(Natasja Fourie)
Up late, up all night, off to work, again.
Thankfully, I have little to say today. The war rages on in the comments section over at Selavy but I have given up. He is right of course, that it is all a waste of time. If others choose to be bigots they will simply find a different name for their bigotry. One way or another they will justify their boorish behavior, often exalting it into a form of honor, a duty of sorts. C'est la Vie it is.
Today is the old guy's birthday, so as a present I'll leave it all alone. One gets tired of repeating the same thing over and over. You begin to sound like your adversary, repeating something as if it somehow makes it more true, or worse, makes a falseness magically true at all. It's like publicly discussing something with a politician. The most important aspect to any lie is only to repeat it. Tautology it's called, a fault in style sometimes used surreptitiously as a method of rhetoric. What, dear readers, could possibly be worse than a fault in style...?
There is a story from my childhood about another child who took my apple one day at lunch. Remind me to tell it here as it reminds me of the ongoing argument, an important lesson that perhaps I had forgotten.
Rachel's mother arrives today, to help with the baby. We are on the non-stop family express now. I suppose it will all make a little bit more sense for us once we have bought a house. It will be easier when we feel settled. We are as of yet floating in that sate of flux, caught between seasons, unsure how to dress, fumbling towards the door, wrong keys in hand. So there is a sense that we are also guests, entertaining guests, in a guest house. Or, an apartment, I should say. It will be much easier once we feel that we are at home.
The baby is great as ever, Rhys. He is just starting to respond more and more, to follow us with his eyes, even to smile a little bit, if only with his eyes. It is subtle but you can tell mostly when Rachel holds him and talks to him, swaddled in the warmth of loving mother. There is an almost imperceptible change in his expression. It can be seen, but it is still very minor, an acknowledgement trying to find its place among the features. But it is a lovely thing to see, truly. A pocket miracle.
He is just over one month old now. It is still so difficult to believe, that the creation of a new life happened because it's what we wanted. Never before in my life have the effects of my choices been so overwhelmingly pronounced, nor imbued with such a sense of importance, even simple grandeur. At least that is the feeling to me anyway, one of naturally majestic proportions, packaged tightly, lightly and condensed in size.
For others, outside of our lives, I understand that it is just another common event in a sea of common events, having a child. I still believe that life is not precisely a miracle, but it certainly seems miraculous to us. And what could possibly be a miracle that does not also contain the feeling of the miraculous?
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