Waiting for You

​I'm longing to meet you...mysterious little you.  I have yet to feel your tiny ballet of movements, making yourself known, but I still know you are there as my belly swells and skin stretches and my mama glow begins to take form.  

I wait with bated breath between midwife visits until I can hear that reassuring whirring of your tiny heart beating you into life.  To me that tender thumping is the sweetest music ever created...not even Beethoven can top this symphony of percussive perfection.   

You already amaze me...without instruction or a helping hand from your mama you are forming and growing into the person you'll become.  I just sit in wait for our long anticipated first meeting.  Where your tears of life's first breath will meet my tears of life's pure joy.  Flesh on flesh and bone on bone as your tiny fingers furl around mine.  The day you become our son or daughter and are welcomed by arms and hearts wide open for you alone...and an entourage of grandma's and grandpa's, of auntie's and uncles and kid cousins that can't wait for you to come out and play. 

In the meantime, we wait and watch for your reassuring signs until the day you are ready to reveal yourself.  And I am the luckiest of them all...to hold you deep inside like a sweet little secret.  As I sleep and as I rise you are with me.  Before you are tangible to anyone else, you have taken on life becoming one with my breath and closer to my heart than anyone else could ever be.

(see picture at https://www.pinterest.com/pin/98938523040805159/)

Releasing Max

On March 29, 2015, my boss and good friend, Max, passed away suddenly.  It left a hole in my day to day that is hard to explain or to really grasp.  I struggle that my words can't quite capture his life or this loss but if Max taught me anything it's never to give in to giving up.  Just over a month of coming to grips with this loss, I pay tribute to an unforgettable human being:

Silence can be deafening.  When it's not expected...not welcomed.  When my chance for a farewell passed me by...I didn't know this goodbye would be into the deep eternity of forever. 

Each passing day I sit guarding your remnants.  I sit outside the space you filled with your laugh and your jokes, with your brilliant ideas and your boisterous spirit.  Where you'd call my name and challenge my mind and teach me.  I see remnants of your fingerprints...the patch of carpet which tells the tale of clumsy hands spilling coffee, the messy piles of paperwork that you would get to tomorrow, and the last place you laid your pen to rest.  But tomorrow has come and gone and the dust is settling...covering over, like a blanket of dignity to that which was lost.  I run my finger over the dust in hopes to relive one last moment...to hear one last word.

You lived  abundantly and you loved relentlessly.  You believed in second (and third) chances. You never let a setback set your pace.  You always fought the good fight, even at your weakest...never afraid to show your humanity.  How honoured I am to be let in to those small and private moments.   You lived life fully awake, looking for where you could give a piece of yourself.  You left your mark...inside the doors of your everyday and inside the hearts of everyone.

I'm grateful for the time that's passed...for the memories of witty banter and brotherly advice.  I've known for some time that this blessing of moments and space was not forever young...that the expiry would meet us. But that I must be grateful for God's gracious hand to give me this small glimpse of time with one of the unforgettables.

But today the silence rings loud...it tells of what's been lost and what will forever be missing in this life.  A life lived too short, but lived so well.  My boss, my teacher, my friend. 

Unforgettable Max.

(see picture at https://www.pinterest.com/pin/98938523040784394/)