Just in case I die.

I'm having surgery on my sinuses.  Surgery under general anesthesia is something I've undergone a few times.  This is the first time I have felt the weight of those consent forms, the ones that warn patients that they might die during surgery, in my hands. 

A long time ago, when Michael and Stella were just babies--newborns, in fact, tiny little creatures that could barely see my face, but surely recognized their mother's smell and sound--I wrote a long letter listing all the things I hoped for my children, in the event that I died and was not able to raise them myself.  This seems like a morbid thing to do, as I was in the midst of celebrating new life,  but the first moment I realized that I had someone(s) other than myself to take care of and someone(s) who couldn't take care of himself and herself, all that I wanted for them to live and breathe and experience and just... be, appeared to me in a list.  First a list, then a series of images of them at each stage in their lives.  I wrote it all down.  I can't find it.  I can't find that darn letter. 

And now they are 6 years old.  Six:  Young, but so independent and determined.  They are already who they are.  They are wonderful; the epitome of beauty, inside and out--they know that inside matters more.  

I'm having surgery tomorrow, and I have been labeled by a few doctors now as being in the 1% club.  I'm the one who is that tiny fraction of a statistic who ruins the 100% accuracy of that statistic.  I go against what's supposed to happen. 

And I realize now, (as I go under the knife again), that instead of that long list of about 1000 things I want them to know, and do, and be, I just want them to be who they are, and simply know that I love them with every beat of my heart, and every flap of my "angel wings."