150 days and counting...

Counting down to the day that little Ms. Penelope can come home.  That day is 5 days away. FIVE!  It's truly hard to believe that the time is around the corner that we will be stepping out of the NICU with our little Penny, prayerfully walking away and not coming back.  Not coming back, as a patient but rather a graduate of this academy that a select graduate from.  I've been on a strange work/writing hiatus since my last post. Seven long weeks on the road, 38 shows, and only three days at home to see your fragmented family equal an emotionally, spiritually, creatively drained individual.  Our silver lining was often the little cameras on front of our electronic windows, carrying me hundreds of miles in to a hospital room or nursery, visually and mentally holding my children and my wife.  Carrying on a conversation with doctors about cals kkals/kgs/day, possible surgery dates and how to help an anemic little baby all while sitting in a coffee shop or back lounge of a bus.  Technology may be the downfall of a lot of folks but for this family, it's what is helping us stay together, keeping us, in a strange sort of way, finger tips apart.

On my notebook, my screen saver spools the images of the past 152 days (the two days prior to their birth in the hospital) and my mind flutters to the moment I, or someone else, snapped those images, the flooding of emotions that come washing in to my brain, seeping it's way out through the windows to my soul.  How far we have come! but yet, how absolutely little we have scratched on the surface to the lives of these little ones.  We have journeyed the path of a thousand lives over the past 150 days, leaning on the shoulders of all those that choose to carry us to the next oasis.  The NICU life is a much like a trek across the desert with the knowledge that there is a great mystery to be discovered.  Many that walk it, come out discovering their mystery leads them to a great ocean, one called the Ocean of Loss, having to send their precious treasure they have been carrying across the great crystal sea.  Others walk and walk, taking them to an ancient chamber that many have journeyed to, that once inside leads them to yet another mysterious quest called "parenting."  We have met many along the way that have taken their little treasures out of the desert in to the next mystery, saying good bye and praying them the best as they enter in to that tough next quest.  We have also met those select few who have seen the Great Ocean and have tasted it's saltiness, wondering why their path brought them there.  They walk away with the bitter taste of that Ocean and pray never to experience it again.  This journey is filled with many that help you navigate through the tough sands, guides that point you to your next steps, craftsmen who specialize in caring for your treasure and most importantly your fellow journeymen who lift you up as you try the best you can to keep that priceless gem out of the blasting winds of the desert, away from the sands that could mark up and buff out the twinkling.

It's hard to believe that we are actually about to walk from this desert in to the next chapter of the mystery.  I do know, it's going to be a fun one!

Every storm brings a rainbow, a symbol that was given to Noah that God chose to use something destructive to bring about a greater good.  A symbol that would be given to us as a sign of hope, that God has given us another day to give Him praise through our lives.  We give Christ praise through our storm.

(Samsung Epic Panorama option. 05.23.11)  

Not my best work, but I needed to remember that moment.