Yay

Don is home, f-i-n-a-l-l-y. Got in around midnight after driving all day. The thing is, it really isn't that bad when he's away. We've been separated for as long as six weeks at a time, between staggered cross-country moves and travel for work, so it's not like I can play the weepy we've-never-spent-the-night-apart! wife. And there is the security of knowing that he's coming back, and when. It's not as though I'm an Army spouse with a deployed hubby or in some other precarious situation, you know? I tried to explain this to his mom, who seemed to be feeling guilty about keeping him away for so long-- that I can be on my own for a few weeks with no appreciable harm-- but I think she can't get past the idea of me all lonely and sad.

She seems to be doing remarkably well, but is house-bound as she's restricted from car-travel until her breastbone (which they have to break in order to get into the heart) heals, because a collision that re-opens it would be fatal. Being stuck at home isn't easy for her.

Anyways when Don came home, it was to a sparklingly clean house and a hot meal (butternut squash soup, roast chicken, peach cobbler. All from the Saturday Farmers Market). I think if he only came home once a week-- I would be a domestic goddess. The keys to squash soup are to make it kinda spicy so that it doesn't taste like baby food-- a little chili powder does the trick-- and top it with sour cream and bacon. Don will eat anything, I think, if you put bacon on top.

Problem is, the house is clean and organized and pretty because I poured hours of labor into it. Every day for more than a week, I was coming home from work and getting down to work. Running car-loads of stuff to the laundromat, dragging huge bags of trash to the curb. So the cost of coming home to a homely home is a slightly peeved partner who will want to sit down and have a Big Talk about housekeeping. Including New Rules and Responsibilities. Because a little two-bedroom house like ours should not take that kind of effort to clean, it really shouldn't. And I have no intention of being the only one keeping it nice.

Today is the first day of my favorite month. Yay for October! It was even chilly this morning, a nod to the new month. I called my doctor this morning because I want to get my thyroid tested. Hypothyroidism runs in my family and can cause infertility and miscarriage. Symptoms include inexplicable weight gain, fatigue, and feeling cold all the time. Those are kind of vague, because I exhibit all of them at times, but not all the time. And how can you really know if weight gain is unexplained? I'd say in my case it's more a matter of inexplicable weight change-- gaining and losing for no apparent reason. If you tracked my weight on a time-graph, I would look like a yo-yo dieter when in fact I'm not a dieter at all. I hope she will call me back, run the tests, get a diagnosis, put me on medication, and get me on the way to a place where we can start trying for a baby again. (Look, God, at my clean house and organically stocked freezer and homemade squash soup. Don't you think I should have a baby? Don't you think I'd take good care of it? Come on!) My faith in nature and my body being somewhat squashed at the moment, I'm pinning hopes right now on a medical intervention. Maybe a year from now, I can have a blog full of baby pictures...