Just Keep Swimming!

We are connected to one another in ways not even imaginable just a few short years ago. One status update on one Facebook account can make me laugh for awhile, cry, or even add to my worldview. I am able to see a friend while talking to her on Skype. I can connect with countless people in an instant. I don't know if I would be as grateful for these technological breakthroughs if cancer had never poked its icy fingers into our family's lives. I can cry with other moms battling with their child by simply reading blogs. I feel understood. I feel their pain, their anger, their awe...all of it. It is crazy how I am comforted by the like-minded bafflement we parents experience when we see our own flesh and blood battle for their lives with more strength and positivity than we thought even existed in super heroes, let alone our babies. You are no longer strangers to me, but family. I pray for your little warriors as well as my own everyday. That will never change.

I feel like supportive strangers are snowballing into larger numbers and prayers are lifted in heftier doses every single day. I can't tell you how blessed I feel by this. Just today a friend sent me a link to an event created by an absolute stranger; someone I have never met. She created an event called "Fishies for Gideon" urging her college friends to donate blood on Gideon's behalf. Pausing for a tear break. Hold on, please........................................................................................................................................................ Breathing...and......back.

Wow.

I'm getting frustrated with myself for being so shocked by generosity and love....still. After six months I am still a granitified (Glinda the Good Witch makes up words with wild abandon, so shall I) deer whenever anyone exposes their gorgeous soul to me. Gideon never is shocked. He waves at the sweet man who bought our lunch at the hospital like, "That was great of you! Have a nice day!" while I stand there dumbstruck and ready to sob myself into a puddle of hysterics. Still. More beauty abounds! You are everywhere. I see you. I feel what you are doing, and you are softening hearts with your actions (just like that commercial...the one with the woman who stops someone from crossing the street when a car came buzzing around, and that in-turn made that person hold the door of an elevator...good begets good...).

Speaking of beauty, Katelyn Drake came over to drop off more NO SHARK shirts for the Clinic staff and also the money raised at the ORANGE OUT she organized. From just one basketball game and after covering all of the expenses, I will be dropping off six HUNDRED dollars to our Clinic tomorrow! WOAH. Woah. THANK YOU to all of you who were a part of this. Again, you have amazed me.

Back to the GOOD FISHIES... Gideon has been anxiously waiting by the door each time I go out for the mail. As soon as I walk in he squeaks, "IS THERE ANYTHING IN THERE FOR ME?!" Ever since I posted this post, Gideon has gotten a fishy in the mail quite often! We are up to 15 fishies so far...That's 45 people who have benefited from receiving blood in my little man's honor. If you have donated and have not sent a fish just yet, please go back to this post for the templates and our address. I also want you to know this: Every fish sent is absolutely cherished by Gideon. He fawns over every single one...the glittered and the penciled, both. If you are not artistically inclined, your fishy will still be loved and given a home in Gideon's Sea of Loving Souls, I promise. We are a no-flush-fishy rescue, and each one is fed by Gideon's giggles of glee.

With that, I will post Gideon's fishy arrival of the day today. I have a really high-pitched voice. Sorry about that. I guess you all already know that, it's me that's startled by it every time I hear myself speak. I can't help it. I get all excitamatic (another Glinda-inspired term).

Please note: Gideon is psyched at the beginning and then is all serious at the end. Just as I stopped recording, Gideon asked how the mail system works. He didn't ask it like that, he asked: "How do these fishies get here?" So, his little wheels are turning and his face is all serious. We went back to HOORAY! soon after I explained. ;)