Misery Loves Company
When you're in these final stages of pregnancy you know how you sound, how you come across; whiny, self-consumed, and negative. That's why it's so good to have friends who have felt the same way themselves, like my friend Dana who has felt that way three whole times herself before.
Saturday we went to a birthday party for Evan and Madalyn's friend, Sydney. I was in a lot of pain and struggled to enjoy myself. (Look, it's not easy to enjoy yourself when you can't even keep up with your kids because, frankly, you're just trying to keep your clothes on; the bigger selections from your maternity wardrobe that are trying to pop off of you like the blueberry girl in Willie Wonka.) And Dana was there to take note of these frustrations and had great pity on my being "in waiting."
Our husbands were supposed to play golf last night while we let the kids play at her house, but when the forecast said rain, she knew I still needed a distraction from the sleepless night ahead of me- a night so sleepless Shaun said he was certain I'd be titling today's blog "Sleepless in Orlando." So Dana not only insisted on still getting together, but also was firm that we would throw a mini birthday party for Madalyn who officially turns two Saturday, on my due date.
She bought a cake and ordered pizza and had a present wrapped all pretty for Madalyn. She almost bought a pinata, for Heaven's sake, because "it was only nine dollars." (That was before she envisioned Evan and Aaron swinging golfclubs around. And it was a great night, even without swinging golf clubs and destroying their recently pressure-sprayed windows, and she and Chris didn't even flinch when OUR CHILD coerced their child into opening and emptying an entire "rainmaker" filled with rice and styrofoam popcorn onto the floors of three rooms in their house. I had to hunt down their vacuum against their will before we left with Dana objecting and fighting me the whole way...
See, Dana's great for many reasons. As you've already gathered, she's generous and gracious, but she's also funny and has a relaxing sense of humor and enjoyment of life. An excerpt from a recent email to show what I mean:
As i was getting the kids ready for bed tonight and they were brushing their teeth, Aaron kept trying to tell me something about Madalyn, but I couldn't understand what he was saying. He kept repeating "Madawin square, Madawin square". Finally, Aubrey told me that Madalyn threw a chicken nugget on the floor and so she didn't get any goldfish, and Mrs. Katie said: "Madalyn Claire".......aha! Lightbulb moment. Aaron was trying to say Madalyn Claire. =) So for the duration of our toothbrushing and bed preparation, the kept saying Madalyn Claire, Madalyn Claire!!!
and another:
Your not going to believe this: about 3 hours ago, we were sitting in the family room, and shannon was in her ultrasaucer right by the sliding glass window, when a black bear walked into our back yard and right up to the glass door and started sniffing the glass and the BBQ grill and then it just laid down on the concrete!!!! So, do you want to buy our house... it comes with baby gators, and a wandering bear - who could resist... next time you want to come over so the kids can play in the back yard, i'll be sure to get a tranquilizing dart gun, and IF i don't use all the darts on the unruly kids, maybe we'll have some left over for the bear.But right now, what I'm appreciating even more than her humor and love for life, even more than her generosity or her graciousness, is Dana's empathy. She's the kind of friend who will drive you home if a cockroach haunts your dashboard and you just can't seem to get back behind the wheel because you have a fear of roaches that is precisely THAT BIG, inherited from your father and bad experiences growing up, (like when one crawled out of your babydoll's hair and over your arm when you were six.) She's the kind of friend who you could confide in IF- just hypothetically "IF"- the only two nights you recently slept in your third trimester were when you had a glass of wine in the bath before bed. (Like just "IF" you happened to be in that situation; just supposing that was something that had happened... that your husband had talked you into...) you could lament to Dana.
Because her husband sells drugs for a living.
