the pieces of my life

The timer has gone off–we’ve reached full term. The baby is fully baked, and now just resting in the oven. Anyone’s guess on when he’ll decide to make his exit (I was looking for another baking metaphor there, but it hurt my head too much, so just forget it).

First thing I should say here is I’m a big fan of acupuncture. I went for the first time when I was in my early twenties, having tension headaches of a massive sort. I went first to a guy in Chinatown (in New York) who creeped me out because he used the electric variety of acupuncture (where the needles are hooked up to something that sends a tiny electrical current into them). I’m sure it’s a perfectly valid form of acupuncture, but the whole thing reeked too much of shock therapy for me, so I quickly left him. However, I found another acupuncturist who used a more traditional needle method, and he worked wonders for me. My headaches went poof! He showed me some herbs to take to tame the headaches should they come back, and I left raving about the wonders of acupuncture. I tried acupuncture again in Seattle, and for the life of me I can’t remember what for (as those were my Amazon days, it was most likely stress), but I didn’t stick with it (and I can’t remember if it’s because I moved to Boston or because the appointments were more stressful to get to than whatever it was that was ailing me). But I’m still a huge fan. In fact, my cousin in Miami studied acupuncture, and frequently when I’ve been home, I’ve asked him to stick needles in me (that’s just the kind of person I am).

So, last night was attempt-to-turn-the-baby acupuncture. Actually, what it was was mostly moxibustion, in which the acupuncturist puts these tiny pieces of herbs on my toes and burns them with incense (no, really! It’s a real thing!). (Betsy described it best to me in an e-mail: the moxa makes it “smell like a Dead show in the office.”) The acupuncturist was a really nice woman with that low, soothing new agey kind of voice. For those who haven’t been to acupuncture, it’s a little like going to a psychic. She’ll touch parts of your body and make these absolutely true statements. “This is tender for you right here.” Yep. “You really crave sweets. Always have.” Bingo! The first thing she did (after checking me out) was a bit of the pokey poke with a gold needle on my belly. It wasn’t the traditional acupuncture I’m used to in which needles are placed in my body and left there for ten or fifteen minutes. This was just a light pricking with a single needle that was not pushed in very far and didn’t remain in me. It doesn’t have that cool electrical sensation of the other kind of acupuncture, but that was sort of welcome as I’m a little paranoid about the treatment/pregnancy thing. Then she did the moxa. Apparently, despite all evidence to the contrary, I’m really an insensitive person. “Do you feel that?” she’d say, holding a lit stick to my toe. “Nope!” I’d respond. I’m not sure what she was doing as I was laying down and their was the huge hill of my belly blocking my view, but she kept doing something and said, “Let me know when you do feel it.” After a while I’d feel a tiny burning sensation and say, “There it is!” Apparently, my channels are quiet blocked and it’s preventing the energy from going through my legs. Anyway, I’m not sure if this thing worked–the baby hasn’t yet turned. He’s been really squirmy last night and today, but then he’s often really squirmy, so I can’t tell if it’s just coincidence or a direct result. I made another appointment for next week in case he remains stubbornly breech. We’ll see!

There really are two types of people in this world: card people and non-card people. I come from a diehard tribe of the latter. Cards in my family were only acceptable if they were handmade or really weird. Adam’s people are the former. They don’t just send cards, they send cards in bulk. We receive not just the birthday variety (which I understand and try to do myself to my friends when I can remember–it’s hard to convert to cardom when you’ve been raised an acardeist), but the Passover, Halloween, Mother’s Day for the Mom-to-Be, anniversary, and just about everything else variety. It creates sticky situations as I often have to ask Adam, “Are we expected to send a card for that?” And, yes, it is expected. For example, we sent out a Hanukkah card/gift that arrived on the second day of Hanukkah. But the lecture about not being thoughtful came on the first day of Hanukkah (it was rescinded immediately the second day).

What am I getting at? I’m getting at the “Oh shit” feeling that struck this morning when Adam called and said, “You didn’t do your job.” Huh? “You forgot to remind me that it’s my mother’s birthday today.” Let’s count in how many places that sentence is simply wrong. On second thought, let’s keep marital harmony and not count the ways. If this were my family, a quick trip to an Amazon wish list and a simple phone call of “Happy Birthday, your present is going to be late,” would suffice. But this isn’t my family. So instead of his gourmet meal and walk around the swan pond during lunch, Adam will be scurrying off to buy and deliver a gift (this is probably the one time he’s grateful he works in New Hampshire). And I can be grateful that for all the flaws my family has (yes, Peter, you people have flaws!), at least we’re not card people.

Is anyone else addicted to Salon‘s Match Made in Heaven, Match Made in Hell column? It’s the best part of Wednesday and almost as good as reality TV.