Good Fortune

Jeremiah read somewhere that this year's Corsendunk Christmas was on tap at the Brickstore. Yum. Excited, we packed up the family and headed over to our favorite downtown Decatur pub. When we got there we learned that the Christmas ale was in the building but they hadn't tapped it and had no plans of doing so. Stricken, I grumbled a bit about our having gathered up the children to rush out for WHAT? To this, Jeremiah responded something along the lines that I never had it so good. "You're lucky! Kate, tell your mommy she's lucky". Kate obediently turned to me and said "you're lucky mommy!" Looking at her sweet, round face, and across the table at Jeremiah and Sarah who was snug and snoozing in her carseat, I had to concede the point. Then, unprompted, Kate turned to Jeremiah and said "you're lucky daddy!" Jeremiah agreed. Then she said "I'm lucky!" And to that, Jeremiah and I both agreed.

When I got home mom called. Among more cheerful items, she told me Sue's pregnant god-daughter, Chris, had lost her baby. I've never met Chris but she's dear to Sue and Sue's dear to us so that makes Chris extended family by default. She was 17 weeks pregnant and her baby had failed to develop a brain, so she had to be induced to deliver it and then name it so a death certificate could be drawn up. Holy crap. I was unable to avoid imagining how I'd have felt if that had happened to either of my kids. In fact the thought of it still brought tears to my eyes this morning. The whole time mom was talking about it, I could only hear Kate saying, with her ketchup-soiled grin, "you're lucky, mommy!" Truly, I never had it so good.