Bouncing

There are four bouncy seats in my living room right now. Well, I think a few of them vibrate too and play music, and it is possible one of them also does the dishes. I'm not sure. But there they are, all lined up in the living room, waiting to be put into action.

Today was an important day in our household: it was the day we began collecting stuff. So far we've been too frightened of invoking the wrath of the VooDoo Gods, but today, egged on by my sister-in-law irrepressibly sending me e-mails about local baby sales, we decided to stick our toes into the world of baby stuff. And wound up in up to our necks.

I shouldn't say we. I stayed home in bed, fielding phone calls from my frantic husband (the one who came home with four bouncy seats) about whether a dresser could double as a changing table (yes) or whether a plush recliner would do instead of a glider (no).

And even though I was the one who sent him, and begged my mother and my sister-in-law to go along with him to keep him from freaking out, I found myself having a strange reaction to the whole day.

My sense of malaise was only heightened when he came home from the sale so invigorated by having broken the stuff barrier that he decided to, with the help of my mother-in-law, move all the furniture out of my office and create an empty space to start the nursery. As he happily moved desks and filing cabinets and printers, calling out about his progress, I lay in my bed and sobbed.

I had no idea I was going to feel this way, but I guess I had always imagined that I would be part of this process. That I would be the one proudly walking the aisles of the mommy group sale, sporting my big belly, accepting congratulations and exchanging phone numbers with other new Moms. That I would be there to ensure that, if we were going to take home four bouncy seats, that at least one of them had some pink in it. That I would be the one supervising the clearing of the space.

I lay there in my bed, bouncing between overwhelm that we were actually doing any of this preparation at all and despair at being entirely outside the process. I wish I could say that I suddenly understood how Bruno felt about not carrying the pregnancy inside his own body, but that parallel only occurred to me now as I write this post and remains an intellectual idea, not a heart felt insight. No, instead I lay there and had a big old pity party, pitying myself for having to lie in bed, pitying myself for all the experiences and innocent joy I've lost. And not remembering at all how lucky I am to still be lying in bed carrying two twin girls into safer and safer waters every day.

Now, at the end of the day, my bouncing has reached its limit and I am returning to sanity. I love looking at the living room line-up my husband brought home because they represent his belief that we will be bringing little beings, with their own personal tastes in bouncing and vibrating, home from the hospital. I love the fact that a clean slate of a room now exists in our house. I have been full-on bitten by the stuff bug, and look forward to hours of pointing and clicking at frivolous pink things to fill the space, to fill the hours, until I can welcome my daughters into our home. And I am resolved, once again, to letting go of all the things I need to let go of in order to make that happen.