I am standing on a cliff.
Everything is new.
Everything,
everything
is new.
Or will be very soon.
Within four weeks these things will happen:
1. We will sell our beloved first home in North Carolina.
2. We will buy a new home in Kansas City.
3. We will move in to said new home in Kansas City.
4. I will finish my masters dissertation for St Andrews.
5. I will have a baby.
As I said before, I am standing on a cliff. Looking down. I am afraid of heights.
What will this new life be? What is being a mother? I feel this baby move and I wonder who she is. I wonder what we will say to each-other in all the years that are coming. I pray that I will make a home for her—a place of light, beauty, love, peace.
For me, the New House has become a symbol of hope for my new life (and the New Life who will be born soon). It is difficult to imagine the future, or plan for the complexities of this new life. It is difficult to imagine a person you have never met—or a world you have yet to create. I find that my fear, my expectation, my joy are all tied up in the house. I spend hours thinking about the house. And silly things about the house: paint colors, curtains, pedestal tables. Or the garden: what will I grow? Is my soil alkaline or acidic? What color climbing roses? Will hydrangeas work in the back bed (which doesn’t exist yet)? Or the way light comes into the house from the south, the cool northern side where the front porch is. The bats who live behind the shutters. Somehow all these things stand in for the baby who will be in this place, whose first memories will be of this place.
I love leaving my clinical world for a little bit to read your posts over microwaved kashi meals and stevia root beer. Thank you for the escape :)
ReplyDeleteThis is such a lovely post. In the midst of all these big, wonderful, life-changins things, it is ridiculous for me to focus on bats, but that is what I am about to do. Please be kind to the bats behind the shutters! (if you do not like their choice of home, I wonder if you could get bat boxes and see if they will move into them?) The bats need your love for the following reasons:
ReplyDelete1) They eat a kajillion mosquitos every night. More bats, fewer bites. I love bats for this reason alone.
2) They are important pollinators and friends to the natural world.
3) They are kind of cool and Paloma Jane might enjoy watching them fly around.
4) Bat populations have had some troubles recently. There are several petitions to list different bat species/populations under the Endangered Species Act. Some species are already listed.
This concludes my bat public service announcement. Much love to you three.
-Ali
ps Did you know about my new blog? babydistrict.wordpress.com
B and B: I am flattered that my blog was your friend over lunch. And I would dearly like some root beer right now!
ReplyDeleteAli: We fully intend to be kind to our bats! Our realtor suggested we get them "dealt with" before we move in, but we didn't so much like the sound of that... Besides, the bats were there first! We definitely want them to stay eat a kajillion mosquitos, for one, and we just like bats, for another. They do make a tad bit of a mess on our front porch, but I'll just sweep up after them. We might go on and put up a bat house in our backyard, but who knows if they will choose to relocate. Maybe we will just attract (and host) more bats!
I do not know everything about your life, and yet I feel I understand you completely. I was reflecting in my journal this morning that, for the first time in may years, my life feels "not new." And I like it. I like knowing what to expect in my job, in my marriage, as a mom, at my home. But I really haven't known stability since I left home for college. We go in and out of seasons, that's for sure. God bless you in this one!
ReplyDeleteThank you Jess!
ReplyDelete