It’s the day before Thanksgiving and I’ve got about 15 minutes until Henry wakes up, so let’s see what I can do with it.
Really, there’s too much to say. There’s always too much to say, so I’ll do what I always do and thank the higher powers and the lower powers and the super powers and the not-so-super powers for everyone and everything that makes life so beautiful, so raw and so fun.
Since this window is brief, I’ll focus on one thing, a recent development.
My son has started to give me kisses. Nothing lifts me like this does. Nothing. When he sees me from across a room, he’ll give me this look. It’s a cross between What Can I Break and What Can I Climb. If I’m perceptive enough to catch him in the middle of these two thoughts, I’ll throw my arms open and he’ll spring into my embrace, landing at my chest like a wild animal returning to its mother after a long hunt. Sometimes he turns his face to mine and plants a slobbery kiss on my chin, or my cheeks, or my forehead, or my glasses. Sometimes he’ll just stand there waiting for me to kiss him. This rare exhibit of patience astounds me.
I kissed a lot of boys in my day, but nothing prepared me for the joy of being kissed by my 18-month-old son. Joy is an understatement. It’s surreal actually. When you take the time to live in it, the heaviness and the lightness of the moment can spin you around. It’s essentially a flash, a spark in your day, and the more he does it the more you take it for granted.
It’s one of those feelings that as a writer I’ll never accurately describe. It puts into perspective the things that matter and the things that don’t. It wipes away the difficulties of motherhood. It conjures up in you the hopefulness of youth, the wisdom of adulthood, the profound sense of love that fills a body with warmth and gratitude. So much gratitude.