My boys left the house this morning to give me time to sleep. I woke before they returned.
My house is so very quiet. I used to hate silence and do my best to never be around it. But now I relish it. It’s become a hot commodity. In the silence I prepare our breakfast. Brunch, really, at this time of the morning. In the silence I cut butter into sugar and flour, chop nuts, slice berries. In the silence I contemplate and I breathe and I sit down with my coffee. In the silence I let words flow out of me onto the page. These days will be especially hard to come by soon.
As my belly swells larger with each passing day, I’m not sure that I’m ready to have a newborn again. Though, really, even if you think you are, you’re not. Nothing can prepare you for the tiny person who comes in and tears your life apart in the most terrifyingly beautiful way possible. I feel like I’ve only just found a way to put the pieces together again since the last time. They don’t fit the same way anymore, of course. But isn’t part of life constantly rearranging the pieces?
But now is the time for waiting. Waiting for the time that this child will come out of me into the world of light and noise. Hoping it’s not too long from now. This pregnancy has been so much more difficult than the first (to put it mildly), and the first was no picnic. I’m ready to not be in near-constant pain. Ah, the things we do for love.
I’ve never been good at waiting.
It’s gloomy and rainy outside today. I don’t mind at all. In fact, it suits me somehow. The snow is finally all gone, awakening with its departure parts of my soul that have long been buried beneath it. Often times I think we should move somewhere warmer, but I never fully knew the gloriousness of spring before I endured a Minnesota winter. Still, the winters here are unbearably long, especially for someone who grew up in the tropics. There’s a part of my soul I left there, too. It bobs out on the Pacific ocean, like its own island, waiting for me to return to it. I wonder if I ever will.
The Ocean! Of all the things I miss living here, it’s the ocean I miss most. There’s nothing like it. So vast, so riddled with hidden treasures– at times seeming so tame but belying the dangerous power beneath. I’ve often wanted to dive into the vibrant blue, salty water and surrender my body to it, breaking all my atoms apart and becoming part of the ocean. Perhaps when I am dead, my final wish will be for my loved ones to tie my body to a funeral pyre and send me out to sea.
Ah, but now my boys are home. Time for me to return from my mind’s wanderings. Time to nourish the bodies here and now, to sit with my boy on my lap before he gets too big. So I’ll sign off for now. Happy Saturday, my friends.
In case you want to know what we’re having for breakfast, it’s this Baked French Toast from the Pioneer Woman. I’ve tried a few baked french toast recipes, and this one is by far my favorite. The tweaks I make to mine? I use whole grain bread, cut down the sugar in the egg mixture, and today I added some pecans to the topping. I also used fresh strawberries and raspberries today.
I am in fact working on projects to show you. Several, but none of them are done. Well, I did make another dress, but it was supposed to be easy and then gave me lots of trouble, so I don’t want to talk about it.