It’s the night before Adahlia’s 4th birthday.

And I had just written a quick Facebook post about how excited we all were… how I’m spoiling her, but I can’t help it, because every month its a miracle she’s still here, and with all the complications and big health scares, she is still, somehow, about to celebrate four years with us (nearly five if you count the time in my belly).

We finished icing her cake and cupcakes, decorated as per her request: pink icing, star sprinkles, flowers, butterflies, a bumblebee making honey, Hamiya (our cat), and her own name.

And then, as I’m getting her ready for bed, she says:  “I can’t wait for my last birthday!”

And then:  “Tomorrow is my last birthday!”

“Last” birthday?  Such as phrase has never escaped her mouth before.

She’s always said “fourth” birthday.

Each time she said “last birthday,” my jaw tightened.  My muscles around my heart constricted and I stopped breathing.

So, naturally, I could not say anything.

And once that moment passed, both times, I merely continued the joyful exclamations:  “It’s going to be wonderful!  I can’t wait!”

But, I mean, shit.

And all I have to say to Spirit on that one, is NO.

Of course, I understand that I really don’t have much of a say, ultimately, though I’m free to put up as much of a fight as I want, and to make my desires and intentions plainly known, as a co-creator of the divine plan.

And my vote is:  No!

I mean, come on.

Why am I relaying this to you all?  Why am I being “Miss Debbie Downer” right before her birthday, on a super holiday weekend promising all sorts of delights?

Well, because I’ve promised to write this blog honestly.  And while I do still promise to follow up this post with joyful pictures of her birthday celebrations, I also need to share that this happened.

Because it sucked.  It cast a bit of a shadow.   Ignorance is bliss… right?

Maybe.  But maybe we’re not meant to remain ignorant children forever.

Maybe we’re meant to figure out how to be joyful even when Shit SUCKS.

And so, maybe its a gift.

Because truth is, I cannot tell the future.  Is there anyway to know if this was just the random babbling of a child or the revelation of heavenly prophecy?  No.

Just in case, I’ll be sure to live it up tomorrow.  To make this weekend — and this upcoming year of her life — the most FANTASTIC series of moments yet.

Dammit, I WILL find a way to dance in the rain and not give a hoot about the future.

About any false and meaningless constructs.

I will break into a enlightened state of being where the future doesn’t exist and therefore does not need to be feared or mourned, despite what anyone (of any title, degree, or reality) tells me to the contrary.  A place where nothing exists except what is.

And that’s the fact that she’s still alive, we’re both still here playing, and anything can happen.

Adahlia has become very adamant recently that she doesn’t want any more transfusions.  The other day, she skinned her knee very badly and it bled profusely.  Exalted, she showed it to me, saying:  “Look, Mama, I AM making my own blood!”

Whether she is or not, I know it is up to me to find a way to clear the grief and sorrow of motherhood just as surely as all of its ignorant joys (joys that can be so easily squashed), to make room for something brighter, something everlasting, something timeless.

Something true.

Its a heck of a soul challenge — these sorrows and joys of motherhood are ancient, biblical, and have been ingrained into the very fabric of our DNA… but I accept.

I will clear it.  I will live in Light and Wisdom.  I will move into and through and transcend this experience.

And as I work to reclaim and remain cognizant of this ultimate reality, if you have a moment on Sunday, July 3rd, I want you to picture Adahlia in your mind, surrounded by a bubble of bright golden light.  And I want you to see this light pouring into her, infusing her, igniting the diamond-white light of her own life force, and then flowing back out again in an even brighter bubble of golden and diamond light, a light that will sustain, keep, and protect her for twenty, thirty, and even sixty more years.

Thanks for coming along on this ride.

Lov,e.