Overdue

This post is dedicated to my dear friend Carolyn who is actually not overdue but very very underdue, having just had her baby, Noah, 8 weeks early. It sounds like he is doing okay so far, as is she, and we are all just holding our breath until we hear more news. To Carolyn, Raven, and Noah, we are thinking of you.

This post is what is overdue. Way, way overdue. I've been traveling the past week, but I'm not sure what my excuse was before that. I think sometimes a week goes by without any events that prompt me to get out the camera and when that happens I feel like I have nothing to blog about on the weekend. And that's not fair, because plenty is going on in Jack's life, even if I forget to record it. I was complaining to my mom while I was away this week that Danny just couldn't tweet enough about Jack to satisfy this poor mommy who was missing her baby on the longest trip she'd ever been away from him. My mom basically told me I deserved it because I hardly ever update his twitter feed and am even worse about the blog, so I am going to try to get him on twitter more often. Because she's right, it only takes like 20 seconds. I think I can manage that most days.

So last weekend, I went to see my old housemates Carolyn and Raven in DC (because I had a conference in Pittsburgh and living in California makes everything on the east coast seem very close together even when it's not, so I made a side trip that I considered to be "on the way").  Noah was still safely inside Carolyn at that point, and we thought he would be until October. I can't believe I missed his arrival by only five days, when I wasn't supposed to be anywhere near it! We walked all over DC, saw many free museums and national monuments, but my favorite parts were things I'd never experienced before in our nation's capitol: natural beauty. They have this canal that apparently goes all the way to Ohio, and as we walked along it,  it suddenly seemed to me like we were in Amsterdam.



And the Potomac! Who knew!

So pretty. I was there during the one reprieve from some of the worst heat-waves they've ever had, apparently, so I was thankful to have missed it. After a wonderful visit with them that made me curse the size of our country that makes all these people I love have so far away from me, I headed off to the ecology conference I attend every year, which Jack had joined me for last year in Albuquerque, but which I decided I might have an easier time going solo at this year. Of course I regretted my decision every day when there was no Jack to come home to at the end of it, but Danny indulged me with nightly rendezvous on the webcam, which was a little better on my aching heart than just missing him completely.

Jack had a wonderful time in my absence, however, because he got to trade a mommy for a grandma AND a granddad, which was not really too bad a deal, he decided. Bill and Melissa came to take care of him while Danny was at work during the day so we didn't have to pay for 12 hours of childcare a day (and I'm not even sure if we could find someone to start at the crack of dawn hour that Danny leaves for work). It worked out very nicely. I think they enjoyed themselves as much as Jack did, and I certainly felt a lot better about the whole ordeal of leaving my baby for so long knowing that he was in such good hands. They went out to visit daddy's work one day, which led to some of the best photos my camera may have ever taken.

Good work, Danny! Why am I always the one taking pictures in this family? I'm clearly not the artistic one!

And Bill's not so bad either! It looks like it was a fantastic day, and I know there were six more of them even if I don't have the photographic evidence for the rest. I'm so glad Jack got to have this special time with his grandparents, while his mommy was off cavorting with a bunch of egg-heads. It was time well spent, it turns out, because an editor of a top ecological journal saw my talk and wants me to submit it to their journal! So thanks for letting me do that and not hating me for leaving you, Jack. When I was your age my mom left me with my grandma for a week to go to the Grand Canyon and I apparently wouldn't talk to her when she came back. Lucky for me, my baby is much more forgiving. He somehow knew it was me when I went in to pat his back when he woke up late in the night when I got back, and when he woke up the next morning, called for me. Danny said he didn't do that the whole time I was gone, so he really knew it was me, and actually remembered! I'm not sure I would even be able to do that! You astound me, Jack. I'm so glad to be back home.