I think things happen for a reason. Lately, books have been coming to me at the perfect time. When I read Eat, Pray, Love  last year, I was shocked at how much it resonated with me. Shocked and deeply comforted. I needed it at that very moment in my life. It was my buoy in uncharted waters. 

I read a review of The Middle Place by Kelly Corrigan and knew I had to read it. I tore out the review from a magazine months ago and it sat on my desk among a pile of other crap. A blurb from the book stayed with me and I thought about it every day:

The Middle Place is about calling home. Instinctively. Even when all the paperwork -- a marriage license, a notarized deed, two birth certificates, and seven years of tax returns -- clearly indicates you're an adult, but all the same, there you are, clutching the phone and thanking God that you're still somebody's daughter.

The book arrived yesterday and I took it with me this morning to Finn's gymnastics class to read in the waiting room while he tumbled and swung and flailed about.

I got through half of the Prologue before I had to close the book and consciously fight back tears in the brightly lit waiting room. I sat there with the book closed and my hand on the cover, just breathing. It was breathing similar to the breathing you do after you've been underwater for a long time. I was trying to keep it together and not sob, quietly gulping for air. I also was so relieved to have found this woman's voice and story to cling to and absorb.

(added 1/11 - I forgot to add two major parts of the book. That she discovers she has breast cancer in the beginning of the memoir. And then after her chemo is done and she is on her way to recovering, her Dad discovers he has late stage cancer and dies. Meggie and I talked yesterday and both agreed that you are not an adult until a parent dies.)

Her father was a bigger than life, gregarious, Irish presence who made her laugh and filled the world with lightness and fun. I felt an instant kinship with her. I know I will laugh and cry my way through this book.

She calls the book, The Middle Place, because it is "that sliver of time when parenthood and childhood overlap."

As I anxiously approach the year anniversary of my Dad's death, I feel that way more than ever. I feel like a kid,  masquerading as an adult, with a husband and two children and a mortgage. And that one of these days my Dad will show up and tell me everything will be ok.

I am finding my way through the middle place now, and as Corrigan says so eloquently "It is about the family you make and the family you came from -- and locating, navigating and finally celebrating the place where they meet."

After an exhausting gymnastics class, I took the boy to get sushi. He sat like a perfect gentleman next to me as we chatted about the decor and ate our lunch. I wanted to tell him what a sweet, warm little comfort to me he was at that moment. And how interesting it was that profound grief and immense love and pride could live inside my heart at the same time. And how all I wanted to do was just curl up into a ball and cry. Instead, I kissed him on the head and told him I loved him and was proud of him.