...an Argentine Tango.

I love that dance. Have you seen it? Argentine Tango

This dance requires complete connection with your partner. Feet so close and so intertwined at times that one wrong move would lead to a pile of body and limbs on the floor. It is breathtaking to watch.

Wikipedia says this, "Argentine tango is a new orientation of couple dancing. As most dances have a rational-pattern which can be predicted by the follower, the ballast of previous perceptions about strict rules has to be thrown overboard and replaced by a real communication contact, creating a direct non-verbal dialogue. A tango is a living act in the moment as it happens." I like this description. It is so much more than steps to follow. So much more than footprint diagrams showing you where to step next. It is not about "dancing". It is about being that act of dancing.

I have a new dance partner. She and I have only been dancing together for just over a year. At first we were all left feet and I, quite frankly, did not feel the least bit graceful. I was still enjoying very much the fluid and effortless footwork with my dance partner of 5 years. I wasn't sure if I was ready for another one. It had taken all of those 5 years to perfect some of the steps with her. We were starting to take on more challenging footwork some days or enjoying the ease of something familiar on others. Did I really want to start from square one again? But after a rough start and a lot of resistance on my part we just clicked one day. It took about 7 months before I found that I felt really beautiful as we swayed together in our nested embrace. We had shifted from "gestating" to "being the act of gestation". Together we were a whirling dervish of growth and creation. Culminating in the wildest, most frenetic dance of our lives on the day we met. Now with 5 months of face to face dancing under our belts I am happy to report that we are just as clumsy as ever some days and as skillful and agile as professionals on others. It helps when we both pick the same dance of course. Sometimes I am in the mood for a waltz or a foxtrot but Lola is all revved up for a quickstep or jitterbug. The roles reverse just as frequently too. But it truly does feel like one, long, seamless (or attempt at seamless) dance. Each move by one of us having a direct impact on the other. We ebb and flow, sway and shuffle... It isn't always pretty but it works. Now that we are a family of four it gets complicated. I guess on a good day we get quite the hoedown going. Our unconventional square dance is a sight to behold. But most days I think it looks like more of a mosh pit.

I find that at any given time I have a good groove going with one of my dance partners and the others are a bit awkward. One day maybe I will become skillful enough to dance with all three of my partners with grace and endurance, simultaneously. For now I will dance with wild abandon. I will feel the beat deep in my bones and create a rhythm that rocks our love-filled home.

...an R.S.V.P.

When Dave and I were planning our wedding 15 years ago we sent invitations to a lot of people we knew would not attend. We were planning an outdoor, white tent, casual reception to celebrate our marriage that had begun in January of that year at a very intimate ceremony. It would take place at my parents acreage in Canada, while the vast majority of David's friends and family were in Scotland. He had only decided to stay here a few months prior when I swept him off his feet...but that's another story. In response to our invitation most of the guests from Scotland went out and bought RSVP cards to mail back to us. One special person in particular sent us a card to express her dismay at not being able to attend.

Winnie Huggins lived across the street from David in Aberdeen. She had been there as long as they had lived on Craigton Road (since David was three). She was a spinster and didn't have family living near. So David and his parents did what they could to help her out. Fetching groceries, taking her to appointments and David's job was to fill her coal bucket from the bin outside. She wasn't a demure and sweet old lady. She had feist. When David told me about her I knew she would be a kindred spirit. Cranky, spirited, mischievous and with a touch of soft and gooey on the inside. She had a string of cats, all named Fluffy and all as cranky as her! She lived in a large old house on a piece of land that was owned by the city council and when they approached her to give notice of eviction so that they could build a seniors residence she fought them tooth and nail. In the end they agreed to build her a new residence on the property and consider her under their care. She suffered from diabetes and had a lot of trouble with her legs. She'd had multiple surgeries and treatments but healing was slow or non existent and she was unable to get around very well. Dave went over to check on her one afternoon and she didn't answer the door. Of course it was locked and he was forced to break in a window to make sure she was ok. She had fallen and as procedure dictated he notified her caregivers who in turn called an ambulance. When they arrived she was quite dismayed with all of the hubbub. Not only did she insist that the paramedics get the hell off her property but they should have David arrested for breaking into her home. I couldn't wait to meet her.

Her RSVP to our wedding invitation read "It would give me great pleasure to see you both thoroughly engaged in matrimony" but naturally she would have to decline. Those words "thoroughly engaged in matrimony" became emblazoned in my memory. I was completely smitten by this woman and the depth in which she could describe our union. She seemed truly delighted that David had found matrimonially bliss. In fact there was almost a cheekiness to her response. As if she was taunting us. I loved it! Winnie passed away two years later, only months before my first trip to Scotland. I never got to meet her.

6 years ago we were anticipating the birth of our daughter. We didn't know she would be a "she" so we had lists of names to consider of both gender. On our list of girl names we included Winnie. It had been on the list for years to be truthful. In the end we settled on Meg (the name of another dear old friend in Scotland). We had tried to work Winnie into the name but somehow it just didn't fit. We have a new list of names (of both genders) as we await the arrival of this baby. I have revisited many of the names we considered 6 years ago. And when thinking about Winnie I was reminded of that RSVP. "...thoroughly engaged in matrimony..." It made me think about this ritual of marriage. This need to be honoured and seen as you make the tranformative journey from bride to wife, from groom to husnband. To have all of the people that have helped to shape you come together to bare witness to this shift in your life's path. As if not having them there would leave them behind in your old life and not give them the frame of reference to journey forth with you and your spouse as you forge ahead in partnership. As a society our reverence for this ritual has wained. I wish we honoured it more "thoroughly" on a soul level.

The next rite of passage for most couples after marriage is the journey to becoming parents. This incredible time of tranformation, unfolding and growth is now most often marked by medical-like notations in a baby book and a baby shower to play silly games and place wagers on the sex and weight of the new arrival. Most times leaving the father completely out of the picture. I am craving something different. I am wanting to connect with everyone that has seen me unfold as a mother over the last 6 years. I am hungry to have people dear to me bare witness to me as I am "thoruoghly engaged" in gestation. I want all of the people I love to admire my ripening body and see that at 36 I have found the youth and innocence of a maiden once again. I want to connect to this energy and ensure that I bring these people forward with me as I journey onwards from here.

...something that is urgent-ish.

Last week my midwife scared me. Normally not a sentence one utters. Midwives are not generally very scary people or people that raise undo concern. I love my midwife and I am quite certain that her induction of panic in me was completely unintentional. I have been watching the days tick by with painstaking sluggishness over the last 7 months. In some ways I have been wishing this time away. Hoping for the end to come into clear sight before I lost my mind with the feeling of being unwell all the time. But now the days seem to be slipping from my grasp at an alarming rate. So last week when my midwife reminded me that I was very nearly 33 weeks and wow, next visit I would be approaching the 5 week countdown... I kinda freaked out. So now I have been fitting as many appointments as possible into my weeks, trying to sort out as much as I can at work and making a list of the must-have-done things around the house. Thank goodness my energy level is up but now with any prolonged activity my belly is one big contraction ball. Oy! I think I will be hopelessly unprepared when this baby arrives but I gave over to the idea of unpreparedness over 5 years ago when we welcomed the first small soul into our lives.

I have been lamenting that I have "done nothing" for this baby. I have not spent a lot of time reflecting romantically on the miracle of life. I have not sought out soulful prenatal preparation, even though it is something that I offer to parents and highly recommend. I have not been to the chiropractor weekly and the massage therapist monthly to nurture my growing and shifting body. I have not made any physical preparation to my home to accommodate for our change in lifestyle. I haven't even begun to prepare my homebirth supplies or got a hold of a car seat. I wasn't feeling terribly guilty about any of this either but slightly apologetic. Now I have come to believe that this is the way that this baby is supposed to arrive. I have stopped doing what I think "should" be done in this time of gestating a new life for my family. Instead my lack of "focus" is allowing me to attend to what ever is coming through to me at any given time. I think this is why I have had no resistance to my changing and overwhelmingly beautiful relationship with my first born over the last few months. I may have missed this incredible time in our lives if I had been fully immersed in my pregnancy and preparations for birth. Perhaps this is the soulful preparation I needed to ignite my mother spirit once again...