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Well, it’s been a while since I’ve written
about our baby Gregory, and about my healing process. Bottom line, I’m sure not healed. And who would expect me to be?
Nobody. But, knowing that my
baby has entered into eternal life, that Kingdon of Eternal Life is less far
away to me, because he is there. There was so much I never wrote about
during the months from September to now, having been in transition, nearly
visibly so, as I moved from crawling to standing, to walking. I do have a few “phases”, and revelations from
those months documented, so to speak.
Maybe one day I will add them to my blog and stick them in a category
regarding Gregory. I’ve got to figure
out how to do that. But, a few things this week have caused me
to re-live, or re-visit, some experiences and thoughts of the past months. This week, a death of an elderly neighbor,
an infant adoption, along with some other things really dredged up my
memories. I sure have been crying a
lot, though not from reaching the bottom, but from seeing the top. One particular thing I would like to recall,
and talk about, is my experience, and revelation, while reading a lovely
picture book to my 4 yo. It was Moses
in the Bulrushes by Warwick Hutton. The
events of the week made me think about the book again. We own a copy, and we’ve read it plenty of
times. But, shortly after Gregory died,
my 4 yo picked it up and asked me to read it.
I knew it would be a tough read for me, at that point. But, I began to read. I reached a certain point in the story, and
slowly, with all I had in me, gathered enough control to read the words aloud. The hard part began with the page where
Moses’ mother sits on the water’s edge and makes a simple ark for him. Carefully, thoughtfully she makes a vessel
to carry him away. If you haven’t seen this book, I want to
give you a picture of the beautiful watercolor full-page illustrations. The colors are gentle and the overall
expression is of stillness and quietude.
The text is quite spare, reinforcing the elegance of the images. On each double page spread, there are
typically just one or two sentences. As I continued to read, I watched myself,
and allowed my thoughts to move in and out about the story. I felt myself overwhelmed with emotion. There was the obvious… Moses’ mother letting
go of her baby. That is why I knew
reading the story would be hard at this point.
But, as I read, I thought about adoption and thought of the awesome
beauty of it: The Pharoah’s daughter taking and raising a baby, knowing why the
mother was unable to raise the baby herself. And I watched myself some more as
I struggled to say the words. I
wondered, “why am I so upset?” Well, I
knew to a degree, but just felt there must be more. Reading on… a double page spread shows the Pharoah’s daughter
carefully unfolding the covering, and cradling the baby in her arms. The image on the next page shows the baby’s
sister speaking to the princess. But,
the next page is overwhelming in the simplicity and power. There, we see Moses’ mother sitting alone in
a room, next to an empty cradle, with gentle noises about, but the mother lost
in thought. And, through the door we
see the young girl running towards the door with the wonderful news! The mother will have her baby back! And the story revealed itself to me. I realized, that I, too, will have my baby
back, in God’s time. After this reading, I was telling my friend
about it all, and about my revelation.
I had just recently, as per request, lent her my copy of Christine
Field’s book, So You Want to Adopt. She
reminded me of Christine’s words at the end of the book, about how one day, the
mothers of the adopted children will be united with their children again, and
there will be no separation between the family members: mother and father,
children, and adoptive parents. I can’t
quote exactly since I don’t have the book back yet. Just this week I got out the Warwick Hutton
book again, and thought about my sister in law and her husband who just adopted
their first baby, after waiting many years, and I was, and am, so overwhelmingly
happy for them. And I particularly thought about the birth mother, and felt for her,
and felt kinship with her. But I was
consoled in knowing that she and her baby, and me and my baby will not be
separated forever. Since I love the picture book so much, I
did look around in case you wanted to look for it, and I found many copies at
Alibris. Thanks for reading. Barbara |
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