well, hi? how are ya? i totally missed you yesterday...

Our internet service was down all day yesterday. I had a lot of offline work to do, so it wasn't a loss. I spent way too much time turning this:

into this:
It's the background of a cover for a client's huge-to-me 5o-something page catalog which I can't think too much about or I get a little embryo of an anxiety attack in my gut. It's a bigger project than I've ever done, and I'm still wobbly on my InDesign feet, and it the dealine iscomingthisfastohmygods.

Meanwhile, in Molly Tooth Watch 2007, we have one still in the just-broken-through stage on the bottom, and a matching top one, as well as one you can see pretty well on the top, if you catch the 1/778678332 of a second glimpse you're allowed before she rebels. The nursing-biting has abated for now, so I no longer flinch every time she latches on.

In the land of me-separate-from-Molly, I keep getting compliments on my baby elephant post from people in real life, who I totally forgot read my blog. It's disorienting and yet very cool. The comments on the post were so encouraging and awesome. Thanks:)

Oh, I meant to post this on Thor's journal, but due to previously mentioned ISP tragedy, I didn't. And now I'm lazy, natch, so I'll postie here:

Happy Belated, L'il Bit:) Many awesome parties this spring. The Souster's "Irish twins*" will be 5 and 6 (holy shit!) in March/April, and Molly'll be a year (holy holy shit!) in May.

*Did I just use a racial slur? Am I allowed if I have a stray ancesetor or two from Ireland somewhere in the mix? What if I named my daughter Molly Shayne**? Does that help?

**Shayne is actually Hebrew (or Yiddish?) for "beautiful." See footer on blog. I was reading Prodigal Summer one very pregnant day, when I read an allusion to the poem, and I convinced Bu, aka Shane, that we had a new spelling (not Shane) for the Birdie's middle name. If we ever have a boy his middle name will be Heidi; it's only fair***.

***and now I stop being silly, and wishing I knew how to do actual footnotes to a blog entry, and get my ass back to work.

pulsate

Thordora's giving away an intriguing book about genetic mutations to a random reader who blogs about her/his own oddity. The post came a few days after a photoshoot with Bu when I noticed that I was always turning my arm away from the camera. I have had a tension between embracing the strangeness that is my body and wanting desperately to fade into the background. I've never made art about my birth defect, and it seemed like a perfect chance to explore it a little.
The photo Bu took is really beautiful I think, and it's weird how that surprises me. The digital collage is filled with personally empowering symbols... text from the Malleus Malleficarum, the book used by medieval witchfinders alludes to my neverending gothgirl delight that in more ignorant times my arm might have been called a "devil's mark." The Hindu god Ganesha is the patron Lord of the deformed and they served as priestesses in His temples. The mirror, a stormy sky, just moody layers. An atique ticket to a circus, because I love the idea of being freaky today. I'm showing you the simple file beneath, too- because I didn't want to hide under a Photoshop veil.

As far as genetics, there's never been a real answer. It kind of looks like Amniotic Band Syndrome, but I had some organ deformities too which can't be explained that way. I had a wall separating my uterus and vagina in two which had to be operated on. The scarring is a huge reason Molly's birth was complicated... I also have three kidneys. I remember waking in the night early in pregnancy in a cold terror that Molly would have my birth defects, and being so confused and confounded by feeling so scared. It seemed like that worry undermined my own sense of comfort with my body. When the nurse told me she saw one hand in her mouth and one by her side, then counted tiny shadowy fingers with me the relief was amazing.

When I was little, I thought my arm looked like a baby elephant, and it became a nickname, and later, another reason to love Ganesha.