What it all means

Of coarse, losing someone I love so much makes me ask the endless question, what does life mean? What is the point of coming here and loving when we will all die? Everything will die? I wonder if I will ever come to terms with this, if I will see the beauty in it like the masters who accept the leaves falling from the tree and going back to the soil as a metaphor for their lives as well.  

So beautiful to have been the dark, warm space for you to grow, one cell at a time, to make a heart that started beating and blood running in beautiful, branching arteries and veins all through you, the bones of your fingers, your toes, your legs, your eyes, all coming to be, all perfect, and then to have it all stop. And die. After all that mysterious creation, you go back to the earth, you become ash.

These words from a Blackfoot Indian Chief, Isapwo Mukisika Crowfoot, eases my heart and my thoughts.  He whispered this as he lay dying, 

What is life?

It is the flash of a firefly in the night,

It is the breath of a buffalo in the winter time,

It is the little shadow that runs across the grass

And loses itself in the sunset.

And so you are my love, and so am I.

the days you were here

The days you were here at home with us are a warm and golden blur.  Yes, I knew what was ahead, but you filled me with joy. With a happiness I hadn't known before. I knew it was only a matter of hours, so I decided to let them be golden, so  could remember them that way.  Everyone said I was doing so well, and that was because I was filled by you, by the existence of you, our son. By the love we had flowing between the three of us, our partnership so strong.  I know now that it won't end, that it is as normal as the blood in my veins.  But also, I mourn.  I grieve and it is work. I feel lonely for you.  I feel like my best friend has died. 

But the time you were here, your sweet 9 pounds, your golden heart, the sounds of your breath, was beautiful. Thank you for being here for that time, for not checking out right after you were born, for the week you stayed.  thank you for letting us feel your warm, softest skin, the silkiness of your hair, the scent of you.  

I always ask for your help. Funny to ask your own little baby for help, but you are in that position now I think.  Help me trust that more babies will come.  That we will be parents for healthy children.  Get them ready for us, take care of them, big brother.  I feel your love for them too.  Guardian. Sweet little boy. Help me be strong enough to keep going. We love you.

I walked

I walked with Tessa yesterday in the woods and hills of Point Reyes.  The dark underneath of the world.  The sour, wet earth, a running creek, trunks with caverns in them, great mothers.  It comforts me, to know there is a great mother who holds the dark places, the wombs, who knows the darkness that I walk, the path of loss, of wanting to go down down. Not that I want to die, no.  But I want to be in the dark. The trees held that for me.  Gnarled and old and crouching by the water, sprawled out toward the places of light, winding to get a piece of the sun. I felt just like them. They are covered in moss, and when their turn comes for the sun to hit them, they glow, all around, the moss radiates the light. Tessa said, "mind, remember this."  A glowing tree. 

Since I grew up in the woods I know about shadow and light.  I know that it is mostly shadow, and that the light wavers.  But you notice it more, it has a shape and a heart, you move toward it, you feel it on you.  It encases things, it loves them.  I need both. I need the mother who understands the dark, who isn't afraid of it, who knows that it is a part of us, a part of the earth, not to shy away from it, be big enough to take it in, to be it.  This is a part of what we have lost in putting women into a smaller place, this big mama holding of the shadow. Women hold this in their hearts. To be the place where your child grows, to talk to your baby, sing to him, eat for him, and know him, to give birth to him, to then let him go, back into the arms of the earth, the arms of GOD, this takes a heart with a dark forest and a little creek and a floor where things die and rot and then become fertile again, fertile for another life. I am proud of this dark place. 

I am grateful for the father sun also, to shine on my skin and make me look up. We walked into the meadow, into the sun, the trees where on a hill, to the west.  Their branches moved up and down, just a little. They said, "that is the mother of Otto. She brought him here." And they knew you.  They knew who you were and that you came. I love you baby. I am glad you came here, to me, to my belly, to my heart. It is hard to keep taking steps but I am getting braver. And I will keep visiting that place with the trees with the caverns in them, with their openings into the black, because they know what this is.

I love this picture of us. I need to look at pictures a lot. To feel your weight and know that you are our baby, we are your parents. We miss you so much. Days are very long. A search for what it is all about. It is hurtful to have you gone. I was really angry today. To unravel these feelings seems impossible. But slowly I unraveled. I hugged my friends. I told your dad I was sorry for exploding so much. People want to hang out and I just don't think they know how much hurt is in me. It can be really lonely.

I hold the blanket you are wrapped in here at night. I hold it close to my chest and belly like it's you. I smell it. You are my precious one and you are gone. And I don't understand. Why the world goes on. Why other people get pregnant with their babies and have their families and their joy and I watch them go on, without me. With their joy.I tell you every day that I miss you. I write it down. I will write it down and say it to you for a long time. And it will always be true. I love you and I miss you, my sweet son. i send you a kiss to heaven.

Hello my baby. Today is warm, strangely warm for January.  In the 80's here. Like a summer day.  The plants are all confused because they were just freezing and now they're dry.  And the full moon has come and gone again.  I like looking at our pictures together, me holding you.  

Our little friend Chester died yesterday afternoon, our sweet little yellow bird we've had for 5 years. It brings up all the pain of losing you, losing another part of our family.  We brought him to the vet to see what was wrong, he was puffy, and we knew he had some organ problems, and they wanted to keep him for tests. I didn't want to leave  him, but I was so upset by being at a medical place again, having to make decisions again, I just left him and went to the car and cried and cried. He died at the vet.  I was so mad at myself, that I didn't have the clarity to just bring him home, to let him be at home to die.  I didn't know he was that sick, but I had a feeling.  

I am so glad, my baby, that we took you home. This makes it all so clear. You were home in the quiet with just the whirr of the fan overhead, no beeps, no loud, laughing conversations of doctors and nurses who seem so clued out to our last hours with our son, no machines to watch, no needles in you, just you. Just a baby, just our little boy, where you were conceived, where you grew, in the same bed, in our arms.  I am so glad that we had you to ourselves, to ease to the other side. We were such a team, I wish there were a more graceful word for it, but we all three worked together, our souls enmeshed, as you let go, bit by bit, as you shut down, bit by bit, we were with you, over you, guiding you. Never alone, covered in love.

I hope Chester had some comfort as he died, I hope he felt our hearts with him.  I think part of his dying there was to show us that we did the right thing with you. So Chester, thank you for your brave gift.  We miss you.  We hope you are flying free with your friend Clarence up there, I hope you fly over our sweet Otto.  

I realize sometimes that I don't feel as valuable a person without my little boy to take care of. To eat for, to sleep for, to watch everything for. It's easy to feel like it's not as important to eat, to eat well, without this little body and spirit who was also partaking. I just read something that reminded me that I am worth feeding, body and soul, as just me.

I don't feel as important, not being a mom. I am waiting for the day I am a mom again to be important again. And, as hard as it is to live it out, this is not true. I am still important, I am still a soul, just like Otto, I am as important as him. This part of my life is real too. This part that is so hard and dark and gets so old, and I see it stretching out in front of me for long miles and it just doesn't seem worth it sometimes. But I have a garden in the back yard and it makes me happy to work out there. To put my hands in the dirt. To care and tend it. The sun came out as I was doing breathing and stretching in the living room and it shines on me as I breathe, and I am alive now. I don't just want to wait till I'm pregnant or have a baby to feel good again. I know Otto wants me to feel good things, I know he loves me. I just can't stop crying.