It sounds strange, but seeing my children happy makes me feel less terrified at the thought of dying.
Not in an I’d-be-happy-to-die-tomorrow kind of way, but in another way. Perhaps in an I-understand-just-how-fragile-this-life-really-is kind of way. She didn’t exist two years ago. She’s wholly new, just conjured up out of a few moments of frenetic energy. And here she is. And she has this amazing, dynamic, infuriating-already personality. And she just loves her little world. She’s happy. She’s new here, and she digs it.
And that makes me realise, we’re all actually new here. We’re all fragile, and so temporary. As she didn’t exist, so too will I not exist, one day. And it won’t actually be consequential at all, because I’ll go back to that place where my little monkey came from.
We think we have to do huge things in life. We think we need more. We think we want all of those things. But really, we’re all just shattered glass, bound together with a slap of glue, just waiting for a little vibration to send us falling apart again.
Why shouldn’t I live more like my daughter?
And to all the children that I could possibly have in the future when my husband and I expel more frenetic energy, you’re not here so I don’t miss you, but if you come you will absolutely fill my heart. Fill it a thousand times over, so filling it could explode. But you’re not, as she once wasn’t, and one day I won’t be either.
So if I die tomorrow, I’ll be gone. But I won’t know about it, and everything will be ok.
All I hope is that they know how much I love them with all of my heart. All of it. All of my soul and my heart and all of me. My slap of glue is them. My shattering and my repair. My everything.
