Mourning

 97% of the time, I am perfectly content with my life. I love wearing all the different hats I do to so many different people. Most days at 43, when I see parents exhausted chasing children, I am so thankful to be just me. I love doing what I want, when I want, for how long I want. 

But then there is that other 3% of the time. Recently someone was talking about a child being like their mom or dad, and in that random moment the 3% showed up. All of a sudden I was slapped in the face with the sadness that I will never meet a little version of me. 

I will never get to share my magical view of the world, my imagination, my love of all the fun things with my real mini. 

I will never get to pass on the wonderful lessons my parents taught me. I will never get to know what kind of parent I would be. I will never know what it is to do anything doing with the most basic purpose of being a woman. 

I fully understand I am not less of a woman for this deficit. That is not what I mean. I simply mean every now and then the 3% sneaks in and clouds up the clarity if the 97%. It’s kind of like how I heard once something like a tablespoon of moisture can create enough fog to cripple an entire city block. Yeah it’s like that. The fog lifts, but for a moment, it is impossible to see. 

So, as I lie here in the early morning hours of what I consider the most magical day of the year, I can’t get the image out of my head, an image simultaneously unclear and perfectly clear of a little brown haired girl with big brown eyes full of wonder and merriment at the excitement of Christmas tomorrow. A little girl, or boy, who will never exist, who lives somewhere deep in my soul. I will never truly understand why I didn’t get to pass on my joy to a little me, but I have to believe there is a positive reason God didn’t see fit to put a little Regina in the world. 

That is what is in my head at 12:56 am on Christmas Eve; a tad of remorse and a huge dose of resilience, and a belief in magic that will never end.