Fourth of July

The day was great. I spent the day doing nothing and I read Tova Mirvis' The Ladies' Auxilary, which is by far one of the best books I've read all year (much better than the last five or six, at least). It's about an Orthodox Jewish community in Memphis that gets completely shook up when a young widow and her daughter move into town. It addresses issues of tradition versus change, finding meaning in law versus observance for observance's sake, small town versus large city, belonging versus being an outsider, and more. I think the main reason I liked it so much (besides that the topic was interesting) was that the book is written in third person plural. The narrator is "we, the women of the Memphis community" and so the very structure itself leads to a new way to explore communal expectations and norms. I thought it was very original.

But aside from my book review - the 4th here is celebrated with pomp and grandeur! People are more patriotic in the Midwest than in CA by far. We went over to our neighbor's for dinner and a BBQ. Dave and Elbie (they're about our age) had all the burger fixings, and we brought corn on the cob and dessert. But it rained! Almost ALL day. I still don't understand this state. So we huddled next to the grill, then as soon as everything was done we raced upstairs to eat. It stopped raining and turned nice at about 9pm, so we moved into our backyard and then set off what had to be half the fireworks sold in Ohio. (Jonathan had bought a whole box, and Dave and Elbie's downstairs neighbor Steve came over too with even more.) We freaked the cats out, I could hear them meowing from inside. But it was really fun! There were smoke ones, ones with color, ones that made loud popping noises... you name it, Kroger sells it. We had all been thinking of going to see the fireworks in the local park (and Jessica and Michael would maybe have joined us) but we pooped out. Instead we just sat around talking the rest of the night.

As far as pregnancy goes... it's definitely getting harder to bend down. Sleeping is also more difficult as Wiggly has apparently decided that whenever I'm nice and relaxed is a fabulous time to kick and do somersaults. He wakes me up sometimes! The best was when he woke up Jonathan: I was spooning behind him, the baby gave a hard kick, and Jonathan muttered half-asleep, "I felt THAT!"

We decided not to take a childbirth class (like Lamaze or Bradley) because our midwife is giving us so much good information, and I'm doing most of the research on my own anyway. I just started a book from Holly, A Holistic Guide to Pregnancy and Childbirth by Deepak Chopra, which I find fascinating, and I'm also partway through Hypnobirthing: The Mongan Method, about releasing fear and pain through self-hypnosis. Ida May's Guide to Natural Childbirth is on its way from amazon.com and should get here next week.

Jonathan is greatly enjoying every errand that involves driving. He even completely cleaned out the garage so two cars now fit. Oh, and other big news! My sister may come to live with us in spring. She's out of the army now and wants to move to New York, but realizes she's a bit short on cash to go straight there. So if it works out, she may stay with us for a few months from February on. I'll keep you updated.