June Gloom

The skies have been rather grey around here, both metaphorically, and in reality. It has been a cold spring, with intermittent periods of warm, but thundery and sticky weather. Most of the nights have been quite cold, and we haven't had heat in our apartment since the mid-April cut off, so I've kept flannel sheets on the bed. Yesterday, in anticipation of today's 80 degree high/thunderstorm, we switched the sheets to cotton.

Today I woke up feeling particularly gloomy. The clouds this morning were especially thick, I hadn't slept that well so I felt groggy, and I just plain didn't want to get out of bed. I couldn't put my finger on why I felt so bad; I just figured this was going to be one of those days.

This afternoon I had a question for Jeff, so I decided to give him a call. I picked up the phone and went into our bedroom, the one room in our apartment where the cell works reliably, and sprawled across the bed. I called; no answer. I rolled over to get up and was hit by the clearest memory picture: lying on my bed, on top of those same blue sheets, nudging my belly in an attempt to get Leah to kick for a video. Making that video was quite an awkward undertaking. Leah didn't kick often, as she was pretty snug in the womb, but she would be fairly reliable with her thumping in the morning after I showered and in the evening when I was settling into bed. The evening was Jeff's time, so the time for cinematography was in the morning. I would lay down, as flat as possible on the bed, so that my stomach actually made a little bump. With our digital camera set to video I would massage my tummy, talk with her, and poke her a little to get her to wiggle and kick. It was tricky to hold the camera still enough to make the difference between my stomach jumping and general camera unsteadiness discernible. It always seemed like she did her best kicking when I didn't have the camera ready.

I don't know if the blue sheets triggered all this, or if it was the weather, the timing, or (probably) all three. I am thankful for the reminder of good memories with Leah, but so tired of grieving. And the June gloom has just begun.