“Congrats Mom!” I chimed into the phone, “How long have you been married? Thirty-four years? Thirty-five?”
“Oh, I don’t know, I haven’t had my coffee yet.” She tells me in annoyance, “Wayne, how long have we been married?”
“How old is Melissa?” I hear him yell in the background.
“What?!?” My mother yells back, “It’s our anniversary, not her birthday!”
“How old is she?” He hollers again; this time he sounds annoyed. From the sounds creaking I can tell he's sitting in his chair in the parlor.
“Thirty!” She shouts.
“Twenty-nine!” I correct indignantly.
“Close enough.” My mother scolds.
“Wheeeell let’s see…” my father drawls out, “That makes it we’ve been married twenty-eight years!”
“Wayne!” I hear my mother’s scandalized tones followed by my father’s mischievous cackle.
Then I hear his voice fading in song, presumably as he fleas my mother's admonishing gaze, “Oh when I was single my pockets would jingle. I’ll never be single again…”
Less than a year ago I was a Project Manager on a multi-million dollar contract. I oversaw the creation, duplication, and distribution of 750 different media and 13.5 million pieces of printed documentation. I would travel 2000 miles in one week, walking into locations I’d never been before and wielding all the confidence and authority that came with my pre-motherhood position.
Now, my job is to make my son smile, and to teach him about the world. And apparently to make jam. I’m still learning how to be this paragon of motherhood. But sixteen cans of homemade strawberry-rhubarb jam and one son sticky with strawberries from head to toe later…I just might be getting the hang of it. I don’t need VP recognition for this job. The enthusiastic clapping of my son’s sticky palms is satisfaction enough.
My dearest Zander,
You are one and how much I love you! I love you all the way from the top of your head to the bottom of your toes, which just happens to be from the crook of my arm to my knees. You cannot imagine the fierceness with which I love you. You began as an extension of me and gradually grew apart and seperated into your own little person. Now I look upon your face and my heart warms, swelling with pride.
You are one and you are the very best of your Daddy and I. Your dad wanted so much for you to have my eyes, and you have them along with the dimple on my chin. You have your father’s smile right down to the tiny gap in his front teeth. You have your father’s cheeks and strong jaw line. Already so many family members and total strangers have remarked at what a good looking man you will become, so evident even at a year old.
You are one and you smile and dance throughout the day. Every day, you explore the house and backyard as though you’ve never seen them before and you endlessly jabber to the kitty or the doggie. You squeal with excitement as you watch the world out the window. You love to watch the dogs walk by or the squirrels scamper and play. You love for me to sing to you when we ride in the car and when I stop you ask for more and even sing along with me. Every emotion you feel shows on your face from confusion to concentration or glee to distress.
You are one and when you are upset, you present yourself to me and fling yourself backward upon the carpet in a half suicidal baby meltdown, yet I can easily persuade you that all is fine in the world. A kiss and cuddle do the trick most of the time though some times a song is needed. If it was a particularly enthusiastic display I may have to resort to graham crackers and milk, but you love to smile more than you like to cry. So, it never takes much to make you sing again and dance. And I am breathless with delight watching you transition from baby drama to bubbling over with joy.
You are one and you are so sweet and caring. You share your bottle with your cousin just to comfort him when he cries. If the bottle doesn’t work, you’ll even share your blankie. You wander up to me many times throughout the day to give me a hug and to receive one in return. You cannot let the morning pass without giving a hug and a pat to the doggie or your Teddy or your Blankie. You show us all you love us in a million tiny ways.
You are one and your favorite pastime is to make us laugh and smile. Whether it’s Daddy or Grandma and Grandpa, you delight in our laughter as much as we delight in yours. You’ll babble a funny story or make funny noises to get my reaction and interaction. You’ll dance the way your daddy taught you for your own delight, but when I applaud, you clap too and laugh and dance again with more enthusiasm. Even when you throw your food on the floor just to see if I’ll pick it up for you, you do it to share your curiosity and joy and don’t understand why it doesn’t bring the same reaction from Momma.
It won’t always be this simple between us. I will no doubt embarrass you when you get older and you will eventually grow up and not need me as much (my heart breaks at the thought). But for now, you are one and you stretch from the crook of my arm to my knees. And I will hold on to you. And I will tell you about all the things you could become later because right now you are my little one. So, my future president, rock star, band geek, quarterback, chess club guy, I will hold you and sing to you as we rock. On the outside, I will love you from the crook of my arm all the way to my knees. On the inside, I will love you with all my heart and soul. And I will hang on to this moment forever.
All my love, always!
Love,
Momma
(This is my RAAAWRRR face)
I tried to share in the magic of Fourth of July sparklers with my son. Our conversation, if baby babbles were English, went something like this -
Me: Look Zander! This is called a sparkler! And we're going to stick it in the ground a safe distance away and light it!
Z: That's nice. Put me down.
Me: Here we go! Are you ready???
Z: Ooo a pine cone!
Me: Isn't it pretty sweetie?
Z: I have a pine cone.
Me: Now it's time for the glow worm! Isn't that amazing?
Z: (patting my leg and holding a nature object up to me) Mom, have you seen my pine cone?
Me: Maybe you'll be more interested in the whistling sparkler. Let's try that one.
Z: (in a sing-song voice) pine-cone-pine-cone-pine-cone...
Me: (puts whistling sparkler in the ground and lights it)
Z: Holy SHIT Mom!!! What the hell was that??? Pick me up! Pick me up! Pick me uuuuuuuuuuuuuuuup!
My son’s first birthday is coming up and I find myself wondering where the year has gone. A year ago at this time he was a part of me, just an extension of myself, my sweet little parasite. Then I was hacked into like a ripe watermelon and torn asunder all so he could make his debut into this world. Hearing his first cry and watching him lift his head in those first few moments of welcome to the rest of your life; I knew any discomfort I faced was worth it.
Sometime in the last year, I’m not really sure when, he grew. He went from being an extension of me to his own little individual. He babbles away constantly repeating the only five words he knows. Last Wednesday he took his first few steps. And today, my little child prodigy learned the clean up game. He does everything with such enthusiasm! All I had to do was step away for a few minutes and when I returned my living room was in shambles. Coffee cup spilled on the floor, Play Station pulled out of the entertainment center, and…I have a lint roller???
But how can you get mad when he has such a look of concentration practicing so hard what you taught him to do! I looked around at my disheveled living room and looked at his sweet face and thought another one wouldn’t be so bad.
And to keep me from being too elated by the abundance of revelations, a thorn was given me in the flesh, a messenger of Satan, to harass me, to keep me from being too elated. Three times I besought the Lord about this, that it should leave me; but he said to me, "My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness." I will all the more gladly boast of my weaknesses, that the power of Christ may rest upon me. For the sake of Christ, then, I am content with weaknesses, insults, hardships, persecutions, and calamities; for when I am weak, then I am strong.
– Corinthians 12 : 7 – 10
A little over a year ago I had a career, not just a job, but something I really saw myself doing for the rest of my life. My husband only had a year left before he graduated, and once he found a job, with our combined incomes, we would be debt free and living the American Dream in a matter of a few years. I was six months pregnant with a little boy and my sister had just learned she and her husband were also expecting. Our parents, who have no other grandchildren, were elated. My mother started planning for the March baby shower back in October. And at my Father’s 70th birthday party (where my sister announced the good news) he proudly accepted congratulations from his friends and made plans for future fishing trips with grandsons.
Then, in the midst of all this euphoria, things started to go wrong. My company was underbid for the contract I was working on. Suddenly there were six managers all applying for the same few positions trying to keep their jobs. I was six months pregnant and working 60-70 hours a week, trying to keep my income. My husband was having a really tough time in school and the pressure was double for meeting his graduation date because now we had a child on the way. Then we got the news that made my heart stop.
My father, the strong one, the fearless one, the unshakable one, had been diagnosed with stage 4 mantle cell lymphoma. While I was busy worrying about my job and my husband and his education, and while I was blissfully happy and completely petrified about the birth of my child, and while I was otherwise occupied with my own life, a persistent and deadly cancer had invaded father’s body. And what did I do? The only thing I could think might help. I prayed. I clung to my faith with ferocity I had never known. And what did God do? He appeared to be silent.
And then it happened. My son was born. And his birth, though an unplanned C-section, he was completely healthy with ten fingers, ten toes, and the most perfect little face you have ever seen. For three wonderful days the world stopped and the only thing I knew was beautiful boy, loving husband, and amazing family. Then it was time to go home from the hospital.
I started to suspect that something wasn’t quite right. I started feeling a pain that was acutely sharp and would make me cry out, and then just as quick as it was there it would be gone. It started to happen more frequently and last for longer periods of time. I asked the nurse about it when she came for the well child visit and she smiled at me in an indulgent manner and told me with great patience that I did just have a baby.
But within a matter of hours, from the time the nurse left to the time my husband returned home from school the pain had gone from infrequent to intolerable. I couldn’t move without screaming and when I wasn’t screaming it wasn’t because there was no pain, it was because the screaming only made the pain hurt more. The trip to the hospital was worse than a nightmare and once I was there no one could figure out what was wrong with me and the strongest pain medication they had was only strong enough to dull the pain if I were completely still. I remember thinking that I would rather give birth to triplets than experience this pain, and I begged for the pain to go away, for the nurses to do something, for the doctors to make it stop.
I had been in the hospital for over 24 hrs and all the tests showed there was nothing wrong with me. I had a nurse that withheld pain medication without the doctor’s knowledge for God only knows why, but I can understand why people beg for death. It was during that time that I thought this might really be it. The end. I might die. And then I remembered something. In all of the heart pounding pain and agonized screams when my mind should have been filled with nothing but the moment, I remembered a bible verse I’d read before I was pregnant.
Now…this wasn’t just a random bible verse. This was like that song that kept popping up on the radio whenever you turned on your car and hours later someone would be whistling the tune at work, and then when you got home and turned on the TV, the reporter would make some bad pun using the same lyrics from the song. This bible verse was everywhere. And at the time it really freaked me out. I remember calling my mother and asking her about it. “Mom”, I complained, “I keep asking God for guidance dealing with a particularly difficult situation at work, but instead I keep getting references to First Samuel! How is holding a baby in my arms a year from now going to solve any of my problems! If anything, a baby would just make things worse!”
But lying in that hospital bed, half wishing for death, half wondering if it was on it’s way, I knew. I was going to live. God was going to take care of me. God had told me that previous June that a year from now I would be holding a baby in my arms and it was only April, so I was going to live!
And the doctors did surgery, though they didn’t know what they were looking for. And after that surgery while I was recovering, my right lung partially collapsed, and I had internal bleeding, and I came down with pneumonia and a blood infection, and my hemoglobin dropped to 7, and the nurses weren’t sure I was going to live. But something incredible happened.
Each time something went wrong and I would find myself lying on an operating table in a room filled with white light. I would be surrounded by divine doctors and nurses. Each time something went wrong, the doctor would nod to a nurse and the heavenly nurse would touch the spot on my body that was going wrong and my lung would be working again. And the bleeding would have stopped. And whatever had been going wrong was suddenly working properly again.
The doctors were surprised when they got the pathology report back. It turns out it is extremely rare but entirely possible to be allergic to amniotic fluid. When I had my c-section amniotic fluid got into my peritoneal cavity and caused a massive allergic reaction. All of my organs to swell up and then healed together in one big mess. Three surgeries, nine incisions, and one year later I was holding my son in my arms, just as God had promised. And for a time, all felt right in my world.
Then came the day I shaved my father’s head. It was mostly bald anyway with a few spots of wild fluff making him look more like a cancer victim than I’d ever seen him. His clothes were too big. His once broad shoulders looked lost in the droopy polo shirt he wore and the pants made a ruffle around his waste where the belt cinched them in. I was devastated watching black and silver strands of hope collect in my bathroom sink. And again I turned to God.
While previously silent, this time he had something to say. And that something, like his earlier message to me, was persistent and it wouldn’t go away. And God’s message was Christ’s power is made perfect in our suffering. And I thought back to my time in the hospital and knew this to be true. And I prayed, night and day, and I believed, and I had faith, and my entire family had faith. And we all prayed, and people we didn’t even know prayed.
Then in December, my father rang the bell at the clinic, announcing to all those waiting that he was a survivor. That his spleen, which had weighed 12 lbs at the time of diagnosis was now back to normal proportions. That bell said that my father no longer needed chemo. That with God’s help, he beat it.
All the blessings God has given us this last year have been incredible. I’ve learned a thing or two. I’ve learned that God reveals himself in his time. I’ve also learned to trust in the Lord, he has a plan and even if it doesn’t match my plan, his is better. But I’ve learned that no matter the situation, no matter the hardship, you must have faith.
