Long, long ago, in a land faraway called “Oklahoma,” a young farmer and his wife brought home a little baby girl. This baby girl was their first baby girl and everything thing they had prayed for — right down to the dark curly hair on top of her little bitty head. The only thing they hadn’t prayed for was the screaming. They certainly hadn’t prayed or wished or hoped or wanted THAT!
Eventually, as the little baby girl grew, the screaming turned into babbling, the babbling into first words, and those words became sentences. Never-ending sentences. The poor farmer and his wife had to hear their little girl’s voice all -day long, just gibbering and jabbering away. There was nothing, it seemed, that could bring peace and quiet to their lives.
But then, just when all hope seemed lost forever, the little girl learned how to read and write. Now, instead of cheerfully chattering, she got lost in the world of Anne Shirley, Charlotte and Wilbur, the Ingalls family, and Nancy Drew (the original Nancy Drew, mind you). Reading became the little girl’s favorite thing to do — it was better than playing with her dolls, playing outside, watching TV, or playing with her little sisters. It was certainly better than doing chores; unfortunately, skipping chores to read resulted in the little girl being GROUNDED from all reading. It was a horribly painful torture.
When the little girl grew up, she still loved reading and writing. Her writing, however, wasn’t as good as what she read; the little girl (now a young woman) wrote horrible poetry, contrived short-stories, and sappy personal narratives. But, she had fun and, I suppose, that’s all that matters in the end.
The young woman, who was a hopeless romantic, dreamed of the day she would meet her Prince Charming, her Gilbert Blythe, her Mr. Darcy, her Heathcliff. She found him after she moved from her land to the kingdom of Texas, only — well, he wasn’t necessarily a romantic like the heroes she’d discovered in books. But, he was the perfect husband for her so she snatched him up and married him four months after their first date. She wasn’t about to waste any time with a courtship.
There was only one snag in this wanna-be fairytale: the young woman was unable to have a baby. There was one time, early in their marriage, that a baby began to form in her womb, and the young woman was so excited and happy. But, within just a few weeks of learning she was pregnant, her doctor quietly told her that the baby had died. With white walls closing in on her, the young woman closed her eyes and tried to breathe, tried to will away this moment, tried to dream a different ending. When she opened her eyes, the doctor and the white wall were still there . . . just swimming in a sea of the young woman’s tears.
After that one, too-brief, pregnancy, the young woman couldn’t conceive. She turned to books, websites, friends, looking for advice and tips. The young woman and her husband tried different doctors and different medicines, but nothing worked. Her body just wouldn’t work.
None of the books she’d read and loved ever prepared her for this. There was no heroine to turn to for advice — no plot to lean on for strength. She and her husband felt alone. All around them, other couples were living their fairy-tales with plump princes and princesses being born left and right.
But, the young woman and her husband had forgotten one very important fact while they grieved the lost child and their empty home: God was writing their story and knew the ultimate path their plot would take. Early in their 3rd year of marriage, He introduced a new character: Miss G.
Miss G was young teenager, full of laughter and tall tales. She was also an expectant mother, carrying a baby girl. Miss G loved her unborn baby more than anything else in the entire world, but her life had not been easy or smooth. An adopted child herself, she decided that the best way to show her child love, the best way to care for the little life growing inside of her, was to place the baby in the arms of another mother. Miss G chose the young woman to be the Mommy for her baby girl.
And so, after hours and years of questions, tears, and prayers, the young woman found herself in a West Texas operating room. She was dressed in pale blue hospital scrubs, sitting on a small stool, under the bright lights. Next to her, on the long, hard operating table, lay Miss G. Their little girl was about to make her entrance in this story. During the c-section, Miss G and the young woman talked, laughed, made jokes, and waited for the scratchy sound of a new baby’s cries.
They heard it. The young woman looked over and saw the most beautiful swollen, purple baby she’d every seen. Her Little Lady.
Now, the young woman is a Mommy and her husband is the Daddy. The Little Lady grows each day, learning new tricks and new words and new ways to make her Mommy and Daddy laugh. Sometimes, the Mommy doesn’t know what she’s doing (after all, no one has really written a manual for new mommies . . . yet) but she does know that she loves every minute of this new chapter.
