Coexistence

This is not a post within a post, like most of my other October posts, but it's something I've been thinking about. Weston would have been fifteen months old today. He would be walking (or close to it, since he was so premature).

Anyway. Before Weston, I had good days and bad days. A good day happened when I slept in, or had a victory at work, or went outside for a run, or went on a date with Shannon, or watched Caroline have fun. A bad day happened if I was too busy to enjoy anything, or Caroline had a public meltdown, or I had a bad day at work, or I fought with Shannon, etc. Normal occurrences.

Then I was put on bed rest, and a good day was equated with minimal blood loss. Then I was put in the hospital, and a bad day meant I bled so much that my baby was in even more danger of dying. And I lost my daily wheelchair privileges. Seeing Caroline around dinnertime was the bright spot in every day when I was the patient.

Then Weston was born. A good day meant he pooped on his own, tolerated a drop of breast milk, perhaps gained a fraction of an ounce, and stayed alive. A bad day meant he was sedated, had a serious diagnosis, had unstable blood gases, had fewer rounds, and only one nurse assigned to him.

You get the idea: what constituted a good or bad day became more and more basic.

And then Weston died. My child is gone until I die: this fact makes every day unbearable. As long as my child is dead, every day will be a bad day. (Yes, he might be living in heaven, but he is still very dead in the physical realm, which is the realm I will occupy for the foreseeable future. Please do not try to talk me out of this.)

Yet, I have a daughter. I can't even describe how much I love her, and I get to spend every single day with her. I have a loyal husband who is just as crazy about our daughter. I have a loving family and more friends than I can count, and I communicate with at least one of them every day. A day spent with any one of these people is a very good day.

Two things happened recently that cemented this good/bad coexistence for me. We recently returned from several days on the central California coast for my cousin's wedding, and the weekend was a mini-family reunion. Many of them came to Weston's funeral, but it was good to see them under joyful circumstances.

As the wedding started, the musician started playing the exact version of "Somewhere Over the Rainbow" that I play all the time as part of my Weston playlist. Y'all know how I feel about rainbows now. Shannon looked over at me, wondering if I would be able to keep it together.

But then I remembered the song we played at Weston's funeral. A friend sang the same song at our wedding almost ten years ago.

I kept it together.

Why shouldn't wedding and funeral songs be interchanged? Both occasions honor love. Grief is a product of love, and I have plenty of love in my life. So do my cousin and her new husband.

The second thing was, simply, a visit with a friend. She met us in Santa Barbara for several hours before we flew home. I talked about her and her family in this post. The reasons for our reconnecting are, of course, terrible, but the reconnection itself is a priceless gift. We spent several hours together, and it was not nearly enough time.

So, there are no more purely good or bad days. The good and the bad mix, they coexist (but not always peacefully), and one is yin to the other's yang. Every day is as celebratory as a wedding and as tragic as a funeral. It's an uncomfortable and beautiful truth.