The Blue Chair

I bonked my knee this morning. That's the short story. The long story is that I was at my parents' house, about to take a shower but after I undressed and turned on the water, I remembered that I had left my teensy bottles of non-Suave shampoo upstairs. I was pretty sure that Baby and I were the only ones in the house, so I crept upstairs and ran into the computer room to retrieve my backpack. I forgot that my center of gravity had recently shifted, making me a super-klutz. In my naked dash to the den, I twisted my right ankle, fell down, and landed on my left knee.

I normally like to shriek loudly when I'm in pain, but this time I only whisper shrieked. I was deathly afraid that I had miscalculated who was still in the house. I had a horrifying split-second vision of my dad hearing his daughter shrieking and running down the stairs to find her lying on the floor, her recently pregnant abdomen flapping in the morning breeze, yelling "cover your eyes!" Lucky for me, my dad wasn't home. You know, I've been feeling kind of sorry for myself lately, and I probably need to pay more attention to tender mercies like these. At least Dad wasn't home.

So anyway, I bonked my knee, and I have to stay off of it for the day (not doctor's orders, just common sense because it weally huwts when I twy to walk on it). I have taken refuge in my favorite chair in the world. It's the blue Lay-Z-Boy recliner that I lived in for the two years I gestated Baby, wrote all of my law school final research papers, and nursed Baby for 14 months. Sadly, this chair now lives at my parents' house. It would have taken up our entire New York apartment, and in the time since we've left New York, we haven't found a way to transport it without paying more for the transportation than the money-value of the chair (the sentimental value of the chair is priceless, yes, but not so priceless that I'm willing to pay whatever to move the thing wherever my nomadic life leads me). Thus, when I visit my parents, I visit my chair.

Know what was on my to-do list today? Clean my parents' entire house (well, the main part of it, anyway). I wasn't really looking forward to it, but I was going to do it anyway because I love my parents and I love my little brother whose graduation will be celebrated in this house tomorrow afternoon.

I love my chair slightly less than I love my parents and little brother, but if I have to give up doing something nice for parents and brother, I'm satisfied to spend the day in the chair.

By the way, I've decided to write non-sad blog entries for a while. I think that blogging about the twins does more harm than good for me at this point. Talking to people: helpful. Blogging: not so much.

Provo in the Springtime

I think I will always remember my first spring in Provo. I was fifteen, and it was, in some ways, my first spring because I had previously lived in Southern California. While spring exists in Southern California (it's when the hills with a brown tint take on a green tint, before they get the yellow tint, duh), it doesn't have the same effect.

It was a perfect storm in some ways: I was fifteen and at the peak of my ridiculous, dramatic, romantic-ness; I had spent the winter being lonely, bored, and cold; and I played Chopin nocturnes on the piano and read Bronte novels. Then, gradually and all at once, daylight savings, friends, joy, sunshine, spring.

I wandered the streets of Provo, cross-eyed with bliss, ecstatic over the hyacinths and apple blossoms. If apples blossomed in California, I had no memory of it. I was in love with spring, with Provo, with myself (every healthy fifteen-year-old is secretly in love with herself, right?). I was Leisl squealing in the gazebo, and I hadn't even been kissed. I was Anne Shirley on the White Way of Delight, and I hadn't even been adopted. I was Ariel the mermaid, and I hadn't even found a fork in a sunken ship.

I think I've stomped down that fifteen-year-old springtime insanity, but I still get a teensy bit bubbly when I'm in Provo in April, whatever else is going on.

Burial

We decided to have a private burial for the twins. We were given the option of "letting the hospital take care of it," but we opted for cremation and burial in the Provo Cemetery. Truthfully, I was confused and ambivalent on this subject (as I am about everything these days), but, especially after having seen the twins' bodies, Husband wanted to know where they would be.

The little shared urn was two inches tall. As part of our move to California, Husband drove it from Chicago through Nauvoo, IL; Columbia, MO; Salina, KS; Rocky Mountain National Park; to Provo, UT. He took Baby with him and called it a road trip with his boys. He carried the urn in his pocket wherever he went.

The portion of Provo Cemetery set aside for infants and stillborn children is called the Angel Garden. On the map, it's called Babyland. Most of the plots are unmarked, including ours.

Usually people live before they die, and usually it is the children who bury their parents. My twins died before they lived, and I buried their ashes today.

Lost

One week ago, during a routine ultrasound, I learned that my twins had died at 16 weeks gestation. By the end of the day, I had been admitted to the hospital, induced into labor, and delivered the babies.

Their tiny bodies were beautiful, but heartbreakingly incomplete. I am lonely for their warm presence and for the anticipation that comes with pregnancy. I have never felt such deep sadness. I have never been so thankful for the opportunity to care for my first son.

Thank you to so many people for their support and understanding during this most difficult time. The most difficult time.