This week my to do list hasn't gotten off the ground. When you break open your life with a crow bar by putting your son behind three sets of locked doors, things get forgotten. 

One night I was feeling fragile and a friend texted me. We volleyed back and forth a few times, which was a good distraction from the circular thinking I was stuck in. 

"My midwife once told me not to try to be comfortable."

I held her words like a glass dome. Why was it surprising that I was restless? Bringing Benjamin into this world was many things but it was not comfortable. We were in the messy process of bringing him into a new way of being, one in which we can all coexist without a constant surge of adrenaline. 

Comfortable has its perks. John's parents always took cushions to church, to soften the hour they sat each Sunday. At her funeral, I noticed that they are on a shelf, unused. 

But comfortable is not the presiding priority for the people I know who pay good money to sweat at a gym or in a marathon. Cozy is not a criterion when purchasing the cement on which you build a house, or the gas that ignites your engine. Au contraire,  tensile strength and explosive potential are what keep you safe in a storm, or speeding down the highway. 

For today, I am not comfortable. But between you and me, I have a hunch that John's mother has more comfort now than even a faded blue cushion could tender.