Reading Assignment Twenty Four

I am almost done with Rattled! I have enjoyed every page. I only have a couple left, and Christine has taken JD to New York City. She loves New York City. She moved there after a big change, and moved away when she got pregnant. Although I have never been to NYC, I really want to go. I can understand her connection that city. There's a place in Canada, and I love it there. It's relaxing and quiet. The house is on the water, and if look straight down, you can see clear to the bottom. When you dive it, it's cold and refreshing. It's forty feet deep, and the rocks look precariously close- it is that clear. The island we live on is wooded and in seclusion. There is no air conditiong, no internet, not even cable TV. We kayak and I even saw a mink once. It takes two days to get there, we fly, drive, take a boat, take a train- almost every mode of transportation is involved. The boat we take, the big ferry, we always drive on whilst cranking Madonna music. It is the only artist my whole family can agree on. So we crank up the music, and we drive on in, and the next two hours are spent looking at the water and reading magazines. It's a journey.
On our last day in Canada, out boat left at eight. That meant we had to be up by six. I woke up at five, cold and unable to sleep. I grabbed a blanket, and snuck back under the covers. The sun wasn't up, so the lake was serene and dark. I watched it. I watched the water for fifteen minutes until it happened. Gradually, almost as if it weren't happening at all, the sun slowly glided up over the water. It was a moment straight out of the Lion King. A single beam of light broke over the water, and the whole sky lit up and turned a faint pink. It my first sunrise- until that last day, I'd never seen a sunrise. That moment, the one where the sun broke over the water, that's when my connection began. Something about that moment forever tied me to that island in Canada. So when Christine talks about her love of NYC, I understand. There's just some places we are tied to.

Reading Assignment Twenty Three

Well, Chrissy had her baby! It's a boy. She's settling into motherhood, and getting to know her son. In the early days of her son's life, she's watching him and feeding him. Christine has a nice, long maternity leave. But she also writes a blog everyday. Her ex, A, is not in contact with her. He isn't there for his son. Throughout her entire pregnancy, Christine has expressed a range of emotions perataining to A: sadness, anger, dissapointment, disbelief- she feels it all. Now that the baby is actually here, A still isn't. As Christine puts it, all he get is, "Just a daily paragraph." He won't know his son, he just get some words in a Monday-Friday blog. It made me sad to read that. I both can and cannot empathize. Although my parents are divorced, I have a wonderful father, and I get to see him all the time. I can talk to him anytime I want. Chrissy's son, JD, doesn't have that opportunity. He will not know his own father. I can't imagine what that must be like, to not know half of your family. One of my best friends is adopted. She's never met her birth parents, and all she has are a few facts and a shared name. That's it. She will not and cannot know anything until she turns eighteen and petions the court. She does, however, have the most amazing parents I know. They love her more than anything. She's always felt like a part of the family. Heck, her parents make me feel like part of the family. I guess what I'm trying to say is that blood may be thicker than water, but love is thicker than both. Family is does not just mean "people who I am biologically related to." It means friends and people who love us and who we love in return. It's about love. My friend is a part of her family; they love her. Chrissy and JD are a family. He may not have a father, but he's got a mom, and sometimes, that's enough. She loves him. And that love is enough.

Reading Assignment Twenty Two

She did it! Christine Coppa, the wonderful author of Rattled!, just had her baby in her book. She's a mom! I love the way she described the experience. She makes it feel like one of those defining moment. Like she walked in the delivery room one person, and came out another. Chrissy: single woman, pregnant woman, comes out as Chrissy: Mom. It's funny how people change and stay exactly the same like that. It's almost as if you could look back over your shoulder, and the old you isn't so far away, but is distinctly different- a past you. We are constantly evolving people, and the me you meet today is not the same one you meet tomorrow. I grow everyday. I get a little taller, I gain a little more knowledge, and put a little more experience behind me. Just in the span of a couple of hours, I become a different person. This is the way that most of us change- slowly, with a gradual move from one existance to another. Then there are the moments that divert us in a split-second. We're going down the regular path of our lives and POOF! we are a whole new person. Not just a little different, but so different that everything looks different. Touches are unknown and once farmiliar sounds seem foreign. It's like a blind man seeing for the very first time. Defining moments are rare and fleeting, but they change us in such beautiful ways. Some are miracles that leave us in wonder. Some make us lose all hope, only to gain it back again and appreciate the small moments we have on this planet. Some change our perceptions of life and the people who fill it. And some change our very identity. Like the birth of a child. Walking in a door as one person, and coming out as another. Chrissy: pregant woman... Chrissy: first-time mother. A defining moment.

Reading Assignment Twenty One

I am about halfway through Rattled! as of now, and its starting to pick up momentum. Christine is nearing the end of her pregnancy, and her writing has begun to portray a new confidence. She's decided to name her son Jack, after her own mother. It reminded me of where my name comes from. My middle name holds a sentimental value: I was named after my grandmother. It's her first name, and my middle name, but neither of us use it. She goes by her middle name, and I go by my first, but that thread of commonality ties us together. Whenever I think of her name, our name, it always think of her capable hands and warm heart. I'm not close with my grandmother (she lives on the opposite end of the country), but I love her dearly. Our name reminds me of her, it reminds me of her strength and courage; she's been through things I cannot and will not attempt to empathize with. My grandmother lost her older brother when he was seventeen. My older brother is eighteen, and we're very very close. He went off to college, and I really miss him. With divorced parents, he's the only person I've ever lived with full-time. He's not here now, and even though he's gone in one sense, I cannot imagine losing him in the other. My grandmother experienced that loss, yet she's eighty-one and a firecracker. She bounced back, got married, and had four kids. One is named after that lost brother. She found a strength she didn't know she had, just like Christine. Christine's pregnancy started out as shocking and scary, but over the course of those nine months, she's become this strong, independent young woman. She's having a baby! By herself! It's triumphant. Christine is triumphant.

Who were you named after?