Moving Forward

The young woman waddled to the edge of the pool steps, gingerly felt her way down the stairs, and sat heavily at the edge of the pool. Her advanced "mommyness" showed in her mannerism and careful grace. "Go on in", I said. "The weightlessness will be heaven". "If I go in, I might not come out!" she laughed.

After bobbing around a while in the pool, dodging laughing and splashing children, she resigned herself to getting out and pulled herself up the stairs to her waiting husband. He swaddled her in a beach towel and gently kissed her nose.

Talking to her later, I was eager to ask, "I thought you didn't want children. I thought you said that you had so many things that you wanted to do before you even thought about them." She turned to me, smiled, and with all the wisdom that comes to reckoning with what means the most said, "I realized that without my own children in my life, all I will ever be is my parent's child. I want to be so much more during my life. I can have a 'career' later, but love and children can't wait."

Looking aroung the garden and seeing my own husband, sons, and grandsons, I understood.