Stages

As a parent, especially a first-timer, it's natural I am going to love every one of your stages, the next more than the last.

As a newborn, I couldn't get enough of your quiet sleepiness, the way you'd lay on my chest content for hours. The way your tiny, fuzzy head smelled.

As an infant when your mouth gave way to smiles and gurgles and coos; how you were finally communicating with the world around you.

As a toddler when you began to speak and run, all within a matter of months. How you blew my mind with your fierce capabilities.

Now, as a girl, how you want to be everywhere and everything your Mama is. I am in LOVE with this stage of your life. How you want to be taught. How patient you are. How near you are to me. How proud you make yourself when you contribute to our daily lives together.



It's helping sort laundry, throw things away, pick up after ourselves, do the dishes, clean the sinks, mail the letters, feed the dog. Clip the coupons on quiet, sunny Sunday mornings while we drink coffee and juice, and eat warm muffins together.

There is nothing I'll love more than this stage than the next.

Ice Cream Cone

Friday night on a whim, we headed out for ice cream. I love the spontaneity weekends provide!
It was cold enough to warrant coats, hats, and the heater.
But that didn't matter to us.



This was your first ice cream cone. You've had plenty of bites and bowls of ice cream, but there's just something sweet about your first cone- all by yourself!



The minute we got home, I made a mad dash for the camera- telling Daddy I needed to document this for LDM.
I mean- you only have your first ice cream cone once!



And I'd say your happiness was unparalleled. The rest of the weekend when I asked you want you wanted for meals, or snacks, or even to do, you answered, ice cream? with hope in your voice.

And I don't blame you for asking!

Empathy

Main Entry: em·pa·thy
Pronunciation: \ˈem-pə-thē\
Function: noun
Etymology: Greek empatheia, literally, passion, from empathēs emotional, from em- + pathos feelings, emotion — more at pathos
Date: 1850
1 : the imaginative projection of a subjective state into an object so that the object appears to be infused with it
2 : the action of understanding, being aware of, being sensitive to, and vicariously experiencing the feelings, thoughts, and experience of another of either the past or present without having the feelings, thoughts, and experience fully communicated in an objectively explicit manner; also : the capacity for this.

3 : see also: waking up at 6am to empty your stomach's contents violently in empathy as your Daddy's team, Syracuse, loses in the Sweet Sixteen round of the NCAA tournament the night before.



Feel better, you two.
Mama loves.

My Most Favorite Gift of All

Dear Mom,

I wanted to take the time this week to send out a belated/revisited/extended Thank You for the best gift I've ever received from you.

It's not my writing chair, my college graduation gift.

It's not any of my fabulous Tiffany jewelry.

Or my new Perk-o-Matic coffee pot that's older than me and makes amazing coffee.

Not my bridal tree Christmas ornament collection that made me cry in front of all those people at my bridal shower.

It's not the Snoopy Icee Machine I got when I was three.

Or my bed.

Or, that Starbucks-themed Easter basket I got a few years ago.

It's not the Crazy Quilt you bestowed on me when I moved into my first home that wasn't also yours. The quilt that took you four years to hand-stitch.

Not my middle name, which is also yours, and the lil' dude's.

It's not even my baby brother- Christmas, 1984.


No. It's not any of those things.
It's my steam-cleaner I received wrapped all fancy from you at the lil' dude's baby shower.



The card said;

"You'll See.
Love, M."

And see I have.
And here's advice: never give a child with the stomach flu neon-colored fruit snacks when she begs and begs and tells you she feels better. Especially if you have beige carpeting.

Because she DOESN'T.

Unless your Mom rocks like mine and you have a steam-cleaner.
Then, really, give her what she wants.
You can handle it.

You'll see.
Love, LDM

Wordless Wednesday

The Most Important 433 Words to Read

As you know, darling daughter, I love words. And writing. And stories. I am always looking for inspiration around me, and for sweet tidbits to pass along to you. This is no exception; this is an excerpt from I Am an Emotional Creature: The Secret Life of Girls Around The World, a book by Eve Ensler.

Dear Emotional Creature:

I believe in you. I believe in your authenticity, your uniqueness, your intensity, your wildness. I love the way you dye your hair purple, or hike up your short skirt, or blare your music while you lip-synch every single memorized lyric. I love your restlessness and your hunger. You possess the energy, that, if unleashed, could transform, inspire, and heal the world.
Everyone seems to have a certain way they want you to be- your mother, your father, teachers, religious leaders, politicians, boyfriends, fashion gurus, celebrities, girlfriends. In reporting my new book, I learned a very disturbing statistic: 74 percent of young women say they are under pressure to please everyone.
I have done a lot of thinking about what it means to please; to be the wish or will of somebody other than yourself. To please the fashion setters, we starve ourselves. To please men, we push ourselves when we aren't ready. To please our parents, we become insane over-achievers. If you are trying to please, how do you take responsibility for your own needs? How do you even know what your own needs are? The act of pleasing makes everything murky. We lose track of ourselves. We stop uttering declaratory sentences. We stop directing our lives. We forget what we know. We make everything OK rather than real.
I have had the good fortune to travel around the world. Everywhere I meet teenage girls and women giggling, laughing as they walk country roads or hand out on city streets. Electric girls. I see how their lives get hijacked, how their opinions and desires get denied and undone. So many of the women I have met are still struggling late into their lives to know their desires, to find their way.
Instead of trying to please, this is a challenge to provoke, to dare, to satisfy your own imagination and appetite. To take responsibility for who you are, to engage. Listen to the voice inside you that might want something different. It's a call to your original self; to move at your own speed, to walk with your own step, to wear your colors.
When I was your age, I didn't know how to live as an emotional creature. I felt like an alien, and I still do a lot of the time. I am older now. I finally know the difference between pleasing and loving, obeying and respecting. It has taken me so many years to be OK with being different, with being this alive, this intense. I just don't want you to have to wait that long.

Hey, Mama

You've become quite cavalier in your casualness, little girl.

You're all, Hey, Mama! now when you greet me.
It's funny. And, another reminder you're just growing up, up, and up!

You say, Hey, Mama! when you pee on the carpet.
Jump on my bed.
Hide from me when your nose needs wiping.
Balance on the arm of the couch.
Spill gallons of bath water on the floor.

Hey, Mama!
Hey, you goofy, dramatic, casual little girl!