Sharing a Muffin
On some days, the smallest of moments radiate with the brightest of lights, and I am filled with overwhelming astonishment, grief and gratitude.
Today Younger Brother and I took a trip to the bakery. He picked a donut with colored sprinkles and I picked a muffin. At the table, while sitting across from one another, we agreed to share our treats, half and half. We shared smiles, washed it all down with a glass of juice, and visited the bathroom before we headed down the block to the toy store. A simple, small moment common to most of my friends with toddlers.
I am astonished that such a moment is possible, common, repeatable. This was one moment in a string of moments on our outing: the bakery, toy store, playtime at the park. How can such a parallel world exists alongside our ICU realities back home with Levi? I am astonished to be the "mom" inside this moment.
I have been a parent for over five years and these moments are just beginning to happen in my life. I am grieved these moments have never happened with Levi, are happening apart from him, and at this juncture there is no hope of it ever happening like this, just the two of us.
Levi eats a liquid diet (breastmilk) by Gtube and doesn't know the taste of sprinkles, let alone how to show a preference for them over the other items in the bakery counter.
He needs the full support of my arms and torso when sitting, so he always sits on my lap. In this way, I am forever looking down upon him.
He has no mobility of his own although I am sure he would love to be able to climb in and out of that chair by himself.
At age five he is in diapers and finding a bathroom in which to change him is not easy. The average toy store, even the one Younger Brother and I visited, with Eco-friendly toys, is filled with toys well beyond his developmental age.
I grieve the loss of my own experiences as much as I grieve his. I am thankful that on some level, Levi doesn't know what he doesn't know, and therefore he does not grieve as I do.
I nearly skipped this outing with Younger Brother. Not out of anticipated grief, but out of exhaustion.
The night before I had gotten just four hours of sleep and had been up since 3am. (Something that happens three times a week, every week.) It was my intention to take a nap with Younger Brother when he fell asleep on the way home from water therapy with Levi. However the noon-time bright blue skies and radiant sunshine got the best of me. Sleep just doesn't compare to enjoying one of the first glorious days of spring, particularly in Minnesota. While he napped in the car I headed for the bakery and enjoyed some quiet time with the windows wide open. When he awoke we walked down the block to the bakery.
I am so grateful that in my days of utter exhaustion (which is 90% of the time), the Lord gives me the presence of mind to fully experience the simplicity of sharing a muffin with my son. He illuminates the ordinary and reminds me of it's extraordinaryness in my motherhood. He allows me space to breathe it all in, grieving while honestly smiling, and to receive it all as a precious gift.
I am thankful Levi is still with us this side of heaven, so that when I return home there is the opportunity for our eyes to meet, my hands to touch his, and to cherish all that he is and was never expected to become.
Perhaps someday Levi and I will find our own version of sharing a muffin?
