Happy Birthday, No-No

black & white

Ailis Evelyn

I wish I could hold you, precious girl, and tell you how sorry I am.
Sorry that I love you so much, but much too late. xo


Photo via weheartit.com, sentiment mine.

come morning light

Sad, but so well done I can't stop listening to it.
(And now, a beautiful video to go with it!)

concise

My posts are often short. I cannot go on at length, for what is left to say? I cannot tell you of their darlingness, their splendidness. Their precious, precious hearts. I cannot tell you.

I cannot tell.

teenage escapades

Got a simple text from my sister in the middle of the night that broke my heart wide open. Broke my heart as if she were my own daughter, for the very reason that she's not my daughter after all. My sister was giddy and excited, telling me about her adventure, but I was crushed, soon spiraling away inside my own head, feeling fresh pangs of loss and knowing full well -- Ailis will never sneak out with her friend one night and get a tattoo when she's 18... because she will never BE 18.

She'll never have the chance to do something naughty and harmless, like get a tattoo without my advice or permission. She'll just be my baby, forever and ever.

ugh

Can one of you please come over and hang out? I am so tired of communicating mainly with a computer screen. Someone with a face, email me and I will give you directions to my house.

I am 90% serious.

Sorry I'm neglecting you, little blog. I still love you, I swear... You just can't talk back to me; and I so need someone to talk back to me right now.

I can't seem to explain anything properly this week.

be mine

I was going to bake a cake for today, but my cousin made about a million cupcakes last night, so I figure there is enough cake in the house for now and I should probably wait. I have no one to make it for anyway, aside from myself, so no one is getting let down.

You may or may not be surprised to hear that I am not a romantic. Like, at all. Many of the things that other girls swoon over or have come to expect on this day, I find silly and contrived... But still, I've always liked Valentine's Day.

As a child I really enjoyed the idea of a day devoted to showing love to one another. School parties were the best! Even the unpopular kids who usually got left out due to classroom politics were showered with hearts and candy on at least this one day -- and that made me happy inside. Even when I was older (in college, and abroad in Australia) I still liked to make handmade valentines for all of my friends, and my little cousins as well. I am not a fan of the commercial aspect of the holiday -- but I won't move to revoke its 'holiday' status just because of that. You don't have to buy anything to make someone feel special. And you don't have to have a romantic relationship to be happy that love exists in this world.

I wish that my little ones were here, so I could shower them with sweet treats and too many kisses. I even wish, for literally the first time, that I'd had a date this Valentine's Day. I don't feel bitter about it; not even a little. Humbled, actually, would be far more accurate...



You know, there's so much more I could say about this, so much I discovered about myself as I thought it all over yesterday and today. But I don't think I can write it down very well right now. So I'll save it for later, tuck it away. And maybe one day we'll have coffee together, and you'll say: "How do you feel about Valentine's Day, Vera?"

And I'll tell you. I'll tell you everything I'm thinking. I promise.

rainbows

It seems that many of the BLMs whose blogs I read are pregnant again; their little rainbow babies pushing out only newly slimmed tummies, showing up as glorious blobs of life in grainy black and white. And I am so, so happy for you, mamas; really I am.

Only... only I wish that it was my turn too, you know?
My turn looks awfully far away from here.

the stars lean down to kiss you

As many times as I blink / I'll think of you tonight

And I'll forget the world that I knew / But I swear I won't forget you
Oh, if my voice could reach / Back through the past
I'd whisper in your ear / Oh darling, I wish you were here

baby-daddy

It's not that I miss him tonight, exactly... But I miss having a lover, a partner, a champion; a friend. And I wonder when I will ever have that again, and with whom.

It seems the cruelest kind of irony that the very event that severed our connection permanently is the same one that ensured we would be bound to one another forever.

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You would have loved your daddy, No-No. I am sure of that much, at least. And I think he would have loved you more than he ever even knew he could. Certainly more than he loved me; but I'm okay with that. Perhaps he does love you, still; perhaps he remembers you, thinks about you, even now. I wish I knew.

I wish I didn't feel so alone in missing you.

trepidation

I didn't think Christmas was going to bother me much. I know some people have been dreading it for months already, while I was still feeling pretty okay. Christmas? Piece of cake. I have a lot to be excited about. But I am starting to feel a few new twinges of grief as well, and it kind of sucks.

I miss my babies, in the dull, aching way which I have learned precedes the hole-in-my-chest, can't-remember-how-to-breathe kind of way. When it happens, it is like stepping distractedly into the street, experiencing a sudden sense of unease, and then glancing up to find myself face to face with a city bus. I am not looking forward to this feeling, and am trying to figure out a way to prevent it, if I can. But I'm not really sure that I can.

I really want some kind of gift this year that acknowledges that I'm a mom, though I don't know if anyone will think to give me one. And I want to buy presents for my kiddos. I know it's crazy, but it is a kind of crazy that I'm okay with. I will buy them stuff if I want to. Even though they will never use it, I hope that someday, a child of mine will. I like to think of these items as hand-me-downs. It makes me happy to think that a little brother or little sister will have a few things that were passed down to them; that's how it should be, in a family. Things that were gathered with hope, and infused with love. Things with a little bit of history, even if not as much as I would have liked.

I wish I could wrap up the gifts though, and that they would be torn open on Christmas morning by eager little hands. Lissie would have been old enough to really get it this year, and I can just imagine her noisy excitement and her generous spirit and contagious joy. After it was all over, I would have put sticky red and green bows on Noah's fuzzy little head, and taken pictures of them together, still in their jammies, amongst the piles of shredded wrapping paper.

Oh. Oh, my heart.

take it back

Undo it, take it back, make every day the previous one until I am returned to the day before the one that made you gone. Or set me on an airplane travelling west, crossing the dateline again and again, losing this day, then that, until the day of loss is still ahead, and you are here, instead of sorrow.

Nessa Rapaport, A Woman's Book of Grieving

co-sleeping

Lying in bed, I imagined I could feel Ailis lying with me, the warm weight of her body stretched down the length of my back, one little arm flung carelessly over my shoulder, her sticky-sweet hand hanging in my face; and I curled myself around the place where No-No should have been sprawled, with a faint frown on his face, sleeping the sleep of the just...

And I thought about the miracle of breath, moving in and out of lungs, of blood running swift and sure through veins. I thought about the rise and fall of a seven-month-old's round little belly, and of glossy curls brushed back from a two-and-a-half year old's smiling face. I thought about the work that was begun in me, but never finished, like a length of knitting that came undone. All of the vast potential that was present and waiting inside of them, needlessly and wastefully lost, like an acorn planted, rooted, and then too quickly dug back up. The potential for greatness, for annoying habits, for creativity. The potential for courage, and rebelliousness, and love.

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As I thought these things about my children I held myself very still, so as not to disturb their imagined forms beside me. And for a long time I could not sleep. But it was a sacrifice, of sorts. It was discomfort for their sake. It was an opportunity to parent -- even if it was all in my head. And for this one night, it was enough.

all hallows

As I was driving home last night I saw rows of glowing jack-o-lanterns on neighbors' front porches, and lots of extra cars parked outside. It made me wonder, suddenly, what exactly was happening in those houses, what their Halloween parties might be like. (I've never actually been to one.) It also made me think, for the first time, that I might really like to host an annual Halloween party, when I have my own place and, later on, a family.

I could totally see it. It would be like an early New Year's Eve -- which for the most part is what the holiday originally was. I would decorate with pumpkins and plenty of candles, and I would invite everyone to come over with their kids in the evening, after they were done trick-or-treating. We could go through the loot together, and then eat lots of candy and cookies and caramel apples and popcorn. There would be mulled wine for the grownups, and hot cider for the kids. I would have an ofrenda set up for my babies, and each person or family could also honor, if they wished, someone dear to them who had died.

The children would fall asleep eventually, sprawled in front of "It's The Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown" ...but we would be sure to stay up until midnight at least, playing games and talking, as the last day of October slid gently into November 1st -- Día de los Angelitos, Day of the Innocents, All Souls' Day. A day not for fear, but for remembrance, hope, and prayer.

I find it soothing just to imagine this, this blend of rituals and traditions, made personal and new. The thought of the fact of death being readily and gracefully accepted into the life I am building brings me an unexpected sense of peace.


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I don't know that the veil is really thinner at this time of year, my loves;
but if it is, say you'll snuggle up close to me tonight?

inexpressible

I wanted to put a quote here. A poem, a song. Something. I've been searching and searching. But nothing is working. And I find I am trying to describe something that I'm not sure can even be described in someone else's words, or maybe in any words at all:



I am trying to tell you what you mean to me


What it means that you were here


What it means that I'm your mother -- your mother


Not someone else's


Not anyone else's but yours


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What I picture in my mind, as I'm thinking about this, is the ocean, the wild breakers of the South Pacific ocean, at night. And I see so many stars overhead, unfamiliar, and very bright, the moon a shining silver splinter, and the waves foaming right at my feet, washing beguilingly over my toes, and then sliding away again. The air is warm, and the water is cold, and I stand there for a long time, with my head back and my arms outstretched, as if I could embrace the whole world, or gather the essence of you back together between the palms of my two reaching hands, gather you back from where you have disappeared into the heart of the universe. I can feel the whole of the earth missing you with me. Wondering with me, where have you gone, where are you now? Every rock and tree and flower, all the sand beneath my feet, all the whales, and the lions, and the mice, and the bees. We notice, we remember, we pause.

We look up.

And this string of moments is like a string of perfect pearls, or like a string of notes in a perfect melody, our solemn, silent song of acknowledgement, and memory... for you are a part of this story, this poem, this Place. You are part of us, and it -- and me. And we remember you.


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So this is it, baby. This is it.


If I had a picture of what I'm trying to say, this would be it.

the frightful symmetry of numbers

Ailis Evelyn, today it has been 3 years, 3 months, 3 weeks, and 3 days since we said goodbye. Noah Griffin, it has been 1 year, 1 month, and 1 week since we said goodbye. It is my hope, however, that even though time is passing here, for you everything has been suspended, and when my turn comes to finally leave this life, we will walk into heaven together, in the space between one breath and another, as if we were never parted at all...

I don't know why I'm so sensitive to patterns and numbers. I don't know why on some days, the dead are simply dead, and life goes on, but on others... On others I look at the time ticking by or the calendar's date and I feel like I'm breathing glass, because this is all wrong; it is all so very wrong, the way I have so much free time during the week, and all my clothes are neat and unstained, and there are no crayon marks on the wall, no toys spread on the floor. All my laundry is just mine, and I swear out loud (especially when I'm tired), and if I want to eat ice cream for dinner I can. And this is all wrong, because I'm a mother of two, and that's not at all how things would be if my kids were here.

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I feel like a bad mom sometimes, when I am able to focus on a project for hours at a time. When I say yes to extra shifts at work. I feel like I'm not paying enough attention to them. In the back of my mind, I feel guilty. But they're not here, to pay attention to. They're not here to change or grow, to be taught new things or marveled over. They don't need me anymore. And therein lies the problem, doesn't it?

I'm 26 years old. I have two beautiful children; they're just not here right now. They're never going to be here, so you needn't wait around to meet them. I'm not actually crazy, I swear! Or maybe I am, a little; just not dangerously so.

I can tell you one thing: This is not at all how I imagined my life would be.

I always seem to forget / How fragile are the very strong

Well, thanks to the awesome blog challenge I am participating in, I had a handy list of things I could do for self-care.  And today I really needed me some self-care.  Good timing, universe!  Thank you very much.

Today I : Had hot tea and toast for breakfast.  Asked A not to turn on the TV till I was done eating.  Wrote some posts for my blog.  Took extra care with my outfit and makeup (and received several compliments in return).  Hummed my Lissie's sweet little song all day.  Said "No" to an extra hour at work.  Tried on clothes after my shift.  Sat in Barnes & Noble with a soy Chai latte and read the first five chapters of Inkheart (which is also a pretty great movie, by the way).  Had a nice bath, with sparkly bubbles, when I got home. 

I wish the sea was not so far away; it would have been nice to lay on the sand and listen to the crashing waves for awhile.  Though I would trade even that beloved experience gladly for a hug.  A real life hug -- from anyone really, so long as they meant it.  (Nobody touches me, here; have I told you that before?  My skin is starving.  The most human contact I get these days is if my hand accidentally brushes a customer's while I'm giving them back their change.) 

I wish I had my Sophie and my Cissa.  I miss them so much; and they give the best snuggles.  I hope hope hope I will get to see them soon.

one (part i)

Day 1 - a song that reminds you of your child

Reminds me of Lissie:


I only discovered this song recently, but the first time I heard it I immediately thought of my little girl.

At the time (when I was pregnant), I felt so incredibly overwhelmed. I was so emotionally unhealthy, so battered and bruised. Yes, I do believe that I had it in me to be a good mother even then; but oh... it would have been so very hard on us both.

I remember one night, the only night I came out of my denial for long enough to have a vivid memory of doing so. I remember thinking, Oh baby, what are we going to do? I want to be good at this; I want to be able to be everything you need me to be, but I don't know if I can right now. Maybe you should just leave. Maybe you would be better off.

I cannot even describe the guilt I felt for thinking those thoughts, afterward. Even though I had absolutely no control over what happened, I still manage to tell myself all kinds of awful and untrue things. I know in my deepest heart that I only ever wanted what was best for her; and maybe this was it. But what I wouldn't give for an almost-three-year old, fast asleep in my house tonight.

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When I would play my song / You used to sing along / I always seem to forget / How fragile are the very strong

I'm sorry I can't steal you / I'm sorry I can't stay / So I'll put bandaids on your knees / And watch you fly away

I'm sending you away tonight / I'll put you on a bird's strong wing / I'm saving you the best way I know how / I hope again one day to hear you sing

one (part ii)

Reminds me of No-No:


I think this music video must be the reason for the persistent notion I have that Noah died at Christmastime. Even though it was really late summer, I played this so many times that the light displays are permanently linked in my mind with his loss, and continue to make me feel vaguely melancholy whenever I see them.

The way she passes her hands over her stomach at the beginning guts me every single time.

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Look down, the earth below is crumbling / Look up, the stars are all exploding / It's the last day on earth / In my dreams, in my dreams / It's the end of the world / And you've come back to me / In my dreams

Every time anybody speaks your name / I still feel the same / I ache, I ache, I ache inside / I ache, I ache, I ache inside / I ache, I ache, I ache inside / I ache, I ache, I ache inside