Random Thoughts

Today I went to our small library with the kids. I hadn’t taken them all summer. It has actually been months and months since we set foot in that library. I take the kids to the bigger library all the time (I use my sister in law’s card) because they have a better audio book selection. I feel like I had to interject that fact so you wouldn’t think that I have been depriving myself and my kids of literacy all summer.
Anyway, today we went to the small library where the librarian knows us all by name. We have gone to story time enough that the kids love her and think they have a special relationship with her. As we walked through the doors and I saw her welcoming face, a thought struck me. I am obviously pregnant now. Before, you could have just argued that I had put on a little weight. Now, it looks like I have a pregnant belly (at least I think so). The people I see everyday know all about Sam. They know that the baby in my belly is a special one. The people I see at the grocery store or other places I go are complete strangers. They pass by and could care less about me, or the special baby I am carrying. I don’t have to explain things anymore. Today was the first time in a long time that I have seen someone who knows nothing about Sam, but would probably care. My mind was immediately active in thoughts. What if she asks when the baby is due? Do I play the “Debbie downer” card and tell her the truth about Sam’s heart? Do I brush the surface and tell her the “normal” things about an impending birth? The way my mind works, I ran through all these questions in seconds, including what I would say in the fall if I come to story time with Allie and empty arms.
In the end, it was all fine. The librarian only commented that it had been a long time since we had seen her. We picked out some books and left.
Still, it brought all this to mind. The early days of Sam’s diagnosis, where the pain was so real and so raw, feel so far away. The pain is still close to the surface, but not anywhere near the same as it was a few months ago. We have accepted things and have found incredible peace. I have a prayer in my heart constantly and I know that our house continues to be engulfed in a spirit of peace and comfort. Through that peace, we move on with our daily lives. We live. We play. We laugh. We talk about Sam all the time, in fact, today Jake handed me one of his precious star rings that he has been carrying around since the 4th of July. He told me that it was the one that he is giving to Sam. We do all these things, but every once in a while I am caught off guard. Every once in a while I am reminded that this is our new life. There are people we will see that don’t know anything about us, or the pain that we feel. There are people that I see every day that have gone through something similar, and I would never know it. Yet we all carry on. We all continue to live our lives and rely on the Lord for comfort.
I don’t know what the point of writing all of this is, I guess I just wanted to try and put words to these new feelings. I delete every new sentence I start, so I guess it’s time to just stop writing. It’s not really a completed thought process, but that’s okay.