Darkness and light

You are the poem I dreamed of writing.
The masterpiece I longed to paint.
You are the shining star reached for
in my ever-hopeful quest for life fulfilled.
You are my child.
Now, with all things, I am blessed.
-- Unknown

Granted, a shopping trip can evoke various emotions (usually elation, irritation, or a combination of the two), but I don't think I have been brought to tears in the middle of a mall. Not even when I got my first designer purse at the Coach store in New Orleans, or found my beloved $225 Laundry by Shelli Segal pants on sale for $49.95 at the Nordstrom Rack. So why was I getting teary in some random store in Westlake Center called Fireworks where Collin's stroller kept crashing into awkwardly positioned racks?

It wasn't the heat, or too much caffeine, or relief that the last of the relatives had gone home, signaling the end of the wedding festivities and the beginning of the return to normalcy.

It was that poem.

The words jumped out at me from a large (and extremely overpriced) frame hanging on the wall when I was in Seattle earlier this week, and I looked for the poem online last night. The type wasn't overtly bold or large, so there had to be a reason why it grabbed my attention -- and tugged at my heartstrings.

And I think those words were meant to symbolize what this week signifies.

Two years ago this afternoon, I went to Seattle and came home with a broken heart. Our baby was gone, and I didn't know how I would get through the pain.

A year ago tonight, I cried as I wondered if I would ever get another chance to be someone's mother. To shape a life. To be whole.

And early this morning, I tiptoed down the hall after checking on my son as he slept in my husband's arms, as he has done most every night since coming into this world two months (and one day) ago.

Today, I am at peace.

I never truly knew how much I wanted this baby until I didn't think I could have him. I had always loved children, but not until my dream was shattered did I realize just how badly I wanted to be a mother.

On the eve of the two-year anniversary of my miscarriage, and not for the first time, Chris and I pondered the one question to which we will never have an answer: Would Lentil have been Collin? Or was he/she a different child altogether?

Either way, we agreed: This was God's plan. While Lentil will always be in our hearts, we were meant to be this child's parents, and he was meant to be our son. The pain, the uncertainty, the hopelessness ... it was all for a reason. And he was worth the wait.

Two years ago, there was darkness.

Today, there is light.

And it comes from Collin, our shining star.