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It’s a pity I had no time to unpack the week’s “unforgettable” moments.
Instead, my off-line journal holds four disjointed pages of thoughts, when in a normal week there would be twenty-one packed full of “don’t-wish-to-forget” or “wish-I-could-but-can’t forget” moments. But all that deeper reflection must come later — because I want to get down everything I can about this miraculous, love-sloshed week.
Like last night’s expressions of love that came by way of a fancy steakhouse downtown, in celebration of my future daughter-in-law Amy’s twenty-fourth birthday. If only I’d had the presence of mind to snap Amy’s photo. But perhaps with these words, I’ll remember how especially pretty she looked in her evening finery — how she bubbled with joy.
And like every single minute since last Saturday, thirteen minutes after Noon — as I’ve expressed and been privileged to witness other’s countless expressions of love to our family’s newborn parents and child — daughter Kara, son-in-law Joe and granddaughter, Reese Caroline.
Sometimes the love expressed — like those that came out of dark, sleep-deprived moments in the middle of the night as I jarred myself awake to help a very tired and sore new mother and child — seemed more like expressing oil from olives. Though I’m told there is no “second press” of olives — that all olive oil comes from the first pressing — at times, this week, I felt as though my expressing of love came by a second and third pressing — until I thought I had nothing else to give. But most the time, my love rose boundless to the surface like bubbles in a just opened bottle of champagne. Whether bubbly or hard-pressed, neither vintage of love was better as both came from the same source. Yet it amazes me that when it comes to love, when we think we have nothing else to give, we’re wrong.
But whether my own or others it makes no difference — deep expressions of love leave me weepy. So forgive me while I slosh as I wonder in words — on a night, mind you, when I should be sleeping, since I’ve come home to grant space to others who wish to express love to my newborns –why we are so stingy with our love? Why do we do things for any reason other than love? Why is it that we too often do things merely out of a sense of obligation? What weight does fulfilling an obligation carry — especially in eternity?
Living this week, as I have in a celebratory bubble of love, I see that only what we do out of love really and truly matters. And as I write this, I see that everything we do traces back to love of someone or something. And though I confess to not thinking so clearly in my sleep-deprived state, it seems we go astray those times when our love of things gets in the way of our love of people — whether the things are money or pride or whatever. The ‘right thing” is always to love someone rather than something. And even when the something is grandiose, like a desire for world peace, even then there should be people and their well-being standing behind it.
This old-song of Jackie DeShannon’s makes a good everyday prayer in my sleep-deprived mind tonight. And with it, I’m tucking myself back in to bed.
an everyday life 
Lovely photo, wonderful thoughts. Enjoy!
Beautiful just like her mother and grandmother
Thanks Jane. You and Christi need to come see her yourself.
Take it from me, little Reese is heavenly to hold. And coming into the world at the healthy birth-weight of 8 lbs, 7 ozs — coupled with her healthy appetite — who knows how long she’ll be wearing that “newborn” size!
Janell
Thanks Linda.
In catching up with the rest of life this morning, I called my mother-in-law to chat. Janice had gone to the hospital last Saturday too — so I needed to see how she was fairing. But the second topic of conversation was, of course, THE BABY. I told Janice how perfectly gorgeous little Reese is — and that “if anyone thought otherwise, I hoped they leave me blissfully ignorant.”
Oh my friend — I cannot describe the pure bliss it is to hold a new grandbaby in my arms again. Though I do need to stop calling Miss Reese “Karson Elizabeth” (the name of grandchild #4), which I do half the time. Though my calling a child by the wrong name reminds me a lot of Mother, who sometimes went through two or three names before landing on the right one — “Jane, Christi…., I mean Janell.” 🙂
I laughed at your “name game”. That happens even now in our family – Mom will call me by her sister’s name, and calls my aunt by mine. We have an extra bit of fun now and then, since we all sound the same on the telephone. No one’s ever quite sure who they’re speaking to.
And you know – there are times to walk without a camera and times to live without reflection. Everything in its own time. You won’t forget.
Linda,
I imagine many families playing chase with names until tag is reached. I now remember that I played name chase with my own children.
And I sure hope you’re right about my not forgetting the week’s rich memories. I fear my memory is not as fine-tuned as yours — your blog posts evidence an ability to knit together so many thoughts, that at first blush, appear disjointed. I can’t imagine many would think to join them together, or be able to recall them from memory, as you do — post after post.
Contrast that with me — the gal who can’t always recall her own ATM code without discussions with her husband.
Janell