Happiness is holding someone in your arms and knowing you hold the whole world. (Orhan Pamuk)
Recent talk among several groups of friends has centered on gratitude. I don’t take it as a coincidence. Ella grins at me as she watches several versions of “five little monkeys jumping on the bed” on YouTube. “Oh dear,” she says as each one falls. Falling is forbidden for her at the moment. The stitches in her chest are deep; they will heal from the inside-out and that will take time. The best recovery in a lot of areas begins as an inside job. I put my arm around her and know I hold the whole world.
Small details jump out at me: the pink edging around her shoes, the smallness of her body and hands, the sunshine white-blond of her comb-resistant hair, even the yogurt stains on her jeans.
Her seven-year-old cousin arrives and without a word Ella lifts her t-shirt and shows Rebe her scar. No whimpering. This is a statement of fact. Rebe looks at me, her eyebrows raised, but she doesn’t speak either. She gives Ella a kiss on the cheek. The children seem to know this is answer enough.
Play continues. Pretend games, a mock form of hide-and-seek, i Pad entertainment. Lots of giggles. Running, monitored and limited in a small house.
My memory goes back to a time when I was in water aerobics class. The news had been fresh that our youngest granddaughter would have Down syndrome, an A/V canal defect and duodenal atresia. At that moment we saw our granddaughter as someone who had not yet been born. So far all we knew were problems, unseen and vague roadblocks, the kind that lead many women toward abortion. Ella had not yet seen her parents’ faces and no one had seen hers.
I recall following aerobic moves as a song played in the background. It was only a rhythmic drum beat. I was seeing the rest room doors behind the instructor, not the instructor. I knew our granddaughter would be a girl—that was all. And the rest of what I understood was surrounded with fear. I wanted to know more than the skirted figure on the door of the restroom could tell, and I didn’t want to know.
Now I look into Ella’s eyes and see sapphire blue, a hint of humor, a ton of strength, and a spirit the angels could emulate. Yes, our little girl has been through more surgery in her short life than I have in my almost 69 years. Yet, she accepts the next day as another experience, not the morning after.
“May I sit next to you, Ella?” I ask.
She smiles. A lot of words aren’t always necessary. Sometimes they get in the way of a simple message. Love loses its beauty when it is over-defined.
terrypetersen 