Meet Jack!

It's been almost a month since our little dude joined us, and since the holidays happened right after he arrived and tons of family and friends were in town visiting (not to mention postpartum healing and getting used to newborn life), I haven't had the energy to post an announcement here until now!

I haven't written out his birth story yet, and I'll probably share that eventually, though nothing crazy happened so it's not the most thrilling of birth stories.  For the best birth stories, I will direct you to Indiana Adams who has the best and funniest birth stories of all time and makes us all look bad in the birth stories realm.  Thanks a lot, Indiana.  I jest.  Indiana is hilarious and her birth stories really are the best.  Enough about Indiana, though, this post is about Jack!

Jack Polaris Morrow made his entrance on the morning of December 18th after a pretty quick and relatively easy labor.  He was about a week past his due date, which I thought was going to be the case.  He was always so chill and cozy in the womb, I figured he would want to hang out in there as long as possible.  I tried many a thing to get him to shimmy out.  We went to a hockey game.  We sang karaoke.  We did zumba.  We had a full moon (a supermoon, no less!).  Eventually after a couple membrane sweeps and some castor oil (holy shit, that stuff is no joke.  Talk. About. Cleansed.) I went into labor.  It took some convincing for him to make his way out and I don't blame him, it's cold out here!

Dusty and him are already best buds and if he ever complains that his birthday is too close to Christmas I will take him to a Zumba class and show him how hard I tried to get him to come out sooner.  And if he's still not convinced, I'll feed him some castor oil and see how long it takes before he has to run to the bathroom.  

Radio Silence

I haven't written anything here in over a month, I think mostly due to the overwhelming stress and all-consuming nature of this year's presidential election.  My thoughts have been centered around social justice, the future that my kid will grow up in, what I want our lives to look like moving forward, and then the more mundane things like trying to keep our house from looking like a hurricane blew through, finishing up my final wedding of the season, and getting the baby's room done.  

That being said I have a lot of thoughts mulling about below the surface, perhaps not yet ready or ripe for putting into words.  It's a weird transition to go from thinking about things in terms of their impact on me and my life to then thinking about their impact on my child's life.  Or even, thinking about how to raise my kid in a way that can respond to and address our culture healthily and also revolutionarily.  It's a weird place to be in to want to change the world so my kid can grow up in a world better than the one I grew up in, while also wanting to raise them to be agents of further positive change.  To continue the process of change and growth far into the future.  And in a way, raising my kid to be a kind, creative, brave, critical thinking, courageous, compassionate human IS something that I'm doing right now that is changing the world. 

So it begins.

Well folks, it's begun.  I've made my first purchases of baby things, namely: some tiny onesies and a crib.  We finally got the room cleared out that will be the nursery (a word I kind of hate?  So I've been calling it our bebe den).  Now that it's a blank slate, I can finally start making it into the baby's room.  

Some days I still look in the mirror and think this is all some crazy dream and I'll wake up back in Tacoma in our little house, sans bump, shake my head and be like, "whoa, that was some crazy shit," and go about my day.  It's still bizarre to me that we are here in Anchorage, I'm in my 3rd trimester with a child that will come out and be all mine to take care of in 12 weeks.  In a way, I'm glad that it shook everything up.  I know I was getting restless in Tacoma and was Jonesin' for something new.  We had planned on moving into the Brave and living a mobile life, but honestly, it was really difficult to move out of our house and without the push of needing to move to Anchorage, I'm not sure it ever would've actually happened.  It was just such a cozy house, we were so comfortable.  Even though I wanted something new, something different, change, I'm not sure it could've actually happened without something pushing us to make the move the way this pregnancy did.

I don't feel married to Anchorage the way that I thought maybe I would be, moving back to my hometown.  I have a lot of cognitive dissonance about Anchorage.  Growing up here it was the best place ever and I loved it.  I loved coming back for visits over the years I've lived in Washington.  But now living here its sort of pulled back the veil and I'm not quite as in love with it as I was.  It's like how you idealize an ex, then you date someone that matches you way better, and then you meet that old ex again and realize how they really aren't as great as your idealized memories.  I don't know if we'll end up staying here.  Part of me feels like maybe not, maybe this is just an intermediary place.  But I don't know where we'll end up.  I like Alaska, I like the Northwest.  I want to be near family.  Sitka has been in the back of my mind as a potential home.  I like the idea of my kids growing up in a town like that.

But of course, all that is speculation right now and I really don't care to think about it all that much until next year, after the baby comes and we are ready to even begin thinking about what's next for us.

Goodbye

Sunday morning, as I was rustling awake, my grampa slipped quietly away. Just shy of 95, his life was something rare, simple, and beautiful. Born in a tiny Alaskan fishing village on the Bering sea, he mushed dogs hundreds of miles, mined and trapped, and was a commercial fisherman from the days of open sailboats through till the days of modern powerboats--most of his life. He fell dearly in love with a powerhouse of a lady, and they lived out their days, crafting a home and family, on the shores of Southeast Alaska. He loved deeply and showed it. Every time we parted ways in the past few years, his eyes were dewy with tears, knowing it could be our last embrace. This past May it was. But I got to share the news in person with him and my grandma that they were great grandparents and show him an ultrasound picture of the baby that was growing inside me, his bloodline flowing through me into the future. He so wanted to make it to his 95th birthday and hold my baby, whose birthday is due to be just a few days after his. But I hope that in lieu of that moment, he's sharing that in-between space with my tiny one, the unborn and newly passed on, crossing paths like ships through the ether. He always called me his WeeBit, and I think that little name will find its way to my babe, carrying his loving spirit with it. 

I miss you grampa. Thank you for giving me an adventurous and creative spirit, for your unending love, for your stories, and for this family you created. You will never be forgotten. 

Your WeeBit

Entering the Cocoon

I'll be honest.  Moving to Alaska was not an easy decision and even though we are here now, it still doesn't feel quite "right" in a way.  After going back and forth for months about whether to stay in Tacoma or move up to Alaska, it ultimately made the most sense to move up here, primarily for medical care financial reasons, but leaving Tacoma felt really bad for a lot of other reasons.  

In almost every other decision I've made, I've been the sole person involved.  It's easy that way, because the decision affects me and no one else, so it really simplifies the decision making process and how I feel after making the decision is very straightforward.  This was one decision that really makes me feel like I made the right decision logically, but I know that it affects Dan much more negatively than me.  My job is mobile, Anchorage is my hometown, my family lives here, my medical care is affordable here.  For Dan, he's leaving a place he grew up, all his friends, his job, the house we bought and cared for.  So my confidence that I made the right decision for my medical care and pregnancy/newborn support is twinged with a lot of guilt and heartache surrounding what feels like tearing my husband away from a place he very much loves.  And while I know that it was a decision we made together, I feel a lot of responsibility for causing the move.

And, to be frank, it doesn't feel like a move "up," if you will.  We are living with my parents, which, at 30 years old, isn't #lifegoals, if you know what I mean.  We are living in an apartment above their garage, so we have our own separate living space, but there's still that feeling of, well, failure I suppose, in a way.  Going from being independent homeowners to moving back to the house I lived in growing up, it's not easy.  

I want to feel independent and grown up.  I know that this time is in many ways a cocoon for me, and maybe both of us.  And I feel so so so grateful to have a family that can provide a cocoon for us as we make this transition to parenthood.  I'm trying to choose to be positive and seeing this time as a true cocoon time, where we will inevitably emerge stronger that we were before, more independent, and more equipped and able to be the best parents we can, in a financial situation that allows us to move "up."  Ideally a cocoon isn't somewhere to stay forever, and it's also not a place where you revert back to your caterpillar self.  I'm trying to keep that in mind as we enter this somewhat uncomfortable space of being cocooned.  I imagine a caterpillar feels a bit uncomfortable, going from being able to scrunch around freely to being all wrapped up and stuck in a cocoon for who knows how long.  And not knowing what he'll look like, what life will be like when he emerges.  I feel that way very much.  The uncomfortability of not knowing what life will look like as a parent, how we'll cope with it, how I'll be able to be a businesswoman, wife, and mom all at once (even though I know it's more than possible based on how many amazing ladies I see doing it).  

People's lives on the internet can seem all insta-perfect and wonderful, but that's never the whole story.  While I feel a plethora of mixed emotions about moving, pregnancy, parenthood, and more, I'm doing my best to focus my attention on staying positive and having a great attitude through all the change that we're dealing with, because really it's one of the few things I do have control over.  Doing my best to take this in stride and take each day as it comes.