Me & Maxine

Oh pregnancy. There are so many neat and wonderful things that happen to a woman's body and spirit when the miracle of life is growing in her womb.
And then, there's me when I'm pregnant.
My husband has so eloquently and carefully started referring to me as Maxine. Have you heard of Maxine? Well, if not, she's a Hallmark greeting card character that has a little, uh, shall we say, sass! She speaks her mind exactly the way she's thinking and doesn't really care two hoots what anybody else thinks.
Maxine might be a tad bit misunderstood, or at least that's how I feel when I'm pregnant. There's something about the filter over my mouth that goes bad. Let's say a "normal" person's filter would be fine enough to strain pulp from orange juice. Well, during the nine months of gestation, my filter starts to loose it's efficacy and soon it's only able to filter the equivalent of a manhole grate.
I'm not trying to be ugly. I'm not trying to make a point. I'm not even trying to push my "weight" around just to have my moment of getting what I want. There's something that just happens in my brain that cares less how it affects other people.

Not good. I know.
One time while working at FBA, my previous full-time and monetarily paying job, a male co-worker of mine and me were talking something work-related out. We had a pretty cordial and happy-go-lucky relationship, up until I got pregnant with Katherine. I don't remember what we were talking about, or what exactly was said, but he stopped in mid-sentence, looked at me through the corners of his eyes as if he'd never seen me before and cautiously said, "Listen, I'm not exactly sure what's happened to you, but when you are pregnant, you are, uh, a little, uh, spicy and mouthy."
Whatevah!

It must have been the same day during my break, that as I was walking across the parking lot of Wal-Mart in all of my 8 1/2 month pregnant glory, a retiree that had just moved down from "I own the world" acted like the waddling pregnant woman wearing a bright lime green sweater couldn't be seen and almost ran me over. I stopped traffic, turned square to him facing down the 2-ton vehicle, face bright red and declared loudly where everybody could hear, "Can you not see I'm trying to cross the road here?" while Vanna White-ing it by showcasing my larger than life physique.
Seriously, it wasn't like nobody noticed me.

But back to my man-hole grate size of a filter.

We had an aunt that we affectionately compared to Maxine also. Her name was Aunt R and she has left this earth to be with the Lord. (That's how us Southerners like to term it). Comparing her to Maxine was all done in jest and she embraced their similarities, but Aunt R was truly a cartoon character in real life.
It was a 10-12 times/day occurrence that Aunt R would take a drag from her Virginia Slim cig held delicately between her index and middle finger, and declare in her gruff smoker's voice, "Dammit!" It could have been over something as minute as her favorite show was over until next week, or the timer went off to alert her the cookies were done. Whatever it was, the response was always the same, "Dammit!"
Well, in addition to being compared to Maxine, Jim has also started comparing me to Aunt R. So much now seems to be THE END OF THE WORLD in my little mind and keeping it all in perspective is turning out to be an arduous task.
I'm even in the process of penning an email to my friends apologizing for my less-than-leadership response to a meeting I was co-leading last night. I wanted so badly to pull the whiners aside and say, "Seriously, nobody is forcing you to stay here. You don't like it, Leave!" Now, doesn't that sound like the leader Christ has called to be in this position. I think not. So, the fine particles that used to get trapped before, are now passing through along with all the crap the hurricane in my body has created.
There is one request I have. Pray. Pray for my husband to have the strength and wisdom to not send me off into public places without duct tape over my mouth. Pray for my children to have Godly wisdom in understanding their mother still loves them, just says some things that might be contrary to her previous ways of parenting. Pray for the Lord's hands to be gently placed over my mouth, with all fingers closed tightly to not let anything nasty spew forth. Pray for my friendships to endure my pregnancy, even when they had nothing to do with it.
I love my husband. I love my children. I love my friends and family and community. I just hope they can see past my mouth here lately and know, the old Kel will be back soon. Back to being concerned about everybody's feelings.
Amen