Dear Son,
There are so many things I can’t believe about 2020.
For example, you haven’t stepped foot into a classroom since March 13th.
You’ve played exactly…three baseball games since March 13th.
You’ve been in your room playing Minecraft since March 13th.
On March 13th, you were a 13 year old seventh grader, anticipating your final little league season, getting itchy for a summer of long-planned adventures and a kid who was exploring newfound independence that comes with age and not yet having broken the trust of your mother. On March 13th, you and Daughter hopped into the back of my Jeep after the final bell rang and I silently prayed I had enough toilet paper (wine) Trader Joe’s frozen orange chicken (wine) and strength (wine) to get us through the next three weeks of our stay at home order. Three weeks had never stretched so long; endless, empty days waited for us, only an hour or two of schoolwork each morning to occupy the parts of your brain that wanted to work. Three weeks to three months to three more months and yet..here we are. Desperate still for an end to this pandemic chapter entitled 2020: Go F*#k Yourself.
But what’s most unbelievable personally for me in this year of 2020 that we all anxiously await to be rid of, is that it began with a boy of 13, face still clinging to boyhood, voice still ringing of youth and it is ending with a young man of 14, face hinting of manhood, voice leaving no question of it. It is your birthday. You are now 14 years old and I can no longer deny that the years are closing in confusingly quickly; I can no longer deny that I am a mother of Older Kids; I can no longer deny that while you still gift me with hugs and snuggles, not to mention a body slam here and there when you mistake me for an NFL player, our time together is precious. I can no longer deny that we are closing in on the final years of your childhood.
So much of this year has felt exactly the same. So many days passed that we didn’t even bother to label. But in all that perpetual monotony, I watched as you changed, Son. I watched as the inches grew upon you, as your feet began to outsize mine. I watched, and sometimes cried, as your need for me dwindled. I know it’s what we want. I know it’s what it is supposed to be. I know that as a young mom with two toddlers clinging to me, I dreamed about what it would feel like one day to not always be so needed; to not always be so wanted.
And now I know.
Now I know it feels equally exhilarating and excruciating to watch you break away bit by bit to become your own man. To watch as you slip into your next skin, trailing the bits as they shed and me following behind, collecting them. I don’t want to ever forget any part of you, Son. I don’t want to ever forget any age. I don’t want to ever wish a moment away. Such a stubborn lesson we must keep learning; a lesson so often learned in retrospect that this too shall pass. Whether we beg for it stay, or beg for it to go, pass it will and we are simply left with the ghost of it.
I think your aunt, who has three grown boys, said it best, Son, when she told me that raising boys is like enduring the longest, most devastating break up you’ve ever experienced. But I would have to add that it’s also the most beautiful gift I could ever hope to receive. Because if this year, this god-awful, please let it end, soul sucking year has taught me anything, it’s that even as the clock ticks molasses and the days are only groundhog, your childhood is racing, sprinting to the finish line and I’m right there, clicking your heels, grabbing your shirttails, desperate to slow you down but amazed to watch you run.
I hope you never stop calling me Mama, baby mine.
Happy Birthday.
I love you.
Mama
