Sleeping With the Chickens

As I walked by my son's room tonight, I saw something strange in his bed. From the distance, I couldn't quite make out what it was. As I moved closer I was both horrified amused that tucked under his arm was a featherless rubber chicken. You know, the kind you find in the joke shops? Why in the world would he sleep with that? It's kind of creepy looking, if you ask me.

Darling hubby had it at work (he's the workplace version of the class clown). I think my Third Darling's affinity to the pathetic foul has more to do with his daddy's ownership of it than any cuddle factor it might hold. Scattered around his bed were his Texas longhorn - Beevo, the teddy bear that jingles whenever you move it, as well as the jointed wooden snake. How this nasty chicken ever made it to the prestigious spot under his arm, I'll never know. But it will sure be a sweet memory that I hope I can use when I meet his first girlfriend!

Sadness & Wonder

It was one of those afternoons that matched the situation. It's been raining here, forever it seems, which seemed appropriate when I found out that a new friend of mine is going through the saddest off all things....her baby is dying.

Little One passed away today, I think. He was eight months old. It wasn't until after he was born that it was discovered he had spina bifida, and several other health issues. But - he made it to eight months old! I didn't know his mom well, but she would always bring him to play dates and everyone cooed over him just as they should have. He had the clearest blue eyes. My Fourth Darling, who is about four months older than Little One, enjoyed trying to hug him as he would sit in his bumba seat.

All of this has made me sit in wonder as I think about the joy and devastation that his family must be experiencing. How blessed to have known him, but it was only for a short while. Then, I'm embarrassed to say, I turn inward and wonder, "what if that were us?" I almost can't bear to think too long.

One hundred years ago it wasn't uncommon for a woman to lose several children. How did women loose half their children and stay sane? or did they stay sane? I really don't think I could. It's easy to say that one gets through it through "the grace of God," but that's really it. It is that grace, which surpasses all understanding, that makes life exist after something so shattering. It's that mystical, unexplainable substance that picks up our soul when all we want to do is wither away. It is that miracle of Salvation which makes a mourning mother able to speak coherently to friends and family who have come to offer paltry comfort, when all the comfort she really wants is holding her baby in her arms.

How delicate we are. We like to forget that condition, but it takes these soul traumas to open our eyes to God working in us and holding us up. It is that faith which even allows me, an insignificant onlooker to her grief, to pray for her and believe with her that God will get her mother's heart through this, and that her soul will recognize her son one day when she is greeted by him in heaven.

The Vortex That Is Blogging

Well, it's happend. I've been sucked into the black hole of blogging. It is one of the many things I have sworn would never happen and yet somehow does - you know, like letting my kids leave the house with no shoes on, driving a minivan (green, no less) and even bread making. Blogging - who has time? ...not me! It's just the latest trend, and here I am doing it.



I guess I'm working out my writing compulsion. The longest thing I've written since the third baby came along is a grocery list. My English profs would flip if they knew. We'll see if this is "more than a flash in the pan," (something my grandmom used to say).



This is it for now. I've got to put bread in the oven. You know, the bread I swore I'd never make when I can buy a loaf for seventy-five cents....and yet here I am.