When it comes to relatively inexpensive good food, Fazoli’s is a must for us. Aaron can always get one of his two staples there – lasagna or pizza – and I can experiment with the variety of pastas available with the create your own pasta bowl. Nothing like a giant plate of carbohydrates to make a person smile.

Cordy has also picked up on her mama’s love of starch, and will now beg for pasta until her next fix.

So it was no surprise that when we took her there for dinner on Sunday night, she was a happy, happy child.

Oh God, send me more pasta please!

Mommy, can we come back tomorrow? And the next day?

Sure, you can say a lot of bad things about Ohio (and who hasn’t?), but one thing I really love about being here is the weather. If you like experiencing all four seasons, Ohio is the place to be. We have all four, fully-defined seasons, although not always occurring in the correct order.

Fall has to be my favorite of the seasons: the crisp air, warm during the day and cool at night, the changing colors of the leaves, the bright blue skies, the bountiful harvest. Ripe, fresh apples, sweet corn, and of course, pumpkins.

So of course when my friend Kristi, from the blog Life with Aveline, invited us to her family’s farm for pumpkin picking, horse-drawn hay rides, corn mazes, and a petting zoo, we couldn’t resist. Today we drove the hour north to Honey Haven Farm to meet up with Kristi, Laura, Jessica and others.

It was also the big debut of Kristi’s newest baby, Scarlett. Seeing that tiny little person asleep in the sling made me remember why I wanted another baby again.

Aaron and I worried about how Cordy would act during the day, since we were arriving right before nap time. Interrupting nap time can lead to, well, a grumpy troll of a child. But the day was perfect – not too warm, a light breeze, and sunny – so it was worth the risk.

When we first arrived, we met up with Kristi, who was attending to the baby, so we wandered around on our own for a bit. Cordy immediately saw Kristi’s dog, Elvis, and ran for him, petting him gently and following him wherever he went.

After that, we found our way to the petting zoo in the barn. Cordy ran back and forth between the animals before settling on the goats, mostly because they were the only ones close enough to pet. She would reach through the fence, pet the goat, then look at me and say “Mooooo!” I tried to explain that these were goats, not cows (there was a calf in the next pen, however), and she then tried again and said, “Baaaaa!” Sigh.

We tried to get her to go see other things, but she was fixated on the goats. I walked over to look at the straw maze for the kids in the barn, hoping Cordy would follow and be interested. Looking back to find her?

Still with the goat.

Finally she did wander over to the maze.

While in the maze, she ran into Aveline, who had just woken up from her nap. The two had never met before, but were quickly plotting in the back of the maze.

Then it was time to ride the wagon out into the field to pick our own pumpkins. Cordy loved petting the horses. Once in the field, Cordy was fascinated with all of the running space. Once her feet touched the ground, she was off, yelling, “running! running!” just in case we weren’t sure what she was doing.

We did have to grab her once to keep her from running right in front of one of the wagons. We walked the field, looking for just the right pumpkins. Cordy’s crazy running led us to a good section of the patch that hadn’t been picked over, and so we found three nice pumpkins.

By the time the day was over, Cordy had learned the word “pumpkin” and was proud of her new toys. We ate a little ice cream while chatting with Kristi, then packed things up to start for home. Cordy was well past her nap time at this point, and the meltdown was nearing. Not even 5 minutes into the drive, she was asleep.

Thanks to Kristi for inviting us up to the farm. We had a fabulous time, and we now have three lovely pumpkins to display outside the house. I love fall!

After the storms of biblical proportion came through last night – seriously, there was baseball sized hail in the area – and the drop of about 20 degrees in temperature overnight, any thoughts of playing outdoors today were quickly forgotten.

So, we had to rely on one of the indoor playgrounds in town. And since this mama loves ice cream, my friend and I took the toddlers to the Graeter’s factory. Graeter’s is a wonderful local ice cream maker, and their factory store has a really cool dessert themed play area. The play area is completely enclosed, so escaping is difficult, unlike the mall play area. Which means this mom can rest and eat ice creame in peace without chasing Cordy back into the play area.

My friend’s 2 year old son ran around introducing himself to everyone in the room. “I Spidemah! I Spidemah! I Petah Pahkah!” He wouldn’t stop until someone would finally acknowledge, “Oh, you’re Spiderman!”

My less-social child, however, preferred to lavish all of her attention on the red balls in the room. She carried them around, rolled them down the slide, hugged them, and generally kept to herself.

The photos of the day:

Uh, mom, you’re blocking the slide.

Meet my lovely red friends.

I Spidemah!

She’s so strong!

I have no idea what she’s thinking here.

No, really. I’m serious.

I remember being tired during my first pregnancy, but I don’t remember being so tired that I’d want to pull off the side of the road on my 20 minute drive to work for a quick snooze. It’s like my entire body feels heavy as if I’m moving around in water, and I have to fight to keep my eyes open. Mid-day is the worst, especially when I’m at work. If I’m home, I nap when Cordy naps, but there is no designated nap time while at the office. When I do finally get the chance to sleep, though, I’m awake every two hours to pee. Sigh.

And then there’s the issue of food. My luck did not hold out, and my ol’ buddy from last time, nausea, has returned. I spend about half of my day in some state of nausea, either from not eating recently or from eating ever-so-slightly too much. I’m really puzzled about the current size of my stomach. I can eat about 2/3 of a normal sized meal now, instead of an entire meal. If I ignore the warning signs and continue eating the entire meal, I spend the next few hours feeling miserable, wishing I could throw up but having no luck. And when I’m hungry, I must. eat. right. now.

Sweet foods upset my stomach, which is different from last time, when I loved anything sweet. I still have my love of spicy foods, although I’m not ready to try anything as adventurous as Indian food yet.

All of this has led to Cordy watching a lot more TV lately. I feel bad about letting her watch so much TV, but sometimes mommy needs to rest on the couch without a 32 lb. toddler trying to practice her latest balancing act on mommy’s stomach. Crayons last a little while, building blocks maybe 15 minutes, but TV can give me a half hour at a time, or even a full hour if she’s watching “Bwue’s Bud-der” (translation: Meet Blue’s Baby Brother).

Cordy, as you can guess, has taken this new change to her schedule in stride:

Sometimes I wonder how I will manage two of them?

There are a lot of unhappy people out there.

I’d like to say I was surprised by all of the responses I received to this post, but I’m not. I see it everyday among my friends and family, those with and without children. Right now, there’s a whole lot of unhappy going on out there, in varying degrees.

I wish I could give an answer as to what is breeding this discontent, but I have none. I can give several theories, but they are as valid as any other theories you could come up with. Most of the theories I can come up with rest on one central point: modern life and technology.

As I said in the last post, it could be that thanks to technology, we have reached a point where many of the jobs we perform have little real value to society. Many of us work in jobs where we do not produce an actual product, or provide a necessary service for the survival of the people around us. At the end of the day, I didn’t save anyone’s life, and I didn’t do anything more than advise students and maybe register a few for classes, which is something they can do online as well. A hundred or two hundred years ago, few people had that kind of job. Most could go home at the end of the day and have something to show for their work: they made 4 wagon wheels, they shod 6 horses, they baked enough bread to supply everyone in town, etc.

I worked a short stint in daycare, and while I wasn’t thrilled with my job at the time, I did feel more of a sense of accomplishment than I do in my current position, sitting at a desk, enrolling students in college classes. After all, as part of my duties as a daycare worker, I kept those children safe from harm, and saw that they received food and attention. I provided a necessary service for their parents, without which they would be unable to work, or would have to put their children in dangerous situations.

So that theory makes some sense to me. But what of the moms who stay home with their children who also feel the weight of unhappiness on them? They are performing a task that is very important to society and so basic in our evolutionary mammalian roots that we still have traces of mothering instincts to this day. If mothering is such an important job, why should we not feel entirely fulfilled while doing it?

I think part of that has to do with how our generation was raised. We mothers today are the first and second generation products of the feminist movement. While I can’t say all of us were raised this way, I know I was raised to believe I could have it all. I was raised by a single mom, grandmother, and two unmarried (and very feminist) aunts. Up until I graduated college, my education was the most important task in my life. Unlike my grandmother, who worked as a secretary after raising her daughters, I could be anything I wanted to be. Going to college was encouraged, not something I had to fight for. And I was told that when the time came and if I wished to do so, I could marry, have children, and have my career with no problems.

I’m sure many other women were instilled with similar beliefs. But reality has turned out to be harsher than the grand dream of “having it all”, I think. Having it all is hard to do, and often in the process of juggling all our responsibilities to have it all, something gets dropped. And so often, as women, we blame ourselves for that one thing getting dropped, when in reality it isn’t always our fault. For example, as much as we wish for an even 50-50 split in housework and childcare with our spouses, it doesn’t always end up that way. (I consider myself lucky to have a husband who will change poopy diapers and do the dishes, but I know many don’t have that.) Which means that having it all often leads to doing too much and forgetting your own needs in the process.

And then once you have a child, that remnant of maternal instinct, buried deep within the most primal part of your brain, can surface and make the thought of returning to the career you prized so highly seem like torturous punishment. It can make you want to throw all career aspirations away just to be with this little person. This can lead to an identity crisis, as you feel you have given away your old independent life in trade for a life that now only revolves around your offspring and their activities. Your college diploma that you once displayed proudly is now boxed up to make more room to display the artwork of a three year old.

Or, you could still want to work, but feel torn about leaving your new, helpless child in the hands of another. So while you want to continue taking pride in your work, it is now overshadowed by the guilt you feel letting someone else care for your child each day. Either way, it can be enough to drive many moms into the sweet embrace of antidepressants and tranquilizers.

But what of non-mothers and men who feel adrift and unfulfilled? Clearly that theory doesn’t explain their feelings of unhappiness. And so I could also suggest that the modern media and internet could possibly have some root in the causes of this epidemic.

Think about it: our entertainment industry is there to help us escape from the real world. We go to see movies of people performing extraordinary acts in amazing, exciting jobs. TV is also full of these exciting jobs, but we all can’t lead the exciting life of Jack Bauer. You don’t see many shows or movies about average people living average lives, because it’s boring. (OK, Office Space might have parodied the average office worker, but we can all agree that no one wanted their lives, right?) You don’t see shows about the adventurous life of an accountant, do you? And even if they did have that, how many accountants could really hope to live like that?

I think it can be hard to see all of these exciting people “living” daring lives, and then go back to your desk at your office job and pretend that your job makes a difference. Many people want excitement and drama (of the good kind) in our lives, but there really isn’t that much out there for the average modern person. The truth is that while TV can show us exciting con men and world travelers seeking answers to great unknown questions, the average person must deal with a mortgage and a family and bills to pay. That unglamorous side of life is rarely dealt with for Laura Croft or Clark Kent or Indiana Jones. Somehow the bills just get paid, and their houses are still clean and ready for them when they’re home. Even superheroes need a day job to pay the bills – they just don’t talk about it much in the movies.

So I guess I took all of this time and space to say what I said in the beginning: I have no answers. Maybe we’re all just more ungrateful of all we have today; maybe we’re now so far away from real danger in our lives that we take everything for granted; maybe we have too much time on our hands to sit around and feel sorry for ourselves; or perhaps there really is something wrong with modern society that is leading to more and more people feeling unsatisfied with life. And perhaps this problem is something bigger and scarier than middle-class people feeling like they don’t have it all. Maybe this is one cause behind people who snap and do horrific things, like take hostages and kill children in schools?

What is the modern secret of happiness? Is it pursuing your dreams despite all costs? Is it finding time, in the rush of daily life, to care for your personal needs? Is it accepting that you can’t do everything and letting some things go? Is it learning to accept that your life probably won’t turn out the way you hoped it might?

I recently started reading Judith Warner’s book Perfect Madness: Motherhood in the Age of Anxiety, and while I can’t comment on the book yet since I’m only on chapter 3, I can say that I’m already developing a pain in my neck from nodding in agreement so much. Perhaps I’ll find some answers there.

What I do know for sure is that from your responses to my previous post and from the experiences in my own family and those around me, many people are feeling this way, and I worry for all of us if we don’t find some way to combat it.