Nine years of love

Steve and I have been together since we were 19, lived together as a couple since 21, and been married since 23. Most people from our generation say we're crazy to have committed our lives to domesticity so young. We say we would have been crazy not to because...well...when you know, you know.

Over the years, we have had many, many, many good times. We travelled to France, Italy, Louisiana, San Francisco, New York and Jamaica. We lived in Ottawa, Toronto, Kingston, and Toronto again before settling back in Kingston for what we hope will be for good.

I've been feeling a little nostalgic and weepy lately (okay, a lot nostalgic and weepy) thinking about how having a baby will inevitably change our relationship. We've grown so accustomed to life as a twosome it's hard to imagine what it will be like with a third Campbell thrown into the mix.

Here's a look at some of my favourite photos of the two of us over the years...from 2003 all the way up to 2011.

Pain and acceptance

EMC Editorial - I'm almost there, my friends. Almost to the end of the long and arduous journey that is pregnancy. It feels like a lifetime ago that I wrote a column expressing how overwhelmed I was by the endless, often alarming bits of "advice" offered by certain celebrated pregnancy guides and the well-intentioned people of the internet.

Tearing myself away from those sources and relying instead on the much more comforting advice of my midwife has largely cured me of my former hysteria.

Yet as long ago as that unpleasant stretch feels, it's been longer still since I first found out I was pregnant. It was the middle of summer and we couldn't tell anyone. Being the kind of person who needs to talk or write about things in order to make sense of them, trying to come to terms with this monumental development without having the opportunity to vent and complain about it to anyone other than my poor husband was nothing short of torturous.

At this point, pregnancy seems almost old hat. I can barely even remember what wine tastes like, and am no longer all that bitter about being every gathering's teetotaller. I've grown accustomed to being asked "how are you feeling?" about 10 times a day. I've even learned to roll with the many different aches, pains and other mysterious bodily discomforts I experience on a daily basis.

It figures that as soon as I begin to get used to this way of life, a new and arguably even more daunting challenge complete with its own set of anxiety-inducing realities, looms ahead. I'm not talking about the soon-to-arrive new addition to our family. That part I'm actually quite excited about. No, it's the whole business of how this baby girl will make her way out of my uterus and into the world that scares me.

I understand basically what to expect - namely pain. Overwhelming, all-encompassing, previously unimaginable degrees of pain. Over the last seven-and-a-half months - and even more so over the last few weeks - I have spent a great deal of time coming to terms with the fact that I will soon be experiencing this, most painful of pains ever known to humanity.

Most people I have conversed with on the subject have an easy, in many ways no-brainer solution to this unpleasant reality: the epidural. Personally, I've gone back and forth on the subject. Part of me sees it as a useful tool of modern medicine that exists to make life a little easier for labouring women.

On the other hand, the pain of childbirth was endured for a million or so years without the epidural. Perhaps the reason most women today feel such a need for it is because of a preconceived cultural notion that it is all but impossible to get by without one. This doesn't strike me as a particularly healthy attitude. The physical effects of the medication (most notably numbness) are unsettling enough, but what about the psychological implications?

After weeks of contemplation I've come to the conclusion that for me, walking into this under the assumption that I will definitely be needing an epidural will only increase my fear of childbirth. Being in midwifery care has allowed me to develop a different, and to my mind much more rational attitude toward birth from anything I had previously considered: essentially, this is a normal, natural process. Women in labour are not "sick", and while it may not be 100 per cent enjoyable, delivering a baby is nothing to be scared of.

Thus I have once again ceased listening to the many stories circulating online and amongst my own acquaintances, this time dealing with problems that arose during their births and why the epidural is absolutely necessary. Judge me if you will, but barring any major complications I plan on bringing this baby into the world completely naturally, and with as little fear as humanly possible.

Oh and whatever else happens, please spare me the morphine. (Apparently, it's routinely given out to labouring women at KGH.) I didn't give up my beloved wine for nine long months only to be injected with a close relative of the heroine family on the last day, thank you very much.

Oh, the television

EMC Editorial - Lately I've noted with interest the number of people around my own age who are choosing to give up their televisions - or at least their cable or satellite, which now that everything's digital basically means that the TV itself can be used only for the purpose of Netflix or DVD viewing. I'm not sure if it's simply a coincidence that a sizable number of my friends and acquaintances are making this decision, or if it's more of a wide-spread generational trend that I personally can't get behind.

It's not that I don't spend a great deal of my spare time enjoying non-television-related activities like reading, listening to music, exercising and visiting with family and friends. It's just that sometimes all I feel like doing is veging in front of an episode of Storage Wars, Toddlers and Tiaras or whatever happens to be on the Food Network. And I don't know what I'd do if I couldn't watch The Daily Show and Colbert every night in bed before drifting off to sleep.

Then there are all the high-profile events that are televised, like various sports playoffs/championships and, at this time of year, guilty pleasures like the Oscars and the Golden Globes. I am an unapologetic lover of Hollywood's awards season. Yes, I recognize that to many all it means is a bunch of over-inflated egos parading around in ridiculously expensive clothing congratulating one another for being passably good at something that doesn't really matter to the world anyway. But I personally can't get enough of all the dresses, gossip and cattiness. (Did you SEE the look on Elton's face when Madonna won the Globe for best song? And speaking of Madonna: her ARMS - yuck!)

Yet I wonder, in this age of rampant hipsterdom and the subsequent lameness of anything that has not been widely recognized as "indie", does my enjoyment of these things render me hopelessly out of touch and un-cool?

Lately, even my beloved awards shows have made me question my level of commitment to the trends of my generation. For instance, I had not even heard of any of the TV shows nominated in the drama category for this year's Golden Globes (American Horror Story, Boardwalk Empire, Boss, Game of Thrones, Homeland...anyone...?) Maybe you need to subscribe to Netflix to know what these things are.

The movie categories were a little better, but I had still seen only a very small percentage of them. And the one that cleaned up - and is supposed to once again do very well at the Oscars - The Artist, was completely unfamiliar to me. I realize that this probably has a lot to do with the fact that many movies are not released to theatres in Kingston. Furthermore, I live with a man who thinks it's a waste of time and money to go to any movie where the main character is a woman. Or anything that has below 80 per cent "fresh" ratings from the top critics on Rotten Tomatoes. Or anything that's playing at the Screening Room unless it's some depressing documentary about how there's an 85 per cent chance humanity won't survive the next two centuries.

Maybe I'm just getting old and have neither the time nor the inclination to try and keep up with the latest trends - especially if they involve getting rid of your TV. I suppose everyone has that moment where they wake up one day and realize it's time to stop apologizing for their personal preferences. Perhaps this is mine. So what if I enjoy an hour or two of semi-trashy TV every night, or if I no longer have the energy to argue with my husband about his refusal to give the vast majority of new movies a chance?

For the foreseeable future, I'll remain in my out-of-touch, decidedly non-hipster bubble of cooking shows and the same DVDs over and over for seven years and counting because they're the only ones Steve and I can agree on. And that's okay.