Comal

Keep it to yourself

I'm sick of everybody's fucking opinions. 

Don't tell me how miserable I'm going to be when the baby's born, how I'll miss sleep most of all. Don't crow that I'll look at the childfree with an envious eye. And for God's sake, don't tell me what I can and can't do while pregnant (drink, take anything stronger than Benadryl, et cetera). 

Yesterday a Facebook friend posted the most insulting link on my wall: all the stupid and humiliating things to which new parents must accustom themselves, with a little note: "Better get used to it hun!" She took it down after I not-so-kindly let her know that what she did was fucked up. 

I thought getting married brought out the busybodies. Getting knocked up, however, has proven far worse in that regard. 

I'm on the warpath. Back the fuck off. 

Commandments to Poppy

1) Thou shalt see Jack and Maizie as your brother and sister.
2) Thou shalt laugh early and often.
3) Thou shalt understand the meaning of giving.
4) Thou shalt appreciate, if not love, The Doors, The Cure and The Beatles.
5) Thou shalt be thy own person. We are here to support and love you unconditionally.

Love, Mom.

From NOT THE MADONNA

Identity is a slippery one, tough to wrap your hands around. The question of who are you may seem more easily approached when one is altered – drunk, high, something else – but sober it’s so much more of a bitch. Life conspires to both structure and steal your identity. You can’t allow it. The influences may come from without, but the strength springs from within.

I’m trying to figure out how to say this to Adam without sounding as though I’ve preemptively smoked six doobies. Instead I say: “I’m sorry.”

Ah, the knee-jerk feminist reaction that may be imagined at that one! Why should the woman, as vessel, apologize to the man as invader? Penis as pirate, really; a one-eyed Captain Jack. In any event, I am truly sorry. For once my body has functioned as might be expected, and as it turns out it was the wrong goddamned time for those sorts of uppity tricks.

My mind-body connection malfunctioned. I planned and my uterus laughed.

The most recent Poppy sighting

From NOT THE MADONNA

All my life I’ve considered myself too young to fill-in-the-blank. At 23 I was too young for a full-time job, so I switched to freelancing. Ten years later I was too young to get married, so I stood under the chuppah and told myself that I would make it. Now at 40, I know I’m too young for this baby shit. I wear a backpack, don’t I? I have way more in common with these early twenty-somethings than I do with the women pushing strollers.

That’s another thing I must tell you: The Mommy Mafia scares the crap out of me. These are the women who descend to eat your brain the minute you make the announcement that you’re knocked up. I see them in groups, tight multi-person knots holding little bundles and patting tiny heads. They have been assimilated. They have given themselves over to the Other, and the Other rules their mind and their lives. The Other comes out of your body as a miniature demanding devil and it is all you can do to stop from getting gored by the horns.

A secular prayer

Please, God, whoever or whatever you are, don't let me lose myself. Don't let me succumb to the Mommy Mafia. Don't make me the kind of person who will no longer listen to Eminem at top volume on my headphones. Please say it's okay to smoke pot every so often. Please, please tell me it's going to be okay.