Thoughts Over Breakfast

As the surgery draws nearer, I am more and more content with the decision to undergo it. Every time I am on my feet for more than an hour, something bad happens (popping, locking up) and then I have to go rest it. So our house is pretty dirty right now. Tidy, mostly, but not clean. And Mama is a cranky, snarly person most of the time. I do not deal with ongoing inconvenience very gracefully, that much has become clear. I obviously need to work on this area of my character.
But all that was to simply say: I am actually feeling excited about going in for surgery on Friday. Not so much for the spinal and the sedatives and the being vaguely aware that people are threading tiny little scopes into my leg and all that, but for the end result, of walking around and feeling normal and not appearing like a bloated eighty-five year old with gout.
Here's the only thing I am truly dreading: Not eating prior to the surgery. I know, I know, how shallow am I? But this is a big deal for a pregnant lady, and if the surgery is in the afternoon, which it still might be, I could be sitting around in a hospital johnny watching horrible daytime TV and starving for half a day! This is a more gruesome prospect than any blood drawing or IV insertion.
I am in an unusually good mood this morning. The sun is shining, and I have the back door open to let in the sound of the breeze and the birds and our neighbor's wind chime. I am eating eggs and toast and juice, and I am also blissfully alone. For once, the other members of my family are sleeping in and I was the one who woke up ready to start the day. Jim is enjoying the rare novelty of sleeping in on a Monday, I'm sure.
He is home because we have a funeral to go to later this morning- my grandmother's, which is sad for me in a wistful, "now this era of my life is over" kind of way, but not in the heartbroken way that my grandpa's death hit me. I am glad they are together again, for one thing. And I am glad she's not in pain anymore and will have her mind restored to her. I am glad she will not be lying, incoherent, in a nursing home bed for years and years to come. Her passing almost feels peaceful, like closure. But I am sorry to not have grandparents anymore. She was my last one, and I feel oddly adrift, even though she and I were not especially close. I feel like my childhood is completely ended now (I know, I know- I think that door was shut a while ago, like when I had my own child!)
I remember I was pregnant when Jim's grandma died, too. It feels comforting to me to be bringing a new life into the world as I say goodbye to an old one. This morning, I laid in bed for a few minutes to enjoy the baby's movements. A few of them I could swear I felt from the outside, so I grabbed Jim's hand and pressed it against the bump. "I think that's a hand!" I whispered. "Can you feel it?" Now, we have done this routine several times over the last couple of weeks, but this morning it actually happened, and Jim got to feel his son for the first time. It's such a magical thing. I got big time de ja vu remembering the first time he felt Adelay, also in bed in the morning. I wonder how many more times we will get to experience this particular first of a child's life?
I think I must go wake everyone up now, but I'm really enjoying the solitude. Maybe I'll have to start trying to get up before everyone else on the weekends or something to soak up a little sun and alone time more often.