my red velvet journal

It is not anything I would wish for anyone to endure: infertility.

My journey was private, most of it not shared even with those closest to me.

Mine was very much a lonely, solo trip.

Once you have children, your life will never be the same, my mother would say. She loved my sister and me without question, but if given the choice in hindsight, I think she would be honest and decline having kids.

I didn't have a choice at the time, but if a little farther into adulthood, I was granted a do-over, I too would decline the pursuit. No regrets.

The yearning years were painful though, and it was sometime then when I ran across this lone stanza. It sucked me in and I tucked it in a journal where it still resides. Eerie that at the time, the house which wished to be a home was a late 1800's farm style two story, with a stairway visible the minute you entered.  

                As I was going up the stair

                        I met a boy who wasn't there

                                He wasn't there again today

                                        I wish that he would go away 

Bastardized version from the poem, Antigonish

by William Hughes Mearns