February 25, 2017
12:03 p.m.

Do babies have souls before they're born, or does the soul dart in at the moment of birth?

Are souls reincarnated? Does a soul leave the body of a dying person and then hover around waiting for the next available body? Or does it pick and choose?

Do you suppose there have been souls created for the express purpose of entering the bodies of babies who will only live briefly? Souls that are forever infant souls, entering the babes as they are born, viewing the mothers and fathers who hold and love the newborn until it passes? Souls who are there for no other reason except to gaze into the faces of parents so those parents will know that however short a time that baby stays with them, it was aware of them and knew somehow that it was loved? A soul sent only to comfort the souls who would remain?

Some people sleep at night, and have dreams they forget as soon as they wake up.

Then there's me. I lay there staring into the darkness, my brain whirling with what usually amounts to a lot of nonsense. If I'm lucky, I get story ideas or continue the one I'm actively working on.

Sometimes I'm not so lucky. Sometimes I get questions like the ones you just read.

And they drive me crazy.

I mean, think about it: little souls who are sent by God to spend a short time with parents who will very soon be grieving the loss of their baby. This little soul who enlivens the child, who fills it with personality and awareness for a brief time, and then returns to God, having completed a task to give a grieving mother some comfort that her child was really, truly with her and understood that there was love.

Could that be true? And in that case, could it be the same soul, over and over again tasked with that same mission, never to exist in a larger time frame, never to grow up and grow old?

Wow. What a terrible job! What a profound responsibility!

I hope it's not true. I hope souls take turns with that. Because that would be too much to ask, wouldn't it? Every soul deserves a chance at a lifetime, right?

Yeah...I don't know where these questions come from. Insomnia really sucks. No one should get so tired that things like this pop into their minds and make them question the universal plan. How can I question a plan I have no real knowledge of?

What do you think--is there an infinite number of souls and they all exist only once, ever? Or do they get recycled?

I'm asking because--wow--it seems really unfair that a one-use-only soul might only get to make a twelve minute appearance, and then "poof!" This while another soul drops in and hangs around for a hundred plus years.

I'm thinking, nah. There's got to be some kind of plan so every soul gets a chance to climb a tree or pick a rose, or take Mom a dandelion with a proud smile.

Maybe God knows which babies are not going to get to stay more than a couple of hours, and so no soul drops in at all.

No, I can't believe that, either. There's a life there, even if it is a brief one. If there's a life, there's a soul. There has to be.

Which again begs the question--is there a soul before birth?

You can see why I'm feeling a little crazy, can't you? Who can answer these questions? Besides God, I mean, because He's not talking to me about this one.

I know there are a lot of people who would tell me one way or another, and use their own convictions to prove to me that right to life is or is not valid.

The truth is, we don't know the answer. We don't know when the soul does or does not exisit in a baby. We don't know if a child who dies in utero under any circumstance had a soul yet. The two-and-a-half month miscarriage or the eight-month sudden death before birth--alive? Yes, both were alive, and then they were not alive.  Endowed with a soul prior to first breath? We don't know. No one knows.

Or do we? The bible says that when Mary, barely pregnant with the infant Jesus, went to visit with the much-more pregnant mother of John the Baptist, Elizabeth, the older infant leapt with joy in his mother's womb because he recognized the Savior Mary was to give birth to.

(It's in there, but I'm too tired to go look it up and give you the details. You go look it up.)

(Yeah, yeah, you knew I'd do it for you, didn't you? Luke 1:39-56 )

Anyway, that sounds to me like there is a soul before birth. At least in the case of the six-month- gestational-aged John the Baptist. And the less-than-a-month-gestational-aged Savior.

Hmm. Something to think about.

Something else to think about. Since I was already thinking all this other stuff.

Whatever it all means, I still have no idea if that same little soul makes repeated trips into the bodies of short-lived infants to bring comfort to the parents, or if all souls take turns doing it, or if souls have a one-term-only residency program.

No wonder I can't sleep.

Puppies. I need to think about puppies. Puppies are cute. Puppies are simple. Puppies are cuddly. Puppies would sleep with me and keep me from thinking profound thoughts that lead me nowhere except to more questions.

Yeah. Puppies. Worst case, I have to pick up poop.

I can deal with that.
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11:54 p.m.

Do you suppose that people who read my blog consider calling the nice young men in the clean white coats and the butterfly nets?

I got busy and forgot to finish this post earlier. So now I read it over, and I'm wondering if I can somehow talk my dad into letting me get a puppy.

Not gonna happen. Ha ha! There are too many upcoming travel plans in this household. And when I go back to Colorado, there are already a couple of dogs who can try to hog my bed.

Anyway, I guess I will post this and let the chips fall where they may. Hopefully no dudes with straight jackets show up at the door in the next few days.

Hopefully, I will go to sleep tonight!!

Thinking about PUPPIES!

Good night!