Dear friend,

I want to introduce you to someone close to my heart. I’ve been meaning to write for a while, but as you’ll see, it’s a lot to write about and I was a little overwhelmed. I’m ready now, so here it goes . . .

Coco Noel was born on November thirteenth at one minute past midnight, and not a minute too soon. We called her Coco because Wade wanted to name the baby “Hot Chocolate”, so we compromised on a Christmasy mix of Jacqueline “Coco” Noel. I always thought it would’ve been nice to have a little boy named Jack, and Coco had a nice ring. She was in fact, the same age as Wade, in a way. Not exactly a little sister.

They were both born on the same day, if you can call it that. Stored in the same lab after the same procedure on the same day four and a half years ago. Who knows, maybe she was actually older than him if she had developed a nano-second faster. They are twins, in a way. Anyway, out in the real world, almost exactly four years had gone by since Wade was born. She would’ve been baby Coco . . . and she was . . . I mean . . . she is, of course.

I wasn’t sure how to tell you about Coco because, you see, I have peace about it, and so I don’t want to make you sad. Now you’ve guessed what happened: She was supposed to be born in June, this year . . . not November, last year. She would’ve been a gemini, a lively twin, not a scorpio, mysteriously nestled back into the earth. And yet, of course, she was perfect.

The math gets a little tricky with IVF, how far along was I, really, after all was said and done? All I know for sure is that she was about eight and a half weeks old when she died and almost another four weeks went by before we knew for sure though, of course, in retrospect, there were signs -- omens, even. And somewhere, deep down, I had registered them all along the way. And so, when I began to find out, and when I found out for sure, I was not entirely surprised. There was no cause, it was just “one of those things”.

This was a sacred time. The whole thing. From deciding, after four years of not being really sure, to actually try again. To have made such a decision. To have it work out. To be pregnant and have a small child at the same time. To talk to Wade about the seed growing in my belly. To finally have it start to sink in after a couple months that I was, in fact, pregnant and I wanted to tell people and enjoy it. All I remember is being completely happy and relaxed. I had a lot of energy. I hardly felt pregnant at all.

Earlier that year, around May or June, reality had started to sink that my time to have another child was really running out, and not making a decision was, itself, a decision. It took me all summer to really warm up to the idea of following through but I knew, somehow, that I would want to know I had at least tried.

Around my birthday in August we started the process. I had the embryo transfer in late September. It was a beautiful autumn to be pregnant. Warm, sunny, and golden then turning cool and perfect with a great foliage season.

So we tried. . . and it worked. I had felt her attach to me the same way I had felt Wade arrive-- a very physical sensation of some high-density tiny thing landing all of a sudden into my womb from a great distance away. Coco came the same way, while I was in the kitchen. The nurse called a few days later with the news - pregnant, congratulations! I wasn’t surprised.

At the time I was in the midst of planning for my sister-in-law’s wedding flowers. I was creating all of the floral arrangements and I was having the time of my life. I loved absolutely every second of it and was even more joyful because I had a secret person to share it all with.

Some of the happiest moments of my life were being out in the garage until midnight, surrounded by flowers listening to Sam Cooke and “having such a good time dancin’ with my baby”. We danced, too, at the wedding surrounded by family. And she left a few days later, while we were all still glowing from the celebrations.

Coco came in with the flowers, she left with the flowers, and she is returning, now with the flowers.

One of the things I am most grateful for is that her birth was completely natural, as was Wade’s. She was born at home, something I had always wanted (my brother and I were both born at home). I had made a midnight temple out of the kitchen and the bathroom downstairs and she arrived to music and candles, soft prayers, and moonlight. I was alone, at my own request. I was not in pain and I was not worried, I would rather have complete privacy and that, too, was a gift. I immersed myself completely in the holy experience of having a miscarriage.

Eventually I held what I felt to be the small placenta in my bare hands and softly walked her around the house in my bare feet. We live in an old house and I had often walked the circle of the main floor with Wade as a baby, wondering how many other parents had done the same over the past two hundred years. So I carried her, too. I took her upstairs and through the bedrooms while others were sleeping. I took her under the moon and the stars and into the garden. I took her out to the crest of the hill by the maple and held her up so she could feel the cool air and moonlight.

A few days later, I went to the garden center and bought the best soil I could find. I came home and mixed it in a wheelbarrow with what I had saved from my experience (yes, blood and bits of womb). I mixed it with the dirt, and with seeds from that summer’s garden, and with rose petals, and with dried flowers left over from the wedding. With tears and prayers, music and gratitude.

I had bought dozens of early spring bulbs to plant because I couldn’t wait to see her again. In the strawberry bed we have a young magnolia. I dug a deep hole here where I put some more pieces of my experience (yes, more blood). Then I laid the hyacinth bulbs atop and buried them. Wade helped plant the tiny crocus. They all are coming up now along with the tulips and grape hyacinth all planted with the special dirt. I also planted some at my front door so that I can always come home to her.

So the bulbs are coming up now. These tiny yellow crocus. I don’t know if they’ll get bigger next year. My aunt Lorraine called them fairy crocus, and that made me happy. Of course, Coco’s garden is a fairy garden. A delightful midsummer oasis adorned with windchimes, lights, painted rocks and whatever else delights us.

The strawberries and the magnolia will both bloom in June, phenological twins, and she will be there, too, every year. But, of course, November 13 is her actual birthday and she is as mysteriously beautiful as they come. We were meant to exist this way, she and I -- not really together, not really apart, just this . . . a mysterious connection.

Today I’d been arranging Easter flowers and it reminded me so much of her that I thought I’d better tell you before too much more time went by. There is so much to say about this whole experience including how it all even came to pass and how I accidentally cast a spell when it was all over . . . about how it’s still hard and complicated six months later. About how parts of me were healed, revealed, elevated, laid to rest, and celebrated. But I can only write so much at once.

Many ancient myths tell us about innocent people being turned into flowers after they die. The urge to plant flowers after a loss seems to be one of the oldest human traits in the books. When it’s just bad luck, when it’s just one of those things, how can you cope? Apollo, the god of music and poetry, created a beautiful, fragrant flower from the ground where he had accidentally slain his best friend and lover, a young man named Hyacinth. Even the gods grieve . . . and I, a humble human gardener, did the same.

So . . . if you’ve been wondering how I’ve been the last six or seven months, things have been good but . . . I’ve been changed . . . and I am divinely grateful for it.

xxoo

m

PS: This is a little poem I wrote the next day, a tiny F. Scott Fitzgerald inspired piece that spoke the truth I believe: Somewhere on another plane, she and I are dining at Cafe Royale on Regent Street in London tomorrow night. If you’re there, you might notice us, we’ll be dressed to the nines and laughing about something only we understand.

November 14. 2025

We liked it better like this, she and I.

It was our little secret, in the best of ways.

We were a kiss in the doorway at midnight.

We were a happy ‘see you soon’.