Stuck Inside on a Beautiful Day.

It is one of the most beautiful days I've seen in what feels like years here in Middle Tennessee. As luck would have it I'm having another stricture dilation tomorrow morning, and that means I'm doing the prep today. I'm not allowed to eat, and in about an hour I have to begin the vile task of drinking a gallon of salty, murky, lemon-flavored laxative. Jealous?
Adelyn's still a little sensitive from her two month shots. At least I feel like she is--she fusses for a few minutes when something brushes against her upper thighs, where they injected her, and she doesn't seem to want to nap for more than ten minutes at a time. A walk would probably cheer her up, but I genuinely don't have the energy.
The least I can do is leave the back door open to let the dogs watch other dogs on their walks. And nothing's cuter than watching Adelyn's eyes open wide as a breeze hits her face.

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Louie.

People told me having a child would make me realize just how un-childlike my dogs really are. Because you know how people like me--people who love their dogs just a little too much--are, who say things like "my dogs are my children" or who search Ebay for a "I'm the big brother" T-shirt for a six-pound poodle.

When I went to the hospital to have Adelyn, I didn't know I was coming back with a baby. I thought I was just going to the doctor and that we'd be home in an hour, back to dote on Louie and Sampson with our usual focus. Instead, my dad had to come home and rescue them ten hours later. Louie then spent the next four days at my parents' house, playing with his uncles Charley and Elmo (my parents' dogs). Yes, I really am one of those people.

Jason's parents kept Sampson, his chihuahua, and brought him over two days after we got back. I wasn't worried about Sampson. Even though he can be incredibly needy, he hasn't spent his life being babied quite like Louie has. He's much more content on his own, shivering under a blanket. (Chihuahuas never stop shivering.) He came into our apartment, walked over to Adelyn, who was lying in Jason's lap, sniffed her foot, and carried on with his life. Every now and then when Adelyn's crying especially hard I'll catch Sampson giving me a "are you gonna do something about that?" look, but for the most part he's unperturbed.

Now Louie. Louie, unlike Sampson, sleeps with me like a teddy bear at night. He's accustomed to being loved on constantly, and he knows when the attention isn't up to par.

My parents brought him over to meet Adelyn when my sister was in town--for the first time on a visit not to get her Louie-fix. We're a whole family of those people, people who take off work and fly in because they miss their family's dogs.

And Louie ran into the apartment in a frenzy. He ran right up to Adelyn, asleep in her bouncer on the floor, and jumped on in with her, frantically kissing her six-day old face. I had to scold him for his tenacity, the first in what would become many scoldings for getting too excited around Adelyn. And then I spent the next hour trying to comfort him. Every time she moved, even just a finger, Louie pounced in her direction. Not for any reason other than curiosity and interest, thank God, but each time he jumped up to sniff her, the bouncer would start bobbling like crazy. At this point I was so tired and overwhelmed that I just didn't have it in me to take care of two needy babies. Louie had to go back home with my parents.

The first few nights we had him home for good, he sat at the edge of our bed, staring at her asleep in her bassinet. I'd have to pick him up and physically hold him down near my pillow for him to fall asleep. He couldn't get over his fascination, even for long enough to take a nap.

Breastfeeding her was the biggest challenge with him. Louie would always sit on the other couch, just staring at us, a look on his face I can only describe as utter disappointment. He spent the next week or two with that look on his face. His poor little dog-life had completely changed over night, and there was nothing we really could've done to prepare him for it.

It's gotten a little better now, I think. Louie even has his protective moments, where a new person will reach toward Adelyn and I can see his body tense up, at the ready if they dared try anything fishy. But for the most part he's adjusted. He's back sleeping on my pillow, and he only glances in Adelyn's direction if she starts crying. Or if she grunts really loud.

As much as I love Louie, things have changed. There was nothing I could do about that. He was my first baby, the first creature I was ever responsible for. And I think he knows that this new being in our house is just different. He knows--he knew the second he walked into our post-Adelyn apartment--that she comes first.

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Like father, like son.

Jason just started playing rhythm guitar with a band, for a country singer named Ryan Weber. I've always known Jason was a talented guitarist, and not the kind who drills it into your head on the first date but who slowly, over time, lets the secret out. I realized a long time ago that I was dating the kind of person who is magically amazing at everything he does, which is why he was a sponsored skateboarder as a teenager and can play the guitar lick of any song immediately after hearing it, or sit down at the electronic drum set we just bought so I could maybe fulfill my lifelong dream of becoming a drummer and start tapping away instantly like someone who's played the drums all his life, meanwhile I've been watching Youtube videos daily on how to master Seven Nation Army and still can barely keep a steady beat with the base pedal. It can be frustrating for a super-competitive, wanna-be-amazing-at-everything person like me who often falls short.

But anyway, the band is about to start a local tour (we're going to Memphis on Sunday, and I get to stay in an actual hotel... yay!), so he's been playing every night.

I don't blame Louie. I'd crawl in the cushy red velvet Les Paul case with my chewy toy, too, if I wouldn't look like a psycho doing it.

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The things that change when your life takes an unexpected turn.

Morgan, Jasmine, Me, Elise, and Erin (not pictured members of the pack--Meagan and Crystal, who couldn't make it to New York City this past summer while I interned at The Village Voice). Morgan lives in Brooklyn now. Jasmine's still in Murfreesboro. I took the leap to New York, then back to Murfreesboro, then to Nashville and now probably back to the godforsaken Boro. Elise lives in upstate New York with her aunt. Erin's still trapped in the throngs of the Boro, but keeps trying to find a way out. Meagan, my oldest friend, lives in LA.

I've spent the last five years trying to defy the odds with those girls.

We've all been friends since high school. Morgan, on the far left, has always been the one I've butted heads with the most, but also, not coincidentally, the one I see eye-to-eye most often and who shares 99% of my passions. We moved to New York together after high school to enroll at the Fashion Institute of Technology. I left. She stayed, and is now a technical designer for a bigwig fashion conglomerate. Jasmine is the youngest, eternally optimistic, carefree, an unfailing romantic. Elise will spend the rest of her life trying to figure out exactly what she wants, and she'll never give up until she finds it, and she'll never stop making you laugh. She always keeps you guessing. Erin, on the far right, is my fiance's sister. I can credit her with not only being one of my oldest friends but the person who introduced me to the love of my life. Crystal, not pictured, is hands down the funniest person I will ever meet. We went two years only talking here and there, and all of the sudden we've picked up where we left off, and are now meeting every Monday for lunch.

Meagan, seen here during her last visit to Middle Tennessee from Los Angeles about five months ago, has been my best friend since 2nd grade. That's about 14 years of friendship.

I am completely and totally aware of how corny it is, but we decided to call each other "husband friend" when we were 17, because there was just no other way to describe how intrinsically connected we were (and still are). And, yes, she's listed in my phone contacts as "Hubs." And, yes, she will remain "Hubs" after I get married. Jason will have to settle for "Jason," or "babe," or "old man," because she had the title first.

I could write a novel about each of those women. They are all unique, and wonderful, and insane, and a mess, and beautiful. And I love them. And each day that passes, I can feel them all drifting away from me a little more.

I don't know a single adult--one who's been through marriage, children, career changes, moves-- that has a tight-knit group of childhood friends that has survived. Sure, those groups exist in fiction, but rarely in reality.

When I called each of them to announce my pregnancy, not one reacted with any sort of tact or grace or composure. Each screamed. Half of them shouted "WE'RE HAVING A BABY!!??" Two of them cried. Meagan has still not told her parents, because we've been friends for so long, telling them, she says, feels like admitting she got knocked up, too.

I've known for a while now that it was all changing. I only see Meagan and Morgan once a year. Even before I got pregnant, I only saw Erin (who lives 30 minutes away and is going to be kind of related by blood to this kid) once every other week. Jasmine, once a month. Crystal, not once in two years, and now once a week, if our work schedules permit.

Elise came to visit last weekend. It was going to be the first time I'd seen her since I left New York last August.

I used to live with this girl. I saw her every morning when I woke up, every night before I went to sleep. I picked up her trash and asked her to do my makeup and let her borrow all my clothes. I listened to whichever boyfriend she had at the time's basso profondo resonate through our adjoining walls. I took her to the emergency room in the middle of the night when her stomach hurt. All I wanted was to see her for a night.

But with the way life is now, that's almost too much to ask.

On Saturday, we all planned to meet for dinner in Nashville around 8. I didn't have to be at work until 3am that day, so I could get a few hours of shut-eye in as long as I got home by 11. I knew I couldn't go with them to all the clubs afterward, because I didn't really want to have to stare my favorite alcoholic drinks in the face and say no, and also because, yeah, I'm pregnant and have to sleep.

The reservation inevitably gets changed to 9:30, because no one is ready yet and Erin has Jasmine's curling iron and has to go bring it to her so she can do her hair and Elise needs a nap, and so on. Fine. It means I won't be able to stay as long, but I'll still get to see my friend.

9:15 rolls around. Jason and I are about to walk out the door of our apartment.

I'm wearing makeup, and I spent more than 5 minutes putting it on. I've curled my hair. I'm wearing an outfit I actually planned and that doesn't include stretchy pants and flip flops. I AM WEARING HEELS. Big ones. I'm excited to have an excuse to feel like my old fashion-obsessed self, my old social self, my old surrounded-by-friends self. I don't even care that, at this point, I have to be at work in six hours and that I have not yet slept. I have a chance to be me again. Not the pregnant version of me, not the sleep-deprived, ponytail-loving zombie I've been playing for the past two months. Sarah Caitlin, she of enviable wardrobe and perky demeanor and wit.

And then my phone rings, and they tell me they haven't yet left Murfreesboro. Twenty minutes pass. They still haven't.

Before it was time for us to leave, Jason and I had been cuddled up on the couch, watching Legally Blonde 2. It is the worst movie I have ever seen.

So, now, my heels immediately stripped from my pounding feet, I sit back down on the couch. This is what my life has become, I think. Watching a movie I just admitted is the worst movie I've ever seen.

They eventually make their way to Nashville. It's 10:30 at that point. The restaurant has stopped serving dinner, and when Jason and I sit down at the table, they all have drinks in their hands and empty glasses in front of them. The smell of alcohol wafts from the table.

I hug Elise. We spend twenty minutes talking and laughing and hugging some more. And then I have to leave. It's midnight. I have to go to bed and wake up in two hours for work. They have to hit the clubs.

Were I not pregnant, I would have been out with them. I would have been a part of the countless drunken inside jokes made that night. I would have been in all the bathroom photo shoots. I would have stumbled into work without any sleep, and I probably would have been just fine.

When we get home, I wash my face, put my hair into a ponytail, and climb back into Jason's T-shirt, the same one I'd been wearing all day. Legally Blonde 2 is playing again. Jason and I get in bed, our dogs snuggle up between our legs, our 2 and a half inch baby dances inside of me and drains every last ounce of energy from my body.

This is now my life. I won't see Elise again until my wedding. I won't see Erin again until we can find a spare hour in our schedules to make the 30 minute drive to each other. I won't see Jasmine again until god knows when, because she's in the throes of a new relationship and I barely hear from her as it is. I won't see Crystal again until I can get my lazy ass off the couch and actually make one of our lunch dates. I won't see Morgan again until she visits in October, for the birth of her sister's third kid. I won't see Meagan again until she's (I hope, I pray) by my side in the hospital while I give birth to this child.

Things have, without a doubt, completely and irrevocably changed.

But lying in bed, Jason is holding my hand. His other hand is on my belly, hoping to feel the slightest indication of life. Louie is licking my toe.

I really can't ask for much more.

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Practicing for baby.

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If you're cute enough, it's hard to be annoying.

For a pregnant woman in the first trimester, smack dab in the middle of ohmygod my pants won't button and all the Zebra Cakes are gone and my boobs hurt so bad I think I just might punch my bra in the face, it's easy to get on my nerves.

If I have the energy to make the bed, don't get in my way and expect me to smile about it.

Unless, of course, you're this guy, whose protest against my making the bed only made my day better and made me forget, for a fleeting moment, that my pants aren't even pretending they might button.

Step one. What are you doing, crazy throw-up lady? I was about to lie there.
Step two. Watching, waiting, plotting the next move for ultimate comfiness.

Step three. Oh, you did that on purpose? Well I'm just gonna mess it up and lie here anyway. K thanks.

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