The Birth of Avia Joy

     Like Sarah and Elizabeth, I was beyond my childbearing years, but for a number of months now, I felt the sense of a new life bubbling within my being.

     I had felt this way almost four years ago, when I ended up giving birth to a manuscript about a very holy woman, but that's another story.

     What was I pregnant with this time? A mother does wonder much as she awaits the new life to make itself known. I knew I needed to be patient and wait . . .that I needed to trust that God would reveal it to me. Like a pregnant woman, I pondered and questioned as different ideas would come to mind. My disposition is such that waiting is difficult. I was always the kid in the back seat asking, "aren't we there yet?"

     I also had the fear that maybe I was wrong, and it was just my vivid imagination. I better just keep this to myself . . .but I couldn't. I found myself sharing this with my closest friends, and asking for their prayers.

     For a number of months now, several of my friends kept telling me to start a blog. "A blog?," I replied. "I don't know the first thing about writing a blog - nor do I have the time to do it even if I knew how."

     "God - this is not You - you know, this blog thing - is it?"  No, I was sure it was not Him. But the suggestion kept presenting itself again and again.

     I made an appointment with my Pastor to go to confession, and while I was there, I mentioned about this "feeling" I had about this new life within, and the whole "blog thing." I told him I didn't think that blogging was the answer. Boy was I surprised when for part of my penance, he told me to look into what I had to do to begin a blog!

     I was more perplexed than ever, but at the same time, felt like God had spoken to me through His priest. So, since this was part of my penance, I needed to do what Father had told me to do.

     I talked with a friend who has a blog, and she was helpful. But since she lives so far from me, and I am a visual learner, I knew that was not the answer.

     When I mentioned it to my daughter- in- law, she said she would help me to get started. I didn't know how to feel - excited or scared - but as I pondered the idea more and more, the feeling of excitement outweighed my feelings of fear.

     "A name. You need to come up with a name,"she told me. Now I really felt like I was going to give birth, and at that moment I knew this was of God. He had planted the name that I would give to this new life,though I did not know it at the time.

     About a month prior to this conversation, my husband and I were watching a show, where a women shared that she had changed her name when she became a practicing Jew. She changed her name to Avia, because it meant "God is my Father." I was deeply struck by that name because of my close relationship with God the Father, and it resonated deep with in my heart.

      I needed a name to go with Avia. I didn't have to look far. My baptismal name means "one of joyful spirit," so Joy is a name I sometimes use with God. That's it - Avia Joy!

     So it is true. I am giving birth to Avia Joy, and you are here to meet her. I don't think you'll be disappointed. She is a song that has been waiting to be sung, but till now, I didn't have the words, and I didn't know where to sing it.