This is my study. Today my friend, Jane, came to help me sort things out.

When I wrote about my previous study, I mentioned that I haven’t been able to find a new desk that suits me. My writing group gave me a gift certificate to a lovely shop as a house warming gift almost a year ago. I have been very slow to buy things, for a variety of reasons. The main one is that I am trying to adhere to William Morris’ Golden Rule, “Have nothing in your house that you do not know to be useful or believe to be beautiful.” I would add to that the considerations of budget.

I stopped in that little shop the other day and noticed the desk pictured above. It was just the right size, though I had some concerns about how tall it is. It’s not as old as I like but it has simple lines and the price was so low, the gift certificate more than covered it. And then I realized, if I bought it, my writer’s group would be replacing my desk and my heart skipped a beat.

I brought it home today.

It is a little taller than is entirely comfortable, but the three drawers that deepen the apron make it worth it. All in all it’s a good fit.

We need to make a space for writing. In some ways that is figurative, and in others literal. I’m so thankful to dear friends for helping me to find and make room.

I have been reading through old emails and facebook messages sent to and by Paul and me in the early days after the fire. Every single one from us was full of gratitude and hope. We were alive and thankful and that was pretty much all we had to say.

We were concerned about the children. We knew that arson is NOT good for kids, but for ourselves we were astonishingly optimistic.

It should be noted we were in the very early days with insurance and had not yet spoken to the township. Paul had called all the utilities and we assumed that our work there was done until the house was rebuilt.

My final post in the series, “What Not to Say” on Flunking Sainthood is up. I address accepting help, which is so hard, especially, and surprisingly, when you need it the very most.

I am going to keep talking about giving and receiving, of being haven for each other.  We will make mistakes. We’ve all said stupid things we regret. Just this morning I remembered something I said, years ago, and winced.

“To err is human.”  Right?

One of the messages sent to Paul, one day after the fire. It was from an acquaintance, a former co-worker he hadn’t heard from in years.

“I heard about your house. That’s terrible. But other than that, how are you doing?”

“To forgive is divine.” I don’t think forgiveness was necessary in this instance. I’m sure Paul just rolled his eyes.

I laughed and made it a story.

https://alisonhodgson.com/2012/03/119/

This is my only son and firstborn child, Christopher.

When the midwife handed him to me, I thought, “He is so heavy.” He weighed 8 pounds and some change, but seemed so much bigger.

“Are you sure?” I asked and they were until the next day when they weighed him again and he was over nine. Since newborns usually lose weight the first day they knew something was off. That was when they discovered that the scale in the delivery room was broken and estimated he had been closer to nine and a half pounds.

This was in 1995, one year before hearing tests for newborns was mandatory. So we took this beautiful boy home with an estimated birth weight and no idea that he was profoundly deaf…and so much more.

I have a post on Jana Riess’ blog, Flunking Sainthood about how to love and support the parents of kids with special needs and I hope you’ll check it out.

If you’ve come from there, welcome. You might enjoy this little snippet of a post about his birthday but NOT( God help me!) his birth.