1. Baby Shoes Never Worn
When I came across Ernest Hemingway's six lines short story I started to cry.
For Sale. Baby Shoes. Never Worn. The biggest event of my life was the death
of my son Ben. He was never after a very normal pregnancy and I went into
labor at full term spontaneously. He just didn't make it. The signs were there at
towards the end of the labor that he was in distress and so I was taken into
theatre for an emergency c-section. Ben never breathed outside the womb.
That’s why Ernest Hemingway's six line short story made me cry. For Sale.
Baby Shoes. Never Worn. It’s funny how six words can transport you to
another world. That really difficult world of wondering what to do with all the
baby stuff that we had acquired, those gifts that people had sent in anticipation
of the birth, those hand-me-downs that other mothers had promised me would
come in handy. That pile of cloth nappies that I'd been eco-minded and think
that I'd be washing. Instead they got used as rags.
Heartbreaking. And the very strange thing about that whole time of Ben's death,
the funeral, his wee coffin, scattering the ashes in the river and the tears that
would not stop flowing was the complete clarity and realization that only in the
present moment was everything okay. It was immediately apparent that the
past was too painful. It was full of memory of being so happily and joyfully
expectant. And the future was too daunting. It was full of empty dreams and
baby shoes that had never been worn. Yet, when I could keep my mind from its

2. wanderings into past or future, I found myself feeling blessed. Feeling
strangely wonderful. Powerfully moved. Heartbroken with such incredible love.
Sitting with that feeling of surrender and of powerlessness was so very
humbling and I would not change it for the world. I was blessed by that
experience.
I did get rid of all the baby stuff and baby shoes eventually. It took me a while. I
remember nine months later emptying a chest of drawers and put the radio on
to hear of Lady Diana's death. Her six line story equally heartbreaking: Car
crash. Princess dies. Motherless boys.I didn't put those baby shoes up for sale.
I put my heart up for breaking again and again.