Joy And Sorrow

Please welcome my dear, dear friend, Amanda, of Tumble Dry.

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“Might you consider guest posting for me in August when I have the baby?”

This was the whispered request that came via email one Monday afternoon in July. Its arrival had me thinking about friendship and motherhood, marriage and solitude. I’ve known Mrs. Chicken for a year or two, I guess. I remember seeing her from afar, her posts always favorited by so many during the Blog Exchange, and thinking as I read her posts, “I wish I’d written that.”

It’s a Sunday morning as I sit down to honor her Monday afternoon request. I imagine that she is still resting, body and mind weary from wondering and sustaining, first the life within her and second her firstborn- The Pooh. My own girls are sleeping. Moments ago they were here, feet swinging at the table, ringlets bouncing and eyes, the blue of their Daddy’s, dancing. Toddler giggles and infant coos swirled around us, graduates of the petals thrown at weddings, chapters of our story.

The familiar whir of Finley’s swing calms me, gentle clicks from the dryer sweetly reward me as they announce a Sunday accomplishment.The fan overhead is casting shadows on the map of our morning, long purple straws listing drunkenly from decadently chocolate milk, cups of yogurt sit mostly eaten with spoons, sticky from end to tip, waiting to be reclaimed. My own breakfast, toasted wheat bread with peanut butter, has been sectioned and redistributed, little finger sandwiches with mini-nibbles taken here and there.

The empty stools soothe me, they tell a tale of presence more than absence, it has taken time to understand the difference. It was nearly four years ago that we had our first daughter. She winnowed her way into our deepest sorrows, threading together wounds that had never healed, and in return we loved her in ways we never knew possible. Days before her first birthday her sister came to be, two lines and a squeal. Despite my joy, fissures of worry blossomed, the precariousness of certainty.

I have ached for Mrs. C in the loneliness, fear and tentative joy she has shared these past months. I know release will come, but I cannot say when or how. For me it was the moment I glanced in the rear-view mirror and saw two dimpled hands, garden soil under ragged nails, reach for each other. Their arms were so short that they had to lean from their seats, legs kicked out in an attempt to stretch further, and as their hands touch I could swear the light changed.

Now we are five, a third daughter joined us in April. Already they are holding hands, redefining the two that we were. Rarely easy, but undeniably right. The tears I cry as I sit on a Sunday morning considering purple straws and sticky spoons aren’t simple, they are sorrow and joy, woman and girl, daughter and wife. There are three stools and they hold my place in the world, my three girls.

Across the miles I imagine three people becoming four, dimpled hands and dark tendrils, fresh tears and, finally, certainty of belonging.