“You must be so excited to be moving back home!”
How many times have I heard that over the past several weeks? Still, I was never quite sure what to say.
I feel like it is the right thing to do. I feel at peace. But excited…not exactly.
Don’t get me wrong. I love Oregon. And I have really missed my family and friends there.
But it’s hard.
It’s hard because I love Maryland.
I love it for steamed blue crab with Old Bay, Baltimore’s inner harbor, baseball at Camden Yards, more than 200 trick or treaters in our neighborhood each Halloween, Washington DC, people I have come to love, and the snowball stand in front of Kendall’s Hardware Store.
That first summer I craved snowballs all the time. I’d drive by and act as though I just noticed the little building with the cheerful red, white and blue stripes. Casually, I’d suggest to Abby that we stop, even going so far as to place a couple of dollars in her almost five year old hand and watch from the car as she procured my fix. After all, I couldn’t let the teenager behind the counter know the second cup gripped in Abby’s little hands was for me. Again.
By the time the leaves began to fall, my snowball desires had waned to a manageable degree, but it was still a sad day when they closed for the season.
The next spring, Abby and I paid a visit to the hardware store for paint. I had a need to dress up my dreary family room.
On the way out we saw a woman carry a big block of ice into the little stand.
Could it be? Were they opening today? She replied yes to our questioning, indicating that she could serve us in about fifteen minutes.
Abby and I sat on a canvas porch swing displayed for sale in front of the hardware store. We swung back and forth in the warm
spring sunshine and waited.
Abby started to sing, “If you’re happy and you know it clap your hands…”
Something seemed different about her. Her open mouth revealed a crooked bottom tooth.
When did that happen? I touched it and it moved under my finger. Her first loose tooth!
We laughed together, though it was a bittersweet moment for me. My baby growing up.
Moments later we enjoyed the first snowballs of the year. It was a perfect moment.
My life here has had few perfect moments like that, but many happy ones. Many difficult ones as well.
I have grown in ways that I never anticipated. I have become someone new.
It is that someone new that worries about going back home. What if it is like trying to fit into an old prom dress? Tight in places it shouldn’t be and only serving as a dim reminder of the silly girl you were back then.
I know that in the end I’ll settle into life there. Maybe not the same, but still good. I’ll have more moments: perfect, good and bad. I’ll continue to grow.
I guess I’ll just have to dust off my sewing machine and make that old prom dress into something amazing for the girl I am now.
Anyone have a pattern I can borrow?
Early in our marriage, when W and I were discussing how many children we’d like to have, we both said five. Because, well, we wanted to keep things manageable.
We hadn’t even celebrated our first anniversary when the questions began.
Q: When are you going to get pregnant?
A: Oh, I’m not really sure.
Q: What are you guys waiting for?
A: Well, we haven’t been married all that long yet.
Q: You know, you’re not a real family until you have children.
A: Um, is that a question?
Q: So, when-
A: WOULD YOU JUST LEAVE IT ALONE!
But to give ourselves time to grow as a couple we had made the rational decision to wait a while before starting our family. You know, awhile. Like the four entire months we waited before I went off the pill and we began planning our exciting little future.
Yet, month after month, I got a bit more worried when that future failed to materialize. And those annoying questions just kept coming.
That’s how W and I came to be strapped into the fun and exciting rollercoaster ride called Infertility.
Continue Reading »
