I'm sitting here on an oddly cool August evening just having left your room. Your Daddy is working late for the fourth day in a row and I know he is tired. And so the evening is not perfect. But it's okay. And "okay" after all, all that could be, all that has been, is not far from perfect.
I'm soaking in what you just told me. Even as it may have been a bit contrived. Even as it really was you reflecting back to me what I just said to you. I was explaining about Jewel, her CD and that no, she does not have children but is now expecting as I understand. I told you that she, at the time she recorded the CD, dedicated it to her future children.
It is one of my favorite CD's and you haven't listened to it in a long time. However, a while or so ago, in that fuzzy existence of last summer, you would listen solely to that CD as you feel asleep at night. It is now close to your heart. Tonight, I started to play it, and you realized how much you did want to hear it instead of your usual stories that we play on your little Ipod for you.
So as I explained that Jewel thought of the children she hoped to have one day and loved them even before she had them - I told you that I loved you before you were born, that I knew I wanted to have children someday...and I thought of you and loved you even then. I told you how much I love you now.
And I do. Even as you can challenge every last wit, I love you so deep. I love you on a level that I know it's not healthy. Letting children into your life is the riskiest kind of love. And worth it - two months, twenty years, but know, I want you here forever - that I don't want to leave whenever I'm faced with that... even, despite...
Today you said to me, "I'm sad about your Gwenyth." Just randomly after you ate your cereal while you were playing with your toys, you volunteered this. I did tell you that I dreamed about her last night - so I'm sure that's why she was on your mind. I asked, "Oh, and what are you thinking of?" You explained, with a sigh and much to my surprise (I didn't expect an answer really) "I was thinking that if she was here now, she'd be all grown up already."
I don't know if you mean that she would no longer be a "tiny-little baby" as you used to call her, or if you didn't understand that she would not be older than you, that she would always be younger... So I explained her age and what a year-and-a-half-year-old might be like and you listened and went on with your day.
The other day you asked me another startling question. It was the first thing you said when I went into your room in the morning; "Mommy, do you think someone else is having baby Gwenyth?"
I don't know if you dreamed something like that or what, but something got you thinking that - maybe all the five wonderful new cousins that were born since April made you think along those lines. Maybe you really are becoming a vegan all by yourself and believe in reincarnation (totally joking here, but you sure do inquire about which animals people eat and all, and you don't seem to be totally okay with this reality). But I explained, that just like you were always mine, so is Gwenyth - and I said, kinda jokingly serious - she sure better not be born to someone else - she's MINE.
But tonight, you looked at me as you lay on your pink pillow with Jewel singing her lullabies on your Ipod, you stumbled through, trying to find the words... "Mommy (long pause), I loved you before. I, I. (another pause and then you looked directly in my eyes and said, "Mommy I knew I was coming to you."
I love that thought. True or not. It's a perfect idea. It's a perfect thing to hear your little girl tell you. Simply perfect.