The moment your baby is born, your heart grows so much with love that you think it will explode out of your chest. A second later, you have a vision of this tiny baby all grown up, leaving you to find its own way in this big world, and you feel the searing pain of anticipated loss.
There are times you have to tuck that knowledge away in a cupboard of your heart so you can quit worrying... so you can relax and enjoy those precious, fleeting baby moments.
At other times you need to pull that reminder out and set it in a prominent place, either as consolation when those precious moments turn into exhausting, overwhelming, frustrating, and seemingly endless days of their childhood or a reminder when you take those days and their childhood for granted.
If you're lucky, the going moves gradually, back and forth, like waves on the seashore during lowtide, returning but staying away longer and longer each time.
We're now in low tide with TG. Last week I moved her home... today I moved her back out again, into a first apartment with two other girls. It was a planned move and it's a cute place, with a spiral staircase in what seems to be a secure complex. I'm excited for her. I'm happy for her.
But this will be my first summer without her here at home (will I ever have another?) and dang it, I'm going to miss my baby, just like I knew I would one day.
We've had bad luck with our kids - they've all grown up.
~Christopher Morley
But I have to admit... spending whatever time I'm given with the woman she's become is a pretty good trade-off.
Wishing her the best of luck in this summer semester, and keeping her close in my heart and lifted high in prayer...
