20 Years Ago Tonight

Today is June 11th. Twenty years ago, I was 39 weeks pregnant. It was a Friday in 1993. I had just had my farewell presentation and drinks at Leo Burnett - the agency I was working for. Having been presented with a big cane laundry basket over flowing with baby bits and consumed a couple of Diet Cokes, I went home at about 9pm and started feeling crappy. I had a bath, went into labour, got to the hospital about 12.30am and had George 90 minutes later.

My gorgeous baby boy.

Tomorrow, he would have been 20.

Had he still been with us, I can't imagine life would be going well. We was due for more spinal surgery in October last year - and you might recall, he almost didn't make it through the first operation in February.

He would have finished school and frankly, the options after that weren't great. The day facility I had chosen was due to the energy and philosophy of the woman in charge. When I rang last last year to say George had died, I was told she had left.

Had George not had NPC, I'm sure tomorrow would have been very different again. He would have been at uni, had a girlfriend I'm sure and be hanging out with his mates. But that's not how life turned out, was it. Powder Finger was on my iPod on the treadmill this afternoon; these days turned out nothing like I had planned. I'm not much of planner - but I certainly didn't imagine this day 20 years ago.

My mum knitted this cardi for George's Christening (yes, we are atheists - that's a story for another time)  - it's so tiny, he wore it when he was three months old. Mum also gave me the sapphire ring - blue for a boy.

And here's yet another amazing video my friend Sarah put together for his 18th - a great party! George didn't like seeing video of himself as a younger kid - I think it reminded him of his fading ability - so Sarah skillfully used stills for that part of his life. She cut it to one of his favourite bands, The Killers, Warning to show that regardless of his ability, he didn't hold back.

I'm having trouble embedding it because it does use a Killer's song, so here's the YouTube link.

We'll send up a lantern tomorrow morning to wish George a happy birthday and then I'm off to Thailand for work. More about that to come!

PS I didn't get this one proof read - timing is of the essence - sorry in advance.