Crying

Well, it's official. I am becoming a crier. I used to sit through shameless tear jearkers like "Titanic" with only slightly moist eyes (unlike the Beluga surfacing in the seat behind me-pull it together honey...Jack and Rose are not real). Even Hallmark commercials glanced past my armor.

Then I gave birth.

Now I find myself unable to stop feeling.

I sobbed at news footage of the shooting at Virginia Tech. Those were someone's children.

I sobbed at the news that my sister's pastor's son drowned at only 18 months old.

And yesterday, I was unloading the dryer full of onsies, blankets, and previously tinkled on sheets when it side-swipped me.

The smell of my baby's laundry.

My throat began to close and the living room became blurry. Women always warn me to treasure these days because they are gone soon enough. Here I am crying because I know it is true. I can't trap these days and jar them to release their aroma years later with my wrinkled and shaking hands.

But someday, when my kids are busy texting their friends or off at soccer practice, I will walk by a young mother and a small whiff of her baby will send me back to my living room, wearing pajama bottoms, carefully folding the tiny clothes in my hands as my one year old shakily pulls up on my leg and my three year old attempts to dress herself and the dog.

So yes, I am a crier now.

Nature's first green is gold,
Her hardest hue to hold.
Her early leafs a flower;
But only so an hour.
Then leaf subsides to leaf.
So Eden sank to grief,
So dawn goes down to day.
Nothing gold can stay.
-Robert Frost