Maybe Tomorrow

No news. Oh well. With each passing day we have to be getting closer and closer. For about the past week or so before we go to bed either Damon or I will say, “Maybe tomorrow.” On the surface it may sound a little depressing but I actually think it is just the opposite. It is all about hope. Tomorrow is still a real possibility. I do get bummed around 6pm each day because I assume if the call hasn’t come by 6pm then the hope for that day is gone. But when we go to bed the hope for tomorrow starts all over again.

A little over a year ago, I read a book that my mom and sister recommended, A Hope in the Unseen by Ron Suskind. The author followed one student, Cedric Benson, for several years and chronicled Cedric’s life in the inner city as he tries to make the best of one of the worst public school systems in the US. I won’t ruin it for you but if you read the back of the book you do learn that Cedric perseveres and makes his way to Brown University. The title of the book is based on a conversation he had with a particular teacher in his high school. This teacher pushed and encouraged him to dream big despite the obvious obstacles. Here is the conversation:

"Hebrews 11:1," says Mr. Taylor. "The substance of faith is a hope in the unseen."
"NO. Wrong--you messed it!" Cedric laughs. "It goes 'Faith, the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen." Man, Mr. Taylor, you always getting 'em wrong."
... Then he turns the botched line over in his head and hears his giggle echo through the empty hallway. A hope in the unseen. Sort of a pocket-sized version of the original, and not really a religious phrase he decides, but one you can definitely take with you. [pp.49-50, Broadway Books, 2005]

This is really what our journey to parenthood has been about as well. It has been a hope in the very much unseen. Nothing concrete has happened over the past few years that would lead me to say with certainty that I will be a mother. All I have had to cling to was hope and faith that this mystic thing called motherhood would actually be achieved. I have dreamed about this face that I can’t see and cheeks that I can’t squeeze and a belly that I can’t give raspberry kisses to but there is hope that someday all those things COULD happen. I haven’t lost sight of that.

Maybe tomorrow or the day after tomorrow or...