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that’s why it’s called a one-person papasan, fools
The other night we were lying on the futon with the lights off and… Well, to get the full picture you have to understand what this futon looks like. The second month we were together we were making plans to move from the old Victorian we were sharing with four other people to a different state and our own apartment. We literally had almost nothing; I had the clothes I’d brought with me from Missouri and Todd had a stereo, books, and his own clothes. That was it. So we drove down to the futon store and picked out a futon and brought it back, and took it with us when we moved. The first night in our new studio apartment found us with: a Dominos pizza delivery box, plastic bags of clothes, a one-person papasan chair (which we later broke by trying to sit together in it), a stereo, a very old tv, an even older dinette set (both of which his parents gave us), and the futon mattress. The entire year we lived in that apartment we were tickled by the idea that it was going to be the setting of our “first year together” stories — the way couples who have been together forever always have stories about how they lived in a one-bedroom apartment in Brooklyn, and it was always hot, and they survived on macaroni and cheese when they didn’t have any money.
I’m a bit distracted; I’m trying very hard to listen to the cd I borrowed two days ago from the library without bursting into tears. The cd is called Te Deum, and right now I’m listening to the Estonian Philharmonic Chamber Choir sing (i.e. emit wondrous amazing can’t-possibly-be-human sounds) with the Tallinn Chamber Orchestra in the background. Awestruck is not an exaggeration of the way I feel when I hear music like this.
Eventually we bought a futon frame, for some insane reason it seemed like an extremely good idea to buy one from a store in the middle of Boston, I spent that day wandering around by myself because Todd had work there and I remember that it was absolutely pouring rain. After a few months one side of the frame began to sag alarmingly and we nailed the sagging bit up so that it could only be used as a sofa and not a bed anymore. By that time we’d bought another futon at a yard sale, so we had something else to sleep on. Unfortunately it ended up a casualty of cat pee and Todd leaping too exuberantly onto it one night (quit smirking, it was completely innocent) and so we were back to the old futon. We took all the accouterments off of the broken frame so that it’s now something that keeps the futon off the ground by about three inches. It resides directly to the right of my computer desk, which you can see a photo of here. (Speaking of photos of bits of my life, there wasn’t a journal entry yesterday because I was busy polishing a new section of this web site called “tiny threads” which consists of photos of a rug and a bag that I designed and then crocheted.) At night one of us sweeps it off with the broom before lying down because so much cat litter and other grebbles get tracked onto it during the day.
No, none of that has anything to do with what we were talking about, but knowing what the scenery looks like when you’re reading is always helpful. We were chewing over the prospect of children, which we frequently talk about, and I asked if Todd ever felt sad that he couldn’t get pregnant. He said no, he never had. Not even as a little boy? Not even as a little boy. Me, I’d be green with jealousy, knowing that half the world could do something that I couldn’t. He asked if I felt sad that I couldn’t create children and I said that it wasn’t the same thing, that you have to have two people to do that. I was surprised by his answer; I guess I always assumed that all men wish they were able to give birth.
Then yesterday I heard someone talking on the radio about how men who don’t go with their wives into the delivery room are missing out on a wondrous experience and I thought, “There are men out there who actually DON’T GO into the delivery room?” If I were a man and someone was giving birth to my child the thought of not being in the delivery room wouldn’t even occur to me. I was telling Todd about it and he agreed that not being there was idiotic, and I grinned and told him that if we did decide to eventually have children he was definitely going to be in at least as much pain in the delivery room as I was… Although having to live with a caffeine-less Galactic Web Empress for nine months should be excruciating enough, tee hee.
I’d be very curious to hear about the male perspective on this concept, both not being able to be pregnant and being there in the delivery room. Care to comment? Please be sure to note in your email message whether or not it would be okay with you if I quoted your comments in my next journal entry.
And then two nights ago I was lying on the futon, trying to fall asleep and listening to Todd’s breathing and thinking about birth and children and suddenly I wondered: do nurses and doctors who work in delivery rooms get bored? Do they get blasé after seeing the same transports of joy hundreds of time, after seeing the same tears and hearing, “My beautiful baby!” twice a day? Or is every birth wondrous?
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