 |
| photo borrowed from newbornastrology.blogspot.com |
This week we enter into that phase of “any day now
baby!” The constant question, just
like an impatient child on a road trip is “Are we there yet?” “Is today going to be the day?” As you might know, I am a control
freak. I am even surprised at
myself that I am really gung-ho at having a normal delivery. I would have been more comfortable with
the predictability of a caesarean birth.
But this is pregnancy – not all would be experiencing it – it is a gift
to me and for some masochistic reason, I actually want to experience the whole
shebang, labor and all. Sometimes,
or more like everyday I ask our daughter, “when are you going out? I’m not rushing you, but I just want to
know.” Haha! How we wish they would answer back
right? I made a code between the
two of us: kick me in the middle if it’s on the due date, to the right if it’s
before the due date and to the left if it is after the due date. And my husband was like: “My
wifey! What are you doing?” Of course Luna kicked me in the middle,
then to the right, then to the left.
So much for codes with babies in the womb!
So here we are, in the precious moment of
waiting. Which brings me to an
essay I have received way back: The Sacrament of Waiting by Fr. James Donelan, S.J. He says, “We cannot remove this waiting from our lives. It is part of the
tapestry of living—the fabric in which the threads are woven that tell the
story of our lives.”
And waiting mostly comes with love. “All we know is that growth—the
budding, the flowering of love needs patient waiting. We have to give each
other time to grow. There is no way we can make someone else truly love us or
we love them, except through time. So we give each other that mysterious gift
of waiting—of being present without making demands or asking rewards. There is
nothing harder to do than this. It tests the depth and sincerity of our love.
But there is life in the gift we give.”
Which is but timely because as we enter the season of
Advent, we are at the end of the day entering the season of waiting. The gift I give to our dear daughter is
to wait. Which for me, is A
LOT. But “think of all the great
love stories of history and literature. Isn’t it of their very essence that
they are filled with the strange but common mystery—that waiting is part of the
substance, the basic fabric—against which the story of that true love is
written?”
So here we are, in the season of Advent, in the sacrament
of waiting. Noo ni noo ni noo...
No comments:
Post a Comment