Two age-related conversations with Griffin today:
“I want to go to Kindergarten soon.”
“Oh, why?”
“Because soon I will be a teenager.”
Later, while climbing some rocks:
“Daddy, why did you almost fall?”
“Because I’m old and clumsy.”
“Well, you are not clumsy, but you are very old.”
Ready Player One by Ernest Cline
My rating: 5 of 5 stars
A delicious romp through ’80s geekdom! This is the sort of book I could have read in a single night, wrapping up before breakfast (as I once did with Ender’s Game some twenty years ago). Alas, sleep is at a higher premium these days, so I paced myself.
I was immediately taken in by the setting: a dystopian future where people spend their happiest hours immersed in The Oasis, a virtual reality where you can be the superhero/knight/wizard/jedi of your fantasies. (Think of a global, genreless World of Warcraft with infinite scalability and no lag.) The public schools have even gone virtual, since simulated schools have better facilities, stellar libraries, and no bullies (the school zones don’t allow physical contact between characters and you can mute anybody you don’t want to listen to). Meanwhile, the real world crumbles into islands of urban slums separated by Mad Maxish no-man’s-lands. The setting was painted in broad strokes leaving plenty of room for my piqued imagination to fill in the gaps. Vivid scenes gave the basic flavor. I reveled, for example, in the image of a public bus that traveled between cities (a la Greyhound). Fully armored, with a defensive gun deck up top, the passengers jacked into their VR rigs as soon as they boarded and spent the entire trip lost in another world.
The plot is built around an epic quest within the Oasis to locate the late lead-programmer’s Easter Egg, a deeply hidden golden ticket worth a dazzling real-world fortune to whoever finds it. The programmer built his puzzles and clues around the obsessions of his youth: 1980s geek culture (movies, music, video games, and classic role-playing games). To say more will lead to spoilers, and half the fun is applying your own knowledge to the puzzles, but I will say that there were many joyous epiphanies along the way as treasured memories of Atari cartridges and D&D adventures were given new life.
When I first rated the book I put four stars, but I’ve been considering the line between really liked it and amazing ever since. After writing this review, it’s clear that the overall reading experience was in amazing territory. With that said, the novel was not without flaws. Characters were often two-dimensional, and there were a number of relationships that didn’t quite gel. Foreshadowing was of the un-subtle variety. The plot was predictable, though a dash of cyberpunk toward the end was a pleasant surprise. In short, I kinda wish this wasn’t Cline’s first novel. In defense, one might argue that the source material suffers from all of these flaws in spades, but I think that’s a copout. Better writing would have improved the depth of immersion. Despite this, however, Cline easily managed to dunk me deep enough to have a blast. I want to read a book like this every summer.
He may have been born in California, but Griffin is definitely Minnesotan now. When I asked him about the cool lego train he built today, he explained that it was a “Corn Weeder.” Further discussion revealed that he was talking about a combine harvester. I didn’t even know what a combine was until a few years ago when Sarah explained that she drove one for a summer job long ago. Griffin is way ahead of me!
“I don’t have a headache because my head is very strong and tough.” — Griffin
After a particularly insane laugh at dinner tonight, Griffin announced, “I was laughing in another language!”
I was solo-dad last night. It was my first time attempting to manage Griffin’s bedtime routine while taking care of Maggie. At one point it got so ridiculous that there was only one thing to do: record it for posterity.
Maggie got a surprise package yesterday. Inside was this letter:
“June 8, 2012
Dear Maggie:
We haven’t met, but I saw your baby picture on Facebook the other day, and I was very excited! My name is Maggie, too…short for Margaret. There are not too many Margarets around anymore, and I wanted to send you this silverware. It belonged to your great-grandmother, Margaret Crutchfield Roy. Your great-grandparents, Andy and Margaret Roy, were Presbyterian missionaries and lived in exciting and wonderful places, and traveled all over the world. Over the years, they were given many interesting and amazing gifts of art and porcelain and ivory from China and Hong Kong. They lived long and happy lives. After Margaret died, your great uncle, Dr. David Roy, and my mom, Nancy Robertson, cleaned out the garage and the closets in the Pittsburgh apartment so that Andy Roy, who was almost 100 years old, could move to a smaller place.
David Roy was very generous and cavalier about giving away these items from his parent’s storage. He didn’t want them. He was sure that his brother, Stape, would not want them, and that your daddy and your uncles (who were young unmarried guys) would not want them. “Take them!” he said. “Take them all!” My mother and I loaded up her car with family heirlooms and knick-knacks and drove back to New Mexico where we live. We sorted the items fairly so that her sister, Aunt Sally (Robertson) Foster, could have some of the fascinating mementos for herself and for her children, too.
This silverware came to me because it is engraved with our name, Margaret. I believe it was given to your great-grandmother one piece at a time as she was growing up, by her relatives who loved her. When Margaret was a little girl over a hundred years ago, many young ladies were given nice silverware at Christmas and on their birthdays so that they might have a lovely set for entertaining when they were ready to marry and settle down. Margaret married, but her life was not one of settling down! They lived overseas for many years and usually ate with chopsticks. Margaret was not a materialistic person, but she kept this silverware from her childhood all of her life for sentimental reasons. I love this silver, but I have always thought that if Margaret Crutchfield Roy ever had a great-granddaughter (especially named Margaret) she would be very, very pleased for her to have it…to eat with, to play with, or to sell to pay for something she needs.
I loved and admired your great-grandmother, Margaret Roy, very much. She was an intelligent, gentle, and courageous woman who raised wonderful sons and made the world a better place. She was a role model to me because she was unafraid to go out in the world with the man she loved and do work that was important in spite of danger to her and her family. She was my great-aunt by marriage, and my father named me after her. I think we are lucky to share her name and heritage.
Love,
Maggie (Margaret Robertson-Linsky)”
We are so excited to have a piece of Roy Family history, and especially to have something linked directly with Maggie’s namesake. We could not have been more surprised and touched by Maggie Robertson-Linsky’s thoughtfulness! What a treasure.
On our way home after seeing friends, close to bedtime, Griffin says, “I’m not sleepy or tired or resty or nappy, Mama. I just want to go home and relax with you.”
The first half of this post was written two nights before Maggie was born. I had no idea it would be two nights before her birth, and I hadn’t quite finished my thoughts, so I didn’t post it. But the waiting was such a part of her birth story, I thought it would be appropriate to start with what I started writing not knowing when her arrival would be.
I am nearly 42 weeks pregnant with our second child, and this waiting has been a surprise to me. Griffin was born 11 days past his estimated delivery date, and I was definitely not expecting to go longer with this one. But here I am, 12 days past the estimated delivery date with no baby in my arms, and it is an hourly roller coaster. There are many things to be said about birth, due dates, medical pressure to induce, and all of the things that go along with our current culture’s views on pregnancy and birthing, but that’s for another blog, and perhaps personal conversation over tea.
But what I know and want to write about is that pregnancy (and waiting to birth) is probably the most public private thing that I have gone through, and I simultaneously want to connect with other women, and cocoon myself from the world while I wait. The end of this pregnancy has been very different from my time waiting for Griffin. Today I feel really great physically, all things considered, and even went to yoga this morning where I stretched and squatted and felt graceful. Three years ago, I was experiencing agonizing pelvic pain for nearly a month, which kept me grounded on the couch and subsequently lead to incredible swelling and discomfort. Today, I have been experiencing pre-labor signs for weeks (increased contractions, cramping, dilation, prodromal labor) which lead me to believe I would be meeting this baby sooner. Three years ago, I experienced very little until 24 hours before Griffin was born. Today, I have to start each day with a game plan to include a very energetic three year old AND the thought that I could go into labor at any time. Three years ago, I had the luxury of scrapping plans with no consequences and no planning if I went into labor. Today I am 35, technically of “advanced maternal age,” and under a lot of pressure to induce (something I’d like to avoid for myriad reasons that are personal, as they are for every woman). Three years ago, my OB pushed to induce by 42 weeks, but I never got there.
I’ll be honest: I’m tired of waiting. I do want this baby out. I am concerned about the statistical risks associated with going past full term (which is 42 weeks, not 40). I’m tired of trying to encourage labor through means that, I’m increasingly believing, exist solely to make you feel like you can control something you have no control over. I’m tired of hearing about every Joe Schmoe’s trick for getting labor started, and I’m tired of being lead to think it’s something I’ve done or haven’t done.
But today, at this hour, at this minute, I have come to believe that my baby is doing something for me I’m only now just getting. S/he is my own personal Buddha, giving me the opportunity to cultivate a new kind of patience. This may be patience I need for this particular child; it could be patience I need as the stay-at-home mother of two children; it may be patience I need to become the best human being I can be. I read this very lovely post from a midwife in Duluth the other day about the waiting time being a place of in between, and it seemed to be written just for me. I am truly in between in so many ways.
. . . .
Maggie’s Birth Story
On Monday, April 23, Andrew, our doula Cynthia, and I spent a long time talking with one of the midwives at HCMC about what we were going to do next. I would be 42 weeks the next day, my amniotic fluid was getting low, and the baby was still not out (although looking very healthy by all measures). I really, really did not want to induce. I honestly didn’t think I would make it to the point where I would have to start thinking about induction, but there we were, and I just didn’t want to believe it or commit to a plan that involved medical intervention. I reluctantly scheduled an induction involving breaking my waters for the next morning, still with the thought that I could back out if I woke up not feeling right about it. I went home and cried and pleaded with the baby to please, please come out on his/her own. I called our doula, I called my parents, I made arrangements for Griffin for the morning, and I made sure everything was in order to leave for the hospital if we followed through with the appointment. I tried to surrender to this plan, one I hadn’t wanted.
I had experienced more prodromal labor (for the fourth time) that afternoon and evening, but the not-quite-the-real-thing contractions subsided by 9pm, and I went to bed around 11:30 feeling resigned to the fact that this baby was quite content staying inside, and I may just be the first person in history to be pregnant forever (ha).
Around 1am, I woke up with a very strong contraction that had me breathing hard and doubled over from the strength of it. It lasted over a minute, but it wasn’t the first time I had experienced a strong contraction in the last few weeks, so it was hard for me to let myself think that it might be the real thing. I timed it and stayed in the bathroom to see if another was coming. I waited for 5 minutes, 10 minutes, 15 minutes. Nothing. Deflated, I crawled back into bed to try and fall back asleep. At 1:30, I had another that was so strong, I literally leaped out of bed, waking up Andrew. This one was even harder than the one I had at 1am, and after that, they started coming every three minutes. This time, it definitely felt like the real thing, and even Andrew knew it was time when he heard me moaning and saw my legs shaking.
Andrew called our doula and my parents, and I called the hospital to check in with the midwives. Having experienced a 14 hour labor with Griffin (4 hours of which involved me pushing), I probably wouldn’t have even called the hospital had it not been for the fact that I had started bleeding. I felt really in control of the contractions, and while they were close together, I figured I had a few hours of laboring at home before we had to head in. But after talking with the midwife on the phone, she kindly suggested that it sounded as though I was working pretty hard through the contractions and since I had started bleeding (a normal part of birth, of course) it might be a good idea to head in soon. Andrew called our neighbor, Anne, who had volunteered to hold down the fort until my parents could arrive, and as soon as she got to the house, we headed for the car.
I was still feeling very in control during the contractions. I would drop down to hands and knees during the waves to moan and breathe, but then I could carry on a conversation in the two to three minutes in between. It felt like the early labor I experienced with Griffin, but I was still glad to be headed into the hospital. I frankly was looking forward to trying to birth in the water! I knelt backwards in the front seat (it felt very wrong not to wear a seat belt, but the hospital was only a 12 minute drive from our house) and continued to breathe and moan through the contractions. I suggested to Andrew that he needn’t stop at the red lights, and I was truly entering into the laboring zone. We arrived at the emergency room entrance around 2:30, and the admittance desk nurse actually asked me to fill out a form. I said, “Are you freaking kidding me?” and gave him a look like, “Did you not just see me on my hands and knees in the street?!?” but scribbled out my information and promptly moaned through a contraction right there on the floor in front of him. Another nurse rushed down with a wheelchair as the admitting nurse said, “Skip triage and bring her to the Nurse Midwife Unit.” Damn straight.
We waited for the elevator and got up to the hallway with the Midwife Unit when another contraction came on. I told the nurse to stop and I got down on my hands and knees again to do my thing. The midwife and nurse on duty then saw me through the glass and rushed to greet us. (Andrew describes the experience as a huge warm hug, and I couldn’t agree more.) We got to the birthing room around 2:40am, where I had another contraction right there on the floor. The midwife, Kate, and nurse, Sarah, were so wonderful and made me feel like they knew I knew what I was doing, and had I requested to birth standing on my head, they would have been cool with it. Kate asked to check me for dilation, and declared, “You’re fully dilated!” which I just couldn’t believe. The contractions were heavy, strong, and close together, but I really had no idea I had been in transition. Not more than two contractions later, I felt the urge to push. At this point, our doula Cynthia arrived, and just in time.
The pain during the pushing was unreal and unlike what I had experienced with Griffin. Ring of fire, indeed, and my contractions were so close together, and the intensity was so strong, I had a hard time even knowing when I was having a contraction. It was the only time I felt out of control, but with the calming words of Cynthia and Kate, I was able to get back into the zone. My water exploded, and Kate encouraged me to feel the baby’s head. It was so soft and nearly out, I was able to muster the focus to continue. (Again, I had experienced four hours of pushing with Griffin, so I was not expecting to have a quick birth, but the baby wanted out NOW.) A couple of pushes later, out she shot, and she was born at 3:00 AM on the nose. I truly could not believe it. A girl! So fast! I just birthed a BABY?!?
She did not come out crying and lively, so there were about 5 minutes of mild worry, but she quickly was up to standard and was snuggled up on my chest. She latched on almost right away, and I spent the next hour or so saying, “I can’t believe this. I really can’t believe I just birthed my baby in an hour and a half.”
We had about two hours of bonding time before I sat up to go to the bathroom and had an enormous hemorrhage. Apparently, it’s not entirely uncommon for women who birth quickly to lose a lot of blood through hemorrhaging, but it was a little frightening to lose so much blood so quickly. Thankfully, the nurse, Sarah, was on it fast, and the kindest, gentlest OB came to the rescue. About an hour and a very uncomfortable procedure later, I was back to normal, still stunned to have Ms. Maggie Wren in my arms.