How many boxes?

How many boxes does it take to hold all my stuff? Well, I guess we won't find that out anytime soon. How many boxes does it take to make R mention that the kitchen feels so empty? Just 1 (granted, it was pretty big) and a tiny start on box 2. How many rooms have to start feeling that empty before R will shut up about not agreeing with the pictures and instead tell me how fabulous they look? 3- kitchen, living room, bedroom. Not quite the answer I would want, considering there are only 2 other rooms in the house (Little H's room and the bathroom) and neither holds any significant amount of stuff. I, of course, made sure I packed the most obvious and likely to be missed items first (like the measuring cups and knife block). I was tired of fighting, I was too emotionally drained to fight to stay. So I did the only thing I could do, I accepted his choice. OK, so packing right in front of him, not allowing him to help, asking about so many random things ("do you want the tree-shaped kitchen timer?" "how about the box of extra toothpicks?"), that was a bit passive-aggressive. But, it did accomplish the desired result: R making the choice to work on our marriage without me begging him or forcing him. Whether I manipulated the situation or not makes little difference, he feels happy with his decision.

5 boxes to unpack today. 1 is clothes, 1 is mostly books, 1 is kitchen stuff, 1 has 3-4 kitchen items in it, and the last contains the bouquets from our wedding. The flowers were all fake, I had them put up on the wall for a while, the only real decoration we had for 4 months (until we got the clock a month ago, that really was a big excitement). R wants to finally take down the Christmas lights around the ceiling. I like having them up, it's convenient to be able to light the entire front half of the house from just one plug. OK, the plug is behind the couch and so we have to move that to plug/unplug, and they're not up evenly or even that prettily, but sometimes I don't want to use 2 lamps and 2 overhead lights to make it less dark. Oh well, minor concession on my part. As long as he takes them down carefully and winds them up carefully so that I don't have to spend 4 hours untangling when it comes time to put them up this winter.

Even after we've decided to work hard on this, even after all the tears and the good night we had (bought Ea.ster supplies for Little H and a couple things to mail to my cousin in A.ustralia, got a nice massage that was very much needed after several nights sleeping on the couch, that kind of stuff), unpacking is stressful. After a few days in limbo, I'm stuck feeling indifferent. I am more relaxed, I did actually sleep well last night, I finally ate without feeling like I was going to hurl, I brushed my teeth and actually cared while I was doing it. But the rest of it, I'm not feeling much anything for. I have no desire to do the dishes, no drive to make my home beautiful and clean again. I don't care if my laundry gets done, I'm staying in my pajamas for a few days anyway. I feel a bit of relief, but I don't want things to "get back to normal." That normal is what got us where we were, but it's also the only kind of routine we have. I have no expectations, just a little bit of hope. 2 1/2 years of infertility have taught me how to have just enough guarded hope to not be depressed, but little enough that I don't get broken by the next upset. Not a personality trait I ever wanted to be grateful for or proud of.

Little H will be here tomorrow night. We have big plans for the week: Tuesday video games and reuniting with the toys he has here, Wednesday video games with dad (R has bible study Tuesday night, so they won't have as much quality time available then) and any spring break homework (gives him plenty of time to ignore school, but not long enough that he can't remember what needs to be done or how to do it), Thursday boil and decorate eggs for Ea.ster (we got a Spon.gebob decorating kit, the cardboard rings are the bottom half of the characters and there are those fun shrinky plastic ring things that are the top half), Friday afternoon is early Ea.ster (we'll all go outside and play, Mama Roy will have to "go potty" and run inside for a minute, when we all come in, the bunny will have magically stopped by while we were playing with the dog), and he goes home at some point after that (the details with that are yet undiscussed). Busy week.

Time to get started with staying, we're going to need a lot of the stuff that belongs to me this week, and it's unusable when it's packed in a box. It will take a long time to come back from this, to trust and understand and listen again. I'm glad I'll have somewhere to turn during this journey, a whole world to escape into, a place to get out my feelings without having to effect R until I figure them out.

On the IF front: one of the pictures is me on my side, sheet draped across my groin. R wants a picture just like it with my pregnant belly instead of a flat one. He talked about it for an hour yesterday, he's desperate to have a baby once we start trying again (we're still taking a break till 2008, no plans to change that part of it, but he is now as desperate for a child as I am, completely willing to jerk in as many cups as I ask him to and spend thousands of dollars on doctors our insurance says we can't see). He's never been proactive about IF before, it's one fabulous change. Little H just had to get old enough to be fun, now R is wondering what he's missing during the week when Little H is at his mom's, and he's wondering how much really great stuff he missed out on before now. Sad that he had to miss so much before he realised he was missing anything, but it's awesome seeing how into being a dad he is. Definitely the man I want to inject myself and have dozens of internal ultrasounds for (hmmm, I wonder how fertile girls decide if a guy is worth it? maybe that's why "we" question them so much, because their only qualification for the father of their child is somebody they'd be willing to have sex with... save that thought for another time, I think I should devote a blog to it, when I'm ready)