It’s not hard because I can’t talk about Miranda. I love talking about my daughter. Unfortunately it often seems there is more of the “bad” to talk about than the “good”. I don’t shy away from opportunities to talk about her or tell about her short life, especially when someone is interested in more than the medical side of it, because the stories tied to Miranda that declare God’s glory are amazingly abundant.

It’s hard because I sit here with nearly six months worth of hindsight and countless amounts of information that wasn’t readily available when I needed it most.

At nearly six months after her birth the rawness of the emotions has dulled quite a bit and the way I am able to process things now is quite different.

It doesn’t mean I’m over it. It doesn’t mean the tragedy is minimized. It just means I can assess the road we’re walking with what I think is a pretty balanced footing.

In my interview today the nurse mentioned knowing Miranda’s purpose. I didn’t answer her because I still feel everyday we find out more and more of her impact and our purpose through it. But we knew her purpose on the night she was born, it’s what gave her her middle name…

Her life was meant to bring glory to God.

She did, and she does. There isn’t an inch of me that doubts it.

The final question I received today was “Is there anything you would change or do differently?”

I can hardly start to express all the things I would do differently if I was armed with the knowledge I have today all those many months ago.

But that’s the gift/curse of hindsight isn’t it?

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Why?

Because I’m left-handed.

When I took calligraphy in high school my teacher was good about trying to teach me techniques to compensate but I don’t even hold my regular pen the way a leftie “should”. So instead I just made do and kept blotting paper close by. The side of my left hand was often stained and I had to re-do quite a bit of work. I can get away with calligraphy markers because the felt nibs are forgiving of my nontraditional hand position.

So today I broke out an old copperplate nib and barrel as well as a parallel pen and fountain pen.

It’s been a number of years and I think it shows. I had a hard time mixing the gouache to a good consistency and I didn’t line my paper so my letters are dancing quite a bit.

If you’re a real calligrapher you might want to look away because you will shudder at the way I hold the poor parallel pen.

Then I played with an inexpensive Plumix fountain pen from Pilot (the only thing I could find locally). I like it, the ink flows well but it isn’t a pointed pen, which I prefer, instead it is an italic (or flat) nib. It writes well but not as fine as I would want (so I’ll be ordering a Noodler’s).

I can’t wait to see what she has in store for us next… hopefully my Amazon gift cards can handle it.

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It’s about how God is allowing the gifts He has given me to help heal my heart.

Some times a pen can express words that our mouths can’t seem to speak.

So thankful for the class Joanne is teaching, He is using it greatly to minister to my heart.

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