To combine or not to combine…

I can’t figure out if I should combine my regular blog (this one) and my “Made of Family” blog… That one is nominally supposed to be a shared blog between me & Seppo *cough* but it’s hard to really segregate out parts of my life from blog to blog, especially since I’ve been blogging less frequently in the last year.

Hmm.

I think I might also migrate this back to inciteariot.helava.com and to wordpress, because I love to overload myself with optional non-projects when I have a ton of real projects to do! Hahahah! Hahah. Ha.

Ha.

While I’m here, I might as well do a short little update. Earlier in the month, I turned 33. Seppo, my little brother and I went out to Lake Chabot, armed with books and some bahn mi. Here is Seppo, who has fallen sleep in the sun. The sun makes him sleep. What a strange instinct. I’d like it to be known for all posterity that Seppo made his pregnant wife and her 15 year old brother row around in the heat while he slept.

Ok, he rowed us out and only fell asleep for a little bit, at which point my little brother and I acted silly by rowing ineffectually.

Thursday, I did a biggish release for my project, so I took some time on Friday to drive my little bro and my coworker out to Half Moon Bay. It was a fantastic day for a short jaunt to the beach. Here is a pic I took of the water and my ginormous belly:

On Saturday, we drove the little bro to the airport after downing some awesome xiao long bao (Shanghai soup dumplings), then headed down to Laguna Seca, where Seppo went for a ride with our coworker. Here is Seppo before the ride:

Here is Seppo after the ride:

We stopped by Monterey Bay on the way back up and had an early dinner. Sorry, no pics. :p

In memory of my grandmother

Dear Halmoni,

Although people will say, “She lived a long, good life,” I wish you were still here. I wish I had been able to see you one more time, hold your hand, and tell you what a wonderful childhood you helped give me.

We used to go to your house in the summers and winters. I often tell people that my time visiting you and my other grandmothers were like an idealized world of Tom Sawyer and Huckleberry Finn, with farm life and clean, clear streams you could drink from, and kids running around, getting into the kind of good, clean fun that ends up in cuts, scrapes, dirty clothes, and memories to last a lifetime.

I remember still, after three decades, sitting in your lap and making you clap. I remember all the pictures of us you had posted on your wall. I remember the treats you had tucked away in the back of your lower drawer and in your pockets every time we came to visit. I remember your paper-thin skin and marveling at how fragile it looked. I couldn’t wait until I was your age and had all the dignity and fragile beauty that only age and hard-fought wisdom could bring.

You raised your kids — my father, my uncles, and my aunts — and fostered several family-less children over the decades, all on your own, a strong matriarch, a strong business woman, a kind grandmother. I know that despite all the differences my father and his siblings may have had over the years with each other(and what big family doesn’t?), they were 100% united in their love and devotion to you.

I remember playing in your front yard. I thought it was the biggest and coolest garden ever. My mom still has a picture of my sister and me playing around one of the trees in the front. I remember it well. I remember finding some secret corners of the garden that I thought no one else would ever know. I remember the feeling of being surrounded by beautiful nature, being alone yet fully a part of the world around me. I associate all these feelings with you.

I remember your outhouse! I thought it was the scariest place on earth, especially at night, with no lights on! 😀

I remember you calling us your little puppies. There were so many of us kids during the summers! Undoubtedly, we yipped around and bothered you, but you were always so patient with us. If I close my eyes now, I can almost perfectly picture your face, your home, your hands. I’ll always remember your hands.

I only wish that things had been really patched up between you and my dad in the recent years… But there is no helping that and no use regretting it. There were years of good memories between you two and I know my dad is broken with grief over your passing.

I also wish that I was sure that I was able to pass on the news that I am pregnant. I told various family members, but I never knew if you had heard. I should have called directly. What a fool I am sometimes. Sometimes, I think there is all the time in the world to pass on news, to tell people I love I love them.

Halmoni, I don’t want to spend time kicking myself. I want to spend time thinking about the lives you touched and the impact you had on my life. I never doubted that women can be strong, independent leaders because I had women like you, my other grandmothers, and my own mother to look to. I didn’t need the words that said, “You can do anything!” because it was so obvious to me from my own family. I didn’t need the words that said, “Stop feeling sorry for yourself, and just suck it up!” because it was so obvious from seeing all the stuff you’d gone through, seeing what my own parents had gone through in life. I didn’t need the words that said, “Don’t fear growing old,” which a lot of people seem to do, fighting it tooth and nail, because I always knew it was a part of life and that life didn’t end when you were an older person, because you were so involved in life, community, church, and business. And again, you were always so good to us kids.

I heard that when you passed, you listened for the tolling of the church bells in the morning and passed gently, with your family around you. I am so glad.

Sexism & babies

Most people we interact with now know we are having a boy. I am excited to know but that largely has to do with being able to more concretely think of names and such. The biggest concern for me is health.

The thing that disturbs me is that even before the baby is out in the world, the world seems to greet him with its sexist notions. So many people have voiced the assumption that Seppo must be happy and that I must be bummed. Several others have said I must be glad we “don’t have to worry since [we] are getting a son out of the way with the first child,” as though there is less value in a girl or we would have kept trying until there was a boy.

Don’t get me wrong; I know most people are just trying to find something nice to say, and are fumbling for something positive and boy-specific to say in regards to the news. But it doesn’t stop the feelings of dismay from filling me up. It’s these subtle sexist notions and “innocent” comments that help prop up institutionalized sexism, and it sucks that it’s starting already.

Personal finance

We bought a car! I have the pic in my camera, but haven’t uploaded it yet. I shall soon. We went with the Mazda3. It’s quite beautiful and I definitely love the bluetooth integration of modern cars. Heh. It has enough space for the baby (obviously) in the backseat and Mobi in the hatch, which was our biggest concern in picking out a car for our growing family, aside from the presence of air conditioning.

We sold our Civic! I took a final drive but I need to get a final picture of the car that’s served us so well for the last 7 years. *hug* We need to get it smogged and then we’ll be ready to pass it on to the new owner, who is our coworker. It is the cleanest and best maintained it’s ever been (new tires last year, 2nd 90k tuneup this year, fan fixed, rebuilt transmission last year, etc.) and I know it’ll treat the new owner well for years to come. If it weren’t for the lack of air conditioning and 4 doors, we could have kept this for another 10 years.

We are refinancing the house to a significantly lower rate, which will lower the total paid interest and potentially cut several years off the total lifetime of the loan (depending on which strategy we decide to go with)!

We still have to decide if we’ll be able to fix the upstairs bathroom before the baby arrives or not. If not, we can always wash the baby in the kitchen sink for several years. That sink is hugenormous, after all, and at a much better height for easy baby-washing, with a spray head even. 🙂 The issue with fixing is both money and time. Obviously, we need to save money to be able to take time off after the baby is born, but we also need money for daycare going past that, and for various baby-related costs.

And on top of everything, the Hawaii trip is a go! You’d think we were nuts but we know this will be the last vacation we’ll be able to take in a long time. And given that in our 11 year relationship history that we’ve only really gone on two other vacations (honeymoon in 2006 and Tulum in 2007), we really wanted to make one more trip for just the two of us. Plus, the tickets only cost $10 due to years of saved up frequent flyer miles. 🙂 We’ll need to book lodgings and a rental car, but it’s so nice to have the tickets for just about free.

Because I am such a skinflint, all this money spending is making my head spin and my palms sweat profusely. But I know we’ve managed to do all this very economically and with plenty of slush in our various savings accounts for emergencies, long-term savings, and planned spendings (like the car, which we’d been saving for for a while now), so I know I need to just unclench a little and breathe. Plus, the refinance actually saves us money in both the long term and on a monthly basis, so it’s the right thing to do, even with a little cash out of pocket.