, a little luck, some toys and games, a lot of time, and a lot of love.

Bittersweet End

I made my final donation on Thursday.  I've been slowly weaning off the pump over the last month and now I only pump if I'm really engorged in the morning.  My son is 12.5 months old now.  I'm somewhat torn about packing up the pump.  I've been able to give so much through using it, but the pumping era had to end sometime.  We're still nursing 6+ times a day and will be until we decide to wean in another year or so.

I made my first donation in March.  I started pumping for work at three weeks postpartum and went back to work at six weeks, and my freezer filled up far faster than I expected.  I hadn't even heard of milk donation at the time, but I found out about it when I ran a search for something like "what to do with extra breastmilk.  After a lot of thought and research, I decided to donate privately.  I have a lot of dietary restrictions that turned out to be ideal for babies with certain allergies.

My first donation was to a family awaiting the birth of their adoptive child.  My freezer was completely full, with no room left for food, and I gave all of it to them except for about 100oz.  I never held on to that much again, once I saw how quickly I could replenish 100oz.

My last donation was actually to two families -- a pair of twins whose mother just needed an extra 5-10oz a day for daycare, and a little girl with milk allergies whose mother worked and didn't respond well to the pump.  It was my third and second donation to these two families, and I helped the twins get past a year without needing any formula.

I ended up donating a total of 4000oz to 7 babies in 6 families in 4 states over the past 9.5 months.  Sometimes I feel like I shouldn't have weaned off the pump and could have given more, but then I look at those numbers and realize that what I did give was pretty amazing.  It is really hard to move on from being a donor, but I know it is time.  I haven't worked out of them home since the end of July, and I think my son has only taken 2 bottles since then and won't take milk from a cup either.  He is very much a "booby baby" and I love our nursing time, since it is the only time he sits still for a cuddle.

I'm sure I'll be donating again when we have another baby.  It would bother me not to, especially since I now know what my body is capable of.  All the pain and frustration in the beginning was worth it.  I am still breastfeeding my toddler and I also helped grow seven other babies, most of whom are now toddlers or going to be soon.  I'll miss my built-in reading time, but it is nice not to have to schedule my mornings around pumping.  It could be tedious and uncomfortable, but it was worth every moment, every dollar I put into the pump and supplies, and every ounce.  It only seemed weird to me at the beginning, and now milk donation seems like a normal thing to do for anyone healthy with extra milk.  I gave what I could, and what I got in return was far more valuable than money.  I received a sense of accomplishment and a feeling of self worth I'd never felt before.  Helping those babies while watching my own grow up was incredible and I am so happy I was able to be a donor.

My final donation.  I wish I had taken pictures of all of them, but I didn't think about it until the last two.

One Year Ago and Today

One Year Ago -- A birth story
I wasn't expecting to go into labor for at least another two weeks.  I had my routine weekly OB appointment on December 17th and had absolutely no progress. I was horribly uncomfortable and hoped she would tell me something was changing.  The baby was still high up and cozy.  My doctor asked me about induction and I told her I didn't want to be induced without medical reason.  She was fine with it, and told me she'd let me go until 42 weeks, which would have put me around January 12th.  My original due date was December 29th, so I was at 38 weeks.  Despite my discomfort, I was going to let the baby come when he was ready, especially since he was predicted to be quite small.

I got home from the doctor and had a breakdown.  My hormones were going wild.  Every little thing made me cry.  A calender, a baby on a TV show, even my cats.  I went through work on December 18th with tears in my eyes.  My heartburn flared.  I was on an emotional roller coaster, and it was really the only time in my pregnancy that I was in that spot.  I was always so calm and cool, even when I was working 20 hours of overtime a week for months straight.

We made plans for the weekend.  The 20th was my husband's birthday.  We bought movie tickets and set a time to go to the art museum.  We bought groceries.  We sat on the couch and watched a movie and then went to bed.

I had woken up several times each night ever since I was 6 weeks along, so waking up in the middle of the night on the 19th was nothing unusual.  I went to the bathroom, and I wiped away a glob of goo and a little blood, again nothing too unusual, since it happened every time I was checked by the doctor.  I woke up a final time at 6:30am and when I stood up after using the toilet, a large amount of liquid ran down my leg.  I thought I might have urinated on myself, a common pregnancy problem, but when I shifted, it happened again and I noticed that there was a little bit of pink in the liquid.

I woke up my husband and he groggily rolled out of bed after I told him I thought my water had broken.  He has always been a really difficult person to wake up, so I think it took him a good 10 minutes to figure out what I was telling him.  Since we weren't expecting labor for a couple more weeks, we didn't even have our bags packed.  We got our things together and called the doctor.  My doctor wasn't on call on Saturdays, so we ended up talking to another in her practice.

We headed to the hospital at 9:30.  I was still only having light cramping instead of noticeable contractions, but since my water had broken and I had tested positive for Group B Strep, I was told to come in so I could start antibiotics.  The hospital we had chosen was a 20 minute drive and it was snowing lightly.  My husband made me sit on towels over a garbage bag because I was making a mess.

I had pre-registered at the hospital and we had called ahead, so they knew I was coming.  We walked to our L&D room and the nurse tested and confirmed that what I was leaking was amniotic fluid.  It took two nurses and an anesthesiologist to get the hep-lock in my arm.  I have terrible veins for sticking.  They are tough, roll, and have many valves that tend to blow.  It took seven sticks to get the hep-lock in so I could get started on antibiotics.  I ended up getting fluids at some point later because I ended up vomiting throughout my labor and couldn't even keep down ice chips.

I had a check and was only at 2cm and still wasn't having significant contractions.  At around 11am, I had my first real contraction, a ten-minute long tetanic nightmare.  I held onto a steady tone, a D-flat, and breathed through the contraction, but the monitor showed that my baby's heart rate had dropped as a result of the extreme contraction.  It didn't go back up when the contraction ended.  I got onto my hands and knees and the nurse gave me an oxygen mask and the change in position made his heart rate go back up to normal.

The doctor came in and told me that if it happened again and a position change didn't help, they'd be taking me for a Cesarean.  As it was, I wouldn't be able to use the jacuzzi tub because he wanted me hooked up to the external monitor.  I was still only 2cm dilated so the tetanic did nothing for progression.  The doctor wanted to give me pitocin, but I told him no.  I told him I wanted some time to try to progress on my own and only use interventions if absolutely necessary.

I spent the next hour and a half bouncing on a birthing ball while playing Diablo 2 on my laptop and watching Kung Fu Panda.  My method worked and I progressed to 4cm two hours after the pitocin threat.  I didn't get on the bed until transition.  I spent the next 9 hours or so on the ball, standing and leaning over, walking, rocking in a chair, and in the shower when they let me go off the monitor for a while.  My baby's heart rate stayed up.  I rocked through the contractions.  Even when I was just standing, I was dancing, swaying side to side.  We listened to music, played games, and watched movies for distraction.  A friend came by to bring my husband dinner around 5, but other than that, it was just him, me, and the nurses.  The anesthesiologist came by once to tell me that he could give me a high epidural despite my spina bifida, but I basically told him off.  There was no way I was going to let anyone stick anything in my spine.  I was handling the pain really well and I didn't need anyone trying to tell me that I should just take the drugs.

I'm not sure when I hit transition, somewhere around 9 or 9:30pm.  At that point, I couldn't stand up anymore because the pain was constant.  I kept humming my D-flat while lying on my side, rocking front to back.  At 10:20 I was ready to push.  The nurse told us the baby had a lot of dark hair.  I never felt the crowning or the "ring of fire".  I pushed with each contraction, which greatly relieved the pain.

At 10:49pm on December 19, 2009, my son Rowan was born and was placed on my chest while my husband cut the cord and I was stitched up.  He had a full head of black hair and dark blue-indigo eyes.  He was a hairy little guy.  He even had fine, dark hair on his forehead, ears, back, and arms.  His hairline and eyebrows were connected.  He was a tiny guy, weighing in at 6lbs 5oz and was 18.5 inches long.  He had quite a conehead, which resolved over the next 12 hours.  He had an incredible set of lungs, which he still likes to demonstrate.  He was extremely alert, active, and rooting like mad.  We had a little trouble initiating nursing because his mouth was tiny, but he got it after a while.  He kept looking at me with those big bright eyes.  He was absolutely beautiful.

I had such an endorphin rush that I couldn't sleep for 12 hours after birth.  I was out of bed 30 minutes after being stitched up and was able to take a shower an hour later when my husband went with Rowan for his first bath.  I turned the bathroom into a crime scene, but getting on my feet so quickly was definitely a major perk of natural birth.  Rowan was brought back to me in the room we'd be staying in and we snuggled up for some more latching practice while my husband slept.  I think he was far more tired than I was.

My regular doctor came to visit the next morning.  She kept calling me a "rock star" because of the way I handled my labor.  I was always calm and in control.  She was surprised that I was out of bed and moving around when she came in.  I guess they don't get many unmedicated births, even though it was a low-intervention hospital with the lowest Cesarean rate in the area.   He ended up going to the nursery for a couple of hours because he had trouble maintaining his body temperature even with skin-to-skin contact, but he was completely healthy.  He was better able to maintain his body temperature and we were home 36 hours after he was born and on to our great adventure.

Today I am nursing a toddler
The in-between matters, but this isn't about the year, it is about a year ago and today, so that is what I will observe.

My little boy's first birthday is today.  Instead of a helpless itty bitty baby, I now have an independent-minded tiny tot who asks for milk, and eagerly crawls to me to get it.  Our cuddle time is better than ever, since milk time is the only time he wants to sit still.  Rowan is busy exploring the world, but always comes crawling back to me when he needs a little milk.  He isn't walking yet, but he makes up for that by being a very early talker.  He started asking for "nana" at 8 months, and now he asks for "meh".  His first three words were "mama", "dada", and "kitty", and now he has added book baby, yeah, hi, up, crackers, done, more, stinky, poopy, Loki, Rhappy (sometimes called Pawpaw by him... her full name is Rhapsody), play, my, and done.  He is extremely animated and only falls asleep on accident.  He is observant and doesn't want to miss anything.  I get comments from strangers all the time on how smart they think he looks.  There just seems to be some light in those gray-brown eyes (used to be blue, but not anymore).

We're halfway to my vague goal of two years for breastfeeding.  The dynamic of our nursing sessions has changed considerably, even just in the last month.  He's faster now because he wants to get back to playing.  It is a huge change from the 45 minute marathons of even 3 months ago.  Our positioning has become acrobatic as he first learned to hold his head up, then sit, then crawl, and now stand.  The teeth weren't even a challenge after the initial problems I had with severe engorgement that lasted for over two weeks and Reynaud's phenomenon vasospasms.  He's got 8 teeth now and the points of a couple molars are starting to make an appearance.  He only nips when he's falling asleep, and only once did he nip hard enough to draw blood.

We've dealt with RSV/bronchiolitis (and a 4 day hospitalization), coxsackievirus, and gastroenteritis, but Rowan made it through his first year without an ear infection, diaper rash, or food allergy.  The last one was a huge concern for us, since DH and I both have food allergies, mine multiple and severe.  Rowan is vegan and loves to eat beans, tofu, leafy greens, tempeh, and mushrooms.  He chowed down on a pineapple cupcake at his birthday party, and followed it up with a few minutes of mommy milk before he went back to being overwhelmed by wrapping paper, sparkles, bows, and too many toys.

All the nursing pain I went through at the beginning was worth it just for this moment.  Rowan sprawled on my lap, napping off his party, a drop of milk still on his chin.  He is worth the hours and hours I spent pumping at work before I left my job.  He is healthy and intelligent and fantastic.  We are heading into unknown territory with toddler nursing, but I decided a while ago that I absolutely do not care if the ignorant criticize my parenting style.  I look down on my lap and see not an infant, but a little boy who still has a lot of growing to do, a little boy whose future is still forming, and I am only writing the prologue. 

Synesthesia 2

 Just a little bit more on my auditory-tactile synesthesia.  It came up on a message board recently, so I'm mostly just doing a copy-paste and adding some more detail.

I can't remember not feeling sound, and I used to think it was normal until I was in high school and wrote some descriptive poetry that the rest of the class thought was absolutely bizarre.  I had childhood epilepsy, which my neurologists think probably triggered the sensory crossing.  There are some sounds I avoid because they are physically painful for me.  The absolute worst are waterfalls.  We went to Niagra when I was a kid and it was like a full-body migraine.  There are some people I avoid talking to because their voices are like scratches, slaps, or cheesegraters destroying my face.  Words like 'reticulate' and 'purse' are an insult to my nerves.  

Synesthesia does have its upsides.  Some sounds are silky, cottony, or warm.  I have near-perfect pitch because I can feel it when an instrument or voice is out of tune.  I'm a classical percussionist.  Playing my instruments can be a touchless massage.  Piano and harp illicit a similar response  Cellos and basses are wet, like swimming, but violins itch if they start to go up into a more strident range. Plucked strings are a totally different feeling, a tickling tap that travels around my body. Steel guitars are spiders walking over my arms and legs.  Trumpets and piccolos/flutes can leave me with spinal headaches.  I would rather be in the band then listen to one.  Most recorded music doesn't bother me.  Rock concerts are quite a sensory overload, but in a good way.  I usually come away from them refreshed and euphoric.

I have played clarinet on and off since I was seven because we had one in the house.  The sound is hollow, a breath against my skin. Saxophones have a somewhat wet quality, which varies depending on the register. It's actually a tingly, refreshing feeling, like putting a touch of Vick's Vapor Rub on my chest and standing by a humidifier. The lower the range, the warmer it feels, and when it gets toward the soprano sax range, it gets icy, like the feeling you get when you suck on a mint and then take a swig of cold water.  Trombones, baritones, and tubas are a thud in my chest.  Cymbals are a full-body vibration, not much different from sitting by the engine on a small plane.  Oboes and Bassoons are like being breathed on and pinched at the same time.