July29

Before Ferdinand was born, there were of course speculation of when, if there will be any coincidences with birthdays of friends, relatives, friend’s friend, or friend’s friend’s niece…

Now, I know who shares his birthday. And, gosh, you would think me sick, but I am glad, that Ferdinand shares his birthday with Rosepetal’s firstborn son V (please go over and remember with her too). And, today is also Tash’s wedding anniversary and Bella’s birthday. It brings me to my knees that she writes about it all in one post, with no qualms, like only Tash can do. By chance we got to write on a groupblog and back then she found time to dig back through my debris to find out what happen, and also to discover that we share significant dates. I was just thinking, some days back, thanks-be-to-whoever-is-out there, that it is Tash. Having read of bereaved moms who gets shunned, or treated as invisible, I am relieved that it is Tash. Because somebody else would probably have struck me off their address book, and ran far, far away, crossing her fingers at me, garlic cloves tied around her neck. Of course, I wish no one shared dates like this, but in the darkness you gotta find that relief somehow.

So, I hope Tash is hitting the pinata hard, and having a swell time with Bella, The Police playing in the background, followed by Beatles, of course. (And we’ll be there behind you as you break the news about the Beatles, Tash.)

I am wearing a necklace today, but I’ll write about it another day. I just wanted to say thank you for remembering with me, for walking along. I am grateful.

Like clockwork, they remember, and started drawing pictures. This is Sophia’s, with giant birds, flying and walking on the ground, on a windy day.

Stars, stars, stars

And Val is still coloring but here’s her picture, with a magical tree that grow different types of leaves, and stars and hearts…

And she drew Ferdinand and herself connected by a cord, “we’re forever connected”, she said.

Ferdinand my son, two years ago on these days, we looked into your face, knowing we will not watch you blink your eyes as the light of day flooded the room, knowing we will not hear you utter a sound, ever. That was very difficult to understand, why.

Today, I think you have your journey to take. I truly believe you voyage among the stars, making your home amidst unseen Universes and doing what you enjoy. I look up and always think of you. I miss you, always will. Your absence is a fact, so is our love for you.

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last post

Not here, but over at Glow in the Woods. I have decided to step off and let in some new blood. I feel I have said yabbled a lot and it has been great therapy for me, but all the poor ears/eyes I have tortured! I do feel I have run out of things to say but maybe it is jus a phase I am going through and I may be back with a vengence.

I still have this blog, where I had come here to just pour everything out, where I received much support and understanding. Please allow me to repeat again, I am SO very grateful.

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Thanks for all your supportive comments on the previous post! I really appreciate that… …

I almost immediately went searching for someone else to make a new neckalce, and I did start searching. For five seconds. Then I stopped.

It will have to wait. Too many emotions, even if I felt I had calmed down and let go.

Because I have not really let go. I was still clinging on to the idea of a necklace.

So next week my chest will be empty. No weight around my neck, or against my skin to provide a tiny sense of comfort. But then so be it. I will get through it.

Life being a series of letting go is a repeated lesson, a continuous zazen session, clubbing over your head until you die or you get it and start living. I am still sitting in this class. Still getting clubbed over. Still obstinate.

But consciousness and understanding also slowly creeping into me. (I hope)

Have a wonderful weekend, you all. We’re off to the cabin until Tuesday, making fires in the evenings and just letting the days go.

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i don’t want to be upset (warning: RANT)

I really don’t want to be upset…. don’t want this to turn sour…. holding on to tenuous threads of sanity and peace but I’m slipping rapidly.

The custom necklace that broke? So I sent it back and she was taking a long time to repair. Last week she said, first thing Monday I am going to send it back to you, it will be in time. OK. Today is Thursday, and nothing. So I asked, can you check the tracking number, just in case?

AND SHE SAID:

“It is drying now. I can ship it back to you or I can give you a refund. I am sorry it broke but you were rushing me and this was a new design and then it broke. Also, I took 2 extra days of vacation since I did not take any for 1.5 years.” (paraphrased)

I was having a pretty good day, and then really soured it. Excuse me while I walk away first and scream expletives into a pillow.

…

……

I checked our conversations and by golly I NEVER rushed her to complete the necklace. She said you needed it to go away on a trip and actually I was asking, you said you shipped it, but it still has not arrived. I am going away Saturday and I hope it arrive by then. It did arrive, she sent it by first class, not Priority as I assumed.

Also (wait while I wipe the froth and foam from corners of my mouth, as they are drooling down my neck soon), she said she would work on it last week and ship it Monday. Instead she was silent until today, telling me it is curing now and it needs 12 hours so she’ll ship it tomm. WTH???!!

And, a refund right now? For something I initiated May23?! I call this irresponsibility and cowardice. She said she felt honored to do this piece for me and now it is all soured.

I told myself… peacepeacepeace, calmcalmcalm. It is just a thing. It is just a thing. IT IS JUST A THING. I don’t need it to honor him. I only wanted something to wear, something tangible. Maybe the lesson is I don’t need any.thing.

So, when I get this necklace I am going to wonder what energy has gone in there, what energy went in when it was mailed off to me. Not love, not honor, not compassion. Probably resentment that the stupid wings dared to fall off, and resentment at my insistence… now that I write this out, maybe I shd ask for a refund?

…. …

(10 mins later)

So I have asked for a refund. I just don’t think the necklace is going to have good energy in it. This was probably not meant to be. I will look for another necklace. Or maybe I do not truly need one.

So, the drama is over now. For some 3o minutes back there I was really upset and a one-crazy-woman spectacle. It’s all over now. Phew.

(although I do have to wonder… what will happen to the necklace then? there’s that little piece of paper at the back with his name on it. I hate to think about it but I guess I just have to let go RIGHT NOW.)

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coming to terms

I am 65-dollars richer now.

Because I sold the five prenatal workout dvd’s I had. All of them sold within three days of listing. OK, they were priced to sell but I would not call it a loss either… because I won’t be using them and I am not going to upcycle those discs into coasters or whatever crafty blah-blah ideas other people come up with.

So, yeah, I am coming to terms with my life. At least, I am trying hard. This marks the end of our child-bearing years. Being a parent is a whole-life thing, you know… even if your daughter is 60-years-old and a great-grandmother herself, you are still her mother. Responsibilities will be different (hopefully!) but it does not change the fact that you are a parent. Once a mother, mother for life.

I know I am reluctant to say, Yes, let’s stop here because a part of me so desperately wants to have the son that we lost. It is as if if we keep trying and trying, somehow, what that had happened will be erased, and replaced with a new reality.

But this is not how things work.

My age is looking northward, while my body steadily sags southward.

We would really like to go to concerts and performances again, and travel with fewer concerns.

Right now, moving through the kitchen requires a navigation through a ginormous highchair and the sometimes-there exer-saucer.  It is lovely but I cannot imagine that being a somewhat perpetual-state, as is the case for some family who keeps shouldering on until they really could not have more. I admire people who have six, or seven, or eight children because having children is not just having sex and giving birth. It is so much more. It is an entirely different lifestyle. I love children, but not enough for my house to be in a state of perpetual play-land.

Even when I keep hitting myself over the head with above argument, I am still deeply saddened that we have indeed made this decision. It is mourning all over again, with a layer added. I know that if Ferdinand had not died, we would not be as adamant about this, we would have played with the idea of Hey, why not? Let’s see what happens? Now, let’s see what happens is a way too scary notion and I am getting old and not up for excitement and anticipation anymore. (You wouldn’t imagine it, but having Lyra poop into the potty is generating a lot of excitement around here. I wish you were here, really.)

I used to hold the girls when they were babies and thought, “Oh, I can’t wait to experience this all over again!” and now when I hold Lyra I think, “Gosh, this will be the very last time I get to experience this.” and I tear up like crazy and feel maddeningly sad. I cannot imagine that the emotions can be so strong, it literally warps me.

It’s not just the coming to terms with not having another; it is also the coming to terms with not having the other.

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life in July

It is so searing hot I nearly burned my hands opening the car door. But, you know, grief does not melt under heat.

::

Sliced off a small piece of flesh from my thumb while cutting up mushrooms to throw into the stew. Knife was freshly sharpened by my in-home dedicated knife-sharperner husband so the cut was clean and good. Oh, it hurt. And bled while I shouldered on to get dinner made. Did I say it HURT?!

But nowhere near how it felt to lose our son.

The flesh will grow back. It already is.

::

I turned down the bigger-than-expected translation assignment. I just don’t have the mind-space for it.

“Throwing away money?” was R’s question but I have my “reputation” at stake. I know with everything that is going on, it just won’t be a quality piece of work and probably I will be late. And truth is, I want my sleep. I don’t want to work till 3 or 4 am in the morning and be groggy in the day and unable to be present to my kids. So, yeah, I threw away that sum of money to enjoy whatever time I have with my children right now. There will be a million other ways to make money, but the time I have with my children will never come back.

I do think I am being wimpy though. If the bank is threatening to take our house away, I guess I would have done every single job that comes my way, quality-assured or not.

::

I read a couple of blogs from creative/designer-type women who happen to be expecting, and I cringe every time they post a  picture of some baby product and say “Oh, I soooooo want this for our nursery!” or “This is toooo cute!!” All those exclamation marks makes me sick to the stomach.

I know, I was one of them bubbling-over-crazy women waiting for the birth of my child. Until I learned that babies can die, at.any.time. No more exclamation marks for me in this aspect. And I mourn for that, I do.

::

For Val’s birthday I bought her a set of blank Russian dolls that she can paint herself. Sophia has a set she rec’d as a gift a couple years back and Val had always wanted one set of her own. She talked about it so much… when I saw they sell blanks I got a set for her. She was so excited and this past weekend decided she is finally going to paint them. She counted and there were 5 dolls.

“Papa… mama…. me…. Sophia… Lyra… … but there won’t be a Ferdinand, mom. There are only 5 dolls.”

“… …”

“It’s ok! He’s an angel, flying over us. It’s ok!”

“… …”

She drew a sketch of what the dolls will be like and they all have a pair of wings at the back.

“These are Ferdinand dolls, mom. In memory of Ferdinand. They are all angels, with wings. Don’t you like them, mom?”

“I love them. They are gorgeous.”

(Conversations like this moves me, and kills me at the same time. I don’t want no freaking angel dolls. It just makes me want to scream sometimes, or take a knife and stab my heart repeatedly.)

::

I look at the calendar. And wonder when July will just be another month in the year. Just another freaking normal month.

::

I have been sent red jewelry and a free artwork, and a beautiful wrap coming to me soon. I am grateful for the generosity and beautiful hearts. I truly am. I just wish I did not need all these things. (No, I don’t need them. They are gifts. I guess what I meant was, I wish I did not need the comfort.)

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