Images of Max

Images of Maxie have been dancing in my head all morning.  Warm and Cozy, warm and cozy....Maxie all wrapped up in a towel, smiling at me.  Jumpie, jumpie, jumpie....Maxie in his jumperoo, smiling at me.  Maxie Moo Moo!  Maxie Moo!  Maxie Moo Moo!  Maxie Moo!  Maxie sitting in his car seat, chewing on his Cat in the Hat soft book, smiling at me in the mirror.  Sometime several weeks before Maxie died, he was on the changing table and I was about to put a diaper on him when I heard a loud "TOOT".  Max farted.  I yelped and jumped back a bit.  He started cracking up.  I started cracking up.  We both laughed and laughed.  There are a couple of big red chairs on my mom's deck, behind the tree, next to her pool.  I used to like to sit in the chair, on the deck, looking out at the trees with Maxie on my lap, his face occasionally pressed against mine, while he played and played with my infinity necklace Ted gave me for our wedding.  I used to lay Maxie on the bed and hold him by the hands, and then sit him up, he would crunch his little ab muscles to help me help him up, his face full of a concentrated look.  Then after I had him sit and I would pull him up to stand and his face would go from concentration to a big smile as I said "Up up up up and All the way up!"  I am so lonely without Max.  Everyone asks me if there is anything that I do that gives me any relief.  Here is my answer.  There are periods that I don't cry.  Is that relief?  I enjoy being with Ted but I recognize that I am sucky company and he may not feel the same way about me.  He makes me laugh though and that is a good thing.  Honestly, I am sad all day and all night long.  This isn't real.  It is much too devastating to be real.  Real life would be me, putting on the Raffi Pandora station and dancing around the livingroom with the baby, who we made, who lived inside of me, who I gave birth to, who I nursed and fed and sung to sleep.  My little pumpkin, my punky, my monkey, my Max.