Change

Broadcasting to you live from Diesel Cafe with a Tex-Mex wrap, no cheese, extra avocado in hand ... I enjoy wireless.

It's official. I finally fit into maternity pants. I'm so relieved. For about a month now, I've been in the inbetween stage: my regular pants were too tight and maternity pants way too large. All of the advice I've read about this stage say to wear your husband's clothes. I hardly think my office wants me to come into work in an Opeth concert shirt and baggy cords. So I've been rotating between three different pairs of pants, the ones that have always been at the back of my closet because they just don't fit right. And, even in this inbetween stage, they still don't fit right.

Another first: someone other than my immediate family has finally admitted they can "kind of tell" I'm pregnant. This floors me, because it's been quite obvious to me for more than two months now. How can you not tell? My stomach looks humongous to me already.

It is strange to have your body change as a woman. I've always had a slim build, so I've never given much thought to body image in the realm of weight before. Well, I've read and researched it as a feminist who took a lot of women's studies classes in college. And I've observed and listened to friends and family going through the pains of not having the body society wants them to. So it's not like I've been oblivious to the issue, but, as they say, it's different when you actually experience it. It has been a wake-up, personal style. Especially being in the inbetween stage, when it's not apparent that you're pregnant.

By the way, when I Google "changing body image during pregnancy," of the hundreds of hits, the majority of them advise, "Try changing your hair color!" or "Wear fun accessories!" I don't want to avoid my body's image, I want to talk about it with other women so we develop a community and an understanding of how pervasive and all-encompassing this issue is. And maybe then we can enact real change.

There is a little baby at the table across from us with her toddler brother. There are babies everywhere nowadays. It's more than me noticing it ... I wonder what they'll call this wave of babies. Boomers, Gen X, Gen Y/Millennials, then what?

Rebecca Thorman at Modite recently wrote about how Gen Y needs to recognize social media as a means and not an end. "Who will be loud enough? Who will scream?" she asks. I wonder, will we scream? With decreasing interest in traditional forms of protest, we may just be the generation that finds an alternative to screaming. Holding stock in an ethically irresponsible company versus marching on the streets for change; designing our own work-life balance while disregarding work hierarchies; rising interest in community and urban living rather than suburban white-picket fences ... We seem to hide behind computer screens and text messaging with silent forms of protest. This might seem less effective than staging sit-ins at our local campuses, but I would argue it's exactly what we need as a country. The old forms of protest aren't working anymore; we need ingenuity, innovation, and a lot of hard work. Thorman's right; we can't expect Facebook apps to change the world.

Even traditional methods for change within our government are evolving. Rather than force laws and subsequent vetoes down the hatchet of Congress and the bowels of the administration, we have cities stepping up to the challenge and successfully enforcing new laws to reflect new needs: the Internet, trans-fat and smoking bans, multi-zoning uses, et al.