19 Weeks

“You made all the delicate, inner parts of my body and knit me together in my mother’s womb. Thank you for making me so wonderfully complex! Your workmanship is marvelous—how well I know it.” Psalm 139:13-14

In the past I would have called myself multifaceted. Intricate in my thought patterns. These days I wonder...
I haven't been writing. I've been reading. Vonnegut, Hemingway, and now Bradbury.
 Damn, they make it look so effortless. They make me question my capacity to let my most inner dialogue pour out and into the lives of my greatest critics or those near that thought they knew me. They make me reexamine my aspirations of opening a vein, letting it bleed out exposed, while naysayers throw salt and call a heart a spade.

Still I'm compelled.

Not everybody is gonna be a fan. So it goes.

I want to write about the short nine month time span it takes to miraculously make a human being of flesh, blood, soul, and my DNA. I want to candidly write about the modifiers I would use to describe this blessed event. And I want to do this with full intention, knowing I run the risk of having no fans or sympathizers.

First, it is impossible for me to look at another woman who has carried a child and not mouth the words with complete sincerity, "You're Amazing."

Secondly, if I hear one more woman describe her "gentle" pregnancy as a beautiful experience where she glowed with radiance from within without a tinge of nausea, I might bite the tip of her nose off and violently throw it up with my daily dose of bile that ends up in the closest toilet, sink, or bucket I can reach.

With that said, I begin the written pilgrimage that could be just for me. Pulling on my threadbare stretch pants whatever time of day and wrestling with the conflicting feelings of grateful, awestruck elation and a downright miserable existence where raising my head off the pillow is my greatest feat of accomplishment.

Won't you join me?