Devin
I scroll through a huge list of fonts, trying to find the one I’m looking for. It’s definitely a script font, it has a swoop before the D.
I’m scrolling through a list of “Devin”s. I’m so focused on the details, eyes swiftly picking apart each option and mentally tossing it out, that I forget that fact for a minute. But my scrolling gets slower and slower until I stop, staring at my screen. The letters have jumbled together like they often do when I stare too hard, the word forming and un-forming in front of me. Devin. Devin. The word seems so warm and familiar, and yet so otherworldy.
I remember finding out it was a boy, realizing it was a Devin growing inside of me. I remember coming home and delightfully, joyfully turning that name over in my hands, feeling it on my lips. We were going to have a Devin.
We do have a Devin – but not how I pictured it then. His name is sprinkled liberally through our house. It slides easily off my tongue when I talk about our past, our great loss. If Devin were here. In memory of Devin. Since Devin. Past tense.
It can be such a random shock. We have this name, this child, and yet we are not parents… not day-to-day, not the way you would expect. We live our lives like a childless couple, going about work and homeowning and socializing.
Sometimes I forget where we’ve come from, the losses that we’ve had. I play with graphics and pictures and names, arranging pieces on my screen, seeing with an artists’ eye. Until the mother’s eye peeks over and the rest shuts down as the memories come flooding back.
We could have had a Devin in our present, a child in our lives. Instead we have a Devin on my screen and an ache in our heart.
Oh, Devin. I wish you were here with us.
Oh, Natalie, I wish he were there, too.
That’s what haunts us, isn’t it? How very close of a thing it was.
Oh reading this just made me so sad.
Huge hugs to you
xxx
♥
I wish more than anything he was here with you.
Me too.
“We have this name, this child, and yet we are not parents… not day-to-day, not the way you would expect. We live our lives like a childless couple, going about work and homeowning and socializing.”
That really hit home with me. On top of the monstrous grief, the cognitive dissonance and identity confusion brought on by this type of loss is just unbearable. I don’t know who I am anymore. This is one of those days when I’m just dazed and disoriented beyond words. I feel like I’m living in some grayish limbo between worlds.
{{{hugs}}}
I don’t really know what to say. I am so very sorry that your Devin is not here with you. You really have a way with words…this post really touched me.
I get exactly what you’re saying. What a beautiful name for a beautiful boy. And I’m so sorry he isn’t here.
What a sweet, tender and poignant post.
I wish Devin were here with you too.