Beside Us

This past Tuesday, Mary Jo, Judy, and Hannie held a Share holiday memorial service for us parents. I was surprised by two thoughtful gifts that moved me immensely: Rachel gave me a very sweet pewter angel ornament with "Elise 11-07-06" engraved on the back, and Mary Jo gave me a CD music mix and some delicious spice cookies. We lit candles and decorated ornaments with glitter for our babies. Felix sat very quietly during the ceremony, and told the other parents that he had a baby sister named Elise who couldn't be with us, but he hopes that soon he will have "another baby sister who will come to our house and stay with us."

I'll close today's writing with a lovely poem by John O'Donohue from To Bless the Space Between Us. Chris Furtak, the 60-something super-energized, muscular yoga lady who lives each day for spirit and community (see "Hope is Prayer" from Dec. 7th), read this poem after class, just 2 weeks after her husband died.


On the Death of the Beloved

Though we need to weep your loss,
You dwell in that safe place in our hearts
Where no storm or night or pain can reach you.

Your love was like the dawn
Brightening over our lives,
Awakening beneath the dark
A further adventure of color....

Though your days here were brief,
Your spirit was alive, awake, complete.

We look toward each other no longer
From the old distance of our names;
Now you dwell inside the rhythm of breath,
As close to us as we are to ourselves.

Though we cannot see you with outward eyes,
We know our soul's gaze is upon your face,
Smiling back at us from within everything
To which we bring our best refinement.

Let us not look for you only in memory,
Where we would grow lonely without you.
You would want us to find you in presence,
Beside us when beauty brightens,
When kindness glows
And music echoes eternal tones.

When orchids brighten the earth,
Darkest winter has turned to spring;
May this dark grief flower with hope
In every heart that loves you.

May you continue to inspire us:
To enter each day with a generous heart.
To serve the call of courage and love
Until we see your beautiful face again
In that land where there is no more separation,
Where all tears will be wiped from our mind,
And where we will never lose you again.

Hope is Prayer

Last year at this time, I wanted to be in the furthest place on the globe away from Christmas. I ended up not only surviving the day, but actually enjoying myself a bit too. Even though I felt terribly sad because Elise's due date was around Christmas, I kept myself open to the possibility I could have a good time. I even got us a small tree and decorated it with as many star ornaments, Elise's symbol, as I could find.

This time, I am astonished at how peaceful and blessed I feel. I anticipated an undercurrent of sadness when November 7th arrived and the nearness of the holidays, but there is none. I almost looked for it, around corners, under the sofa cushions, asking myself, Do I really feel this good? But why?

I think it's because I worked so hard to remember Elise, to forget Elise, to miss her, to welcome her. My heart has been open to her, even though this meant having it break repeatedly over the months and years.

And my heart has been open to another child, and breaking repeatedly, again, when that child has not arrived. Truly I have never known the meaning of "It just is" until now. Why did Elise die? Why when we suffered her death are we now dealt more suffering with infertility? When I read stories of people losing their babies, I always held my breath thinking, oh I hope they had another baby, and they always did.

But not us. And I raged at the world, at the families with multiple children. Now I know that it has nothing to do with them and their good fortune. It has nothing to do with whether I'm a bad person, a good person, whether it's "meant to be," whatever that means.

It just is. And truly, it is all good. It could be worse, and life would still be good--eventually. I will not stop hoping. I used to think hope would only make the downward spiral of disappointment more precipitous. Now I know it leads to other possibilities. "You always have choices," my friend Mary Jo says. I will not stop hoping. Hope is prayer. Prayers bring blessings.

Last night we had dinner at Ben and Sarah's house. Felix had a great time with his girl cousins--Anna who is 5 months older and 6 inches taller than he, and Reeve, born in March 2006, the same year as Elise. They chased each other around the house, I chased them around the house, they watched "Mulan" on the TV, they gathered in the bathroom with the lights off to look at Felix's glow-in-the-dark shirt.

As we walked to our car, Reeve and Anna waved goodbye from their front door. "I want a little sister," Felix said to us. My heart swelled with tenderness.

"We'd like another baby too, Felix. You know, you do have a baby sister--her name is Elise, remember? She was born when you were 2 years old. But she just can't be here with us."

"Yeah, I want a baby sister who will stay with us and live in our house," Felix said eagerly.

Dan told him, "Well, after Christmas, Mama and Papa are going on a trip. You'll stay with Bamba and Granda, and we'll go on a trip to see if we can get you a baby sister, okay?"

"What kind of store will we get her from?"

"We don't get a baby from the store, we make one. And Mama and Papa are going to see a doctor who will help us get a baby. We won't come back with the baby, but it will be in Mommy's tummy. Maybe it will be here for your 5th birthday," I explained.

Dan added, "We're going to try to make you a big brother for your 5th birthday, Felix. Would you like that?"

"YEAH!" Felix shouted from the back seat.

So I ask the universe, (the) God(s), spirit, Lady Luck, Saint Gerard, Diana, Isis, Demeter, Pan, Hera, Hariti, Kishimojin, Mother Earth, Kokopelli, Sarah mother of Isaac, Rebecca mother of Jacob and Esau, Rachel mother of Joseph and Benjamin, Hannah mother of the prophet Samuel, and whatever other-worldly allies there are to conjure. Most of all, I ask for your thoughts and prayers in whatever tradition or faith you choose. I'll take all the blessings and magic and whatever there is for us! Somewhere I have a prayer card of Saint Gerard that my fellow "Catlicker" friend Susie gave me--I'll dig that out too. We're going to Seattle Reproductive Medicine in early January to see whether they can help make our family's wish come true.

I've been going to yoga classes at the home of a most amazing woman named Chris, who creates community and embraces the world in every way. After a class of about a dozen people I'd never met was over, people were chatting, nibbling on the treats Chris always provides after class. Chris was listening to people's recent news, talking about her own, just as enthusiastic as ever even though her adorable husband had just died in October after a swift bout with pancreatic cancer. She turned to me and whispered, "Is it okay to talk about your trip to Seattle? Is it private?" For some reason, without even hesitating I said, "Sure, it's okay."

I thought she was going to introduce me and my news to the woman she'd been chatting with, but at the top of her lungs she announced to the whole room, "AND MARILYN IS TRAVELING TO SEATTLE FOR IN VITRO FERTILIZATION NEXT MONTH!" After I recovered from laughing, I threw up my hands and said, "So send all your good vibes my way in January." No one was scandalized, and I wouldn't have cared if they were. "That's exciting!" a number of them said. In that moment, I realized it felt good to have their support, that a little bit of the burden of my secretly lived anxiety had been lifted.

Hope is prayer. Prayers bring blessings, in many forms, in every moment.