I’m beginning to believe that all poignant parenting moments happen at unlikely and unexpected times.
Like 4:40 a.m. on a Monday morning.
When my 7-year-old son is wide awake and begging to go on a run with me.
I’m sitting on his bed, trying to convince him that what his growing body really needs is sleep, but he is steadfast in his stance.
I’m not tired anymore. I don’t want to stay here and play the Switch. I just really want to spend time with you. I want to run with you.
He pulls on the orange Atari jersey that I found at Goodwill before the kids were born. He wears it proudly. When he outgrows it, I’ll probably still wear it.
He tells me about all the things that he was excited about for the upcoming week: the book fair, using an app called Flip in his Tech time class, reading The One and Only Ruby, why he likes LankyBox (a YouTuber who is now on Hulu), and why I’m wrong that Adam and Justin (also YouTubers, also now on Hulu) aren’t selling him toys. (They most definitely are.)
The boy tells me everything.
He has a best friend named Landon, and about 84 other best friends whose names he usually cannot remember. Landon is also the boy with whom he perpetually argues during his after-school program. So that tracks. He’s 100% confident that he can ride his hefty, electric scooter down the half pipe at the skatepark and not fall. (He absolutely will.) He asks me to go ice skating and when I tell him that I haven’t skated in a long time, he tells me not to worry. He’ll teach me everything that I need to know.
He asks me if I’m going to listen to any music on my phone while we’re walking, so we walk closer together, each of us with an earbud in one of our ears. I turn on Pandora and Ocie Elliott sings to us.
You know the night Crying on the floor Closing all your doors When you know you need more You know the night But you need the day You’re hearing what they say Still you’re turning away ‘Cause you know the night You know the night
It’s a beautiful song, even though it makes me think too much about how much I’ve known the night, not so long ago.
We’re not there anymore, I tell myself.
I am here, with me, in this moment.
It’s a mantra that helps me when thoughts of the past grip me and take over.
Today, I add: I am here, with Henry, in this moment.
Henry leans his head against my ribs, because that’s how tall my 7-year-old is. Then, he wraps his little arms around my waist and locks his fingers together as my hip bobs up and down while we walk.
Does he know how much I love him? Could he ever understand?
That’s how much we loved you.
This thought doesn’t belong to me.
It belongs to my mom.
This happens sometimes, now that she’s gone. I’ll think something and one of her thoughts invades my mind–and I just know it’s her. There she is again, the Emotional Ambassador of my parents, still telling me indirectly how much she and my dad love me. Because Mom was never a direct person, but she still understood the importance of feelings and emotions. And Dad just never had the words.
This thought from Mom strikes me so hard, I miss a step. Henry doesn’t say anything. Just adjust his step and continues to hug me.
I get it, Mom. I totally get it.
Is this what it takes to fully get it, to fully understand all those moments your parents felt so much love for you, and they couldn’t pass it on to you because there were no words that they could use, that you could hear and fully embody what they were feeling in those moments?
I imagine their own heartbreak when my siblings and I made reckless, stupid choices, running straight out in front of the Oncoming Train, even though they warned us, they warned us, and we went ahead and did it anyway. They had to watch us be hit by the consequences of all our stupid decisions.
I cannot fully imagine this heartbreak because my little person is here, holding me around the waist and the thought of a car veering off the dark road beside us, coming straight toward us instantly launches me into Take-Me-Not-My-Child Mode.
Maybe someday, if he’s lucky, he’ll feel this way too about his child.
“I love you, Mom,” Henry says.
“I love you more,” I say, a balloon of sadness and gratefulness filling my chest.
But my mom isn’t done.
You wouldn’t want him to be so sad after you’re gone.
It’s a crippling thought, imagining Henry grieving me after I leave this world.
I know, I tell her. I wouldn’t. But he’s a lot like me.
He’s like him too.
This thought is unexpected. Even unwelcome at this moment. This is how I know it’s my mother, speaking a truth to me that I’d rather not acknowledge. But there she is, forcing me to hear the truth, that Henry is like his father, this truth exists, even as Henry continues to hold me as we walk in the dark.
You’ve got to love that part of him, too.
She’s right. Of course, she’s right.
There’s still a part of my ex-husband that exists, that I love, where generosity, authenticity, and wholeheartedness abound.
I may not ever see this side of him ever again, but it was real and he shared it with me.
I see it living in my children.
I feel it holding me as we walk through the night.
Becoming Mother 