Jelena Ardila's photostream  

A few weeks from now our baby boy will arrive to this world and the family we used to be will change completely. It’s been four wonderful years of living together the three of us (Darling, Gaturria and I), waking up every morning to the smell of fresh coffee, spending our weekends behind closed blinds when we are craving for some extra hours of sleep, taking showers in the morning to the rhythm of the Beatles, The Black Keys, Noel Gallager’s HFB and long baths once a week with candle lights. Surrounded by rock and roll posters, cameras, guitars, films all over the place and a kitty-scratched sofa, our home has been our paradise. We long for it and when we come back to it every night, there’s no more peaceful, right or better place to be.

And soon, what we knew about our home and our life will change. We’ll have a new sound, new flavors, new laughs, new cries, new games, new images, we’ll even welcome new hours of the day and night. And all I can think of, all I can wish for is that our baby be happy and can love this little sanctuary of rock, photos and cat toys as much as we do.

These are happy times. I feel so lucky to realize that, to seize that.

More on Revelados

More on Revelados

I’m not that kind of person who is constantly reading book reviews or know much about authors. Books have always come to my life in such a magnificent natural almost mysterious way. I remember being just a kid, sneaking into my parents’ bookshelf and finding always a book lying there as if it were looking at me, inviting me to read it. That’s how the books of Nietzsche, Dante, Oscar Wilde, Goethe, Isabel Allende, Borges and many more were always with me when I was just a teenager. Later on, I decided to study Modern Languages at the University, which meant 5 years of reading more wonderful English and British Literature.

After graduating, I came across Milan Kundera and got addicted to him, thinking I would never find another author as appealing as him. His stories about love, Czech Republic, politics and views about life were the perfect combination to keep me hooked. Books kept coming my way, but nothing compared to his work, until one day, I saw a beautiful photograph on Flickr of a book called Norwegian Wood (Tokio Blues) and felt curious about the title (being a Beatles Fan of course).

One day, in San Francisco, I was wandering in a bookstore and they there were lying at the bottom in a corner five Haruki Murakami’s books and among them Norwegian wood. As if it was whispering me “take me home”, I didn’t even hesitate to buy it and started reading it on the flight back to Caracas. The story begins with one of the characters on a plane, which I took as a sign and thought: oh my, this book is going to be good. And so it was.

So now I have a new reading crush. Murakami breaks my heart every time, makes me rejoice in his beautiful descriptions of mundane life and allures me into the erotic and nostalgic relationships of his characters. It’s so good people. So good I wish I could borrow his words to tell you how good he is.

I’m in bed rest since yesterday. Apparently baby Lucas wants to come to this world early. We’ve got an impatient baby boy! The o.b wants me to rest at least for 2 weeks before delivering him, which mean I have to stay most of the day lying in bed and stand just for peeing or having a healthy snack. Thanks to Murakami, the wait has been pleasant and I can relax and send those peaceful vibes to our boy. It’s going to be so lovely to remember this time of my life when looking or re-reading Murakami’s Books. Pure Magic.

I remember when I thought oh sure! this pregnancy is going smoothly, piece of cake! Well… big mistake! Everything has changed in a couple of weeks: All my clothes no longer fit, no energy to exercise, I’m gaining pounds like crazy and worse of all, my so called get-all-the-baby-things-done-this-long-holiday-carnival weekend was nothing but me staying in bed with fever, all my body aching and a bad mood.

After 3 days of laying on a couch feeling useless while darling assembled all the baby furniture with no help at all (I could not even hand him over a screwdriver), fever went away to leave me all bloated and gassy…. not pretty folks. I keep gaining weight and thinking how hard it’s going to be to get rid of the baby weight and still, what is worse, I cannot get out of my system an insane craving of eating potatoes with ketchup. I tell myself, you are way overweight, you are not exactly a glowing expecting mother and you still want to eat potatoes with ketchup… really… POTATOES!?

I feel a constant frowning on what it used to be my cheerful face.

My darling deserves a place in heaven.