Anything but a nursery

As part of my chronic, compulsive "nesting" disorder and my husband's desire to expand our livable space, we've decided to remodel our basement. Our old basement was finished, but probably in the 1970's and the people who did it were so lazy that they paneled right over all the windows, leaving us with a definite feeling that we were living in a cave. Our basement didn't get much use, except for all the wonderful space that we could store everything. Now, that everything has been moved throughout the house as we have emptied almost everything from the basement.


We had a contractor lined up to do the work and then he decided to never call me back for several days, when I had important questions about the work he was to start in a few days. I followed Oprah's advice to "Believe people when they show you who they are the first time", and I knew it would be unlikely that he would be urgently returning my phone calls once he had my money in his pocket, so I fired him. Over email. I actually preferred to do it over the phone, but he never answered my calls. So, blackberry to blackberry and it was done. This occurred after the basement was already emptied and my dh was giddy with anticipation of having a beautiful new basement. Dh decided that he wanted to construct this basement himself and had me imagine how wonderful it will be that he works with his own two hands to create the space that we will soon call our "family" room. I couldn't resist the warmth in my heart as I imagined us, in our new living space that was created by my own husband, as we glowed with joy as friends and family came to see our baby. I imagined exactly where the baby swing would go and thought it would only be appropriate to also have a bassinet downstairs for the little one to rest in for those short periods of time that he's not in my arms.


We've decided to carpet half the basement and install pergo in the other half. The true purpose for the pergo is so I won't kill one of my dh's friends if he spills a beer on my new shag carpet. However, dh has convinced me that the pergo will be the ideal spot for the "kid's table" during holiday's so our children, nieces, and nephews won't make a mess of our new carpet. He knows that I cannot resist any suggestion that involves our future family. He's even convinced me that we should pre-wire the bar to have a flat panel television. Although this seems quite similar to what a sports bar would have, he's suggested that it would be for the children to watch TV during a big game. Wouldn't it be nice to be able to put a DVD in for the kid's while the adults are watching a football game on the big TV? Interesting how he's also thrown in a "big TV" into his plot.



We have a three bedroom home, the third bedroom has two entry doors that have been removed and we use it as an office. A bookshelf stretches almost the entire length and height of the wall to hold my dozens of books about how to make a baby, obviously none of them proved to be very successful. The second bedroom is the 'nursery', although I can't hardly bring myself to refer to it as such, but it's always the label that I mentally assign to it. It usually contains a double bed, small vanity area where I blow dry my hair, and random articles of clothing that haven't found their place in our main closet yet. Currently, it is packed solid with Rubbermaid containers, wall hangings from the basement, the mesh bag of mis-matched socks, early Christmas gifts that I've purchased, the ironing board, along with other remnants from our basement.

Although it never functioned as a nursery before, it was always clean and organized and much easier to envision quickly becoming a nursery with just the removal of a few pieces of furniture and a fresh coat of paint. It would require so much work now to transform that space into anything appropriate for even the smallest of babies. Perhaps all the effort that would need to be exerted to make the room a nursery is a gentle reminder that there is still quite a bit of effort required before we become parents. Some days it seems so simple, we have a surrogate that we're in love with, a small amount of money going into our "baby account" every month, and a hidden container of baby items that have been purchased over the past several hopeful months. But today it seems overwhelming. Today I realize that I need an egg, and sperm; both of which we don't have. I need them to find themselves in the perfect moment of marriage and create a miracle for us. I need 9 months of uncomplicated gestation, a beautiful day of healthy birth, and an attorney, court date, and tens of thousands of dollars. It's too much to imagine sometimes. It's too much that I can't control, too much money that I don't have, and too much too risk. And then I remember, "What would you attempt to do if you knew you could not fail?" -Anonymous