ladynox25

Houston, we have a heartbeat! Estimated due date: March 22.

Joanna pulled one of my old grad school chemistry texts off the shelf (The Organometallic Chemistry of the Transition Metals) and had her daddy read the Introduction to her.

Once upon a time, a young woman sat in a small church in East TX, as nervous as a long-tailed cat in a room full of rocking chairs, waiting to begin an adventure. She never could have predicted where she was going to end up or what she was going to learn along the way. The one thing she did know is that the path she had chosen was the right one; the only one she could choose. And the man she was about to meet was the only person she wanted to walk with.

After five years of walking that path, with choices and consequences, joy and pain commingled, that choice has proven to be eminently correct.

Happy Anniversary, my love. Here's to our next five year mission: to boldly go where we have not gone before, with as much uncertainty and yet as much resolution as we started with, five years ago.

Happy Anniversary. Today and always, let us celebrate where we have been, where we are, and where we are going, together.

Potty training Joanna this weekend. Wish us luck!

The most important family event of the year, of course, was the March 11 earthquake & tsunami, that thankfully spared our loved ones in Yokohama.

Work-wise, I started the year teaching OChem labs at UTTyler. John was teaching Special Ed at GW Carver ES. Around March he got the word that his position would be eliminated due to budget cuts and tendered his resignation. In late April-early May I got the word that my contract would not be renewed. So, at the beginning of June, we were both without work and with a 2 year-old to support. Not good. Immediately we started pounding the electronic pavement, and the first weekend of August I flew to Charleston for a face-to-face interview that turned into a job offer. For a job that started orientation 6 days later!

Three weeks later, I was teaching at Ashley Hall, where Joanna was enrolled, our stuff had finally shown up at our new apartment, and John was about to start teaching Special Ed at North Charleston HS. Talk about a whirlwind! Since then, life has been nothing but busy.

Joanna has grown so much this year, especially developmentally. She is so articulate for a 2 1/2 year-old. Her teachers love her, and vice-versa. She can be exhausting and aggravating, and her tantrums are, well, tantrums, but most of the time she tries to act like a "big girl". I couldn't be prouder of her, especially after the last road trip we went on. We were originally supposed to drive 2 days from Charleston back to TX for Christmas, and then back home. We ended up taking a detour by way of Boston when we heard that John's grandmother's health is fading. So, instead of 4 days on the road, we ended up spending 7!

On that last note, it is pretty evident that Baba will probably not last too much longer, and I am very glad we got a chance to see her, and she got a chance to see Joanna.

My four New Year's Resolutions:

1) Help John through what is probably going to be Baba's last year
2) Stay at AH more than one year, so that I can (finally!) spend a year perfecting a course, rather than running full-pace to catch up
3) Potty train Joanna
4) Try to conceive Baby #2

http://www.truth-out.org/goodbye-all-reflections-gop-operative-who-left-cult/1314907779

Read it.

So, Irene is not actually going to hit us, which is good. She is going to hit people we care about, which is bad. High winds and the risk of flooding have cancelled school, which is good, because it gives me more time to help unpack. School is cancelled, which means Joanna will be underfoot while we're trying to unpack, which is bad.

little hovering body
powder blue and black
busily dancing here and there
above a small green pond
water gurgles, ripples
under the spreading oaks
with their green leaves
and lush crop of young acorns
harmonizing the cicada’s hum
as a cool wind blows
and Pan plays his endless, silent, song

I feel like I just ended a long grueling climb up flights of stairs and stepped onto the rooftop. It's a beautiful view. But now I have to walk over to the edge, stand on my tiptoes, hold my arms out to the sides, and swan-dive off the side. I know there's a net ready to catch me not 1 ft below. But wouldn't you be terrified anyway?

*pulls off dust cover*

*coughs*

Is this thing still working?

Really?

How remarkable.

As soon as the DOS over @ LJ lets me, I'll import all my missing entries since the last.

Just wanted to make sure y'all knew I wasn't dead. Yet.