On Pregnancy, Fall, and Time Moving Toward Both

It's 7:53PM but I feel like it's 3AM.  I just sent a stranger off to test drive my car alone because Ben is out for a run and the kids are sleeping.  I hope she comes back... (She pulled in right when I wrote that).

I'm a little sick -- the summer colds have been mild but unrelenting and surprising.

We sit in the final three weeks of summer, our summer list of fun things taped to the door with various check marks down the left side, but without the riveting events like
-get hand-foot-and-mouth
-buy toilet paper holders, paper towel racks, medicine cabinets
-leave medicine cabinets in the garage that floods in rain and try to return the muddy boxed soggy cabinets to Home Depot (did that)
-schlep the kids more times than is healthy to local hardware store, Ikea, Target to buy and return various curtain rods, storage bins, paint samples, faucet heads
-find that all shower curtains are too short and all curtains too long
- put on afternoon movies so as to collapse on the bed rather than yell at the children

I am 33 weeks pregnant and have begun dreaming about the baby -- her name, her being twins that need two names, nursing her.  Even a few weeks ago, the speed of time flying by stung my eyes, but a shift in the last week and I've started to lean into it.  With all that's been unsettled the last four months, having this baby finally a baby in my hands rather than a concept in my brain will be a welcome relief.

The other day I bought the kids pencil boxes, lunchskins, and new markers, and could taste the zing of Fall, newness, back to school.  On the 27th, Silas will start at a new school again and begin 1st grade.  Since we moved, he's grown tall and has new black high tops that make him look old.  The school bus stop is across the street from our house, and when we moved in I couldn't imagine a brighter Godsend for hectic mornings, but now when I picture Silas stepping onto a school bus full of strange kids at 8AM to head out for the day, I wilt.  That's how Fall is, isn't it?  It crackles under foot and thrills us with its wind, smoky smell, arresting color, the very air charged with change, and then it strips us down to bone.  And there we wait through the quiet months until blooms overwhelm us once more.

It's a wonder, with such a visual aid, that I'm always so taken aback to stand in these vulnerable quiet months between fiery branches and weighty boughs...