The Last Time I Voted

... I was pregnant with the Wee One.  I stood in a very long line on a warm November day in a big brown sweater.  I wasn't sure that I would be able to go vote, since I had bad all-day sickness at that point still.  But I didn't eat much that day so there wouldn't be anything in my stomach to make me feel nauseated.  I carried a bottle of water that I sipped lightly.  And I also carried a book.

Choosing Single Motherhood, to be precise.

I love that book.  I wish I could find it since the move last year.

I had wanted to have a baby.  On my own, even.  Last night as I was hugging the wee one goodnight and singing our special song in her ear, and looking over her shoulder at her crib, I remembered a time that I saw a sale at KMart on cribs.  99 dollars.  I almost went ahead and bought it to start setting up a nursery.  Then I figured my mother would flip out at me spending money on a nursery for a baby that didn't exist.  So I didn't.

I did end up getting pregnant, knowing that I would have her on my own.

It was all a great idea, until it became a reality.  Then I panicked.  What do I do now?  What do I tell people?  What do I tell her (at the time she was still an "it")?  I ordered the book to help myself feel better, to help me have some direction in this new world of single mommyhood.

So there I stood, in the fall sunshine, in a too-heavy sweater, trying not to feel sick, reading a book to try to make myself feel better about being a single mom.  Waiting to vote.

That's it.  That's the story.  There's not much else.  I came to no conclusions that day.  I still struggle with the "what to tell her" part of the whole thing.  I've got "mommie wanted to have a baby" and "mommie is glad that God gave her you" and not much else in between.  I voted for Obama and everyone thinks he's doing a stinking job and I happen to think it's too early to judge so get off him.

I just wanted to reminisce about standing in line in the fall summer sunshine with a baby in my belly, waiting to vote.