Degrees of Separation

I'm one of those people who can SLEEP. I love to sleep. My head hits the pillow and I am OUT.

Of course even I would occasionally (though rarely) have trouble falling asleep. Usually because my mind just wouldn't 'quiet down'.... I start thinking and thinking and can't stop and get myself all upset or worked up and then I can't fall asleep. My trick for when this happens is to play the "Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon" game in my head. Yes, that's right.... it quiets my brain. I am really good at it, I pick the most difficult person I can think of so i have to really work at it. Makes me stop thinking about anything else, stop remembering or worrying and just start trying to somehow connect Bing Crosby to Kevin Bacon... by the time I figure it out I'm usually halfway to dreamland.

This week, I've been spending a lot of time laying in bed thinking about Kevin Bacon movies. I just cannot sleep. At first I blamed it on our Keurig and the large volume of coffee I've been drinking, but I don't think that's it.... I've been drinking disgusting amounts of coffee since the babies were born. It's my mind... it won't stop. Even my little trick isn't working. I'm not sure what it is that's causing it, but I'm tired.

So much of it is thinking about Jack, and so often it's just the little things. Trying to remember exactly what songs we had on his CD player. The precise walk from the parking garage up to his crib. The names of his nurses. What his little chubby hands looked like, what his stinky little neck smelled like (the kid never did have a real bath). The sound of the machine that suctioned out his nose, and how much he hated it. The feeling of him grabbing on so tight to my finger.

I can go days, weeks now even and feel okay. Feel okay about everything, love my girls and my husband and miss my Jack but really believe all the trite things I tell other people - it's okay. Jack's in heaven, he's watching over us, he's here with me all the time, I will see him again, at least he's not suffering anymore, Jack was a little angel who was never meant to be here long....

And then something will remind me of him, and sometimes it's the craziest thing. It's U2 singing "Beautiful Day" on Good Morning America, or Alicia Keyes at the Oscars. The other week it was John Carter fainting on ER.... when he fainted, as he went down, his eyes rolled back in his head and I instantly thought JACK! Jack used to do that all the time, he didn't have very good control over his eyes. This melodramatic moment on television actually made me smile for a moment, thinking of my blue eyed boy. But then it started my mind going and no amount of Kevin Bacon movies could stop it.

I hope the memories never stop. One of my biggest fears is forgetting anything. Jack was here for such a short time, every day, every second is so important.

At least once a day I look at the girls and think, where would Jack be... where would he fit on my lap, which swing would he be on, who would he be pushing off the firetruck, which direction would he be running in and how would I ever catch all three of them. And I always know we would make room on my lap, and it would be the swing right in between the girls, we would share the firetruck, and I would just have to run a little bit faster. I wish, I wish, I wish.