Sorry Not Sorry

I saw that friend of mine, he said

you look different somehow

I said

everybody's got to leave their darkness sometime

I said

I'm so happy that I can't stop crying

I'm laughing through my tears

-Sting, “I’m So Happy I Can’t Stop Crying”

I’ve felt SORRY for being pregnant this time around. Inside I’m doing cartwheels, preparing to close a chapter, and writing heavenly thank you notes for my abundance…but I’m also very SORRY. I’m SORRY because I was a former poster child for infertility. I belonged to a club where we occassionally glowered and sneered at people who “got pregnant by accident” or “had no idea how it happened.” Come on, Bozos, you know how it happened. Spare us your fake surprise.

I had to inform my club I got pregnant by accident and had no idea how it happened. It’s always beneficial (and painfully eye-opening) to live both sides of the coin. It was a surprise and I know exactly how they feel about it. I’m SORRY.

Archer was a long-awaited, expensive, public miracle yet I’ve basically hunched over to hide this new baby bump. I feel like a traitor to my former comrades; I feel undeserving of an “extra free baby” when Archer already healed my wounds. I’ve almost forgotten what I used to feel like; I rub my scar but the knot doesn’t hurt.

What if I move and my new circle thinks I’m just a par-for-the-course, van-owning, appointment-forgetting, squishy mother of three who rants about lack of personal time and loss of hobbies? They won’t know about the 12-year war I survived, about the old circle who fasted and prayed and willed Archer here, or about the empty hole I babysat for 1/3 of my mortal existence. Which reminds me: what do I not know about those around me? Not everyone in a circle is open.

It’s often seemed like the right thing to do: to play down incoming joy so those lacking don’t feel even worse. I would never share a favorite pancake recipe with my dog groomer who has Celiac disease because that would be cruel and unusual punishment. Likewise, I shouldn’t gush about an excess baby when there are still people aching for a first. It’s the higher road of smile self-denial, right?

Wrong.

I believe censoring happiness or sweeping joy under the mat is no kind of do-gooding to those who feel BLUE; it’s just a disguise for ingratitude. It’s a great way to waste a blessing. It’s shunning the highs to forever feel low when the point of life is to feel them both. BLUE is a beast we all have to kill our own way with our own weapons. Sometimes BLUE is like a trick birthday candle that keeps lighting after you blow it out. I'M BAAA-AAACK! Anvil smash. SURPRISE! Gunshot. MISS ME? Dynamite.

Amy Harris, a girl I knew as a newlywed and later learned was the childhood best friend of my neighbor, is an opera-singing, hot-ham-and-mustard-in-foil, pixie-cut sprite who surrounds herself with good music. One day she shared this:

I was listening to a Mozart violin concerto on public radio this morning. At the end one of the DJs commented that something very special about Mozart is even in his darkest moments there is always a little smile in his music.

Steve Vawdrey shared this odd epitaph* he read about in the newspaper:

HERE LIES A MAN TWICE BLESSED: HE WAS HAPPY AND HE KNEW IT

Am I happy? Do I know it? Does my face surely show it? Am I clapping my hands?

My friend Jonna sent a text with the emoji I call FAKE SMILE. In my mind it is the face of someone trapped in an awkward moment or frozen with embarrassment but trying to pass it off as a smile. When she sent it I thought I had ticked her off. I apologized but she told me she sent it as CHEESY SMILE. She was not upset. I guess there is a vast spectrum of emoji interpretation. She saw grin, I saw growl. I know, I know, my emoji glass is apparently half empty.

It is not enough to continue the walk with gritted teeth. We are told to "rejoice evermore” (1 Thes. 5:16). We are "that we might have joy" (2 Ne. 2:25).

This is a line from one of my very favorite sermons ever. The author was speaking of the pioneers and how they had to keep walking and walking and walking. And then walk some more. Their personal journeys were smattered with difficulties yet they were expected to rejoice (cheesy smile) and not grit their teeth (fake smile.) Such similar faces. Such different feelings. The Lord’s plan is a happy one. Happiness doesn’t happen; happiness is a choice.

William Faulkner said,

YOU DON'T LOVE BECAUSE, YOU LOVE DESPITE;

NOT FOR THE VIRTUES, BUT DESPITE THE FAULTS.

I had to love life like that when I was heartbroken and holey. I didn't love life because I had everything I wanted; I loved life because I manually inserted a smile on life's blue sheet music. I faked it many, many times until I made it.

I don’t want to fake smile about this baby. I want to rejoice out loud in broad daylight with a multi-toothed smile. SORRY NOT SORRY. I have plenty of legitimate teeth-gritting hard stuff in my life. We all do. I wish everyone who wanted a baby had one fast, free, and easy. I wish life came without obstacles, however, my Obstacle (when it's big it gets a capital letter) was the greatest school of learning to date and my current cartwheels would be null and void without it. The final exam was accepting my happiness cannot depend on what anyone else says, does, or has. I think the converse rule also applies: my happiness cannot depend on what someone doesn't have. It's a truth I've forgotten these past few months.

I can't change the timing and fate of other people’s lives so being the baby martyr won't help anything. I can compassionately mourn with those that mourn without mourning my own happiness. Looking at joy "through a glass darkly" doesn't change the fact that joy is crisp, clear, not blue, and meant to be viewed in high definition.

*Any time I hear about gravestones I think of the beautiful American Fork Cemetery. I have taken pictures of it during every season. I love walking the uphill mile from my house until I reach the obelisk. If you stand next to it 30 minutes after the sun has set you will be surrounded by a continuous silhouette of mountains. And if you look to the right you’ll see the freshly scrubbed, always clean headstone marking J’s sister.

After I read Betty Spencer’s “The Early History of American Fork” I went to the cemetery to find the graves of Arza Adams and his family. He was one of the founders of dear old AF. The markers look like giant Mickey Mouse ears because they are half-buried grist mill stones. Stephen Chipman was the other founder and his historic mansion on Main Street is the current retail location for “The Glass Slipper” and “The Belle, Book, and Candle.” If I could just take the built-ins from the entry of that home I’d die a twice blessed happy woman!

Craig Roberts, who could easily pass as one of the nicest people in American Fork, said, “People aren’t afraid to die. They are afraid to live a life that doesn’t matter.” Which reminds me of Fran from Strictly Ballroom when she screams "Vivir con miedo es como vivir a medias!" ("A life lived in fear is a life half lived!") to her dance partner, Scott Who Only Wears Wife Beaters. And speaking of people concerned about happiness in Spanish...check out the truck I parked next to at the bank. If piñatas can be happy surely people can be happy.

-quote about gritting teeth by Elaine S. Sorensen Marshall from her May 2, 2013 BYU Women's Conference address "A Pattern For a Joyful Life"

-through a glass darkly reference: 1 Corinthians 13:12, Paul speaking about the power of charity (but I love the imagery of looking through an antique mirror or a dirty mirror that doesn't portray reality)

-SORRY card from the ever-thoughtful, thrift-scoring Frenchie