"What if I have to work at 7 am next term, too? Then what will you do?"
Without having to think of a response, I said, "Start counting down again..."
So, I have this thing for counting down. I've always had it. In the little agendas we used to get in school, I would write a number at the top of each date counting backwards the days left of school: both including and excluding weekends.
When I actaully enjoyed going to school more than not going to school, I would excitedly count the number of days that I had been to school. I got over that fairly quickly and learned that counting down was a little more fun.
Recently, though, the whole counting down thing has become somewhat out of control for both Andrew and I.
For example, off the top of my head I know that I only have 15 days left of work. That doesn't include weekends or the 4th of July.
Even better is the countdown we have on our baby.
We have multiple little gadgets to help us keep track, one of which is featured on this very blog...
We have a few others on our iGoogle homepage:
The last one is the best because it informs us to the day, hour, minute, and second that our baby is due.
With this constant reminder of our due date, I really hope that she's on time...otherwise we'll have to start counting how many days I've gone over my due date, and that simply isn't as much fun, as discussed with counting the days in school verses counting the days left of school.
We also have each week of our calendar marked with how far along we are. We'll be 37 weeks this Sunday and, as Andrew was so keen to point out, only go to church three more times (including this Sunday) until we have a baby. Unfortunately, he pointed this out to my friend Valerie and she, seeing as she had her baby over a week late--and even then he was forced out, pointed out that she might possibly see us on that 4th Sunday without a baby and still very pregnant, just as she was a week after her due date.
Last night, the Wilsons came over and brought us some lemon-poppy seed bread for my birthday. They brought their twins up with them and we were chatting about air conditioning, baby births, and school, when Kim suddenly asked me how old I was.
We had just been talking about babies...and I had just answered the question about quitting my job...so when I opened my mouth, "25" blurted out before I could stop it, or even realize what her question had actually been.
"Wait..." she said, calculating, since she knows she's older than me.
"You're not 25!" said Andrew.
"Oh!" I corrected myself, "I'm only 22...but there are 25 days until our due date."
Everyone seemed to think this was much more accurate information. Everyone, with the exception of Andrew. He turned and looked at me indignantly:
"You're not..." he started.
"I'm 22," I interjected firmly.
"Wait, then I'm..."
"Yes," I interrupted again, "Not going to be 22 for much longer."
Silence fell over all of us as we realized, looking at the squirming (almost) 11-month-old babies, how old we were all getting.
"Well, Kim's birthday is coming up!" I said cheerily.
"Yes," she said, "I am going to be 25!"
"Quarter of a century!" said Taber. Kim shot him a look.
Ahhhh, yes, getting old is so much fun. It gives me a lot of perspective. People I used to think of as old don't seem so old. I don't think of my parents as any older than when I was like 5, so it always shocks me when I have to think of how old they really are (not that they are old, they just aren't in their 30s anymore). And thirty doesn't seem all that old (or far away) anymore. I used to think 30 was old, and thought my parents were old. Now I think 30 is young and don't find my parents that old. Young seems so much younger than when I was young...18? That's hardly any old at all--not even 2 decades yet. So of course, being a mere 22? That makes me pretty young.
Soon we'll have a nothing-year-old in our house. That's either going to make me feel really young or really old. I haven't figured out which yet, so it will probably be a little bit of both. I'll feel old that we actually have a child, but I will feel that I am a very--and pardon my use of one of my most ditested phrases in the whole world--"young and inexperienced" mother.
I wonder if parents ever think they are old enough for anything. I know my friends who are on their second child are like, "Whoa! Two? Me?" so when my mom was on #6 was she also like, "Whoa! Six? Me? I'm too young to have six children!" I should probably ask her, just to know.
Haha. You're SO YOUNG. Sweetie, when you're nearly 31 and still single, without prospects, and certainly without babies, you can start talking about "how very old" you are. And even then, you'd better be careful, cause there will be friends and others who are still 10 years older than you are (OK, 9) who are still single and prospect- and baby-less. As for your countdown... you could only have 10 days left, you know... I was two weeks early. :)
ReplyDeleteWeren't you the baby your mom was trying to get up to Canada to have--and you ended up being born somewhere mid-Montana?
ReplyDeleteHow very unthoughtful of you! 2 weeks early...that's actually not a horrible thought!
And it isn't so much as being "old" as it is realizing that there is no going back to being young anymore. I'm being replaced as the youngest generation--and that's a scary thought.
And, by the way...you will never seem old to me. Didn't I say that 30 simply doesn't seem that old anymore? That is because 30 isn't that old!
:-D Yes, I was the baby that they were trying to have in Canada. To be fair, it might have worked better if they had 1: left with more than two weeks to go. 2: hadn't had a big 90 pound half-grown airedale terrier sitting on my mom's lap all the way to Canada. I turned up in Helena. Thanks to a kind policeman who stopped my dad for speeding (my mom was giving his knee hell through each contraction) and led them to the hospital, or I'd have been born on I-15 and totally ruined my dad's Baracuda...
ReplyDeleteI know. 30 doesn't seem that old to me, either. But it's because I AM it, and no one thinks I am! No one believes I'm older than 25... After this degree is done, though, I'll probably start looking my age. :)