Looking through old things

 I should spend some more time in the basement in this house.  It's not an uncomfortable place to be.  I have my sewing space and my scrap booking spaces all set up and ready to go.

 It's just one of those things.  You shouldn't go there if you expect to get anything done.   

I started looking through boxes and files looking for Chance's original copy of his report of birth abroad.  I didn't find it, but I found so many other things.

I have old La Leche League papers and sign in sheets and a few thank you notes from moms.   I found the 2004 directory of LLL Leaders in Virginia and West Virginia.   Listings of the various groups and who was leading them.   It inspires a "where are they now" feeling.  I could spend hour upon hour just searching for the people who's names I know but have not heard in years.   

 

I found a few elementary school year books and project books with poems written by my kids.

Morgan in third grade

 

I found my college transcript with notes I wrote on it about getting into nursing school.  I never did apply to nursing school, but my grades were not too bad.

Pictures.  So many pictures.  All of the kids at different ages.  Pictures of friends too.  Some dead now, some just lost touch with.

And my journal that I started in 1977.  It starts with the words "the bleeding started a week ago" referring to when I lost my first baby.   

And many pages later in the journal I write "Courtney is delightful. She talks and has so much to say.  I wonder if she understands about the baby?".  I was pregnant with Morgan at the time.

  Who was I?  Who am I now.  Who are all of the selves and lives have I lived.   Homes around the world  One baby, two, three, four and then five.   Each one an individual with a story that is shared with me and stories of themselves that do now include me.

A couple of years ago we had a Christmas cookie exchange here in this house in Aldie.  Looking back, I had forgotten that Shannon was co-hosting it with me.   And now Shannon is sick.  Has been for at least two years.   

The world is big and wonderful and scary and amazing.  I wish I could make the world heal and stop the fighting and hurting people.   

I can do a lot of things.  I had the "fix everything" mom kiss for years.  But it seems that the kids don't notice that they have outgrown the need for a mom kiss even though I have not outgrown the wish that I could kiss everything and make t better.