Oct 15, 2019

I feel city distractions peel back and color reemerge, as I’m met by upstate graces. I feel my process begin again, I am home.

I’ve found myself blessed to be in the company of new life, over and over again lately. Holding three precious little people, the gifts to three different sets of our friends. What a time of excitement for each family, and for us. I can’t get over the miracle of a baby coming from a human- friends of mine creating life, like magicians. I feel honored to glean from their experience, learning from their fresh wisdom.

As I’ve spoken to the new mothers, the realness emerges. Below the happiness and thrills we hold, roots of loss, and the questions for which we will never have answers, pull ground. The epically exciting next to unquestionable ache. The awkwardness of shifts. Each life a lot the same, while also totally different.

I thought seeing friends have kids would be hard, and maybe it will be sometimes, but I’ve been surprised by how precious and kindred the experience has felt. What a gift it is to borrow and share joy. New life paired with fresh hope and a mix of a lot of big feelings, questions, and life changes- I guess I can really relate! All my senses have been engaged- it’s both electric and terrifying.

In beginning a new program with new and friendly faces in the city, at first I wondered if I could relate after my experience with cancer left me feeling so changed. But, it’s been cancer that has helped me to find the honest ground we share.

We might not know or choose it to be this way, but our vulnerability creates home. Nothing leaves us more isolated than thinking we are different than others because of loss. If anything, it’s shared pain that can bind us even more richly to life. In our grief, there is context to our joy, and this is where we begin to know each other.

Distractions are part of the process. We see, then we don’t, until we do again. We sometimes need opening. Opening can be odd like a rusty blade rolled along the curve of a can, crackling it’s way, dangerous at jagged corners. Let’s be not afraid.

Softly flutter your eyes, open, and have your gaze fall soft. We lay jagged and smooth together.