Last night I went back to the birthing center that is both the home of the amazing midwife who was a wonderful support to us, and the weekly Pregnancy Circle that I was attending before Ben died. It was for a needle felting class and I was ridiculously excited but wasn’t sure how I would feel being back in that space with a group of pregnant women and new mamas.

Of course the only other person there when I arrived was one of the mamas from my group and her 3 month old daughter. And I was fine. I sat down and got the quick version of the birth story before more people began to arrive. She did not mention Ben. Neither did I.

I did talk about him later, sitting next to friends. One of the two other women at our table expressed sympathy. The other was quiet. The first then said she’d known two women who had experienced the same loss – and I caught a quiet wink across the table.

There are thousands of us. We are everywhere. The baby lost.

At home afterward, Steve and I had a conversation that sent stress coursing through my body. This morning I woke up feeling as though I’d been hit by a truck and it was spinning its wheels on my chest. Finally I got in the shower and the tears came, tributaries running into rivers as water washed over my body – this body that bears the scars of both birth and death, one directly on top of the other.

There are times when his presence is soft and comforting. There are days when he sits quietly in my heart, in the background of my life. And then there are days, like today, when missing him rends my heart in two, chokes my throat and pulls me away from the living. Just shy of 8 months after his death, those days are less frequent, often taking me by surprise.

As my head and heart whirl back towards center, I want to share that I fell in love with needle felting. This healing journey has brought cravings to create with my hands and needle felting was on my 40 before 40 list. Here is what I made last night, complete with fairy wings, beehive and magic wand.

I love her.

I couldn’t wait to share needle felting with Ada so we ran out this afternoon for supplies. Here is her first attempt.

She loved it too.

To see some really amazing felted fairies, mermaids, and animals click on over to BoriDolls on etsy. Borbala taught the class last night and I could have easily come home with a number of her gorgeous creatures. Her Easter creations are adorable and I’m madly in love with this mermaid and this Mama Earth.

Today, once again, I was taken from tears to joy. I bow to the power of love and creativity.

I believe that we come into this world with our inner light shining brightly and as we move through childhood, forces shift and shape us, often causing us to dim that light in order to be loved, liked, approved of, safe. We are a construct of both nature and nurture and yet there is a part of us that transcends time, that is energy, is light, is Love in the grandest, most holy sense of the word. As I moved through my 20’s, I felt myself moving towards then further from that essential core. Now as I close out my 30’s I finally feel I am stepping back into myself, journeying back toward wholeness. Not whole as a child who comes into this world with Spirit intact,  but whole and perfect in the way that my wounding, my scars, my failures and successes, my broken and healing heart have added to the entirety of who I am. As I look toward 40, now 358 days away, I feel anticipation and hope. I believe this next decade will see me standing in my own personal power in a way I am only beginning to taste.

I watch those I admire, whose circle I am a part of and not a part of, find each other, invite each other in, support each others’ growth. My ego feels lonely, wanting to join with them but feeling unsure, unformed. Then I get quiet and I watch myself taking shape, joining hands, taking my place in the circle of wise women. I have left my youth and stepped firmly into mid-life, with all its challenges and gifts. I am leaving uncertainty and growing into knowing. It is exciting and demands my patience, my commitment and my allowing. It is time.

In honor of this growth and this last year of a decade, I have pulled a list of 40 things* from my “life list” that I want to do before I turn 40. Et voila! Here it is…

1. 40 days of giving leading up to March 15, 2012 (inspired by Dyana Valentine)

2. Attend a retreat (hoping for this month – Feb 2012)

3. Take private ballroom dancing lessons

4. Learn to play one song on guitar that I can sing along to (I think I’m giving up on this one until I get new strings for my guitar. My fingers can’t take it).

5. Get paid to write

6. Throw an amazing party

7. Get rid of every article of clothing I don’t feel gorgeous in (almost there!)

8. Use my china and crystal at least twice

9. Start my legacy cloth (with the help of Wholly Jeanne)

10. Hug, hold hands and have wonderful conversations with as many of my favorite online friends as I can

11. Buy and work through Danielle La Porte’s Fire Starter Sessions (now The Spark Kit) (I’ve been waiting for this moment since it came out and I’m almost ready. I can’t wait to tell you how awesome it is.)

12. Spend a day being pampered at a first class spa

13. Have my first paid speaking gig

14. Take a raw food class

15. Become a Reiki Master

16. Build an altar in my home

17. Turn our bedroom into a beautiful, healing space (buh-bye taupe)

18. Read at least six books that are already on my bookshelf, cover to cover (60 would be better but I do still have a husband and child, so I don’t know how likely that is)

19. Lose the last 20-25 pounds and feel healthy, fit and comfortable in my body again (I’ve dropped 23 since I was at my heaviest after Ben died so this is actually possible)  60 pounds gone.

20. Take a digital photography class

21. Maintain my 1000 day meditation practice (and buy a zafu cushion)

22. Finish Charlie Gilkey’s Email Triage on both my email accounts

23. Launch the business that is totally aligned with who I am

24. Get at least 1 massage every 3 months

25. Go through all of my MA writing and see if there’s anything publishable

26. Have all my art prints and photos framed and hung

27. Go camping

28. Have my web presence professionally redesigned

29. Have fresh flowers in the house at all times

30. Begin every day consciously and with gratitude

31. Learn how to needle felt

32. Re-learn how to use my sewing machine

33. Have date night with Steve once a month (Friday nights are date nights, at home or out on the town)

34. Deepen my trust in my intuition

35. Choreograph a solo movement/spoken word piece

36. Ask more people what their dreams are, because that’s really what I want to know

37. Have more picnics

38. Sell my wedding dress and give the money to a favorite cause

39. Go horseback riding

40. Find joy every. single. day.

What’s on your list?

*I reserve the right to add, subtract or modify said list if any of these things no longer feel like fun.

I used to know it was a full moon by how crazy my customers were when I was a bartender. Now I know it’s a full moon because my body buzzes from the energy, I can’t sleep, and everything in life seems to intensify. It’s been a strange couple of days – a funky roller coaster ride that has taken me to amazing heights and bizarre depths. We got some news today that could have been a direct hit to the solar plexus and all I could do was laugh, shrug my shoulders and say, We’ll figure it out.

I went to a special Kundalini class in honor of the full moon and vernal equinox. I came home flying high and was disappointed to find that Ada was already asleep. I asked Steve how she did with me not being home since I’d told her I would be. This was his answer.

Picture Ada, lying in bed, falling asleep but eyes still open.

Daddy: What are you thinking about?

Ada: Mama’s heart.

Daddy: What about Mama’s heart?

Ada: Inside.

Daddy: What about the inside?

Ada: How much love there is.

And she closed her eyes.

Patience is the only prayer by the side of a master. Utterly relaxed, in deep love, in great gratitude, something goes on growing in you without any effort. Something goes on maturing, something goes on becoming more and more crystallized, without any effort on your part. You are just a watcher of the miracle that is happening to you. – Osho