someone to walk with
by bam
it took eight years. it took eight years of wanting, and wishing, and prayers on my knees. it took burying an unborn babe. and shots and more shots in my belly. it took, finally, making peace with the way that it was.
“we’re a tiny family, but we’re a wonderful tiny family,” the wise man i love finally said. he said it when it came time to quit. time to quit trying. time to quit making all kinds of bargains with those whom you bargain with when there’s one thing in the world that you want but you can’t make it happen. time to quit when my much rattled body nearly completely could not go on.
so peace we made.
the very last time it didn’t work, the very last time the doctor’s receptionist called, said matter-of-factly, you’re not pregnant, the numbers are bad, i cried and i cried. i rode my bike down to the lake, i rode and i cried.
i let go of dreams. i let go of the gaggle of children i’d always seen in my head. the ones i’d make tall stacks of flapjacks. the ones who’d be nestled all snug in their beds, the ones i would kiss forehead to forehead like back on the waltons. the ones who’d require milk by the gallons. three times a week.
i gave it all up and relished completely my one and my only. i marveled that given the odds stacked against me, we’d gotten him, so very easily.
but for years, it was my own private aching. when i saw two kids in a line at the movies, two kids who looked like they fell from the same genes, maybe the same whorl in their hair, or freckles spilled ’cross their nose. when i watched a big brother reach out a hand to a baby sister, pull her out of a sandbox where she was stuck.
when my own brother sat with me at the side of my mother, waking up from a surgery, still tethered in tubes, it wrenched me.
wrenched me and my heart in the same way i know it wrenched his.
he told me only once, but that was all i needed to hear. i was taking him out of the tub, wrapping him in a long white towel. he was three, maybe four.
“why can’t God hear,” he asked me, one of those questions children sling with no warning. we might have been talking about soap one minute and suddenly the channel had changed and now it was God of whom we were speaking.
what do you mean, i asked back, not sure quite what woods we were tiptoeing into.
“well, i keep asking him for a brother or sister, but God isn’t listening. i think maybe God can’t hear.”
and so i wrapped him tighter than ever that night. i wiped my tears with that towel. but all the tears, and all the unanswered questions got us no closer to a brother or sister for that sweet blessed all-alone boy.
then, one night i had a dream. a dream that a woman in a dark blue sweater looked at me and said, “you are pregnant.” and i was. at 43, almost 44. just about now, only seven years ago.
it turned out to be true. it turned out, despite the odds, despite the fact that every doctor who’d looked at me, in me, through me, turned out to be wrong.
God musta been listening after all.
we used to like to tell the story of the day we told the one and only. how we sat down to lunch, how the father there at the table said, most fatherly, “we have something important to tell you,” and then i leapt in and blurted it out, not at all restrained, or guarded, or considering the chance that this wouldn’t be. “we’re having a baby,” i said, already crying. and how he, then seven and a half, then used to a table with only three chairs, how he slapped himself upside the head, said, “this is a dream. i must be dreaming.”
only soon, my belly started to swell. and then there was kicking. and then one night in the shaft of a light, that baby came. his big brother was right there, watching. taking it in, every last drop.
and for the whole first year, every time i looked at that baby, i couldn’t not think of the fact, feel the chill down my spine, that sometimes dreams really do come true.
and it all came rushing back to me, as often it does, when i was walking in the woods the other day, and i looked up, and there were two boys, entwined. the way i always dreamed it would be. only better.
because i hear the things the big one teaches the little one. and i saw the way the little one couldn’t breathe, couldn’t bear it, when his big brother was hurt, so very hurt, the day he fell off his bike and moaned and asked if maybe he was going to die.
because i still don’t make flapjacks for dozens. but i do make them for two. and i do listen to the little one practice subtraction, asking when the big one is 70, how old will he be? and i know when i help him figure it out, all the take-away-8s, that way way down the bend, when i’m gone most likely, i will still have two boys who still have each other.
and long long ago, when i was aching but nobody knew it, that was the one unanswered prayer i could not put to rest.
but, thing is, God listened. God, after all, has very big ears.
just like both of my boys, matter of fact. i think maybe my boys spill from that very same gene pool. as a matter of fact, of that i am certain.
and i know that you know that’s not bragging. it’s just being in love. and that is a very fine thing for a mama. a mama of two, most especially.
tell me your sibling stories. i certainly spent eight years realizing the virtues of having only one child. i tried all those years to raise him in a virtual extended family. he had uncles who were really big brothers, still are. we had friends, some of whom were similarly singular, and we shared holidays and sunday dinners. had saturday sleepovers. tried as hard as we could to never allow him to think he was one and only in ways that might not be so good for a kid. but the times i catch the snippets of brotherly love, in the midst of brotherly squabbles, i melt. big time. tell me your tales of brotherly-sisterly being there for each other, in ways no one else could ever, would ever, understand….
speaking of brotherly, sisterly love, i tell you proud like a sister, that one of the chair puller-uppers, one you know and love for her wisdom and poetry as jcv, well, she is a writer who until yesterday had not seen her name in a newspaper. yesterday that all changed. in a very big way. she wrote a magnificent story that ran smack dab all over the perspective section of the chicago tribune. we like to think of it as the thinkingest section of the paper. and our very own jcv, and her beautiful beautiful story of her little girl and her “hearing maids,” made everyone think. about the power of hearing. about a world with no sound. about insurance companies who won’t pay for hearing aids for a child. i would love you to read it, if you’ve not had a chance. here it is, click to this link.
and happy week after turkeys.
If two comments from me show up on today’s entry, please excuse me, I posted one, but it doesn’t appear, so I will paraphrase my original thoughts.bam, thank you for sharing intimately with us both your deepest dreams and your deepest doubts in life. I celebrate with you that you walk hand in hand with two, no three of your deepest dreams.Oh how I wish I could return to the days where I believed that anyone who wanted a baby could get pregnant. Years of walking with friends and family and also working in a hospital, has shown me that for too many people, they hold onto the dream of a child and love nieces and nephews, godchildren and neighbors and harbor their longing for their own. I give thanks that science and logic doesn’t always win, especially when it comes to your dear little one.I remember when I was in my early twenties, I was babysitting a cherub of a girl with blond ringlets. As I swayed back and forth with this toddler in my arms, a woman approached me and asked me about my daughter. I quickly told her that I was a mere babysitter. She told me that swayed back and forth so naturally, I was meant to be a mama, because I had the mama rhythm in the hips. I do hope this woman is a prophet illuminating my future story.I have walked with trepidation into a labor and delivery unit one too many times. It is rarely if ever part of parents’ plans to have a chaplain stand by them in the labor and delivery unity. I remember talking with my wise Spiritual Director who is a Franciscan sister. She told me that when people decide to become parents, they risk all on behalf of the possibility of life. She asked me what I was willing to risk bringing to life in this world, both literally and figuratively. Her question remains with me still today.I give thanks for the spirit that calls people to risk on behalf of life. I give thanks that life is fully known in the hands of a first grader who walks alongside his mother. I hope that I one day will know the touch of my child walking down the path with me.
hmmm… as the oldest of 8 and the daughter of a mother who is one of 15 – leaving me with 72 first cousins – and then married to a guy who is the oldest of 5…and then me not being able to carry 3 pregnancies full term….(got to love the question “are your fertility issues inherited?” ) Well I would go with the concepts of hope, prayer, and faith. I eventually became the mom of three wonderful children through adoption. My next sibling is my dear sister who was born the day before my first birthday…yep – mom was not with me on that auspicious 1st birthday….she was busy bringing my Irish twin into the world and thank goodness because my sister and I ALWAYS have each other’s back. All this being said, I have watched my daughter blessed with two goofy younger brothers and NO sister…but she has found her “sister” in the world through friendship. This has blessed us with another ‘daughter” who we love and my boys adore. There are so many ways of creating family. I guess it is just taking the journey one day at a time….and being open to every possibility and then blessing each one.
Wonderful ‘jcv” – speaking of blessing possibilities! I am sharing your story with a young girl I know who is struggling with her hearing aids…and so hope the “hearing maids” give a new perspective…..thanks for an absolutely beautiful moment.
oh bamforgive me for not visiting often enough. so much love born out of so much pain and persistence. lucky boys, those little men of yours…And speaking of rays of light, shine on, shine on miss bam. hugs!!!!
never dawned on me that the twosome up above wasn’t immediately identifiable as “the brothers”–aka my boys. but, silly me, i forget: how in the world would you know who that is? it’s my 6- and 14-year-olds, the big one with his arm shouldering the little one. it melted my heart. and i am so sorry if you didn’t know that was who it was. i heard today from a dear friend that she thought it was me, the moppy-haired one, and the little one. in fact, i share a mop with my big boy. only he is brown. and i am no longer……..anyway, i think the meander makes more sense if you know it’s the two boys in the woods, so i thought i’d leap in–late, albeit–to clear up that little bit of mystery….
powerful!!
We too waited awhile for a second little one, inexplicably. By the time she finally came, big brother was beside himself. He probably wants to teach her too much, as when I hear him drilling her on fractions and telling her all sorts of facts about geography, then lecturing her on proper behavior……Yeesh. Once in awhile she sighs and asks me wistfully why didn’t she come out first? I can’t really answer that beyond, well, just because. I am so glad they have each other. They are each just what the other needs. And nothing quite warms my heart like seeing these two siblings, opposite though they may be, playing sweetly together or telling each other stories, or offering a hug and a kiss when the other is upset.Praise God from whom such blessings flow.Thanks for the shout out, bam, by the way! It’s all because of you, you know, speaking of blessings.