Valentines

Hello darling.

There are so many things I have wanted to say this week. I go back and forth between hope and joy and fear and despair. Sometimes I want to sell everything and live on a yurt. I keep telling people about this yurt and how good it sounds. It's hard to get my mind straight. It's hard to get it quiet. What am I about? I want to get beyond the news and the fear. Every time I'm with people I love and we laugh I remember the point of being human, which is of coarse, to tell jokes. To laugh at things that happen in life, to find humor. There is usually humor around, even in the most dire of situations. My family seems particularly good at finding this, to the point of sacreligion. Yes, I'll coin that, it has a red line under it as I type saying it's not really a word but who cares. I know you are with me, I know you love us, you are just sooo missed. Going to the Y has gotten hard, so many mommies with little babies, so many of them my friends, old high school friends. I have to decide, will I give it a break for a while to just heal up the old heart or just tell myself to deal with it so I can go swimming, not be so surprised every time.

I love your dad. It's valentine's day and I'm trying to be up but I'm just sad. I love him and I'm sad. I am so grateful for him, for our almost 10 years of marriage, for our friendship, for our sharing of you, the knowing together of this love and heartache, and learning to love and be sad. To be sad and make jokes. To be sad with moments of long and deep laughs. Life, I'm here, I might as well see what you've got.

I love you my child.

And just a note to all those we love, and all interested, I just want to share that it's hard to hear the phrase "try again." It's not because we don't want more children or don't want to talk about them, but because Otto was not a try. He is who he is. He is my firstborn, my oldest child, and though I understand that there aren't really other words to use that easily come to mind when asking this question, I'm sure that there are creative ways to ask it without the word "try". We have a son. He isn't here, but he is real and always. And there will be more. My friend Maria asked me the other day in spanish if we were applying. I asked, for what, insurance? And she laughed, and said, no, a baby! I loved it. "Is that really how you say it in spanish?" I asked? And she laughed and said yes. I love the idea of applying for a baby. You just turn in the application to the angels and see what happens.

Happy day of love to everyone. We have each other today. It's a good celebration.