Jay,
Jared, Kyrie, and Jesse have written the chapters of my life for half of the
time I have been alive really. They were
the authors of the sleepless nights, the scariest moments, the biggest battles,
and the countless trips to the emergency room.
The four of them wrote the sincerest moments of joy, the happy tears and
the incredible since of accomplishment and pride. It was a miraculous, over tiring, unsung
story.
I
can remember the loving Princess Kyrie and her many long dresses and homemade
flower crowns. It was such a refreshing
change from the Power Rangers and Batman costumes that I spent endless hours
creating. The wonder of huge birthday
parties for that one week in October.
There so much cake I was glad not to see or eat another cake the rest of
the year. I think about staying up until all hours of the night putting
together Christmas presents for Christmas morning. The beauty of their smiles and the
enchanting roars of laughter have made life a complete joy.
There
were those times I am not sure how one of them did not end up buried in the
back yard. The quarreling, slamming doors, the raised voices over things that
did not amount to a hill of beans were as frustrating for me as they were for them
just from a different standpoint that the buck always landed in my lap. The land of antibiotics for ear infections,
for pneumonia, and scarlet fever, the scary night watching them breath during
the croup, and the patient panic of getting stitches and watching them do dangerous,
foolish things have architected the
diaries of their childhood years.
I
think of the countless stories of silly moments and cute sayings that are today
as big a part of my everyday life as they were the moments they happened. We
still call them “miced” onions and “road destruction” thanks to a Jared. We all
smile biggest when we squeeze our eyes shut because that is Bear (Jesse) learned
to smile. I can imagine words written on
mirrors when I am having a bad day because it has always been Kyrie’s favorite
not board. I cannot pass anything dinosaur without think of Jay and “me see
Mommy”.
I
remember their first steps all the way to the last ones as they walked out of
my house to lives of their own. Jay learned to run before he walked were in Farmington
at his Grandparents and then in the blink of an eye he was moving out of the
house to live with Angie (his new wife). Jared’s were in Fredericksburg at my parent’s
house and Jared as close the door to go live at his father’s house. Kyrie’s were walking away from Brian who was inevitably
going to sit on her and as she excitedly jumped in the car to go to the airport
to leave for art school . Bear’s were in physical therapy and even though his
footsteps are still stomping about the house, I know that moment is coming all
too soon.
I have pictures of their first days of
school, their proms, their first cars, their various graduations, and even a
wedding now. I have a hope chest full
of paintings, hand prints and essays. I
have their announcements and grade cards.
I have all the precious Mother’s Day cards and gifts they made. I have their certificates of achievement and their
awards of excellence. They are safely stored away more in the way they occurred
than any particular order. We opened the
lid and it drifted onto the pile with all the other memories stored there.
I love my children and I pray that
someday they will have the blessing of children of their own. I have tried to
be a good mother but I know I have failed in many ways. I also know that I was
by far, a better mother than my own was to me. No one really has a playbook
that predicts all the moments in life. If you push button A, you will get
response B. You just do the best you can. If I got it wrong, I apologize but I
tried. I hope that someday you will know how much you have meant to me and
still do. I hope you know that I often read the pages and they fill up the
emptiness that is left as you have grown.
For
the most part, these are the chapters of my life. The memories and words that filled my pages
are not much different from those that fill the pages of mothers
everywhere. As we celebrate them
tomorrow, I wonder if you as children they know that those pages are more
precious us than other in our lives. I am not going to lie it is usually nice
to get a gift but in the end, truth is that the gift was our children to begin
with. For without them the story would never have been complete. You may travel
to the moon and back but in my heart I see the beautiful faces that were my
little ones I love you and I thank you
for such an incredible work of art.
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