Week One --- What the hell have you done this time??

Today is Sunday, July 12th. It's a lovely summer afternoon, just as it was last Sunday. I'm sitting at my computer, just as I probably was this time last Sunday. I'm drinking coffee and thinking about smoking a cigarette, again, just like last Sunday. I'm also thinking about baby names, scouring the internets for baby clothes and furniture, and wondering what the hell I've done this time, which I didn't have to do last Sunday afternoon.

Last Sunday evening my fiancee Alise took a bath while I stayed downstairs on the porch, looking at news and porn websites on my laptop and enjoying some 'me' time. When she emerged from the bathroom about an hour later (I have no idea how she accomplishes this, I can barely stay submerged for ten minutes before I start to wrinkle and escape to dry land) she called 'Jeremy? can you come up here?' in a voice that trembled slightly. I dutifully bounded upstairs, hoping as I usually do that she'd be naked and ready to do the dirty.

It surprised me a little that she was fully dressed. Clearly I'd missed the boat. She walked silently into the bathroom and picked up a large, apparently new thermometer from the top of this IKEA shelving rack thingy that we have, and showed it to me.

A closer inspection revealed to me that this was not actually a thermometer. She's passed to me a pregnancy test. One of the new digital ones, one that said 'YES +' in clear type.

This information took a little longer for me to process than it probably should have done. I considered that it might mean 'yes, you're not pregnant, get on with your life as usual' before finally putting one and one together, adding 'baby', and making three.

Now, I've mentally rehearsed this moment for probably years. I've seen how 'real men' do this in movies and TV shows. I was supposed to scream at the top of my lungs YES! WHOO HOO! GET IN! BACK OF THE NET! HE SHOOTS HE SCORES!!!'; run about a bit, come back and look at the test again, hug Alise tightly and then loosen my grip, show slight panic that I've harmed her stomach, be reassured by her as she laughs at me and cries, run about some more, possibly spend some time on my knees and say 'thank you' to the ceiling, and then cry. And then repeat. And then smoke a cigar or something. The thing is though, this kind of surprised me a bit, you know? It's a Sunday evening! I had plans to read a bit, go to bed and hopefully do the wild thing. I froze a bit before realizing that Alise was looking at me, no doubt thinking 'He'd better start shouting and running about a bit otherwise I'm going to punch him'.

I didn't scream or even run about a bit. I still feel bad about this. I did hug her, fairly gently, before telling her what I wanted to do next.
'Let's go for a drive'.

Alise and I often go for a drive when we need to talk about things or when we need to process news. While I am only 31, I'm an old man at heart and I like to do old man things. Sometimes I like to go for a drive, end up in a new place and then try to find my way home for the sole purpose of knowing that one day, someone is going to ask me if I know where 'Bumblefuck, MA' is, and how to get home from it. I had actually intended this time to go to a Dunkin Donuts to get some coffee but had a better idea along the way and ended up in the parking lot of the local Target.
'Why are we here?' Alise asked me.
'Because I wanted to buy some socks', I told her.
'We drove all the way here on a Sunday night because you wanted some socks? What's wrong with the socks you have?'
'I wanted to buy a pair of baby socks', I said. 'This is my very understated, British way of saying that I'm ok with this'.

I think Alise cried. I'm not sure if it was because she thought this was pathetic or cute or most probably a bit of both.
'It's past nine though, she said. 'It looks like they're closed'.

As usual, she was right. Target was closed. Bollocks.

So, this is why we ended up driving about 40 miles to the nearest 24 hour Walmart; where I bought a Winnie the Pooh pair of socks and a little cloth hat with Pooh bear ears; for the cluster of cells that are in my fiancee, that will one day rule my life. They actually already do rule my life, and I've found that pretty much everything that I do is either because of, or in spite of them.