Now and Then

On August the 25th and 26th, both my "kids" are going to be here sleeping under the same roof with me (along with my son-in-law, two grandchildren, my future daughter-in-law, two cats, three dogs and a husband!) On one of these two days my step-daughter, her dog, my step-son and future step daughter-in-law will also be here, although not actually sleeping over, for reasons that should be obvious, as we live in this
house, heh. I really cannot wait!
As I read this blog I am struck how sort of regular and normal it all sounds, as if my life is pretty perfect. I guess it is, now, as it appears to people on the outside. I wonder why I am letting this impression stand, if I am, as I write here.
My life is probably the best and most stable it has ever been, this part is true.These "Grammacello Years" were arrived at with a lot of work of many kinds.
I rememember being at a conference once, when Jenn was 21 and Matthew was 11- we all slept in the same ROOM (at a hotel) and it was the first time I had slept well in 15 months. This was July, 1993 and Shawn had been dead 15 months- the conference was the national Compassionate Friends Gathering. Nothing ever seems normal after a loss like that but a new normal gradually takes shape. It would take so many words to tell that story.

Sometimes I really really really wish that it were a different "now" and that I was posting this;

Here are my 3 kids at Pinery Beach, Lake Huron, summer 1984. Jennifer is 13, Shawn is 11 and Matthew is 3. I used up a whole roll trying to get a good one of all three, but, sigh, kids-you know how it goes.

It makes me cry to write this.

I wish I had him back, to sleep in our bursting at the seams family sleep-over in August.

I just want him back.