My Rain

  This week started with rain. The kind that brings with it a dark maelstrom of swirling clouds, where howling winds send even the most stalwart of travelers scurrying for safety, as rain falls like sheets of glass across the horizon. It was the kind of storm that you know is on its way, but as you watch it roll in you're surprised by the savagery of it all. The way it beats at your walls like a hungry wolf, let me in, let me in, and you huddle inside with all that you love held near, praying that your shelter holds. This week that started with rain finds me with a stormy soul, and even though I had time to prepare, I am surprised by the savage way that my emotions are beating at my heart, and words are failing me.

I am tired. I am overwhelmed. I am angry.

  On Monday I got the news that someone that I love very much needs a new kidney. She was told to fill out her paperwork right away. Her need is very great, and though she has a willing donor in me she chooses to try other altnernatives. She chooses to turn me away because though it will lengthen her life she worries it might limit mine. Still we laughed. It's what we do she and I. We laugh because if we don't laugh we will cry, and she never cries.
  Austin had tubes put in on Tuesday, this was done in hopes of reversing the acute hearing loss in his right ear, but we have always felt blessed that the hearing in his left ear was impeccable. As a nurse carried my littlest baby away from me I told myself, "you are lucky, so many mommies have to deal with so much worse." I thanked God when they brought him back to my crying but whole, with his new tubes in place and no less then twenty needle holes where various anestesioligist tried to insert an IV.
  We spent last night at a childrens clinic in Orlando, a pulmonologist is trying to gain some insight as to why Austin has coughed almost every day of his young life. As we drove down the turnpike to the city I had a quiet moment to reflect, and I prayed for answers. I want him free of the cough that rips through is tiny body, I want him to sleep the innocent sleep of a baby, undisturbed by spasms and spells and wheeze. But last night as I watched them hook this newest piece of me up to wire after wire something inside me broke.

  And my shelter is failing. And I'm trying to hold it together, because I know that this storm will pass. But it hurts. Oh how it hurts. I'm tired of being positive. I'm tired of saying oh this isn't so bad, when really I want to scream..... THIS ISNT FAIR!!! Why can't I fix my baby? Why can't I fix this women that I love? Why can't I fix my heart? And I want to scream at the hungry wolf howling at my door.....DAMN IT WOLF, GO AWAY, because I'm angry, and I want to fight, and there's no one to fight.

  So I cling to the ones I love. They are balm to my troubled spirit. Slowly I'm sure the suns rays will burn off the clouds. This deluge will be reduced to a distant memory. Leaving nothing behind but the crisp feeling that follows a storm. Like the world is reawakening with a clean new slate.

 I'm waiting for this to happen, but until it does here's to rainboots.