Waiting for my period never seemed like such an event until today. For about 10 years I’ve been on birth control and in all that time my period was never late, except for last Thanksgiving- I was a week late. But I blame that on the stress of the holiday- or some weird blip in my cycle. My body is tried and true. I can usually tell when I’m about to have my period, even if I don’t calendar it. I’m annoyed at whomever is around me, I get bloated, and have headaches- certain things on my body swell- kinda like the doors in my house during the monsoons. Every month I go through the same thing- only this month, this time, I wasn’t so sure what I was feeling. Am I pregnant or premenstrual? What I am usually so sure of is now a big ball of confusion. You see I’ve never been pregnant before, so I just don’t know what to expect.

Even though I have never been pregnant, I have my ideas of what it must be like. I’ve read novels and have always chuckled when a woman knows right away when she’s pregnant. Ha! How could she…? Could I…? Would I feel a fluttering in my womb? The waves the little sperm make to get to my egg? Would I feel it? And the day after, would I start to transform like a mutant, or a superhero undergoing immediate changes? Would I have that “glow” the day after, or does that happen later?

Well considering that I can’t feel it when my egg drops from my fallopian tube, I highly doubt that I would feel conception. But who knows, right? That’s the messed up thing about this whole situation. When you start trying to have a baby every little sensation seems inflated because you are trying.

Last week everything tasted differently, I was emotional even a little dizzy, and what’s this….? I think I was nauseous too. Is this what it’s like to be pregnant? Shall I write it down and document this to read back to my kid in the future? I now understand the meaning of “phantom pregnancy”; even small degrees of it- the mind can be a tricky thing.

Last night my husband and I were walking around the neighborhood and he told me he didn’t know if I was PMS’ing or pregnant- either way he knew I was stressed. It was then that I had my first reality inkling that I was indeed not pregnant. I could tell by the way I wanted to snap at him some cold short remark that I was being way too mean to be pregnant….nope this feels like my old regular PMS self to me. Crap. And yes, I was filled with stress- like I just got out of a canning bath and still not cooled off. Having a baby is no light thing to consider, especially after years of choosing not to have one.

Thoughts of not being able to conceive never really seemed possible until today. My period came, right after a conversation with my husband about buying a pregnancy test. Am I upset because of the possibility of my own inability to conceive or of not being pregnant? There is a difference. I do like to be good at things, and this is no exception.  And although I am someone who likes to do well in class, this particular class is a little scary. Shall I call it “A human experiment”? because that is indeed what this journey feels like to me. Put on your space suit because we are going to Mars.

If you can survive the heat of the desert year after year, I have learned that you can survive practically any other discomfort that comes your way. Not only survive but to learn to embrace it. From Tucson to New Orleans in June, well, I’ve touched 2 different kinds of heat. One chaffed me and the other burned me. In the end, hot is hot, whether you are sticky and wet or dusty and dry.

The heat draws out the sweat and temper in ones head, it makes us move slower and look longer. Our thirst cannot be quenched, but can be drowned with a bottle of ice-cold beer. We become sleepy and restless at the same time.

I look for signs. When those big monsoon clouds embrace Tucson, the excitement in the air is contagious. We are all waiting for those clouds to burst, and when the clouds don’t burst with rain, we burst from our own sweat and deal with our own inner storms. 

The Palo Verde beetle emerges in late June early July- its birth from the ground is a calling that summer is indeed only temporary. The mass of flying queen ants also make themselves known, swarming in a frenzy of excitement. I know when my prickly pear fruit ripen that August is just around the corner. August, the long last run of the summer.

All these things mark the passing of the summer and as each year goes by, the more I look for them in anticipation.

Watching movies such as Street Car Named Desire, and Long Hot Summer make me feel that I’m not alone in the heat. That heat alone creates a good setting for an interesting story and that I may be a part of that story, or of some story. The main object of summer is not to stay cool, but hydrated and to embrace what the desert has to offer during this trying time of the year, because the good news is- is that there will be an ending to this summer story.