Welcome back to Show and Tell. Everyone is welcome to join, even if you have never posted before and just found out about Show and Tell for the first time today. In fact, we hope you do go back to your blog and post your own Show and Tell item and then return with the link to your post. Details on how to participate are located at the bottom of this post.

Let’s begin.

I met Karen from Chookooloonks at BlogHer and she asked why I wasn’t participating in Shutter Sisters. “I don’t have a great camera like you guys,” I said, showing her my Canon.

“But this is the same camera that Kate uses,” she said.

“But my pictures never look gorgeous like Kate’s!” I exclaimed.

“Do you know how to use the camera?” she asked.

“No,” I admitted.

So I actually opened the manual and began fiddling around with buttons and I’ve started to learn. First stop, these action shots of water at a fountain outside a museum in Washington, D.C.

What are you showing today?

Want to bring something to Show and Tell?

• If you would like to join circle time and show something to the class, simply post each Sunday (or earlier in the weekend or on Monday if you can’t do Sunday), hopefully including a picture if possible, and telling us about your item. It can be anything–a photo from a trip, a picture of the dress you bought this week, a random image from an old yearbook showing a person you miss. It doesn’t need to contain a picture if you can’t get a picture–you can simply tell a story about a single item.
• Label your post “Show and Tell” each week and then come back here and add the permalink in the comments section below (make sure you don’t just comment that you participated: add a link to your blog in your comment so people can click over). I post a new Show and Tell post every Saturday night or Sunday. I usually move people up into the body of the post every few hours.
• Oh, and then the point is that you click through all of your classmates and see what they are showing this week.
• If you want it…
  I
  ‘ve now placed a Show and Tell archive on the sidebar that will be updated each week in case you miss it. And click here for the icon code if you wish to have it for your blog. It links to the archives.

Has it been unusually quiet this week? I had to declare bankruptcy with Google Reader and start over after last weekend. And there have been no posts. Okay, there have been some posts, but there haven’t been the numerous posts that piled up during the final two weeks of August. Were a lot of people taking last vacations this week? I thought everything usually went back to normal after the first of September.

I’m just looking around, a little confused.

Children mentioned in this post about writing…

The night I finished the book, the Wolvog threw a tantrum during tuck-in and we had to follow through with the consequences which meant that I didn’t sing his goodnight song. This has only happened maybe once or twice before and it was terrible timing to have it happen on a night where my heart felt so raw.

I finished the final chapter edit and wrote the epilogue. I’ve never liked the last page of a book. I’m really not a fan of having a book end. So I wrote the last page to be an open moment, where the reader and the writer (who is who? Truly–since so many readers contributed to the book and were the writer and I felt like I learned just as much as someone reading the book) can sit together indefinitely on a final thought that needs to be considered in every moment of every day.

I went downstairs to get Josh to read the epilogue and then slipped into the twins’ room, intending just to give the Wolvog a kiss. But he was still awake, silently watching me while I stroked his head.

We climbed into the glider and he rested his head against my shoulder and we both closed our eyes. And my heart broke into 1000 thousand tiny shards. It literally exploded inside my chest. Because the glider felt like a boat and I had just written all of these pages about this fictive island–the Land of If–and it felt like by writing that epilogue, I was somehow rowing away even if not really. At least I was sailing around the island, sea monsters be damned, even if my plan is to remain on this island for longer.

Whether we get to add to our family or not, this is my home.

I had a long cry in the glider and then returned him to his bed and had a longer cry with Josh. I have been living in these two hard lands–the Land of If and the Land of Not Write (oh, you know this place–where you’re not writing because everyone is saying “not right, not right” about your work)–for so long. And they both suck. The Land of If sucks a little harder, but suckage is suckage.

Josh and I are both writers so we often get the question whether we think the twins will grow up to be writers. And, on one hand, how can I tell them not to aim for this when I know the highs are so high? Signing the agency agreement, selling the book, turning in the final page–it feels so good. It feels good in a way that I could never get from teaching. But the lows? The rejection letters and the unreturned emails and the “not rights“? Those lows are so low. They are so incredibly painful because they are not just a rejection of your work, but they are a little rejection of you.

Both lands not only share a play-on-words (not write/not right or infertility (IF)/what if) but also a lot of failure and rejection and hope and ecstasy and despair and frustration and anger and love. We all spend time wondering why we live where we figuratively live.

Am I glad that I kept at it with treatments to get the twins? Of course, from a place of success, I can say the journey was worth it. I could not imagine my life without them specifically. I could not imagine my life without parenthood. But what if we weren’t here because truly, you and I both know that it’s “there but for the grace of G-d go I.” It is too easy in the Land of If to not see your hard work pay off. And I certainly don’t think emotionally I could have written the book before they arrived. The advice I give in the book is all the advice I wish I had followed and didn’t. It’s what I wish I had known then so I didn’t lose myself so deeply. I really lost myself in the process.

Am I glad that I kept at it with writing and submitting to publish the book? Of course, from a place of success, I can say the journey was worth it. I could not imagine my life without writing. I didn’t have writing for years while we did treatments the first time and it’s hard to deny this huge part of myself. But what if the book hadn’t been published because you and I both know that it’s “there but for the grace of G-d go I.” It is too easy with publishing and the Land of Not Write to not see your hard work pay off. I have tossed around this thought of what if I had given up. And just not kept at it. And not plugged away. And not taken the rejections on the cheek. Would things have been better overall? How would I feel to live my life in the middle–without the low lows, but also, without the high highs?

For me, writing and infertility are so intertwined. I stopped writing when we started trying to have a child. I started writing after we were successful. And I wrote the book for them. So they can one day understand what the Land of If feels like–what we went through to have them or how we felt or what we thought.

For me, I can say that it is worth living in both places simply because of the people I meet. In the Land of Not Write, there are all these bizarre nooks and crannies where different people wave out–some who helped me along the way and stepped back and some who are these huge presences who have influenced my life or certain projects greatly.

It was worth plugging away at this because I got to meet these incredible women at Seal and forge this friendship (I hope?) with Wendy, my editor (I hope we stay in touch because she has this fantastic ability to put into words exactly what she needs or wants and that translates out not only to being a great editor able to structure a book, but also a great communicator for debating the upcoming election or simply discussing the fine qualities of the Wonder Pets), and connect with my agent who is brilliant and comforting (and knows how to handle my anxious ass). It was worth plugging away simply to meet them and have our lives bump into one another. Once I write it, you will see this crazy path of choices that brought me here. And the roads not taken, they could have been equally cool. But I doubt that. Meeting the women I just mentioned were well worth the choices (and this does not even touch upon the incredible writers that this project has connected me with through the last two years).

And, of course, some of those choices brought me to Josh. Would he have fallen in love with me if we hadn’t shared an intense love of the Long Room at Trinity College? And would we have shared that intense love if we weren’t both writers? I cannot imagine my life without him so I guess the answer is that dealing with the low lows is worth it. He gave me this writing space–he created this writing space for me so I could feel the high highs that he had already felt from writing–and maintained this writing space. I don’t know if I can properly thank him with words and I hope that he can see from the expression on my face when I look at him the intense gratitude I feel to be married to him.

Of course, if not for writing, I would not have Josh and if not for infertility, I would not have the twins. I would have had other children…older children…but not these children. And those roads not taken (as well as the ones taken from me), would they have filled my heart the same way? I’ll never know. I think what is amazing about life is the way our hearts come to peace and fit around the choices we make (if not instantly, then with time). We can find the good in our individual choices. I am thankful that each of us will find the right path out of the Land of If. This one worked for me, and I’m well aware that it would not have worked for everyone.

Trying to walk someone else’s path is just about the most dangerous thing you can do; only behind not walking your own path.

Simultaneously, not taking time to try to understand someone else’s path is just about the most dangerous thing you can do; only behind not honouring and accepti
ng your own path.

By all this I mean that I could have had a fantastic life very different from this one if I had not kept going on the paths that brought me here. But I only know the one I have and I am grateful not only for the choices I made but for the people who helped me get to those choices. And, at the same time, I have only the deepest respect for the other paths people have chosen that I have seen–both in honouring themselves in the Land of Not Write and in honouring themselves in the Land of If. I can see the peace that exists for others in the other choices.

It is strange to feel gratitude towards the hard paths. Towards paths that have such deep rejection and disappointment embedded in each stone. But I am grateful for writing and I am also grateful (in a strange way by which I mean grateful may not be the right term) for infertility.

If not for infertility, I would have never met all of you in the Land of If.

I thanked all of you in the acknowledgments page, but since the book won’t be out for a bit, I want to thank you here and now. This book was literary stone soup. I brought this rock–this idea–and dropped it in the pot. And everyone added this and that to the pot until we had this really amazing soup that is emotionally nourishing and strengthening. I didn’t want to write a book any other way. Stone soup is who I am–for me, it is always about community. Taking care of community and drawing strength from community.

Therefore, thank you. For being my community and for letting me be yours. I took care of your stories–I was so grateful to be entrusted with them that I carried them through the book as if they were porcelain. My only sadness is that a lot of quotations were cut due to space. But what can you do?

I am trying to get my life back on track (I am so sorry about sucking so hardcore with email. And seriously, I am debating whether or not to take pictures of my front hall) and then jumping into the next book. Again, about infertility/adoption/loss. So nothing is really going to change around here. I built the website I wanted back when we were trying the first time, and I wrote the book I wanted to read when I was trying the first time, and now, I will attempt to write the other book I wished existed. I hope you’ll throw in your carrots and cabbage again.

And now, with so much time on my hands again, I plan on driving you insane with all sorts of projects.

Please stick around.

Still coming up: thoughts on the twins starting school for the first time, how I came to wear the turkey cutlet to my friend’s wedding, and the bizarre path that brought me from a box of tampons to the book that contains all of your stories. But for now, breathe.

Lori has launched Perfect Moment Mondays (fine, fine, I’m a little late). Click over to read other perfect moments and add your own.

My perfect moment this week came when the curtains opened in the back of the room and my best friend came out to walk down the aisle. I had seen her for hours in her wedding gown, but that moment, standing alone at the back of the room, about to walk down the aisle, still made me stop breathing. She was so beautiful and there was this stillness, this peace, in the length of air between the bride and groom.

The other perfect moment came after the snap of the glass under the groom’s foot, the long kiss, and the recessional down the aisle where we all went clapping to the beat of the music. It was that kind of joy.

The new list for October will open on October 1st. Please check back then to add yourself to the month of October. This list is currently closed and IComLeavWe is running.

Welcome back to IComLeavWe. It stands for International Comment Leaving Week, but if you say it aloud, doesn’t it sounds like “I come; [but] leave [as a] we”? And that’s sort of the point. Blogging is a conversation and comments should be honoured and encouraged. I like to say that comments are the new hug–a way of saying hello, giving comfort, leaving congratulations.

Here is the vital information, pure and simple (a more detailed set of rules follows below the list):

• The list opens the 1st of every month (I know I’m posting this a day early this month…long story). It remains open until the 21st. You can add yourself at any point. The list is open to everyone in the blogosphere–blog writers and/or blog readers.
• Add yourself to the list by leaving in the comment section your blog name, blog url, and three words that describe what you blog about most often.

• I move the information from the comment section into the post (usually within 24 hours).
• Click here to cut-and-paste this bit of code to add to your sidebar (if you have the old code from another month, remove it and replace it with this one).
• Commenting kicks off every month on the 21st. Please mark it somewhere (calendar, post-it note taped to your computer…). Commenting week runs from the 21st to the 28th. Every day, leave 5 comments and return 1 comment for a total of 6 comments. You are highly encouraged to choose the blogs you comment on from the participants list below, but this is not required.
• Read below if you want to find out about Iron Commentors.
• The commenting ends on the 28th. We catch out breath and the whole thing starts again the next month on the 1st. Drop in and out according to what is happening in your life between the 21st and the 28th.

1. Stirrup Queens (infertility, twins, books)
2. Baby Smiling in Back Seat (infertility, IVF, pottery)
3. Life After Infertility and Loss (recurrent loss, parenting, hysterectomy)
4. Sticky Feet (parenting after IVF, cooking, life)
5. Our Surrogacy Adventure (surrogacy, infertility, ramblings)
6. Conceive This (infertility, cynicism, ridicule)
7. In Due Time (infertility, PCOS, life)
8. IVF Land on Surrogacy World (intended father, surrogacy, IVF)
9. A Tale of Two Surro’s (surrogacy, intended parents, IVF)
10. Stop the Train I Wanna Get Off (IF, school, family)
11. The Fertile Infertile (family, infertility, crafts)
12. Production, Not Reproduction (adoption, parenting)
13. This is my Truth, Tell me Yours (current affairs, randomness, personal)
14. Just Me (infertility, life)
15. Get Pregnant (infertility, miscarriage, life)
16. Musings of a Teacher (TTC, life, faith)
17. The Not So Secret Life Of Us (infertility, recurrent pregnancy loss, emigration)
18. Creating New Life Not As Easy As It Seems (infertility, endo, miscarriage)
19. Jenn’s Journal (parenting, twins, secondary infertility)
20. Vikki Press (cooper, infertility, stuff)
21. Communique (infertility, life)
22. Crazy Lady Ramblings (IVF, exercise, life)
23. The Idle Mind Of Beth (infertility, aging parents, life changes)
24. Mrs Spock (infertility, parenting, health)
25. Who Shot My Stork? (infertility, whining, broke-edness)
26. Isn’t TTC Supposed To Be Fun? (pregnancy loss, TTC, life)
27. Helping Make Sense (infertility, IVF, failed cycles)
28. Mommy Needs Therapy (special needs, parenting after IF, general angst)
29. Heeeeere Storkey, Storkey (twins, ttc, life)
30. The New Life of Nancy (infertility, pregnancy, sarcasm)
31. Ronda’s Rants (rants, faith, family)
32. Kicking You From the Inside (infertility, parenthood, life)
33. Out On Good Behavior (pregnancy, parenting, life)
34. The Saga of Becoming Fruitful (infertility, finance, cost)
35. Life in the White House (infertility, donor sperm, life)
36. Loving Thee… and more (kids, family, random thoughts)
37. None in the Oven (infertility, IUI, life)
38. ISO the Golden Egg (IVF over 40, single mom by choice wanna be)
39. Different Is Always Good (fitness, life, politics)
40. What I Did for Love (infertility, loss, weight loss)
41. Blogfight (advice, debate, entertainment)
42. In Search of Biscuit 2.0 (secondary infertility, parenting, knitting)
43. One More Week (FET, high FSH, CCRM)
44. Something to Blog About (fostering, death of infant, adoption)
45. Life With the Georgia Reiniches (life, kids, random)
46. A Maybe Story (pregnancy loss, TTC, home decorating)
47. Bella And Her Fella (POF, infertility, dogs)
48. Our Journey to Baby (IVF #5, adoption, life)
49. Unquestionable Love (infertility, shopaholic, travel)
50. Nervous Breakdowns are Highly Underrated (parenting after IF, WAHM, life)
51. Off My Mind But From My Heart (adoption, kids)
52. Twin Peas (infertility, resources, premature birth)
53. Mom of 2 Dancers (daughters, reviews, crafts/scrapbooking)
54. Where Is That Special Water (RE fact finding, low sperm count, musings)
55. I Believe in Miracles (infertility, faith, weight loss)
56. Elusive BFP (infertility, life, TV)
57. Tales from Kiddyland (mothering, triplets, special needs)
58. Between the Lines (IVF, MFI, RPL)
59. Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Pregnancy (infertility, military life, random thoughts)
60. Eye Heart Internet (infertility, expat, France)
61. Blissful Body Yoga Blog (yoga, meditation, stress reduction)
62. From Such Great Heights (infertility, life, family)
63. Mommy Confessions (parenting, humor, longing for sanity)
64. Faithful Infertile (infertility, IVF, pregnancy)
65. Inner Musings of An Eclectic Pagan (life, rants, raves)
66. Raggedy Ann (infertility, motherhood, memories-from-across-the-sea)
67. Maybe I Will Have a Glass (infertility, beginnings, life)
68. My Hope My Faith My Love (infertility, secondary infertility)
69. Not The Path I Chose (secondary IF, RPL, life)
70. The Unfair Struggle (male-factor IF, life, friendship)
71. They Call Me Bobby (motherhood, homeschooling, opinions)
72. Elana’s Musings (pregnancy, twins, infertility)
73. Seriously? (pregnancy, personal thoughts)
74. Waiting on Life (infertility, IVF, life)
75. It Is Tuesday, Right? (new parenthood, snarkiness, IVF)
76. Beautiful Mess (life, friends, random)
77. I’d Blog That! (humor, daily life, randomosity)
78. Naturally Knocked Up (fertility, nutrition, PCOS)
79. The Daily Gratitude Blog (gratitude, nature, bliss)
80. Inconceivable (infertility, NOA, life)
81. Mustard Seed Baby (IVF, endo, faith)
82. Dreaming of Baby (pregnancy after m/c, relationships, life)
83. Reservado para Futura Mama (open adoption, parenting)
84. Mommy Wants Vodka (life, liberty, the pursuit of happiness)
85. A Soldier’s Girl (life!)
86. Emily the Hopeless (IVF, dogs, veganism)
87. Gotcha Baby (adoption, young children, randomness)
88. The Baby Dust Diaries (infertility, IVF, pregnancy)
89. Sippy Cups Are Not For Starbucks (life, sarcasm, mommyhood)
90. Volvo Driving Soccer Mom (family, life, random)
91. Surrogacy 101 (surrogacy, third party reproduction, infertility)
92. What am I? (infertility, miscarriage, culture shock!)
93. A Potpourri of My Life (surrogacy, intended mom, life)
94. Mom to Twins Plus One (parenting after IF, twins, crafts)
95. The Teal Designs Art Studio Blog (art & design, artists, crafts)
96. To Baby and Beyond (PCOS, miscarriage, infertility)
97. Hultman House (Texas, life, randomness)
98. That Grrl (rural ruins, photos, stick figures)
99. O’Irish Diplomacy (parenting/step-parenting, life, surrogacy)
100. Don’t Gel Too Soon (politics, pop culture, judaism)
101. My Life Crazy as it May Seem (everyday life, loss of a child, grieving)
102. Building Heavenly Bridges (stillbirth, parenting after loss, writing books)
103. The Maniacal Mommy (infertility late in life, marriage, cynical)
104. Portraits in Sepia (infertility, adoption, life)
105. The Binky Diaries (infertility, working mom, life)
106. I’m a Smart One (surrogacy, parenting, infertility)
107. A Sense of Humour is Essential (parenting, pediatric nursing, Los Angeles)
108. La Chambre d’Orchidee (donating my eggs, my kids, marriage)
109. Simply Anonymom (parenting, family, life)
110. Slade Rocks… (mommy, army wife, pro-juggler)
111. Isn’t it Pretty to Think So? (life, rpl, pregnant after loss hopefully?)
112. Morebeansplease’s Weblog (infertility, lesbianism, vegetarian cooking)
113. Along Life’s Little Journey (infertility, endometriosis, morphology)
114. Junebug’s Musin
     gs (infertility, random life crap, travel)
115. I Just Cant Keep My Mouth Shut (kids, infertility and baby loss memories, life)
116. Ophelia’s Revival (infertility and torturing my husband.)
117. Woman Anyone (treatment yo-yo, infertility, frustration)
118. Gas Passer aka UUer (infertility, pregnancy complications and bedrest, doggies)
119. So, I Started a Group (parenting and organizing)
120. Peachy (infertility, miscarriage, life)
121. Child Bearing Hips (unexplained IF, IVF, pregnancy)
122. Planning Doesn’t Work (infertility, dogs, acupuncture)
123. This list is now closed. The next one will open on October 1st. Mark it on your calendar so you remember to join along.
     

Q: What if I miss a day?
A: Catch up the next day by doubling your comments–12 comments instead of 6.

Q: What is an Iron Commentor?
A: Not for the faint-of-heart. People who wish to be an Iron Commentor and be entered on the Iron Commentor honour roll need to leave a comment on every blog on the participants list (exceptions are blogs that require you to have a special log-in, such as some LiveJournal accounts or other similar situations). You can spread out this commenting any way you wish over the whole week, but the final comment needs to be left by midnight on the 28th (EST). Reaching Iron Commentor status is done on an honour system. Please email me if you earn iron commentor status so I can add you to the wall of honour.

Q: Why do I have to add that bit of code to my sidebar?
A: The code is the latest icon (the icon changes colour every month so you know that you’re on the right list). This month, the icon is blue, the next month it will be orange, etc. The reason is two-fold: (1) it enables more people to find out about IComLeavWe and (2) it gives you easy access to the current list once the commenting week actually begins. The icon is linked back to the current list. On the 28th, remove the icon from your blog. A new one will be created for the next month.

Q: It’s the 23rd and I just saw this for the first time on my friend’s blog! I want to join the list–why can’t I?
A: Because IComLeavWe happens every month, once the list is closed, it’s closed. If you’re finding out about this on the 23rd, you can’t join the current month. But leave yourself a note to check back in a week on the 1st and you can sign up for the next month.

Q: You said the list closes on the 21st. Well, it’s still the 21st where I am. Why aren’t you moving my information onto the list?
A: All dates and times are U.S. Eastern Standard Time (UTC/GMT -5 hours).

Q: What if no one comments on my blog and I have no comments to return?
A: Well, that really doesn’t happen for the most part, but in that case, simply choose another blog and add an additional comment. The goal is to hit 6 comments daily as a minimum. Going over that is fantastic and encouraged.

Q: Mel, my question wasn’t covered at all. What do I do?
A: Email me; I’m quite friendly. It helps to place “IComLeavWe” in the subject line. You could also check this post which contains the history of IComLeavWe and see if you can glean anything there.