Today is the anniversary of when I went into labor with you. Last year I stared up at the moon and asked you to make your appearance. As I walked inside, my water broke. On the day you were born I sat on stairs outside of the hospital with a friend who had come to visit; I had left you with my mom inside and for the first time since I had discovered I was pregnant, I was alone. Valparaiso smoldered around us – the fire that had started the day prior was the largest in the city’s history and I was a new mother, heavy with the realization that I would never really be alone again.
Read MoreChile
Scratch /
My bleary eyes can barely read the message on my computer screen – I haven’t had my first (of the eventual four) cup of coffee yet – but I can already tell it’s not good. I swing my now toddler-sized baby from my right to left hip and scroll down to find more bad news; the municipality inspector who came out to view our property yesterday has said there really is no way to legalize our Chilean home, a crushing realization that puts the final nail in the coffin on a dream we thought would equate with monetary compensation, if we chose to sell rather than stay. Shit. After being up all night with my teething daughter, I don’t even have the words to respond.
Read MoreThe Story /
We all piled into my midwife’s car and my husband followed in ours. I was basically 10 cm at this point, having intense, almost pushing contractions, speeding down miles of incredibly bumpy dirt roads. When we finally got into Valparaiso I remember looking at all of the college students coming out of the clubs and bars on Errazuriz street, feeling very strange that something so life-changing was happening to me while these kids stood five feet away, going about the very normal business of having a good time. It was surreal because I knew I most likely wouldn’t be them ever again, at least not in the same way.
Read MoreWhirlwind /
These last three weeks have been intense and beautiful and incredibly challenging in about a thousand different ways.
Read MoreThe Last Days /
I feel like I'm caught in limbo between an old life and a new one I know nothing about. I feel like I'm saying goodbye to someone, to the 'pre-mother me' and I guess that makes me nostalgic and a little sad. I keep thinking of all the things I may never do again - staying up all night in a strange city with new people, spontaneously taking a trip (spontaneously doing anything...), smoking a cigarette in a car with the windows down and the music blasting with my best friend.
Read MoreAnd Now We Wait /
I'm trying to get everything prepared before she comes, though I actually think this is impossible and is really just my way to have some semblance of control before our lives are flipped upside down.
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