Missing

I think, because it's a gloomy, depressing day, that it just calls for some sort of melancholy/reflective/for-my-own-personal-introspectiveness blog post. I just read so many blogs that are *happy* *happy* *happy* and let's face it folks, the highlight of my day is going to be that Mountain Dew I pour for myself in about an hour . . . So why not take a few minutes to ruminate?

In the past year my life has done what seems like a complete 180! Not in every single aspect, but in most. I think about it a lot. Just about what a huge change everything has been. And how sometimes it is so hard, and sometimes it is so wonderful.

There are things I miss. I miss getting to sleep until whenever I want, when I stayed up late the night before. I miss getting to go where I wanted, when I wanted. I miss having time to clean my house often. I miss playing the piano. The real piano, not the digital one I play now during nap time. I miss my job at American Eagle. I miss getting sleep during travel. I miss shopping for myself. I miss actually watching the matches at tournaments. (whoa- never thought I'd say that!) I miss planning date nights for whenever we wanted. I miss knowing we could go up to Bogus at a moment's notice, if we wanted. I miss keeping the doors open. I miss having time to read my own books. I miss doing what I want, when I want to.

That being said, the bigger picture is this: I don't miss spending many days and nights agonizing over why we hadn't been blessed with children. I don't miss crying when I drove home from visiting friends who had babies. I don't miss hating the fact that I could get 20 errands and a workout done all before 2:00 because well, I was alone all day. I don't miss reading book after book about infertility and thinking maybe I had missed something. I don't miss cringing at the question "when are you going to start having kids?" I don't miss feeling like the odd one without a kid whenever I was around people my age. I don't miss the calls from the fertility clinic to say "sorry, but you're not pregnant." I don't miss spending countless hours filling out adoption paperwork, all the while wondering if anything would ever work out.

And if it weren't for what I have in my life now, basically, it would be empty. Not completely empty, because I have great friends and a wonderful family, especially my husband. I guess what I'm saying is that even with all the things I sometimes feel like I miss, my life now is so much better. I'm not saying that it's all roses, heck to the no. And even after all those years of hoping and waiting to be a mother, I definitely have my moments of just wanting a little time to myself. But there are things in my life that I can't help but smile about.

Like the fact that I clean up our living room and kitchen floor at least 3 times a day. And that if I leave the piano room door open I will soon hear little notes being played with glee, followed by the sound of ripping sheet music. And that whenever I get into the car it is always on a classical music station. And that I have often sung so many verses of Old McDonald I feel like I'm losing my voice. And that now, instead of even stopping to look at the women's side of the store, I go straight to the baby clothes. And that my sink seems empty if there aren't 4 or 5 dirty bottles in it. And that literally, all the last 50 pictures on my phone are of one person. And that I know every word to the Sesame Street theme song. And that I have about 20 board books memorized, cover to cover. And that I have lost count of the number of times I have rinsed poop off clothes. And that I get dressed expecting to get spit up on, pooped on, peed on, or have food flung on me. And mostly, the fact that it seems just a little too quiet when I get home from dropping her off at the babysitter's.

Basically, these are all the things that I didn't know I would miss, but were missing before.