As we enter the last full week of the term, preparing to
wrap up this leg of our MBA journey and settle into full-on baby #2 prep mode,
and as I enter the 27th week of pregnancy, I am struck by the concept of change. Standing at the backdoor, I see the sod we planted last season ready
for its first spring mow. The hellebore is perky and full with its beautiful
white bell shaped flowers. The hydrangeas are budding and need a trim. The
bleeding hearts have sprouted and are poised to take over the box they share
with the autumn fern. Jonathan’s Grandma’s peony is stretching its bright pink
stalks… I hope it blooms this year! The first camellia has opened and the
others are full and ready! Not only does this mark a lot of yard work for our
to-do list, it also marks the changing of winter into spring and reminds me that
life is constant change.
Obviously change has always been a part of my life… our
recent wedding anniversary reminded me of that. 15 years ago, after three years
of being best friends, Jonathan and I decided to be more. We held hands, kissed, hung out in the
stairway in high school, laid in the field watching the clouds during lunch, and
took the bus everywhere together. Then we prepared for our long distance year
as I packed two suitcases, boarded my first solo flight, and headed off to
college some 2,500 miles away. That was a time of great change… and we have
changed so much since then. But college was five years (guilty overachiever
here who just had to double major and nearly double minor). Though it was
marked with change (classes changed every semester, we started new jobs at the
Oberlin Computing Center, lived in our own apartment for the last two years, and adopted Podi)… it
took place at a slower rate and we were in a groove. Now our classes wrap up
every 10 weeks, life with G is different monthly… sometimes nightly depending
on his growth and the sickies that seem to frequent our house now, and our time
with each other gets more and more limited.
This time last year, a typical weekday included setting the
alarm for a full 2.5 hours before we had to leave the house for work. We’d get ready
as quickly as possible before getting G up, nursing him for 30 minutes, getting
him dressed and ready for daycare, gathering up our work stuff his daycare
stuff and my pumping supplies, before getting loaded up into the car so we
could get him settled at daycare before I walked the three blocks to my office
(lugging the diaper bag, my pump and supplies, and my lunch). By the time I got
to the office I felt like I had already completed a full work day. Of course,
there was still an entire work day to complete.
I called my students, talked with the client, planned pipeline meetings,
managed my two coaches, and desperately tried to fit in two pumping sessions…
only to find that my supply was getting quite low. At 5:15 I’d gather up my
stuff again and hurry over to daycare to greet my little guy! We’d hurry home, get him fed, and nursed again so he could go to bed. Then I’d be greeted by
a sink full of pumping supplies and bottles to wash, dinner to make and eat, and
the next day to get ready for. It was chaotic and stressful… and is now no longer our
routine.
I traded the full-time job, with a regular schedule, for an
unpredictable schedule, full with plenty of to-dos but no set time to get any of
them done, and more time with my sweet little guy…. We no longer have a sink
full of nursing supplies to wash in the evening, but we still rush to get G fed
and off to bed at his regular bedtime of 7pm so we can make dinner and cram in as
much school work as we can before we find ourselves falling asleep in our
books. The weeks are just as long and require us to cram as much school work,
to-do’s, and freelance work (did I mention I still need to make some money?)
into our evenings and weekends as possible. It’s interesting to think about all
of this on the cusp of Ezra being born. We’ll enter back into the cycle we
started with G, but like all things it will be changed. We won’t be able to
focus solely on the new babe like we did with G (much to Podi and Meko’s
dismay). Maybe the thing that doesn’t change here is our need to juggle… just
what we juggle changes. This time juggling the new babe (and new babe diapers
and nursing) with the needs of a two year old who can run and climb and assert
his will like nobody’s business. Taking a moment to sit back and reflect…. All
I can say is wow! The Sarah and Jonathan who decided to be more than friends
that night watching Millenium had no idea how crazy, special, full, amazing,
and constantly changing their future would be!
As we enter the last full week of the term, preparing to
wrap up this leg of our MBA journey and settle into full-on baby #2 prep mode,
and as I enter the 27th week of pregnancy, I am struck by the concept of change. Standing at the backdoor, I see the sod we planted last season ready
for its first spring mow. The hellebore is perky and full with its beautiful
white bell shaped flowers. The hydrangeas are budding and need a trim. The
bleeding hearts have sprouted and are poised to take over the box they share
with the autumn fern. Jonathan’s Grandma’s peony is stretching its bright pink
stalks… I hope it blooms this year! The first camellia has opened and the
others are full and ready! Not only does this mark a lot of yard work for our
to-do list, it also marks the changing of winter into spring and reminds me that
life is constant change. 
