Happy Anniversary

Tonight we celebrated eight years with a $4.89 meal at Costco. If we weren't spending next week in San Francisco I might be a little on the disappointed side. I tried explaining to Wyatt what an anniversary is but he kept saying, "Happy birthday, Mommy. Mommy eight!" I think he was just hoping for a piece of cake with ice cream.
I can't believe it was eight years ago when I walked down the aisle (or runway, as Garett prefers to call it) to my groom standing on the metal platform welded with love. I love Garett more today than I did eight years ago. His depth, courage, kindness, generosity and humor are a few of the things that I especially value. And I also don't mind his amazing skills in the kitchen and the garden and the way he lets me sleep in on Saturday mornings while he makes Wyatt pancakes. It's an honor to be his partner and I'm looking forward to eight more years of adventure.

Trust and Costumes

Yesterday was a really good day. Wyatt loves playing "barefeet" in the backyard and I can't bring myself to force him to wear shoes. But yesterday several splinters wiggled their way into his feet and it was a problem. We got the tweezers and started talking with him about what we needed to do to get them out. He was understandably not thrilled about this process but nonetheless sat still for us to pull and dig them out. As he sat there with huge crocodile tears streaming down his face, I was struck by the immensity of his trust. Yes, he was uncomfortable and not pleased, but he stayed still and believed what we said about benefits of getting the splinters out now instead of later. I couldn't help but think about how I want to trust God through pain, knowing that all is not outside His purview and that He's holding me, comforting me and caring for me in and through it. And that tears somehow allow a greater depth of comfort and relationship to prevail.
We also had a Lost Finale Party last night. The food theme was seafood and everyone wore a costume. We had crazy Claire, Locke, Rousseau, Charlie, and the front and tail sections of Oceanic Flight #815. Garett and I were Sawyer and Juliet circa 1974 during their Dharma days. We ate clams casino, ceviche, cioppino, and fresh made bread with herb butter, and drank lava flows. And this group does not disappoint in the food department. Each item was prepared with the best ingredients with keen attention to detail. For example, we had three kinds of rum in each Lava Flow and each drink had at least 10 ingredients (and probably more) including fresh strawberries, pineapple and banana. Yum!
It was a late night but definitely worth staying up for. I am still on the fence about my feelings on the finale but watching it with friends while sipping a Lava Flow out of a hurricane glass was so right. The costume fun reminded me of Garett and my dating days when we nailed a punk rock look one Halloween. I'm grateful for friends who value having fun as much as we do.

And some pictures...

We have a little lookout near us called Terrace Hill. We've been enjoying walking up it lately and Wyatt is now able to walk up and down by himself. Hopefully the shot below will the last time we bring the Bob with us.
The zoo. We loved the gorillas.
And we took a tram up to the polar bears on this lovely San Diego day.

Round Two: Tears are Good

We spent another weekend in San Diego. Celebrating Mother's Day with an intense session of grieving may sound odd but it was a really good way to spend the morning. The remainder of the weekend was uneventful in an ideal way. The zoo was huge and a little overwhelming (for me, not Wyatt) but the gorillas, polar bears and elephants were fascinating. When I ask Wyatt about his favorite part of the zoo, without fail he answers, "Macaws too loud." I had a perfect bowl of Pho at a Yelp-recommended Vietnamese restaurant near our hotel and Wyatt discovered a love of egg rolls.
To prepare for Sunday, I read Crabb's Shattered Dreams, mediated on Psalm 62 and 63, and thought back to age 15 and wrote a list of everything that I was angry about and what I lost. I think the meditating meant the most, as God is helping me learn how to be more honest. In what can only be described as mystery, Sheryl opened up our time together with Psalm 63, though she had no idea that was the passage that God led me to during our six weeks apart. God led her to the same passage that morning. I struggle to acknowledge these moments in life as divine and would usually rather chalk them up to coincidence but it was a surprising confirmation that God is in the middle of this grieving process.
We spent a considerable amount of time talking about things I've lost. I hate even typing "things I've lost" because it feels so final and depressing. If I hate typing it, you can imagine how I feel about sitting with these things for any length of time. I desperately want to push fast forward and get on with it. Yet I'm clinging to what I remember about my life before I got sick.
Grieving is messy and that's probably the hardest part of the process. I'm messy and unpredictable...which is code for not in control. As God opens these deep crevasses in my soul, I am flooded with a new range of feelings on nearly every subject. There is a rawness to me right now that is uncomfortable.
As messy as it is and as many tears as I'm crying, I'm thankful that God is meeting and loving me. My hope is that His presence and love will be what my heart craves. For now, I'm still wrestling with my natural-but-too-important desire for good health and a quick, easy path, and I'm learning to be patient in the waiting.

Evidence

We had a few friends over today for a mini birthday celebration. It was a lovely morning to play outside and we even had a few conversations that lasted longer than two minutes. A friend took these pictures (Thanks, Amanda!). Josh, I thought you'd especially appreciate Wyatt's cool shirt. And I'm glad to now have a photo of Wyatt with dirt on his mouth. When he's older and I tell him that he used to love to eat dirt, it will be nice to have actual evidence of this stellar phase.

More Pictures - Garden and Good Times

Some Pictures

We spent Easter with some new friends and Wyatt got to experience his first Easter egg hunt.
We've spent the last couple of weekends working in the yard and planting our first garden. Garett built a few raised beds and we found two feeding troughs at the local farm supply store. The highlight was the large amount of dirt dropped off in our driveway. Wyatt's never been as dirty or happy. He liked to climb up to the top of the pile and slide down on his belly. It's too bad that I don't have a picture of Garett using the wheelbarrow to bring all this dirt from the driveway to the backyard because it was pretty impressive. All I really contributed was some measly shoveling and keeping an eye on Wyatt while he tried to eat globs of dirt. Yes, I still do a lot of finger sweeping.