Those rainy days of March

I've been thinking about the day we left Southern California twenty-nine years ago on March 15th in a rainstorm. It took us three days of driving to get here and it rained for a month after we arrived. I was in my eighth month of a very unpleasant pregnancy and developed phlebitis shortly afterwards.
My two little tykes were unsettled and unruly and I recall that I just sat on the couch and cried while they rampaged around the house. The carpet in the living room was a nasty orange shag and the windows were single-paned and cracked from the house being moved onto the lot. They were always covered with condensation and sometimes ice when it was really cold. Jeff had a low-paying job and was working nights. We had no bed (we had to leave it behind because there was no room on the moving truck) and were sleeping on the sofa bed. Money was almost an abstract concept.

Yes, things were dim indeed.

After a weary, dreary, month of March, the morning of April 14th dawned bright and sunny. Jeff was in the National Guard and was gone on his once-a-month weekend duty, but I had heard of a park that was nearby and decided to take my poor wee babes for a walk and a play. This, in spite of the fact that my legs were swollen and painful and I could hardly walk. We started up the road, and when I walk that route now, I shudder to think how long it took us to walk a hundred yards or so. There was no park in sight, so we stopped to ask a neighbour for directions. We were headed the wrong way, which made me want to cry, but we turned around and soldiered on, hobbling a few steps and then stopping to rest. We finally got to the park, although I have no memory of the kids actually playing. All I remember is the painful walk.

That night, I started labouring, probably a result of all that exercise. I sent Jeff off to his Guard duty in the morning, fully expecting to be in labour all day. Which I was, but the midwives called him home in the afternoon. By late evening, Annie made her appearance, all nine-and-a-half pounds of her. I had to push her out all the way to her dainty toes.

I spent the next week in bed with my legs raised above the level of my head, to encourage the blood clots to dissolve. Kind people from church brought us dinners and took Bethany and Jon home to play with their kids, but Jeff was tired and grumpy and I was tired and grumpy and I got annoyed with him for not taking care of me as well as I thought I deserved.

So if I get a little angsty this time of year,  you'll have to pardon me. The inevitable grey days of March somehow tickle my senses and pull me back to that first year in Oregon.

But the good part of it all is that, in spite of the frequent discouragement of that time of our lives, we stuck together and ....

Wait! That makes me think of a song!

Whoa-oh, whoa-oh, stuck like glue, You and me baby we're stuck like glue.
Listen to it. You'll be happy you did.

Melodies that get stuck up in your head. Oh yeah!