birthday

april 27 was my birthday.  okay, so it was not really my birthday.  but it was my half birthday. eliot passed away on my actual birthday so this is the day we celebrate.
it seems like maybe something matt would come up with to be all loving and sweet like he is.  but the idea was all mine.  i don't think it was the the first year following losing eliot, but probably the one after that.  I can't remember. matt kept wanting to make sure that on my actual birthday, that we weren't just sad but that we celebrated me too.  as great as this was, i was frustrated by the sentiment.  celebrating a birthday on that day just wasn't gonna happen.
so we began to celebrate my half.  but then it's still sorta tricky. a friend says happy birthday on that day in the halls of preschool and i know that they know. it's not really my birthday. and even in celebrating the half, sadness tags along.
and that's the thing with loss, one day it may be all over you and another day it may subtlety trail your heels, but it's always around.
this may sound like a real downer but its not, it just is what it is.  and it's okay.

they made me cake.
our friends did.
the same ones who came to the NICU with eliot, celebrated daily birthdays with our sick infant son and held our hands at the funeral, listened to our tears, rejoiced with hazel and anders and took us to the airport to fly off to ukraine for 6 weeks.  i sat hip to hip with them on a park bench and they put candles in a chocolate cake and sang to me with other friends and children running round on a day that wasn't actually the day of my birth.
as the happy birthday song rang out, it was like it all went slow-mo for a minute.  the park, the sunshine through blue sky and white clouds, lena banging her hand on my thigh, hazel & anders faces anticipating blowing out candles, friends who live out Jesus to us over and over and over.
i don't know how i arrived here.  all this goodness everywhere.

so, yes, still the sadness.
and yes, great joy bursting forth.