Looking back, Looking forward

On New Years Day, in visiting a dear friend, we got to introduce our babies to each other. Except my baby isn't a baby any more, and her baby was truly a baby, only two weeks old at the time. What a blessing. What a joy life is. What a mystery, how life comes to be. All mixed together were my sympathies for a difficult labor, my ecstasy for the abundant love coursing between mother-child-husband-father-wife, my appreciation for a husband who cared so lovingly for my dear friend, my respect for a woman who cared so lovingly for her child, my comfort at seeing an old friend, and an intense sense of overwhelm in realizing that we were once there(ish) and are now in such a different place.


Somehow, for me, this picture [above] captured so much of what I was feeling. Sofia, neck firm, brain spinning with curiosity, eyes at attention, discovering, wondering, learning independently about this baby whose only volition is to absorb her mother's love and care and neck support. Were we ever there? New parents, just home with a newborn, minds still spinning from labor and sleep deprivation and joy and wonder and shock. Less than a year before that day, we were there, and yet I can barely fathom it, barely bring back that memory from the fog.


It occurred to me that throughout my whole pregnancy, I did no let myself believe there would actually be a baby at the end of the process. I was so fearful, no, so sure, that I would miscarry like my maternal grandmother. When we got past the point of miscarriage being possible, I became convinced I would deliver a still born like my paternal grandmother. When had to go to the hospital because the baby I was pregnant with was in distress, there was a real part of me preparing for leaving that hospital empty handed. But I did not. I walked out of that hospital with a fragile life-filled baby in arms. I hugged my nurse goodbye, and went home and filled my house with all that love I was witnessing a year later in my friend's cottage by the sea. But, I had thought, that was already more than I deserved. Certainly, it had all been too good to be true. Certainly, SIDS would find us, and it was only a matter of time before I lost my precious. (don't think the Lord of the Rings allusion in that term, and the desperation and idolatry that surrounds it wasn't lost on me each time I uttered it over my child)


But a year later, there I was, witnessing my lively daughter, witnessing another new life. At what point will I accept this gift? Why do I instead accept these shackles of fear so readily? When will I accept this life that has been given to me. When will I let myself look forward, to dream for her future, wonder what life holds for her? When will I stop holding my breath, paralyzed in the present moment, fearful that it will vanish like the air I refuse to exhale?


For a time I did not believe she'd ever smile at me. For a time, I couldn't imagine she would ever sit up on her own. I believed she would sleep swaddled in wings forever. I was convinced she would spend eight hours a day nursing for eternity. As each stage came, I settled into it as if it were my new, permanent way of life. Perhaps I'm so busy adjusting to each change, that this underlying shift is too much to grasp: life is forever changing. Certainly there is a sense in which this year has been nothing but a series of goodbyes. Gone are the days of supporting her neck, supporting her sitting, swaddling her arms,  and holding on tight with two hands while she tries to walk. Gone are the days of sleeping in, of spontaneous carefree choices about how to spend my time, long extended periods of quiet ended only by my own choice. It has been a year of endings. 


And the endings will continue to come, some possible and some certain. My fears are not fully irrational. But the problem has been that I have not been able to see beyond them. They have blocked my view. It is true. My daughter, our love, it is more than I deserve. 


And yet, it has also been a year of constant beginnings. Hello to the intimacy of three, not just two. Hello to new discovery, new laughter, new joy. Hello to a new me, less concerned with me. Hello to a new husband, exuding more love, more devotion. Hello to a new home, new friends, an entirely new way of life. 


My present is beautiful, it is precious. And still, I must learn to loosen my grasp, to hold it more lightly. Because without my hands open, I can not receive what the future holds, what my true Precious has in store for me. For He desires to give me every good gift. But when my fingers wrap tight, when my knuckles burn white, how can the gift come in? 


What if a year ago I refused to move forward into a future where she smiled at me? What if I didn't let her learn to sit up, roll, crawl, walk? What if I did not let her away from me, unclasped from my arms? Then she could not come running back into me, arms wide open, outstretched, to receive her smiling-giggling-leaping little self, crashing into me with a force of love I've never known. 

Life is perpetually coming to be. I need to open my arms to receive this. I need to open my mind; I need to humble my heart, realizing I don't know where the new joy might be coming from. It is only mine to release and to receive. I need to open my eyes, see past the fear, and allow myself to look forward to what new life is yet to come.