SURPRISE IS WHERE THE MAGIC LIVES

I can't even put it into words...but she can. And I've often wondered, about the lessons and the timing and why? Why now? Why couldn't I have found you earlier, before the heartbreak, before the tragedy of brain injuries and infidelities? But, you know, life just isn't our terms.

And instead of worrying and wondering? I'd really rather just enjoy it. Sit and write. Lie down with IV when he naps and not worry. Walk in to the house and inhale deeply the smell of my life and family.

...It would have been about that day, March 9th, 2011 and how I realized that there's no such thing as a planned anything. As a planned pregnancy or a planned career or a planned life or a planned afternoon. Even when I try to plan... it rains. Or someone gets sick. Or there are two babies in my uterus instead of one.

That's the magic. We have no idea. Ever. We have no idea until the storm passes and we are on our backs in a field ten miles away from home.

And all of the things that aren't supposed to happen will because all the things that weren't supposed to happen did. Because that's how life moves forward. By dealing with the aftermath of the unplanned.

Surprise is where the magic lives, between the margins of to-do lists, the aftermath of the eviction notice, the tiny movements on the ultrasound machine.

And maybe this is all just coincidence...maybe all of this is just stuff that happens and when enough stuff happens, more stuff happens after that

Or maybe, somewhere, deep within me us, sits a pocket of magic. And once in a while, we are given the option to tap into it, to watch from the audience as the rabbit comes bounding out of the hat, free and fearless and full-speed ahead, surprising even the man with the wand.