Visualization Entry - Primal Nature - 11-6-08

I’ve always had a sense of primal nature. I’ve always been aware of the rhythm of nature in those essential differences between male and female that make the mingling of the two so perfectly scintillating, so irresistible. The pattern of life, the innate urges that harken back to purer, more savage times. The basic purity of the need to eat, to sleep, to hunt, to mate, to procreate. Compulsions that slip the tether of refined, evolved society while still running through its veins. And it has always seemed strange and ironic to me that I seemed so much more attuned to these undeniable compulsions than those around me, yet more than any of them, I have remained apart from these compulsions, feeling them but never experiencing them. All my life, I have, in some inarticulate place inside me, seemed to be waiting to dive in, to be swept overboard. And all I’ve ever known is the coldness let in by the door I left open.

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How constantly astonishing it is, then, to have finally come into that which I always felt so keenly. It stays in my mind, and I wonder what others’ eyes make them see of life that they can walk through their days and take for granted that they are with someone they love, are sharing their life, are bringing a child into the world, and truly feel their life is ordinary. I don’t seem to have the gene necessary to take those things for granted. Maybe the gene got burned out of me as years fell into time and I was still alone.

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All I know is I am constantly aware – over and under and through every moment’s consciousness – of those animal instincts that make these human experiences so powerful and magical. My mate. Male to my female. So strong and muscled where I am soft and white. So tall where I am small. So straight where I curve. Our differences dizzy me. I look so hard at him, my eyes grow warm with the concentration. I look at the animal kingdom and can’t feel so civilized. I don’t feel so apart from it. We humans may have high, intricate thought patterns, may have invented wildly wonderful things. But the most satisfying human experiences are the ones that are closest to the undeniable simplicity of the animals. The life-long bond of mates. The instinctive defensiveness of home. The purpose of continuing the species.

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And as my belly swells with my mate’s child, I feel at last that I have dived into the current of life. The entire point of a species, the ultimate urge that cannot be denied, is the propagation of itself. I have watched others do this while I have stood apart. A dead-end. A gene pool when there should be a river, flowing into and then out of the pool. I was only unto myself, and somehow felt at odds with nature. There was more to my destiny than just my own life, my own self. The river kept lapping at my feet, sucking me gently into its current, but I couldn’t immerse myself. All of human life flowed on in its proper pattern, but I was like a dam, storing up all I have to offer, all of the fruition of those who came before me along hundreds and thousands of years. Rich life pulsed in my veins, strength and goodness, health and possibilities, and all of it stayed locked up. And nature flowed on past me, always showing me what was supposed to be.

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But now, I have stepped into the river. Like the animals, I have a purpose. I have finally come into that purpose. I am giving life. This flawed humanity that so many believe doesn’t deserve to continue, will only devour its young, is swelling in number by one. I am giving the world another child, and it is proof of my kinship with unstoppable nature that all the arguments for not bringing a child into the dangerous, devolving, depraved world, that there are so many children who are already here who need homes, cannot dissuade me. This world has enough children! A ragged, unwanted army, and yet I can no more stay my footsteps down this path than walk on the ocean – I must have a child. My body has its purpose, it will not be denied.

Visualization Entry - My Child - 11-5-08

I can feel him inside me. He is always with me now, nudging me, a flutter here, a quiver there. It seems surpassingly strange that he was not always with me, from the beginning of my own life, inside my womb as I was in my mother’s, from the thinly breaking dawn of time. When time himself was being born, emerging owl-eyed into consciousness and action, my child was there. All my life, I could feel him, as if he was pressing so soft against the thin curtain of the unseen. I could feel his breath-quiet pushes against the thin film that separated his future from my present, until I could find the seam and meet present and future together.

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My hands always touched my body, my skin, drawn to its own softness and warmth, touching myself because no one else did. My hands know every curve of my arm, where the cool flesh of my upper arm gives way to the firmer, warm skin of my forearm. I know the particular curves and hollows of my jaw and throat. The heaviness of my breast and the sinewy boniness of my ankle. I know the veins that ripple under the skin on the backs of my hands, I know the strength of my fingers twisting around each other. I have always known my body. And I don’t go long without touching my skin. Self-soothing, I suppose.

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So it is no wonder that I touch my body even more now. And it is every wonder to feel what I feel as I run my hands down my belly. I have only ever known softness, sometimes a little too much softness. Only ever knew the specific lumps and bumps and tucks of my ribs, hips, and waist. But that is not what I feel anymore.

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I stand in the dim shower, streaming with steaming water, slick and soft, and marvel at the feel of my swelling belly. Its foreign hardness where there had only ever been softness. I slide my hands from my ribs, still rippling through my skin, and then down and out and back under. And I think every time, this is not a dream. This is not pretend. Just to prove it, I try to suck my stomach in and I just . . . can’t. It won’t go. And even after months of this, it startles me. I can’t get used to it. My belly stays out. And unlike all those times when I pushed my belly out and pretended, but was always aware of the essential emptiness inside, always aware that there was still only and all me in there – unlike all those times, my brain spins at the knowledge that there is not only me anymore. I’ve only ever known just me, but there is another being inside that swollen belly, a being that came from me and from the man I love better than my life, but essentially, this person is his own. I can’t know what that will mean yet. What inklings and inclinations will be uniquely his? What mistakes will he make and shenanigans will he get into, simply because he is himself and could not avoid them? What will his voice become that has a separate timbre and special resonance because it flows from the tiny throat that is forming and swallowing inside my body? Worlds within worlds within worlds.

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My showers take an hour now because I just stand there on aching feet, happily letting my ankles swell with the heat, because my hands can’t stop learning and feeling and writing this belly of mine. And as I get out of the shower finally, all the hot water gone (sorry, honey!) to dry off and put on my bathrobe and lotion my legs, I am always so brittly and beautifully aware that this big, round belly of mine, so smooth and adamantine, doesn’t change. It doesn’t shift as I move around and go away as my stomach muscles tire. It stays hard and full and firmly a part of me. I adjust around it all the time, bending my body and my life around it even before a baby is in the house. Tying my bathrobe high under my breasts, noticing the outward flow of the fabric below the belt. Having to shift the cord of my hair dryer in different ways than before. Getting into bed and pulling up the covers and getting into a comfortable position, all in new ways, ways I never did them before. When I read a book or write in my journal or cook a meal or make the bed, my hands and wrists are constantly bumping into my belly because as I get used to and accommodate one size, my belly is yet growing even more. I’ve lost count of how many times I’ve turned or rolled toward my husband and miscalculated and bumped my burgeoning stomach right into him. He laughs and pulls me closer when I apologize, but I can’t really mind it. Every one of these accidental touches only reminds me of where I am. Who and what I am. Wife. Mother. Family. I love every clumsy move, every accidental bump. I’m huge and I want to be huge.

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I wanted this. For so long, through all the changing currents and squalls and storms, this never changed, never shifted an inch, as entrenched in my body, ingrained in my flesh, incorporated into my blood as this baby is now. I wanted this. I wanted my strong, beautiful husband who makes me laugh and makes me breathless with impatience to meet my son to see how much of his father he took. I hope he was greedy there as he took his life and his nature from his father. I wanted this home, so beautiful and warm and inviting and painted with laughter and dreams. I wanted this marriage which makes me stronger, better, softer, richer, which comforts me and teaches me, which gives me diamond-hard lessons in appreciation, compromise, and commitment. And I wanted this child that grows inside me, that kicks me hard when I’m in bed and no longer moving around to lull him to sleep. I wanted this big belly and this warm, flushed skin and the contradictory feelings of delicacy and strength. I love the look of my nightgown sloping over my full body. I love the sheer femininity that charges my veins, and I love that those very veins are rising up under my skin as they pulse with extra blood.

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I love my body, whispering deep in my throat of my pride in its strength, its uncompromised ability to do what it was born to do. My body works perfectly, accepted my baby with all the naturalness I expected one such as me to feel when finally pregnant. I am strong and warm and healthy and soft – all the things my baby needs. I fill with pride to know I can care so well for my child. My body can handle both myself and my unborn child with no strain at all. Oh, I was made for this. Grow strong, I croon softly to my small, moving child. Take all you can from me. I can handle it. I have so much to give you. Take all you need and there will still be more. I love you.

I Want a Child - 11-5-08

I want a child. I saw one today and to my complete astonishment, started crying. My eyes blurred instantly with tears and my skin flushed with their heat. It wasn’t out of despair as it would have been, and had been so many times, long ago. I did not think it was out of my reach. My longing wasn’t mingled with regret or hopelessness. It was just desire, so strong it took my breath away. I want a son. I want my son. My child. My chest near collapses with the vacuum left in the wake of my crushed breath. My bones creak and stretch with their aborted opening. My belly waits in its muffled silence to be filled with movement and sound. My legs tremble against the instinctive spread. This is my purpose. My destiny. I was meant for this. I am made to bear, and bear again. My skin flushes with need, with perfect purpose. My hands spread of their own accord over nothing, as if to cup tenderly. My children are inside of me, waiting, waiting. They drift in the void of what is not yet seen. They wait for me. They are inside me, and I feel them. I feel the absence of sound they make, the utter stillness of the movements not yet created.

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My time is near. It will be my turn soon. Soon, I croon as in a lullaby. Soon, my loves, soon, my children. Soon all I have worked for and created with my life will be revealed in your tiny warmth, your wrinkled softness. Soon, all I am will finally become crystal-clear in the murky color of your newly-open eyes. Soon, soon, you will be here, and my arms will wait no more. The endless delay will find its end and I will hold you.

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My child, my baby, my soul. Soon, I will bring you forth, and continue my parents’ legacy. Soon, I will meet you and finally know the face I have dreamed of all my life. I will see myself in your eyes, your father in your face. I will bear down in utter pain and feel nothing but utter joy. No fear will be mine – only a fierceness in bringing the unseen into the seen. No woman welcomes labor as I do, no woman is as strong as I am – stronger than taunted bulls, stronger than an ocean current, stronger than a spewing mountain, a leaping wildcat, the deepest grief. I am all strength as I bring you forth. I am strong enough for all my children. I give you strength not pain, joy not terror. I breathe and grunt and cry out and only see you. I want you. I want you. I want you.

Reflections on the "Date" - 11-3-08

My date with Alan has come and gone. He wasn’t the One. And I have to admit to a relief at that. The name for one thing. That was the source, the locus, for all the bad feelings I was struggling with – how could I be destined for an Alan? Every time I would think of his name before the date, I would inwardly cringe and think, “He can’t be the One.” And then I would have to overwrite those thoughts. But I was also relieved when I saw him for the first time. It’s never a good sign when your first thought is, “Well, maybe it’s the light.” But also how he was during the date – all the things I didn’t want: easy-going to the point of laziness, letting several cuss words drop on the first date (hello! first impressions, anyone?), the sense that he didn’t really want to hear what I had to say. We got into a political discussion about the upcoming elections and the state of politics in general, and though he was passionate about it, he was persistently negative, and gradually I got the impression that as my political education wasn’t as thorough as his, he really didn’t value my opinion. And when I did offer devil’s advocate opinions or statements, as I love debate, he seemed less interested in a real discussion or debate than merely an audience for his opinions.

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All in all, it was a date that had all the hallmarks of a bad date. And yet, I was light as a bird on the drive home. If I didn’t get my true wish that my next date be with the One, I got my next dearest wish: I truly saw and understood how simple it all is. Dating is really so simple. Early on in the date, and several times throughout, I had the distinct thought, “I really hope he’s not the One,” which effectively makes him not the One. But that didn’t make me despair or feel awkward or uncomfortable. I was patient until we left, and then we walked out of the restaurant and I smiled up at him and said I’d had a fun conversation with him, and thanked him. I could tell he was taking my signals and he said thanks, too, and then I said, “Take care,” and strode off to my car with head high and tail twitching. And I was able to see dating is really that simple. You go out with someone, commit to a couple of hours of your evening, to get to know them, to see if you’re interested in finding out more about them enough to go on a second date, and if so, you give them you’re number. If not, you smile, thank them, and walk away. So simple. It doesn’t have to traumatize you. It doesn’t have to be a failure. It’s just what you do till you stumble on the one who makes you stay there. So I did get one thing I visualized. I get it now. I get how to date. And I didn’t have to go on a great date to get that. In fact, I think I needed the not-so-good date to really show me that.

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And the absolute greatest thing about the experience was that as I got in my car to drive home, my greatest fear didn’t materialize: that a bad date or just a date with someone who wasn’t for me, didn’t send me into a tailspin of despair. It had absolutely, totally, and completely no bearing on what was still the truth: my perfect mate was out there. Still waiting for me. Still destined for me. We would still meet, and meet soon. As I drove away, still in my date clothes and still with the smell of Bravo’s in my nostrils, this date and this man who was so not for me, was already years and years in the past for me. In fact, by the next morning, barely twelve hours after the date, I had to struggle to remember what his face looked like. And I realized that men I dated would no longer loom in my mind, menacing with the bad memory they inspired. That date, unlike all other dates I’ve ever been on, took its proper place in that two hours of one evening. In the past, a date would have, in my reflection, bloated up far beyond its actual time and would have still been nudging me days later. But no more. I could, by the following morning, look back on the date and see it occupy merely two hours, and then it was over and done with. I love perspective! I love love love it! May I be showered daily with it! Thank God for that perspective. It truly freed me! I can now face more dating with no fear. I did wonder afterwards why this wasn’t the date, after I had used the Secret so well for that very thing. After all, it had seemed to be the thing all those days were leading up to. It had the echo of the questions I had initially about the TowneBank disappointment. Then it immediately occurred to me that this date and the preserved hope and more complete perspective that followed it took away all my years-long fear of dating. I can go into a date now and be free and relaxed. And that is the greatest gift I could have been given with dating, aside from the gift of the date. So yet again, still, the Secret worked out in the best way.

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So let’s see what the next great thing to come to me will be!

Revelations - 10-26-08

I came to a climactic realization tonight as I was pulling out of Mom and Dad’s driveway to go home. With all the little and big revelations I have come to since my first date with It’s Just Lunch was scheduled, all the realizations of what has stymied me in the past and the courage and ferocity I’ve unleashed on the universe for what I truly want – this one seemed ultimate. As if this is what all the others were leading up to.

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It started with the realization that what all this thinking has been leading to is simply that I don’t want to be afraid anymore. I want no more fear, not a whisper of it, at any stage in dating. Fear is what I’ve been lugging around for so many years, and I don’t want it anymore.

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Now, while I thought that was the culminating understanding, the key to unlock my future, it turned out to be the key to unlocking the true end to which all this was gravitating – I’ve been dancing around this for days, and really for years, even the last few days only thinking it in haphazard, subconscious fashion, and only tonight have pulled it out of the ebbing and flowing seascape of my mind: I don’t want to go on one more date with anyone other than my perfect mate. I want my next date to be with the One. I want this date with It’s Just Lunch to be that much-anticipated beginning to my life.

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And I realized as I metaphorically stomped my foot and shouted, “I’ve had enough!” that all my life, I’ve carried such an anticipation of THAT MOMENT that I’ve then somehow gone into every date thinking, “This couldn’t possibly be the date.” As if that particular date was too portentous, too significant, too life-changing, how could it ever come? When would my life, or me, or the world, or him, ever by good enough or aligned enough or coordinated enough to be ready for that great moment? Which means I’ve gone into every date expected that it’s not here yet and that he’s not here yet and that the guy sitting across from me will not be for me. And guess what – I found exactly that to be my experience.

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And so ever since my date was arranged on Wednesday, I’ve been struggling with all the old bad feelings, despite having access to a window into hope and the life I want that I had never had before. And I came simply to God tonight saying I have done every thing I am supposed to do. I’ve done the best I can but he needs to help me. He needs to help me. That simple. And I expect that help to come, which usually in my life I haven’t done.

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And I realized that all those bad feelings I’d been struggling against, the same bad feelings that have sabotaged me again and again, have come out of my reluctance to declare boldly that I am no longer willing to waste any more of my time or wait any longer for my perfect mate. I had just never been capable of just throwing that out there. To say fiercely that I want him and ONLY him. I don’t want a bunch of other Mr. Wrongs in between us. If I could put that word “only,” cosmically, in huge Hollywood-sign letters, with blinking colored Christmas lights and spotlights glowing up from below, I would. I’ve said all along I want him, and I’ve always felt I want only him, but there was never any force behind it. until now. All that I am, whatever strength I have as a cosmic frequency tower, all of everything within me, I throw behind those words. I want only him. I want him and I want him now. I claim him. I will not allow him to be anyone else’s any longer – not for another day, week, month, or year.

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There is a reason it’s taken nine months of using the Secret to draw him finally to me. I wasn’t ready for this yet. I could never have dreamed that I would so boldly and constantly call him into the seen world, into my present. I needed the last 9 months and all my successes so far, to embolden my desire with power and conviction. And here I stand, for the first time in my life, expecting what I want. I will not waste any more time going on dates with other men.

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And you know what is injecting this conviction with passion? Logic. It simply doesn’t make sense that everything is happening now so fast, every day bringing another huge step to my future, only to cool my heels with guy after guy, date after date.

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I go on that trip to Glendorn and begin writing down my vision for my future, my pen all but shivering with the power of my determination. Then It’s Just Lunch calls, out of the blue, then I have that fateful hair appointment with Stephanie where answers are reached and decisions are made. Then the next day I finally unlock my true gratitude for my life and my job, and the day after that I get the news I didn’t get the job, and later that night, answers come thick and fast with Dad sharing his thoughts that put everything that’s been happening into perfect perspective (I mean, who gets answers to a crushing disappointment so fast?), and the next day I call It’s Just Lunch, and the next day, they call with my first match, and the day after that, they arrange the date, and every day since then, as I’ve concentrated to overpower the bad feelings, I’ve written journal entry after journal entry with one new revelation after the other, piling on top of each other, all leading to this one. It doesn’t make sense that all of that happening, nine months of steady growth and development coming suddenly to birth, new things happening so fast, only to find what I’ve always found before – the same cycle of bad feelings, dull dates, and discouragement and awkwardness after. No, all of this has been happening for a reason; they reason I have held to consciously for weeks now, 3 weeks exactly: he is coming. I have claimed him and he is mine. He is mine now. There is no even remotely possible reason to have done everything the Secret asked of me, and come to understand and trust God better, and have attracted all these paving stones for the end of his journey to me, only to delay it. And if the Secret is right – and I have no reason to believe it isn’t and every reason to believe it is – then the deciding factor is me. The law of attraction is obedient to my thoughts and feelings. God will give me the desires of my heart. Any possible delay or deviation from the plan wouldn’t come from those quarters. It lies with me.

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I realize that I’ve always believed timing was out of my hands. Couldn’t do anything about when. That was God’s domain. If the One kept not coming, it was just because it wasn’t the right time. I had nothing to do with it. But if it is true that how soon I get my desire relies wholly on how closely I have aligned myself with the universe – or God’s plan – then that notion of powerlessness is blown out of the water. If it does all rest with me, then what we need is the perfect cheer, because I have finally done that. I have done and felt all I need to feel to be ready to accept him. There is now nothing more than needs to be done before I meet him. And that’s a heady thought. It is a completely new experience to truly believe that the time is now. My time is now. That I don’t have to waffle around with filler guys, men who make me feel nothing, because it’s finally time now to meet him. I want ONLY him, and I want him NOW.

The Kibosh on Fear - 10-25-08

It occurs to me now that one of the fears that has always stymied me in dating was the contradictory fear that I would find someone great. I suppose I’ve had many experiences with not feeling anything for a guy who was interested in me, and somehow that awkwardness coalesced into an unarticulated sense of me with all my imperfections being vaguely ridiculous as I strived to come into a grand, glorious love with someone who seemed like a prince. And I think I have carried that awkward anticipation of being revealed as a crushingly average, somewhat attractive, sometimes annoying woman as I’ve gone into dating experiences.

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But here is the kibosh on that argument. I know who I am. With all my imperfections, I am still sweet, soft, and very pretty. I am smart but kind. I can by hysterical but still be feminine. I stand straight and strong and carry myself like a lady. So many of the paradoxes about myself that have alternately frustrated and pleased me would strike a man as enchanting.

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Now, one of those contradictions in myself is that I have felt awkward in my imperfections while still feeling apprehensive at the prospect of being found attractive and desirable by the men I date who didn’t inspire the same interest – a prospect that is far more realistic and likely than that of being found wanting. I know I have a lot on the ball. And yet the apprehension is there at the prospect of seeing the interest in a man’s eyes. I can’t find clearer words to explain this conundrum. This is the best I can do. Perhaps it is just that the right man hasn’t shown me that interest.

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All I can say is that this muddle has been what has twisted my stomach into knots whenever I’ve faced a date. But the thing is that I’m different now I know who I am and – never true before – I know what I want and I fearlessly claim it.

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And what I want is easy dating. Only to attract men who are easy to date until I sail right into the One. I want a pervasive, unrelenting sense of understanding on my dates, a repetitive thought of, “I get it now. I get how to date.” This is what I want as I get what I truly want.

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I picture being on a date with the One – only the end result is what I will invest my attention in – and just feeling totally relaxed. Like the me that is sitting there, in all her imperfections, all her odds and ends and ins and outs, has fallen effortlessly into place. Like this is the most comfortable chair I would ever find because it is where I discovered how it felt to fall into place. That is what I want. I say it again fiercely. That is what I want. I declare it again, my mind shouting out into the ether: That is what I want. I want to come home. I want to be at the end of my journey and feel that joy and relief that it’s over and I am home at last in the warmth emanating from a man’s eyes. And I want to feel it on my first date with him. I don’t want to end a single date with the One not feeling that sense of rightness yet. I want it as soon as I meet him. Others may scoff at that, saying it is an unreasonable expectation, but my heart and mind and body is so aligned with my true love’s that I boldly declare it is possible. It is what I want. It is my experience. All the bad is behind me. All the bad feelings are only a dusty memory. Only good things are in store now. Only good things are coming to me. I will feel only good feelings. I will only be happy. He is coming to me now. Every day, every hour is one day, one hour closer he comes. He is mine. I claim him.

Visualization Entry - My Firstborn - 10-25-08

I look down at my newborn child, my firstborn, and of all the thoughts and feelings and images filling up my impossibly expanded heart, the one that is the clearest, the loudest, the most immediate and insistent, is this: He is mine. The ferocity of it swells within me and I cannot stop thinking it over and over. He is mine. All my life I was borrowing other people’s children. All my life, I had no claim beyond an enchanted, distant affection. But not now. Not with this one. He is mine.

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I can hold him for as long as I want. I never have to give him back. I can do as I please. I don’t have to explain my actions or ask permission. I don’t have to stay in the room and make sure I don’t move too suddenly and alarm the mother. I am the mother now. I don’t always have to check the time to make sure I don’t hog the baby. I’m hogging this one all I want.

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I look down at him, a sort of gloating affection on my face. No other baby looks quite like him. No other baby ever had any of me running through his veins. He is the better version of me. Half of him is me and it’s my better half. He took the best of both of us and we can see it in every generous, chubby line of him, every insanely soft part of him.

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He is beautiful, my heart sings. He is strong. He is mine. Mine, mine, mine!

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It is my turn now. And beneath the natural anxiety of “Oh, my God, what all do I do now?” is that savage pride, that undeniable claim that he is my own. My son. I can hold him as long as I like, take him wherever I like. If I want to wake him up in the middle of a nap because I can’t resist the drug of him in my arms, and endure the storm he’ll give me over that, I can. If I want to change his little outfits five times, I can. If I want to drift with him through every room in my beautiful house, I can. If I want to hold him and stare at him for hours without ever surrendering him to another person, I can.

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The freedom of it! It springs up from the same source as the freedom I felt when I fell in love with his father. I was so caught by how free I was to touch this man, smile at him, wake him up to love me, gaze at him for an eternity or two. I didn’t have to be careful of my looks or cautious with my whispered words. He was mine. I didn’t have be remain friendly but ultimately distant so his wife or girlfriend wouldn’t grow suspicious. I didn’t feel that instinctive distance from him because someone else had a claim to him. He was mine! I claimed him. I was the wife, the girlfriend, the lover, and I was free to love him as long, as freely, as boldly, as publicly as I wanted. No walls, no limits, no sociably acceptable exchanges. The freedom of acknowledging and letting loose our love at last absolutely dizzied me. And now I have another person who binds me close to him and frees me all over again. My heart has stretched and swelled to twice its size to hold all that infinite love. I’m surprised my ribs haven’t cracked with the sheer mass of emotion.

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I gaze down on that utterly defenseless face, that perfect, tiny, shockingly fragile skull and the savagery I feel astonishes me even though I was prepared for it. I would die for him. I would sacrifice myself without a thought to protect him. No one will lay a hand on him if they expect to pull that hand back whole. My blood has changed color a bit from ordinary red to fiery crimson. It’s a different feeling from the fierce protective passion I felt for my mate when he became mine. I knew, as I know now with my son, that I would die to save him. I would protect my mate at any cost. But the intensity and single-mindedness of that urge never reached the critical mass of what I am feeling now as my son makes those heartbreakingly soft noises in sleep. Suddenly the world I lived in for so long has received a warning thrummed through the earth at my feet, radiating out in ripples to reach every living thing: don’t touch my child.

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I feel the tears in my eyes start blurring my vision. He is so perfect. He is my son. He is mine. Mine.