Life in Raleigh: Day 2

Well, we are here and alive! There was one very long day of travel across the country that stressed me out to no end in advance of the trip. But by 1:00am Raleigh, N.C. time we were here alive and well, 1 bag and 2 naps short, but otherwise unscathed. In fact, I had literally laid awake nights worrying about going through security with my kids. I don’t trust my health or that of my unborn fetus to those backscatter-radiation-emitting-cancer-machines they have installed at PDX now (neither do several of the security personnel, btw.)(and I know many people reading this will think I’m kooky-crazy and overprotective, but whatever. Go through yourself, then, if it doesn’t worry you). I’ve traveled enough in the past few months to know that if you decline, which you’re allowed to do, they give you a thorough pat-down. Anyway, if I'M not going in the cancer-thingy, I’m CERTAINLY not sending my kids into it, and I can NOT imagine subjecting my child to a pat-down. I can’t even begin to extrapolate on how inappropriate I think it is to pat down a 5 year old girl, and how confusing it would be to try and help her understand the difference between appropriate and inappropriate crotch-groping (and don’t tell me they don’t touch your crotch. I’ve done many times: they do). I read the TSA guidelines on children, which included language to try and convince you they were going to try and avoid pat-downs, but they still say that anyone who declines the radiation-thingy is subject to a thorough pat-down, no matter their age. So here I was, fully prepared to have a show-down with security. We arrived at the airport really early just in case. And I was honestly prepared not to get on the plane, if need be.  

To PDX’s credit, they were very nice and accommodating. When we got up to security they wrangled us all together and we all went through the metal-detector, me and Jared holding the boys, Seville on her own... and THAT WAS IT! No discussions, no pat downs, no insistence on radiation-thingies, just that. I can’t tell you how relieved I was. Jared couldn’t have cared less, I think, except I think he was not looking forward to being the guy with the wife who was arguing with security about them touching her kids’ privates.  I mean, in retrospect, it seems obvious that this is how families with young children should be handled, but given the TSA rules and the stories you hear about old ladies being asked to remove diapers and whatnot, there was no way to know.

So, greatly relieved and with security behind us, the rest of the trip was mostly what you’d expect: Trying to keep kids entertained in a very very small space without irritating neighbors, trying to convince boys to nap (they didn’t), trying to find ways to feed people on airplane snacks and airport food (the carry-on we accidentally left on the plane during our layover had our snacks in it) (we got it back the next day). I have to share the thing we did for entertainment in case you ever travel with kids, something I got from my friend Kate:  I went to the dollar store and bought 8-10 little toys or activities for each child, put each one in a paper bag and stapled it shut. So once each hour we could get out a new “prize” and they could see what was inside.  We had coloring books, toy cars, stamp sets, pinwheels (that will twirl if you hold them up the airplane air vent, by the way), card games, puzzles, all kinds of dumb little toys that would entertain them for a few minutes at a time. We did this on our trip to Tennessee for my brother-in-law’s wedding last summer, and it worked out really well. We didn’t need to use them quite as much this time, since the kids were more interested in movies and interactive iphone games than 9 months ago, but still... parents take note.

We are renting a van at the moment, and starting to search for one to buy. Jared’s car hasn’t arrived yet - I don’t think it will for several more days. We are also in the process of buying a house, but it won’t close for 3 weeks, so we are staying in a townhome near the airport here. It’s fully furnished, and comes complete with 3 kids’ beds and a playroom full of toys. There’s even a pool across the way, that I might be able to take the kids to if I encase them completely in life-preserving paraphernalia. Maybe. It’s a great situation, in any case. We discovered that the temporary housing offered for families in our situation by companies really doesn’t accommodate kids very well, and is exorbitantly expensive - about the same as a nice hotel (we would have to pay for it ourselves). Jared found this place on Craigslist - some guy from Virginia owns it for visiting with his kids, but they are staying with him at his more permanent residence for the summer so he’s renting it out. We totally scored, and I’m so grateful.  The only downside is that it is 3 stories with nice, high ceilings but lots of stairs, which are already pretty hard on me this pregnant. But given everything else, it’s pretty amazingly perfect for us for now.

Tomorrow is the inspection on the house we’re buying, so we’ll see how that goes. I’ll admit to having some reservations about this purchase. It’s not the location or style I would have imagined myself in, but it may just be the best we can do for now. It’s actually a really fantastic home and property. Maybe just a little too big and nice for my immediate comfort level, if that makes any sense. There’s part of me that doesn’t like the idea of moving to a big house in the suburbs - I’d much rather live close-in in a modest house with “character” and “charm.” But our family is definitely growing to larger-than-average, which makes it harder to fit into a smaller house, and the areas I most love are, of course, quite expensive, so we’ll see what comes of things. I’ve ruled out the possibility of renting for a year and moving again - having just watched 15,000lbs of my stuff get packed up and hauled away, I can’t imagine that the difficulty and hassle of doing that myself in a year would be worth whatever extra mojo I could muster in finding a different house, so it’s now or never.  I have until Monday next week to be certain, so I’ll keep you posted.

It’s definitely HOT here! I’m not used to it at all, and so far I’m both delighted and apprehensive. At some moments I have totally loved that we can go outside without sweaters and see sunshine all day. Other times I just want to collapse in an air-conditioned room. It will probably take me some time to adjust, but overall I think I will really like being in a sunnier climate, if not the first hot, muggy, pregnant summer :)

We have treated the last couple of days like vacation, as much as we can, so the kids will have fun. We took them to a park and swimming yesterday. Today we went to the local children’s museum. The hot-dog-stand lady outside the museum asked me, “are these all your kids?” and then she asked, “are you gonna be done after the next one?” These are the types of things I hear that moms of many kids get asked, but it was a first for me. I guess 4 kids magically transports you into the realm of “weird lady with lots of kids” nowadays. Nobody batted an eye at 3. Now I feel like a walking commercial for birth control. Maybe I should come up with a snappy comeback: "Anything else you'd like to know about my personal life, my bedroom habits, or my reproductive health?" But I'm sure nobody means anything when they ask insensitive questions like that.

My camera is dead and it seems the cord maybe didn’t make it with us, so I can’t take any pictures for now. Not that pictures of our temporary townhouse would be very interesting.  Here are pictures of the house we are buying, if all goes through as planned. They are not good pictures at all, taken by the homeowner I assume (selling by owner), but you sort of get the idea. The best is the purple calla lily wallpaper in the "master font". Oh yeah baby.