Today my heart is aching. In about an hour, it will be exactly 14 years ago that Hannah entered the world. Our beautiful, perfect baby girl.
Our world unraveled shortly after her birth, and we painstakingly rewove a new tapestry – one filled with a different kind of awareness about how fragile and precious life is and how even in the most heart-wrenching grief, you can find an abundance of joy.
This morning I was looking back at my Facebook posts on this day over the past 2 decades. I reread many of the birthday posts I wrote in honor of Hannah (they are on the blog if you’d like to peruse). I still feel that same love and yearning that I expressed when her loss was recent. However what I didn’t realize until today was that it was on this day, in 2008, that Barack Obama was elected president.
I remember how much joy and relief I felt – how inspired and hopeful. How much love I felt for my fellow Americans. I can’t tell if my heartache today is my continued grief with the life Hannah could have had if she’d not been born with a life-limiting condition, or if my heart is heavy with the impact of what the election tomorrow will mean for our country.
I often focused on a song to share in my posts during and after Hannah’s life. All have special meaning in our lives (many are featured on this wonderful list of 50 songs created for a better world. https://playingforchange.com/articles/songs-of-hope-50-songs-created-for-a-better-world. But this one. This is how I feel now – Hannah taught us as parents; we teach our children and I know Wes and Maura are the people they are because of all of the adults who love and teach them. Our kids do see the truth. They know. Praying for a future we can be proud of together.
Teach Your Children
Song by Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young
You, who are on the road
Must have a code you try to live by
And so become yourself
Because the past is just a goodbye
Teach your children well
Their father’s hell did slowly go by
Feed them on your dreams
The one they pick’s the one you’ll know by
Don’t you ever ask them why
If they told you, you would cry
So just look at them and sigh
And know they love you
And you, of tender years
Can’t know the fears your elders grew by
Help them with your youth
They seek the truth before they can die
Teach your parents well
Their children’s hell will slowly go by
And feed them on your dreams
The one they pick’s the one you’ll know by
Don’t you ever ask them why
If they told you, you would cry
So just look at them and sigh
And know they love you
Don’t you ever ask them why
If they told you, you would cry
So just look at them and sigh
And know they love you
Ooh, and know they love you
And know they love you, yeah
And know they love you