Storing Up Sleep and Treasures

Above: The boys at their second "Hiking Party" of the winter-- making birds out of pinecones. Clara in her tutu after the winter concert. Ask her to show you her dance moves. She dances with her shoulders in this perfect coy way.

The past few days have been a steady rhythm of napping with kids and stories, furious walking on the treadmill at the gym, reeling from our wait-list letter from GFS, visiting the thrift store and cooking. The end-result of these things is gratifying. I have had some really promising contraction-series. I have found the best "new sib" story, "Welcome With Love" illustrated by Julie Vivas and written by something Overend. I found these great retro 1950's drinking glasses that remind me of our den ceiling back at 1610. I plan to make a Clark Kent little display in the boys room with a wire hat armiture I thrifted, the wool fedora, and the funky 1960's typewriter that Santa brought them. A Mulligatawny soup that received a 5/5-star rating (5 out of 5 of us finished our serving). A homerun roast chicken that caused Geoff to thank me numerous times.

I have searched myself, "What needs to happen before I allow myself to give birth?" "Is there an obstacle?" "Something I am awaiting?" Geoff and I had this very lucid and healing conversation at 2a.m. last night. It was another in a series of confrontations where I have had to face the fact that God does not just remove idols in my life but that he actually has to shatter them completely. This is the case with my idol of academic success. That somehow a person IS his degree from an ivy school, that he/she is superior to someone who went to a humble state school or someone who never graduated. It is the totem by which I measure so many people. And now, when our son is measured against the yardstick of an exclusive private kindergarten, I am racked with disappointment and shock that he might not get into Harvard. I know, it's not logical. The whole thing comes crashing down around me: I can't WILL my child into success. I can't strong-arm others into seeing my child the way I see him. I can't translate him so that the world understands him perfectly. How this pains me!

I wish I could say that once you have a 5 yr old, you can kind of coast and not sweat it. That at this finite point you can just turn and focus on the younger one, and so on. I realize that you can't. I am feeling stretched, the child only complexifies with time, his needs, the ways he expresses himself. His dependence on you is dicier, less concrete. Anyway, I find my instinct is to just keep him close, give face time, read books, feed warm snacks.

I realize I have to share these burdens, I have to be transparent, I have to accept help, I have to accept rejection. I cannot tidy things so that I am neat and clean and ready for this new baby. I think birth is like death and I just can't be ready. The process of birth will ready me. God will equip me moment by anxious, fraught moment.