Gift from the heart

It's been a long while since I've blogged. I've been busy meeting deadlines for work and caring for our living four children - and still grieving the death of our George of course. I marked his tenth and eleventh months in disbelief and sorrow. How could my boy been gone from this earth longer than he was alive?

And today is Mother's Day. Bittersweet being a babylost mumma. Thinking non-stop about how this time last year I had no idea that when I held my new son in my arms he would be still. Torturing myself with what ifs that have no bearing on our current reality.

A few weeks ago a lovely friend from high school days surprised us with a package that arrived in the mail. In it I found a CD production of At the Back of the North Wind by George MacDonald (she purchased it here if anyone is interested). This dear friend, with whom I reconnected on Facebook after years without contact, has not shied away from me in my grief. She has emailed, talked with me on the phone, and send the most kind and thoughtful messages to me. She doesn't hurry me through my grief, but listens. A gem.

Kirstin is also a George MacDonald scholar and hired me to edit her PhD for St. Andrews University in Scotland. It's been wonderful work, reading her manuscript and learning so much about this amazing author who inspired both C.S. Lewis and J.R.R. Tolkien. It is also lovely that my angel boy shares his first name - and Kirstin shared with me some writing George MacDonald published about his own bereavement over the loss of his son.

Here is part of what Kirstin wrote in her note to me:

"I had initially planned on sending At the Back of the North Wind as a book for George's birthdate (a double-birth, GMD would say), but then I remembered the audio version. Even though it is dramatized and thus abridged, I thought that in this form George's brothers and sister could enjoy it along with you in some of your many van trips."

We couldn't wait to listen to the story as we have listened to many audio books as we drive around. When we piled in and started this one, everyone was hushed and listening intently. What a beautiful story! Truly poignant and meaningful for a bereaved family. It's full of love, wonder, and hope. Thank you so much, Kirstin, for your thoughtful way to remember our George.

It was just what we needed to hear as we draw ever closer to George's angel day, the day of his double-birth as I now know George MacDonald would say. If you like faerie stories - and particularly if you also have an angel baby or babies - this is a wonderful story.