Hi...Good...Bye

How my idiot girl’s heart was warmed by all of your kind words and thoughts. Last Wednesday was a sucky day, sucky, sucky, sucky. It felt like when you are mindlessly chomping on potato chips and swallow before one is fully chewed. That chip will then carve a jagged path down your esophagus, leaving you choking, gagging, and gasping. Your eyes water, your face turns a vibrant red; you cough and cough and cough. All the while the faces of others watch you and continually ask, “Are you okay?”

“Well of course I’m okay! Don’t I look okay?”

”Actually, no, you don’t.”

Sometimes that ache, scratchy feeling in your throat will stay for hours, maybe even days. Oh, alright, it never lasts for days. But heartache, well, that’s just a horse of a different color. Isn’t it?

After the initial shock of it all, we managed to recover ourselves. Although rarely an hour passes without a memory or phrase being drummed up and repeated. Thus far, over the last five days, I have discovered things in unusual places: the toy bottle for one of the Destroyer’s baby dolls hidden behind the dog food bin, one of Monster’s flowery turtlenecks tucked among my shirts, a bright green elastic hair band being batted around by the cat, or the rubber ducky from bath time, neatly squirreled away behind the bleach.

Silence aside, we had a good weekend. The guys went camping and we girls reclaimed and repainted Miss C’s bedroom (it had been hosting those wee tyrants), stayed up far too late, and watched chick flicks (with the exception of Henry V) until our eyes felt dull and heavy.

Monday dawned cold, drizzly, and gray. How surprising to behold such weather in early April in Oregon. Snicker. Then, the most amazing of things happened. The phone rang and the caller ID announced that it was none other than Bio-Mom.

I hadn’t even hoped to hear from her in a month and here it is, a mere five days since the girls were reunited with her and she’s calling. My heart leapt. Good news? Bad news? Actually, a mixture of both, but I’ll take it none the less.

”The girls really miss you guys. They want to talk to you.”

The Monsters little voice choked with emotion and I stuffed sappy, idiot girl securely into a key-hole while I spoke encouraging, bright words to my sad, sad girl. The Destroyer, being two and half, had less to share:

”Hi…good…bye.”

This same conversation was repeated another two times to Miss C and Beloved, who happened to have the day off. Just hearing their voices made me glad and while I worried over the tiny bit of bad news, I was relieved to know that Bio-mom is doing two things: she is understanding that I am not a threat (at least she knows that unless I get her alone in a dark alley, she’s probably pretty safe) and she is listening to the needs of her babies and doing something for them.

In other news:

My writing contest entry is just about complete and ready to post. I have another writing contest that’s due by the end of the month and my book to get busy with. I’ve finished, The Girl who Stopped Swimming by Joshilyn Jackson and am half way through Ophelia by Lisa Klein. I haven’t truly started chewing through Step by Step HTML and XHTML by Faithe Wempen, but I’ll get there. I’ve read my Bible every day and slept well beyond the 5:20 alarm.

All things considered, life is looking pretty bright on this drippy Monday.