who arrives and who departs and when

Who lives in here?

life support

I have enjoyed watching that baby.  First, there was this teeny tiny red baby which needed every sort of life supporting care.  If she wasn't kept at a constant temperature, her body temperature might go down.  If she wasn't watched and monitored, she might just cease to breathe.  There wasn't much sign of a person in there although of course, we knew that there was starting to be someone there.  Now, there is a real being moving her arms and legs at will, smiling, connecting with her eyes and it is clear that although she needs care, she is there and she is participating.

 Coming into life

This Thursday morning I say goodbye to her and her mother in the kitchen and make my way from the quiet country village we live in to the great big city with honking horns and traffic lights and traffic jams.  I make my way across the great whizzing metropolis where by some extraordinary grace no-one bumps into another, where the stops and starts are governed by lights and everyone just obeys them; I make my way to see my 96 year old friend who is struggling to leave her now wasted and painful body behind and return to the place which is waiting for her.  I think that this is the same place that the baby came from, it is where we all came from.  Some people call it heaven, some call it their eternal home and some call it nirvana.  I don't know quite what to call it and nor do I know at the moment what it is like but I do sense that it exists and that it is probably more familiar than the home I call home at the moment.

Tonight I hear that the dear and old friend has been able to leave the tired and wasted frame she has called ME for 96 years.  I feel that she is now free and full of the delight which I can see crossing the ever changing face of the baby who has come to live with us.

Kitchen