… I meant to leave as a link — in case all you are desperate for some blog-reading while I’m on hiatus — to Dr. French Fry, written by a witty, eloquent medical student (wonder who that could be?) I particularly direct your attention to the post on the wonders of Pedialyte, whose elixir-like effect I was first introduced to by my friend Melissa, while on a ski vacation in Steamboat. On the way home from a bar one night, she made us detour to the drug store to buy Pedialyte so we would be ready to hit the mountain early the next morning. I dismissed it as a strange remnant from her ski-bum days, but I dutifully drank it.  When I woke up the next morning feeling fine, I attributed my clarity to the fact that I just hadn’t probably drank all that much to begin with (doubtful).

However, I re-remembered her Pedialyte pit-stop before a recent bachelorette weekend. And now I can say with all surety: it’s truly a miracle worker. Between Dr. French Fry’s post –even though she mocks us “normal people” for liking to talk about it so much — and last fall’s Times article on how and when athletes use it, Pedialyte seems to be making a comeback, something all you bar-exam takers should take note of as you drink your little faces off the first week in August.

Someone likes her new bedtime routine. She looks like a little girl…

My car was supposed to be inspected in June.  Today is July 1, and the Boston Transportation Department had already slapped a fluorescent orange ticket (oh the sinking feeling when you see that obnoxious orange on your windshield from down the block…) on my car by 7:30 a.m.  No mercy or leeway in this town!  Already feeling pressed for time today, it sent me into a tailspin.  Clearly, I now also had to find the time to get my car inspected, and after a tearful phone call to Tim (yes, really), I decided that I’d go to BarBri school out at BC so that I could drive to one of the garages in Newton Circle and hopefully get the inspection done before class.  That part worked out okay, and by 9:15 I was pulling up to school.  Then the phone rang.  It was Janet, and she and the Little Bug were locked out because the lock to our apartment door was broken.  It wasn’t that she didn’t have the key — after our last lock-out fiasco we stashed extras all over the place.  This time, the key was moving around in circles in the lock but the lock wouldn’t catch.  So I turned around and drove all the way back into the city.  It was way past the baby’s nap time by that point, so after booting up my laptop to go into my online bank account to look at the scanned checks to see the name of the locksmith I called last time (ingenious of me!), the locksmith was again on his way.  I sent Janet to CVS to buy diapers for our wait, and then went down to our neighbors, who have a six-year-old, to procure a sippy cup, crackers, and some books and toys.  Then we all settled into the stifling foyer to await the locksmith, who finally arrived an hour later.

Janet gave the baby a cool bath (she was red and sweaty and totally dirty from crawling around the front entranceway by then…) and a bottle, and I supervised the installation of our new lock.  All’s well that ends well.  Now it’s noon, and I’m four hours behind and need to somehow make up this morning’s lecture.

I’m strangely less stressed than I thought I’d be — unlike the stupid parking ticket which had me reeling (because the ticket was the result of my disorganization and inability to deal with life’s little quotidian chores) — there was nothing I could do about this morning’s events:  the lock was broken. 

I know there are women out there who do do it all.  I know them.  Or think I know them.  They go to the grocery store, get the car inspected, go to the gym, cook dinners, buy their babies new shoes, and don’t procrastinate.  I still feel like I can be one of them — I should be one of them — if only I just tried a bit harder.  Weren’t so lazy.  Were more organized.  Maybe beating myself up is just part of my personality — that drive for perfection in some ways contributes to “success” in the way that I define “success.”  But, as we all know, it’s a double-edged sword.  So I’ll keep trying and trying to be that woman, and probably will never succeed, and at some point will either drive myself and everyone else around me crazy or will have the epiphany for which I’ve been searching for the past ten years.  And will let it all go.

View from the deck

My family is a little bit crazy about its annual vacation to Long Beach Island, on the Jersey Shore.  My sister just created this: http://www.beaumont-design.com/shore/2008.html

I spent my first Mother’s Day as a mother frantically finishing my final law school paper, while my own mother and daughter buzzed about in the background.  I have a bit more time to reflect on Father’s Day — a Hallmark holiday of ties and golf clubs and grills, but one I nevertheless find poignant.  I haven’t had a father to celebrate father’s day with for nine years. Father’s Day 1999 was a hot, muggy one in D.C. — I remember the silencing heat as much as anything else.  My sister and I sat in the loudly air-conditioned townhouse watching my dad drift in and out of morphine consciousness.  I actually haven’t thought about that day in years — it was horrible, and it’s difficult for me to write about.  I remember my dad staggering outside to watch the dog (whose name I can’t even remember:  I’m still aghast that he went ahead and got a dog in the first place) race up and down the back alleyway in the stifling heat, as he feebly called out “Good boy!” and wondered aloud if the dog would miss him.  But no one really thought he’d have just two weeks left.

Father’s Day was always forced for me — a time to supposedly celebrate a relationship that was far from easy.  One that mostly made me more unhappy than happy.  I’ve read so many times that, psychologically, a young girl’s most important relationship is with her father, and how true that was for me.  As a small child I idolized my father:  his pitch-perfect baritone, his intelligence, his skinny, bony knees, the scent of cigarette smoke on his starched collars, his jet-black hair. I relished the days I’d take the bus into NYC with him; I would color under his desk on the back side of legal documents and every so often his secretary would take me up to the cafeteria for a Coke. I relished the hot August days on Cape Cod Bay sandbars and the Saturday mornings he’d be home (before going back to the office, natch) to make us pancakes on an electric, plug-in griddle.  I like to remember those days the most.

And this Father’s Day, I will, grounding them with new memories of a father as in love with his little girl as I hope my dad was with me.  A father who crawls around on the living room floor, chasing his chubby, dimpled baby.  A father who gets up every morning wants to be the one to lift his smiling daughter from her crib with a big “Hi Buggy! Hi Angel!”, and then brings her into the bed to snuggle with me before making her breakfast (”Would you like apple-meal today? Or banana-meal?” referring to his special concoction of baby oatmeal and fruit.)  A dad who bundles up his baby and carts her off to “swim lessons” (which actually consist of a bunch of babies and dads, singing “The Wheels on the Bus” in a circle in the B.U. pool) every Saturday for his self-termed “Daddy-daughter day.”  A father who reads to his baby with patience, makes up silly songs, and will look at me seriously over one of our few-and-far between dates a deux at a fancy restaurant and say, “Isn’t she the most beautiful baby in the world?” A father who supports his child’s mother as she juggles her family through school and work. 

Ironically (or perhaps not so much so?), Tim looks at times strikingly and hauntingly like my dad:  the black hair streaked with silver, the crinkley eyes, the dimples.  And watching him with my daughter is a conduit to those really, really good memories of my own father.  For that I am so grateful. 

So, last Saturday night, in 90-degree humidity, I found myself drinking an $8 Bud Light at the Comcast Center, formerly known as the Tweeter Center, but always known as Great Woods to people who are really “from here.”  The last time I was there it was still, in fact, Great Woods, and I drove from the Cape during that crazy summer after freshman year to see a concert that might have been anyone of the following: (a) Phish (b) Dave Matthews (c) Widespread Panic.  It really doesn’t matter which; not surprisingly, I can’t remember the show anyway. 

This time around, Isabella had told her husband she wanted Tim McGraw tickets for her birthday, and he wisely concluded that she might have more fun with someone else, especially since half the fun of going to a Tim McGraw concert is ogling his massive and muscular arms (but as I told Isabella when she said for the fourth time, “Look at his arms!”, it’s his JOB to make 30-something women think he’s sexy.  How else does he sell out stadiums every single summer?) 

I have to admit that I wasn’t really going for the concert itself — I’m too old for concerts, right?  The last one I went to was Super Diamond at the Paradise (does that count?) about four years ago.  Super Diamond, for the uninitiated, is a Neil Diamond cover band with a stealth but cult-like following.  And as fun as it was, I was a bit bored after an hour of sequined pants.   So spending time with Isabella beforehand, sharing some mini-bottles of white wine by a lake/swamp across from the Center’s gates and the mesmerizing people watching inside the gates, was sort of what I went for.  Speaking of people-watching, I almost went out and bought a phone with a camera the next day (i.e., iPhone!) just because I was so bummed I didn’t have one to take stealthy pictures the night before to post here.  Apparently, here’s what you wear to a country music festival in New England during a heat wave: 

Men: Celtics jersey tank-top (if you wear a shirt at all…), cowboy hat, rope or white coral necklace.
Women:  Cowboy hat, jean shorts cut so short that the fabric pockets hang out, bikini top and/or tube top, cowboy boots or platform flip flops.  No matter what your body-type/age/weight. 

I wore white jeans and a black H&M top, and Izzy wore a linen shirt dress, although she did have a cowboy hat.  We were the preppiest people there, until we saw a guy wearing a pink Polo shirt and seersucker shorts with little whales on them.  We weren’t sure if he was trying to be ironic or not.

Anyway, it cooled off, and a crescent moon dropped over the ampitheater.  And, almost as an added surprise, the concert was actually great.  I don’t think Tim McGraw is necessarily the most talented country musician out there — as Iz pointed out, he sort of filled in a gap left by Garth Brooks in the late 1990s.  The Dixie Chicks or even Kenny Chesney are a bit edgier and have a more distinct style.  And lest you laugh that I am opining on country music, I’ll defend myself by saying that for my sixth birthday I asked for and received a Kenny Rogers album (the one with “Coward of the County”).  My parents loved country music and we grew up listening to Kenny Rogers and Tom T. Hall and Waylon Jennings.  I saw the Dixie Chicks perform in a Joey Tomato’s (think Appleby’s) in Dallas in 1990 before Natalie Maines was even the lead singer.  I do like Tim McGraw — but for the reasons everyone likes him:  sappy songs that make you unabashedly tear up (”Live Like You Were Dying”) or fun tailgating songs (”I like it, I love it”).  However, he is a great performer.  He knows he has cut arms and is always holding them out or raising them up.  His black cowboy hat (yes, covering up some bald, as my Tim wanted me to recognize) is always tipped just a bit too low (sexy! mysterious!).  The lighting and video kept the show interesting.  And the crowd was having a blast — a sold out show of Massachusetts rednecks singing every word to every song. 

While I fully admit that I am smack in the middle of Tim McGraw’s target demographic — 30-something mothers psyched for a girls’ night out — it worked!  Isabella — with whom I’ve long shared a love of country music (we saw Garth Brooks live in Central Park on a night in 1996 probably as hot as Saturday) and, of course, music in general — was as big reason for that (standing up for the whole show, “yee-hawing” as only a girl from Rhode Island at a country-music concert can…) as was Tim (and his arms) himself.

If you drip olive oil on your clothes, liberally sprinkle the spot with baby powder and let it sit overnight.  The next morning, just brush it off, and no more oil spot!  I may have read about this little trick at one point in Real Simple or Martha Stewart or some similar life-perfecting magazine, but my sister reminded me of it recently, and it really works!  Hooray!

Hot yoga on a 95+ degree day is maybe not the best idea. 

Mosquitoes will always find me.

Just like these.  To bar review.  Every day.

(This is bar-review related, but it’s not exactly a complaint, so therefore doesn’t count towards my bar review moratorium.)  There is a girl who sits in the row ahead of me at BarBri class who rolls in every day at 9:30 dressed like she’s going clubbing:  halter tops (the room is 60 DEGREES!), tight jeans, and — I’m not kidding — four-inch platform, stiletto, peep-toed, patent heels.  As Kara would say, F- M- heels.  TO BAR REVIEW CLASS.  She has a little cohort of friends (I have no idea where they went to law school.  BU?  Northeastern? Harvard?  Suffolk?)  who also dress way too nice for the occasion:  always heels and “going out” tops and hauling their heavy review materials around in leather Coach- or LV-logo bags.  But her heels, in particular, continue to amaze me.  I find myself looking forward to see what she’s going to rock out in each day.  I’m not making fun of her because she and her friends look great.  It’s just rather unfathomable to me, someone who has officially given up on cute summer clothes, albeit more because of the arctic blasts of air-conditioning than the fact that, in the end, I am spending my mornings in a windowless, basement room for BAR REVIEW.  I now keep a fleece in the car.  And once you are wearing a fleece in June, who cares what else you have on.

Where would you rather spend the next seven weeks? I thought so…

…is what all the bar exam-review people tell you, over and over. That being said, it’s a marathon being run on a 95 degree day and you are so slow that all the water stations have run out of water. And unlike, say, the Maui or the Sonoma Wine Country marathon, it’s in some place you’d never really want to visit, such as Camden.

I’m at least five days behind the Barbri “paced program.”  I haven’t even received my PMBR books in the mail, even though the chipper rep told me that I should be doing 50 of their multiple choice questions a night ON TOP of the Barbri work.  What?  Who has time to do that?  I guess you do if you get up, study, come home, study, and never exercise or eat or talk to anyone.  Or maybe even sleep.  Or are just really, really efficient.  I have done just a couple multiple choice and essay questions, and it takes me far, far too long to outline my class notes from that day.  This is, admittedly, because I am so type-A.  Is everything properly bolded, underlined, italicized, and highlighted where necessary? Even though IT DOESN’T MATTER because, unlike law school, you can’t take the outlines into the exam with you, I don’t feel like I can move through the outlining process without understanding every step. This is not the Barbri way, but I can’t let go…and I’m slipping behind.  That and also the fact that I spend a good deal of time that others are spending studying with the Little Bug.  Which is only proper and of course I want to (especially because she is growing and learning and developing by leaps and bounds every day.  I mean, my child can say, “woof woof woof” when she sees a dog!  Who would have thought?), but it makes me anxious.  And somewhat resentful — not of her, obviously, but of myself and for some strange reason, others who have more time to study than I do.  I got through law school with a baby, surely I can get through the bar?  At least I’m not the poor woman trying to pump milk in the bathroom for her two-month-old in full view of everyone during the 10 minute break, right? (I asked her if there was anything I could do to help, and she snapped at me, and probably rightly so — I guess I wouldn’t want someone talking to me were I in the middle of pumping in a public place…)  And so I go into avoidance mode: I don’t want to talk to anyone for fear that I might learn from them how much more they are doing than I am — even though, in the end, it’s obviously not a competition, and it’s highly likely that I will, in fact, pass.

Here’s my promise to myself and to you, my dozen(s?) of faithful readers: I will make an effort to post every (OK, at least every other) day about something non-bar review related.  If you are only reading this blog, this might keep you coming back despite my sore lack of posts the past few weeks.  If you know me, it might make you want to still be my friend after all this is over…

And…I’m back! My blogging mini-vacation is over, and it’s time to get back to some real, serious posting.  Such as this one, a version of which I have emailed to several pregnant friends, who have encouraged me to post it on my blog in the hopes of, you know, enlightening the masses.  The topic was what to wear after having a baby, and, specifically, “Do I really have to buy a hideous nursing bra?  Do I really have to keep wearing maternity clothes?  Does it matter?”  The answer is maybe, no, yes.  I discovered after some trial and error — as I did with everything pregnancy and baby related — that having a post-baby “uniform” is key, for several reasons.  First, since I was not one of those “I fit into my pre-pregnancy jeans the day I left the hospital!” type of new moms, NOTHING I used to wear fit.  For months.  And some things (mostly tops) may never do so again.  So if you buy yourself a new uniform of sorts, you stop longing for your old clothes.  Second, you have to change your clothes about as often as you change the baby’s.  You will be covered with milk, spit-up, poop, and Starbucks.  And hopefully also a little wine.  So you don’t want to go through the whole “what to put on?” dilemma ten times a day.  Finally, you feel pretty gross for awhile.  Even if you take the baby for a walk or even eventually make it to the gym later in the day, getting up and showering first thing wakes you up and makes you feel like a real person.  Then, you put on your new clothes and you feel pretty good!  Anyway, for what it’s worth, here’s my post-baby uniform (a variation of which I’m still wearing!)

1. Nursing bras are hideous. By all means buy one, but I thought they looked awful under a shirt and are annoying to use.  Also, I didn’t like my stomach showing when I lifted up my shirt to nurse (I bought some of those “nursing tops” that they sell at Gap Maternity and the like, but they were also pretty unflattering, and had supposedly easy to open clasps that never actually stayed clasped.  More on this in a minute.)  Instead, I found these tanks by Glamourmoms: http://www.glamourmom.com/NS_productpage.php?ItemNum=18  These ones with the lace at the bottom are a bit longer than the other ones they sell (I tried them all!), so I like them in particular because I’m not only long-waisted but because it was even more insurance that my stomach would never see the light of day.  I bought several in white and black and wore them under everything.  They are suprisingly supportive (I definitely had a large nursing, um, bosom…), and I liked the way there was just enough spandex to keep everything covered and secure.  The straps were much easier to use than any nursing bra, too.  Some of my friends with less, um, bosom employed the same strategy (tanks, not nursing bras) with just regular old Gap tanks and just pulled them aside.  At first, I sometimes wore a regular nursing bra under these tanks when I was going out somewhere (it wasn’t that hard to unclasp the tank and then the bra underneath), but eventually the nursing bra got tossed. 

2.  OK, so you have your nursing coverage.  But what to do about a top?  The nice thing about the tanks is that even if you are wearing a regular t-shirt, you can be pretty discreet when lifting up the shirt to nurse (i.e., your fleshy stomach doesn’t show!).  But I found a better solution to the whole “nursing top” thing (a marketing gimmick! Which I fell for hook line and sinker, and then tossed the nursing tops about two weeks in because they just scream, “I’m nursing! I’m frumpy!”).  Old Navy makes deep v-neck t-shirts which are great because you just pull the v-neck part down and to the side a bit when feeding.  Moreover, they are (1) cheap and (2) a bit ruched and thus super-flattering.  They are form fitting without being tight — which is just what you need post-baby.  I bought a bunch in white and black — wearing them with the appropriately coordinated Glamourmoms top — and then one or two fun colors.  I bought size L for after the baby, and have since gone back and gotten size M just to wear all the time now because I love them so much.   www.oldnavy.com/browse/product.do?cid=7525&pid=507719&scid=507719002

3.  Pants are a problem.  You can wear your maternity jeans for awhile, but that’s kind of depressing.  You can also wear your black yoga pants, which of course is a great option.  But what if you want to look a bit cuter?  Again, Old Navy has some suprisingly cute and flattering capris (for all of the elastic and draw strings involved) with a low-riding, elastic waist.  http://www.oldnavy.com/browse/category.do?cid=35158  I also bought some Gap jeans two sizes larger that I knew I’d wear only for a (relatively) short while, but it was nice to wear regular jeans (as opposed to maternity). 

So, there you have it:  black and white tanks to go under black and white t’s, to wear with khaki and white capris.  All machine washable!  I’d put one of these combinations on daily with a bright-colored button down cardigan (worn unbuttoned, of course), and then flip flops or cute ballet flats.  (Note: if you have a summer baby, be warned:  your feet do not go back to normal for a few weeks! I was particularly shocked and horrified by this discovery…)  If it’s winter, you can still do this but with maybe a heavier sweater and more reliance on the jeans and nice yoga pants.  But ballet flats can do wonders!  So can a shower and a cute non-diaper-bag-looking diaper bag. 

My whole point is:  it’s nice to prepare yourself with this sort of outfit because it saves you the angst of feeling like you look horrible not only because you’re exhausted, leaking milk, hormonal, etc. etc., but because you can’t fit into either your old clothes and don’t want to wear your huge maternity clothes.  You have some cute things ready to go.  It took me a good five or six months to figure this out, having bought and not worn a variety of nursing tanks, too-big tops (which you don’t really feel all that great in, either…) and pants, etc.  And most important, I think that these clothes are flattering enough while being forgiving that you can enjoy these first few months without being anxious about getting your “old-self” back.