Never Alone

She has compassion and empathy because she, alone, was there.  She remembers.

No one else can understand, no matter how hard they might try, because they simply weren’t there.

She remembers juggling motherhood and a career and being torn between the two.  When she was at work, she thought about that baby.  When with the baby, she worried that something was neglected at work.  She longed for peace with both.

She picked him up from the sitter’s, drove home, and carried him inside with the diaper bag slung over one shoulder and brief case on the other.  She lugged everything into the nursery, laid him on the changing table, dropped the bags, and changed his diaper.  Nothing was said, but they were together.  She removed her suit jacket exposing a black and white slick polka dot blouse.  As she fastened the diaper, she realized he had grabbed her sleeve and rubbed the fabric between his fingers.  The contrast must have appealed to him.  There was a slight grin.  No one else was present – just the two of them, alone.

She fed him and kept him with her in the kitchen as she prepared something alone and cleaned up the dishes.

He rarely fussed and was relaxed with a bath just before bedtime.

She warmed the bottle and headed back  to the nursery with him in her arms, his soft skin releasing the gentle smell of baby lotion.  Bottle, blanket, and baby in tow, she sat down in the rocker and watched him fade into never neverland as she rocked and held the bottle for him – such innocence.  No one else was there.  The day was done.  They slept and, at dawn, began again.

She walked him to the corner on his first day of school.  He was so excited and both were unaware of the bullying he would endure the next few years.  When she found out, she covered him with her feathers.  No one knew.

She shared the joys and disappointments of adolescence.  She paced when he pitched.  No one seemed to notice.

The time came to let him fly.  Sometimes he fell.  She picked him up and set his feet on solid ground.

As she learned her favorite dance, the waltz, she learned such is life – the rise and the fall, the rise and fall – and learned to accept both.

She went to bed, but sleep eluded her.  She sought peace – peace for the night and peace for the next day.  She turned on her side as the pillow gathered the tears that no one knew fell.

Morning came, and she found grace to begin again.  She realized she was not alone.

“Because of the Lord’s great love we are not consumed, for his compassions never fail. They are new every morning; great is your faithfulness.”  Lamentations 3:22-23 (NIV)