I’m Sorry. You Have the Right Number.

A call from my father who I haven’t heard from in ten years and before that 14 years, asked, “Cynthia?”. Wished it were the wrong number, but no. I didn’t even recognize his voice. “Yes,” I replied, wondering whom this was. “It’s…” a pregnant pause, “your dad,” Dad, defined as a man who begets or raises or nurtures a child, a term used loosely. “Your grandma is not doing so well.” Whatever disregard I have for him crawled it’s way out of my fiery lips into the corner of the room. This call had nothing to do with us, as nothing ever has. This call was about Vita.

When my younger brother and I were little, looking like twin boys when I had been a victim of a fanatic barber that decided that at five, I needed a tight cut like my brother right before picture day (cut sponsored by dear old dad), we never called our grandparents, Abuelita or Abuelito. We shortened it and called them Vito and Vita and it stuck. They were essential parts of my life. When my parents divorced, they were the only people on my father’s side that showed me any love (this includes my father).

At seven, they moved back to Guatemala. Vito died of cancer shortly after. I didn’t know at the time, that they had moved so we wouldn’t have to see him suffer. Vito was a towering man at six foot four, with ivory hair and a uniformed mustache. He always dressed like he was going to mass and in the wintertime wore a burly, sable woolly hat. His father was British, his mother Guatemalan. He looked like a bi-lingual Sherlock Holmes.

He would sit in his dark green recliner and watch TV. My younger brother and I would crawl behind the long, beige sofa like stealth military agents, quietly making our way over to him. We would sneak behind the chair, Vito oblivious to us. He did have hair, not much, but he would grease it with something I am still not certain of what it was and comb it to one side. My brother and I would silently play around with his hair. Making it into a Mohawk, making pig tails, splitting it in the middle. We’d giggle and I could see Vita from the kitchen laugh and all the while, Vito would just sit there watching Kojak.

It is said that before he passed, in his bed he told my father to tell us that he loved us very much. I was ten and never got to tell him how much I loved him. How he was the only positive male figure in my life.

Now, twenty years later, I get a call about Vita. My last link to that side of me. Once she is gone I will not have any connection from that part. I did visit her three times from 1999-2003. The final time I went with a good friend of mine for seventeen days. My Vita became her Vita. She told us stories of how after only a few months, Vito proposed and she said, “Why not?”. Told us how when she came to Chicago, she started out by cleaning hospitals, learned English in her spare time, studied and became a physical therapist. How one time, a woman with an infected foot was placed in a tub of hot water and that worms came out of it.

The first movie I remember seeing was with my grandparents. Snow White, at Vita’s holiday party. I remember sitting on Santa’s lap and thinking he had some bony legs that hurt to sit on.

We had many laughs in Guate and many tears the day I left because Vita forgot that was the day I was leaving. To her, it was like someone just came and took me away. In a way, that’s how it still feels.

Now, she is bedridden. My father, by name only, taking care of her. Do you understand the irony of this situation? The woman I love, my only connection to the other half of me is being taken care of by the man who left my family and never took care of us. All my hard feelings against him that plagued me throughout elementary and high school, that took years to not forgive nor forget, but to let go, mean nothing right now. He is there for her. Right now she is the one that matters. Not me, not him, her.

We spoke calmly. The first time since I was 12 that it didn’t end with him hanging up on me. We were two adults speaking of a mutual love. We were civil. Who would have thought?

My baby will never know her great grandmother personally, but will know of her through stories and pictures. If God allows her to live long enough, maybe she can hear her voice over the phone. Vita doesn’t remember that I told her I am pregnant, but if I have to call Vita everyday and tell her that I am having a baby, like it’s the first time, every time, I will do so.

My baby, however, will have a father. A daddy. Someone who will be there for her no matter what. To make sure that she is loved and cared for. To play and discipline her. To hug and kiss her. A daddy to look up to. Something that I wish I had my whole life. Something that I am grateful and blessed to say, she never will.

Baby, It's Cold Outside

24 weeks 2 days

Christmas. While the temps decrease, the cups of hot chocolate, holiday festivities, and Christmas songs increase. I walked through Union Station today, past a trio of Salvation Army volunteers playing a Christmas song on their trumpets. Tears began to creep themselves up, waiting to take a dive off the rim of my eyes. The first sounds of Christmas, the first sight of volunteers smiling and asking for donations to benefit those in need, tends not only to pull at my heart strings, but stretch them out and snap them back in like rubber bands. Two minutes later, I passed another trio, this time they were playing Feliz Navidad and I laughed. For that song always reminds me when I sang that in 7th grade with 3 other girls, in front of the entire school. My bright red turtleneck, loose all over except at the neck where it was strangling me, and my white skirt that showed off my white legs (I wasn't wearing tights), and my large, black glasses that took up half of my face - there I was singing like a cat caught in a razor fence, doused in cold rain watching the lightening creep closer - and I sang my heart out anyway (and I think I sang some people out of the auditorium too).

Snow. The first time those frosted flakes fall (no, not the cereal, but that does sound good about now) unto the cold pavement, covering the street and trees and dying grass in an ivory cloak, I take a deep breath and say, "Oh, man. This stinks." I don't like driving in the snow, don't like shoveling, throwing salt onto it that eats away at my new gloves, don't like the way the blanket hides the ice patches like mines, just waiting for an unsuspecting passerby to step, and slip and fall. Sure snow is beautiful - on a Christmas card.

Winter. A time to purchase boots, gloves, a scarf, ear muffs, coat, leggings, thick socks, sweaters and toasty toes. A time to spend plenty of money on these necessities only to have in a short amount of time, one glove, salt-encrusted boots, a ripped scarf, cold ears due to lost ear muffs, a hole in your sock, and shrunken sweaters.

Level of Attractiveness During Freezing Temperatures. I have seen one too many of women, in their tall high heel boots, tiny thin coats, bare ears and thin gloves, slip on oh those mines I mentioned above, have the reddest, driest, most painful looking noses and ears that make me want to touch them to watch them crack and crumble, and hair that isn't covered by a hat, yet by frizz control products and hairspray. Oh, yes and one last accessory for these women are Kleenex as they always have a cold. Then there are the rest of us, bundled up like Arctic ninja's, only eyes are seen, waddling as they walk (I waddle now without all this gear on), you wouldn't be able to point out your mother among these stealth, layered, honorary Eskimos.

Baby. Through this winter of already below 0 temps, my baby, warm and oblivious in her temporary home (her lease expires in 3 months), kicks and punches and reminds me that she's on her way. That next winter will be the warmest one yet in my life. A winter I am throughly looking forward to.

Do As the Jeffersons and Move On Up

All George and Weezie had to do to was own their own chain of dry cleaners and hire Florence to move on up to the east side. My placenta on the other hand better move it on up to the north side of my belly button by the 40th week or I may have to have a c-section.

I was like George, all short, and dancing my way to my doc's appt today and I came out looking like Louise when Mother Jefferson came over for dinner only to criticize her meatloaf. The doc told me that I have a "low-lying placenta" explained as "a placenta that lies low". So, no need to worry now about it, as long as it moves up where its suppose to be or a c-section it will be. That's like telling Florence she's not getting a raise.

I am taking it all in stride as much as I can because there is nothing I can do about it. I can't reach in and move my placenta up (that would hurt and be gross), so I will just have to wait.

Perhaps, in the meantime I can watch some of The Jeffersons reruns and laugh as poor Ralph the Doorman gets another door shut in his face with no tip or admire how George can pull off that smoking plaid jacket.

Hopefully soon I will finally get a piece of the placenta pie. (Wait.... you know what I mean)

Our Girl

21 weeks 4 days

Cesar and I are having a daughter! Wow, that has a whole different tone to it then just saying we are having a baby girl. Daughter sounds more serious. More "parental". I am more than halfway through my pregnancy and I don't know where the time has gone. Sure I had any-time-of-day sickness and back pain, but it really has been a great pregnancy compared to other women's stories. I wish I had something more in-depth to say this time around, but I am so happy right now and know everything will work out that I don't have much to write about. I just didn't want more time to go by without writing something. The last thing I have to say is that she is moving around a lot. It's a beautiful and surreal feeling her kicks and punches. I can't wait till they are strong enough for Cesar to feel them too. Yes, and she is a funny girl already. In her 20 week pic above she is kicking herself in the head :)

My pic: I am 5 months and 2 days

Pass the Salt N Peppa

18w 1 d

Yes, it's early to think of the collection of tracks that I will take to the hospital during labor. You know, music that is suppose to relax me while I am pushing out a human being into this world. 18 hours of music that is suppose to help me "focus" on my breathing and on the end task while strangers are looking at parts of me only Cesar has seen in the last 12 years, while they prod and poke and check me. Oh, that's what the music is for.

I do enjoy classical music, but I don't want music that will inspire me to drink wine and have a cigar. Give me something with a beat. Some music that will make me automatically move my hips and wiggle this baby out. I mean for those of you that have had the pleasure to see me dance you know that I love to dance. Mind you, I can't go as low on the Perculator as I did when I was 16 nor can I jump as high with the Roger Rabbit nor be on full speed with the Tracks, but I still like to shake what my mama gave me (and my 38 - well now 42 inch hips which have nothing to do with my mama)

So, I have complied a list of songs that I think will motivate me to sing (which sounds like yelling anyway), push, and accomplish bringing my baby into this world, who may come out dancing!

First Few Hours of Labor:

"Enjoy the Silence" Depeche Mode
"Hold on" Envogue
"Tonight's the Night" Redman
"Step by Step" NKOTB

Into the 10th - 15th Hours of Labor:

"Endless Night" Cynthia
"It's Bigger than Hip Hop" Dead Prez
"Bring Me to Life" Evanscence
"Adreneline Rush" Twista

Into the 18th and Final Stretch of Labor:

"I Will Survive" Gloria Gaynor
"Kick, Push" Lupe Fiasco

"Weak" SWV
"Hanging Tough" NKOTB

"Livin on a Prayer" Bon Jovi

The Final Push:

"Push It" Salt N Peppa

When we finally hold our baby:

"Here and Now" Luther Vandross
"Love of My Life" Erykah Badu
"The Right Stuff" NKOTB

(So, I couldn't find a pic of me dancing (thank God), so I added this one because I am craving chocolate cake. What?)

Clowns Not Allowed

17 weeks exactly

"....clown has tried to abduct children in four separate incidences." I woke up to a news anchor with a squeaky voice reporting on a man who has tried to lure children on the West and South sides with candy as he is dressed as a clown while driving a white van with broken windows.

Have I not told people for years that clowns are bad news? Any man (they are mostly men), that needs to put on heavy makeup, loose clothing and a wig to be around little children has something not right in their mind (this includes Michael Jackson). I have never liked clowns. I have, in fact, have a phobia of them. All I know is what I was told by my mother. When I was 6 months old, she took me to the circus and a clown came up to me to play with me. She said I began to scream and cry like I was being murdered and this in turn scared the clown off. Since then I don't like Ronald McDonald, Bozo, Cookie, circus clowns, carnival clowns, Insane Clown Posse, the movie "Killer Clowns" or Bobo the clown. There are three exceptions, however - Homey the clown and Krusty the clown, and the Joker but that's because they make me laugh and one I have seen without makeup, the other is a cartoon and the Joker is such a bad ass.

Anyway, so what do clowns have to do with this baby blog? Let me tell you. Cesar asked me many years ago if I would ever take our future kids to the circus. I immediately said no even though I have been called a clown by several people throughout the years for my silly outbursts and my smart ass remarks. Now, that I am with child will I change my mind?

If my wide-eyed, little child comes to me in their cute little sneakers and awed expression after seeing a commercial and asks me, "Mama, can we go to da circus, plees mama?" will I turn to lil' Cesar or lil' Cyn and say, "No, young one. I am afraid of those evil, serial killer, child predators, something-is-so-wrong-with-them with their large red shoes, matching plush nose that looks like a cut out Nerf ball and colorful, frizzy hair with strands that reach out like Medusa's snakes"? Will I really turn them down and hinder their growth, making them afraid of something they want to explore?

I will muster all my strength, be brave during this time of overcoming my fear and instead lovingly embrace my child, and with courage and bravery I will sweetly say, "Sure, baby. Your father will take you,"

Labor Pains

16w 6d

I dreamt last night that I was sharing a plate of banana foster with New Kids on the Block. After I woke up to pee for the 4th time, I dreamt that I was in a castle being chased by cannibalistic blonde children who climbed walls and had an appetite for me. Needless to say, the first dream was better than the latter.

Besides the leg cramps, heartburn, peeing 5 times a night and my back pain (which has been diagnosed as SI Joint Dysfunction), I wake up with thoughts about labor. Going into labor, being in labor, how am I suppose to push something the size of a watermelon out of something the size of a lemon? I have less than 5 months left until I have 18+ hours of intense labor and that is why I want an epidural. No, all natural for me. I say give me the drugs my friends. I wince when I get a paper cut, how am I suppose to push this baby out with no drugs?

This past weekend was the "Labor Pains Weekend". The weekend in which I spoke to several mothers who thought it would be educational (if not fun) to share their labor stories with me. The tearing, the intense pain that was 100 times worse than anything they had experienced before, and the "I am possessed" state. Yes, the state in which they bitched and became "possessed" with the staff and occasionally their husbands. They said it was like an out of body experience.

I try not to think about it during the day and most times I succeed, but it's when I am half asleep, making my way through the dim room to the bathroom that those thoughts creep up. It must be that when I get up from bed, my stomach feels so heavy. More than any other time of day and I am reminded that it's only going to get bigger and eventually have to come out. Yes, I know this is all common sense to you, but when it is actually happening it's a whole different feeling.

I am 17 weeks tomorrow. My baby can hear voices now, and the dog barking. He or she now has fingerprints, can sense light and stretches and sucks their thumb. Around 20 weeks I should feel the baby move. I can't wait. Besides Nov 7th when we find out the gender, I am looking forward to the baby kicking and reminding me that all that future labor is well worth the pain. I say then "Bring it on..... but give me the epidural first" :)

I Wonder

15w 6d

2:19AM
Wide awake listening to Cesar's heavy breathing as he sleeps and dreams of something and Olivia's stomach growling as she is apparently dreaming of food. I cannot sleep - again. I am just lying here, watching the shadows of the trees move slowly across the ceiling, the light from the moon shining on my face through the break of the curtains.

I am tired, but can't get comfortable. My mind races in curves, on the edge of cliffs, twisting and turning never hitting the brakes. I think of a fellow alum Michael Underwood, someone who is a great volunteer and a really nice guy who was attacked last week and is now in a coma. Someone hit him with a heavy object on his head and stole his wallet. I think of the incidents of students getting robbed, jumped, a couple getting their teeth knocked out and head shaved by some homeless people. How all this has happened around where I work. How I am a little freaked out now since I walk to and from the train. Most of these incidents happened during the day. No time is safe.

I cry thinking of the 17 year old girl that got shot on the bus because two punks bumped into each other and started shooting. She was innocent in it all and shot in the head. Imagine how scared she must have been as she saw it going down. I saw her mother on the news crying asking someone to come forward. I have always felt bad and wondered why people do such crazy things, but this made me so sad. Imagine how much love you have for your baby already when it is just 6 weeks old in your womb. How much more you love your child when it is born, has a name, a face, a personality. To think that in an instance that could be taken all away. I can't contain myself.

Why are people this way? Why do people think that violence is the answer? I don't want my children to be fearful of the world for they need to experience it, but I also don't want them to be so trustworthy. I want them to make mistakes (and they will) because that's how they will grow, but not make such a horrible mistake that they grow up too fast. It's this balance that I don't know the formula to. I don't want to be too overprotective, but I don't want to hold them back.

I am not naive when it comes to violence. I have some very close people that have experienced traumatic moments by people they didn't know and I know people including myself that have experience traumatic moments by people we thought we could trust. However, lately it seems to be effecting me more. How am I suppose to protect my child from all of this? I know that I can't, but I have to as much as possible. I want to live in a world of change. A world in which good outweighs the bad and good people win. To provide my child a place in which they can grow and give back in a positive way because we chose to bring this child into the world and is it not our responsibility to raise respectful, caring and loving human beings that will stand up for what they believe in and try to make this world full of hatred and selfishness into something more? These kids on the street that take the lives of others like it was as easy as killing a bug - where are their parents? How were they raised? I know some "bad" kids actually change for the better. Hard lessons learned. But there are so many more that don't.

Thinking of the parents crying on the news, talking about their lost children, thinking of what kind of parent I will be as I lie here listening to the cars zoom by on this quiet night, I finally close my eyes and wish for sleep.

Welcome to the Jungle

Picture this. Tall massive trees, luscious green covering everything. Monkeys howling in the background, insects flying, crawling, gnawing. A tiger off in the distance with its cubs.

That's all I needed to look like an extra in Apocalypto. (If you haven't seen it you must). Here I stood, about to change into my pajamas, down to my underwear when I cross in front of my full view mirror and paused as I catch sight of myself. Like a baby that discovers its reflection for the first time, I stood there. Head titled to one side. I had on animal print underwear (don't laugh - they are Victoria's Secret), my protruding belly popped out, my dark hair, long and hanging in my face. Let's just say parts of me (ok all of me) is getting bigger, so I looked like one of those tribal women, with a large mouth, and only animal skin skirts to cover their lower half. I was tempted to go get my lip, tongue, ear, nose and belly pierced. To paint meticulous symbols on my face in bright colors. I'd fit right in.

If you have seen Apocolypto, the main female character is pregnant. She fights against her enemies, protects her cute small son, and delivers a baby all at once. Imagine having labor like that? In a dark cave filling up with cold rain, as you try to save your son and you and the baby from drowning. I suddenly felt powerful. I can do this pregancy thing. I can do this labor thing. I know it's only a movie, but before and even now in some places in the world, women still give birth with no drugs, in small villages, in.... the jungle.

After a minute of contemplation, in front of the mirror, as I rubbed my pot belly in circles and as goosebumps enveloped me, I reluctantly walked away, put on my pjs and proudly marched down the hall.....here comes

the Amazin...I mean Amazon Woman.

A New Pace

14w 4d


With my ever-growing belly, I find the need to slow down. I used to make The Flash look slow with my quick moves walking downtown, passing the old people with their canes, the ever slow tourists and bikers alike. Now, the old people give me the finger as they walk passed me.

I have always been an observant of people. They are walking stories and if you pay enough attention, they tell you by how they look and their behavior. I wrote this poem last year when I saw this old lady with sagging breasts, in a white Puma jumpsuit, neon pink Nike's to match her lipstick that ran off the corners of her wrinkled mouth. Her hair as white as the suit, high and round, teased beyond frizz like a birds nest, her hand getting lost in it like a plane through thick white clouds. That was all of 10 seconds. Now, I am forced to take time not only to get from point A to point B, but to pay attention to all the minute, yet equally as important points in between.

With cell phones, text messages, instant messaging, email, we get instant answers, products, contacts. Is that however, what we really want? I still write notes and letters to people and mail them out and I receive them. Isn't it nice when you receive a letter from a friend among the pile of bills? With life taking over, I understand the need for emails. "How are you?" "What are you up to?' "Hope we an get together soon." I am there with you. But what about having a long conversation on how we are really doing, making and hearing each other laugh or wiping a tear? How about actually getting together? And it doesn't have to cost anything. A game of Scrabble (my favorite), a museum tour, a walk in the park.

I am 30. I am not old by any means, but I have already lived 30 years of my life. Have I made those connections? The true connections that count? Not through email, or im, or texts. But through personal connections, where I have made memories that will last a lifetime? Has it been enough?

The slower I move now, the more I see. Those people who take time to walk a little slower, to cancel an "all important" meeting to hang out with a friend, or their spouse or their mom, that is what I want to be. Once the baby comes, I am sure it will be a lot harder to make those personal connections for I will be forming the most personal connection of all. But that doesn't mean, I don't want to be there. So, what can we both do about it now, because it goes both ways.

Are you willing to walk slower or will you let life race by?

Sleep?

14w 1 d

I find myself sleeping more restlessly now. Could it be the fear of sleeping on my back and cutting the blood off to the baby? So, each time I turn away from my left side and my body pillow, I wake myself. Could be that now my dreams which where vivid and intense to begin with has become what I didn't think they could ever be - even more vivid and intense? For example, I can't read nor watch the news anymore. I have had two incidents already, in which I read a story about a murder-suicide and that night I dreamt as if it happened to me. The other time, I read about terrorists and I dreamt I was taken hostage and then shot. I only want to hear happy news now. Have any?

I also wake up through-out the night. My eyes open wide, stare at the gray of the night, at nothing in particular since I can't see without my glasses, and wonder, "Will I be a good mother? The type of mother my child needs me to be?" and I will lay there, pondering all that I am, all that I will need to be to make my child a well-rounded human being that will contribute to this world. See, I find that most men worry about money. Will they have enough to provide food, clothes, shelter, education? Will they be able to buy the top stroller, the best diapers, put them in the best schools? Most women tend to worry about the upbringing. About the hugs after a fall, about the right way to discipline that will be firm but fair, about instilling in our children the need, desire and want to care, love and respect others. Together, there is a balance. Of course, women do worry about money, men about emotions, but we each take on one more than the other, so that we aren't all worrying about just one thing.

For the last 3 months and for the next 6, I can control my child's environment. I can protect him/her from almost anything. But then they enter the world, and the instinct to protect will be more than I can imagine now. All my feelings will be heighten. Love, fear, guilt, joy. My mind races with so many thoughts, that now they wake me. Knocking as I lay there wrapped around my pillow, saying "Hey. There is no rest now. Have you thought about this?" Perhaps, it's to prepare me for those other restless nights when 'lil Vargas cries for food, warmth, comfort. When they cry for me or Daddy. When they just want to be near us. To snuggle next to us. In between us, as we watch a movie with Olivia at our feet.

To those restless nights, I say "Welcome."

13 weeks & 2 days

I can't begin to express how ecstatic Cesar and I are about our pregnancy. I wish I would have started this blog sooner (I did start a journal at 4 weeks for the baby), but I finally decided to make time to write online. I want the people I care for the most to know what is happening without receiving countless of emails from me.

So, I found out I was pregnant at 4 weeks. The first one to find out was Olivia since she walked into the bathroom when the two lines began to appear on the stick. I didn't cry. I was more in shock. I mean, we had planned it, but still seeing those two lines was like, "Ummm... it's happened!" I told Cesar the next day (after confirming it with 2 more tests). I gave him a t-shirt that said, "Guess Who's Going to be a Dad?" with a man looking up at him. That whole moment was surreal. I had pictured it in my mind many times, but to finally tell him that we were going to have a baby was amazing. To know that in a few 6 months we will hold a being that is part of both of us, that I already love more than anything is the most incredible feeling.

We have been on a high ever since.

The ultrasound pictures above are of the baby at 12w and 1d.