Hello and welcome to An Altitude Problem, where life goes on. The chill of fall has arrived, and it won't be long before gold tinges the aspens, which are already losing their deep summer green and looking a little pale. Nights produce heavy frost, afternoons often produce a gray, thick layer of clouds reminiscent of the milk-white winter sky. Drizzling days keep the trails soggy, although the last few have been sunny enough to dry them out again, making it perfect biking weather- a cool nip in the breeze, but warm sun to take off the edge. Only when the sun hides behind a cloud does one realize how close winter is.

This won't be a long post, just a brief update on the lives of me and mine. At least I don't intend for it to be, but we know how these things go.

I had to wait four long, agonizing days to find out if I was still pregnant, but the result was that on Tuesday night (after they fixed the lab- they couldn't get my results to me sooner because the machine they needed to test my blood was broken) my doctor called me to tell me that my HcG levels had dropped, so I had indeed miscarried.

I know the way most people perceive me- as not being very interested in being a mother. There is more I could have said on the subject to persuade them otherwise, but to say more would have made me far more vulnerable than I have already made myself. Although I suppose if one wants to not be vulnerable, one is better off not keeping a blog that talks frankly about the normal joys and sorrows that comprise life, the feelings one assumes others experience as well and do not talk about. Except I don't believe in keeping one's struggles or happiness a secret. I believe that painful honesty shows those around us that they are not alone. I believe that if all of us were painfully honest, we would all be able to connect on a deeper level, and maybe we wouldn't all have to bear so much pain alone. Maybe we would learn from each other's mistakes instead if having to make them ourselves. Maybe we wouldn't misunderstand each other and add rejection to the pain we are already feeling. Maybe we wouldn't just be lone organisms in the same tank. Maybe I should have been more honest all along.

It is hard to articulate the reason tears silently rolled down my cheeks as I went about my business for the next day and a half. The fact is, I have spent years knowing that I want a child, but simultaneously knowing beyond a doubt that it was not a good time.

I should clarify- I still believe that there is no difference between a child one adopts and one that comes from one's own body. The soul is what matters, not the DNA. I know I would love a child that someone else had given up as much as one that was biologically mine (and to say it is yours seems a bit presumptious when you think about it. Do you control what happens to it? It's gender? How he looks? How she feels? The choices he makes? How she chooses to live, and how she dies? You can, and should, try to influence it toward good choices. But while you are responsible for it, it is it's own person, and while it is inextricably linked to you, it does not belong to you. You were merely honored to be trusted with it's well-being and given the right to love it more than anyone else possibly could.) And I still feel it is a bit of a waste making my own when there are kids out there who already exist who need a good home. But adoption is expensive and honestly, more beaurocracy than we can handle at the moment. And B really wants to see his own DNA recreated in a new person. It must be a boy thing. And for me, that dam has broken, and there is no holding back the flood of love and hope. I have waited and agonized for years, already loving that future child of mine so much that I was willing to wait until a time in our lives when we could give it everything it deserved- the full attention of both it's parents, the most formative time in it's life not dictated by it's parent's stress and frusteration and anger at circumstances we could not control and a job that dictated every second of our lives in an industry we don't feel fulfilled in. But in the meantime, as one by one my friends had kids, nobody but Bobby saw me cry, and even he did not understand why I could not just be happy for them.

I was born into a disfunctional situation. My entire adult life has been spent realizing the implications of this. Too late, I have discovered that my deep insecurities have affected every major decision I have made, have made me believe that I did not deserve to be happy. I say this knowing that my parents will read it, and it is nothing that hasn't been addressed before. It isn't their fault. They were overwhelmed and they sacrificed their own well-being many times to see that I did not suffer for them. They told me again and again that what they were going through was not my fault. Their issues got back-burnered and taking care of me became their priority. I have often wondered what they might have been able to resolve, the understanding they might have been able to cultivate for each other had I not been in the picture until after the worst had passed for them. Only now, after I have been out of their house, have they been able to grow together as a couple. I have the opinion that many couples have kids too early, and have to get to know their life's mates through childcare, and every couple knows and is known, and grows together through a series of errors. Many of these are errors that an innocent, sweet, unmarred child should not have to bear the consequences of.

I have lived an adventuresome life while I have waited to be the person I need to be, with the life I need to have in order to completely give myself to a child. When I have that child, it will be my "thing". I won't have the time or inclination for my "own thing". I must be ready for that, and know that I won't resent the temporary loss of my "thing" while I am in the middle of diapers and temper tantrums and sticky fingers. I tried to explain this one day to a young mother who seemed particularly judgemental of my decision to wait to have kids, and obviously failed to make myself understood, because she kept telling me I couldn't just lose my own identity. No, I don't plan to. I plan on my identity shifting from badass mountain biker and skier and tough girl to mother. People who made the desision to have a child simply because it seemed like the thing to do after a few years of marriage, who never agonized over the implications of bringing a new soul into the world, who never wondered if their own shortcomings would affect the future well being and psychological health of their child, seem completely flummoxed over why I would want a child so much and still not have one. In the meantime, I have felt a surge of anger at every comment made by others about how I am so selfish, not wanting kids. How I need to grow up. How I am loving my life too much to want to share it and need to realize what is really important. I bite my tongue to keep from saying the same thing to them. I know I make it look like my reasons are shallow to keep from exposing the dark side of myself that doesn't believe I am a good person, so it is my fault. It seems easier than articulating the deeper, darker emotions behind our waiting for so long. Every time I had reason to believe I was pregnant in the past, I let myself believe that it was fate, that higher powers believed in me, trusted me to not screw this up, so I believed in myself. But then it turned out to be a false alarm, and just like that, the switch flipped and I was back to thinking of myself in the singular, and back to knowing I couldn't handle the amount of responsibility of caring for another human, one who would be totally dependant on me, when I could barely manage to care for myself most days. And back to my heart breaking every time I thought of it and what could have been. And back to tears every time another friend got pregnant and suddenly thought that every other woman should want this, too, and seemed to judge me for not wanting to be just like her.

Which is why, for four days while they kept telling me there most likely hadn't been enough bleeding, that bleeding like this happens in the first trimester, that I was probably still pregnant, I tried so hard to not start to believe it, but I couldn't help it. Getting the news that I had miscarried after all was what it took to rip that fragile hope back out of my hands. I had this brief moment of fierce love and fierce protectiveness over that thing inside me that at that point, still resembled a sea monkey more than a human. I saw it as it would be in seven and a half months and I loved it so much it hurt. And then I spent four days trying to un-love it because it was most likely dead. The day after they told me it hadn't survived, my body varified it by offloading massive amounts of whatever was in there. Disgusting, I know. But common. Sorry, boys. You're in a girl's world now. If it makes you uncomfortable, feel free to not read herein.

That was almost a week ago. I haven't shed any more tears. It seems pointless. It took those days of tears to start to think of myself as a lone organism again. I am especially lone with Bobby back in Kansas. Sure, I share a house with another human, I'm never completely alone, but I am singular. I am no longer we. I feel like me again, not this person I don't know, but like. I am sad that I have to wait to try again, annoyed that we were finally there, I finally decided to trust myself to be the person I needed to be, we finally decided we were in a good enough place to be able to bring someone into the world and provide them with happiness and security, instead of the same insecurities we both deal with. Annoyed that the higher powers didn't see fit to let us just have that dream easily. Annoyed that we have to try and agonize and wait and see. Annoyed that it seems so easy for some others, but nothing can ever be easy for us.

...moving on. I really wanted to skip the last race of the season yesterday morning, but went anyway. I planned on not riding hard. But I pulled away from the pack within a mile of the start, and two girls from Boulder stayed with me, and we battled it out over 16 miles and about 2,900 vertical feet, from Breck to almost treeline up Boreas Pass, and back down. At the top of the climb, I had no hope of catching the girls from Boulder, but it was a descent I have raced down before, so I was prepared. My bike fishtailed under me, but we stayed upright over the washed out trail, babyheads roling under my tires, we caught air over water bars and splashed down a shallow stream that decided to share the trail for a ways, navigated the tight switchbacks that caused me so much time last race, passed the Boulder girls halfway down and crossed the finish line in first place. I probably would not have done so well, but the girl who beats me almost every race did not show up to this one, and "that girl Marlee" decided to move up to Expert. I was tied for second place overall going into the race, so I knew I had gotten second overall. I was a little sad I wold never have another season to try for first overall, never have that pretty plaque with my picture to hang on my wall and remember my glory days, but at least I would get a medal as a consolation prize. I finally got to stand on the tallest podium, and I got a new pair of bike gloves as a prize. After all the awards were handed out for that day's race, they started on the overall awards. I was expecting second, but the race organizer started in on this explanation before he announced my name. "And there was a tie for first place overall. We break the tie by who has the highest score in this race, and since one of the girls was not at this race, the tie goes to..." And suddenly my teammates were cheering and jostling me, and I realized I had won first overall. That was unexpected. I felt bad for the girl I have been neck-and-neck with all season, because she actually did consistantly better than me, I was down one race, up the next, but their rule of taking the best six out of seven scores meant she had to drop more points than I did. I have my getting lost on that second race of the season to thank for my high overall score, as bizarre as that seems. If I had had to drop a higher score, my overall score would have been lower and I would not have been tied for first, but second.

It was a good feeling knowing that while I won't be racing again, at least not for the forseeable future, I did accomplish more than I had hoped to with this season. I could have had more podiums, but I still helped my team win the series, I won the overall championship, and I had fun and didn't miss a race. I was also extremely lucky- not a flat tire, not a broken chain all race season.

The last happening in the lives of me and mine is that my mom has decided to go back in for another surgery. Her last one was a single mastectomy with a lumpectomy on the other side, and at the time, it was important to her to keep as much of her body as she could. She has since become less attached to her girls, and has decided to have the other side removed, as well. Less careful monitoring, more peace of mind knowing that she won't be getting breast cancer again if there are no breasts left to get cancer. It was hard, agonizing, to know that she was losing one of them, but after one has been gone for six months, the other has finally become more of a priority. Her appointment is set for September 30. I hate to see her have to go through that again-the surgery, the pain, the rehab. But I do agree with her decision- I'd like to think if it was me, I would do the same thing.

The month ahead looks like a long series of trips between here and Kansas, with several other trips thrown in, like the one to Michigan for Heather's wedding. It looks like the little Focus will be carrying four girls- Marci, me, Laci, and my mom on a 14 hour road trip Northeast. It's not really a comfy car for traveling, but it does get good gas mileage. In the meantime, I am trying to not think about the future, since we still don't have a house in Kansas, still don't know when I will be moving, don't know if I want to move or not. Out there, I will get to be with Bobby, but there I might lose my mind with boredom, while here, I can at least bike, and after the resort opens this fall, I can still ski. But alone. That just isn't as much fun. When I am out there, I will be spending 16 hour days waiting for Bobby to get home from work so I can see him for a few hours a day, while up here, I can fill my days up with work and play, as long as I don't mind being apart from him. There's really no good solution.

Until later, faithful few. Here's hoping honesty doesn't make you squirm.