What I've learned about my son

I keep waking up feeling like my brain has been left on all night.

A lot of people will say that as a new mom, my increased concern for the state of the world was pretty predictable. Thinking about the world your children will inherit and all that.

That may be true. I've found myself shot through with reckless bravery in some ways lately, the result of looking outside my living room bubble and constantly asking, "what am I supposed to do with these moments?" I don't want to live in a world where hope hides itself and the people of God are resigned to mediocrity. I want my son to live under the power of God, bold and steadfast. Maybe motherhood has actually shifted that into clearer focus for me.

There are a lot of things I've been told about motherhood that haven't fit my experience--like the horror stories of sleep deprivation and utter exhaustion--and some that have been spot on accurate. 

Like how normal it feels. Pregnancy and childbirth are two of the weirdest things we think are normal as humans. Those nine months carrying my little guy around inside me feel almost like a dream now, but the transition from having a preborn baby incubating in my womb to holding my newborn was like stepping through a tiny waterfall. The experience of giving birth was the event. Everything after that just makes sense in the most bizarre way. 

We stepped through the waterfall and now we're on the other side of it. Nothing else could possibly be true.

And so here we are. About five months of life this side of the womb, and Salem is almost unrecognizable--but somehow there's a glimmer inside of the same something that was there from the beginning. His soul is like a marble I found in the dirt behind my house, and time is slowly washing off the dust so I can begin to make out all the tiny details inside the glass. 

Just like I know that marble is the same one that I picked up outside, I know my son is the same little boy who inhabited the space below my ribs for the better part of a year. Only now I'm getting a clearer picture of who he is than I did from the fuzzy black-and-white sonogram screen. 

He emerges more and more each day. Eyes that were once deep blue, like the waters of Lake Superior, sparkle now with ripples of hazel. The smile that once crept across his face unknowingly as he dreamed now comes into the light when he sees the faces of people he loves. Tiny hands that used to flail like two confused birds now reach out for new adventures, like the soft fur of a curled-up cat, or the shiny rim of my glasses, or the clickety-clacking joysticks of my husband's Gamecube controller. 

The boy is curious and critical. He's generous with his smile, eager in laughter, always searching and studying and sucking his thumb, reminding me of photos of his dad. He bounces back from tears easily, as if he'd rather be happy than anything else. Like me, he always seems to have something to say.

As I watch him grow, Salem is experiencing everything for the first time. In a way I am too. 

"Babies really are amazing creatures. You can learn all there is to know about their ways in two weeks, and then after another week, they can still surprise you." -adapted from Gandalf