The Most Amazing Day

(To watch this directly from YouTube, you can go here.)

Before June 17 is over, I wanted to post this footage from June 17, 2008.
I watched this a few times today, remembering the most amazing day, the most amazing birthday of my life, a year ago.
Remembering the incredible love and hope and light that surrounded Tikva on the day of her surgery,
And how smoothly everything went.
Remembering learning from Laurie that the Red Tail Hawk had flown by twice while I was in the pumping room.
Remembering seeing Tikva's eyes when she opened them for the first time after the surgery,
When she could finally be taken off the paralytic medication.
Remembering the three-hearts bandage that Tippy the surgeon cut for her scar.
That was the day I got my Miss Piggy socks.

I cried as I watched.
I smiled too.
I felt so much love for my most beautiful Baby Girl.
I felt some longing to be back there, to that day.
To the hope and positivity, the possibility and all that was ahead.
I felt sadness that Tikva is not coming with us in body when we leave San Francisco in a few weeks.
I sure would love to be strapping her into her carseat next to Dahlia when we hit the road.

I have no regrets, though.
I loved her completely, unconditionally.

I still love her, I always will.

I loved her without knowing the outcome,
With no illusion of permanence.
We did everything we could and then some for her
And I feel like I can leave here feeling the peace that comes from that.

I felt good today on my birthday.
I often feel kind of melancholy on my birthday,
But I think I got my freak-out out beforehand yesterday.
So today I was able to just feel good, clear, peaceful.

I felt super loved today, enjoying having no distractions from my birthday,
Nothing bigger to do like send my husband off to Cincinnati to move all of our belongings cross-country before we left for Israel (2007)
Or support my baby daughter while she had major, potentially life-saving surgery (2008).
Today, in 2009, it was just my birthday.
Thank you to everyone for showering me with so much love.

I took myself shopping and bought some brightly colored clothes today.
A 38 year old woman who's been through some serious and heavy sh*t (I'm sorry, but the word stuff just doesn't quite fit here) needs brightly colored clothes.

And my sweet husband took me for a picnic on the beach of a lake and we ate the most delicious food
And watched the tranquility and life of nature flow by...
Crows, turkey vultures, ducks, a mama deer and her baby, a snowy egret.
I love snowy egrets; they are so beautiful in flight.

When the sun set the gentle wind died down, the water got even more still and the quiet grew even more silent
And it reminded me of being in the Sinai in October 2007,
When I first suspected I was pregnant.
Nothing like that kind of quiet outdoors.

I could feel Tikva so close today.
She was there in all the animals that visited us.
She was there in the wind.

I think I am going to like 38.