Those who come after

As I sit here, pondering posts that Mrs. Spit has shared with me and which she has yet to post, I came across this poem completely at random. Or not, depending on your outlook of the world and the cosmos.

You see, an Atheist would say that I came across this poem, as stated above, completely at random, with no connection to the poignant words of my dear wife An Agnostic might tell you that they don't know if I stumbled across it due to the vagaries of chance, or whether someone laid it in my path. A Christian, believing in Divine Providence, might say that indeed, this poem was a treasure waiting to be found at the exact time I needed it, and how I needed it, for it is part of a greater plan.

Times like these, we think outside ourselves, to see where the world will be when we're gone. What is the legacy of what we have done for those who come after us? You think big, powerful, scary questions when you sit with the ashes of your dead son resting on a shelf three feet away. And so, as someone who has built bridges to cross rivers in reality, this poem resonates with me. I find myself blessed for having come to this poem, when and as I did tonight. For, unlike the Atheist, or the Agnostic, I know that my redeemer lives.

The Bridge Builder

An old man, going a lone highway,
Came, at the evening, cold and gray,
To a chasm, vast, and deep, and wide,
Through which was flowing a sullen tide.

The old man crossed in the twilight dim;
The sullen stream had no fear for him;
But he turned, when safe on the other side,
And built a bridge to span the tide.

“Old man,” said a fellow pilgrim, near,
“You are wasting strength with building here;
Your journey will end with the ending day;
You never again will pass this way;
You’ve crossed the chasm, deep and wide-
Why build you this bridge at the evening tide?

The builder lifted his old gray head:
“Good friend, in the path I have come,” he said,
“There followeth after me today,
A youth, whose feet must pass this way.

This chasm, that has been naught to me,
To that fair-haired youth may a pitfall be.
He, too, must cross in the twilight dim;
Good friend, I am building this bridge for him.

By Will Allen Dromgoole

Would that people knew

A Man in Grief
by Eileen Knight Hagemeister

It must be very difficult
To be a man in grief,
Since "men don't cry" and "men are strong"
No tears can bring relief.

It must be very difficult
To stand up to the test,
And field the calls and visitors
So she can get some rest.

They always ask if she's all right
And what she's going through.
But seldom take his hand and ask,
"My friend, but how are you?"

He hears her crying in the night
And thinks his heart will break.
He dries her tears and comforts her,
But "stays strong" for her sake.

It must be very difficult
To start each day anew.
And try to be so very brave-
He lost his baby too.

Thanks to Tim Nelson for posting this poem. Thanks to Lisette, for commenting and posting the following information about Eileen:

Lisette said... This poem was written by a compassionate woman, Eileen Knight Hagemeister, who saw the difficult issues regarding men and grief. She wrote this poem to her son‐in‐law after his baby girl was stillborn.

This poem transported me, with tears in my eyes, instantly backwards in time three years to when we were still heavily mourning the lost of Gabriel. I've lived this poem, which is sadly very true. Notwithstanding my baby-loss support group, I can count on one hand the number of people who asked me how I was doing after Gabriel died, as opposed to the numerous others who were only concerned for Mrs. Spit.

If you want to help a grieving father feel even more isolated and marginalized, please, continue to ignore that they too lost their precious child at the same time as their beloved.

Meh-bleh...

That's how I'm feeling this week.

It's been a week away from home - except for the quick jaunt home last night to pick up a piece of equipment that I ... err... forgot at home. Whoops! Good to see Mrs. Spit and the fur-children though.

The week started with us at Marriage Encounter - not attending, but supporting. Thanks to Mrs. Oblivious, we got saddled with a couple with young children. And wasn't that fun? Mrs. Spit and I both get awkward when we're asked in a social situation "Do you have children?". This was a social situation, faith based, where the couple just came off a demanding weekend of immersive intimate communications. So we can't blame them for asking. The other side of that is that it sucks to say that no, we don't have children, and we don't want to throw a big, wet, fire blanket on top of the party atmosphere and explain that Gabriel died almost two years ago, thank you.

So this week, without intending, I've totally slacked in my blogging. Last night I had zero internet at my hotel (go figure that one out...) so I have an excuse, kind-of. Time to pick up my socks though.

So, even though I'm out enjoying the unseasonably warm weather, it's been a meh-bleh week for me. About time for me to spend some time at home, working in the office, home every night. Yeah... looking forward to that!

Surprise, it's your old companion!

I was looking for a term to describe how I felt on Saturday. It wasn't easy. Thanks to this culture of ours, my mind went in the direction of sports descriptions. And frankly, it does a good job of describing how I felt.

Blindsided.

Now, to clarify, here's the definition according to my handy source, dictionary. com:

blind-side or blind·side (blīnd'sīd')
tr.v. blind-sid·ed or blind·sid·ed, blind-sid·ing or blind·sid·ing, blind-sides or blind·sides

1. To hit or attack on or from the blind side.

2. To catch or take unawares, especially with harmful or detrimental results: "The recent recession, with its wave of corporate cost-cutting, blind-sided many lawyers" (Aric Press).

The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
Copyright © 2009 by Houghton Mifflin Company.
Published by Houghton Mifflin Company. All rights reserved.

Sounds really academic when you see it in black and white, doesn't it? And when it's academic, it doesn't seem as bad, or as dramatic. So I must show you in more graphic terms what it means.

(image from here, in case you're interested)

Someone in that photo is about to be surprised by a rapid and forceful encounter with the turf.

That's what I felt like on Saturday morning. I felt like I had things in control, and then seemingly out of nowhere, I got tackled by grief. And like the quarterback, I was slammed down pretty hard, getting my wind knocked out of me. I was caught completely unawares.

Saturday morning I was sitting, waiting for my winter tires to be installed. I had my book with me and I was reading, killing time. And that's when I got blindsided. I had the sudden realization that I wouldn't be able to use tasks such as getting new tires to introduce my son, my Gabriel, into the world of men.

Really, a tire store is a guy's place. You walk in the door to be assaulted by the smell and sight of new rubber. There are tires and wheels everywhere. The sales staff are in work clothes, ready to help you and explain the world of tires to you. You have tires in all flavours, from sporty, to winter, to off-road, to the imminently boring yet necessary cheap tires for small cars. In the corner the popcorn machine churns out it's perfume (at 7:30 in the morning at that). There is a 24 hours sports channel going on the TV. You have a remote monitor readout so you can watch the guy doing wheel balancing. Techs going in and out, especially paying homage to the coffee maker.

And it hit me. I wouldn't be able to explain that corner of the world to Gabriel. Pass on the pearls of wisdom from my own father - such as "Brakes and tires, as long as those are in good condition, the rest is negotiable. Without those two, you have no control and you're not safe." As I looked around the store with a child's eyes, I saw all that needs explaining to a child. How to read a tire. What is the purpose of having different types of tires. Why we were buying four winter tires and not just two.

This little corner of the world had a plethora of lessons that I will never teach Gabriel. I will never take him for a morning away from home, introducing him to things that a guy needs to know.

Later in the day, Mrs. Spit and I went to a baby girl's 'tea party' - also known as an open house for this couple's friends to come and meet their recently adopted infant. I can't say that I was excited to be going, but we have to continue to live.

Mrs. Spit handed me the little girl to hold, though I must admit that she offered me the chance to abstain. I held the child in my arms, and even held the bottle while she went to town. It was enough to rip my heart out to hear Mrs. Spit commenting to others that I am so very good at holding babies, and that babies seem to love it in my arms. I wanted to hand off little Ivy and leave, now. But I couldn't - though I did take the first available chance to hand her off.

It's been almost two years since my little Gabriel was swept out of my life. I thought that I was doing pretty well in my grief. I thought that I had been through the worst of it, and that I could go forward with life with remembrances of Gabe, but without the searing pain of his loss laid open like a fresh wound sprinkled in salt. I thought that, since I was able to attend a remembrance walk earlier this month without wanting to run away to escape the pain, I was living with and adjusted to my grief.

The football analogy breaks down at this point. Sure, quarterbacks get blindsided, but it happens pretty regularly to them. As they are used to it, they are able to stand up, brush off, and carry on. I'm not able to do this. Instead, days later, I am still dazed and bruised from the experience.

Courage

I've been rather remiss and neglectful with the blog. Spring blahs. I know, most people have winter blahs, but I got a case of the spring ones.

I won't talk about the insensitive clot of a woman who brought a whiny child to the infant loss memorial last week, or about how, after Mrs. Spit read her memorial epic and everyone had gathered in the reception area, that she blithely commented on how her son was a 25 week baby, and he survived, after hearing that Gabriel died at 26 weeks.

Instead I will share with you something that I found today, via the interweb while cruising aimlessly. Sitting at home while Mrs. Spit is off to see a harlot. It seemed almost trite when I started reading it, but it quickly became evident to my tiredness fuzzed mind (I got home at 1 am from an away trip) that this text is indeed quite true and poignant. I've removed the pithy smiles and cuddles text at the end.

If someone knows the author of the text, I'd like to attibute it properly instead of to the ubiquitous 'Anonymous'.

The Difference Between Strength and Courage

It takes strength to be firm,
It takes courage to be gentle.

It takes strength to stand guard,
It takes courage to let down your guard.

It takes strength to conquer,
It takes courage to surrender.

It takes strength to be certain,
It takes courage to have doubt.

It takes strength to fit in,
It takes courage to stand out.

It takes strength to feel a friend's pain,
It takes courage to feel your own pain.

It takes strength to hide your own pains,
It takes courage to show them.

It takes strength to endure abuse,
It takes courage to stop it.

It takes strength to stand alone,
It takes courage to lean on another.

It takes strength to love,
It takes courage to be loved.

It takes strength to survive,
It takes courage to live.

Touched by a quote.

May the love hidden deep inside your heart find the love waiting in your dreams.
May the laughter that you find in your tomorrow wipe away the pain you find in your yesterdays.
- unattributed

Caesar's Day

Beware the Ides of March. Sound advice, if you're in a Shakespearean play and you encounter some old hags dispensing it.

I've been watching far too much TV of late. This seems to go hand-in-glove with the fact that I've been out of town working far too much of late. But, as my Dad says, it pays the bills. My station of preference when I'm out of town generally defaults to the Discovery Channel, with the Weather Channel a close second in winter. Sometimes though, it's better to curl up with a good book.

I really wish, those several times that I encountered the subject of this blog, that I had been curled up with a good book instead of watching television. If wishes were wings, pigs would fly. There's a banking commercial out right now that shows a man. He's commenting that "That place, where it's not all about me anymore? I'm there." Of course the visual shows a younger man holding his newborn infant while in the hospital with his wife. Just thinking about it, my heart clenches from an invisible hand. My eyes tear.

It's not bloody fair. We were supposed to be approaching Gabe's first birthday. He was supposed to be born almost a year ago. Instead I sit here, with Gabe's ashes over my shoulder. I am still wracked with grief over a friggin' commercial for a BANK for crying out loud. Times like this, the suckage comes out of hiding and throws me around like a martial arts expert, and there's bugger all I can do.

I am not suffering from a knife in the back from my closest friend. No, this Ides, I'm just suffering from the cruel hand of fate snatching my son from my arms. I have to beware the Ides this year as the memory of the loss of my boy has come floating to the forefront of my consciousness once again.

The silence

It's been just over 14 months since the death of my son, Gabriel.

If he had survived his birth, I would be spending much of my time at home chasing around a toddler, making sure that the house is not hiding any surprises for him to find and surprise us with.

Instead, I can see my son in the same place every day that I am home. His ashes sit on a shelf erected for that purpose. I will never see my son grow from infant, though childhood into adulthood. I don't even know what colour his eyes were. As Mrs. Spit and I were discussing possible eye colours a possible future child might have, this thought came to me. You see, Mrs. Spit has a gorgeous set of blue eyes. Her eyes remind me of a clear afternoon sky during a prairie winter. Me? I have eyes that change with the light, the time of day, maybe even with my mood - I've been blessed with eyes that get called hazel, because nobody can ever figure out what colour they are at a given time. The mystery thus becomes a question of what eye colour do we pass on?

Yesterday morning, I had the express displeasure of sitting through a "tri-party" meeting regarding my construction project from last summer. I drove 8 hours to and from this meeting from the project I'm presently working on. We had a joint meeting with the contractor, the client (the provincial transportation department), and the consultant (us). I was there with my senior manager and my construction engineer. Two hours of discussing what went wrong last year. This with the contractor who doesn't like me anymore - he thinks I have a personnal agenda against him.

There were a number of items where eyes were turned to me in a blame-casting manner. Indeed, the biggest problems we've had on the job stem from actions I took at the end of the job, in error. We had a "process" problem, which had we done things differently, would have led to a much friendlier conclusion to the job.

The manager from the transportation department was at Gabriel's funeral. Both of my engineers that were at the meeting with me came to Gabriel's funeral. How do I point out that last year was the worst work-year of my life? As I have my manager reminding me (somewhat in jest as I'm putting in major OT hours right now) that it's salary review time this month, I recall that I struggled immensely last year.

So there I sat in this meeting, thinking to myself that had things occured differently, I would not have struggled to finish one problem construction project. I would not have dreaded working with that same contractor on a new project last summer. I would have been able to focus more clearly on what I needed to do, and when it had to be done. In this unfair world that we live in, I was expected to bury my grief and continue on as though Gabriel's had never happened. I sat, with a metaphorical target painted on my forehead for people to place blame. I had to say "yes, I screwed that up." or "yes, it was an error that this happened" when I wanted to say "Look, my son died. I should have taken months off of work to grieve him. I didn't. As a result, you got less than I am capable of. Get stuffed."

It still hurts me deeply and intensely when I think of all that isn't, because my son is dead. It hurts me that people don't know that the new me exists. I have to wrap myself in a blanket of silence lest people think I'm a simpering pity case who can't function in the world. Engineering and the construction industry isn't for the emotionally accessible. It's takes someone thick-skinned and hard-nosed. If you can't take someone swearing at you because you're telling them to do work according to the rules, then there's always other work.

The silence took me.

The Memory of Hope

Life moves inexorably forward. No matter what might be of concern to me at the moment, in the greater picture, my woes will not matter a whit to the universe. Life and death are a constant reality on this little ball that we call the Earth. That my son was born early and did not survive the hour, while a ripping tragedy in my life, has no real consequence outside my sphere of influence, let alone the path of the planet.

I'm in a difficult place right now. I am working to move forward in life while at the same time, still feeling the pull of the loss of my son.

According to the Kubler-Ross model of the stages of grief, people go through the following stages of grief:
1. Denial
2. Anger
3. Bargaining
4. Depression
5. Acceptance

Kübler-Ross also claimed these steps do not necessarily come in the order noted above, nor are all steps experienced by all patients, though she stated a person will always experience at least two.

As I think back over the past 13 1/2 months, I can see times when I experienced different aspects of this psychological model. Heck, I cycled back and forth between stages at times. Times when I (months afterward) didn't want to accept Gabriel's death, or wanted to just sit in a sullen cloud of doom, doing nothing. Worse was when I thought I was in an state of 'acceptance' and then found myself slipping back down the ladder.

I've felt like my sense of self, as newly defined as a dead-baby-dad, was in a fluid state. Times like that I wasn't sure what I wanted anymore. Not sure of what to do, how to act, who to be. I'd be feeling generally fine, and then I'd watch Mrs. Spit get set injured by the selfish actions of someone, or by the sight of a newborn and have to stand with her in her pain. This invariably would prick at my own mental stability. Sometimes I could help her weather the storm without much effect - a boulder of granite. Other storms I would help her with effect - a boulder of siltstone.

Of late I am feeling more lingering sadness that my son is dead. Instead of being forefront in my waking consciousness, it rests on a ledge in a corner of my mind. It is similar to how my son rests on a shelf in my dining room, contained in a tiny urn. It's a tacit, permanent location, but it doesn't overwhelm me.

A huge part of healing, for me, was completing the bookshelf construction. Whereas Gabe's shelf is a small reminder of his passing, the zone of construction that constituted 70% of the floor space of my little house was the hulking brute of a reminder of his passing. Every month that passed with it not done was a reminder that it was started when Gabriel was a little ball of growth within Mrs. Spit. Hope for our future as a family, and hope for the renovation were wrapped up together in my mind. Finishing the renovation not only allowed us to start enjoying our house again, it allowed me to leave that ugly, unhappy part of my life behind me.

Today I truly feel like I'm at a point of acceptance. Not resignation, not hopelessness, but acceptance. Gabe's death affected me more deeply and more widely than I would ever have imagined prior to his birth. The new normal is starting to settle around me like a comfortable old coat. I could never have worn it two years ago, but now I can.

I have hope for the future of my family, but it's different now. Thinking back, the hope that I nurtured around Gabriel was shiny, bright, and innocent. If we succeed in trying to conceive again, there will be a new hope, different in so many ways, yet strangely similar. My memory of hope past will never be made more than a memory again.

And so begins advent

Today in church we celebrated the first Sunday of Advent. The service started with the lighting of the first Advent candle, the candle of Hope.

This is a Holy time of year. As the world focuses on the commercial side of the season, we Christians gear up to celebrate the birth of our Lord, Jesus Christ. Oddly enough, I don't recall the last time I heard of a church having its doors ripped off and someone trampled to death in the rush to get into a pew. Sad that we had not only this, but also a shootout in the midst of a store shopping rush on Friday. Truly, it was a black Friday for several families.

A year ago, Mrs. Spit and I were blissfully unaware that we were less than two weeks away from having our lives torn asunder, from seeing our dreams evaporate like fog under a noon-day sun. We were joyful about being expectant parents in the midst of the Christmas season.

Today the Rector talked on the "Adventures of Advent"
Adventure coming
Discover the original meaning of Christmas
Vision - seeing God's vision for our world
Expectant about God's plans
New beginning
Travel towards understanding of God's gift to mankind

While I am truly grateful for the basis of this Christmas celebration, I still find my self having difficulty climbing out of thoughts of my son. I hear of the angels speaking to Mary, and I think of my son, named for one of the archangels. I see the lighting of the Hope candle, and think of the hope lost when Gabriel died.

Despite all my efforts to carry on moving forward in life, my grief for my son is still tangible, still present, still real. I know that only my son died that day. I am still alive. If he could talk, he would want me to continue with my life and to remember that by looking back, I can't see the oncoming life ahead of me. I still weep for my son.

Last year Christmas passed in a flash. This year, I just don't know what to do with myself. It's not an adventure, it's an endurance event.

It's a sad / mad day

Yesterday afternoon Mrs. Spit and I attended an afternoon session to help us deal with grief at Christmas. Or, as I said jokingly afterwards, we paid money to cry in front of strangers.

It was a good session. We learned some things. We shared the story of Gabriel's death with others. We were able to cry about our son, and know that those around us felt for our loss. We were able to feel for those in the room who had lost children, brothers, sisters, and husbands. It was a very tiring afternoon, surprisingly so.

Then this morning I woke up to find that, due to the fact that Mrs. Spit had left a granola bar in her bag yesterday, my mastiff scattered the bag and its contents, along with the contents of her purse, across the floor in the living room.

That was bad enough.

She also broke the glass on the picture of Gabriel that we took to the session. And worse, because we can't replace it, she chewed up the Gund plush bunny that I had gotten for Gabriel long before he was born. The memento that we brought with us to the session on grief is now a wreck. After keeping it away from the dogs for over a year, it's now ruined.

Not how I wanted to start a month from Christmas. I'm at a loss for words.

I can see a light

Well... the bookshelves are almost done.

The project was conceived when we bought the house three and a half years ago. The plans were copied from "The Home Handyman" and stuck in a drawer for a couple of years. The decision to build the shelves was made on a simple premise. Mrs. Spit didn't want to be 7 months pregnant, up the ladder doing the ceiling treatment.

Here's a shot of the old shelves:
We started the project late last August. I'll never forget that the shelf unit was started when my son was a fetus, and will be completed with him as a memory.

The reno was worked around my job, which took me away from home more often than I would have liked. We had a rather optimistic goal of finishing everything in time for American Thanksgiving last year. This fell apart when my work took me away many nights that we didn't expect or schedule.

Then Gabriel flashed into and out of our lives. It would take months before I had motivation to fire up any tools again. 70% of our main floor was given over to storage of materials and construction of the shelves, and we have lived out of our kitchen and entry hallway through the tumultuous times of the last year.

So here I am, hoping that we can get it all done by THIS year's American Thanksgiving. Not a lot of time left, especially when I list everything left to be done and consider that I have to be out of town, again, this week.

Here's the short list of things yet to do in the dining room:

• wood filler for minor gaps, nail holes on book case
• sand shelves, including leveling between shelves and trim strips I attached this morning
• build something to install grate for heating duct on bottom shelf
• install quarter-round through whole room
• buy and install crown moulding
• tint ceiling
• prime and paint walls and bookshelf
• install electrical cover plates on new outlets in shelf
• install trim over windows
• paint trim
• install dimmer switch for lights with cover plate
• install lights
• come up with better system to mount electrical outlet on wall instead of surface mounting to baseboard (tacky as hell)
• cleanup

Yeah, it's a huge list. But at least there is nothing more to build for the bookshelves themselves. The rest of the room... oh boy... but the bookshelves are ready for filling, sanding, and painting.

Renos in this olde house often lead to many many more sub-projects before the job is done. Nothing is straight, or level in the house.
The job list in the dining room to date has included the following:

• clear old bookshelves off
• move books to huge pile in living room
• give away old Billy bookshelves to co-worker
• take down dining room table
• move other furniture out of dining room
• take down overhead light
• tear down tile ceiling
• tear down plaster and lathe ceiling
• strip plaster from one wall - leaving lathe behind
• clean-up awful mess of 90+ year old plaster
• have a moment when we see what looks like olde knob and tube wiring in the ceiling
  
• rewire overhead light with new connection box to center of room
• install insulation in bay window ceiling
• install gyprock ceiling
• install gyprock floor sheets on two walls
• tape, mud, and sand gyprock
• apply textured surface to ceiling
• cut out section of laminate floor for bookshelf location
• install lower and upper bookshelf frames.
• adjust lower frame for change in floor slope halfway across dining room
• install vertical framing
• install two new outlets for Mrs. Spit's computer drawer (change plans for shelves)
• install vertical shelf supports, including dado cuts
• install shelf horizontal pieces
  
• figure out how computer drawer is to work - thank you Lee Valley!!!
• build drawer pull out
• install facing timber on top, sides, and bottom of shelf unit
• build shelf columns
• build face trim and install
• install quarter round on columns
• install trim at top of columns
• decide that the list of what's left is a lot smaller than the list of what has already been done

Inter-spaced throughout have been numerous trips to Rona, Home Depot, and Lee Valley for appropriate tools, hardware, and lumber. Then return trips for more lumber when the lumber that WAS purchased warped after it sat in the living room for too long before being turned into something useful.

Here's where everything stands as of tonight. For reference, the ceiling is roughly 9'-0" above the floor. Shelves range from 8" to 16" tall, and each shelf is roughly 38" wide. The whole unit is 11'-6" wide from the lathe next to the furnace chimney to the wall separating the dining room from the living room.

I really hope that the light I see is the end of the tunnel, and not an on-coming work light!!!

Thinking on Gabe

So, this past week I had my birthday.

Last year on my birthday, Mrs. Spit was well into her pregnancy. Things were going well, with everything seeming to be peachy keen. I was keenly aware of the fact that come my next birthday, I would have an infant child to care for.

It was really hard, when my next birthday did roll around, to remember that 10 months earlier, I held my newborn son for the half hour of life that he shared with us. The keen edge has been taken off of this blade, but it still cuts and still hurts.

He will always be with me, and I shall always remember him. The tiny boy who came before his time, and who left us far too soon.

A crack in the armour

Tonight I was two different people, yet I was the same person.

I spent time telling the mother of a dead baby that life as the father of a dead baby sucks. It sucks that we are shunted to the sidelines. It sucks that we are expected to not feel the same depth of pain as the mother of our dead baby.

Later, I went over the completed scrapbook of my son that my wife prepared. When I came to the page with the hand and foot-prints of my son, I started to cry. An outpouring of emotion like I haven't had in months flowed over and through me. My eyes stung and the tears flowed. And it sucked.

I am eight and a half months away from the day that my son Gabriel was born, and from the day that my son Gabriel died. And my pain is still welded to the fabric of my being. I don't feel it as vividly every day. But when I paid attention to it tonight, it was as if I had just stepped out of the delivery room after my son was taken to the morgue.

My heart, my body, and my soul weep for the loss of my son. And yet I feel obliged to try and help another man whom I have never met forge his way though the pain that he feels.

Just when I feel like I am coping and wearing this burden of my son's death, it reaches out from an unexpected yet not unfamiliar location and reminds me that I, too, am human and that I, too, still mourn his untimely, unfair, and unjust loss.

Riding the balloon

I was sitting in my baby loss support group tonight when I realized that I had completely missed the fact that it's been eight months since Gabriel was born, and eight months since he died.

Two thirds of a year have passed. Two thirds of a year, and I was tearing up tonight listening to a new member of the 'club' describe the loss of her little boy all of 4 weeks ago to a rare genetic disorder where his lungs didn't work properly. I felt jealousy for a minute, as she had her little boy alive for 5 weeks. Yeah, he was intubated in ICU, but alive.

This woman is still immersed in her grief. Four weeks ago today she and her husband (both doctors) made the decision to take their son off of life support. She is still bewildered by her emotions and grief. It seems so long ago when I was in that place. Yet I can take myself back there so quickly that it astounds me.

Hindsight being 20:20, I can see that the stupidest thing that I did after Gabriel died is that I went back to work. I should have taken at least three months off from work. I wasn't ready to work. I couldn't concentrate on my job. I was not effective. It would have helped me to not work. Eight months out, I'm still not in the same place I was before Gabe died.

As I teared up tonight thinking about my son, my heart just cries out to have him back. I think about how he would be five months old right now. I think about the dreams of the future that I had while he was still growing in Mrs. Spit's womb. I hear men talk about how the birth of their child changed them for the better. I've changed, but not because of the need to raise of child. I've changed because I had to cremate a child and because this still weighs me down.

I realize tonight that as much as I'm interacting in the world, doing my job, continuing on with the business of being a human in this society - I'm still carrying my grief with me wherever I go. My grief is a hot air balloon. When Gabe died, I was carrying the gondola on my shoulders, with the balloon bundled in the basket, completely deflated. Over time, I've been able to inflate the balloon so that the weight I bear is reduced. Of late, I've been holding onto a line to the balloon, just keeping it from drifting away. But there are times when the air in the balloon cools off, and the basket drops back onto my shoulders. Often I can fire the burners and the load lightens. And then there are times, like tonight, when the balloon is almost completely deflated and I feel like I'm being crushed its weight.

I want to set it free, but I cannot. I want to put it down, but I cannot. I want to be in the basket, showing Gabriel a new view of the world that is new and magical. I cannot do any of these things. I can only grieve. Times like this, when the weight is most on my shoulders, I hate this damned balloon.

I just want my son.

Things that suck

Sucks beyond belief: Losing my son

Sucks a bit: Stubbing my toe on the doorway

Sucks somewhere in between: being someone that I'm not

Let me put it this way. I'm really a nice guy. I don't enjoy conflict with other people. I work to come to agreeable compromises so that everyone comes out of the problem without feeling like they've gotten the short stick. But most of all, it's not in my nature to be a complete ass to people.

Indeed, even those people who hurt me a great deal with how they dealt with (or didn't depending on your perspective) the death of my son Gabriel didn't get an a__hole response from me. I didn't do it, though I might have wanted to do so at some level.

And then there is my job. And in a position where you would think that being diplomatic and being able to compromise would be an asset, I can't do that. I have to tell the contractor that no, you can't do that because it says so in the contract. Or - you can't do that until you do this - because it's in the contract. Or - why didn't you do this yet - you have to by the contract.

I have had that a couple of times today. My foreman on this bridge construction job is a nice guy. Personable and everything. I get along with him well on a personal level. However, when I started pointing out things that he hasn't done yet - he gets all pissy with me. Swearing at me, and at my superiors who are forcing me to be a bit of a jerk with him. I have to say - yes, I completely understand your point of view, but... and hence I am acting in a way that is totally out of character for me. I have to be a jerk and administer the contract the way it's written.

And the backlash really sucks. Being forced into a corner that I don't enjoy also sucks. Yeah, I want to have a different job after days like this.

A happy day, with tears

Mrs. Spit and I attended a wedding last night. As weddings go, it was... well... different. But it was a wedding befitting the bride, who is not exactly conventional.

I was happy for them both, to have found love later in their lives.

And then they played one of my favorite Christian songs, and I cried. Guys really shouldn't cry at weddings, but there I sat, holding Mrs. Spit's hand, tears falling down my cheeks.

The song is "I can only imagine" by MercyMe. It was written in grief about the death of the songwriter's father. It's about what he can only imagine seeing when he gets to heaven and experiences the love and glory of Christ in person.

As I sit here crying, just thinking about it, I think of my son Gabriel, and how - however much I miss him - he is with Christ now. I can only imagine what that must be like. I live for the day that I will join him, but for now, I just mourn his loss and selfishly wish that I had him here with me instead.

The joy of victory, the agony of defeat.

Roughly this time last year, Mrs. Spit and I were basking in the joy of victory. After years of trying and failing to get pregnant, we had finally succeeded with a little help from our doctor. Heady times, anticipating joining the ranks of parents everywhere.

It was exciting stuff, that morning when the test showed success! We were both jubilant.

A year later, we are still enduring the agony of defeat. It's a long road this, with many twists and turns, ups and downs.

As I was donating blood plasma last night, the nurse assistant was asking me if we were trying again. She was thinking of those stats of so many parents who lost a baby and had another within a year of the loss. We're not in that boat yet. We just starting to seriously consider going down the road again.

The road marked "Pregnancy" is a little more obscured in our life than in many people's. It's not an easy road, either in the finding or in the journey. We will be inundated - ok, Mrs. Spit will be inundated, I'll be along for support - with medical involvement this time. The terms "high risk" "chance of recurrence" "hypertension" "perinatology" will be tossed about like leaves on a brisk fall wind the next time. Instead of overwhelming joy, we can see a sense of reluctance to get too excited, because we've lost one baby already.

This is why I vacillate. Some days I'm ready to try again - immediately. Others, I don't know if I'll ever be ready to try again. It's as much my own pain as the pain of seeing the tribulations that Mrs. Spit has endured. I don't want to see her ever have to go through that again. I promised to love her and protect her - but this is one thing that I can't protect her from.

I know my Gabriel is in Heaven. I know I'll join him someday. This comes to mind every time I hear this new song on the radio by Natasha Bedingfield. I find solace in my own pocket full of sunshine. I've included partial lyrics here:

Natasha Bedingfield - Pocket Full of Sunshine

I got a pocket, got a pocketful of sunshine.
I got a love, and I know that it's all mine.
There's a place that I go,
But nobody knows.
Where the rivers flow,
And I call it home.

And there's no more lies.
In the darkness, there's light.
And nobody cries.
There's only butterflies.

Take me away: A secret place.
A sweet escape: Take me away.

Take me away to better days.
Take me away: A higher place.

Father's Day...

The day is almost over.

It's been an odd day. I've thought about Gabriel a lot today. As I've done different things today, everywhere there were reminders that today is Father's Day. Radio, TV, shopping, going to lunch with Mrs. Spit - pretty much throughout the day I was reminded that today is the day that we as a culture celebrate fathers.

Today sucked.

I wasn't stuck in the fetal position in the corner trying to make the world just disappear. I didn't run around downtown demanding recognition for all of the men who have lost their children far too soon. I just existed. I did avoid going to church today, because I didn't think I would be able to do so well with all of the kids with their parents.

Mrs. Spit has been awesome today. She was similarly introspective today. She wanted me to have a three-month old baby boy today as well. Alas, Gabriel sits on a shelf near me in my kitchen as I type this - or at least his ashes do.

My son has gone to be with the Son in Heaven. I'll never have more than a fleeting memory of him until I see him again one day. And the worst part is, the world doesn't know that I'm a father just like so many men. I'll never be able to raise my son to be an upstanding man and productive member of society.

Today sucked, and I'm glad it's over.

A tree of tears

Sunday was a pretty dismal weather day. It was cool. It was overcast. The weather forecast was for a deluge.

Mrs. Spit and I were worried. We had up to 30 people coming to our house to be there with us as we planted our Weeping Birch in memory of our infant son. As we left church in the morning and the rain was spitting, I recalled the song by the late Stevie Ray Vaughn - The Sky is Crying. The sky was crying when this master of the electric guitar died in a helicopter crash, and it was crying as we were getting ready to remember the short life that touched our lives and the lives of many of our friends. It's not a coincidence that my lovely gardener wife picked a tree that would be perpetually weeping for our son.

As I think back to that fateful day, exactly 6 months ago yesterday, when the doctors told us that Gabriel would have to be born now, or the love of my life could die as well. I cried. I bawled. Tears ran down my face like a mountain stream. The hopes and dreams of fatherhood had slipped from my fingers, and I couldn't do anything.

Yesterday, we planted our tree. With a group of 20 friends around us, we placed it in the ground, in some good dirt. We shoveled the dirt into the hole, and gave the tree a good drink of water.

We followed with good food shared among everyone. People brought good dishes to go with the slab of roast beast that was on the rotisserie all afternoon.

People left us alone together, tired, but dry. Yes, we spent the whole time in the backyard. The weather held off until just after I got the cover back on the grill. I'd like to think that Gabe standing there, please with the gesture of remembrance that we made. We'll see him seated in Heaven one day. We'll never forget him, even though we were only blessed with his life for a scant thirty minutes.

I can only hope that if we have a next child, that the sky will smile rather than cry for them.