So many things take on new meaning after a baby dies. The song ‘You Are my Sunshine,’ for instance, will never sound the same.
Tonight, E and I hauled some of her old baby toys out of the closet. We found a cloth book she used to love and began to read it…
Where is baby? I read, and we looked at each other.
Under this leaf?
Behind this cloud?
In my heart?
We looked at each other again.
Yes. Yes. Oh, yes.
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i sang “You are my Sunshine” to little sun nearly every day when i was pregnant and then when Froggy first put him into my arms. it was such a happy song. i always avoided the first stanza, though. i sang it to him again when they told us there was no hope, and it was played at his funeral. i can’t listen to it now…
the book you write about here made me think of an animated short made by a man who lost his son. http://www.benjamingibeaux.fr/lespetiteschosesdelavie/?langue=en
much ❤ to you.
Eliza died in December and I swear the only song that was playing in a loop on the radio was “All I want for Christmas is you…” Mariah Carey, ripping my heart out.
Ah, yes, the song. So many minefields I never expected.
And that book. XOXO
Omg yes to the songs…the books…the whole lot. It’s all different now.
An entirely new lens. A new life. Everything is different.
Oh, oh. How hard to read innocent books like that.
I have found myself drawn towards break-up songs lately, for the first time since adolescence. All that singing about loss, about being left, about heartbreak. Sometimes it seems inappropriate, but sometimes it’s satisfying to sing along.
I think so many of us feel as if that song belongs to us. It’s our unnofficial anthem, the pleading, please don’t take my sunshine away. Where is baby? Such an innocent, but shattering question. xx