Taking up screen printing

"In the Chronicles of Narnia, the children ask if Aslan is safe. The answer is, 'no.' He is not safe... - but He is good. This is where my mind shuts off - where I generally have to leave it as 'I don't understand, but it's not my place to I suppose, so just stop thinking.' This way of relating to You has slowly - over almost 3 years - drained me of my trust in You - not my belief, but my trust. Can you, in fact, 'trust' some One who is self proclaimed to be NOT safe???" - my journal, 12/14/10

This is the thing about being this kind of pregnant...I want everyone everywhere to see and nod sweetly at my tight fitting shirt, to take notice. After all, I've been here before and not taken advantage - not realized that it was my last month of baby bump, last week of kicks, last day of humming to my mystery miracle someone. But the catch is that I want it to be appropriate for my tight fitting shirt to bear the markings of some catchy screen printer...it would say something like, "Yes, I'm Pregnant! Not the kind where it's a sure thing though. Don't get any big ideas of me and childbearing being a good match." I'm not exaggerating. I want that shirt. Some cultures do this...you fast when people die - you wear black for months - you communicate clearly so that people aren't held to an unreachable expectation of responding to you appropriately despite their ignorance.

When we were pregnant with Elianna, going to church became uncanny. For weeks and weeks and weeks our friends announced their simultaneous pregnancies in Sunday School or over coffee. I felt no joy for them, not then - maybe a hint of "aww, that's nice" but certainly not joy. Each announcement felt like an additional weight of pressure to live up to their impressive mothering skills - of utmost importance, bearing children who stay alive. All together, 7 babies were due (and born, and now toddle around quite adorably each week) in the months around Elianna's due date. My two best long distant friends were due that summer. My sister-in-law, precious friend, was due with my favorite niece just 4 days after Elianna's due date. I said to Kevin, "If all these people have all these babies and we don't...I'll have to leave." Not just church...probably the state. We talked about Wyoming.

We didn't leave our church, or the state; although I could disappear into the woods of Yellowstone and be perfectly happy (I get that from my Dad). Instead, we were given a gift, another early gift, most precious of gifts. On May 22nd, 22 hours before my May 23rd due date with Elianna, Tahlia was born. The day before. I still can't comprehend this...not in a "that is amazing!" way, and not in a "is this some kind of platitudinal 'replacement' trick?" way...just in a way where I am reminded that I know of no other posture before God than one of bruised knee, broken hearted, submissive curiosity at what His big picture must look like.

So why the shirt? Why be so clear about my identity? Because I walk by strollers and slings and grouchy pregnant women and see welcome-baby-tidings on face book and pregnancy announcements loaded with assumptions from my "untouched sisters" and allow myself to feel less than delight and gratitude for perfect package little families. I feel, in part, an ugly little bubble of anger and jealousy that floats up shaped like hurt.  I love you, I do...you, your precious family, your healthy baby...I just can't completely relate. My point? Other people are pregnant - they will have healthy babies, according to their birth plan, on their due date - well, certainly not more than 10 days after it...ahh the horror of having to labor and give birth to a healthy happy baby, and often times, AFTER one's due date...such heart ache! (Side bar.) And now, the real point...still other people are pregnant and their story will look more like mine - and they don't even know what's coming, haven't even considered it. So by grace, I will walk, past strollers and slings and swollen/sleepless/grouchy pregnant women - I'll not shake my head at announcements and assumptions. By grace I will extend the gesture I expect even of strangers on my behalf, of remembering that I know no one's past and that I know no one's future.

"'When are you due?' asked the already mother, and the young woman answered, 'Friday. I can't wait.' I have nothing in common with you, I thought. That shows I had already forgotten the one lesson I'd vowed to learn: you can never guess at the complicated history [or future] of strangers." - Elizabeth McCracken in An Exact Replica of a Figment of My Imagination

Two weeks after we got home (well, to my parents' house to wait for adoption paperwork) from the hospital with our little early-bird Tahlia, I found my mom crying on the couch one morning. "Alison's baby died" she wept. "What? Alison? Alison who?" My mom had decisively chosen not to tell me that my sweet, newly married, much younger cousin was expecting her first (my mom does this NH friends...she's protecting me...it's necessary sometimes...often you have a 3 week-old before I know anything about your growing family). Hearing about full wombs hurts the empty wombs. It's just a fact. It's the same kind of hurt that adored widowed friends feel over my haphazard and off-the-cuff mention of Kevin in blogs I would imagine.
Alison didn't even know what was coming...maybe hadn't even considered it. And we thought I needed protecting from her. Suddenly I was the one doing the hurting. In all my own hurt, I walk around hurting - sometimes people I love.

Oh coveted eternity. Creator, redeem this world...it is NOT our home.

Blessings and peace on you and your family, whether separated by eternity or not. He is not safe. But He is good.

- oxo to baby Tristan (you should be two!)
- heart hugs for baby B and his mommy J and daddy R