Signs of Life

I read a memoir recently called Signs of Life by Natalie Taylor.  I grabbed it off the shelf because it was a) about a new mom and b) by an English teacher.  The book chronicles a year in the life of this 24-year-old mother who loses her husband to a sporting accident while she is  5 months pregnant with their child.  They are newlyweds about to hit their second year of marriage.  The book is brutually honest and also hilarious.  Natalie has a great 'voice' and I can imagine she's a fantastic teacher.  Each chapter is taken from her journals and begins with a quote from a piece of American Literature that she is teaching her high school students as she grieves.  She invents and converses internally with her Fairy Mother Godmother who tells it to her straight about what mothering really is.  I highly recommend this book.  While the author is probably agnostic and uses a peppering of swear words, she is real, touching, and funny.  The book proves that when you think life is over, it's not.  It may be over as you know it, and that is worth grieving.  But pain can be purposeful if we let it make us stronger by enduring and thriving in the midst of it.  Thank God I've not been where Natalie has.  But as a young mother, I can relate. Worth looking at.

Here are some small signs of life I've caught:

Sarah really like to fill things up.

I think this is great.

A young John and Jackie, you think?

Got the bright idea to dump out all outgrown clothes in an attempt to straighten closets and get ready for our Fall Consignment Sale.  The door to this room will be locked indefinitely.

Hair accessories!  Really!

The gnawed crib.  Proof that the IKEA crib might trump the heirloom crib in terms of wear and tear. 
And heartbreak.

More dumping of stuff.

Staying alive!