OBSESSED

I've always been an obsessive type. It takes all kinds in my book, so should it also in your book. They made a whole sitcom about it - it was called DIFF'RENT STROKES.

Anyway, my obsessions have never been cool. I have been obsessed with Egyptian cotton sheets, Nutella, Q-tips, gigantic Sharpies - that sort of thing. Never anything like "vintage childrens books" or "reading the classics". Always things that are a little too day-to-day or pedestrian to be considered interesting or cool.

My latest obsession is cloth diapers. Ugh. Who knew I was so lame? But, really. I am obsessed. I just think these new futuristic cloth diapers are the SHIT. I want to own millions of them in all the colors. They are so soft I want to put them all over my bed and roll around in them. They are better for the environment and now I don't have to worry about what that alien gel in disposables is doing to my babies body.

Oh, Fuzzi Bunz, let's get married.

Poop etiquette

Is there such a thing, you ask?

YES. Let's lay this out.

NO. NEVER.
Pooping while on the phone
Pooping while eating
Pooping and talking to a person in the next room

YES. GO AHEAD.
Pooping with the door open if it's just you and your spouse home
Pooping while reading Oprah magazine
Cursing while pooping because it can be so slow and such a waste of time

QUESTIONABLE
Emailing or blogging while pooping?
Playing Facebook games while pooping?
Applying makeup while pooping?

I need to get to the bottom of this (no pun intended. really.). I hate to poop. I feel like poop asks more of me than I am prepared to give. It takes too long. It's messy. There are so many things I would rather be doing. What do I get out of the deal? I need to go ahead and accept that pooping would be more enjoyable to me if I was able to blog or email or instant message on the toilet. But what's the etiquette here?

I think that having a "theme" (that being 'chelsea loves _______') could be one of the reasons I am struggling with this blog. Or maybe that's just an excuse? I don't know. Maybe if I just come here and write about whatever is going on, I will be more inclined to post. Here's hoping.

Thursday night my dear friend, Erik, came to visit from Colombus. It was so good to see him. I particularly love hanging out with friends from different times in my life now that I have Zoe. They are in just as much awe of her as I am and keep saying, "I can't believe you have a baby, " or "It's so weird that this is YOUR baby!" No one in my Kansas City life really gets it in the same way. People like Erik and Martinique and Paul all knew me as a sort of different version of myself. They knew me as the swingin' single Chicago gal that traveled a lot whose dreams were of a family of her own.

It's also fun to just sit and reminisce with an old friend. Old friends remember things that I forget. And I remember things they've forgotten. It's sort of like visiting your elementary school as an adult...as soon as you lay eyes on it, you're flooded with memories. In our case this weekend it was when Erik mentioned a totally weird restaurant in Chicago called Victory's Banner. We used to take Harrison, the little boy for whom I nannied, there for french toast. The waitstaff wore saris and Birkenstocks and one of the waitresses was incredibly short and it seemed quite possible that she was a mini Pema Chodron.

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Next weekend Zoe and I are going on our first airplane together. I was initially a little nervous about flying with her alone, but quickly eased up. We're like the fucking Wonder Twins. We kick so much ass together. I don't know what I was worried about.

We're going to New York City to visit Jess. She's really going through some difficult changes, but it's wonderful knowing that I can bring to her the little person that makes her the happiest. Zoe cheers her right up.

Completed unrelated to anything in this post: I have GOT to stop saying the word "super" when someone calls and tells me that my car is ready to be picked up or to remind me of a hair appointment. "Super" is just unacceptable. I don't know where the hell I picked it up, but it stops now.

Chelsea loves....her CSA

Do you know what a CSA is? I didn't until a few months ago. CSA stands for Community Supported Agriculture. But what it means to me, is this: I paid $25 to join (this gets me in, plus a few tote bags, a shirt and a cookbook), then every week of the summer I go to Hen House on Saturday mornings and pick up a bag of locally grown natural foods for which I pay $25. Best part is, I don't know what I'm going to get.

This week, my pick-up included a loaf of ciabatta, bok choy, bean sprouts, natural breakfast sausage, milk, eggs, sirloin steaks, fresh thyme and red lettuce.

I love this. It's a deal. It gets me incorporating new foods into our diet (we tend to eat A LOT of the same stuff 'round here). I am supporting our local farmers. And the surprise aspect really appeals to me.

Yessssss.

Chelsea loves....HOME.

I love home. After years and years of traveling and moving from city to city, it surprises me that I have turned into such a homebody. Maybe it's having a child. Who knows. But I love to be home.

We were away for a long weekend and it was a drag. Zoe got sick. I won't go into the details but I am just SO glad to be home.

Jessica Loves...Haircuts and eating ice cream sundaes

Well, I've decided that if you need to find a little sunshine, getting your haircut and then eating ice cream sundaes for 3 days straight is the way to go.

On the haircut front, I went for tiny bangs like Betty Page. On the sundae front I went vanilla ice ream with chocolate sauce and chopped peanuts. I would have preferred caramel, but sometimes, chocolate is just as magical.

Jessica Loves...Skydiving

So, yesterday I went skydiving. Let me write that again so you understand, YESTERDAY I WENT SKYDIVING.

It was one of the most intense and insane experiences of my whole life. It is rare, in these lives of ours, that we actually do something that is indescribable, and that's just what it is, indescribable. It makes you feel calm and confident and crazy and wonderful and excited and scared all at the same time. I am trying really hard to just remember each one of the feelings as I felt them. They are all wrapped up in butterflies and adrenaline.

Here are the sequence of events:

Upon arrival (I went to the Ranch) you hand over a contract that basically signs your life away, then you pay, then you wait. You wait and wait and watch as planes go up and parachuters come down, which is actually quite handy (it's useful to see other people landing, since you too will be landing...hopefully). It is completely and utterly insane to watch batches of people floating down through the sky and gently scooting to the ground. You get to a place in your head where you say "I get it. Let's go skydiving already". Once your group is called you suit up in intensely fluorescent jumpsuits with funny soft helmets and goggles and you meet your instructor.

My instructor was very cute, very european, and very into telling jokes like "It's my first time with a tandem jump, but I'm learning...we'll be ok". Then your face turns grey and he goes "hahah just kidding". Great. Jokes. About safety. And my life. Good.



The instructor goes over everything about how to jump out of the plane (at 13,000 feet), how you have to arc upwards, what to do during the free fall (which is one minute) and then once you pull the ripcord, how to steer, how to land, etc. You listen really carefully and then you think: I am not going to remember one word of that. BUT the best part is, you really don't have to and me, knowing me, said "You can go ahead and just do everything, I'll just worry about the jumping out part."

So we, my instructor and I, got on the plane first, there were probably about 22 people in total including my friends and their instructors, but since we got on first, that meant we jump out last. This can be good or bad depending on the type of person you are, for me, this was the best possible scenario. I've always needed one extra minute to acclimate.  The door to the plane rolls closed and you think "what the hell am I doing? I am clearly and totally insane ." 

You find yourself  sitting right in front of your instructor, on these benches that you straddle. They hook your harness to theirs nice and tight, which feels surprisingly good, it's the security factor that you need at that moment..."at least I'm not doing this alone"...and then you have about a 20 minute long plane ride to endure while you go in big slow circles, up and up. Liken this to the uphill part of a roller coaster that lasts for 20 minutes. The butterflies in your stomach turn into bats which turn into some sort of small mammal which rips it's way out through your chest. Your heart is pounding like crazy as you attempt to laugh, make jokes and keep yourself from screaming your brains out that this is against every survival instinct you have ever had in your life.

So then, just like that, 20 minutes is up. The door rolls open and the advanced solo divers jump right out. I started at that point to take HUGE DEEP BREATHS and to say "OH SHIT, OH SHIT, OH SHIT." 

I was so thrilled at that moment to be last; I got to observe everyone jumping out - the looks on their faces, the positions of their body, and that group mentality kicks in..."if they can do it, I can do it." We crouched our way to the edge of hte opening and there it is, a huge expanse of sky and land and NOTHING in between me and it. You rock back, forward, back and then....JUMP!

I hit the air and it was the most surreal feeling. It wasn't like falling, or how I expected falling to feel. Like one of my friends said "now I know all my falling dreams were wrong the whole time!" The instructor taps you on the shoulder, that's the part where you can start participating, I was all thumbs up, "I'm ok, you just do everything". I was too preoccupied from falling through the sky to check the altimeter and know when to pull the ripcord. I was feeling and hearing the wind, looking at the horizon and at the ground below. Then I felt it, the parachute opened and there I was gliding and floating through the air for 5 glorious minutes. My vocabulary in those minutes consisted of "WOW", "whooooooooooooo!", "this is incredible!!!" and then the instructor said "Jessica, welcome to my office!" Awesome. I love your office. 

We glided perfectly in to land and scooted right it on our butts and I had the most intense rush of my life. My face was glued into a smile for at least a half hour and the notion that I can do anything has not left me still.