Light

Several weeks ago, I was in Indianapolis for a work conference.  It's an annual thing; most of the people I see there, I haven't seen since last year, and won't see again until next year.  Early in this trip, I bumped into the woman who I was temporarily working for when Ryan died.  She asked immediately how Sophie was doing, and if I had a picture.  Proud mom that I am, I pulled one up on my iPhone right away and showed it to her, beaming.  She gasped, smiled bright, and said with true joy, "What a light!"

Truer words have not been spoken.  That is what Sophie is to me - a light.  Before she was born, when I was in the depths of my grief, I know many people were hoping that a baby would provide me with solace.  I always reacted to this sort of sentiment bitterly, knowing that a baby would do nothing to heal my heart, that a baby would not make it all better.  No matter how happy she may make me, I knew that she would not fix things.  And she hasn't.

But, she is a light.  A bright, warm light in the center of the darkest room.  She glows pure and strong even when I'm having my worst days - the light is always on.  Sometimes, it grows so bright that it's hard to look at - it grows to all sides of the room, and the darkness shrinks away.  Sometimes, her light spreads to the walls, and shines out the windows, and for the first time in months, I can see outside, and see what's ahead.  Other times, it shrinks back to the center of the room, dulls, and it becomes my job to tend to it, and make it bright again.  But the light never goes away, it is constant, always warm, always hopeful, always on.

The dark is still in the room too.  There are dark corners, all of the time, and sometimes I can't help but going and sitting in one for a while.  There are shadows too, that catch me unaware.  They are projections of darkness that fall off of relics in the room - old memories, objects, things that are there and I can't get rid of, or don't want to.  As bright as the light is, it can't shine out all of the bits of darkness.  After all, before the light went on, it was a very, very dark room.  I can't expect one little light to get rid of all of the black.  That's an awfully big job for such a small light!  But because of my little light, I can see again.  I can understand the dark corners and the shadows, and know that they are not hopeless - though they sometimes can feel like it.

What a light.  A light that wrinkles her little nose when she smiles her gap-toothed grin.  That laughs when I laugh, and then makes me laugh again.  That runs as fast as she can and giggles and hides, waiting for me to find her.  My little light dances to the music that I play for her, and asks me to sing songs to her again and again.  She snuggles against me when she falls asleep at night, and is happy to see me in the morning.  She's excited when I get home from work, and runs and throws her arms around my legs.  She gives me little kisses when I ask for them, and every so often, for no reason at all.  My little light causes me joy that is bigger than my grief.  It does not replace or cancel out my grief - they run parallel.  But the joy is bigger.  The light it bigger than the dark.  And, to be clear, it is a very big dark.

What an amazing light.