My socks are mocking me

As I walked into the recovery area, I heard a wailing baby.  It broke my heart.  I thought, I wish babies didn't have to suffer that way.  Then, as I came closer I realized the wailing sound was in fact, my sweet daughter fresh from surgery.  Oh how I wished in that moment, as I recalled all of the many times I have sat with her after surgery or before surgery any time that she has been in pain that I could somehow put her back in utero.  She seemed so protected there and safe somehow as if I had some control over all this craziness.  It seemed an absurd notion to take this stout 9-year-old and try to shove her back into my body.  As she lay there, Ellie kept muttering how she did not feel happy.  Which is the exact opposite of how she typically is feeling--grabulous (great + fabulous), joyburstish, happy.  When she was younger, I would sing to her in these situations, but Ellie insisted she did not want a song.  That left me searching desperately for something to distract her, I started to tell Ellie how Ms. Zwart just sent me an e-mail telling me that she was sending Ellie a huggle snuggle.  As I told Ellie, she got that "surprised" look that is her favorite right now and she was back to her old self.  Ellie was complaining of her head hurting and I saw the incision on her head and wanted to scream.  I thought of this scene from Mad About You when Helen Hunt's character is delivering a baby.  Her mother, played by Carol Burnett becomes so upset that her daughter is in pain that she has to be sedated.  In my head, that was exactly how I was feeling right then.  "Why haven't we given her something for the pain??"  I wanted to change my mind about inflicting this pain on her right now.  Then I looked down and there on the bed were my happy face socks I'd worn today because I knew that Ellie would like them.  I thought how bizarre to be wearing happy face socks at such an unhappy moment.  I wanted to rip the socks off or at the very least change them into sad faces.  I think a lesson can be learned by all, that your socks will be with you for the rest of the day, so take care when you pick them...I know we will all feel better soon, but that wailing is still quite fresh.