Forty

Starling just finished up her fortieth day of mortal life. 40. The number that, in scripture, represents a lengthy period of time — often full of trial, testing and cleansing.

There has certainly been no real length to this particular span of forty. (In fact, the second Starling was born a fierce wind came whipping up from behind and, despite all our desperate grasping onto every stable thing, pushed and rushed and tumbled us forward to today. And it’s blowing still.) 

But, it may be that there has been some degree of testing and trial in this forty.

Labor, it recently occurred to me, has never been simply the start of bringing a new child here, but a reminder of what all of life has been and all of what it will continue to be as I add a new soul to our journey: Periods between contractions when all feels calm, and right, and well, and I can’t recall what any prior fuss was about. And then the contractions themselves . . . when everything feels hard and painful and every bit of my focus is needed to continue forward — trusting in an eventual, perfect delivery.

Despite (or perhaps more accurately because of) those periods of intense contractions in all this rather demanding business of mothering ten children, I've been realizing, a bit to my surprise, that I haven't -- as mothers so often tend to worry -- in any way lost myself. Despite limited time to pursue other opportunities or to develop certain talents, it is in tying myself to and raising these specific children that God has worked some of His most personal work in the process of my becoming. Here, in the space of raising these children, has existed perhaps my most-significant, divinely-appointed training on the path to who I am meant to eternally be. 

Matthew 16:25 -- For whosoever will save his life shall lose it: and whosoever will lose his life for my sake shall find it. 

And so . . . bring on all the 40s I guess! And hurrah for this most recent one!

And we have a . . .

SMILER!

Oh all right, I haven't captured it on camera, but it's true! Our little Baby Star smiles!

Unquestionably!

Of course the poor angel tried to smile at us for some time before we would acknowledge her efforts.

"No. No," we'd say. "True she is looking directly into our eyes. And is fully awake. But she's only two weeks! It can't possibly be a true smile."

Or: "Impossible! Yes, it may be that she is completely alert and appears to be smiling -- directly and delightedly -- in response to our own smiles, but she's only three weeks! It just can't be so."

Finally, at four weeks, after a joyous smile lit up her face in response to Anders, we quit insisting on things like "reflex smiles", conceded that she had been smiling at us all along, and declared her our earliest smiler.

And, as if that wasn't enough, the other night she was lying on my bed while I busied about with something or other, when suddenly I heard a single, heart-melting coo!

Did you realize babies learn to make sounds?!? Purposeful sounds above and beyond cries or little fussing whimpers?

Well, of course you did, but I'd forgotten about the miracle of all these tiny little beginnings! Perfect gifts -- coming just in time to rescue and restore the parts of your soul that felt they might die if your newborn aged.

(Also, isn't Summer falling asleep while holding Starling just so so dear?)

Lastly, these next pictures were taken nine days into life with Starling:

Is life, you might be wondering, any more normal now? One month in?

Who can say. It no longer feels wholly new and otherworldly like those very first few weeks did -- when even doing something as simple as taking new baby Starling out somewhere (like to her first doctor appointment) felt strange and like, "How can all these people coming and going around me be acting so normal? Can't they sense that all of life has changed? Don't they recognize that there is nothing remotely normal about me being here -- with this brand new baby in tow?"

No. It doesn't feel like that. (Which in some ways is a bit sad. That space of time being almost sacred in it's newness and unfamiliarity.) Normal life has demanded all of its attention again. Birthdaying and Easter, groceries and school drop offs and pick ups, dinner-time and laundry. We are doing all of those things. But just . . . with a lot more juggling and a lot less sleep and almost always one less arm and hand. 

Here are a few pictures of the normal trying to go about its business:

Penny in several mustaches. (Certainly this fits just fine in the normal category.)

And Goldie is fully free of her crutches. They assure her that her leg is strong and not to fear doing normal things (like this small jump here), but she's still limping and going to physical therapy so she's not completely "good as new" yet. They guessed it would be six to nine months before she'd be that. Still, when I think of all the craziness of that first while and how truly impossible it seemed (after her initial surgery) that she might ever be able to even get up off her hospital bed at all, her being crutch-free is pretty amazing!

And Daisy turned 17. SEVENTEEN! It's one of those numbers that surprise me more than others in how old it sounds. She has a (surprisingly well-lit) window-well outside her bedroom window where various little green weeds manage to spring up between the rocks and live throughout the winter. For some time she's felt she ought to make a little fairy garden in that window-well . . . and so, among other things, she got some fairy garden homes for her birthday.

(This globe was from Goldie. It turns out Daisy has always wanted one. Only who knew? Well, Goldie, apparently. It's nice to have sisters around to know the important things that moms might not.)

And last of all: Easter!

(I've avoided this for most of the year -- mostly because it just hasn't seemed real, but I find myself increasingly slipping into sentimental little thoughts of lasts. Next year we won't be pulling out Abe's old Easter basket and he won't be opening treat-filled eggs with the rest of his siblings. Each of these thoughts are like a tiny hole stabbed in my heart . . . that I quickly plug up by not thinking about it lest I bleed completely dry.)

The Backdrop to the Beautiful

Recently I began bravely/tremblingly tackling all of real life again (everything that was already fairly demanding made somehow nearly impossible simply by the addition of . . . one small, helpless, floppy, new person).

During one moment of frantically trying to get rolls out of the oven, hand one screaming child a spoon, stop a toddler from coming in from the backyard with chicken poop on their foot (yes, that), and call several missing older children to join us (because I had actually made dinner and so help me they better come appreciate it!), all while Starling was fussing and crying to be fed (which is no quickly-taken-care-of process), I hurriedly attempted to pry open a slightly jammed drawer (to retrieve the spoon being cried for) and managed to, instead, pull free a thick splinter -- that wedged itself completely under the nail bed of my right index finger. 

It was very bad timing. 

It hurt. 

I yelled. 

And, not very kindly, told everyone to stop screaming at me, as I searched, in a panic, for misplaced tweezers, and failed several times to get a hold of the splinter (and wondered despairingly what one is to do if they can't pull free something from under their fingernail). Eventually I pulled it out and was able to staunch the rather tremendous flow of blood. 

But kids needing dinner, and a crying baby, and all the associated mess hadn't disappeared in the meantime. 

It all seemed such a fitting contrast to the peaceful, beautiful and POWERFUL feelings I'd experienced while quietly holding my new little Starling during the brief period of time-out we'd enjoyed.

I knew that everything magnificent and brilliant I'd sensed was real. The most real truth in all of this. But I never get over how odd it is that everything mighty and significant and lovely . . . plays out amidst a backdrop of stress and mess and exhaustion and . . . ORDINARY. 

It always does! It's where everything good exists! In the middle of . . . everything else.

It makes it very hard to see anything more than tiny glimpses of the might and importance and beauty of the things we are living and choosing and doing -- though I imagine perhaps that is part of the why of it. Maybe we never would have understood or seen at all without the contrast. Maybe it's a huge part of our growth and test -- recognizing all that is right and a gift in the midst of everything trying to drown it out. 

I'm not sure. 

But I read a little article I liked in the most recent Ensign magazine. In it, a man told of a time in his life when he was serving as a bishop. Work was demanding. Family was demanding. He was exhausted. He'd come home late one night after a slew of interviews only to realize he had something that needed fixed on his car so he could drive it to work the next day. As he was fixing it, he began a whining prayer asking God why He couldn't lighten the load a little. In the middle of the prayer, he had some words come strongly to his mind -- three times. They were simply, "This is it!" 

This was life. This was mortality. These exhausting daily demands were the experiences he signed up for -- the very things that would help him become who he was meant to be. 

I typically recognize big trials as events intended to help us grow, but less often do I realize that the daily, recurring, tiresome struggles and frustrations are this hugely necessary component of our mortal existence. Seeing, on occasion, the lofty things beyond that are a huge gift, but, in a way, all of this is a gift. All of it is intended to change us and challenge us and give us the stress to push against that will make us something vastly greater than we ever could have been otherwise. In that sense, I suppose I should not only be trying to see the beautiful in the midst of the messy, but to recognize and allow the mess itself to create beauty in me!

It reminds me of this C.S. Lewis statement that Elder Renlund is fond of quoting:

"[Mortals} say of some temporal suffering, 'No future bliss can make up for it,' not knowing that Heaven, once attained, will work backwards and turn even that agony into a glory. . . . The Blessed will say, 'We have never lived anywhere except in Heaven.'"